ROYZE!!!
This week, I down sit with Royze. k1ck. Lot of good time have by all, as discuss good thing Team Fortress relate.
The Interviewer: We’re here today with Royze from k1ck Gaming. As is the norm, could you tell us a bit about your TF2 history Royze?
k1ck. Royze: Well, I started my TF2 career as a non-class guy that sucked on all classes. Some day, a guy called Zappah (PENTIA’s ex-medic) told me that I should play medic because I have talent in that. I joined an Israeli clan called Axiom, played with those guys for a while and I started to learn the class. I wasn’t that good but I improved and conquered my main class! After a few failed Israeli clans, I tried my luck in big, scary Europe, joining “Damn” with Brutallus and Retsh0ck, playing with that for a while. I got some division 4 and 3 experience, but had not played on ETF2L yet! Then, Waffle, he took me to some strange dark places with some guys from divisions 3 and2 where I got to mix. I got really really extra super good in no time, from a division 4 or low+ level to mid+ in about a month! But I was still known as a division 4 medic :(. I tried to trial for DCSB against all the odds, because I’ma fighter! And I succeeded… somehow. I got a lot of division 2 and 1 experience with people like Jh and Retsh0ck, Player Thirty Two, Superfly, Tuna, and Jones! Daf even got to merc sometimes and everyone had lots of fun. So here I am today, with the wonderful lads from k1ck.
The Interviewer: So when k1ck was forming a few months ago, what happened that you ended up in position to be their starting medic?
k1ck. Royze: After DCSB went away to the big place in the sky, I joined eSrael for like ten days but it was unsuccessful because they were all inactive! I was still looking for a clan after that until the day Super messaged me asking me to join a team with some ex-Yoyotech2 players, like Crink and Vali! And also some guy called Rake, and I am like what the **! Who are these guys?! They appeared to be sick players that never let me down, so we played for a while and had a lot of fun together! They were all great guys and all have such well developed senses of humor (except for me :() and we just formed the team.
The Interviewer: Of the set of “new” teams forming for what ended up being the summer season of ETF2L, only k1ck have made a real impact, with WeMadeFux folding and several other projects just not amounting to much. Did you feel a lot of expectations on you to come out and perform, especially after TF2 legend Jimmy Breeze said he could not wait to see how played?
k1ck. Royze: Hmmm… I think we did want to prove that we are good because back then, when we were still named Stoic, we got underrated allll the time! Teams did not give a ** about us and thought we were just winning because we were lucky. But I think the k1ck name change made them go oh my gosh! And then they all realized we were a good team, but we don’t do it to get rated as a serious-face team that will dominate the TF2 scene. We are only a bunch of nice guys that play TF2 for fun and they are good at it. For me, personally, I wanted to prove that I deserve a spot in division 1 for the people who thought I wasn’t because of my psychotic and unpredictable playstyle :(
The Interviewer: In line with the no-seriousfacing rule, you guys have been fairly inactive this summer, mostly due to holidays, but even when people are around the games are sporadic. How do you guys manage to stay at a high skill level while not playing that often, especially when you’re a newly-formed team that don’t know each other’s playstyles fully?k1ck. Royze: I think the good mood and chemistry we have makes up for it. We’re all open minded about missing people for a game because we think personal life is better than TF2 (oh my godddd!?!?!?), so unavailability is not a problem! When we play, we just show up in the Mumble, start laughing a bit and get ready to play! We aren’t the same level as our gameplay could be if we played consistently, but that doesn’t matter :D As long as we have fun, losing is not a problem.
The Interviewer: You’ve mentioned it, but your playstyle as medic is very Agron-esque: aggressive and “psychotic,” to the point where you bait yourself for the betterment of your team. What benefit does it actually offer, to play more aggressively as medic, at a high level of play?
k1ck. Royze: I think it is just my way of thinking. I’m not playing aggressive to get frags, I almost never use my needles and I only ubersaw because ubersaw can give the edge on a looot of situations. Twenty five percent from a hit is like… a gift! If you use it properly, of course. My agenda is “the team comes first,” if I die but my team is winning, I won’t mind. I’m not the kind of medic that runs back and leaves his men on the battlefield. My style has pros and cons, but that’s how I play. Mostly, my movement and my **ty mindgames save me from some desperate situations.
The Interviewer: When you ended up joining k1ck, how did that come about? Did you go talking to MGOs or did they contact you?
k1ck. Royze: Superfly talked to k1ck and some other MGOs, k1ck told us that we needed to prove our skill level to them as a team when we were still Stoic. The main reason we wanted an MGO was that apparently servers cost money??? Another OMFG! After a while, Superfly contacted k1ck again, this time they just said “Oh yes, no problem!” and that’s it! k1ck’s manager is a cool guy who understands our reasons for playing TF2 as friends, and he won’t care if we don’t come to LANs and all that crap.
The Interviewer: For the summer, you’ve been borrowing the services of Joseph “Fisshu” Carter from FakkelBrigade. What has his guidance provided to you for helping you ease into your role as division one players?
k1ck. Royze: Fisshu is just.. great :D His in-game calls are just insanely good, he’s always motivating us when we’re losing and even more when we’re winning :P He taught us a few things about using momentum and keeping it, that helps us even when he’s not here right now (he’s on vacation in some place called Canada!) Great guy ingame and out of it. I dont think it answers the question directly but..
The Interviewer: What’s this about a k1ck movie?
k1ck. Royze: Don’t you mean “with all these talks about great achievments and expectations and you specifically as a medic that has an averge of 2 kills per game, are there any ideas about a frag movie?”?
The Interviewer: No.
k1ck. Royze: Aw :( We will start making the movie in a little while, with our movie editor Cla, who basically volunteered for the mission. we’ll start making it as soon as we get good enough to have AVI-worthy frags!
The Interviewer: Any other matters you’d like to address before we finish this off?
k1ck. Royze: We need a scout :((( Pleeeeeeeease…
Originally published on VanillaTV (vanillatf2.org) on 2010-08-04 by theinterviewman.
Recovered from the Internet Archive (archived copy) as part of tf2esports.com's preservation of VanillaTV's TF2 coverage. The original site is no longer online. All rights remain with the original author; reposted for historical reference.