Today we had a chance to talk to another CounterStrike 1.6 team we will be bringing to DreamHack Summer 2011. LowLandLions is one of the top teams in the Benelux right now and they have a very nice lineup of skilled players. We talk to Eric ‘slaYn’ Peeters about LowLandLions, DreamHack, CounterStrike and more:
Hello slaYn! It is not the first time we’ve seen you on an Intel Pack4DreamHack trip, how is everything with you and the team?
Hi guys, I’m very good and the team is fine too thanks.
Last Winter you were playing for Kaos Gaming, and now you are the team leader of LowLandLions CS1.6. How did that come about?
There has been a mix-up between different players and teams in the past year. I feel like I had a chance to make something even stronger than I already had and I took it. In our old team we had the underdog factor pushing us to the limits, which later made us a pretty stable team because we kept playing in the same team even though we had some disappointing results, which doesn’t mostly happen in the benelux scene. In this new LLL team we have the exact opposite I think. Playing with some of the best players in the the benelux and trying to live up to the expectations is a lot harder nowadays than being the underdog and winning against ‘better’ teams but I’m convinced it has more potential internationally because of a lot more stability.
At The Party last April you guys lost the #1 of the Benelux to Kaos. What happened?
Multiple factors, having zero practice hours because of people moving and not being able to play, people not bringing facilities to sleep while it was like 30 degrees out. It really wears you down after playing so many matches through the lower bracket with a couple of guys that are only semi-awake. So I guess it was kind of our own fault. But you learn from those mistakes and it won’t happen again thats for sure.
Now skire has left LLL and went to play for Kaos you replaced the empty spots with old players, DeKMaTcHer and Apollo. Back on track to be the #1 of the Benelux again?
Definitely think so, just after TheParty it felt like we had some major motivation issues and Skire leaving us was kind of a Go in mixing up our lineup to bring that motivation back. I think Apollo and DeKMaTcHeR are a perfect fit in bringing that back. I feel like motivation is the biggest factor in CS right now if you want to be good, creating your tactics or at least a standard outline of what you are going to do in a round and optimizing it just takes time.
In the scene it is expected that either LLL or Mojo will get through the BYOC at DreamHack. What are your personal expectations in this?
I know we can do it, its just a matter of what shape we are in in that particular day. CounterStrike 1.6 may seem pretty random but its not, its a lot about momentum and money management. Then you have the factor of execution, if you don’t execute as good as your opponent there sometimes just isn’t that much to manage because you simply aren’t picking up your rounds. The randomness is how matches can differ because of for example a slow start or a strong comeback which sometimes shifts momentum around so heavily that scores become exact opposites which makes it seem random. These are the factors in playing our a-game and if we can control them I know we can do it and anything less than a pro-compo will be disappointing.
What does your family / girlfriend think of the fact you’ll be traveling all the way to Sweden just to play a computer game?
Haha yeah, a few more events and I guess you can call it a lifestyle. But fortunately they’ve always been very supportive and trying to understand the game, my dad plays CounterStrike 1.6 himself and my brother used to play so they roughly know whats going on and watch my important matches at events.
