Recently crowed the ESWC Masters champion with SK Gaming as well as winning the Dreamhack tournament, Loda is interviewed about his strats, his life and why he now looks like a mmember of the beatles.
What equipment do you use when playing Dota(mouse, keyboard, earphone, etc..)?
SK.Loda: All my equipment is from Steelseries! I've got a steelkeys 6G keyboard, a steelseries ikari lasermouse and a steelseries headset. They only make really really good gaming gear and I owe them for it :)
Who do you think can compete with you at Mid Solo? It was said you lost to Zhaoyun, and as a result you used ID "Banana" for one week. Is that true? Zhaoyun said PGG was the Solo no. 1, what’s your opinion?
SK.Loda: Actually I don't find myself to be THE best solo player, everyone near the top should be able to compete with me! I'm very very good when im in the right mood. Though there are some heroes I believe almost no one CAN beat me with especially the Shadow Fiend.
PGG is a very very good solo player and I believe him to be one of the best but DotA is so much more than solo mid. Zhaoyun can only solo mid, and when it comes to it he's not even that good ^^ He has beaten me but I have beaten him several times so I don't find it interesting to discuss.
Was the reason for which you left MYM that they let you play too much assistant heroes? If so, do you think ns and levent were leaving VP and MYM for the same reason? Although assistant is important, Dota is a Star sports, nobody would like to stay behind all the time.
"Of course there were some days when I got pissed, but you see some flowers need more time to bloom than others "
SK.Loda:No the reason to why I left MYM was that I found myself in a position I didn't want myself to be in ^^ When we made MYM out of JoY I was the leader, but after some time in MYM Maelk had pretty much taken over the leadershiprole and the team believed that he would do a better job than me. I played support and gankers and I have no problem whatsoever with that, but I thought that I could play carry better than the people that Maelk decided should play it ^^ I lost the urge to play DotA is MYM so I found no other way than to leave the team :) Ofc I love being a "star" player, but sometimes I actually wished I wasn't that hyped as I am ^^
Who invented the ‘Global Lineup’, and who was the creator?
SK.Loda: Hm, the Global Lineup was a creation of me and Bogdan I believe. And that time it was the two of us making up strategies and once when we played vs World Eaters in a scrim they used a similar strategy vs us. We believed that we could perfect it and be able to execute it much better as a team so voila, after that we had the global strat! One of the best strats there are if played right in my opinion.
During of 6.43 and 6.48, Bogdan and Tompo were not world class, how did you manage to keep them in the lineup?
SK.Loda: Well you know I find it really important to make the team fit together perfectly, and since im good friends with Bogdan and Tompa I gave them the space to get better etc. I believe that they have both come a long way on the road so I'm glad that we stuck together. Of course there were some days when I got pissed, but you see some flowers need more time to bloom than others ;)
Are you in charge of all the SK lineup and strategy in a match?
SK.Loda: In SK we usually make strategies together and when it comes to picks we do them together over ventrilo etc. But sometimes I take the leading role and control the picks with an IRON FIST!!!
When I do that we usually do well, haha, but to be honest we do the picks together, I have a bit more to say maybe but we always listen to each other. My favourite stratmaker atm is KWOM :D
A big characteristic of SK is that each player has multiple choice of his hero. It that a must in your team, or just everyone likes it like that?
SK.Loda: Well in my opinion we can all play a lot of heroes well but we also have some types of heroes that we do better with than others. We change heroes a lot to keep in shape etc, some days bogdan can have a better QoP than me or the other way around. You should play the kind of hero you feel that you want to play! That's when you play your best in my opinion.
The current SK team seems unstoppable. How long do you think your team will manage to keep this up? Who will be your potential challengers?
"But sometimes I take the leading role and control the picks with an IRON FIST!"
SK.Loda: Atm I wouldn't say we are unstoppable, but we are all practicing for ESWC. Until then we won't play as good as we usually do... We're trying to get our teamplay and strats worked out together so we're a bit unstable atm in my opinion. But we're gonna bootcamp at a Internetcafe some days before ESWC so I'm sure we'll be back in top shape! I think that we will not be as good as we were after ESWC because we got a lot of stuff starting then and won't have as much time to play. The main contenders to us are Mouz, MYM and rushed.
Have you ever watched replays of Chinese clans? For example, the new ACG champion EHOME. How do you evaluate the Chinese Dota clans? Do you have any suggestions?
SK.Loda: Actually im very sad to say I barely watch any replays of chinese clans :( Though once I remember that I watched Ehome play in some Asian tour.
They really impressed me and I've been looking forward to playing them for a long long time! Hopefully we'll meet each other in China if SK will go to a tournament over there =) I would really love to visit China since it seems to be such a cool country and I've only heard good stuff about it.
What do you think of the "earthquake" of the Russian Dota? Does that surprise you?
SK.Loda: Hm I wasn't that surprised with the Russian DotA scene... It has always been pretty shaky with players changing teams etc but I never thought VP and SP would completely fall apart :( I miss the old dominating VP and would love to play them again.
Do you usually watch the mini map? We all know it’s very important to take use of it. Do you have something special to share?
SK.Loda: Yes I always try to keep one of my eyes on the minimap! It's really really important and that often seperates the good players from the bad.
To have a feeling of what is happening around the map is important when you want to gang or when to run! My tip would be to keep one eye on the real map and one on the minimap ;)
Do you think the strategy of a mature clan more depends on the game version difference or on the individuals?
"I don't find that I dress like the "Beatles" in real life, but at events I just don't care that much"
SK.Loda: Well at the moment I believe that a lot of clans feel that they HAVE to pick late game heroes because of the version... We in SK tries to pick different from other clans but often we find ourselves in situations where we need HARD late game like spectre etc. You will see at least one completely new strat at ESWC though so look forward to that ;) We always call you ‘tiny prince’, but now we seldom see you use him. When can we see your show again?
SK.Loda: Haha well my tiny prince day are over I believe ^^ Nowadays I don't find good situations where he can 100% rape, but I'll keep this in mind and pick him in a game to please my chinese fans.
You always use unpopular heroes. Is that your favourite thing to do, or are you doing this to test something new?
SK.Loda: Hehe well yes I believe that picking unpopular heroes make the enemy a bit afraid and then they don't really know how to play vs them. VP was a good example of a team that picked heroes that were not picked often! And they did this perfectly!
Do you use any 3rd party tool like to define CustomKey?
SK.Loda: Yep I use customkey! I bind the numpad 7 and 8 to 3 and 4 on the keyboard!
You look so handsome, formerly with very fashionable hair. Why do you dress yourself like the "Beatles" now?SK.Loda:Haha this question is good, hmm yea I don't know really what happened? ^^ I find it amusing that you know how I wear my hair! I don't find that I dress like the "Beatles" in real life, but at events I just don't care that much =)
Do you have time to play sports from time to time? From your recent photos, we find you are not as thin as before.
SK.Loda: Yes ofc I do have time to take sports, but I injured my knee some time ago so atm I can not do sports =) But I'll get back into it soon.
Aside from Dota, what PC games do you usually play?
SK.Loda: Hm I don't play much games besides DotA, or yeaaa I do play some CS 1.6 actually =) It's really fun!
To be a little bit private, if you don’t mind, we hear you don’t have girlfriend for the moment. How long will you keep single, for those female Dota fans of yours?
SK.Loda: Haha well im single atm YES, but I do get my fair share of the ladies anyway. I'll be single for as long it takes for me to fall in love again! Until then I'll just be a playboy and spend some short time with one girl after another, haha.
If StarCraft 2 is released, will you still play Dota?
"If I'm good enough I'll play Starcraft2 but I won't play it a lot if I'm not supermegaskilled!"
SK.Loda: I haven't decided yet tbh. I LOVE starcraft, and I really hope Starcraft 2 will be as good! We'll see when that time comes I guess. If I'm good enough I'll play sc2 but I won't play it a lot if im not supermegaskilled!What brands of wear and equipments are you in favor of?
SK.Loda: ben sherman, morris, won hundred. I guess if you mean gaming equip that would be steelseries =)
If possible, would you like to come to China with the whole SK team? Many players here are looking forward to a challenge.
SK.Loda: I'd love to come and visit China! Im sure that if there was an event big enough with good prize money we would come 100%. I really want to go visit China and see if I really have any chinese fans! I also hear you have beautiful women over there and I would love to be introduced to them.
Interviewer: Replays.net.Wufan
Replays.NeT
But overall it is still a very cool and nice country to visit, been there 3 months so dont act like i dont know what im talking about. And besides that chinese people are very kind and funny to hang out with.
So stop acting all knowing about a country if you havnt been there or lived there yourself. And go visit china Loda, nice country, and really really cheap :)
Edit: okay so his msg got deleted, fair :)
loda #1
no more to add.
This answer. It sounds like its comming straight from the steelseries office.
PGG is a very very good solo player and I believe him to be one of the best but DotA is so much more than solo mid. Zhaoyun can only solo mid, and when it comes to it he's not even that good ^^ He has beaten me but I have beaten him several times so I don't find it interesting to discuss.
yep DotA is much more than solo mid.. but you gotta start and learn from solo mid.. i learnt that from my games with you loda (harrassing+creeping alternatively).
ah no wait you sadly dont.
takes ESWC !