Ludvig "Luddee" Håkansson has been grinding the competitive Overwatch ladder scene since 2016. Since his debut all the way back during the days of the GosuGamers Overwatch Weekly tournaments, Luddee has been featured on teams like B0nkers and Red Reserve before joining Toronto Esports during the 2017 Overwatch Contenders qualifiers. Now, he’s with the Los Angeles Gladiators academy team, Gladiators Legion, who are currently competing in Overwatch Contenders North America. Luddee spoke with Upcomer about his journey through Overwatch, the support from his family, and how the Legion finds their style.





Nearly three years ago you set out on this journey, going all the way back to one of your earliest teams, Tomatoes For The Win. What’s it been like chasing professional Overwatch for so long? What are some hurdles that the community might not realize you’ve faced along the way?





It has honestly been an amazing journey so far and I’m looking forward to where it will take me. Like most other players, I have had my ups and downs but they have all helped me out. I have grown a lot as a person and a player from it.





The biggest hurdle I have had to face is probably being the younger brother of another professional player. Don’t get me wrong though, I love my brother and I couldn’t ask for a better brother. Being told by other people that I live in the shadow of my brother my entire career definitely got to me when I was younger.





When I got older, I realized that people say stuff like that to me, to try and get to me. He has always been an inspiration to me but I want to be my own person, I’m sure most people understand that. I learned to ignore it and it just made me more motivated than ever to improve as a player and prove to myself that it isn’t true. I work hard every single day to get to where I want to be and there is nothing that will stop me from pursuing my dreams.





With Father’s Day just recently passing and knowing that your family has been super supportive in your endeavors, how much has that helped you these past few years? How important is it to have that support group?





Shoutout to my dad, seriously. He’s the most amazing father anyone could ever ask for and I love him to death, I would not even be close to where I am today without his support and trust.





My brother also helped me take the first step to following my dream, he got me to play and study Overwatch before it even got released and eventually, when I wanted to drop out of high school he helped me bring it up to dad, thank you.









To me having a support group is very important, it makes everything a lot easier. It is a lot easier said than done but if you do have dreams you want to follow, don’t let anyone stop you. Knowing it makes you happy and trusting yourself is the most important thing in life, don’t let anyone take that away from you.





In a cheesy way, teams are like little families, right? Have you found that same kind of support with Gladiators Legion? Do you guys have a pretty open report with each other where you can voice your opinions and get stuff off your chest?





Most teams I have been in have felt like a second family, a group of friends playing and grinding to become the best together. Angry Titans were probably the first team that truly felt like a family to me, it was an amazing feeling. When I left for Gladiators Legion. I was very excited but also nervous because I wasn’t sure if it was going to be the same as in Angry Titans. I got very welcomed to the team and it immediately felt like a family to me, I love all of my teammates.





It is very easy for everyone to bring up opinions and constructive criticism. We all know that we are here to learn and to become the best and if we do not all agree to something we discuss it as a team.





I know that Gladiators Legion recently added two new players to the roster. Could you breakdown how Emil "eMIL" Sandgren and Seo "Stand1" Ji-won fit within your team’s dynamic?





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Both eMIL and Stand1 are perfect fits for this team because they are both very talented mechanically and are very vocal with what they need to be vocal about. Most importantly they are, like everyone else on the team, very easy to bring up opinions and ideas with and they are not scared to voice their own opinion and spark discussions for the good of the team. They both bring a lot of experience from previous teams and it has helped us all improve both individually and as a team, I’m grateful to have them both on the team.





The Legion managed a solid second place finish right behind Fusion University but sadly didn’t make it to the Atlantic Showdown. Do you have any goals set for yourself this season? Anything you feel like you need to prove?





I’m both happy and disappointed with our run last season, we reverse swept Mayhem Academy that earlier in the season 4-0’d us and it was an incredible feeling. Although I didn’t break my second place curse, I am overall happy with how the season played out. This season we will all break my curse together.





I have started this season out more motivated than I have ever been and I am very happy with our improvement over the season so far. It took us a bit to all get on the same page and now that we all are and our first game is over with, we will improve and build synergy faster and faster. No more sloppy play from us.





Speaking of Fusion University, their debut in Contenders Korea is coming up. First, how well do you expect Fusion to do in Korea? And to follow that up, how do you think you guys might fare in Korea?





I’m honestly not sure how they will do in Contenders Korea, they did well in trials but I’m not sure how big the gap is between Trials and Contenders in Korea. I haven’t been very focused on the Korean Contenders scene so it is very hard for me to say, I will definitely try my best to follow it better this season.





How does Gladiators Legion go about finding your signature style?





We have all sat down together and discussed as a team how we all see the game and have gone from there. We have studied VODs from top contenders and top OWL teams and have taken notes from stuff we like, stuff we dislike and have come up with our playstyle that way.





Studying and discussion is the key to finding the playstyle that fits YOUR team best.





Why do you think we’re seeing more and more Sombra used? It’s been running well in the east and now it’s really caught fire in Overwatch League and in Contenders--any idea why?





I think it is a very detailed topic to get into because Sombra usually replaces D.Va in GOATS. If you play Sombra GOATS you want to play slower than you normally do because first of all, you do not have the damage mitigation that D.Va provides and second of all you want to play around Sombra hacks and farming the EMP.





I guess teams realized that playing slower as Sombra GOATS is better because if you get a good EMP in every single player on the team will farm a lot on their ultimates and it makes it harder for the normal GOATS team to match the ultimate economy. There are obviously ways to play around the Sombra as normal GOATS and I think they both work as long as you have proper ultimate tracking and good planning.





In other words, Sombra has an insane kit and teams realized that she can replace D.Va because she doesn’t have one of the best ultimates in the game. Smile.





Create the ideal Gauntlet scenario in your head for me. Who would you love to face on LAN, in Korea, with all the chips on the table? Any rival teams you might want to topple this season?





The obvious answer would be Fusion Uni since we lost against them twice last season but I would love to play against Element Mystic just to prove that their Sombra + Doomfist composition isn’t as good as GOATS in this meta.