Interview with IdrA

Pro]ChoseN- : Well Greg nice to talk with you congrats on everything you've achieved in SC thus far. How do you like it in South Korea?
IdrA : Thank you, South Korea has been awesome so far.

Pro]ChoseN- : Nice good to hear. Is it easy to communicate with your teammates / coaches or how does that go?
IdrA : Not really, I don't have time to take Korean classes and its hard to pick up a language casually when you dont have any foundation to build from. My teammates and coaches all speak basic english, so we can communicate some, but its pretty hard to talk about anything in depth. However CJ's manager speaks fluent english, so he helps with alot with everything.

Pro]ChoseN- : Oh I see. What's the hardest thing you've had to adjust to over there in South Korea?
IdrA : Probably the language barrier and communication. We don't get much free time so I've spent almost all my time for the last year with people I can't really communicate with. Everyones friendly of course, but its still difficult to deal with at times.

Pro]ChoseN- : Yea I'm sure it gets hard. Does it affect your social life like when you go out to have fun? And what do you Pro Gamers do for fun in your free time?
IdrA : Well when I do get to go out its usually with the other foreigners who are over here for esports like Tasteless and Artosis, so thats not a problem. Our free time comes in 1 or 2 hour breaks during the day so most just nap or browse the internet to relax. During vacations the other players generally go home and spend the time with their friends and families.

Pro]ChoseN- : Ah I see. Well what does a typical "work day" consist of for a Professional Starcraft player?
IdrA : Well we wake up at 9, have 2 hours to shower and eat breakfast and wake up, then we practice from 11 until 3, an hour for lunch, practice from 4 till 9, an hour and a half for dinner, then practice from 10:30 till 1:30 when we're free for the night. So mostly just playing alot of starcraft.

Pro]ChoseN- : Wow that's a lot of training ^^ Do you think the players in Korea are so much better just because of sheer time spent playing or do they just take the game to whole different level or what?
IdrA : Its a combination of alot of factors. The culture is much, much more accepting of esports than in the west. A kid who wants to become a progamer isnt necessarily told to shut up and study, so you have alot more players approaching gaming with the intent of becoming a competitive player, which gives you a much bigger talent pool to draw from. Then you have a whole system of teams and training. houses that allow players to focus solely on practicing with other high level players as well as learning from coaches and other more experienced players.

Pro]ChoseN- : Yea hopefully the western culture can open up more to the concept, I think they are. I'm interested in the training. Like do they have you just mass 1v1's or do you just execute certain build orders or do you play UMS practice maps or how does your team go about the training process?
IdrA : The majority of our time is just spent on regular 1v1's. When players are preparing for a specific match they'll sometimes ask their practice partners to do specific build orders to check for timings, but in general that isnt really a great way to practice because it doesn't mimic real game conditions. You're not gonna know your opponent is gonna do a specific build, so its much better to just practice vs alot of different builds, so you're ready to respond to anything. Some players use UMS micro maps to practice specific things like vulture or muta control, but thats usually just used for fun or warmups.

Pro]ChoseN- : Oh ok. Could you tell us how you came about becoming a Professional SC player? I mean you had to get noticed at some point in time or something. Just give a brief explanation of your rise from an American Bnet SC player up to a Professional.
IdrA : It happened rather abruptly for me. I wasn't even really planning on becoming a progamer, because its so difficult to break into the Korean scene as an english speaking foreigner, but then the pro team eSTRO hosted a tournament for the best North American players with the intent of inviting a player from it to join their team. I won the tournament and was invited to join the team, and that was it.

Pro]ChoseN- : Ha nice, so you didn't even have to think about it? You just knew this is what you wanted to do?
IdrA : Yes, its a once in a lifetime opportunity and it doesn't really cost me anything, at worst I'm just putting off college for a few years. I couldn't see any reason not to do it.

Pro]ChoseN- : haha yea for sure. It's hard for the western cutures and the recreational SC players to relate to exactly how big of a deal SC is. Are you guys like celebrities over there? Like does the public recognize the professional SC players when they go out and stuff?
IdrA : Not quite that big, only the really famous players like Boxer and Savior will get recognized by the general public, but there is a very large dedicated fan base, top players make hundreds of thousand of dollars a year and big tournaments can fill massive stadiums with audiences. Its not on the level of major sports in the US but its very, very big, and still growing.

Pro]ChoseN- : Yea definitely, I can tell just from watching the pro scene. How much do the pro players earn? Like from the new comers trying to make a name for themselves up to the people like Boxer, Jaedong, Bisu, Savior?
IdrA : Well at the absolute bottom of the hierarchy are the practice partners who dont make a salary, just get free living expenses in the team house. Low level progamers make a less than a thousand a month, though they still get free living expenses so its not as bad as it sounds. Im not really sure how much the non-superstar proleaguers make. Contracts are usually confidential and players dont really talk about it much. As for the top tier, I think savior makes something like a quarter million a year. Nada and Boxer have similar deals. I'd imagine other superstars on big teams like Bisu and Flash also make significant money. And that's only salary, they also get appearance fees, tournament winnings, and advertisement deals.

Pro]ChoseN- : Ah I see so obviously it's pretty performance based as we would expect. Do you ever stress about not performing well enough and maybe getting cut from your team if you don't perform at a certain level or how do they do that?
IdrA : Well they do cut players who dont perform well enough, but once you've reached progamer status they're pretty lenient about it. Unless you've been around for years and have achieved absolutely nothing they'll usually let you stay if you still want to be a progamer. The vast majority of retirements are by choice by the players. It's never really been a concern for me.

Pro]ChoseN- : That's good to hear, it's not ridiculously cut-throat. I have to know... your first time in that booth, as a pro gamer... going up against someone in a televised event how did you feel? Nervous? Scared? Excited?
IdrA : Well in offline events before, and even in important online events, I'd always had some problems with nerves, so I had expected to be really nervous for my first televised game, but once I was there I was suprisingly calm. I have no idea why but it just didn't get to me at all. That actually seems to have been a bit of a turning point, as I've been much more comfortable in live matches since.

Pro]ChoseN- : Wow nice lol I know I'd be nervous if I were there playing for the first time ^^ What are your plans and the plan amongst the community of pro gamers for SC2?
IdrA : To be honest no one, at least no one I've talked to, is really sure whats gonna happen with Korean esports. It still seems fairly up in the air. I don't imagine they will be able to ignore something as big as sc2, though. It'll be interesting to see what happens. As for myself, I definitely plan on playing it professionally.

Pro]ChoseN- : Nice, yea I'm sure SC2 will be big I'm just worried if maybe it will kill the professional SC1 scene... do you think that's gonna happen when SC2 comes out?
IdrA : It's a possibility. As I said I don't think everythings really been decided yet, and it certainly isnt publicly known if it has, so its hard to say anything for certain at this point.

Pro]ChoseN- : Yea always hard to predict what the future holds. Do you ever miss America, like is it hard for you to do what you do?
IdrA : Of course I miss it at times, but I enjoy Korean culture as well, so I'm quite happy living here. Also almost all of my time is spent practicing, and playing starcraft is pretty much the same no matter where you're doing it.

Pro]ChoseN- : lol ya that's for sure, I'd be playing SC no matter where I lived. Well just for a couple member questions before we wrap up. Do you ever play on iCCup or Bnet?
IdrA : Yes, when I first joined CJ we didn't play iccup at all, but sometime two seasons ago a massive amount of progamers started playing it around the same time so now everyone practices there. We also play on Bnet in order to practice with players from other teams.

Pro]ChoseN- : Oh ok cool. What rank are you on iCCup like A-, A or A+ :D
IdrA : I peaked at A last season, new season just started so im only C+ now.

Pro]ChoseN- : Yea takes time to get up there we all know yer A caliber lolz. One member wanted to know, why Terran? What clicked in your mind that made you decide Terran was your race or how did you come about knowing what race to master?
IdrA : I'm not really sure actually, I played all races at a competitive level in the foreigner scene and was actually mostly a zerg player when I first started to get good I just gradually came to enjoy terran the most and so focused on it. The terran vs zerg matchup probably had alot to do with it as it's always been my best and favorite matchup, as I enjoy the pure management, multitasking focused play style.

Pro]ChoseN- : I've heard your TvZ is insane from other competetive American gamers hehe. So how long you plan to play SC or SC2 as a professional? Like is it a viable career option long term for you given what you've seen?
IdrA : Alot of that will depend on what sc2 does to esports outside of Korea. If it catches fire like sc1 did in Korea, it could very well end up being a lifetime profession, perhaps not progaming but working in the industry in general. I really dont have set longterm plans at the moment, I'm just planning on waiting and seeing what happens with sc2 and playing it by ear. I'd certainly like to be in esports for a long time.

Pro]ChoseN- : Sounds good, well I'll wrap it up with you giving me your best and worst moment as a pro gamer so far.
IdrA : I suppose my best would be winning ESWC, even though its not on the same level as a starleague or anything its still a major tournament, all of the best european, american, and chinese players played it and its really my first major offline tournament win, so that definitely felt awesome. I think my worst was losing to smile[white] in the recent msl qualifiers. In previous starleague qualifiers I'd always gone in feeling like the underdog and just hoping to do my best. But vs smile I definitely felt like I was the better player, and felt I could even give a strong performance vs the seed Hyvaa in the next round. But I lost due to some stupid mistakes on my part, definitely felt pretty bad after that.

Pro]ChoseN- : Yea, it's such a fragile situation, make 1 mistake at that level and it's pretty much gg. Well before I let you go tons of people are dying to know... would you be willing to play an exibition match against the best low money (professional map style) player or a money map player like maybe best of 5 or something? The best that VG has to offer.
IdrA : Ya that sounds like it would be fun.

Pro]ChoseN- : O.o really? You would be cool with playing a best of 5 on a money fastest map?
IdrA : Ya sure.

Pro]ChoseN- : That's awesome. The community is gonna be dying to know when a pro gamer will play one of the best money map players, I had so many people ask me to ask you this. When would work for you / when could you do it? All the matches will have commentary / be posted hehe :D
IdrA : I'm not sure, our free time isn't set too far ahead of time since it depends on when matches are schedualed for.

Pro]ChoseN- : Have you ever even played a money map?
IdrA : Ya I was actually a money map player like 4 years ago, before I started playing low money.

Pro]ChoseN- : Oh nice well that's cool Greg I'll look forward to setting you up with the best VG has to offer. We'll vote on who gets to play you lol. Would you want the money map exhibition bo5 to be random vs random or either player pick a race?
IdrA : random vs random sounds fun

Pro]ChoseN- : Nice haha yea for sure we will definitely do that and be in touch. Thanks for the interview man I'll be following your games as I'm sure most of the American Starcraft community will be too as well.
IdrA : Thanks

End of interview.