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RoX.KIS, Andrew 'Dread' Golubev is a veteran in the competitive scene, having played in multiple teams such as Virtus.pro and Moscow 5 previously. His current stint with RoX.KIS has already shown results as they achieved second place in the recently concluded RaidCall EMS One Spring 2013 finals. joinDOTA had the opportunity to speak to Dread about his team's growth, his thoughts on The International, the Eastern scene, and more.
From left to right: Solo, VANSKOR, BzzIsPerfect, yol, Dread. Photo: ESL
Thank you for taking the time out to talk with joinDOTA today. Let us start with something that is on every team's mind: Do you feel your team is good enough to be selected for an invitation to The International?
Hello! We are progressing really fast in my opinion, but I think we are still not good enough to be invited to the main event, but good enough for the qualifiers. We have been practicing a lot lately, not just playing alot of scrims but watching replays, working on the team atmosphere, etc. I believe we are ready to RoX!
If you were to select one of the remaining teams from EU / US to either send to The International or compete in the qualifiers, who would you pick and why?
Hmm this is a hard question. I think EG, mouz, and Qpandas are tier 1 teams, Kaipi, aL and ICCup are tier 2. My opinion is based on some scrims we played, and lately results - not much of analysis. One team I want to pick is the QPAD Red Pandas. I like their playstyle, their own strategies with Kunnka, and picking uncommon heroes. It is really fun to watch their games. For ourselves - I am obviously biased here so I won't say anything, I'll leave it to others. However if we consider LGD.int to be EU/NA, then I believe they are the team most deserving of an invite to the main event.
Does the China/SEA scene affect your approach to Dota 2 and is there a specific team you follow?
I mostly watch EU/NA dota simply because we need to prepare for our actual opponents. I can't say much about Asian dota besides that they are on different level if they play with 100% concentration. In EU/NA, the Dota team that makes less mistakes emerge victorious, whilst in China (not sure about rest of Asia) the teams that make the better moves win. But they have one major weakess: If you are able to win at least one game of a match, the Chinese teams will get confused and become significantly weaker. For now I am fan of LGD.int! Really impressive playstyle, lots of aggression, and flawless teamplay makes their games so awesome!
Photo: ESL
You recently claimed the 2nd place at the EMS One grand final. What is your opinion of the event?
It was just great. For the players it was very comfortable to play there. Too bad it was focused on the online audince, and there was no large audience shouting! For us it was our first big LAN event together, and I am very satisfied with our performance. We played better there than we do online for sure.
In game 3 of the EMS One grand final against Na`Vi, you tried to run an agressive trilane with Axe, Shadow Demon and Nyx Assassin. What was the idea behind the lane and was the idea behind levelling up Battle Hunger on Axe at level one?
It was an all-in strategy. If you dominate the trilane with Axe, enemies simply can't come in range of Battle Hunger. This gives the team a huge advantage, and a really farmed Axe, which is Die Hard!
What is your opinion on the new Na`Vi roster?
I think if all is well with the team spirit and more, they might be even better than Na`Vi back in 2012. Plus KuroKy is imba! The Kuro + Puppey synergy will be just like the old GG.net days.
With the recent changes in the Team Empire roster and other popular CIS players floating around without a team, do you think the European teams are looking stronger or weaker before the TI3 Qualifiers / main event?
Stability and hard work always bring sucess. All these roaster changes will always make teams weaker for the moment. For now, Team Empire will have much to do before they can be as good as they were before.
DTS attending WDC in 2010: Dendi, LighTofHeaven, Dread, NS, ArtStyle.
There has been a lot of discussion around the CIS teams about the desire to only play in fewer tournaments so that their schedules are not as intense. Do you feel RoX.KIS should play in less competitions so you can focus more?
Yea definitely. There are so many online competitions at the moment (which is good!) that we need to choose the most important ones to participate. If we play just tournament matches, we cannot test different strategies, crazy moves, and so on. More practice, and less tournaments are also vital for sucess.
Any last messages for the fans of RoX.KIS and all other Dota 2 fans reading this?
I want to thank all our fans for supporting us, for flaming us when its required :D Keep doing this! Thank you.
RoX.KIS Roster:
Stanislav 'BzzIsPerfect' Glushan (C) Vladimir 'yol' Basov Andrew 'Dread' Golubev Alex 'Solo' Berezin Ivan 'VANSKOR' Skorokhod
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