"At MSI We Relied Too Much on Each Other — So We Reduced Communication in Scrims" — Zeph on KC's Reset

Do you think international teams would even scrim you, once you're qualified for Worlds?

Of course. In those periods there are two things: Korean teams doing tryouts for next year who want to practise and play the meta, and the Worlds teams who simply want to play. So there's no reason we wouldn't get practice, honestly.

Let's come back to that busy stretch. You had the bootcamp at T1 in Korea, two weeks before the MSI. What was missing in the adaptation — did you need more time?

The thing is, we had the practice but we weren't 100% sure — we're not bad in scrims — so we weren't really sure whether we'd play what we ended up playing, whether we'd run the same kinds of drafts as in Spring. And since we did well with our Spring drafts against the Korean team that was bootcamping, we told ourselves we'd continue on that and it would work. But once we got to MSI, the meta of teams like T1 was totally different.

When you're drafting, coming from a double-range bot lane into that, it's not a shock exactly, it's an adaptation that has to be made. And relative to the number of scrims we had left before we played, it wasn't enough. And especially, when we lost games, we'd tell ourselves — maybe it's not so bad? Are we really sure? I don't know, I think it's still fine. And in reality it was very strong, and we just didn't adapt at the right moment.

What's your analysis of that MSI — what went wrong? Was it really just that, an adaptation that came too late?

Adaptation that came too late, and the way we were working was bad too. We were relying too much on each other's work instead of being focused on ourselves — whether coaching staff or players. It's not a criticism at all, it's more that we assumed everyone would do the work, and it showed in the drafts against Team Liquid, in the games, in the decisions. It costs you a lot — you lose too quickly.

Where does that come from, in your view — starting to rely too much on each other and forgetting the individual side?

It's not easy to say.

I think it comes from a certain insecurity.

In general, if people don't know what to pick, what to play, it's because they don't know what they want to do. If you don't know what to pick, it's because you're not comfortable on anything, you don't know what matchup you want to play. And it's the same in how you play — if you don't know which fight you're going to take, it's because you don't know what you want to do in the game. Because if you know those things, it's very simple to make decisions. We'll try — if they're there, we smash them; if they're not, we take everything. The decisions are generally very simple.

Did that realisation come right after MSI, or later with hindsight? And how did you go about getting everyone more focused on themselves?

The first thing is that coming out of MSI, playing individually is basically what changed — just the way we review, the way we practise.

One thing we still do today is that, in scrims game 1, we don't talk. We're not even on Discord.

The idea is that by removing communication, people can't rely on others, because they can't ask 'do you want to do this? I'd like to do this, can we do this?' You can't ask questions, so since you have no one to talk to, you just play your game.

The first thing is that when you do that, you end up in a situation where if there are decision-making problems, you can more easily see where the problem is and who's responsible for it. Because the people who rely on communication end up having to adapt, and they struggle to adapt, so you can identify the problems more easily that way.

The second thing is that when we then played the game twos, we'd put communication back but you weren't allowed to ask questions.

You're only allowed to give information, affirmations — to avoid the situations where you end up going 'can we? can we do this?' Your guy plays; if he can go, he goes, if he can't, he doesn't. It was a bit hard at the start because the players couldn't ask questions and they struggled, but over the course of that week we improved a lot on it. And again, we just changed the way we practised the meta — we played the meta, we played the Camille, we played Syndra, Viktor, Ziggs, all of it. That made a big difference.

Is that still in place in scrims — communication in game one and two? Something you plan to keep?

It depends. Communication is a great tool, but that doesn't mean you use it perfectly and get all its value every time. I think it's a tool we'll keep, maybe not until the end, but I'm convinced we've had games we threw — notably against G2 — where without communication the early might have gone better.

I'm convinced that without communication we make fewer errors.

A classic example: someone says it'd be good to contest a scuttle, and it's not good for the lanes, so logically you'd never contest it — but when you're on voice and you ask 'can we?', people click over, and once they're at the scuttle they go 'oh, actually we can't.' Instead of thinking, they end up in that situation. Obviously there's an opportunity cost — sometimes with communication you'd secure a kill angle, a '3-2-1 go, I've got flash, I've got my E in two.' But that's how it is.

At the start of the year you told me this team was a lot of very good individuals, but that as a group it didn't necessarily work that well. How do you explain that the team is at its best almost by playing purely through those individualities in the end?

For me, what makes a group is the individuals — it's not the group being strong, it's the level of your individuals and the decisions that get made.

Every time something happens, someone is responsible. It's not to place blame, it's more to identify the problems and find solutions. There's always someone more responsible than the others in a given situation.

Of course sometimes responsibility is shared, but generally it's like that. I think on the contrary, having strong individuals — as long as they can be responsible and make decisions on their own — makes the group better. There's no reason it wouldn't.

Reapered said that at MSI he eased off the drafts and changed his approach afterwards, realising it wasn't necessarily the best thing to do. How did the two of you reorganise, and can you elaborate on your role in the team today?

For me, it's always been the same, even with Melzhet — he's head coach, I'm assistant.

I can suggest with all my heart to pick certain champions, and if the head coach says we do something else, we'll often do it, unless a player is really against it.

I think maybe after the final against G2 he asked himself some questions, because there were different calls during that game five on how to draft. And with that different call, and the fact that we lost, he took it very personally — it was his responsibility, he made the decision, it didn't go well. After that, at MSI, he was more relaxed, more away from the drafts. But in the end, like he said, drafts are too important.

We're at a very high level with G2, we're very close, you lose a draft, you lose the game, that's how it is.

You reduce your chances of winning by 10%, whatever it is.

Viper told us that at the highest level, drafts matter more than individual skill.

It's possible — it's real, actually. Once individual skills are roughly matched, it's the champion interactions that make the difference. That's how I see it.

So today, do you handle the drafts more in scrims — what the players need to practise — while Reapered has the final word on stage?

It's a preparation. In the end, we have roughly the same idea of how to draft in general. My goal is to prepare as much as possible — to show Reapered what the drafts will more or less look like, what direction we take, which ban, why this ban is better than that one. And once the direction is launched, we generally don't stray too far. It's just that when there's a specific call — for example against Vitality, when we played Nocturne 1-2 — there were lots of options in that situation, I'd proposed several, and Reapered said we go Nocturne 1-2, and from there the draft continues but you have to adapt from that moment. Choosing a direction like that is where he has a lot of responsibility, because maybe I'd prefer to pick something else, maybe two different champions, maybe Nocturne with something else — but we took that 1-2 direction.

My goal is to be as prepared as possible in that kind of situation and to be able to adapt in the moment. And I think at MSI that's something we did badly — we weren't aligned on the meta. For example, when Team Liquid picked Mel into our Seraphine, at that moment we could have picked a lot of champions, but the reason we didn't pick Ashe is that we didn't want to use it after what happened against T1 — even though we'd committed to the idea that the guys had never played Mel in their lives, they're not very good on the champion, we'd beat them if we pick our champs despite the Mel.

Now it's totally different, that stuff doesn't exist, because we're much more responsible for the draft, much more sure of what we want to play as a team and how to react in situations.

At MSI that was less the case.

Can you elaborate on your role in the team? What's your day-to-day work beyond the drafts?

Beyond that, it's individual reviews with players from time to time — it depends, because we're on timelines where we have to do team reviews too, and not all players work the same way, whether it's with Yike or with Busio, like during MSI. Post-MSI, we reviewed all the games all the time with Busio. It's reviewing, setting team points, facilitating communication between players. Sometimes players need someone asking questions behind them so they ask themselves the right thing in review — instead of giving them an answer, having someone who says 'and this, why don't we do this?' so it sparks a discussion between them and they can find solutions together. Out of the game, with the replay, I can find solutions. But the goal is to train them to see it in-game.

Did you expect to bounce back that well at EWC, especially after the opening loss to Gen.G, did you expect to be that strong?

Yes and no. I think vs Gen.G we made a draft error — a bad priority, it happens, it's a BO1, you lose. The thing is, we'd scrimmed AL

In the end, aren't they the GOATs?

They're very solid, very solid. And it's just funny — when we played DK we gave them their champs. Little anecdote: we were playing AL in the morning, they ban Viktor, Camille, Jarvan 1-2-3 I think, and we're going 'what are they doing?' Really weird at the time, we didn't get it. Then we play against DK in the evening, right before their BO1 — what do they pick? Viktor, Camille, Jarvan 1-2-3. The guys sniped the bans, I don't know how they did it. I'll say no more, but I just find it hilarious that at EWC you play both teams who play each other and you can see both teams' bans. As for the bounce-back, after TSW and Sentinels I think we used the opportunity well. AL was by far the easiest team to get, the one we were most confident against, and we beat them 2-0. Then we play T1 — and you still see it today, T1 against a KT side that's a bit unsure of themselves, they throw the games like they did against us.

I didn't expect us to beat T1 that way, but it shows it's a game of errors and you never know. You can always win games.

Would you say T1 weren't in great form, that it helped? Even if it takes nothing away from the performance.

No, it takes nothing away. They're insanely strong in certain areas. It's just that — game three, for example, on paper: we play like that against DK in their current form and the game's over in 18 minutes. But against T1, they played badly, they made errors. We made errors too, and then we said, guys, the game is cooked, let's go fight this and come back miraculously. Those are things that on paper aren't supposed to happen, but if big teams like T1 and AL can do it, then... we're not that bad.

How did you experience that T1 win, beyond the analytical side — emotionally? There's a clip going around where you break a chair...

The chair's fine, it's a plastic chair. I wanted to get to the door to go see the players. First off, super happy to have beaten T1. It's not something that happens often. And the way we beat them, that's what's so cool. The game, they're losing — then we take a fight, and we win. It's a real up-and-down, an emotional rollercoaster. I'd never beaten T1 in my life.

The 3-0 to Dplus KIA to finish EWC — did it spoil the party a bit? Or is it a blessing in disguise, making you realise you can beat these teams but you're still a bit far off when they're in form?

I don't think we played super well in that series. But they were surgical. Watching those games, I really feel like they knew everything about our prep — they played with a ward permanently, they knew everything we did in the game.

It was like they had our voice comms in their headset. Watching the game, I'd tell myself the guys' clicks are fully aware, and that's what made the difference.

ShowMaker ultra-solid on Cassiopeia, he knows everything happening — when he's weak side he respects perfectly but makes you want to waste time, and the second you go into the fog he one-shots the better trade in my mid. Those guys play like that very well. When I say they were surgical, it's that even watching the game, we had a few fight opportunities, we didn't take them, and once you've lost those opportunities you have no more — and they just snowball from there. Not like T1. That's what made the difference.

Are they the best team in the world right now, for you?

In terms of form, yeah, they're very strong. Really, really strong. No reason to think otherwise, even with a BLG

The Road Trip felt like a bit of a coronation — a reversal, where you have the momentum and G2 lost it. Do you feel like you're the favourites of this LEC, that G2 are a bit more vulnerable than before, with the meta and the coaching change?

I don't know if we're favourites, because historically G2

They're always surprising, always repairing, always coming back. So I wouldn't say we're favourites. But as a team, the more we work on a meta, the stronger we get on it. And as long as the meta doesn't move too much, I think we'll be very solid. Right now I think we're playing well, and there's no reason it won't continue.

Riot are going to nerf roaming supports — did you see?

If there's a new meta, we'll relearn it, and the more we go into that meta, the more we'll scale into it. In this kind of 2-1-2 meta with roaming support, Busio is really strong, a butcher. Busio played with Inspired

When you look at today's meta, which has nothing to do with the pre-MSI one where you were already very good — does adapting to this meta reassure you that whatever the meta at Worlds, you'll be able to adapt?

Yeah, that's it. It reassures me.

In short tournaments, the most important thing is to discover the meta as fast as possible and be sharp on what it looks like — watching other leagues, seeing what people do, and testing what other leagues play even if you don't know whether it's good, out of curiosity.

That's the most important thing, because you can arrive at Worlds, play three matches, be out — you have three days to play these things. In that situation it's just a flip: you flip on whether you have the meta. If you have it, great, you can go far. If you don't, good night, you've lost.

So a bootcamp in Korea before Worlds would be the best way to be ready?

I don't know if it's THE best way, but it would help a lot. Let's remember that the goal is to win Worlds. Will it increase our chances by 3%, 5%? Of course.

I'd even say, depending on how we use the bootcamp, it could double our chances, triple them, or even reduce them if we play it badly — but that's our decision, how we use it.

I think it's a must for any team that wants to go to Worlds. And I'd even say, if you have a long-term project — say we don't make Worlds but we want to keep all the same players — you'd want to go to Korea for next year, to practise during Worlds with the Worlds teams. It's important.

Is it something you have in mind — the fans have a bit of a trauma from last year, that there's a step you can't miss this year?

No, it wasn't really in mind. For me it's pretty chill, we play and that's it.

There's no reason we don't make Worlds — our current level is very, very solid. We're top one, top two. And I feel there's a gap.

You feel you're above the rest, with G2?

A bit. I think the MKOI-type teams aren't far from the same level, almost at the same level. MKOI are very inconsistent, which means if they peak high they can pass us on a given day. So you never know. But generally, over the consistency of the year, they're much more inconsistent than us. For now that seems to be the case.

You've been crushing MKOI this year overall.

Yeah, but we'll see. Like I said, one day you lose, they're the GOATs. You'd better hope it's not for the Worlds qualification BO. So at least you win and you lose, and there's no reason — I think we're solid.

What are the ways to avoid that bad day? Do they even exist?

Given the level of confidence we have, it's just a question of practice. Being sure of your footing, confident in what you'll draft.

Honestly, since the EWC, we're so serene in the drafts and how we play that we're much more relaxed — there's less uncertainty. We go into drafts knowing what's happening.

Even in game three against G2, we're aware of what's going to happen the whole time. Even in tense moments on stage, we're very serene. I don't think there are magic tricks — there's nothing new to do. You just have to keep doing what we're doing.

A last word for the fans?

Thanks for carrying us in Paris, guys, it felt really good. I hope you come to Berlin and invade the studio, so we can win all our matches with your support — because I had this thought that, so far, we haven't lost a game in Paris. Maybe it's entirely thanks to the crowd. We have no idea if that's the case or not, so until we're proven otherwise, I'm going to choose to believe it. EWC was in Paris. Every time we've gone to Paris, it's gone well. We'll see at the final, because it's in Nice — we'll find out if it's just Paris or France in general.