Q: Hello Weir, congratulations on Speed.int taking the MLG Championship.

Weir: Thank you.

Q: On the official RattleSnake Weibo, it was mentioned that Speed.int was sponsored by a ‘Speed’ (思必得）company incorporated as such. Fans looked into it and discovered that this is an IT company based in Chengdu, China, is this your company?

Weir: Actually, our previous RattleSnake Software company changed its name to this, and currently it is based in Nantong, Jiangsu, working in the realm of hardware and accessories. We changed our name at the time because there used to be another club with the RS abbreviation (RisingStars, recently disbanded).

Q: Already having a Chinese team, what caused you to sponsor an international team?

Weir: Myself and a friend, named Baoxiang, the two of us are all passionate about Dota 2, we really love the game. To be honest, the Dota 2 market has a lot of room for growth outside of China. There’s room inside China too, but it’s a bit slower, and at the time we felt that there was more potential and flexibility outside of China. So we shifted our gaze to the international scene. It was just at that time that Kaipi coincidentally were showing their potential, so we signed them as Speed.Gaming.Int.

Q: Before signing Kaipi, had you guys very thoroughly looked into the team?

Weir: Not really very in-depth. We watched their matches and replays, found we really liked them, haha.

Q: At the time you guys signed them, some fans expressed their belief that you had signed a ‘circus team’ (ie an inconsistent, unproven team that gets wins more through pocket strats and unpredictability than anything else).

Weir: Well it was pretty fun to watch, and can be considered a way to innovate and put on a show for viewers. There is a place in competitive for this element, so personally we fully embrace this label. Just sometimes something doesn’t work, and I feel like it’s a pity they couldn’t win that one, haha.

Q: Did you think they would win something like MLG when you first signed with them? What was the expectation for the team before MLG?

Weir: We hadn’t thought that they would win something like MLG, but for them to win, very excited. We originally wanted to gather them together in the US to train together, but considering the fact that they would soon come to China, the decision was made to let them stay with their respective families and spend some more time with them. Before MLG, we thought they would be able to advance from group, maybe get 4th. After the first day, I said to Baoxiang, we’re basically done, we’re gone! It’s 0-3, and we still haven’t played against NaVi or DK. But unexpectedly, the end result came, and it brought us such a happy surprise.

Q: Have you met your Speed.int players, can you tell us a bit about each of them?

Weir: I actually haven’t met them face to face before, there’s just frequent communication via Skype. EE and Aui are Canadian-Chinese, and EE-sama knows a little bit of Cantonese. Singsing is Dutch-Chinese, bone7 is from Romania, and pieliedie is from Sweden. They all seem relatively humorous and interesting. They’ll be coming to China in December to train together, at which time we’ll all get to know them more.

Q: What do you think about the frequently-discussed topic of EE-sama getting revenge over Loda?

Weir: Haha. I think it might not be that big of a deal, I’ve never heard EE-sama talking about it. So it might just be a casual topic that everyone talks about.

Q: Will it be Arteezy or bone7 coming to China this time?

Weir: Bone7, I’m already arranging for his visa, Arteezy still has to go to school.

Q: Fans are all wondering — is the Chinese RattleSnake squad facing disbandment?

Weir: No, it’s just a temporary thing. Through WPC we found that our Chinese squad needs adjustments in both management and players. We don’t want to see the same problems occur with the international squad, after all it’s their first time in China. So we want to focus more resources on them first, but no worries, it’s just temporary and after a short while, you will all see a brand new Speed.Gaming.CN squad as well.

Q: What are your thoughts regarding the club’s future growth?

Weir: I think it should be to encourage cross-training between the international and Chinese squads, and have both teams able to qualify for events. The international team will stay long-term in China, I think in this way the club as a whole can continue to improve skill-wise.

Q: Any hopes for Chinese Dota 2?

Weir: I hope to see wider promotion, and steadier servers.

Thank you for the interview. We hope Spg.int continues their glory, and hope to see Spg.CN sooner than later!

Source: http://dota2.sgamer.com/news/201311/153805.html

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