Welcome fellow sloths, today we are going to have a delightful chat with Season 9's Epic Cup winners, Team Simple Geography. After finishing 6th in Division 4, they battled through the group stages with some closely fought victories before marching through the knockout stage with some impressive performances.
Hey there! Firstly thank you very much for your time and congratulations again on winning the Epic Cup!
To get started if you could tell us a little about yourselves- who you are, your history with Heroes Lounge and your role within the team.
DarkWanderer: Everyone just calls me Dark (it's just easier), I am the Main Tank player for TSG and am proud to be. I've been playing in Heroes Lounge since Season 6 starting in the lowest division and working my way up with a few different teams in the past. I have greatly improved as a tank player and have gained so many friends in the process.
Aloname: I'm Alon, TSG offlane for the first half of the season until I stepped down for the second half. Been active in Lounge since season 1 with a bunch of the people who are on this team (Narcisit Seals, Throw inc). At the moment of not being part of the core roster I do a side gig as team psychologist.
Hidderino: I'm Hidde, I've been playing on and off since season 3 on many different teams and roles. right now i'm griefer offlaner on TSG.
Mienien: Mienien, pronounced minion, main healer for TSG. Most flamed/pinged role on the team for obvious reasons #Blamehealer. I occasionally do a good job stopping my team inting and get a decent amount of follow ups. Currently second best KDA according to Lounge but we will see if that holds next season.
I started playing in season 2 if I am not mistaken and have been in several different teams of varying skill level (Deported Support, N.E.W.T, Gaming in the Rhythm) all of which have taught me a great deal but ultimately lead me to this amazing group of people that I am proud of and happy to call my team.
Drakoni: I'm Drakoni. I've been playing in Lounge since season 1, started as mage player in Narcissist Seals, then played Support (aka Malfurion) for Throw Inc. For TSG I'm back to throwing fire and ice spells at my opponents, as well as when2meets at my team to organise our games.
Rianor: Hi :OSSloth: i‘m Rianor, joined lounge back in season 2 with Throw Inc, where we established that division 2 is a real place :SirSloth: (in playoffs) we continued that team for 4 seasons until uni / work schedules made us disband. I took a break for one season and am now going into the third season herding Simple Geography. For the team i am kinda the Swiss army knife, doing most of our scouting, drafting and shot calling, while playing the flex role (which mostly involves various shades of Maiev)
So Team Simple Geography is now going into its third season, how did you all come together as a team? Also what is the origin of your team name? Do you just prefer Geography to Geometry or is it deeper than that?
Hidderino: I joined because I wanted to still play in lounge and I wasn't on a team at the time. With the exception of Dark whom I didn't know very well at all, I've known all of the people on the team for a while now and thought it was the perfect team to join as a substitute for. As for the Geography vs Geometry, I'm not sure, it's because we didn't want to fully copy that voice line I think but could definitely be wrong about that
Darkwanderer: So I got asked to join by Ravatar the former el capitan as I posted in the HL lft channel- since then we've been playing together as a team pretty much. In regards to the geography, it's a meme- Mienien should probably tell the story
Mienien: This team was founded by Ravatar, he knew that a lot of amazing people were looking for a team and well, here we are. As for the name, as many people know, I tend to ramble on voice about anything... on that particular day, I was having a rather muddled up and not all together there day so when Rava took Hanzo I started trying to talk about how difficult I found "Simple Geography", in usual Rava style he made a joke about it, team had a good laugh with added comments and it became a meme, we had a funny logo and so it just kinda stuck.
You finished 6th in Division 4 last season, looking back did this match your expectations or do you feel you deserved to finish lower/higher?
And going into the Epic Cup how confident were you that you could go on to win the entire thing?
Mienien: I think we expected to do a little better in Div 4 but were also realistic seeing as everyone had their own personal IRL stuff going on. As for the Epic Cup, we wanted to win that for sure! Rianor did some insane scouting, we all tried to catch the matches of other teams when we weren't playing, there was a lot of effort being put into the Cup. We also just somehow worked better as a team during the Cup, it felt like we knew what was needed and were in high spirits which made the atmosphere and game play better. Hard works pays off, i am super proud of the team.
Darkwanderer: I mean... we played better than most of the teams and I feel that we put up a good fight against the teams we lost to. We deserved the win in the match ups we had.
Hidderino: I don't particularly feel we deserved to be higher or lower considering how we did in the season, we had good and bad games so i don't feel 6th was a horrible place for us to end. apparently it didn't matter in the end since we won the entire thing anyway so i'm completely fine with what happened, I didn't go in with a lot of expectations, I really only wanted to do better than I did in the previous season I made play offs
Drakoni: Given our performance overall I'm fine with the placement. We didn't have a single 0-2 loss, it was always 1-2s if we did, so I knew we can play well. For playoffs, like in the season, Rianor did an amazing job at preparing drafts and scouting, so I went into the playoffs confidently that we could do our best at least, even if we wouldn't win. It all worked out tho.
Rianor: Our finish last season was decent, we had great matches all around and didnt lose 0:2 once. It was a bit unfortunate that we couldn't play most of the other teams that qualified for the cup with how the Swiss system matched us. For the cup itself, after group stage went a bit shaky, we went into playoffs with clear plans and lots of focus. I wouldn't call it "confident to win it" but we definitely wanted to give a great show
We saw some interesting drafts from you in the Epic Cup involving pandas, double support comps and more. Do you feel like drafting is your team's greatest strength? If not, what is?
Mienien: Rianor is our superpower, we will have well structured and organised fun at all times.
Hidderino: Shhh dont give away our strats! :Kapp:
Darkwanderer: We Scout, We Draft, We Destroy (Team Slogan Patent)
Hidderino: Except when we don't :Kapp:
Rianor: Our drafts during the cup were prepared. We have one main style of draft and then practiced a couple more specific drafts before. Over multiple matches we were also allowed to recycle them :OSSloth: so had some more in our pockets that sadly couldn't be shown :GulDansGame:
I think our greatest strength is being decisive when playing aggressive and snowballing from kills.
What was your favourite moment/game of yours from the Cup?
Hidderino: Getting to play Ragnaros, it's not often I'm allowed out of the Leoric prison so when i get to play my favourite offlaner i'm a very happy man
Darkwanderer: I think just being on that high of winning throughout the day was great. Tanks aren’t exactly too interesting at the moment... since there isn’t a pick where people go “wow I cant believe he picked that”
Mienien: Everyone being happy with how they played individually, it just made us all feel good and encourage each other more. :FeelsAmazingMan: I mean, there was that Juice Pirates thing though..... gg I guess
Drakoni: For me it's that I got to play LiLi... twice! She's such a niche hero who I love to play and rarely get to. And just overall seeing everyone improve and the team improve as a whole is great. Playoffs being the peek of everyone being focused and ready to play and just having a good time in that.
Rianor: Not really a moment but just the high spirit in the team throughout the day, but if I had to pick it would be busting out the Kerrigan :TSGKerrigasm:
Looking to the upcoming season you have been promoted to Division 3 after last seasons success, what are your aims for this season?
Darkwanderer: Spring memes and beat teams... I guess
Aloname: More juice pirate :coxKappa:
Hidderino: I personally would like to reach play offs again this season and see how we stack up against higher end teams.
Mienien: To have more well structured and organised fun.... maybe git gud :WeSmart: :Kappa:
Rianor: Aiming for playoffs again, and show some more spicy drafts
If you have any shout-outs/final words, speak now or forever hold your memes.
Hidderino: Shoutout to my teammates, our friends in lounge and the lounge staff for keeping this league alive
Darkwanderer: Giving everyone a solid :Darksmile:
Mienien: I suppose I should say thank you to team, am I doing this right? I mean I guess you all kinda did something to get us here so I dunno, thanks I guess. As for other Sloths in Lounge, to those that supported us and those that have been kind enough to organise HL, a huge thank you!
Aloname: Shout out to my team - they've been incredible friends and incredible players throughout the whole season and hopefully we'll just go stronger going into the next season
Rianor: Shoutouts to teeeaaaam BabyRage and lounge for keeping up this amazing community :SlothHiYo:
So that's all for this interview, a massive thank you to Team Simple Geography for taking part. We are currently ready for some exciting Heroes of the Storm action with EU Season 10, keep an eye on the calendar and in our Discord for games being casted!
There is still time to join the fun over in NA with Season 3 signups closing on the 4th of August, you can find the signup page here
If you want to get in touch, head on over to our Discord!
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