C9 Blaber on LTA North finals: “We haven’t won in a while. So it’s going to be our time.”

HotSpawn sat down with Robert “Blaber” Huang, C9’s LTA jungler, the day before Cloud9 faces down FlyQuest for the LTA North Split 2 Championship, and a ticket to the Mid-Season Invitational.

Cloud9 have surged to incredibly heights this split, establishing themselves alongside FlyQuest as a cut above the rest of the league in most estimations, with a struggling Team Liquid falling short of the “big three” expectations. With a one-sided 3-0 for Cloud9 over a Cinderella-running Shopify Rebellion, it’s time for the two best teams in the regions to face down. We sat down with Blaber yesterday to chat about the SR series, the Fearless format and Split 2’s mixed game count, and his prediction for the LTA North Finals.

Blaber talks Shopify, B0X series, and a banger finals

You just took down SR in a pretty convincing 3-0. Where’s your mind on the series?

Blaber: “I think overall we played a pretty good series. I think game one, we had some oopsies. In game 3, we had some oopsies as well. But I think overall it was just a good series by us.”

It’s you vs FlyQuest for the trophy, a rematch of the five-game banger from last week. How are you feeling about the matchup vs FLY?

Blaber: “I think FlyQuest are a good team for sure. I think last week and in general, they were playing mid-game very well compared to us. And I think that’s something we’ve been working on this week. I think that we just need to play slightly better than we did last week, because I definitely think that we could have won last week as well. And yeah, it’s best of five, hopefully we show up on the day.”

Since you got the play the first five-game Fearless series in the LTA, and now you’re one series from this B01 into B03 into B05 format for Split 2 being over, how are you feeling about this split’s format overall?

Blaber: “I like the format, this split wasn’t too bad. I mean, I do think the whole like best of ones and the best of threes was kind of weird. I would rather have just done like one split full best of three or something like that instead of doing it this way. Because the first stage was kind of useless, I would say. Like, not useless specifically, but it’s just like it’s only for seeding for the next stage. So if you suck in the first stage, you’re good in the second stage. And in the first stage, the games didn’t really matter. So it would have been better, I think, if the first-stage games mattered a bit more. But regardless, I’m just happy to be able to play best of fives. We didn’t get to play a single Bo5 in the first split. So it’s been fun to play Bo5s.

It’s very fun when it comes to at least practice. I enjoy it a lot more because I don’t have to play the same champs over and over again. And I can be more creative in what I want and I really enjoy that. On stage, you just need to make a comp work. You play the meta. Even last week, in game 5 of Fearless, I was playing Sejuani. Like pros can’t play a lot of champs. So, generally going to game 4 or 5, there are still a lot of comfort champs that people will be able to whip out. I still find it fun to play, obviously. So I’ve just been lucky in general.”

Does anybody ever cook a little too hard in scrims for Fearless? Have you seen any picks this split that raised an eyebrow about whether it’d actually make it to stage?

Blaber: “Just because you play it in scrims doesn’t mean you’re going to play on stage, right? But it just means that, in their mind, they could play it on stage. And they need to play it practically if it’s working out. I haven’t really felt like any champ is too crazy because I feel like all champs in League have their strengths and weaknesses. Obviously, I think some champs are better than others, right? But no matter what you do, your champ’s going to have a strength and a weakness. If you pick Teemo, Teemo’s going to win lane pretty much versus everything, right? So you just have to play towards your champ’s strengths. And the person who’s picking it, they have like a clear idea of why they think it’s strong. They’re not just like trolls. Usually the pro players aren’t just troll picking. They have their own idea.”

I chatted with LS last week, and he talked about wanting to see the LoL esports moving from Fearless to Ironman, which is where bans carry over between games, like Fearless picks do.

Blaber: “I’m not sure. I mean I think that that could maybe give Blue side heavy advantage. Because generally your blue side bans aren’t really that impactful. Or they’re impactful, but like they’re not “you need to ban them” compared to red side, and you can maybe just like target ban someone’s champs. Literally just ban them. And then they can’t play the next game. Or any games afterwards. So it would be interesting. But I would need to play it to really give you a good analysis on it.”

If you got to pick the theme for a season of LoL, like how we got Noxus and Ionia, what would it be? You’d redesign the map, get a bunch of skins, some comics, etc. Where are you taking Summoner’s Rift for a season if you had the choice?

Blaber: “I don’t know. Let me think…”

Nick: Take your time, man, this is the heavy-hitting stuff.

Blaber: “When Project came out originally I thought that skin line was super cool.”

Nick: Sounds great, alright, last question, any last words before finals tomorrow?

Blaber:  “I just want to say that our game Sunday will be a banger. You know, we haven’t won in a while. So it’s going to be our time.”