The Los Angeles BigGeese...sorry, I meant, the Los Angeles Gladiators took 5th place in my end-of-season power rankings for 2019 , and I'm ready to fill their review up with a couple of hot takes and enrage my reader pool once again! Don't worry, I'm only joking...just about the enraging part though, not the hot takes. In all seriousness though, the feedback I've been getting on my posts is very enlightening. There is a ton of information packed in there by people who have been following the professional Overwatch scene at multiple levels for years on end, and I'm very grateful to the good samaritans who take the time to write down detailed and informative replies to enrich the conversation even further. Yesterday, I got some detailed feedback on the Guangzhou Charge 's tank line for instance, and it was really awesome to know how the other OWL fans in the community perceive the different players and lineups as well.





Anyway, let's start breaking down the Gladiators role-by-role and figure out how well they're shaping up for Season 3.









TANK

This team currently has OGE and LhCloudy on main tank, and SPACE and Bischu on off-tank.

Traded from the Dallas Fuel, OGE is a fantastic tank player with supreme playmaking potential, and I heavily attribute his lack of success in the Overwatch League to his former teammates and/or coaching staff, who couldn't live up to his standards at all, and failed to make the best out of his strengths. OGE is someone you'd consider a carry-level player, but you need to enable him and promote his playstyle to allow him to pop-off, which Dallas simply didn't do. If you remember him playing during Goats, he was frankly a beast. He was blocking Earthshatters with big-brain mouse flicks as Reinhardt, finishing off targets using amazing Primal Rage mechanics as Winston, and fragging out and punishing badly-positioned enemies as Orisa. I think he will be one of the more notable main tanks in 2020, and everyone should really keep an eye out for him, because the Gladiators' coach, dpei, really brings out the best in his players with his unique and effective strategies. LhCloudy was a main tank on the Paris Eternal last year, and he was surprisingly unimpressive. I still have faith that he'll do well on the Gladiators' roster though, as he still has a solid track record with his time on Team Gigantti, and probably just needs his talents to be utilised in the right fashion, quite similar to OGE.

After making his move from one LA team to another, SPACE is set to have another fantastic season in the Overwatch League. He is one of the most versatile off-tank players on the planet; he's always doing what's required of him as D.Va, is quite comfortable on Roadhog and Zarya, and showed us a fantastic Sigma during the 2019 World Cup. Another benefit of having SPACE is that he's a playmaker himself, making defensive plays in the form of eating ultimates, and even offensive plays involving his own ultimates. His co-off-tank is going to be Bischu, who played for the Gladiators in Season 1 of OWL, was then demoted to their Contenders team, then picked up by the Guangzhou Charge in Season 2, and has now returned to the Gladiators for a second bout. All I can say about Bischu is that he plays a solid D.Va, but he's not showcased talent on any of the other off-tank picks, if I may say so myself. I don't exactly know what he brings to this roster other than his D.Va play, so it's certainly an odd pickup by the Gladiators. Maybe they have plans to put him on a two-way contract with Legion? Who knows.

So, to round off the tank discussion, I think OGE and SPACE are going to be a mind-blowingly good frontline in Season 3. LhCloudy and Bischu do bring down their 'stonks' a little bit, but I have faith in coach dpei, and believe he'll find good use for their talents as well. I can see these 4 players forming a Top 10 tank line, with the possibility of being Top 5 if things go right, so with that said, let's move on to the Gladiators' DPS players.





DPS

The damage dealers on this team are birdring, MirroR and Jaru.

Coming in from the London Spitfire, birdring is a well-known hitscan player who had a bit of a mental slump in the 2019 season. He wasn't enjoying the game as much as he used to, partly because he was forced to play heroes like Brigitte and Zarya, who weren't part of his FPS-ey canon. He was unwilling to play if he couldn't use hitscan heroes, wanting to also sit out during the Playoffs, and this went on to the point where he considered retirement quite seriously. Fortunately or unfortunately, the Gladiators picked him up, and now he's the sole purely-hitscan player on their team, meaning he will probably be a mainstay on their lineup if heroes like McCree and Widow end up being meta. That said, I'm still quite worried about his mental health, and one does wonder if he'll find the new season's metas interesting enough to play, but with Goats now gone, and barriers being nerfed, he should get more openings to pull out his signature heroes. If his mentality doesn't become an issue, I think he could be a pretty good player, and if he enjoys what he's doing, well, we know how hard he can pop off.

The first flex DPS added to this team is MirroR, formerly of Uprising Academy, who has a massive hero pool within his comfort zone. He can play multiple snipers, flankers and projectile heroes, and that's going to be a great asset to the Gladiators. I've watched him on his stream, and he has great aim, along with other nifty tricks up his sleeve. Just as an example, he's a master of abusing map geometry and curvature/slope glitches to execute mind-boggling punches as Doomfist. This guy is essentially meta-proof, and I'm glad the Gladiators have got access to his talents. Coming in with a similar hero pool to MirroR's is Jaru, who was on Team Envy until quite recently. Similar to MirroR, Jaru is also a streamer, and he plays flankers, projectile as well as hitscan heroes, which again means he has a wide hero pool that will come in handy during sudden meta-shifts.

I honestly believe this trio can prove to be a Top 8 or even a Top 5 DPS line if they play consistently and just keep doing what they do best. Birdring's mentality is really the only cause of concern for me, but he's still a very skilled player, and even if he can't play on certain occasions, MirroR and Jaru can certainly pair up and still do a good job, with MirroR likely playing hitscan and Jaru playing flex.





SUPPORT

Alright, remember I mentioned some hot takes in the beginning of my post? Well, this is where they begin. The Gladiators' backline consists of BigGoose and Paintbrush on main support, and Shaz on flex support.

I'm just going to say it: I don't think BigGoose's playstyle will fit in well with his new teammates. I've come to learn from my viewing experience that BigGoose is a very active player, especially on Lúcio, in the sense that he likes to be doing everything all at once for his team. He wants to go for Reddit plays, chase targets, take off-angles to get damage across, but also peel for his team and keep everyone up. Last year, when the rest of his team was relatively low on the playmaking juice, Goose's playstyle was perfect. He could set up all those Lúcio boop plays, go for Reddit rollouts and get environmental kills, and just be everywhere at once. Now that he's got tanks that are known to play like stars, and damage dealers who can pop-off on a variety of heroes, I'd imagine he would need to focus on enabling them, rather than trying to solo-carry team fights like he was used to doing. I'm not saying BigGoose is a bad player, in fact, I'm implying something far from it. If he was able to be an all-rounder last year, and still help his team win, he was doing something very right, and he deserves some praise for that, but I wonder if he will be able to play a more passive game, focus on the defensive parts of his heroes' kits rather than the offensive ones, and just be what his role says: a support. Maybe dpei agrees with me on this, since the Glad Lads have brought in a second main support in Paintbrush. Why Paintbrush though? He's not had much success in Contenders at all, despite spending pretty much a year with Mayhem Academy, and then spending a few months with Revival. I assume he must have played well during the League tryouts, and maybe he fits the new Gladiators' playstyle better than BigGoose, but despite all that I don't see him being one of the better main supports this season. That said, I haven't watched Paintbrush play much, and I may be misjudging how good he really is, but I'm going to assume he's average, as we've been doing with players I don't know much about.

Shaz has retained his spot as a flex support on this team, and correct me if I'm wrong, but he didn't look as great as usual in Season 2 of OWL, did he? I mean, he continues to have great synergy with BigGoose from their time on Gigantti, but by himself, I think he was relatively underwhelming last year. He wasn't absolutely terrible or anything, and he was consistent, but his level of play wasn't something worth writing home about. Considering how stacked the flex support scene is going to be once Season 3 begins, I don't think Shaz is going to stand out all that much, which is why I'm fairly concerned for this support line.

To sum it up, I don't think the Gladiators have a poor backline, but they don't have a fantastic one either. I feel like BigGoose will require a major change to his playstyle to work with this team, and if not, Paintbrush will have to be fielded, and he's not really a top-notch main support and doesn't have much experience either. Shaz is alright; I don't think there's anything wrong with him, but he needs to up his game to stand out among the other flex supports in the League this season. Overall, this looks like a lower-half support line to me, and I think they could be bottom-5 if what I'm saying ends up being true. That's it. My hot takes for the day end here.





THE RAW LOOK VS. REALITY

On paper, the Gladiators look like a competent team that can survive the harshest of metas and still come out smiling. They've got highly flexible players on nearly every role, meaning counterplay is going to be nigh-impossible against them. The only worries I've got are birdring's mental health, as well as the trio of supports. If the coaching staff isn't able to help birdring stay motivated, and if the supports don't perform well or do their jobs, this team might end up looking sloppy, but still, I don't think you can keep them out of the Play-Ins, because this squad is quite versatile.

That said, I don't think keeping birdring in the best of spirits, and getting the supports to play better will help them get into the Top 6, because there are other names that come to mind when you talk about those slots. I'm sorry, I know I'm being a little ambiguous, secretive even, but the rosters are still in flux and my opinions and rankings keep on changing with literally every new signing, trade or retirement that takes place in the League, but don't worry, I'll have a proper pseudo-rankings post right before the season begins, with the updated rosters in consideration.

Anyway, to sum up the Gladiators' chances in 2020, I'm quite certain they will be a Play-In team, and don't think they'll get into the Top 6 or drop below Top 12 and remain in those positions for a long time.



If you agree with what I had to say, please share this post around with other Overwatch League fans, and subscribe to my blog for more roster reviews! If there are points you disagree with, do elaborate on the same in the comments section, but please be polite and respectful to keep the conversation productive. I've still got 5 reviews remaining, which are going to be about my personal Top 5 teams from the 2019 season (starting off with the Seoul Dynasty), so thanks for reading, stay tuned for those, and I'll see you in the next article! Ciao!







