Interview with forZe Rainbow Six Siege team

Rainbow Six Siege Raleigh Major ended quite recently, and there were two representatives of the CIS region who got to the playoffs: Team Empire and forZe. Moreover, the former won the tournament, and the latter took the top-4. We talked with the representatives of forZe organization — the coach, the manager, and the captain — about the esports scene of Rainbow Six Siege in the world and the CIS region in particular.

The team coach is Anton “Korben” Tulbu. In his 22, Anton is a serious and confident person. You can feel the authority and determination in his words. That's obvious as he led his team at the tournament, and together they achieved a fantastic result.

How are you doing after the Major? Are you glad? What's next?

Anton: Of course, we are glad that we have achieved such a result. There was a high probability that we would not go to the championship at all. And then the first international tournament - and right into the semifinals. Having rested for ten days after the major, we will start the new season with renewed vigor, which is very important for us. It is necessary to give all your best, fix errors, and qualify to the Pro League this winter. 

How do you prepare for the matches?

The regular matches preparation includes watching VODs, collecting information on what the opponent is playing, what their style is, what can be done to make it more difficult for them to play.

Do European teams easily agree to scrim and practice together?

It is sad to realize, but we can play only with European teams. In the CIS, there are no teams comparable in level (of course, except for Team Empire). I hope this changes over time.

Regarding the European teams, we play with all the top: G2, Vodafone Giants, Natus Vincere, etc. Sometimes all the Pro League teams are busy, and we have to play with tier-3 rosters as well. But in Europe, the difference between Tier-1/2 and Tier-3 is not as big as, for example, in North America, so this does not particularly affect the quality of scrims.

What about bootcamps?

We had a bootcamp this summer from early June to early August. The task was to get in good shape as quickly as possible to fight for the Challenger League, as well as try to get to the Raleigh Major. As we can see from the result, the bootcamp paid off for 100%. The next one is scheduled in winter during the Six Invitational qualifications and Pro League.

Do you work out in the gym to keep fit as European teams usually do?

We had a coach who did physical training with us three times a week during the bootcamp. But we're not going regularly to gyms all together, as the old Cloud9 CS:GO roster did, we don’t have that.

What do you think of professional psychologists? Is it an emergency or cheat? 

We have scheduled sessions with a psychologist in the upcoming season. The other guys nor I had such experience yet, so I don’t know what will be the results of it. But it seems to me that there is nothing wrong with psychologists. At the highest level, all's fair. Some teams cannot cope with the pressure when playing tournaments, or they cannot believe in each other, which causes quarrels within the organization. The psychologist may try to fix it.

You may have read a great interview with the manager and the coach of DreamEaters on our website. They talked about the plight of the low-tier CS:GO teams in CIS. Does R6S feel easier?

Each discipline has its problems. Rainbow Six Siege's tournament system is very specific. There's not a lot of championships, and many slots are moving from each other. Not every tournament has classic qualifications. All this leads to the fact that it's complicated to break through to a higher level for tier-3 teams. For example, DreamHack is held twice a year, which has 12 invite slots, and four more from BYOC qualifications. You need to buy tickets, pay for a hotel, rent computers, buy BYOC qualifications passes just to send a necessary team of five people to the tournament. A small organization simply cannot afford to spend such a vast amount of money. Of course, if you go to the Major, ESL pays for everything, but there's usually only one qualification slot for the region, rarely two slots, even though half of the teams from the Pro League participate there. As a result, low-tier teams are left to participate in small regional tournaments and leagues, which cannot boast of a large number of viewers and sequentially — they can’t get good sponsors. And I'm not talking about tier-3 level salaries. In Europe, it is easier, as the esports scene is much more developed than in North America. As for the scrims, there is no financial barrier in R6S to play with top teams. It’s enough just to declare that you're good.

Why is Siege not so popular in the CIS and cannot get around CS:GO in the whole world in your opinion? What is missing Siege missing?

Counter-Strike has been an esports discipline for almost 20 years. Several generations of players have already passed. You can get around this only if CS:GO scene suddenly and quickly sinks.

The peculiarity of Rainbow Six Siege is that 60% of players prefer consoles — not an esports thing because they are made initially as casual play platforms. There is also a problem with tournament promotion on the side of the publisher: most players either do not know that tournaments are held, or are not interested in them. It seems to me that it would be great if the developers introduce a system like CS:GO has when you can get stickers during majors or just watch streams in the menu. I'm not even mentioning a trading platform, skins, and bets — they are the reasons why esports in CS have skyrocketed in the past five years, and even small tournaments have had lots of spectators.

But these are all too distant things. So far, R6S lacks tournaments, a good demo and observational system, the extensive promotion made by the publisher, and a more cohesive community.

In Raleigh, two CIS teams made it to the top four. What does this mean for the region? Will Siege become popular over time, or will it drown?

I hope, looking at the results, that more well-known CIS organizations will come into the game and pull up fans from other disciplines. The size of the community in the CIS is growing every month but perhaps not as fast as we would like. There is a lack of coverage from well-known professional esports media, and I will not name specific ones. Growth dynamics can be much higher if the informational problems are fixed.

For me personally, the main highlight of the tournament was the moment when we went into the playoffs and reached the main stage. A few months ago, I could not even think that this would happen.

Have you met any of your rivals off the stage? Maybe you have already agreed with someone to practice together?

All the players spent time in the lounge during the breaks between matches and constantly interacted with each other. They watched the match on TV, played table tennis or just talked on different topics. Therefore, yes, we got along with many players.

If you were an R6S operator — who could have it been? And why?

Echo. Sometimes I have severe laziness attacks which makes me related to this operative.

Are you watching CS:GO Berlin Major? Is there anything to learn from this discipline?

We can learn a lot — both the players and the organizers. Personally, I’m admiring the professionalism that some teams have during the process, people's responsibilities, coach's influence. Sometimes, when watching vlogs or reading an interview, you discover something new that you can use.

Does R6S have any imba Operators?

Since Ubisoft is listening to the feedback, we no longer have the hell that was happening a year or two ago, when Lion, Glaz or Ying were in almost every round. There are only operatives who are sometimes unpleasant to encounter, such as Nomad, Dokkaebi, Jackal, Montagne, but they can not be called imbas.

Blitz with Aleksandr "КаМа" Chernyshov

The next interviewer is Alexander "KaMa" Chernyshov. Sasha is a captain, a leader, and an excellent tactician. His non-trivial ideas during the Major helped the team to defeat FaZe Clan and Vodafone Giants (by the way, one of the scene leaders). They were stopped only by G2 Esports.

We've made a little blitz with KaMa, and he told us what interesting has he seen in the USA, how elite skins influence the game and some other stuff.

What did you do first when you came to the USA?

As we arrived in the States, we immediately went to the store to get some soda. Marmalade Mountain Dew is great.

What do you cherish about the tournament besides your performance?

The scale of the tournament and the fans who recognized us even outside the arena and asked for autographs.

Tell us about your daily schedule, please.

I wake up, watch some streams, play ranked matches, and then practice with my team.

Can you give some advice to those who want to start playing Rainbow Six Siege professionally?

First of all, you need to find a stack of players of similar rank and gradually advance in the ranked mode and then try yourself in some tournaments.

If not R6S, what would you do?

If it wasn’t Siege, I would probably be an ordinary hard worker. But I've got some plans to enter a university in 2020.

Who is the funniest guy in the team? And who is the most serious?

The funniest, probably, is Pasha "p4sh4" Kosenko. I hear all the new memes only from him. The most serious one is Artyom "wTg" Morozov.

You've returned to forZe after playing for other teams and became the captain here. Do you feel that you are a leader or you just feel confident that you can guide your team to success?

From the very beginning of my R6S career, I tried to control the movements of players in all teams. This doesn’t really bother me besides my actions. Well, I was sure that I would help the guys to find their game.

Will it be difficult for a player to adapt to another shooter after R6S?

I believe that R6S is the most challenging shooter of all possible at the moment. Aiming here is not the most important thing that a player needs, so it will most likely be difficult to break into CS or something else. The most important thing here is intelligence.

If you were an R6S operator — who could have it been? And why?

Bandit.

What do you think of the skins in Siege? Do they interfere with playing? Surely, Frost's trap with the elite skin is more noticeable, and the brand new Smoke in his red hoodie looks brighter than the standard black suit. 

I think that if skins do not interfere with figuring out who you see — it's okay. Everything else needs to be removed from the game.

The managers

Why is Siege not so popular in the CIS? Is it easy to create a team to play this discipline? ForZe general manager Dmitry Makarov and Rainbow Six Siege team manager Kirill Zolotov shared their thoughts with us. 

Why was it decided to build a roster for R6S? What are the plans for the future? Do you want to add other disciplines besides shooters?

Dmitry Makarov: Rainbow Six Siege is now one of the most promising esports disciplines. Ubisoft has done a lot of work on the game in recent years, especially with the tournaments system. That is why we decided to try ourselves in this discipline.

We also had previous experience in both Fortnite and PUBG, but it was decided to suspend development in these areas temporarily. We continue to watch these disciplines as well as several others, but we cannot yet talk about any specific plans.

"Spartak" is an excellent supporting brand. Were there any other options? Can forZe become Spartak.forZe, something like PSG.LGD from Dota 2 where the Parisian football club originally bought the brand?

DM: Spartak, Lukoil, Pari Match, and plan b: are excellent partners and sponsors. It’s too early to discuss the moment of buying a brand. We are only at the beginning of the journey. We have huge plans for the future. Everything will depend on the offer, of course.

What do you think of more financially secure organizations from other areas penetrating esports?

DM: Of course, the penetration of large companies and corporations into esports is an indicator of their interest in the audience. The whole world, step by step, understands what young people are interested in. This is a natural process, as in big sports.

How is the Russian Ubisoft office communicate with you? Does the regional office keep an eye on the development of its territory in the esports?

Kirill Zolotov: Yes, the Russian office always supports us. We communicate very closely. Ubisoft listens to the opinions of professional players and is always ready to help and collaborate with esports organizations. This is eloquently indicated by the pilot program for professional teams, which has been successfully implemented for more than a year now.

Ubisoft's Russian office is the organizer of Russian Major League

Did they help you with your trip to Raleigh?

KZ: We talked mainly with ESL about the USA visas. We got the invitations promptly and just waited for the permits. Considering that now it is problematic to make visas to the USA in Russia, we did them in Poland. Our organization paid for all this.

What tournament production is missing? There are significant prize funds, lots of Twitch viewers. But the potential of the game is not yet fully realized. What should the organizers do? Or should we question Ubisoft?

KZ: In my opinion, the production is excellent. The game is quite popular in Europe, Brazil, and North America. Speaking about the CIS, it is quite difficult to attract new players. The income level is quite low, and many people simply can not afford computers to play R6S comfortably, so basically, people choose the less demanding Dota 2 and CS:GO. Also, the threshold for entering the game is much higher than in other shooters. It seems to me that if Ubisoft significantly reduces the price of the game or makes it free to play, the number of players and, consequently, viewers in the CIS region will increase. But I can't really say how much. 

How did you pick the roster? Is there a scout team or you just followed the tournaments?

KZ: We had a bad experience a year and a half ago. In March last year, we built a pretty good roster and had good results; we immediately went to the European CCS league. But then, the team started conflicting within, and everything fell apart. We made substitutions to improve the results, but nothing helped. And in July, it was decided to disband the squad and temporarily withdraw from discipline. I made conclusions from an unsuccessful attempt and developed selection criteria for myself. Then I began to look for the players to build a new team. I chose two players from the previous team: wTg and Zheka. Wtg is still in the team; the rest of the players came over the next nine months. KaMa was the part of the first team, but we returned him last as he joined us in early June.

Judging by the results, all turns out very good! What are the next goals? Bootcamps, tournaments?

KZ: Thank you! Our main goal now is to win the Challenger League to compete for the Pro League. We recently had a rather long bootcamp, from mid-June to the fifth of August. So we plan the next bootcamp somewhere closer to winter. The exact dates have not yet been determined; it will depend on the schedule of tournaments. Also, very soon the Russian Major League will begin, where we plan to compete for first place.

Well, wish forZe good luck in the future! Also, subscribe to the organization’s social networks:

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