pronax: "We are in good shape"

We start today's DreamHack Bucharest coverage with an interview featuring n!faculty's in-game leader, Markus "pronax" Wallsten.

Wallsten's team showed promise already earlier in the summer when they took NiP to their limits at DreamHack Summer, but left Jönköping disappointed as his Publiclir.se were eliminted in groups.

After joining n!faculty in early July, the Swedes did a whole lot better at DreamHack Valencia, where they were able to top the competition to claim their first international title.

pronax & co will go up against tough competition this weekend

With no top teams present in Valencia and such a large amount of online leagues being played over the course of the past two months, it's been hard to gauge just how good n! are, but that'll soon change.

DreamHack Bucharest will be the Swedes' first true test since joining the German organization, and will also serve as Finn "karrigan" Andersen's debut in his new squad.

How have you prepared for DreamHack Bucharest? Have you only practiced online or also bootcamped? How well prepared will you be in time for the event? Will we see you in tip top shape?

pronax: The plan was that we were going to bootcamp at Spitfire's place, but unfortunately it was not possible because of other things that got in the way of that. So we have instead just been praccticing online and tried to make a lot of new tactics for the tournament. So even though our pracctice hasn't been ideal, I still think we come prepared and we are in good shape.

There have been a lot of online matches in the past few weeks, do you think this has helped or damaged you coming into a big LAN event? Do you think being able to study other teams’ strats helps or will others studying you hurt you more? How much should we look into your recent performance as an indicator of current form?

pronax: The last weeks have indeed been very busy, and I think that our latest results are a good indicator of our current form. Our results lately have been quite inconsistent, but that's what to expect from a team that just changed one player aswell. But I do think that these matches have benefited us since we have gotten some match experience with karrigan, and that is really important heading in to a tournament.

Also, we have kept in mind while playing these online matches that there will be teams watching, so we have not used all of our tactics, so because of that I'm not particularly worried if other teams have checked our demos.

You've been placed in group B and will start off against Cph Wolves, IGG and HSBG. How do you expect to fare there? Do you see any upsets taking place in the other groups?

pronax: I belive that the first spot in the group will be between us and Cph Wolves, where we will come out on top of course. We have played them two times recently, first time we were still playing with lidde and they played with a stand-in, so I wouldn't count that match as a real indicator, and the second time was in the EMS Cup, but because it was so close to DH Bucharest I don't think they played all out that match and probably saved tactics, just like we did, so you can't look at that match as an indicator either.

But the match about the first spot in the group stage will definitely be an all out war. And looking at the other groups I can't really see any upsets, I guess any of the two favorites in each group could top the group, but I think all the favourite teams will advance.

pronax, Spitfire & co came very close to besting NiP at DHS

If you had a gun to your head and had to guess which placing you would end up at in Bucharest, what would you guess? What placing would you be happy ending up at? How do you think the top three will shape up? Who will surprise in the tournament, both positively and negatively?

pronax: If I had a gun to my head and had to guess I would guess top3 since I won't be happy if we don't make the top 3. But honestly I don't think I can predict the top3 in this tournament, but if I had to guess I would say that top 3 would include us, NiP & VeryGames. And the team I think can surprise in this tournament is Lemondogs, their results have been very good online lately, so I think they can surprise either positively or negatively.

Who in your team needs to play well in order for you to perform at your highest level? Which players from other teams do you think can turn some heads? Any up and coming stars to watch out for?

pronax: For us to play at our highest level everyone has to play their best of course, I think it's important that my calling is on point, karrigan's AWPing will be a very important factor. pyth needs to win some pistol rounds for us, rdl's abillity to lock down the small bombsites will also be very important, and Spitfire needs to keep his overall level of play that he has shown recently. If we manage all this we will be very hard to beat. Looking at all the other teams I think that Lemondog's twist is the player to look out for, he is such a talented player and he will definitely turn some heads.

How do you see the addition of karrigan affecting your team? How is he as a player compared to lidde? Where do you see yourself in the world rankings once he's settled in?

pronax: karrigan & lidde actually have two very different playing styles, they are both really good at what they do, but something karrigan has that we lacked in the team before is a great amount of experience. The biggest difference in the team now from before is that he is helping me out a lot with the calling. He has changed my way of thinking in certain scenarios and gives constant feedback, so he has really helped us out in a short amount of time to get us prepared for Bucharest.

I wouldn't know where to place us in the world rankings since we havent played a tournament yet and I have no idea how good we actually will be. But I feel very good about this lineup and we will just have to wait and see :).

Coming up next will be an interview with Serbian Refuse's Nikola "NiKolinho" Kovač, who will attend just his second international LAN after knocking out Lemondogs at Mad Catz Vienna.

We will also publish our preview for DreamHack Bucharest later today, and possibly one more pre-event interview. You can expect our viewer's guide to go out tomorrow.