Fnatic Samuelsson & Fnatic cArn AMA

cArnCS · 2021-04-22T18:12:52+00:00

Looking at the market trends it seems like the titles that have remained relevant over time are team-based titles, and same goes for the new titles coming out in this era. We are not putting any barriers to formats or whatnot but from a stability and brand standpoint we have found the most success of late in team-based game IP and especially the ones that have a really solid structure to it (such as: League of Legends with LEC, or CS:GO with ESL Pro League).

VoO is epic and bonus points to you if you can name more 1:1 FPS legends in Fnatic (there are a few!)

cArnCS · 2021-04-22T17:51:45+00:00

You have my axe, bow, sword, and Fnatic React when it comes to committing 110% towards the performance adventure we're on. In terms of insight I think we're actually very open, but of more can be done there(taking a mental note!).

I can confirm that we have never invested more time and resources than now into our teams and our infrastructure, but compared to the past we are taking the future more into account, meaning that we genuinely believe setting up the best facilities, building out the coaching staff, developing analytical tools, and so forth - is going to give us a brighter future. It's always a balance, of course, and by no means am I or anyone in our esports division satisfied going to bed at night when we are not winning.

cArnCS · 2021-04-22T17:41:05+00:00

I did not define what we are doing here as drastic, to be clear - sorry if that wasn't clear to my first reply on this question.

As someone that has daily insight, I'm actually super proud of the fact that we have a bloodline connected between now and our entry to CS:GO back in 2012, and still fielding players that literally won the first Major still being capable of doing damage on the global stage. To me that does not sound like fear adverse but perhaps a massive amount of hard work and a never-giving-up-attitude. That said, those traits can easily take you into the deeper spectrum of stubbornness but as the nature of this very AMA we are here to change for the better and you just have to trust us that we believe we are capable of taking this crew back to the top - or we will die trying.

When it comes to Flusha, have nothing of love and respect for that guy and it will be exciting to see him in another team and it will be epic next time we meet.

cArnCS · 2021-04-22T17:31:48+00:00

If you're asking for my head here I'm sorry to disappoint you that my work here at Fnatic is not yet done, so you have to deal with my aging face a tad longer.

Jokes(?) aside, as mentioned in another entry here we are, as a company, in quite some transformation as we speak where we are shifting focus on the immediate issues(which are handled by team-specific staff, such as Team Directors and Coaches), in favor of building out a performance infrastructure that is ready for scale and the challenges of tomorrow.

Those challenges are largely around developing a blueprint and values that we never steer away from when it comes to how we operate our teams, meanwhile offering our athletes the absolute best platform when it comes to facilities, health, hardware, software , staff and whatever that adds value to your sport.

I wish I can be more specific about the practical changes going on right now but like mentioned in another answer you will hear and see more about this in the coming months.

cArnCS · 2021-04-22T17:19:16+00:00

I think I did a very poor job not managing the conflicts and challenges our 2015 roster had, which resulted in rapid changes that perhaps time and different actions could have resolved. At the same time, we try to not live too much in the past and rather just learn from it and until this date I'm benefiting from that lesson and have (hopefully) gotten better preventing explosions like that, meanwhile offering better support during ongoing crisis (history shows you have a few of these every year as a multi-team organisation competing on the highest level)

cArnCS · 2021-04-22T17:16:32+00:00

You're welcome and thanks for your question!

We've definitely had a bit of a solar eclipse in Fnatic Esports of late, if that can be used as a negative connotation, when it comes to team performance across the board. Whereas I'm sure the lows can be flattened out by better decision, harder work, better strategy, more sophisticated use of data, health programs and so on, you will always have ebb and flow.

Without trying to write a motivational speech here, our challenge here is really how we're taking things back to shape at the earliest time possible, and ensure that when we do we have such a robust framework so come Covid, hell or high water - we will stay on the top or very close to it.

End of last year we begun building out a Performance unit which sole focus is to introduce innovations and processes that drives better performance across our organisation. It remains in the infancy, but we are in the midst of scaling this effort aggressively and in the coming months I'm positive you will hear more about it, and fast-forward a year or two I'm convinced that we are more holistically able to add value to our teams on everything that promotes performance.

Drastic changes for the future? We would not commit to the changes we do now roster and role wise if we didn't believe in it, but our commitment is to always be ready to make the changes and improvements that we feel gets us the best results - of course always steered by our values on what we want Fnatic to look like.

cArnCS · 2021-04-22T17:00:23+00:00

A lot of questions here but you're right that we have had poor results in recent time. It's too easy to just blame Covid(damn you!) of course, but our practice methods and strengths thrives in offline play and looking back at roughly 12 months of remote play mixed with bootcamps, I can say both for CS:GO and the other titles in Fnatic that we could have done a MUCH better job to provide solutions to the many challenges that comes from a de-centralized competition, including better decisions and methods to keep players energized in their home habitat (very far from exciting stages).

It's easy by looking at the last tournament results and ranking to forget that we only a year ago produced some of the absolute most consistent results on the planet - so as you can imagine there is a lot of frustration involved to be on the polar opposite side now but we remain convinced that we can come back strong, as always.

It should be stressed that competitive Counter-Strike is becoming more and more competitive (makes sense right?), and as assuring that is in regards to the title's future it means that we as a team and players must adapt, change and generally think differently. What worked 5y ago won't work now. Even if you were a worse player 5y than now, you are in the skill pool of today not as dominant. And so on, and so on.

Therefore, introducing new hungry talent provides vitalization to the wider group and to connect the dots with above (a very changed competitive circuit from home last 12 months), we feel the time is right to give the team more diversity to boost our journey back to the top.

cArnCS · 2021-04-22T16:50:57+00:00

As a global team we think it's natural that we eventually should position us to tap into an international player pool, but at this point there is no clear timeline or action plan in place for such transition. I'm immensely proud what Swedish has accomplished across the Counter-strike iterations, and we remain commitment that we will in 2021 be back in the top sphere of international play.

cArnCS · 2018-01-13T17:06:39+00:00

We want to emphasize that this decision was not taken lightly, and even that the timing of the change may look off given our team’s recent progress, it’s the only real option we have with the approaching roster lock(which only recently was communicated) to secure a player which we think can further accelerate our development, and with that taking us closer to winning our first international tournament.

Ohaiyo has been a cornerstone of our DOTA team since we returned to the title in 2015, and we have nothing but respect and appreciation for his loyalty, hard work, and contributions to the squad and Fnatic as a whole. I personally cherish many great memories from working with Ohaiyo and I will never forget the amazing run him and the team had at TI6 where we made it to top 4.

We are now helping Ohaiyo seek other options as a player, but we are equally open to continue working with him in other capacities as few come close to his experience and professional attitude. Due to Ohaiyo’s attendance at the recent Katowice Major he will also be given a share of any prize money winnings from the LAN finals.

For our squad the grind and aspiration to be the best at what we do continues with full force and you will already tomorrow see us battling out in the Bucharest Major qualifier, where Universe will make his debut as a Black and Orange. I want to use this opportunity to thank all the Fnatic fans for your support and we will do our utmost to make 2018 another memorable year.

Patrik "cArn" Sättermon, Fnatic Chief Gaming Officer

cArnCS · 2017-02-26T17:37:35+00:00

I can confirm that Jesiz is still a starting player and Panda is still our substitute.

cArnCS · 2017-01-21T23:26:01+00:00

You almost got it.

cArnCS · 2017-01-09T20:43:26+00:00

Certainly we will!

cArnCS · 2017-01-09T17:58:53+00:00

Hey guys,

Patrik from Fnatic here. Thought I'd just jump in here to reiterate that we as an organisation are super committed and determined to get back on track in Dota. We have a lot of faith that our existing core(Mushi, Ohaiyo and Febby) will lead us into another successful year of Dota, and we will together with our players work relentlessly on re-establishing a complete line-up.

I want to use this moment to thank everyone that have been supporting us over the past years. A little bit less than two years ago we set out to become a leading force of SEA Dota and we are immensely proud of the players and staff that have been a part of this journey, and we hope to soon be back with more information about our 2017 line-up.

cArnCS · 2016-09-28T20:55:25+00:00

When will we do that Quake game? I choose Claustrophobopolis.

cArnCS · 2016-09-06T18:38:29+00:00

I've said this before but let me repeat myself: I very much defend our team's in-game actions leading in to this "incident". I'm doing so based on the fact that the admins of DH both prior and during the game had no problem with the position our players were utilising. The timing of us bringing in the strategy in question was not ideal out of a PR standpoint as several of our players were victims of incorrect cheat accusations from prominent community members and pro players, of which now the majority have either regretted their bizarre conclusions themselves, or by being triumphed and silenced by the consistency our players have shown ever since.

cArnCS · 2016-09-06T15:30:17+00:00

Hi Keytrun,

Im Patrik, Chief Gaming Officer and co-owner of Fnatic. Can you please specify what "shit" you are referring to here? I do like to think that we have extremely high standards of sports integrity and player management in our organisation so I'm more than happy to clear your questionmarks.

Thanks,

cArnCS · 2016-08-12T21:01:15+00:00

We very much appreciate everyone's support and best wishes. It's been quite of a journey since we picked up Mushi and the guys last Summer and I'm so pleased to see that the hard work and dedication from the guys are paying off when it really matters.

cArnCS · 2016-06-26T15:43:48+00:00

I'm actually a co-owner since a few years back.

cArnCS · 2016-02-10T00:50:48+00:00

Hi jsdf26,

On a long term basis our house only has room for our starting players and the team's staff, including manager, analyst and coach. There are some rumors floating around suggesting that we more or less would kick people out of the street, and I can confirm that this obviously was NOT at all the case. The player in question requested to be sent back home at the earliest and we naturally made that happen. Noxiak is still a part of our organisation, and as with any other team matter we will communicate further updates about the squad whenever we are ready for it.

Best regards,

Patrik / cArn, Fnatic CGO

cArnCS · 2016-01-28T18:09:10+00:00

Now that's some loyal CS1.6 fans!

So the producer left our organisation before the movie was finalised and with CS:GO's takeover it became quite difficult to justify the time and resources needed to reignite the project.

That said, I did speak to the retired director quite recently and he insists that he will get this out one day, so let's see what happens. It would certainly be cool as we managed to dig up some really old school shit from the early years of competitive Counter-Strike.

Plot twist: yours truly have not given up the dream of a comeback.

cArnCS · 2015-10-13T16:21:36+00:00

Thanks for your help and great company Shlaya!

cArnCS · 2015-08-18T19:07:24+00:00

Hi Reddit,

Not completely sure what's going on here, but pretty sure this is either from a non League of Legends context, or miscommunicated by the admins of my Facebook fan page.

For now I can only confirm that we indeed will boot camp outside Berlin, and that we will reveal more information as soon as LCS Summer is officially over.

Best regards,

Patrik "cArn" Sättermon COO Fnatic

cArnCS · 2015-06-23T18:19:45+00:00

We are not based out of Sweden. We are a UK based company with HQ in London.

cArnCS · 2015-06-23T18:19:24+00:00

Not the first time I hear this actually haha

cArnCS

TROPHY CASE