Interview #3

Greetings everyone, whether you are discontent because I missed yesterdays post or here to see my wonderful blog, I have now obtained the long awaited Heat n Serve interview you've all been eager to read (except one guy, he was all "Heat n Serve is overrated").

Heat n Serve is a well respected administrator at the Leaguecraft forums, which can be found here. He is known for his character and mathcrafting guides, which are popular due to his logical builds that are backed up with sound justification. Here is a list of all the guides he has published, incase you want to take a look:

How to Mathcraft: http://tinylc.com/g
Gangplank: http://tinylc.com/d
Mordekaiser 1: http://tinylc.com/e
Mordekaiser 2: http://tinylc.com/Gj
Galio: http://tinylc.com/f
Jungle Malphite: http://tinylc.com/h
Taric: http://tinylc.com/Tp

Before we continue onto the interview, I thought I'd mention this blog has now hit 10,000 views in just over a week! Woo go blog.

I will be using HnS as an abbreviation throughout the interview for Heat n Serve, if anyone has to read this to understand that, then I guess it was worth writing this bit after all.

Let's get onto the interview, shall we?
 
Me: So, how long have you been playing League of Legends?
HnS: I puchased the preorder in September 2009, which in turn got me an
invite to participate in the closed-beta. Prior to that, I had played
DoTA for about 3-4 years.

Me: What do you think of the game in general? Is Riot taking it in the
right direction?
HnS: I think they are doing a good job removing what they refer to as
"passive play" and other things that make the game less exciting. This
is good for me because I would categorize my play style as somewhat
reckless... lol. 

Me: Do you play with a clan? Or friends?
HnS: A couple college friends of mine play the game with me. I also play
with a handful of people I met through leaguecraft. I always wanted to
start/join a clan, but I really don't have a regular enough schedule to
commit to something like that right now. Fortunately, it doesn't seem
like I'm missing out on too many tournaments at the momemnt. :)

Me: There are a lot of complaints about the idiots and trolls in this
game, does this affect your gameplay too? What is your approach to the
common in-game flamer?
HnS: Absolutely. Instead of focusing on winning the game, I start to focus
on what the flamer will say next. I will act in ways to minimize the
chance I will have to listen to said flamer rage at me (even though
usually nothing will please them or make them shut up). Thus, I stop
making the best move, or hesitate enough that I miss my window of
opportunity.

I used to get baited into doing some flaming of my own, but more
recently I "/ignore"-ed someone who was flaming and it was a smart
decision. I regained my focus and played pretty well from there on out.
I highly recommend using the ignore feature; I know I will be using it
much more from now on.

Me: You are very popular on the Leaguecraft forums, a candidate for
member of the month. What would you attribute this to? Your winning
personality? Guides? Both?
HnS: More than anything, I try to be fair to everyone and be a just admin on
Leaguecraft. In my guides, people will argue against my builds and I
generally defend myself in a civil manner. I like to think people
appreciate the civil (if sometimes heated) discussion that takes place
after I publish a guide.

Not everyone likes my guides, but I at least give a good effort and give
logical arguments for readers. They can then at least walk away and
make an informed decision on how they want to play the champion in
question. I try to provide math when I can, because the math keeps
everyone honest. Sadly, not everyone sticks to the basic principles
which make guides helpful, informative and easy to read. Good grammar,
formatting and organization concepts are in all of my guides. I give
the reader quality so they are more receptive to the arguments I am making.

Me: Recently, Riot have been bought by one of the most influential internet
companies in the world, Tencent. For an astounding $400 million! Would you
say this is a good thing?
HnS: Certainly. Riot has a lot of ideas on the table and right now just
doesn't seem to have the human capital to accomplish all of their goals.
I'd imagine when they get more people, they will be able to give
better support to customers, fix bugs, develop maps, create a forum that
doesn't suck, etc.

Me: Which type of champion is your favorite to play?
HnS: Tanks and Casters are my "go to" champion classes. I play supports
every now and again. I probably play physical dps champions the least;
They lack the complexity and depth of play that I look for in selecting
a champion.

I also tend to play champs everyone thinks are bad. I'm not sure if I'm
out to prove people wrong, or if I just gravitate to making bad
decisions in champ select. :(

Me: If you had to share a house with ANY champion in game, who would you choose 
and why?
HnS: Gragas. I did a little beer brewing of my own with some friends in
college and I wouldn't mind returning to that hobby. I bet Gragas makes
some tasty brews.

Me: And finally, is there anything you want to add?
HnS: /joke

And there you have it! Some enlightening words from Heat n Serve himself! I hope y'all learnt something from this, but if not; then maybe my next interview will be more interesting. If you have any suggestions as to who you want me to harass for some questions to or anything you want me to discuss, let me know in a comment.

Have a good week, and get back here in the next couple of days if you want more content.

Interview #3 CANCELLED

It appears Heat n Serve wasn't able to complete the questions I sent him, which is a shame because I was looking forward to reading it. Anyway, I've been trying to think of some eligible content to publish today.

I thought I'd cover a couple of things, starting with my favorite, Riots inadequacy:


Summoners!
Yesterday, many of you logged in to play League of Legends only to experience bugged IP rewards. As this is not the level of service that we strive to maintain, we wanted to offer all those players affected by these issues something to compensate for their negative experience.
If you logged in and played a game yesterday, your account will automatically be credited with a 10 Win IP Boost. Distribution of the boosts may take up to five days, so if you don’t get yours right away, don’t panic! We haven’t forgotten about you, it just takes some time to credit that many boosts! We apologize for the inconvenience, and for any disruptions to your regular gameplay schedule.
Thank for your patience and for your continued support for League of Legends!

When the new IP system came out, it was flawed and didn't work. Which didn't surprise nor annoy me; I play for fun not for the points. So then Riot announce we get a free boost. And once again, they didn't work. So this post on the news section is their attempt to apologise I guess, because third time is the charm. Amusing as always Riot, when will you get things right. <3

So, moving on. We've all seen the new UI, it's a little more complicated but it looks nice I guess. Vladmir escaped the heavy nerf that we were all expecting, probably by blood pooling out of it. The overpowered bastard.

I'd also like to reveal a few pieces of LoL art that have caught my eye today, League art is always so impressive.

Mhhhm Katarina. Dunno what the background is about, but looks good nonetheless. I'm actually half sure Riot are implementing this as a skin ingame. I'd buy it.

 I thought this was very nice actually, all the League art is so much better than what we see by Blizzard, and that's saying something. Ashe is one of my favorite characters, although she's a little easy to play, except for her ulti.

Now this one just looks like an attempt to remake the DotA loading screen. Fail. No wonder it's not in the game.

That's all I have for you today guys, I'll make sure I get something extraspecial for you tomorrow. For now, just eat your cookie and take a nap.

Interview #2

Hello everyone, it's been two days since my last post, because I've been playing the heroes of the week.  I prefer to test them out when they are released, so I can cut down on my feeding. The thing I hate most about the new heroes, is the abundance of people picking them in normal games and either:

1 - Saying they've never played the character before; and they have no idea how to play it.
2 - Or skipping the whole part where they mention they are a virgin to the champion they have picked entirely, only to feed relentlessly.

Still, it's a good oppurtunity for players to try out all the characters without spending Riot points or IP.

Anyway, today I have another interview for everyone. A forum troll on the official League forums came up with the initial idea to change my perspective from the famous top five ranked players, to the less popular top 15 underdogs. His reasoning was: "Everyone already knows the top five, teach us about the others". I think he was right to some extent, we all know Elementz and Reginald, who here can honestly say they know Samsterlicious?

Samster is currently in the top 20 players for solo ranked, which is quite an achievement. Especially when solo queue is more based on who has the most failers on their side. I managed to get a brief interview with Samster, take a look and see what you think:



1: So, how long have you been playing League of Legends?
Been playing since beta. So basically too long. I was playing Singed before the war
on terrorism.

2: What do you think of the game in general? Is Riot taking it in the
right direction?
The game is really great for a free game. It's fun and addictive. Riot
releasing champs every 2 weeks is a great step in the right direction. If
that direction was money over balance.

3: Do you play with a clan? Or friends? You are currently in the top 15
for solo queue, what's it like playing at such a high rating? Enjoyable?
I'm lonewolf all up in this game. I play with friends. Sadly Riot hasn't
implemented a clan system. Being high rating is cool, it allows people
to think I am better than I actually am. The respect is nice but the
long queue times are not.

4: There are a lot of complaints about the idiots and trolls in this
game, does this affect your gameplay too? What is your approach to the
common in-game flamer?
The idiots and trolls are all up in solo queue. I think solo queue has
turned into who has the least amount of trolls. It's the opposite of lord
of the rings. If someone is flaming a lot in game I usually flame back.

5: Who would you consider to be the best LoL players? Other than yourself
of course!
Bigfatlp and Chauster are the best players by far. Honorable mention goes
to Saintvicious when he isn't randoming in ranked.

6: Recently, Riot have been bought by one of the most influential
internet companies in the world, Tencent. For an astounding $400
million! Would you say this is a good thing?
More money more problems. The only good that can come from this is if they
use that money to hire more people for the alleged "replay team".

7: There are rumors that Riot will use their new money to create a new
game, probably an MMORPG. What do you think about this?
If it's a free MMO that would be a great idea, but I don't think Riot
could put out a good MMO. They can't even put out a good urgot skin.

8: If you had to share a house with ANY champion in game, who would you
choose and why?
I really have no clue. It would be cool to live with a robot so Blitzcrank
would be up there on my list.

9: And finally, is there anything you want to add?
Xpecial is not good at this game.

So there you have it. Beware of Xpecial, he is not good at this game. Anyway, I know the interview today was a short affair, I personally would prefer more information but it depends on how much the player wants to talk, and not on how much content I need.

I have another interview currently in progress with Heat n Serve from the Leaguecraft forums, which should be up very soon, and I know there's a few of you eager to see it. So check back in the next couple of days if you want to read it.

League of Legends interview #1

Hey everyone, today I have something special, opposed to the usual trash I post. This is the first in a series of interviews with some of the most influential and skilled League of Legends players to roam the earth. If you know any players thinking they are worthy of an interview, please comment or email me.

Here it is, presenting an interview with Caddy, a master moderator of the Solomid community, and a great player. Solomid.net features an active playerbase, and plenty of information about League of Legends; including tournaments. There is an interesting upcoming 1v1 tourney, so take a look sometime!


Me: So, how long have you been playing League of Legends?

Caddy: Around the time it came out of beta, I started playing after their first champion Nidalee was released. So close to an entire year.

Me: Wow, so you have more experience than most then. What do you think of the game in general? Is Riot taking it in the right direction?

Caddy: I love the game play, I have always been a fan of RTS and MMO's and this is the best of both worlds, working together as a group to complete a global goal. And I have been playing for a long time and have seen tournaments, I have hung out with the best of the best and even had long talks with people at Riot about what is wrong with champions and all those good things. And I do not think Riot is taking the right path with their game. They began at competitive play, then they started making the patches for the generic gamer, and then they started to over nerf champions and make them to weak - then too strong. They were going for competitive, which I was fine with, now they are going for just user friendly. But they cannot have both - which they are trying to do.

Me: I agree with entirely on this, just today they announced new competitive tournaments, after nerfing Vladmir, Rammus, and Anivia - All of which I believe were unjustified except for Anivia.
Anyways, moving on. A little more about yourself. A lot of people on the Solomid.net forums look up to you, do you mainly play with a clan? Or just friends?

Caddy: Mostly friends - I use to, and still do play with people I usually met while playing. Instead of going out and finding people, who I don't know are good; when I could friend them after I know they do well. I have tried to play with multiple clans, but they are just uninteresting, they think of themselves too highly. And now I am playing with people on Solomid.net. So that they can see what people at higher levels of play are doing to help them become more skilled at the game and have more fun!

Me: Are you not a fan of Hotshot and Elementz then? There are a lot of complaints about the idiots and trolls in this game, does this affect your gameplay too? What is your approach to the common in-game flamer?

Caddy: Hotshot and Elementz are good players and I respect them, and the work they do for the community. Though they may not realize it. Hotshot gets thousands of viewers a day while playing, inspiring people to play themselves and recently Elementz started up his own site for people to go and spend some spare time. And I also respect his Tier list, it gives you generality on where champions belong. But I think people take it too seriously and think if you are not a tier one champion you are 100% bad and should go double check Elementz tier list. Because I am a fan of Gangplank and I have never seen him high, but I know when put into my hands he becomes a very deadly champion - so you cannot always rely on general placements of heroes. And for the flamers, normally I just ignore them - more so as of lately I don't encounter them to much since I am always running 5 man premades. Otherwise I usually ignore them because if you egg them on it only becomes worse.

Me: That's an excellent piece of advice folks, you should try it sometime. So in the high skilled matches of the game, who would you consider to be the best LoL players; other than yourself of course!

Caddy: Well the ladder used to be pretty accurate, but as of recently it's just people climbing the ladder because large amounts of wins and you get more + Rating when you win than when you lose. But the greats that I look up to and are still around are; Reginald, Bigfatjiji, Chauster, Dan Dihn, ManyReason, Laoching, grandjudge, ScarletDoom, and Lilac. Of course, they all have something I don't! And that for now will have to remain a secret.

Me: Awww, well at a guess I'd say their secret was hacks. So recently, Riot have been bought by one of the most influential internet companies in the world, Tencent. For an astounding $400 million! Would you say this is a good thing?

Caddy: Well sadly I never had heard of them up until now. I guess it's a good thing Riot will actually make some money outside of small sponsors their store and their merchandise, and now they can take the time to give us better things like servers, and a non crashing client and a non lagging browser!
But I do not like the fact they already sold their game - I mean they could of waited it out and rolled the dice, and hoped their company got bigger and sold it for even more, because this game is FREE! So making 400mil. Isn’t bad at all, so glad for them, but I hope they don't let it ruin their game, or they give up because they made big money. I just hope they flip the money the right way!

Me: I'm surprised it was worth $400 million as it stands, they must be making a killing off merchandise and skins. There are rumors that Riot will use their new money to create a new game, probably an MMORPG. What do you think about this? Do you think it could be true?

Caddy: It will more or likely be true, you always want to keep on pace, and release new games to keep people happy and earn money. Especially after a large company picks them up - they just want to make money. Nonetheless what they do with it is fine with me. I enjoy this game and I am not going anywhere for a while. Though I hope it doesn't take of too much of what they are currently doing to ruin what I am already enjoying! But if they do release something I would be more than glad to try it out and see what they have store; I can only imagine tons of hot girls with big cans!

Me: Haha, lets hope so. They are gonna have to be pretty big cans to take on Blizzard in their own dominion. Okay, instead of keeping you all night here's one last question: If you had to share a house with ANY champion in game, who would you choose and why?

Caddy: Well.. I think my girlfriend would be upset if I picked one of the girl champions. So my first choice would be Shaco no doubt. Though he would most likely spend his time trying to kill me I think it would be more than entertaining. I feel like I share of some of what he is. He is the enigma of the shadows and that is something I have always been enthralled with - I spent one summer back in high school writing a 130 page short story about a boy who just lives in the shadows, and doesn't know what is going on with his life and is something he does not understand. Nonetheless, though the lore is short and a bit sketchy I really enjoy what Shaco is about, I would love to hold a conversation with someone so detached with reality they find humor in everything. I always enjoy a good laugh and find humor in everything, and I could only imagine with a psychotic killer clown in my house to crack a few jokes with, there would be non stop humor!

Me: Wonderful choice. I think Shaco spent too much time on 4chan, that would explain his attitude. Caddy, thank you very much for giving me your time and such detailed answers. Is there anything final you'd like to say to the audience out there?

Caddy: Yes! I'd like to thank you for choosing me for a candidate for your internet blog. I would also encourage people to stop by Solomid.net sign up and check out our streams, and feel free to add me in game or message me on Skype if you ever need anything. I also want to give a shout out to my boys - PyronicEX, icsmurfs, and Quiet for carrying my heavy head sometimes for free wins!




So there you have it everyone, I hope you enjoyed reading and come back for the next interview.

If you are interested in signing up for the 1v1 tournament, here is the link: Click me