Coming from Challenger League as the #1 team and beating Motiv8 Gaming in Relegations earned Noble a spot in the Pro League’s 8th season. We sat down with their captain and IGL, “Yeti”, to see how they feel going into their Pro League debut.
Noble’s roster is:
Alexander “Yeti” Lawson
Matias “Heavy” Arrazola
Nathanial “Rampy” Duval
Tomasz “Acid” Adamcyzk
Sam “Breezy” Lassila
During the past Challenger League season Noble stomped most of their opponents. Why do you think the season went so well?
It all came down to the teams drive and dedication. Through wins or losses, scrims or games. We knew that there was progression to always be made and there is always something to work on whether we destroyed our opponent, or lost we made sure we made each other better. That's why we were able to move through CL so effectively.
What did you learn in Challenger League that you will be able to use in Pro League?
Honestly I didn't really learn much from CL. After being in PL for one season already I took most of the wisdom from that to get back in PL. Challenger League isn't much learning experience for former pros just because Pro League is so far ahead of Challenger League.
In the middle of the season you brought in Breezy (who had just left beastcoast) to replace Spades. Why did the team decide to make this change?
Bringing Breezy in place of Spades was a pretty easy decision for us. Spades who had fragging potential was not showing his skills in matches made the decision pretty easy for us as a team. The change was a performance based business move to ensure we kept progression and didn’t stay in CL.
You wound up playing Motiv8 in relegations and defeated them to take the Pro League spot. How did you feel in that moment?
In that moment for me, personally I was happy to regain my spot in PL for the second time, but getting to experience my teammates getting into PL for the first time really made the grind worthwhile.
How do you feel going into Pro League?
It feels great to get into Pro League. The amount of time and dedication this game requires to achieve this level of play, let alone be good enough to not get relegated from PL is very hard. I quit my job to pursue this, I'm just glad that it all worked out.
Your team had an amazing run at DreamHack Austin 2018 last weekend, beating teams such as SSG and 12Knights. In the quarter-finals you lost against Rogue on the big stage. What is your biggest takeaway from this tournament?
Our biggest take away from DreamHack is that no matter who you are or what team you play for anything can happen - anyone can beat anyone. The other thing I took away from DreamHack was that even though you are still playing Siege it's a different type of Siege. It's not so much winning because of strats, but more calculated plays individually or with your teammates.
You are the only player in your team that has previous experience in Pro League. How is that helping your work as the IGL and captain of the team?
As an IGL the PL experience helps a little. As an IGL you need to expose yourself to various types of strats and play styles at any level of play. An IGL can't be confused or lost they have to have an adjustment for just about everything, and to do that you must be a student of the game and understand the aspect of learning the ins and outs of leading, adjustments, and countering. You can't be stubborn or hard headed but must be very open to different and weird things. Most importantly though you must trust your teammates. Being in PL has helped me so much as a captain, I feel like getting smacked out of PL with WBG [World Best Gaming] really helped me understand winning and winning the right way. I feel like once you understand the correct way to win, that's when you lead successfully.
How does having an analyst improve or make preparing for a game easier?
Having an analyst is very beneficial to IGL minded people and a coach (if you have one) because when creating new strats or game prep before a match, you can see the numbers and amount of times ops are picked per site by map. So it makes strating for our matches much more efficient and accurate.
This upcoming season represents a big shift: five successive rounds on either attack or defense, map pool and bomb site rotation changes, and even a brand new map. How does Noble plan to adapt to these changes in Season 8?
The new format is something that really excites us as a team. The 5 rounds attack and 5 rounds defense is great for adaptation. The Bo1 could be different in my opinion but I understand who that stands with the growth of the game and viewership. We personally take pride in having a dynamic map pool, so not playing the same two maps every week will be great for us individually and great for the league in general. Villa will be a fantastic map in due time but with it being brand new, I cant see it being played until around the Paris major due to its complexity and our short amount of time to learn it going into the season.
Which team are you most excited to play in the next season of Pro League?
I’d have to say beastcoast. Them being our closest friends in the scene, having come into Pro League together. We became pretty close after scrimming for almost everyday two weeks in a row. I think we have similar play styles and I believe it will be a barnburner for sure.
Your Pro League debut as a team is going to be against Mouz. How do you feel going into this game?
We are feeling confident going into any match so it’s not different for Mouz, we make it our top priority to be prepared going into matches and to make sure we are ready to compete at the highest level come gameday.
Anything to say to your fans and supporters?
I'd like to thank all of the Noble organisation for their wonderful representation of us as a team. They have done nothing but the best for us individually and as a group. Second, I’d like to thank all of the Noble Supporters in the Rainbow 6 community... without your support we wouldn't be able to have the insane amount of drive that we do!
Noble’s Pro League debut will be on June 11th vs mousesports at: twitch.tv/Rainbow6.