Interview with Team Dignitas SMITE Hunter iRens on Super Regionals

Rens 'iRens' Oostenbach is the latest member to join Team Dignitas' SMITE roster, and after a split of steady improvement, Charlie 'Salop' Smith caught up with him to find out more about him, the team, and his ambitions going into Super Regionals. Team Dignitas secured their LAN spot in the last week of the SPL Fall Split - finishing with an 11-17 record, and ending up in sixth place overall in the EU SPL.

It’s been an up and down season for Team Dignitas, but after bringing you in for Fall Split from Upcoming Stars the team managed to string some impressive wins throughout the split, and most importantly qualify for Super Regionals. How do you feel this split went for both you and the team as a whole?

iRens: I’ve improved from when I was still playing on Stars, and right now I’m playing with players with more experience around me - and that’s really helped to improve myself. For the team as a whole, we are a little disappointed with the end of the split, leaving it to the last week to qualify for LAN. We feel like we could have gotten it done way before, and we definitely had our slips - like losing to Les Myrmidons in the first week. But we have definitely improved over the course of the split, and we feel like we’re still getting better before heading into LAN in a couple of weeks.

How was your transition into a new team environment? And just how different is it moving to a big org like Team Dignitas?

iRens: The players made me feel comfortable straight away, so it was very easy for me to settle in and get started. Coming into an organisation like Team Dignitas was a huge change for me, especially coming from a team without any sponsors or backing in Upcoming Stars. However the support they’ve given has been great, there is always someone at the org I can speak to, including Odee, and they’ve helped me out with things like gear, which has been awesome, because before I wasn’t even playing with a mousepad!

How would you describe your strengths as a player? What do you bring to help the team?

iRens: I would definitely say my strength comes from my laning phase, I never just lose lane and the team has confidence in me enough to leave me to farm. I normally don’t rotate out of lane for at least twenty minutes normally, as the team is good at mid game fights without my help. Of course, when it comes to late-game, I feel I can deal out a lot of damage safely and hopefully have more farm than my opponent Hunter late.

With recent balance changes do you see any changes in meta for the tournament, will we see anything we haven’t seen this last Smite Pro League split?

iRens: There hasn’t been a huge amount of change I don’t think, but one big thing will be the availability of the newest God Sol, who we did not see at all during the SPL. She’s definitely going to be a priority pick for most teams – and I know if we were to pick her that I could play her in the Hunter role comfortably, and I know that ShadowNightmare and Variety could play her in mid or solo too. She’s really good in any role. Other than that, changes to Athena’s ultimate cooldown may have some impact on her pick priority - she may fall down a bit.

How has the addition of coach Deku affected the team?

iRens: Deku has been great. It’s nice to have that other view on the team and having someone to help guide you, and he has definitely done that for me in particular. Other than that, he’s been really great with our picks and bans. During our win streak this past split, we found a formula that really worked for us and we just kept going back to it, and he is a huge reason why we got that run together.

How are the team preparing for LAN, and how are you preparing for Paradigm (first round opponents) specifically?

iRens: We’re scrimming as often as possible, and we’re working pretty hard at the moment. We are confident with where we are as a team, we know our own strengths and have ourselves as a team figured out. As for Paradigm, we are always expecting them to do something completely different, particularly with (Paradigm’s Support player) TrixTank. He’s super aggressive in lane and picking Gods like Thor and Bellona for support makes him tough to lane against and unpredictable, but I’m confident in the team that we have the in-game strategies to deal with it well, as well as trying to take certain Gods away in the pick and ban phase. Part of that can be rotating FrostiaK in from the jungle, but we definitely have some stuff figured out.

We’ve seen some fantastic duels between you and Paradigm’s Hunter Funballer this past split, how do you plan on getting the better of him this time?

iRens: *Laughs* Yeah, that was pretty awesome. For me, a lot of Funball’s strength comes from Trix, they’re good at getting early kills and setting Funball up to dominate lane. Me and FrezzOO had a similar style in lane early in the split, but we started to play more safely and learnt a lot about how it can be punished. I’m happy to sit and box Funball 1v1, he’s a great player but I know I can compete with him. I’m definitely feeling good going up against him, and I know the other guys are confident in their match-ups.

 

What mentality is the team taking into this LAN, a chance to improve and gain experience or a genuine shot for a Worlds spot?

iRens:  I think we definitely are approaching this as a shot at Worlds, I think all the teams will be. Our entire roster, other than me, has a lot of LAN experience and I know those guys will feel good in that environment, and really prove themselves. It would be a mistake to go into this thinking “we’re just here so we can be better next time”, we want to perform at our best, we will take away a lot of experience from the LAN anyway. 

Who are the teams from EU you think will be the toughest/who do you think are the favourites coming into the event?

iRens: I mean us, of course!

But aside from us, I really think Fnatic are the strongest team coming into LAN. They have the most LAN experience out of every European team, and they’ve been in every situation that could happen. I don’t imagine they would tilt at all, and it will be tough getting past them in semis if we get there. Really though, there aren’t any teams that worry us too much. If we dropped into Wildcards, we would feel really good going up against London Conspiracy or Titan, we’ve got great SPL records against these guys (at 3-1 and 2-2 respectively) and we’ve proven that we can beat them when we need to. With the LAN experience we have on the team and the records against them, we know we are always in with a chance.

With the prospect of a possible wildcard match against NA teams for that fifth worlds spot, who would you most like to play against, in both team and lane opponent?

iRens: This is a really tough question! Erm, I have no idea.

It would be really cool to go against any of them, I don’t really know any of the guys personally from NA, but obviously the top four NA teams all have great hunters. Allied, Zapman, BaRRaCCuDDa and Snoopy are definitely seen as ‘the’ Hunter players in Smite and I’d love to play any of them. After speaking to Vetium (Enemy Hunter) about BaRRaCCuDDa though, I’d have to pick him. Someone with that much game knowledge, and that much mechanical ability - I’d love to play against him.

Should we be expecting some surprises to come out of Team Dignitas this LAN? Any secret strategies you can let us in on?!

iRens:  *Laughs* You aren’t going to get anything out of me. Sorry, I can’t really say much. But there’s definitely some stuff we can bring out, for sure. Who knows.

Any final shout-outs for us before we let you go Rens?

iRens: Yeah definitely - Team Dignitas for being amazing, all the guys on the team, and of course, our fans and sponsors.

 

Catch iRens and the rest of the Team Dignitas SMITE squad on the 18th of November in their quarter final match against Paradigm at twitch.tv/smitegame, and don't forget to cheer our boys on! You can find iRens on Twitter @DIG_iRens. Catch his stream on Twitch at twitch.tv/irenss.