Could you introduce yourself to us?

Fosken: Hi, my name is Kamil Sierocki, also known as Fosken. I chose to play Zerg fom the beginning my Starcraft career. I'm 25 years old and started playing in.. 2003 or 2004.

That's close enough. Why did you decide to pick Zerg?

Fosken: When I started playing starcraft, it was easy to just make a lot of Zerg units and go attack someone, and even if I didn't have good micro, I could still win against some 'bad' players who picked other races. After all, I think zerg its just a good race for me because I love to have a larger army than my opponent, even if it doesn't matter :D.

I can definitely understand that. When did you come into contact with the competitive scene?

Fosken: As I remember, my 'good' times start in 2006 when I finished top8 at WCG Poland. I started playing a few local tournaments, but it was horrible for me in the beginning. After I got a lot of experience in offline tournaments and that's why I felt good at WCG 2007 where I finished second, only losing to Dreiven in the final match.

Can you tell us about your WCG 2007 experience? How was it?

Fosken: I remember it quite well. After I get to the top8 offline final in Warsaw, I believed that's it's my time to shine, and that practice makes perfect, so I practiced hard. I realized there was a lot of work to do if I wanted to win. So.. when the finals in Warsaw started, I was quite confident about my game against other players. After I won against Draco 2:1, I felt great. "Nobody could stop me now!", I thought. Unfortunately it didn't work out that way. I still remember that final game vs Dreiven on Azealea, it was long game. In my 'final attack' I dark swarmed his reavers and just attacked with my hydralisks... I don't know why, but it was a 'live mistake', and it cost me the tournament.

That must've sucked. How were your tournament experiences other than that? Did you enjoy meeting the players that you play with online?

Fosken: Not really. I mean I meet a lot of cool people in tournaments like WCG. But as far as I remember whenever I traveled to tournaments, I only cared about winning.
Also after the WCG 2007 tournament, I was in PGL in China together with Draco, and that was also a great experience! Unfortunately I lost all my games.

A true winners mentality. Going back to the PGL tournament for a second, how was that? You mentioned it was still a great experience, what attributed to that?

Fosken: It was first time where I could enjoy the 'real progaming scene'. I mean it was diffrent level of production there. All the games were played in a special studio with cast. I was probably 18 or 19 years old, and I got invited to Beijing, China. With my WCG loss still fresh on my mind, it really felt like a 'dream come true' experience.

I can only imagine. Did you meet any pro gamers in China?

Fosken: If I remember correctly, I met Legend, the Chinese Protoss. He was a nice guy who helped me when I needed anything. There were a lot of other good players around too like Sen and Draco around which were fun and cool guys, but unfortunately we didn't get to spend a lot of time together.

That's unfortunate. What's your goal for the reunion tournament?

Fosken: I would like to show some good matches there, and of course I want to win! I still feel that after the WCG 2007 tournament, I have to try even harder and win this time .

Alrighty! What do you like to do outside of Starcraft?

Fosken: After I decided to stop playing bw, I found a new passion and it's dance. Right now I'm a Hip hop/choreography dancer, and I love to do it! Also I like to read philosophical books like "Power of Now" by Eckhart Tolle. I'm that guy who want to try a lot of things, and I'm just trying to enjoy life in the fullest way. Unfortunately I don't have a job right now, so that's why I have to win the whole tourney .

Aw, that sucks. Tell me more about the choreography dancing. How did you get into that?

Fosken: I decided to try something new in my life, and soon decided to start taking my first hip hop classes. It was really hard for me, but I learned from Starcraft that to get better, you need practice, so I just keep taking classes and spending time learning the basics.

What are some of your favourite artists?

Fosken: Paul Coelho, Stephen King, I love to read their books.

I meant music artists.

Fosken: I love a lot of old artists like D12, Eminem, and Chammillionaire. There's too many to name!

Alright, GoOdy and Socke invite you to play in their band. Do you accept?

Fosken: I like to get a new challenge, so yes! I will accept that :D

Awesome. Since you mentioned the authors, what do you like about Paul Coelho and Stephen King? What makes their books so interesting to you?

Fosken: As I mentioned I like to read philosopical books, and Paul Coelho for me is a guy who makes amazing story usung this 'philosopical' approach. About King, I love he's direct way of writing. When I read his books I can feel what's happening, and that's what makes him good for me.

I gotcha. Do you like pets? Do you have any?

Fosken: Yes, I like pets, especially dogs. I have three! Two of them are yorkshire terriers, and one Shih Tzu.

D'awww. Which player (from the lineup) would you allow to take care of your dogs if you were away?

Fosken: I pick Sen! I believe he can't eat them, but I'm not sure what they eat in Taiwan so maybe I shouldn't? :O

A good question. Any last words before we close out the interview?

Fosken: Sure. Thanks for inviite me for that such a great tournament. and some words for my opponents : I will beat you all :D

Could you please introduce yourself to us?

Arcneon: My name is Matti Punkari, I'm from Finland and known online as Clawson/Arcneon/MadClaw, I've been around on/off since 1997 and bw since -98, and play the Protoss race.

Did you play Protoss from the start?

Arcneon: Actually no, first started 1v1 playing with Zerg in Vanilla and after BW came out with DT's I switched into Protoss.

DT rushes were your motivation for switching? Do you consider yourself a moral person?

Arcneon: Haha, DT's were such a cool new unit at the time, so I started playing more with protoss and after things got more serious, I was forced into sticking with one race and that was Protoss . Still, these days I love to play some ZvP

PvP is a great matchup to make DT's in though.

Arcneon: Sure is, every matchup is good for DT's :D

So why do you like ZvP over PvP?

Arcneon: Actually right before I quit playing last time I actually started liking PvP for the first time ever, but still love playing ZvP more. It's just more intense and I think it's the most entertaining matchup in the whole game .

That's fair. What made you start playing Starcraft?

Arcneon: My friends, we used to play football outside all the time like normal people, but they convinced me to try Starcraft and start playing the old time ladder. Gave it a shot and instantly got addicted. Loved to play hunters games, UMSes and then switched to 1v1. After WGTour came out, there was no turning back!

I like how you added "like normal people". How did you do in the early days?

Arcneon: :D. Umm, not so good at first, but I kept practicing every day all the time like a real no-lifer and suddenly I kept getting matched with the best, got top3 in Finland a couple times before winning the local WCG in 2004. We had Nation wars at that time still. The team consisted of Ovvi, Aqrash, Me, Flayer and Napoleon and we played the rest. I think after 2004 I was at my best though, that's when I really practiced with the best players and hit my all time peak. I never was the best, but I think I was pretty good anyway .

You definitely were a scary beast. What BW experience is the most memorable to you?

Arcneon: The two things that come to mind are winning the Finnish WCG in 2004 and when (TE) won the big league finals against ToT). It was just really cool how the community was so active during those times. There were so many conversations about everything, mass forum conversations, lots of messages online, huge competition everywhere in everything, and so much respect in those times. It was really great to experience as a kid.

That's interesting. A few other people complained about how there was only really one big event to charge up for in a year.

Arcneon: Mm, well, there was only one WCG event ever in Finland, which was in 2004.

Wasn't there a Nordic event?

Arcneon: WCG? I think that was it then. We went to Sweden to play Finland's WCG. But after and before that there were no WCG entries for Finland anymore. I couldn't get to the main event.

In 2004 you did though. Take us through your experience at the grand finals there.

Arcneon: It was a really nice hotel that we stayed in. It was nice meeting all the players, especially Shaman . I tried to stay focused on the game, it meant a lot to me in those days. Got out of my group, then I faced Androide with sleepy eyes and that was it for me. Fucking Russian monsters :D

Losing to Androide is no shame at all. Of the players in the tournament, who do you feel most connected to?

Arcneon: Wow that's hard, almost all of them pretty much the same, but I think it'd have to be Sen. I used to train with him a lot. He was always really good manner, really friendly, didn't care eabout losing or winning as much as about just learning more and more. He became really good at the game and I just loved massing up games with him every day. I could easily play from 10 up to 50 games a day with him.

That's awesome, I never knew that. On Liquipedia, your style is described as "Arcneon still uses pretty outdated and micro orientated strategies known for excellent reaver control and aggressive play" Do you agree with that?

Arcneon: Haha, yeah kinda I guess. I tried to update my strategies last time I played but sometimes it's just better to use oldschool strategies anyway, since it's new to newschool players :D.

This time you're not facing newschool players though! How do you value your chances?

Arcneon: To be honest I have absolutely no clue :D. I'll try to play some games before the tournament to remember something. I hope I can reach a decent level quick. Last time I came back after many years I got to B level in one week or so, I guess I could do decently well. For Aiur!!

Haha. Alright, let's move on to more important stuff. What are your hobbies?

Arcneon: These days it's hitting the gym and running. I go to the gym 3-5 times a week and I go running 1-3 times a week. I don't even have my computer plugged in anymore

Look at you pretending not to be a nerd anymore. What happened?!

Arcneon: Haha, I'm always a nerd on the inside! I just thought it's time to make my life the way I want it to be. I'm doing pretty good in many aspects of life, even if my financial side is pretty fucked.

Oh dear. Why is that?

Arcneon: Got addicted to poker long ago, lost a whole bunch of money in the end and will be paying those off for many more years - That gave me motivation to drink more vodka and then I lost my job, twice actually. Lost my girl, and got busted drunk driving when I smashed a car into a streetlamp.

That's terrible. Are you getting your life back on the tracks?

Arcneon: Yeah pretty nicely, I just got engaged for the second time. Getting in pretty good physical shape too. Still got a lot to do, but there's a huge difference already if you look a couple of years back . Can't afford to buy anything for many years, but hey, that's life. Gotta pay for your fuckups.

I admire your openness about the situation. Let's talk about something a bit more fun. Tell us about your favourite artists!

Arcneon: Well, I can talk about music all day! I can barely survive an hour without it. It really means the world to me. For every moment in life, there's a specific music type. I listen to a lot of Trance, some Finnish rappers and then a lot of different types of pop/dance/rock/classics. For favourite DJ's, there's a lot but... Dash Berlin, Super8 & Dj Tab, Tiësto, Armin van Buuren just to name a few. Finnish rappers: Cheek and Uniikki. My last few nicknames on BW were Uniikii and Ak.CheekeR .

So how about festivals and concerts? Do you like going to them? What's your favourite memory in that?

Arcneon: I love going to them, but I just don't have the money to go anymore. I guess the best memories are from my old home town where they organized RMJ (Rauman Meren Juhannus) every year. It lasted for 3 days and was a really nice place with lots of different types of music and people . These days if I get to go anywhere, it's Trance parties, mostly organized in Helsinki. The next one I hope I can go to is in December, the Colors Festival .

Alright, I hope so for you too! Any last words before we close out the interview?

Arcneon: Well I wish bad luck to every single player on the tournament, and a very big thank you for organizing something awesome like this! Gotta put up my comp today so i can get some games in .

Hey Eri.

Eriador: Tell me when you want to interview!

Ooh, you're interviewing me?

Eriador: This is it, I figured we'll make a twist though, kinda like jeopardy. I'll answer stuff, then you try to figure out what question you were asking.

Works for me. Whenever you're ready.

Eriador: Okay. Yeah, I really liked her and had a wonderful time, she couldn't sit straight for about a week though.

What were your experiences with ClouD's mother-in-law?

Eriador: Almost, I was talking about yours , except not in-law.

Damn.

Eriador: I am terribly excited for this wonderful event. This shit is as cool as getting my prostate massaged.

Are you excited for the BW Reunion Tournament?

Eriador: No, I was talking about my date with your mom tomorrow. ZING. Being on brood war makes me feel 20 years old again.

You're messing up my formatting.

Eriador: Let's start for real from now on. I assume you're going to include this though.

Of course. Okay, now let's start properly. Could you introduce yourself to us?

Eriador: Hello wonderful people who read this. My name is Eivind Leknes, I'm 30 years old, I started playing starcraft when I was 13, basically since the beginning, and since then I've entertained myself and others with nicknames such as Liquid`Drone, Eriador[pG], ToT)Eriador( and a bunch of smurfs, participating in many tournaments and being involved in the community!! If you do not know me yet then it is my pleasure to make your acquaintance, and if you know me from before it's nice to see you again.

There's a surprising lack of mom jokes in there. How come you've always had great issues with what race to pick?

Eriador: Because in my eyes all races aree equal, except Terran which is a little less equal and Zerg which is a little more equal. Back in the day I used to play exclusively Random, I always delivered original rape. Zerg has always been the most fun so I went with them, but then ZvZ is dumb so I picked PvZ instead, thus I went from always being Random to playing ZvT, ZvP and PvZ, though I still feel that Brood War at the highest level of competition should ideally be played as Random vs Random without telling each other their races, because that keeps stuff fresh and interesting .

I'm sure you're saying that for incredibly selfless reasons and not because you're better at the offraces than other people would be.

Eriador: But that's a natural consequence of my pro-race equality stance. If other people were more willing to get their hands a little dirty touching forbidden fruit, they would also realize how much fun it can be. I feel we're about to get back on track with the mom jokes here.

I think your dad and touching forbidden fruit would be a more apt metaphor, but we'll leave it at that. How did you end up picking up Starcraft and what made it stick?

Eriador: I had played dune 2 and Warcraft 1 and loved both in their respective eras, then Warcraft 2 came out and was the greatest for a while. Finally, when Starcraft was released I was immediately like "Whoa, I have to play this!" and I fell in love from the very first moment I played it. I actually remember the first game I played. It was a Protoss versus Zerg game on that 5 player map Diablo where I spawned at 4 and my brother spawned at 6. I beat him in a long grueling battle and it was so incredibly fun that I immediately started playing like a madman and noticed that I had some natural aptitude for it or something. It was both more fun and more challenging than anything else that was available to me. In addition, I thought the whole internet and getting to know people from all around the world was absolutely fantastic, and it was actually pretty new at this point (1998). Additionally, I had a 2 year older brother and we had two computres hooked up to a constant LAN party, which seems to be a fairly common background for competitive gamers. There was a natural rivalry and very good motivation to improve. Basically, even during the times where the game itself was not all that fun or amazing, the sensation of hanging out with buddies and being part of the wonderful Starcraft community made it impossible to ever really quit for me.

I gotcha. How long did your brother keep up with you?

Eriador: I think during the first year or so we were mostly quite even overall, he would be better at some points and I would be better at other times. He decided to do more productive stuff with his life at one point though, and I think after mid-1999 the skill difference just continued increasing. Fun trivia though - me and him got third place at The Gathering's 2on2 competition (massive lan party in Norway) in 2000, losing against Sven and Slayer in the semi finals. Considering Slayer was literally the best player in the world and how Sven was the only one who might have been better (slight Norway bias but also kinda just telling the truth) we didn't feel that badly about that, but I was kinda pissed because at least one of the games was lost by him!

I have a feeling that "best player in the world" might be a slight overstatement if we're including Korea, but I'll let it slide. What's been your best BW experience?

Eriador: No, Slayer actually won KBK, a tourney including many of the best Koreans. The last time any nonkorean did that to my knowledge.

And Sync won an OSL once.

Eriador: Doesn't matter. Anyway. I guess there are three stand-out experiences, firstly winning WCG Norway 2004 (just had to check my trophy- beating Slayer in the winner bracket finals) and going to WCG San Fransisco later that year. That was amazing because I got to travel for free and meet many of my super great friends in person. I loved that whole trip, got out of the group stage and got the short end of the random stick for once against Testie in the ro16, but overall I was even happy with my performance.
Then I was appointed the great honor of captaining Team Europe in Blizzard's mystery map invitational, and actually leading us to victory against Team Asia in the finals through beating Legionnaire in the final match when it was 2-2, which even though I know it does in no way reflect the skill I ever had in this game, sounds like a pretty amazing accomplishment to non-brood war players. Like "yeah so I was captain of team Europe and I lead us to win the intercontinental world championship" kind of thing, it sounds cool.
+ Show Spoiler +
Then following that, I guess the last standout experience would be getting invited to Seoul to play against Nada in some Blizzcon-ish event in 2005(?). Even though I played absolutely tragically and got destroyed in an embarrassing manner (forgot my keyboard and mouse at home and had to play with some tiny thing with keys in different places that I had no time to warm up with- not that I would necessarily have beat him anyway;) ), it was an amazing experience to actually get to play on stage and to experience Korea while it was still Brood War crazy.

Sounds awesome. You've been part of Teamliquid since pretty much the beginning. Tell me how that went.

Eriador: I met Nazgul when he was in [i'm] and I was in the-feared, we played some games and became friendly, then both teams seemed to pretty much die, and he asked me if I wanted to join. I said hm I dunno for like two weeks or whatever, then I realized that yeah I should just join. Then I joined and all was good forever after. It wasn't really a magical story about how we met after his horse carriage broke down on an abandoned road and I saved him and his family from certain doom, more like the equivalent of getting a girlfriend in elementary school. Like "wanna be girlfriendz" and then like "yeah", except we stayed true forever and ever, which I guess makes it a little different.

How has the site changed since the very beginning?

Eriador: Haha oh my.

Yeah, we're going there.

Eriador: Yeah, okay. So we made this site called teamliquid.cjb.net sometime early after making the team. It was a pretty average clan-site with information about the members and some very occasional news posts and a not very frequented message board (I think it was using the gamersx template for anyone who remembers that!) This was around 2001. Then in 2002, Teamliquid.net became a reality and actually, the design was not drastically different from the beautiful wonderful internet sanctuary we all reap the benefits of today, but everything else was very different, other than the fantastic newswriters. We had them then and we still awesome newswriters now! (Props to mensrea and Arbiter[Frolix] and to everyone who remembers them) Anyway, the community was dominated by teenagers, I myself was only 17 when the site was established. As such, you could say that it was slightly less mature than it is today, and the community was much, much smaller.

Are you trying to tell me that the current userbase isn't dominated by teenagers?

Eriador: Yeah, actually I think there are quite a bit more 20+ users than people below 20 now, at least looking at people who actually participate on the forums and don't just lurk. Updated moderating policies play a major part in this - I think 17 year old me, which I honestly do not believe was worse than the average 17 year old in terms of forum posting quality or whatever, would have been warned/banned with some frequency today, just because it's like.. it's so, so much bigger and more professional. But also just the sheer inescapable fact that when time progresses, people grow older. It is natural that a community formed in 2001 has a higher average user age in 2014 than it did at its inception.

Unfortunately the passage of time afflicts us all. Is there anyone specific you would like to beat at the tournament?

Eriador: Everyone, because that's how I get the most money, fame and internet cred. Naming one, I would have to go with Moondragoon, because he is the king and if I want his crown I have to slay him, but it seems that's going to be tough because the fucker improves too fast

It starts with believing! What would you think of being stuck on an abandoned island with Moondragoon?

Eriador: No island can contain a moondragoon, so we'd just go back to the rest of the world? I mean he can fly and stuff. Other than that he'd be fine company but I think I'd prefer someone of the opposite sex (hi wife I mean you) for like, eternity lost on an island?

That's so boring. Okay, I happen to know that you're a fan of going to festivals. What's been your best festival experience?

Eriador: Roskilde 2006 was incredibly wonderful in every way. Honestly I'm not the biggest festival goer, I've just been very vocal about how fantastic Roskilde was that year. I was there in 2006 2007 and 2008 and well, weather actually makes a significant difference in how enjoyable it is. In 2008 though I actually met some Danish guy there whose acquaintance I made through brood war! Shout out to him, don't remember your name though sadly :D. But anyway, I was "in a state of heightened sensibilities" (no no not endorsing drug use) while watching roger waters performing the dark side of the moon to close off the festival, and that was basically the equivalent of a three hour orgasm, and quite possibly the most pleasing thing I have ever experienced. Highly recommended!

Might want to be careful about telling the wife that. Which player would you take along to Roskilde?

Eriador: Would have to be someone Polish I guess, they're fun to party with . No names though, I love everyone equally.

Any last words before we close out the interview?

Eriador: Yes. I am done as well. Pleased to talk to you and I hope the tournament becomes the smashing success we're all hoping for, it's sooo much fun to be logged on iccup and seeing so many familiar faces!! hopefully we can do some more fun stuff like this in the future at some point, keep the flame burning and all that. Much <3 to everyone!