GrandPyromania Profile Joined January 2012 United States 38 Posts #1



I'm a 23 year old guy who really loves dota 2. I've had over 2300 hours/games spanning over the last 3 years or so. The first TI I watched was TI3, and I was utterly mesmerized by everything about it. I think a lot of my love for the scene, for the game and why I want to get involved with the dota 2 scene beyond being a casual fan is because of the personalities and general atmosphere I was exposed to at TI3. Perhaps I romanticize it a bit too much, but I'll always fondly remember it and it'll continue to fuel my desire to be involved. However, that was in 2013, and I didn't make a concentrated effort to actually do anything in eSports until 2014.



In the summer of 2014, I attempted to start a weekly podcast show called "Around the Ancient". You can find the attempt



In early 2015, I found that I had a LOT of free time on my hands. So I decided on a whim to contact Beyond the Summit. To my great pleasure and surprise I was almost instantly replied to by David Parker, or as you all know him as, GoDz. What followed however, was a big disappointment. First and foremost, before I proceed, I do want to state that I do not mean to call anyone out, nor do I mean to paint anyone in a bad light. With that said, I added GoDz to skype, as we agreed to talk about potential roles or duties I could do with BTS. So we were able to chat, and he told me after Starladder, he would sit down with me and figure out something I would be able to do with BTS to help out. So in the meanwhile, he added me as a moderator to the BTS streams and I helped moderate the streams to the best of my abilities whenever I could. However, after Starladder XI, the only thing I got was radio silence. I would poke and prod GoDz on skype every few days or so, but ultimately never got a response. In retrospect, I was probably coming off as extremely annoying and I was an unknown entity- why bother wasting effort figuring something out for someone that may or may not be of any use? Overall though, I would have at least appreciated if he told me something along the lines of "well, we don't have anything opening up for awhile, I'll let you know when we do" and let me go on my merry way, instead of waiting and wondering, but such is life I suppose.



A few weeks later, after I figured BTS would be a dead end, that I would just contact whoever, and see if I could get my foot *somehow* in the door. So (once again) on a whim I decided to contact a fairly popular community member, Synderen. I'm not gonna lie, I did not go in expecting a whole lot, but holy shit, was I wrong. Synderen is quite possibly, of the most genuine and nice guy I've ever met. We started working together on a way to potentially taking his streamed content and putting it up on his channel and monetizing that. For me, I was upfront and direct with Synderen when he asked what's in it for me. I wasn't in this for the money, I was in this to get my foot in the door to start laying down the foundations of my involvement with the scene. Unfortunately, this too ended up being a bust as YouTube caught Synderen's music and flagged his videos, thereby ending any possibilities of monetization, and while we would've loved to continue regardless, it also meant that a majority of his videos would be muted. However, I do want to stress the fact that Synderen all in all, is an amazing person to work with, and just a wonderful human being. I pitched the idea of a talk show to him, but with his (understandably) busy schedule, he declined.



However he put me in contact with Gerg, aka, WhatisHip. After a few conversations about a talk show, he went in another direction (with Zyori and Blitz as the hosts- the show Tangoes and Mangos). I don't blame him, as Zyori is a seasoned host, and once again, I'm just a random guy on the internet who hasn't really proved himself when it comes to eSports. I've also tried other avenues by way of talking to Blitz (who understandably wasn't really interested in my services) and applying to the Collegiate Star League as a community manager (who unfortunately had the position filled prior to my application).



So where does that leave me? I don't really know to be honest. On one hand nobody owes me anything at all. I haven't proven myself to people as an eSports person. I haven't done anything of value. On the other hand, I wish I was given a chance to prove myself. Ultimately at the end of the day, a lot of my failures and shortcomings trying to break into the scene is self inflicted and I'm sure if I was more relentless, people would have heard of me by now, haha. I have an odd set of skills that makes me virtually non-marketable I guess. I'm a YouTuber with over 18k subcribers and have like 3.5k followers on twitter. So I hoped that this would give me some sort of leg up when I tried to get my foot in, but it really didn't. What will I do? I suppose I'll keep my ear on the ground looking for opportunities to get myself involved. At the core of it, I really love dota 2, and I really love the scene around it. Like I said however, I just sort of wanted to blog/chronicle what I've gone through. Maybe this'll help someone else, maybe people will just see this blog as a huge whinefest.



Whatever the case, thank you for reading.









I was inspired to write this blog post because I saw Blitz's random blog, as well as the blog with feels from Skrelt. So I figured I'd vent out my frustrations and thoughts from what I, a random guy trying to get into the scene, has experienced, and I guess the amount of times I felt close to being able to help establish myself in the dota 2 scene. I will say in advance that I am sorry if this comes across as whiny or self-entitled. My intent with the blog is not to whine and bemoan my lack of status but rather to illuminate my problems and maybe help people learn from my mistakes. So without further ado, here we go.I'm a 23 year old guy who really loves dota 2. I've had over 2300 hours/games spanning over the last 3 years or so. The first TI I watched was TI3, and I was utterly mesmerized by everything about it. I think a lot of my love for the scene, for the game and why I want to get involved with the dota 2 scene beyond being a casual fan is because of the personalities and general atmosphere I was exposed to at TI3. Perhaps I romanticize it a bit too much, but I'll always fondly remember it and it'll continue to fuel my desire to be involved. However, that was in 2013, and I didn't make a concentrated effort to actually do anything in eSports until 2014.In the summer of 2014, I attempted to start a weekly podcast show called "Around the Ancient". You can find the attempt here if anyone is curious. My intent with the show was to create a weekly talkshow within the dota scene. I lasted one week. There were many issues with why I only lasted one week, the biggest of which was essentially a lack of confidence within myself. My intent with the show was to deliver the news cold cut- that is to say without any sort of bias and with the utmost in professionalism. A lot of people up to that point had decried other shows for lacking in those two departments. I thought it would work out pretty well, but my own insecurities caught up to me and I didn't continue my show. First and foremost, Toffees launched his show with a similar idea and goal in mind, but he had so much more... he had guests, he had a clear goal, and was able to deliver his information in a better, more entertaining way. This led to me doubting my ability to entertain as a host in this matter. Does the dota 2 scene want opinionated podcasts, where the host is an expert on all things dota? Why would they watch my show when I'm essentially a newcomer, an unknown. It's this line of thinking that made me psych myself out and not continue to pursue it. Perhaps I could have sought more feedback from community leaders. I had also attempted to find a partner before setting out on this journey, but the one partner I found and thought would be perfect ended up pulling the age old disappearing act. This show was my first foray into esports, and was ultimately defeated by my lack of confidence within myself. It would take another 6 months for me to make a concentrated effort again.In early 2015, I found that I had a LOT of free time on my hands. So I decided on a whim to contact Beyond the Summit. To my great pleasure and surprise I was almost instantly replied to by David Parker, or as you all know him as, GoDz. What followed however, was a big disappointment. First and foremost, before I proceed, I do want to state that I do not mean to call anyone out, nor do I mean to paint anyone in a bad light. With that said, I added GoDz to skype, as we agreed to talk about potential roles or duties I could do with BTS. So we were able to chat, and he told me after Starladder, he would sit down with me and figure out something I would be able to do with BTS to help out. So in the meanwhile, he added me as a moderator to the BTS streams and I helped moderate the streams to the best of my abilities whenever I could. However, after Starladder XI, the only thing I got was radio silence. I would poke and prod GoDz on skype every few days or so, but ultimately never got a response. In retrospect, I was probably coming off as extremely annoying and I was an unknown entity- why bother wasting effort figuring something out for someone that may or may not be of any use? Overall though, I would have at least appreciated if he told me something along the lines of "well, we don't have anything opening up for awhile, I'll let you know when we do" and let me go on my merry way, instead of waiting and wondering, but such is life I suppose.A few weeks later, after I figured BTS would be a dead end, that I would just contact whoever, and see if I could get my foot *somehow* in the door. So (once again) on a whim I decided to contact a fairly popular community member, Synderen. I'm not gonna lie, I did not go in expecting a whole lot, but holy shit, was I wrong. Synderen is quite possibly, of the most genuine and nice guy I've ever met. We started working together on a way to potentially taking his streamed content and putting it up on his channel and monetizing that. For me, I was upfront and direct with Synderen when he asked what's in it for me. I wasn't in this for the money, I was in this to get my foot in the door to start laying down the foundations of my involvement with the scene. Unfortunately, this too ended up being a bust as YouTube caught Synderen's music and flagged his videos, thereby ending any possibilities of monetization, and while we would've loved to continue regardless, it also meant that a majority of his videos would be muted. However, I do want to stress the fact that Synderen all in all, is an amazing person to work with, and just a wonderful human being. I pitched the idea of a talk show to him, but with his (understandably) busy schedule, he declined.However he put me in contact with Gerg, aka, WhatisHip. After a few conversations about a talk show, he went in another direction (with Zyori and Blitz as the hosts- the show Tangoes and Mangos). I don't blame him, as Zyori is a seasoned host, and once again, I'm just a random guy on the internet who hasn't really proved himself when it comes to eSports. I've also tried other avenues by way of talking to Blitz (who understandably wasn't really interested in my services) and applying to the Collegiate Star League as a community manager (who unfortunately had the position filled prior to my application).So where does that leave me? I don't really know to be honest. On one hand nobody owes me anything at all. I haven't proven myself to people as an eSports person. I haven't done anything of value. On the other hand, I wish I was given a chance to prove myself. Ultimately at the end of the day, a lot of my failures and shortcomings trying to break into the scene is self inflicted and I'm sure if I was more relentless, people would have heard of me by now, haha. I have an odd set of skills that makes me virtually non-marketable I guess. I'm a YouTuber with over 18k subcribers and have like 3.5k followers on twitter. So I hoped that this would give me some sort of leg up when I tried to get my foot in, but it really didn't. What will I do? I suppose I'll keep my ear on the ground looking for opportunities to get myself involved. At the core of it, I really love dota 2, and I really love the scene around it. Like I said however, I just sort of wanted to blog/chronicle what I've gone through. Maybe this'll help someone else, maybe people will just see this blog as a huge whinefest.Whatever the case, thank you for reading.