Archive:Leaguepedia Articles/DNL YoDa Interview

Leading up to the second Spring Promotion Qualifier, I had a chance to talk with Denial's Jungler, Orie "YoDa" Guo. YoDa provided insight into Denial and offered some trivia that may not be well known to League of Legends fans.

YoDa, you recently moved into a gaming house with Denial in Columbus - how was the moving process, and how has living with your teammates been thus far?

Moving was pretty simple. Packed all my belongings and just flew over. I will miss my friends from California, but such is life. Living with the team has been pretty good so far, it’s nice to have most everything paid for. You also get to understand your team on a whole new level when you see everything they do when they aren’t playing.

You’re a long time League of Legends player, but what was your competitive background prior to Denial?

I started playing games at a competitive level in around 2005 with DotA, reaching the peak of my career by getting third in an international tournament (MYM Pride), scoring myself a big $50 (yeah, esports has really grown…). From there, I moved on to Heroes of Newerth in 2009, winning the launch tournament with team Loaded and eventually becoming one of the most popular streamers of the game. I started playing League of Legends competitively in 2012, forming my first team with Link, Hoodstomp, Lemonnation, and xan Vech (stacked roster!!!). Since then I’ve just been bouncing around the amateur scene, but I think I’ve finally found a home here at Denial.

How would you describe the synergy between yourself and your teammates at this point?

Most of the synergy between our team is born of understanding the game and watching replays together. Generally, if something goes well or poorly during a scrim, we parse out what each player (including enemies) could have done better, and almost always agree. We are still working out some kinks however.

Denial has been trying out mid laners following the departure of Arthelon. Is the instability of the situation affecting your practice and/or performance?

I think Arthelon’s departure was a huge loss. He was basically the perfect fit for our team. Not only is his laning prowess extremely strong, he also tended to call a lot of plays. On top of that, he fit our team perfectly as we would often fail to take necessary risks for fear of throwing the game. Arthelon is a maniac, so he remedied that problem. We are working to synergize with Pekin Woof as soon as we can. He has big shoes to fill, but I believe he can do it based on our first few games with him.

You guys unfortunately lost in the first Promotion Tournament Qualifier, but you have a chance again in the second Qualifier. How are you guys preparing for it this time and what can we expect to see from you guys?

To be honest, we failed to prepare enough for the first promotion tournament. First off, we completely failed to research their team and had a fail pick/ban phase. We thought Nautilus, Zed, and Mordekaiser was the enemy team’s main comp (Team VEX -- now vVv Gaming), when that was just a one-off thing they ran against us a month ago. Second, we banned both Zed AND Mordekaiser, when only one of those was necessary to neuter the combo. Third, we have been using a program “WTFast” (shameless plug) to help our connection to the League of Legends servers (time warner pls) and had it working fine on the live client, but failed to prepare it on the tourney realm and as such suffered a little bit of lag. We have since resolved issues with the tournament client, and also have an extra few weeks to work on our team play with Pekin Woof. During the first tournament, Pekin Woof had been playing with the team for less than a week.

How would you describe your practice schedule? Do you guys scrim for a certain amount of time, watch replays, or consult a coach?

We play or watch replays for about 8 hours a day, and most of us solo queue to keep mechanics high. I'd say each player plays about 4 or 5 games daily.

Many people may not be familiar with Denial’s top laner, Billyboss. Having played with him for some time, can you describe Billyboss as a player?

I consider Billyboss one of the best top laners in the amateur scene. Not only does he win his lane a ridiculous amount of the time through ganks, but he also feeds a huge amount of information about how his lane will play out and how we should use it.

What are some of your favorite jungle champions to play, and how do they fit into the landscape of the jungle role right now?

I honestly just like playing strong champions that can both duel and gank well, so at the moment that’s Jarvan IV, Vi, Elise, and Aatrox (although the new patch might change that).

What other games have you found yourself playing recently, or what are some of your other hobbies?

I have cleared almost all of the end-game content of Final Fantasy XIV, and am starting to play Hearthstone. I also play Magic: the Gathering but that is growing rarer now as my irl play group unfortunately did not move with me to Columbus.

What ways can fans connect with you (Stream link, Twitter, etc.)?

I have a stream, Twitch.tv/yodatv. I don’t use my twitter all that much, but it is @YodaOrie.

Thanks again for your time, and did you have any shoutouts or closing thoughts?

Thanks for having me. I would like to shout out to Denial’s sponsors, MicroCenter, AOC, DX Racer, Stinky Footboard, Maingear, Gamevox, WTFast (can’t play without it anymore), and Bloody.

Written by David "TheDynasty" Spitler

Edited by Jordan Spence

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