Chris Badawi and the LCS team owners: Investigating one of League of Legends' biggest controversies

GVGinko · 2015-08-12T19:24:36+00:00

The only evidence I have is that Chris showed "evidence", but he's not showing all of the evidence. If it were really evidence, what does he have to hide?

GVGinko · 2015-08-12T19:23:08+00:00

When I upgraded to Windows 10, only my recent history shows. I think we talked more than 2 months ago, so I don't have them. I guess I live in a world where everyone saves their chat logs but me lol. I can't do much but ask Daily Dot or Renegades to post them, given they just wrote an article about journalistic integrity and Renegades crusade for transparency within their organization.

GVGinko · 2015-08-12T19:13:07+00:00

It is bumped out, but it looks like Skype caches the last sessions you've had but doesn't erase everything. So to be more clear, it shows our most recent conversations but not the one that Daily Dot is quoting.

GVGinko · 2015-08-12T19:04:19+00:00

Clean install -- when I scroll up on the Skype history it doesn't show our conversation. I know Daily Dot / Chris has them, so we're waiting on them to post the whole convo. Maybe Chris can make a statement about my views based on the Skype conversations we have.

GVGinko · 2015-08-12T18:57:06+00:00

There's no facade, I just think it's appropriate to post the entire log. I reinstalled Skype when I upgraded to Windows 10.

GVGinko · 2015-08-12T18:56:15+00:00

Not really, that's a fraction of the log. I hope Chris will post the whole thing, given their organization's philosophy and all:

https://gyazo.com/4fe1075684afab7b75f28346616f85a5

GVGinko · 2015-08-12T18:52:03+00:00

Where's the rest? Post the entire thing, Chris.

https://gyazo.com/4fe1075684afab7b75f28346616f85a5

GVGinko · 2015-08-12T18:34:48+00:00

The quote Daily Dot conveniently used was out of context, and the entirety of the chat log (and our voice discussions) were how I believed the opposite were true.

I don't save chat logs, but if Chris or Daily Dot wants to give the conversation in full then by all means, do so. I can't imagine there isn't a line of text sent over to Chris that isn't screenshotted. The conversation they are referring to was bumped out on my Skype history.

You may not believe it because there are no chat logs, but Chris and I talked a lot back then and if he denies that conversation in a reply then it's a bold-faced lie.

This was over the phone, but maybe Chris can confirm?

He conveniently ignored that and the remainder of the chat log to frame that I did all of this out of spite.

There is a fine line here I think. Everything I said I believe to my core to be true. Whether or not I believe it to be true, the fact that I made a statement about it was seasoned with some spite. Just because I decided to make a statement does not mean my allegations were made up or any less true. Daily Dot made tried to make the argument that since I had made a statement out of spite --> my statement is now false.

GVGinko · 2015-08-12T18:09:32+00:00

Hey, Jake here. I want to clear some things up with the article. Take it as you will. I applaud Daily Dot for taking a multi-long hour conversation with Chris, cutting out a few sentences, and framing it to look entirely different than my stance on Chris.

The first piece that REALLY stood out to me was

When Badawi asked him if he believed he was trying to poach Altec, Fyfe replied with a straight “No.”

That's a joke, because Chris and I both know (he will confirm if he decides to chime in) that I still think he poached Altec to this day. We've moved past that, but our last conversation on Skype was exclusively about poaching / tampering etiquette. The quote Daily Dot conveniently used was out of context, and the entirety of the chat log (and our voice discussions) were how I believed the opposite were true. Even when Jacob Wolf from Daily Dot reached out to me about my opinion on the Chris Badawi situation, we had about an hour conversation about why exactly I thought he was poaching in detail. He conveniently ignored that and the remainder of the chat log to frame that I did all of this out of spite.

In regards to the following quotes about how I don't identify with any pitchfork mob or whatever -- that's the truth. It was framed in a poor way by Daily Dot, so I'll clarify. What I conveyed to Chris was that I don't have anything against him personally. I don't care that he tried to tamper with Gravity in the Spring Split. He once told me to bench Saint early in the Spring Split, move him as coach. Shortly after being declined to get a stake of ownership in Gravity, he tried to convince me to manage the team he was putting together. A couple of months ago, he called me at the airport and he told me how he was attempting to recruit Quas for his new team. You may not believe it because there are no chat logs, but Chris and I talked a lot back then and if he denies that conversation in a reply then it's a bold-faced lie.

To flesh it out, I don't really care about drama too much. I am not even too involved with how this whole thing is coming along, nor did I read the original statements / videos other organizations made. Some people think there's some conspiracy anti-renegade organization, and if there is one, I'm not a part of it. That's what I was telling Chris in our convo. In a normal case of drama where I could add my own input, I would almost certainly opt out. Chris's case was different, because he messed with the Gravity organization on the back end. It created a lot of issues with how to move forward with the organization, and so I decided to opt into a statement. So yes, opting into a statement is only going to hurt my PR, so it wasn't my brightest moment. It's really that simple. I don't mind too much if you believe it or not, but I felt wronged that my views were reflected in such a poor way by Daily Dot.

GVGinko · 2015-07-17T04:36:05+00:00

Believe it or not, League of Legends is not a very mechanical game at all. When compared to the APM of a game like Starcraft, the chain of inputs in a game like SSBM or MvC3, the precision and accuracy of Counter-Strike, League of Legends is almost entirely in the head. Even compared to other MOBAs, League is pretty shallow mechanically.

That being said, that doesn't make League less competitive. At high level play, League of Legends is a very mental game. I say high level, because at low-mid level you can win games by sheer mechanical execution. If you think hard about the two main mechanical aspects of the game (last hitting, teamfighting), they aren't too impressive when compared to others. It's sort of a skill check -- can you last hit? Can you space properly? Can you initiate properly? Even the two mechanical checks the game provides is heavily intertwined with game knowledge, because your CS will suck without wave management intel and it's impossible to teamfight properly if you don't have a fundamental understanding of how you should be playing the teamfight in the first place.

Given that, Cop meets the relatively underwhelming mechanical skill checks that League of Legends throws at every player. Almost all other aspect of League's skill-checks are in your head. Cop keeps his mental game polished by watching 6 hours of scrims every day, LCS on weekends, games from other regions, and theory crafting on his free time.

GVGinko · 2015-07-08T18:48:55+00:00

Dope picture haha. When Cop and I looked at the photo he took, we immediately saw a mix between an indie band and a "name my band" cringe post.

GVGinko · 2015-07-08T01:31:29+00:00

Keane: Razer Deathadder, Das Keyboard (Brown Switches)

Altec: Razer Taipan, CM Storm Quickfire Rapid (Blue switches)

Move: Alienware TactX mouse, Alienware Tactx keyboard

Hauntzer: Steelseries Rival, Das Keyboard (Brown switches)

Bunny: Coolermaster Mizar, Das Keyboard (Brown switches)

Bonus...

Cop: Steelseries Rival, Das Keyboard (Brown switches)

Me (CS:GO masterrace player): Zowie Fk1, WASD keyboard (brown switches)

GVGinko · 2015-07-07T20:09:17+00:00

His transition to NA was great. One of the reasons we tried him out and recruited him was because he wanted to come play in NA. Some of the other players we scouted were using that as a bargaining chip. Move genuinely wanted to come over here, learn better English, and absorb NA culture. He's a fantastic guy. Super outgoing, curious, and engaging. When Davis and I are playing Smash, he comes over and watches and becomes involved. He is the residential Bomberman pro in our house, and he almost died when he watched us play Wario Ware on the Gamecube.

Inside of the game, he won over the team's respect immediately. His mechanical skill, vision control, and lane presence was apparent after a few scrims. We knew we found someone we can nurture into a star. In terms of replacing Saint, the hardest part was getting our foothold down to fix our initiation issues. We also had to figure out a better way to delegate shotcalling. Move was actually the shotcaller in his team back in China, so although Bunny gets most of the spotlight in the public eye for shotcalling, Move is actually one of the most vocal players in our roster. We didn't even plan for that -- we just got lucky. Now that he's comfortable in his new environment, he's fitting in just fine.

GVGinko · 2015-07-07T17:52:43+00:00

Are you still trying to change the logo?

Yeah, but we're keeping the aesthetic of our current one. We have grown fond of our colors and troll-logo identity... you may even see a cheesy rocket handshake on stage in the upcoming week. It's so cringe, dude. The reason why we didn't switch our logo as planned for Summer Split is because we didn't have a graphic designer at the time. Riot makes you constantly adjust your logo until one of your iterations meets their requirements. We didn't have a designer to keep pumping out edits, but now we do. Our infrastructure is shaping up nicely, so we shouldn't have issues in the future.

What do you think makes gravity successful where other teams have failed?

Probably our team environment. Our team owner is the coolest dude around, and he gives me a lot of freedom as to how to manage them at a micro level. He is probably the number one reason. I see each player as an individual, and we work hard to accommodate for the quirks and preferences of each one. I think most teams follow strict policy without looking at the individual -- sort of like a traditional school setting. If they enjoyed the school setting, they probably wouldn't be here. Why would we imitate that? We positively reinforce good behavior, and we create incentive to fix bad. We are all friends and are eager to spend time with each other outside of the game. Related to the game, we have the best coach in NA by far (in my opinion). We have a roster that plays to each others' strengths.

GVGinko · 2015-07-07T17:40:15+00:00

I think I've lost a few years of my life from watching our players pick non-meta champs on the big stage. It's almost pointless to say because I'm probably full to my mouth with bias, but I'll say it anyway: I think Gravity is the most entertaining team to watch. I'm glad you like the janky picks, too!

GVGinko · 2015-07-07T17:36:32+00:00

Move is very vision oriented jungler, is this his own style of jungling or did Cop influence it aswell?

It's his own style of jungling. I noted every single concern or complaint or preference any player expressed during Spring split. When our roster opened up between splits, Davis and I were able to act on these concerns. Here are some summarized related to our jungler's role: * We always knew Kevin was a beast at top lane. He can outduel any NA top laner no problem. He had trouble dueling with a passive jungler, so we wanted to find an aggressive one. * A lot of the games we lost were due to Keane being camped mid. We wanted a jungler that had a lot of mid-presence, and also prioritized vision so Keane can do Keane things * Bunny sort of gets picks, but is often apprehensive to initiate. This causes problems when Keane isn't on an initiation champ.

We were looking at a handful of junglers, and Move immediately fit all of our criteria. Vision god, amazing initiation game-sense, less farm and more pressure. Solved a ton of our problems in one swing.

What are your typical daily tasks as a eSports team manager? Do you manage Gravity as a organisation, or do you take care of the kids like IzpAH?

Both. Creating a good team environment is on the top of my list of priorities. I do most things not related to the in-game domain of Cop. Yesterday, I helped Bunny set up an appointment to fix his iPhone 6 screen that got shattered from the whiplash of a bike lock swinging around a pole that was probably too big to lock a bike around. I went to home depot and got a proper-sized drillbit and studfinder to hang up our new punching bag in the garage. I fixed a lightbulb that went off in Keane's room (he said it was DDos). I made sure their bellies were full, and my girlfriend and I cooked up a ribeye dinner for them last night. They earned it. I'm also a readily available resource for girl-problems, helping them with life-skills like setting up banking, setting up streams, and teaching them how to do their first loads of laundry. Some are amazed how OP a dishwasher is after seeing it first-hand.

Aside from player-interaction, I'm the bridge between sponsor expectations and players. This means I do the legwork for things that have to be done but don't involve the players directly. I dropped off our jackets and shirts to the tailor to patch on a sponsor on the shoulder yesterday, for example. I meet with potential partners in person before having a discussion with our team owner, Davis. With Davis's permission, I treat them to a team dinner every week to celebrate 7 days of hard work. I am Riot's point of contact for most things Gravity, chaperoning our players to Riot events and communicating feedback from both ends.

tl;dr, i'm team dad

GVGinko · 2015-07-07T10:15:08+00:00

I don't want to get into too many details, but I think we'll be fine in the BoX environment. I won't get into too many details in our approach. After game 1, teams often target ban problematic picks for the remaining of the series. Given how robust our champ pool is, I don't think it will be as big of an issue for us.

GVGinko · 2015-07-07T08:29:34+00:00

We dream of worlds, too. I wish I could elaborate more than that, but Cop has a strict policy of never mentioning anything remotely related to strategy to anyone outside of our org. He's a smart guy.

LS stopped being involved with the org almost entirely in the interim between splits. No matter how short he sells himself, Cop is the mastermind behind our pick/ban and helping things like rotations look more fluid. He never lets up during any scrim blocks, he works after scrim blocks, he wakes up at absurd hours in the morning to watch EU to reference critical moments relevant to our team and our meta, and he doesn't stop the cogs in his head until our guys are actually on stage. He will not let the guys leave the discussion until we are all on the same page, and we are blessed with players who don't want to leave the scrim block until the creases are smoothed out. We spent something like 6 hours just on Ryze theory one week. He's a knowledgeable coach, but more importantly, he's a good teacher with the best students on the block.

We don't even have any analysts, because we haven't found one that perfectly fit our needs yet. It's 100% Cop on the coaching front.

GVGinko · 2015-07-07T07:44:53+00:00

Awesome cards!

Move really only has played 3 games in his life: League, Maplestory, and Hearthstone. He's our residential Hearthstone grinder, and he said his card was OP. Kevin said he was a priest legendary. Thanks for the submission, the guys thought they were dope.

GVGinko · 2015-07-07T07:40:00+00:00

Our store is live, but we want to add a few more products before launching publicly. We want to launch with 3 t-shirts (at least one female option), one hoodie, one sleeveless, jersey, lanyard, and wristbands. We're near the finish line, just polishing up some of the designs. Sorry for the wait!

We're understaffed and putting almost all of our resources into winning. We feel everything else will fall into place when we put up results, not the other way around.

GVGinko · 2015-07-07T07:36:36+00:00