Last week, history was (almost) made at the League of Legends World Championship. In a tense quarter-final fight, the European team Misfits brought reigning champions SK Telekom T1 against the ropes, though ultimately lost the series 3-2.

Upon his return from China, The Esports Observer had the chance to speak to Tristan “PowerOfEvil” Schrage. The German mid-laner joined Misfits last December, and spoke about his first ever World Championship performance, that much talked about final series, and the changing attitude towards the team and his own prospects as a pro League of Legends player.

You’ve just got back to Germany. How are you feeling? In terms of the trip, the experience, the games, everything?

[perfectpullquote align=”right” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]”I can’t be disappointed at how we did as a team. Five rookies, five first time Worlds appearances, challenged a three-time world champion team.”[/perfectpullquote]

So a few days ago, I was still a bit disappointed since we lost to SKT. In my honest opinion, I felt like we had the series, and we could have closed it out in the fourth game. I was disappointed, but at the same time, I was really grateful, and all in all thankful for the journey I had this year. Happy about how far we came. I think even on stage I wasn’t that disappointed, since I felt like we showed a lot, and we proved a lot of people wrong, multiple times.

It’s been a few days now since your match with SK Telekom T1. You’ve had time to process it, time to travel back to home soil. How do you look back on that game now?

Looking back on it now, I felt like we lost the fourth game because we were a little bit too excited. We kind of threw the game away, and I feel little bit responsible because, as the veteran, I should have calmed down my team. On the one side I’m the veteran, but on the other, I’m the rookie on the world stage. I felt a little bit responsible for not calming my team down in that important moment. In the fifth game, I tried to take more responsibility and I guess be the carry, right? I feel like I did a good job, getting kills, getting picks, but maybe we just undervalued Tristana in draft…I’m not sure.

It was a really close series, and all in all, we can be proud of what we did and how much we challenged SKT, and how much I personally learned from this tournament, and all these great mid-laners is really insane. I will just take all this learning experience, and implement it in my own gameplay, and be stronger next year.

Do you get to spend any time with the other teams, getting to see them outside of the matches, or is it really just on the rift?

Well, I spoke a little bit with Flash Wolves. They are really cool guys, really nice. They look like a really friendly team, with a friendly environment. I spoke with them, and they were saying they were kind of fighting for us, for us to win, because when they were 0-5 down, they didn’t have anything to fight for, right? Then they got this one game against Team SoloMid, which kept us in the race.

The reaction to that game by the media and perhaps fans too has been interesting. Some see it as what could have been the greatest upset in LoL history, while others look at it as a historic comeback for SKT. Do you view it in either of those prisms?

Well, if we would have won, it would have been the most historic moment, maybe in my career as well. Probably for every EU team, every team at Worlds who’s facing SKT. But, being one of the most historic comeback for SKT? For me I don’t really feel like that, because it was a reverse sweep. I don’t think the games we won or they won were in either favour. The first game, they won really hard, second game, we won really hard. But the other three, in my opinion, were really close. I feel like these games could have gone either way. There was nothing historic, it was just really exciting, tense, but not a 0-2 reverse sweep or one player outperforming everyone. Overall, both teams were on a really similar level, and fighting for their hearts.

[perfectpullquote align=”left” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]”Facing SKT, odds were against us again, but we clearly showed and proved everyone wrong. I feel like maybe at one point, people should stop counting us out?”[/perfectpullquote]

When Cloud9 were eliminated from the tournament, it’s the result many expected; South Korean vs Chinese teams. When you’re playing, how do those odds, the outside predictions affect you guys as a team? Do you try and put them aside?

I don’t think it matters for us. When we entered the EU LCS playoffs, we were the fifth or sixth team. Everyone said “oh yeah, Misfits are going to lose to Unicorns of Love”. If I look back, I was thinking the same. I was like, holy shit. We lost every series and every game to UoL back then, so I was really worried going to the series, but then we 3-0’d them. I know we are stronger than this.

Then we went to the next series against Fnatic, and I remember everyone saying we were going to lose. I even remember interviews with Jesiz or Fnatic team members saying, they have no chance, they’re really bad. We 3-1’d them in a really strong manner. Then we faced G2 Esports in the finals, and everyone said it was luck before. Then we lost 0-3…I wasn’t mad.

Going to Worlds, everyone said Misfits winning against Fnatic and UoL was just luck…It was the same scenario, right? We’re clearly the biggest underdogs in the group, and there were these funny videos of TSM and Flash Wolves being so happy in the group (laughs). It was called the group of life.

Facing SKT, odds were against us again, but we clearly showed and proved everyone wrong. I feel like maybe at one point, people should stop counting us out? That we’re worse than anyone else, because for me as a player, for some reason I was always in teams where people would say “this team will not win”. In Unicorns of Love, I was clearly the underdog, in Origen a little bit as well. I’m so used to being the underdog.

As a team, you obviously had your own expectations for Worlds. But as an individual, how do you rate your performance at Worlds? Do you feel you exceeded your own expectations?

My goal this year was to redeem myself from the bad Origens split. I felt like I could not show what I was capable of. In the eyes of the community, I had a really bad reputation, and in my opinion, being heavily undervalued, and just being in a bad spot. This year, I needed to show everyone that this is not true, that the Origen performance was not my fault, and it was clearly the organisational or team’s fault. A funny example is you could clearly see the old Origen members – Zven, Mithy, sOAZ – and me, were at Worlds. And when we played together as a team we were literally on the bottom.

For me personally, my goal was to at least get out of groups, I managed to do that. I wanted to win really badly against SKT, so obviously there’s a little disappointment, but at the same time I can’t be disappointed at how we did as a team. Five rookies, five first time Worlds appearances, challenged a three-time world champion team.

Pictured: Tristan “PowerOfEvil” Schrage during Misfits’ quarter-final match against SK Telekom T1, image from Riot Games



While the competition was going on, the reports started coming out for the NA LCS teams. While none of them have been confirmed, from a player’s perspective, what do you make of the new North American line-up, particularly the higher number of NBA-team owned teams?

In North America, I feel like it’s just more respected, or implemented into the society than Europe. In the EU, there’s more and more sponsors coming in, maybe more newspapers are writing about it. But back then, one or two years ago, there was nothing in Europe. Not really famous, not many sponsors who wanted to get in, because it’s too risky. With the NA franchising, it just becomes really safe, I would say. It’s just really good for North American sponsors, teams, so it’s a really good system for them.

[perfectpullquote align=”right” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]”[The regional EU LCS] looked like it was an experiment, I would say…maybe it would have been funny, a cool new adventure maybe even, but let’s see.”[/perfectpullquote]

Likewise, the EU LCS has reportedly started going back on its plans to develop a regional league. What were you impressions of that planned European format? Do you think it would work?

Well, it’s hard to say, because players didn’t really get a lot of information about it. It was mostly CEO’s and higher tiers of the organisations. It just got leaked. Players know about it, and players are worried about it. We didn’t know anything about this, right? Riot said on this and this date, we were going to inform you guys on what’s going to happen, what’s going to change. We will give you guys a two to three hours presentation on what’s going to happen. For me, it was just “don’t worry about it…”, because they will do whatever they think is best, and as soon as we have the information, we know what’s going to change. I will obviously just value whether this is a really good or bad system.

From the leaked information, it looked like it was an experiment, I would say. An experiment with all these new regions, or these Champions Leagues around Europe. Maybe it would have been funny, a cool new adventure maybe even, but let’s see.

Finally, what’s your plans now that the competitive LoL season is coming to a close. Do you already have ideas in terms of where your your career will go next year?

My plans for next month is I will pretty much just do a reflection on what happened this year. I will try to write down everything I learned, take everything I experienced and learned from worlds, against Faker, into my own gameplay. Then obviously then I’m really happy that I can finally see my family again, my friends, and have some free time and refresh my mind. We had one and a half, two months of one hundred percent League of Legends. It was the Korean boot camp into Worlds.

I personally didn’t think really think about the next year yet, since I just arrived a few days ago. But, obviously there’s the two most important points of thinking about the future is being successful in sports. Valuing the team’s performance, this kind of sports career rise. How much money do you earn? How much do you value money over the career path? Would you join a really bad team just to get more money? I would probably not do that, since I just played Worlds, and I want to go there again. You just need to take some off, think about what you want to achieve next year again, think about your pro’s and con’s, then just see what maybe even your teammates are going to plan. Over the next weeks and months, it’s just going to be a huge thought process, and just information getting exchanged, and even just talks with our teams. Let’s see what the future brings and holds.