I was able to sit down and talk with Graham “Rifkin” Rogers and Jessica “Zombiegrub” Chernega from BaseTradeTV about what inspires them to do what they do for StarCraft II, what the game means to them and most importantly as community casters, what they feel about the community.

So to start off the interview, would you like to tell any new readers a little bit about yourselves who are you both and what is BaseTradeTV?

Rifkin: So BaseTradeTV is an incredibly hard name to create a logo around, I'll tell you that much right now. But the actual channel itself and the community of it is just people who are really passionate about StarCraft. Everything we've done to build ourselves up, it started for the community by the community, we would take people's donations to throw show matches because you have people who have $100 they'd love to see players go at it but they have no contacts. We have the contacts but we don't have the money so it ended up becoming this really perfect synergy. From that point on we've just been community casters for pretty much every event out there and that's probably the best way to describe us, as community casters.

What race do you both play, because it's well known you both enjoy playing the game and even playing with viewers from your channel?

Zombiegrub: We both main Terran but I play Random to know more about the game

Rifkin: I also play Random but for different reasons, she likes to learn more about the game, I just like to cheese with different flavours.

What inspired you to start BaseTradeTV?

Rifkin: For BaseTradeTV, a lot of this started because of a failed project known as Z33ktv. There was a lot of drama but it was the same sort of idea, community casters hopping into events but like most other small casting channels it did not go well. But myself, mYi PengWin, a guy named BadFatPanda and a couple of others said "You know what, I really like casting it sucks that this thing failed, let's do our own." So we started BaseTradeTV off the back of casting only Zotac cups. From there we just kept begging and asking to cast events and we started creating our own. As we started creating our own we started gaining momentum. I'd say about a year into it I picked up Zombiegrub as a partner and she's been my main co-caster ever since.

How did you fall into BaseTradeTV?

Zombiegrub: Well it's kind of a funny story, in that I don't really remember it but Rifkin does. He messaged me a while back before we started casting together when he was messaging everyone. He messaged me and I didn't respond. I don't remember seeing it to be honest, but he asked me later on to cast a Go4SC or something because he didn't have anyone to cast with. A bunch of his co-casters were getting real jobs and real life and I was like "I have no idea who you are but sure why not." Apparently the viewers liked it so he kept on being like "Hey the viewers liked you, they liked us. Let's keep casting together" Eventually in November two years ago he asked me to be the official Co-Caster and I was like "Suuuure".

Rifkin: I remember we had the most awkward conversation about it too because I am like "I know it's kind of like asking a girl to the prom, but it's not like that, I just want you to be my full time partner." It's really funny because she brings up this other part too, because BaseTradeTV was new I was messaging everyone, I sent out like 30 messages and not a single person responded the intial time around. Zombiegrub was the only person I messaged twice I don't know why just out of coincidence.

You’re known for putting a lot of effort and time into your Channel, particularly the Map Introductions, who makes them and how long do they take you to make usually?

Rifkin: So we've started making them with somebody else because the original guy I was making them with lives in Australia and the time zones were hard to sync up I think he's also moved on to other games and real life things as he just got married or engaged, I can't remember which. He kind of fell out of being ready to make them, what he would do was make the map and set up some cameras. I would take the map, record it, lay down some copyright free music and spice it up on my end with titles and stuff. In terms of time to make, I don't know how long it took for him with the cameras I imagine not very long, but with editing, anybody who has done editing knows most of the frustration is trying to find the music the second problem is rendering time. So actual time to make it not much but producing time is probably about a day or so.

You’ve built an incredible fanbase over the years, did you ever think you’d get as far as you have?

Zombiegrub: I knew it from the day we started... no.

Rifkin: I've had a couple of interviews at this point and nobody has really asked that so I actually have a story I'd like to share. I remember I kept getting really depressed when we'd get like 200 viewers at best and that would be like a good day. This was before Zombiegrub hopped on board, we finally got partnered on Twitch. But even when we got partnered I was thinking this will not be a sustainable thing. But I remember the very first day we got partnered we were casting the Kaspersky Arena, I think it was number 2 but it was a King of the Hill Arena and we had 5,500 people tuning in, but I was so sheepish and nervous I was like "Guys I'm going to play a 30 second advertisement, I've never done this before I hope you guys are okay with that."

The first time I played an advertisement, the fact we got that many viewers without crazy advertising and without front page on Twitch but more importantly the fact we held that viewer count for however long that broadcast was was for me what I needed, the hope to say this was possible. That we could get a fanbase and retain viewers.

What is it about StarCraft II that you love more than anything else, what keeps that passion going?

Rifkin: Everyone has their own flavour of what they love about SCII and the word passion gets thrown around a lot to the point where it actually doesn't mean anything anymore it's a bit like it's own meme. But the excitement comes from the fact that you can see people do weird things or you watch your favourite player mess up or get taken down by something cool. A recent example was we casted a game with Snute and we asked him about this guy who does a crazy hellbat all in, and he says "Yeah I've beat it no problem". A week later they fight each other and Snute loses to it and so we were on stream clapping and hooting and hollering and it was just fun.

Zombiegrub: I've always been really competitive like I did a lot of sports growing up, but I never enjoyed watching sports, just playing it. You expect the same thing from eSports but it's the total opposite. I love playing it and being competitive but it's not just that but learning the game has not just taught me the game but how to learn so it's affected me in other areas in real life. Even now watching it's still just about learning for me. I still have fan favourites I will still cheer for Jaedong, but it's less about that and just seeing perfection I guess.

The StarCraft II community has been pretty great, some of the tournaments you cast are hosted by members of the community out of their own pocket but is there anything else that you guys would love to see happen within the community?

Rifkin: I would really love to see the community lighten up, get some positivity. It feels like when you're watching a tournament in Twitch chat, or checking Reddit and Team Liquid there's so much close-mindedness and negativity floating around. It sucks because it's not so much about feedback or people getting down on us but when I see someone giving really bad negative comments on someone who is trying to start something up. Like our friend Feardragon recently asked for brutally honest feedback on his series Breaking Out some of the feedback was good but there was also a lot of really terrible ones like "Why would I waste my time with this?" With Legacy of the Void coming up especially and potentially new people coming into the scene I'd love to see them not greeted with a wall of negativity.

Zombiegrub: I'm kind of similar, I consider myself pretty hardcore. I'm all about the Koreans and the tip top that's the tournament I want to see. When it comes to enjoying StarCraft I allow myself to do that. There's so much negativity and elitism that's the vocal minority and it just bleeds everywhere. What's so good about BaseTradeTV is that our fans are the kind of people who lay back in their chair, open up a beer or whatever and they watch a tournament. They're not typing somewhere "OH MY GOD THAT CASTER SAID THE ORACLE KILLED 5 WORKERS WHEN IT KILLED 2. WOW WHAT A LOSER." People just get way too caught up in the elitism and negativity and that's the barrier people see.

So for anyone who might be new to StarCraft II; are there any events you cast that you’d recommend people show up to watch?

Rifkin; Absolutely, while a lot of events have come and gone the one I recommend that's kind of become our back bone is the OlimoLeague. It's a tournament funded by the community through Patreon, there's no big corporations. But the point is every single Saturday (10pm KST Korea Standard Time) we get to cast this really fun tournament with pretty good players and have a great time doing it. It's probably one of our biggest events anyway.

StarCraft II can be seen as a particularly intimidating game from the outside what tips would you offer to new players to overcome that anxiety and to get the most out of a great game?

Rifkin: Just play. There's so many people get obsessed with ladder anxiety but they did this great thing where you can't be demoted from a league so if you place Platinum and lose every single game for the next year you won't get demoted. So just play because the worst case scenario is you are exactly where you started off.

Zombiegrub: I used to actually be affected by this ladder anxiety that people say shouldn't affect you and it probably shouldn't but like with many things you're afraid of failing. It doesn't matter if you get demoted it just matters if you lost especially if you lost in a humiliating fashion like if you get cannon rushed or something. To new players it's about what you want to do, I did coaching and the first thing I ask them is "Are you looking to be Diamond and get serious or are you looking to learn how to learn and have fun" it's very different, if you're looking to be top of the ladder you have to look at it like it's your profession. If it's for fun consider not caring what eSports StarCraft is doing, get rid of the build orders you think you need to learn and just have fun, two base locusts once in a while.



Finally to keep up with current affairs, how do you feel about the new map pool, particularly Inferno Pools surviving a second season?

Rifkin: If I had a "my face when" reaction to Inferno Pools, it would be the face that is hidden on Inferno Pools.

The face so affectionately described by Rifkin as "Raaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar!"

Zombiegrub: The reaction to this new map pool is just that I am glad they are taking maps from people who make maps as opposed to just doing whoever makes their maps at Blizzard and we still don't know if it's someone who tries really hard and we should feel bad about making fun of them or if it's like the Janitor that they pay an extra $10. We don't know.

Rifkin: It's like the equation on the board except it's a map and the Janitor comes in with a piece of chalk and makes the base layout perfect.

Zombiegrub: Yeah it's like that, except it's totally not perfect, I mean Inferno Pools being kept in there is the only complaint that we have which is much better than the last map pool where we have complaints about every map that we see. It's a matter of whether they are asking the right questions about what they are pushing for what they want out of the game. Blizzard say they created a map to create diversity in gameplay but it's not apparent how.

Last question, how do you feel about the overall balance of the game?

Rifkin: I think we both feel the same about this so I'll let Zombiegrub answer it.

Zombiegrub: Do we? Oh. Well it's actually pretty balanced right now, I think the win rate is shown pretty well. We don't have any abusive strategies, there have been times in the past where balance is okay for the wrong reasons. For example Brood Lord Infestor in PvZ you were either winning off a two base all in, or losing because you let them get to Brood Lord Infestor. It doesn't make good games though. As far as it is now I think balance is okay, the gameplay itself is also okay occassionally you do get some Swarm Host BS but it has been a while that the Meta hasn't really changed, so that in itself might call for a balance update or a patch of some sort.

Rifkin: When people come to BaseTradeTV we make jokes all the time like "Oh that guy got Protossed" but we make the same jokes about every race, but I do believe for the most part the game is looking pretty good right now. There are things that need to change, but that's why they are changing it.

Thank you both for your time; it’s been great fun talking to you both. Are there any shout outs you guys would like to give?

Rifkin: Shoutout really goes out to anyone who helps breed that cult of positivity and makes StarCraft fun to watch. Those who tune in or are out there who actively tweet to sponsors thanking them for supporting events. Above all else our subscribers on BaseTradeTV, all those folks who help contribute to the scene in a small way or a big way. That's who my shoutout goes to.

Zombiegrub: I agree with all that but I also want to give a special shoutout. For those who don't play StarCraft but watch StarCraft. You're the hope for the future, please continue, you guys are great!

That closes the interview with BaseTradeTV, please go check them out on their Twitch, Twitter and Facebook. Don’t forget to also follow Team Dignitas on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube for more content across a wide range of games.