GamerLegion analyst Munstur: “CS:GO is an esport closest to a meritocratic ecosystem, yet still shows flaws causing huge setbacks for rising teams.”

GamerLegion kicked off their 2023 with a bang, claiming the Thunderpick Bitcoin Series #2 and qualifying for the BLAST.tv Paris Major Europe RMR, among several other on-stage finishes. Slowly grinding their way up, they established themselves among the Top 30 and are determined to continue rising. 

In this Fragster interview, we’re talking with the whole GamerLegion squad about their successful RMR run, the grind that’s behind it, and the CS:GO meritocracy.

GamerLegion’s smooth RMR run

First of all, congratulations on qualifying for Paris Major EU RMR. What’s the mood within the team right now?

acoR: The atmosphere in the team is pretty good right now, everyone is putting in the hours, working hard, and learning from mistakes

GamerLegion showed up in outstanding form and swept through the closed qualifier with a clean score. Did you expect such a smooth run? Was it a result of intense preparations? 

Munstur: I wouldn’t say we expected our run to be so short, but we were definitely confident coming into it. The games were close, so when you think of a 3-0 run, it wasn’t the cleanest let’s say. I think the result came as validation for multiple things we are doing right: We were very confident, being in a bootcamp all together and having won an online cup recently, we prepared for every opponent as best as possible considering the circumstance and finally, the experience we’ve gathered from the last year helped us be resilient and pull through this time.

Valve has done some significant changes to the Major qualification system for this edition, specifically adding closed qualifiers for RMRs and direct invites based on regional rankings — that’s how you got into the closed qualifier instead of fighting through open qualifiers. Do you think this is a good change in order to make sure that the top teams won’t get knocked out in open qualifiers?

Siuhy: The new qualification system seems to be more consistent compared to the one for the Rio Major. Better teams seem to have an advantage in reaching the event. I personally prefer the new format as it seems more balanced.

Focus and preparation over setting goals

What are your expectations from the upcoming RMR, how do you see your chances there? You qualified for the previous Major, do you see yourself going to Paris?

Siuhy: On paper, chances of qualifying seem to be pretty good for us, especially if we keep this current form up. Reaching two Majors in a row would be insane.

You also had a great showing in the recent CCT WEU Series #1, where you placed second after the Grand Final loss against Spirit Academy.  What’s your takeaway from this event?

ash: We know that any tournament we are in that we can challenge to win it, and that it’s about how well we play on the day. It’s tough to prepare when there are so many upsets and the games come thick and fast but it’s a regular process we have to deal with around the tier 2 level. Having a hard-working analyst such as Munstur helps us keep our heads afloat and lets the guys focus elsewhere and takes a lot of stress off my shoulders, meaning we can create better game plans.

Can you reveal some of the team’s expectations for season 2023? Did you set any particular goals for yourselves? 

ash: We’ve actually not spoken at any point about goals or expectations as far as results go. From my experience, it’s something that adds unnecessary pressure on a team and so instead the attitude we encourage is to just focus on each separate game and to prepare as much as possible individually. 

For a personal goal, I really wanted the team to win at least one competition this year, which we have already achieved by winning Thunderpick in early February. Now it’s on us to build from that and continue the success elsewhere.

Grinding up from the slump

The current GamerLegion roster has been together for almost half a year now. How would you reflect on your time together so far? Is the team formula working well? 

Isak: I would say this roster we’ve had now for the last six months has been really good overall, we’ve qualified for everyone’s dream tournament (Major) and some more LAN tournaments. We established ourselves as a good Top 30 team and we will keep on going. Also, we are at a stage where after the honeymoon period, most teams have a bit of a “downfall” performance-wise and I would say we had that little downhill too, but it’s important to keep on going and that’s where we are right now. Just grinding ourselves up from the slump we had and we are back on a good path.

What about communication, GamerLegion is an international roster with players from various European countries, how is the team dealing with the language barrier, if there is any? 

Keoz: It doesn’t feel like it is that big of a deal. It might not be perfect but we understand each other really well and that goes for in but also outside the game. Our English is pretty decent I would say.

Last question, if you could change one thing about CS:GO, what would it be?

Munstur: There are multiple things the CS:GO space could improve, but if I were to point out the most critical, especially if you think about GamerLegion as a team, it would be that the circuit is very rough, unforgiving and unrewarding at times. Everything from ranking points to invites is based on favoring bigger orgs that buy into slots, and the other regions than EU, where competition is more fierce due to the busy and unforgiving scheduling, especially among the smaller tournament organizers. I think that CS:GO as an esport is the closest to a meritocratic ecosystem and yet it still occasionally shows flaws that can cause huge setbacks for the teams on the rise, like ourselves.

ash: Rework pistol rounds somehow. They’re way too limited for how important they are in deciding the outcome of a map. If not that then change how KAST works on HLTV in relation to rating. Players shouldn’t be rewarded for saving and exit fragging. Currently, players are punished statistically for attempting to win rounds and that further discourages exciting Counter-Strike.

iM: I would change nothing 🙂

Keoz: It would be first bullet accuracy, make it less random.

Isak: I would up the price of the scout to $2100 and update the map pool more often.

Siuhy: Add bazooka.

acoR: AWP revert to 7 bullets, M4 needs to be fixed maybe something in the likes of the M4 we had in 1.6.