Competing since the beginning of 2017 Elliot "ELLIVOTE" Vaneryd has prospered right outside of the spotlight. However, now he stands center stage as a prominent flex prospect. ELLIVOTE has been featured on teams like Vivi’s Adventures, Angry Titans and is currently playing alongside the Dallas Fuel’s academy team, Team Envy. With a strong first-place finish domestically and a solid second place finish at the inaugural Atlantic Showdown, ELLIVOTE spoke with Upcomer about his longstanding friendship with fellow teammate LullSiSh, what the Atlantic Showdown meant for him, and shares his thoughts on how his role could be impacted by a role lock.





Since you were a child you and LullSiSH have been friends. How did you two meet? How does it feel to finally be reunited not only with your friend but long-time teammate?





We first met through a mutual friend, Baffe. It was my first friend and they met through kindergarten. So when we were like 5 or 6 somewhere around those times Baffe introduced us to each other and then we were in the same class together and the same soccer team etc.





Did you both play a good amount of games as kids? Which one of you first really got into esports? Did you guys follow or play any other games competitively?





Everyone in our friend group always played games, that’s how we usually spend our times together. We used to play games every single day after coming home from school. I played Call of Duty competitively and I wanted to really try to go pro in that game but then when I actually got good and started to get recognition in t3-t2 they introduced the 18 year old limit for the biggest tournaments so it was hard to find decent teams.





It was around that time when Overwatch had the open beta and LullSiSh suggested me to try it out with him, and I was hesitant at first, but I gave it a try and it might have been the best decision I’ve made in my life so far.





You played amazingly during the Atlantic Showdown. I’ve got to ask, how was competing against one of your closest friends? Would you say that you both push each other?





It’s so much fun competing against people you are close friends with because you have bragging rights if you win and the trash talk before our game with Angry Titans was also very entertaining.





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Talk to me about playing against Fusion University? What would you say went wrong? What did you feel like you could have done better in?





I’d say that the games versus Fusion University were close but they capitalized more of our mistakes and we were too slow to adapt to their playstyle. We were stuck in a mindset that worked against every other team but because Fusion University played so slow it didn’t work so, in the end, we were kind of just banging our heads against a wall. After we choked the full hold on Eichenwalde in the finals our spark kind of died.





With that in mind, we got to see how flexible you are on many different heroes. How do you feel about the state of your role in the metagame?





This is the first meta in a very long time where the flex player actually gets to flex their hero pool and I’m loving it. It opens up a lot of different compositions that you could play; 3/3 GOATS, Sombra or Mei GOATS, or 3 DPS.





With that said, do you think that if Overwatch does go through with a role lock that your role, in particular, would suffer from what it means to be a “flex” tank?





Yes, I think flex players would suffer a lot, there are only a few tank heroes in the game and if you 2-2-2 lock I think you would see less flexibility than you currently do now.





You’ve been competing in Overwatch since the beginning of 2017. If you could go back in time, what are three pieces of advice you’d give yourself before pursuing Overwatch competitively?





If you’re trying to go pro you have to have patience, you won’t become a god overnight, keep grinding. Always have a positive attitude in practice and try your hardest because that’s where you are supposed to grow as a player. If you don’t take practice seriously you can’t expect to see any changes in officials.





And last but not least, you have to ask yourself how much you enjoy it. There’s no point in trying to go pro if you’re going to half-ass it. You either give it all you got or there’s no point in trying because there is always someone that puts in the extra hours that you might not.