"PlaymatE has evolved a lot"

fragster: Hi Brian, MeetYourMakers was undergoing some changes recently. Can you tell how this got to happen?

Brian 'MaNia-' Strandby: We have just been really inactive during the Christmas holidays and after a while without really practicing or playing together, we slowly drifted away from each other. We needed some changes within the team and with miGGel and AngeL joining 'DDT', we had a good opportunity to make a new team and hopefully we will be stronger than ever.

You had some roster problems with Maelk going inactive (or not) and H4nn1 joining again (or not). What happened to their plans?

MaNia-: Maelk was gonna go inactive during his start on his new school, also he didn't really feel motivated to play DotA back then, but now I think Maelk feels more motivated after the addition of Lacoste and PlaymatE. H4nn1 went back to play HoN and WoW, since he had problems with playing in the same team as AngeL. Now that he is one of the best HoN players, I don't see him coming back to DotA.

Ducky stated that one reason for the departure of miGGel and AngeL was the fact that they were forced to play heroes they did not like. You picked many times lately, how do you comment that?

MaNia-: That's not true at all! They always got to play the heroes they wanted to play. I don't know where he has got the impression of them being forced to play certain heroes. miGGel normally plays heroes like Sven, Tide, Puck, Lion while AngeL plays Storm, Shaker, Shadowfiend mostly. I have never heard them complain on the heroes they got to play during our period together. Moreover they are playing the exact same heroes for 'DDT'.

You hired PlaymatE and Lacoste. How did you approach to them, or did you test any other players as well?

MaNia-: It actually went very fast. We knew we wanted to get PlaymatE on the team again and we thought of players who we felt would fit well into our playstyle. PlaymatE mentioned Lacoste and after practicing some games with both of them, we decided to take them both in. They both play extremely well and are both very aggressive in their playstyle.

PlaymatE already played with you in MeetYourMakers but he left after a short time. Are you confident that it will work out now?

MaNia-: Yes, I feel like PlaymatE has evolved a lot since last time he was in MYM. He plays more offensive and can play all heroes, so there won't be any problems. Also having a five-man-lineup instead of an eight-man-lineup like in the old MYM, should give him more confidence to do his best in the games he plays. Often having more than five-man-lineups makes it more difficult because someone might get neglected or under-appreciated.

Are you going to change your game style and player roles with the new ones or will they just take in the part of AngeL and miGGel?

MaNia-: We are just trying to get the teamplay working at the moment, and seeing which heroes people wanna play the most. I just play the heroes that are left after the others have picked theirs, but almost all our players can play all kind of different heroes, so we don't think too much of the restrictions in the picking phase. Hopefully we can give Maelk freedom to pick whatever lineup he wants.

On Wednesday you played against Mainline in EMS semi-finals and you had some problems with the host-bot. What is your opinion about those bots and about playing versus American or Asian teams on them?

MaNia-: I don't have any problems with host-bots in general. We just got unlucky and ran into a long line of problems which led to a bit harassing from both parts. (laughs) Normally the games that are hosted on host-bots run smoothly. I have not tried playing vs. an Asian team on an Asian host-bot yet, so I can't comment on the delay on those.

Would you like to play or scrim against Asian teams if such bots make it possible under relatively fair conditions?

MaNia-: Yeah, I would like to do that if the ping is not too bad. It is always refreshing playing versus Asian teams.

Recently it is a bit up and down for the DotA scene. On the one hand some well known organizers like Dreamhack are dropping DotA and on the other a lot of new tournaments like CMStorm or ESWC are popping up or coming back to the game. What is your opinion on that?

MaNia-: I'm glad that ESWC is back up again and supporting DotA. It really gives me a lot of motivation to keep playing DotA. I think it was okay for Dreamhack to drop the game, since it was a BYOC anyway which made it hard for good international teams to join. Hopefully 2010 will be a great year for DotA LANs.

Dreamhack picked up Heroes of Newearth instead and a few days ago fnatic hired a HoN team as kind of replacement for their DotA team. What do you think about the whole 'HoN is going to replace DotA' discussion?

MaNia-: HoN has a great engine and they have a company behind them, which is what DotA is lacking. I hope Valve and Icefrog will create a new game of DotA. I have played few HoN games and didn't really get that into it but it looks like a fun game too, so it will most likely have success.

Former Blight Gaming is now playing for the Asian sponsor Nirvana which will pay the team a monthly reward and some trips to LANs. Do you think this offer is reliable and what could it mean for DotA getting more professional?

MaNia-: I really hope he's legit and will keep paying them. They are a really talented team and deserve a good sponsor. I hope to see them at the upcoming LANs, it's always a pleasure meeting these guys. I hope more teams get better sponsors, so people can allow themselves to treat DotA as a real eSport. It's just hard for Europeans to focus 100% on DotA since we can't spend a whole day on just practicing like many Asian teams do.

Which teams would you consider as the top 5 in Europe and overall at the moment?

MaNia-: Europe: MYM, DDT, Nirvana, TS!, DTS (in no specific order).
Worldwide: EHOME, Ks, Little, LGD, Nirvana.cn.

Sounds like a challenge for your EDC game vs. TeG not naming them here.

MaNia-: Well, I think TeG is unstable.

So all Asian teams are better than the European ones?

MaNia-: Yes, at the moment since they get to focus 100% on DotA.

How long are you planning to still play DotA?

MaNia-: I will play until I feel demotivated!

Anything you'd like to add?

MaNia-: Shoutout to our fans, hope we will get strong again. I also wanna thank MYM, Razer, PUMA and CHIEFTEC for sponsoring us.