Decorated in the Benelux scene, Jacob “Rezst” Hemming has come to experience the wonders of the UK scene by joining K10. The Dutch international has experienced many LANs and BYOCs, but admits that this UKIC LAN is like nothing he’s ever experienced, especially since he’s now partly deaf due to the screaming of a certain teammate.
The former IGL speaks to UKCSGO about Ryan “dox” Young’s leadership style, the differences between the Benelux and UK scene, and which one of his K10 teammates has impressed him the most.
How are you enjoying this LAN?
I think it’s quite different from other LANs I’ve been to because it’s not the usual stage setting where it’s like okay, you don’t really see the other team competing, you have your own little rooms and then outside you can see other people and give fist bumps. But I think I like it quite a lot, it gives this CS Summit kind of feeling where you’re just playing in a room, then come out to meet people. When you just eat something, you go to the community area where you can watch the game and stuff. So it has a nice vibe to it for sure.
How does the UK scene that you’ve experienced compare to the Benelux scene?
I think it’s pretty similar in a way that everybody here saying anything they think as well, but it’s what happens in Netherlands as if people don’t agree with you, they’ll just say, it’s not like where people hold something with them and then after a month they will say. If somebody doesn’t agree with you, they’ll just say it straight to your face. I think maybe the people are a little bit louder while they’re playing here because I thought that I was a loud player in the Benelux scene. But yeah, you’ve got some screamers in here, like Tree60 for example. It’s mental.
On your team, you’ve got screamers and then you’ve got someone like dox who’s so quiet. How does that work within the team dynamic?
Probably he struggles a little bit to activate into a game because he feels like probably he needs to match the energy where it’s not his personality. But I think at the end of the day, it’s also nice to have someone on the team that’s able to calm down the situation, get everybody on the same path again. So, for example, if we’re struggling in a game, if someone is really emotional, he’s really firm, ‘Okay, this is how I want to play.’ And he can keep his calm in that, keep thinking about the game and not be influenced by how the game is going. It’s just like, ‘Okay, I want to play like this’ and you can keep calm in the more difficult situations or later stages of the game, for sure.
How did you end up joining this team?
Basically, me and dox have a common friend, which is like a pretty good friend of mine. I’ll go out to parties or events with him and I was LFT and he just mentioned me to dox. And then dox approached me, and on the first day he thought I might not want to take non-IGLing offers. But if there’s someone more experienced than me, for example dox, in that case I am happy to learn from other people and take a different role in the team.
And how have you found adapting to a different role within the team?
I play basically the same roles in terms of where my positions are. I think there are some positions that changed, but even while I was calling, I was a really aggressive caller. So I would take space for the team and get positions for the team and make calls based off the information I see by going out there, I was never really a guy that would sit back, relax, let other people do the work and then call something.
So in that regard, I do the same now in the team, but I just don’t give the early round call. I just fully focus on whatever’s going on on my part of the map, which makes it a lot easier, I would say, for myself to actually go out there and find the kills. It makes me able to focus on my own game. But then again, even now, mid round, I’ll still come up with ideas or say what I think we should be doing or give ideas to dox. ‘Okay, hey, this is what I think we should be doing.’ And then he’ll have the final say in that, of course, but I will still bring a lot of ideas to the table, like mid round. And then, of course he will make the calls and information based on that and based off that, he will make a call and we will finish somewhere on the map.
In this new team, what teammate would you say has kind of impressed you the most?
Probably dox, I would say in the sense that it’s my first time playing under another IGL because I’ve always been playing for myself. So I’ve never really known how other people have approached the game. Seeing how he sets up the team and how that is different from how I would do it opens up new views of how to play the game or see the game, which makes you get a better understanding of it, I would say.
Obviously tomorrow you have two games or three at most, what are your expectations going in tomorrow? What have you kind of seen from your opponent and what are you kind of hoping for?
I think we’re hoping for a 2-0 and I think we’ll be able to do it. It’s just that we have to be able to be sharp individually. I think they have some strong individuals as well on the team where if we are not on our A-game in terms of shooting heads, it will be hard to pull rounds because they have a lot of people that will be able to multi-frag if we don’t. So I think that’s going to be one of the most important things that we are sharp individually and that we are not dropping the ball in terms of just simple shooting.
You’re on a UK team. How’s your UK CS knowledge?
Pretty bad, I think. I played against dox in some Kayzr tournaments, I think I beat him once and he beat me once. Other than that, pretty limited. Of course CRUC1AL has played in Endpoint, so I knew who Endpoint was and I followed them in the Pro League runs. Other than that, no, I don’t know if someone on a BYOC has always impressed everybody. I have no clue.
Have you played many BYOCs?
Yeah, but I mean at the start they used to be a little more competitive, but nowadays it’s just most of the time I show up with some friends and we take first place and we just drink and do whatever the whole day.
So maybe we’ll see you at an EPIC.LAN?
Hopefully, we’ll see.
