Raven (center) with Lothar (left) and Gnimsh (right) casting PGL Tavern Tales Spring
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The first day at PGL is over now, how do you feel?
Really good actually. The tournament today was a success, I think, and I really enjoy a Swiss stage in a tournament, I think it's really good. A lot of the players want to see more of it, to be honest. So yeah, good overall.
Do you think swiss is the format to go with in Hearthstone?
At least to create a qualifying, similar to how this is run. So, you know, Swiss with X amount of people because the bracket size doesn't really matter too much. And then into top 16 cut, top 8 cut, whatever is decided. But yeah, Swiss is definitely the way to go.
Would you argue that after Swiss you still have to do double elimination, like some players were arguing for that.
Yeah, I mean in all seriousness, if you really want the best tournament ever, then you would do Swiss into double elimination group stages and all that. But you've got to be realistic in terms of time and what's available to people. I think Swiss into single elimination is a tiny bit rough, but these guys in this tournament specifically, the top 16 already gained some money and have done well so far. You'd always love double elimination in every single tournament ever, but sometimes it's not too realistic.
About the format that PGL is doing, Last Hero Standing without a ban. What are your thoughts on this?
I like it, actually. I don't have too many really strong thoughts about disliking any particular format. I actually much prefer to see tournaments run different formats. So, always looking for something new, but in terms of the old Conquest vs. Last Hero Standing and ban vs. no ban I'm pretty okay with everything, because I just want to see tournaments run different ones as opposed to like "okay, this whole year everyone is doing Conquest one ban". I like things to be mixed up and I think this can show off certain players better in different line-ups as well.
"I like formats to be mixed up and I think this can show off certain players to be better in different line-ups."
Next, I want talk a bit about last year's "uprise" of British casters in Hearthstone. You have Sottle, Aquablad and you, obviously. What do you think made this growth possible all of a sudden?
So, a bit of story time: It pretty much all started when Aqua initially made the Facebook Hearthstone UK group. He ran that and then pretty quickly afterwards we just started running weekly tournaments. No prize pool or anything, but only really UK players would play because they were the only people in the Hearthstone Facebook group. And then it turned out that me, Sottle and a couple of others actually were winning these tournaments, so Aqua decided: "oh okay, let's just form a team and just go for it!" And then, shortly after that, I placed pretty well at the Insomnia event. I lost to Kaldi in the semis and then Greensheep won, so, you know, some random UK guy getting third place when the other two guys were Kaldi and Greensheep - at that time, pretty reasonable.
And then we got approached by Team Infused. We got picked up by those guys, which was good, and then it just went from there. We started just casting things, because we wanted to. We were running tournaments like King of the Hill and in general just open tournaments and we were like "yeah, we should cast these, that's the whole point. Put them on Youtube and just see what happens." And then not long after that we started getting picked up, I think the first big gigs were Gfinity when they did those last year. I mean, Nick went to the first one and then Sottle I think went to the second one as an admin and then somehow wormed his way into casting (laughs). I think he was on the analyst desk, that's why.
So he appeared there and then obviously Sottle knows what he's talking about, so I think it's just the continuation from that point really. I think all three of us are pretty decent and I also think that there are a lot of casters, especially then, that are also players. Whereas it was quickly turning for us to where we were becoming casters as opposed to, you know, if you get someone like Reynad or any player on a desk, he's still a player at the end of the day. And they are really good and provide great insight, but I think the casting Hearthstone scene needed some more dedicated casters.
How was it for you to transfer from being a player to caster? Was it a difficult step or did you practice a lot for this?
I don't want to say I've given up because I still play in tournaments. I nearly qualified for EU prelims, so that was close, but I've not given up on playing completely. I still play in tournaments and stuff like that, but I think my talents lend to casting more because I'm not going to dedicate the hours it requires to play at a high level or on like ThijsNL's level for example, which is ridiculous. And because I'm casting I don't have the time to do that.
I enjoy casting, it gives me some great experiences. I was over in America for the first time last week casting for the Blizzard NA prelims, so that was amazing. I'm obviously here, first time in Bucharest, casting this, so I think overall the choice was relatively easy.
With Gnimsh (left) and ThijsNL (center) at PGL Tavern Tales
"The Hearthstone scene needed more dedicated casters."
Talking a bit about your English colleagues Aquablad and Sottle, what do you think you can still learn from those guys?
Yeah, I'm of the firm belief that you can learn something from everyone, whether it's how to do something or how not do something. So yeah, I definitely pay attention to all the casters actually. On one hand you have Sottle, who is very analytical and really knows what he's talking about in terms of actual gameplay, so that's something I'm obviously always working towards and that's why I'm still trying to play at a relatively high level. And then Nick is super approachable and really good on the desk in terms of molding into a host role. I put myself sort of in between and I think it's important for every caster to develop their own style as well, because if we were all super analytical like Sottle, then ... you know, you don't want a desk full of the same person. So, I’m definitely picking up things from everyone, but I’m definitely trying to do my own style.
And within the casting scene, who is your idol from any game? Who do you think “I want to be like him or her?”
Oh you’re making me name names now, pick favorites (laughs). So, I would have to say in all honesty, probably I took most inspiration from Gnimsh. Mainly because my first cast at Gfinity he was there and the first time I cast with him on the desk he made it very easy for me more than anything. It wasn’t particularly work, it was more like we just discussed the game, had some fun, which I think is very important especially for Hearthstone casting to actually create some fun around the game as opposed to being like: “This was the wrong play, he could’ve done that”, you know, being super serious. Because the game isn’t hyper serious. But yeah, I think just Gnimsh’s approach to being a good caster and overall a commentator in general in terms of he can be on the host desk and he’s really good to work with, very easy. So, I try and aim for that, personally.
Lately we had the Blizzard “So you think you can cast?” competition and from that some new casters sprung. We got to see Songbird and Odinn, what do you think the potential is for those guys to grow in the scene of Hearthstone?
I think the potential is huge, because I really think that if you want to do something like cast or even anything like admin, run tournaments, it doesn’t matter, I really think you should just do it, you know? And aim to just do anything you can to make that happen. When I got to cast with Kevin and Songbird they were really good actually. It surprised me how good they were, if I’m honest, and I’m not saying that in a bad way. They’ve never really done or been in a studio and done the work, because casting from your bedroom is way different. You’ve got no one in your ear talking to you, you don’t have loads of cameras and the pressure. They really pulled it out of the bag, I think, and I really wouldn’t be surprised if we saw them on a lot more things going forward, not just the Blizzard events but events in general.
"The potential for the new casters to grow is huge."
Let’s be frank, your career only started going big, how do you see your future as a caster?
Hopefully busy (laughs). I think that’s the key one. I’m actually doing these esports shenanigans full time now, so I rely on jobs obviously to pay things like rent. But yeah, I’m working really hard and luckily I’m being asked to multiple events, I’ve still got a few more coming up in the next month or so, so that’s really good. But my overall goal is to just go and cast BlizzCon. You know, go and cast the world championship finals, that’s the goal. I’m pretty lucky being asked now. Just over a year and a few months ago was the first time I ever cast. So, in a year I’ve done really well and I’m happy with where I am, but I’m always looking to improve. Like, something that was good about going to the American prelims was the only person there out of all the casters that I’ve even met before was Frodan, so I got to meet even more people like TJ and Brian Kibler, look at how they work and honestly, my approach is just constant learning.
What is your thought on the Hearthstone casting scene in general. Obviously everybody wants to get as many gigs as possible, but still the Hearthstone scene is quite friendly in its nature. How is that among casters? Is everybody supportive to you or is there a bit of competition or is it more like friendly competition?
In terms of all the EU casters, you know, you have Gnimsh, Sottle, Savjz, Lothar who cast, they are really friendly and in terms of competition, at least from my end it’s very naturally understood that if someone, say Sottle gets offered a gig over me, that’s cool for him! And then if I can go for him, it’s awesome. I think everyone’s happy for each other that they’re getting gigs and we understand that there’s no weird trying to steal people’s jobs thing going on whatsoever. Maybe there is, though, maybe we caught on to something (laughs). But from my understanding, companies or whoever approach us and if we can do the job, we can do it, great. And if we can’t, all of us then go: “I can’t do this, but how about this guy or these guys or that guy.” And we always try and cycle the work through, because we’re all friends, we’ve all cast with each other now plenty of times and we all talk quite often, so we’re all friends. I think it works really well actually.
Now recently you split away from ManaLight. There are casters who are on a team, Frodan is with Tempo Storm obviously, Brian Kibler is with Brian Kibler Gaming…
(laughs) Noxious and Complexity, well Sottle and Complexity as well.
Right, Nick (or Aquablad) is with London Conspiracy. What was the reason for you to decide “I’m going for myself now”?
So, it was sort of fifty/fifty. I mean, I enjoyed being on ManaLight because my teammates were really good and they’ve got some up and coming players people should really look out for. If I would join a team again, which I could potentially do, I would just want a good team. You know, like a good group of people to work with and progress towards something, but in terms of ManaLight it was sort of a mutual issue where they wanted to move their funding into another esport and they didn’t have the funding to continue Hearthstone, which is fair enough, but to be honest, it didn’t affect me too heavily.
