Liquid Legends Amateur Spotlight #1 Article: Chexx TL_Chexx April 16th, 2015 19:52 GMT







Often, people complain that NA and EU lack talent. In my opinion, this is largely due to the lack of exposure given to the players who are competing at the amateur level, with people instead focusing on the trolls and the drama in the community. I decided to interview the winner of the monthly Go4LoL finals, since the tournament has been proven to foster upcoming talent, with examples like the Unicorns of Love and more recently LowLandLions.



Fabian "Sheepy" Mallant, coach of EU LCS team Unicorns of Love, described the Go4LoL as "the first tournament for amateurs who aim to become a professional League of Legends player." He went on to say: "For many players, it's their first chance to measure their skills against serious competitors. In our case, tournaments like Go4LoL and Black Monster Cup helped us a lot when we were starting out. I believe tournaments like these grow the next generation of League of Legends talent." I hope this series will motivate more people to participate in a more competitive environment.



Could you give us a small introduction of yourself?

Sleeping: My name is Christian Tiensuu, also known as Sleeping. My name on EUW is SLEEPLNG. I live in Vaasa, Finland and I am 18 years old.

Seffe: My name is Sebastian TheodorHinaaja Tenn, my EUW name is Seffe. I live in Helsinki, Finland. The city is by far superior to these crappy countryside villages such as Vaasa.

Taikki: My name is Arttu Sirkka and I'm known as Taikki in LoL. I'm 21 years old and I've been playing league on Diamond-Challenger level since early Season 3. At this point I'd also like to apologize for any comments Seffe makes during this interview :^).

Malkkari: My name is Teemu Maliniemi and my IGN is Malkkari. I’m 21 years old and I’ve been playing League since Season 1 and on Diamond-Master level since Season 2.

Jani: I'm Jani "Huikee Jani" Lampinen. I'm 20 years old and been playing in the EUW (almost) high Elo scene since early season 3 after making transition from competitive CoD. My name is Christian Tiensuu, also known as Sleeping. My name on EUW is SLEEPLNG. I live in Vaasa, Finland and I am 18 years old. OP.GG Profile My name is Sebastian TheodorHinaaja Tenn, my EUW name is Seffe. I live in Helsinki, Finland. The city is by far superior to these crappy countryside villages such as Vaasa. OP.GG Profile My name is Arttu Sirkka and I'm known as Taikki in LoL. I'm 21 years old and I've been playing league on Diamond-Challenger level since early Season 3. At this point I'd also like to apologize for any comments Seffe makes during this interview :^). OP.GG Profile My name is Teemu Maliniemi and my IGN is Malkkari. I’m 21 years old and I’ve been playing League since Season 1 and on Diamond-Master level since Season 2. OP.GG Profile I'm Jani "Huikee Jani" Lampinen. I'm 20 years old and been playing in the EUW (almost) high Elo scene since early season 3 after making transition from competitive CoD. OP.GG Profile



How did you end up playing together?

Sleeping: Jani asked me if I was interested and I had nothing else to do at the moment. The pool of good Finnish players is rather small so we just knew each other.

Seffe: I don’t know Kev.

Taikki: We have an ESL team with a lot of Finnish players in it and we play with a different roster depending on who is available for that weeks Go4Lol. When we qualified for monthly we chose 4 high Elo players and Jani to play in the monthly.

Malkkari: Jani asked me if I was interested.

Jani: Everyone in the team knew each other and have played in various tournaments together prior to this monthly final.



What’s your current rank and what was your best rank?

Sleeping: At the moment I am Challenger 420 LP, best rank was last season when I was rank 30 in Challenger with 700 LP.

Seffe: At the moment I am Challenger 440 LP. I peaked last season at 840 LP and was top 10 in the early season.

Taikki: Right now I'm 700 LP Challenger and my best rank is top 5 with 950 LP Challenger last season.

Malkkari: At the moment I’m master 200 LP , peak rank was 400 LP Master this season.

Jani: Currently struggling at ~100 LP Master-Diamond 1. Highest rank I’ve been is ~550 LP Challenger.



Why did you decide to participate in the go4lol?

Sleeping: I thought that it would be decent practice considering I hadn’t been too active on team games lately.

Seffe:

Taikki: I play Go4Lol’s when I don't have anything better to do on Sundays.

Malkkari: I had nothing better to do and extra money doesn’t hurt.

Jani: Playing with four other players that you already know and have fun playing with is much more enjoyable for me than playing solo queue. I thought that it would be decent practice considering I hadn’t been too active on team games lately.I play Go4Lol’s when I don't have anything better to do on Sundays.I had nothing better to do and extra money doesn’t hurt.Playing with four other players that you already know and have fun playing with is much more enjoyable for me than playing solo queue.



How did you prepare for the Go4Lol monthly final? Just playing Solo Queue or did you scrim with other teams?

Sleeping: Just by playing Solo Queue.

Seffe: I ate porridge for breakfast that morning.

Taikki: We didn't actually practice at all as a team. We just went with a solo queue attitude and ended up winning it.

Malkkari: Solo/Duo queue.

Jani: Solo queue.



How would you describe your experience with Go4Lol?

Sleeping: Nothing too negative to say, would be glad if it was possible to reduce the amount of spare time between games but I don't think that can be helped.

Seffe: 5/5.

Taikki: Since it's an open tournament the wait times and varying skill of opponents can be slightly frustrating at times but when you get to the later rounds it's just fine.

Malkkari: Pretty positive experience all around.

Jani: Playing in the early rounds gets boring really fast due to huge skill difference of teams.



Are you happy with the current meta for your roles?

Sleeping: Exceptionally happy, never had this much fun playing Top due the amount of viable Top champions right now.

Seffe: Not really, the meta of Bot lane taking jungle camps is annoying since some champs excel at that better than others and can also gain unfair advantage in lane through RNG if other team loses 1 or 2 minions more than the other.

Taikki: The latest patch changed jungle a lot and the meta isn't very defined yet. Right now we've a lot more pick variety than a few patches ago which makes the role a lot more enjoyable to play.

Malkkari: The only negative thing about Bot lane is currently the minion RNG when taking jungle camps like Seffe said.

Jani: Best meta by far in my opinion due to pick diversity.



What Champions should I play in the current meta for your role? and why?

Sleeping: I don't think top lane pool has ever been this big which means you can almost play anything right now. My preferred Top laners right now are Riven, Irelia and Cassiopeia because they are super strong in solo queue. Other good picks are Hecarim, Sion, Lissandra, Kennen.

Seffe:

Taikki: CC heavy tanks like Sejuani, Nautilus and Zac are really strong after Riot introduced Cinderhulk. These tanks are still rather weak before they complete Cinderhulk, but they scale insanely well compared to other junglers. Rek'sai is still the most versatile jungler in the game so she's really useful in any team composition. Vi and Nidalee are also very good because of their high damage output.

Malkkari: Graves, Lucian, Urgot, Jinx, Caitlyn, Corki, and Sivir. There are so many champions to choose from you just need to decide which one suits your team composition and Bot lane match up the best

Jani: Viktor, LeBlanc, Ahri and Zed are champs that I prefer over anything else mainly due to their versatility. I don't think top lane pool has ever been this big which means you can almost play anything right now. My preferred Top laners right now are Riven, Irelia and Cassiopeia because they are super strong in solo queue. Other good picks are Hecarim, Sion, Lissandra, Kennen. http://www.lolking.net/champions/ . Look up the champions that are classified as “Support” and you can see. You should play them because they fit in the Bot lane and don’t require much gold to be effective.CC heavy tanks like Sejuani, Nautilus and Zac are really strong after Riot introduced Cinderhulk. These tanks are still rather weak before they complete Cinderhulk, but they scale insanely well compared to other junglers. Rek'sai is still the most versatile jungler in the game so she's really useful in any team composition. Vi and Nidalee are also very good because of their high damage output.Graves, Lucian, Urgot, Jinx, Caitlyn, Corki, and Sivir. There are so many champions to choose from you just need to decide which one suits your team composition and Bot lane match up the bestViktor, LeBlanc, Ahri and Zed are champs that I prefer over anything else mainly due to their versatility.



What would you say are the basics for playing your role?

Sleeping: Knowing your match-ups, farming well considering it is top after all, having the ability to 1v1 and withstand possible ganks.

Seffe: That you are not glued to the actual lane even though you are a Bot laner. Also understanding power spikes are a big deal.

Taikki: Jungle works very differently than the lanes in terms of basics. Most important basics are understanding lane matchups so you know where to gank and keeping an eye on creeps in lanes so you know when the enemy is pushing. While you're jungling focus on your lanes so you get information you can use to gank.

Malkkari: Farm, farm, farm, and trading

Jani: Knowing how to trade efficiently and warding!



Best way to improve at League?

Sleeping: I've always believed in the way of simply playing the game and learning stuff by yourself and then later advancing into other stuff such as proper farming, how to control your lane and so on. Stay positive at all times, bad tilt-y days do happen to everyone. Watching informative streamers does help as well.

Seffe: Be aware of your own flaws and focus on yourself not the others. Playing a lot will improve you a lot if you’re critical about yourself and you actually stop to think what you’re doing in the game or what you should be doing. Ask yourself questions, for example: “Am I where I’m I supposed to be, should I be somewhere else on the map?”

Taikki: Until like high Diamond it's best to just focus on playing more and learning from your mistakes. Especially in solo queue you need to focus on your own gameplay instead of others so you can improve even in bad games. The worst thing you can do to harm your learning is to have the wrong mentality towards playing, because that's really hard to fix after you get used to it.

Malkkari: You need to have mentality to improve your own play every single game.

Jani: Have motivation to play solo queue at least couple games a day. Make sure to play more than one role/champion to get better understanding of the game.



Are you guys streaming? Where can I watch you play? Whats your normal stream like?

Sleeping: I stream every now and then @twitch.tv/SLEEPLNG. I cannot stream LoL from home due really bad internet connection but I do stream osu! occasionally for fun.

Seffe: I don’t stream.

Taikki: I don't stream at the moment because of my slow internet connection.

Malkkari: I stream whenever I feel like it @twitch.tv/malkkari

Jani: I don’t stream at the moment because my internet connection is too slow for streaming with good quality.



Do you guys have any plans of becoming Pro?

Sleeping: If I ever got the chance, there wouldn't be any sort of hesitation, so for sure.

Jani: Currently im not interested in playing league competitively.

Taikki: With the amount of hours I spend playing league it'd be stupid to not aim going pro. I'm playing in a team called Code Gaming aiming for Challenger Series and LCS. After I finished school I'm spending a year with the goal of getting to LCS before I continue studying.



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