We spoke to Wubby from Team Dignitas yesterday after the team’s series sweep against Method. He gave us a lot of insight into how the team is feeling, how they approach each game and what he thinks about North America as a region.

Taha Zaidi: How are you feeling after that win?

Wubby: We feel very confident going into the rest of the tournament. Going into this match we didn’t really know how it would be.

Yeah, in your comments I think you even said that they’re a wild card team.

Yeah for sure. I think they’re one of the strongest teams in this tournament and I think we had the least information about them. Going into the past, they’re a risky team that takes risks and there’s a lot of weird drafts.

So what did you guys think about them banning E.T.C or them picking Zarya and Sonya?

So with the E.T.C ban we were like, “Okay, they’re going to take Diablo right away.” But we didn’t know it was going to set up for a Zarya and all that stuff. We probably wouldn’t have picked E.T.C anyways, it’s a bit of a clash of metas. Maybe they tried it at home, it worked once, and then it didn’t work against E.T.C, so they’re like, “Yeah, we’ll get rid of that.” It was a bit surprising drafting against them for sure. But when a team goes for those risky drafts, it usually ends up with the other team getting all the high priority, slightly broken heroes, you know?

Exactly.

So, Game 1, Game 2, we had exactly what we wanted, and then it didn’t really matter if they had something weird. Even though Game 2, I think we should have closed Game 2 better than we did.

In the comments that they aired before the game, you talked about how you guys don’t put a lot of pressure on yourselves for these tournaments, but when it comes up to actually doing the matches and you go up against a team that’s so unpredictable, do you start feeling some of the pressure?

Always when you wake up in the morning you feel that pressure, but it goes away kinda fast. I think this being a smaller tournament and all of our teammates… after winning the last Western, after doing good at Blizzcon, we feel successful already so there’s no pressure of being successful. Even if we were to drop to the loser’s bracket, I think we wouldn’t, like, tilt off the world. Even if we were to get second or even fourth in this tournament, we’re like… scrims have been good, at tournaments so far the matches have been good. If we lose, it’s just like, you know, “We had a bad day.”

Yeah, so you kinda went in just hoping for the best but also being comfortable with the other realistic scenarios.

Yeah, I mean, anything can happen in Heroes for sure. I don’t think it’s gonna be… let’s say we lose the finals, or actually, let’s say we lose this one then we go down to loser’s [bracket] and we play HeroesHearth or something, a really strong team, and we lose to them and we get 6th. I don’t think we’d be starting a war within the team or disband and stuff. We’re very comfortable as a team and as humans that this is just a small step towards Blizzcon.

You also talked about how you were hoping or expecting three European teams to get out and go to Blizzcon. How do you feel about the chances of having three European teams at Blizzcon?

I think we’re very comfortable and confident that even if we don’t win, we were expecting that Method or Liquid would win. A bit of upsets in the previous days, but also upsets in the other manner that HeroesHearth, they’re probably the strongest NA team but dropped down. So even though Liquid is out, we still feel that Method, us, or even Leftovers will be one of those teams that will win and bring three spots for the European region.

So how do you feel about North America as a region right now? Just strength-wise compared to the past? And if you think that it’s a weak region, what do you think think they need to do better?

I think they were slowly getting better and they were doing something right before Blizzcon and even before the previous Western Clash.

It was unheard of for almost two years that an NA team even took a game out of a European team but now they’re knocking teams out and getting matches almost every series. I think for this Western Clash, I think Tempo has fell. And I think Octalysis and Team Freedom has also become a bit worse, which is weird. But HeroesHearth are going very strong. I’m not sure how strong they will be, going into the future, but when you see their players, it’s like, “Oh yeah, they actually know what they’re doing. They’re not just running around brawling or whatever. So, I think the NA scene is definitely growing, but with roster swaps for some of the top teams, I think that’s set them back but not long term.

Do you think you guys are the best team at this event right now?

Yeah I think we’re definitely the best team. I think if you asked anyone they would say us, just on the scrim results. But even the best team can lose so we’re taking every game very seriously.

Awesome, thank you so much!

Thank you!

You can catch our interview with Wubby’s teammate, Snitch, here. For complete coverage of Phase 2 of the HGC Western Clash, as well as more player interviews and game day recaps, stay tuned right here!