Both Liquid and EnVyUs have been nipping at the OpTic roster’s heels since the start of the HWC season. Both teams were able to take OpTic to game 5s and game 7s at UGC, but were not able to come as close during later events. At Vegas, Liquid was able to take games from OpTic, but remained unable to beat them. At the HWC Finals, again, Liquid managed to take a game, but couldn’t take them down. NV met OpTic in the grand finals, and despite the games being close, fell 4-0. So what is stopping these teams from being able to take down the two-time World Champs? Can these rosters be improved by swapping a player or two?

Team EnVyUs

Current Roster: Justin “iGotUrPistola” Deese, Austin “Mikwen” McCleary, Eric “Snip3down” Wrona, Cuyler “Huke” Garland

This roster was fabled as a new God-squad when forming for the Fall Season. The only team that many thought could contest OpTic. This was proven true, as NV consistently beat OpTic online and were able to take them down at Fall Finals. However, HWC 2017 has been a different story. At UGC, they fell to OpTic in game 5. Liquid seemed to have NV’s number at Vegas as well.

At the HWC Finals, despite coming out hot in most of the games, NV were swept by OpTic. Throughout the whole weekend, Mikwen was being an absolute slaying machine and led his team through the loser’s bracket all the way to the grand finals. Snip3down and Huke were providing their usual slaying power (albeit less due to Mikwen just killing everything). The only weak link of the roster during HWC was The Wizard, Pistola. However, he was usually keeping his deaths down and had on-par damage. That said, it was obviously not his best tournament, but his Vegas and UGC performances do show that he is still a top player.

Snip3down has confirmed on stream that this squad will be staying together for the upcoming UMG Daytona event.

Team Liquid

Current Roster: Zane “Penguin” Hearon, Timothy “Rayne” Tinkler, Braedon “StelluR” Boettcher, Kevin “Eco” Smith

If NV was the roster to take on OpTic during the Fall Season, Team Liquid held that title during most of the HWC season. They were able to take them to their limits at UGC, but were only able to take one game from OpTic at Vegas and HWC.

At Finals, the only player that seemed to struggle was Rayne. Even then, he had assists and objective work to help his team. Penguin, StelluR, and Eco, on the other hand, all seemed to be performing well. Much like NV, the issue with Liquid’s stats is that there’s only so many kills to go around when Penguin is getting every power weapon. Again, there is no merit to make a roster change.

Conclusion

Individual skill is not what is separating OpTic and every other team right now. OpTic, NV, Liquid, and even Str8 all have similarly talented players for the most part. The difference maker is teamwork and chemistry. OpTic has been teaming for over a year, compared to a few months for the rest of these teams. While both NV and Liquid can make roster changes, they would only really be “side-grades” so to speak. Not necessarily upgrades. They’d be changing talent in one area for talent in another. Both of these teams should maintain their rosters for the upcoming season and improve as a team in order to take down OpTic.

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