Interview with coL's qxc: "When big tournaments decide that it is time for HotS then it will be time for HotS"

This week I was able to sit down and have a chat with Kevin 'qxc' Riley, a Stacraft 2 pro from Complexity Gaming. He joins us from the Gamma Gamers house in Houston, Texas, to talk about his recent results, training, competitive mindset, and future plans. 

 

Hello everyone, this is Kyle “Beef” Bautista of Team-Dignitas.net and joining me is Kevin “qxc” Riley of Complexity Gaming. qxc thank you for taking the time to answer a few questions for us today.

qxc: Not a problem, thanks for having me on.

 

Many of us watched you make another appearance today on State of the Game; you've been a guest in the past but how are things now that you're a full time pillar of the show?

qxc: I like it. We get to kind of hang out, talk about the game, talk about whats going on in the community. It's pretty interesting. It's nice to kinda put some of the things I've been thinking about into words and present them to the community.

 

Right now SotG is rotating through some guest casters while trying to stabilize the hosts, who would you love to have come on and be a guest on the show?

qxc: Hmmm... It would probably be one of my real life friends. Someone who doesn't even play Starcraft. that's kind of funny. Maybe CatZ? He's probably the person that I get along with best in the community in terms of like an MC show, hosting a show type position. CatZ or Grubby!

 

Speaking of CatZ and the guys over at ROOT how often are you able to hang out with your old teammates?

qxc: Not too much. Sometimes we play practice games together. Pretty much if you see that at events say hi, hang out, but online not too much. There's not a common gathering spot where you see them over and over.

 

Alright, so I can hear a lot of other guys in the background, you're in the Gamma Gamers house down in Houston, correct?

qxc: Yep!

 

Who else is staying in the house right now?

qxc: Me, GanZi, goswser, Sasquatch, fuzzy, EroSennin, and TriMaster.

 

Are there players from any other Complexity Gaming divisions living in the house?

qxc: No. We had two Heroes of Newerth players but they just left about a week ago.

 

So you've been in the house for a few months now. How is the training environment there in comparison to a training house in Korea?

qxc: I'm not sure what Korea would be like as I haven't actually lived in a Korean house with a Korean schedule. We have 4 hours each day where we are all playing each other. We bring in people from outside the team to practice with us and that helps us fill in some of the gaps because we don't really have the Protoss that we need, we only have one. And we only have, well now we have three Terrans now, and we have plenty of Zerg. Beside that most of us are playing eight to ten hours a day or watching replays or watching VoDs or something like that.

 

I think many of us remember your all-kill of Incredible Miracle in the GSTL last year, are there any plans for Complexity to send you or a team out to Korea and maybe establish a house and participate in the GSTL?

qxc: As far as a house in Korea goes I don't really think that's really something that's in the future for Complexity. Likewise with GSTL. I would love to return to Korea, but I don't want to do it until I'm satisfied with how I'm doing. Right now I don't feel like it would be a good use of my time or money. When I start to perform better then Korea makes more sense.

 

I think many of your fans will recall your involvement with both parkour and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, are these still part of your training routine?

qxc: It's important to be relaxed. You'll play better and make better decisions. I think it also helps with thinking about the game. Everyone has a different way of relaxing. Goswser basically never exercises. But at least for me, I really like exercising. I really like getting out and doing things so those have just been some of the outlets, but everybody is different and has their own system that they follow.

 

Recently Ret and DeMusliM have both spoken about the importance of physical activity while training. Are there any physical training regimens in place for the Complexity team?

qxc: Since GanZi has gotten here we've run about a mile and a half every day. Before that we would go to the gym occasionally and I would run on my own every other day or so.

 

Last month you won WCG USA in New York in a team-kill finals. Next you'll be heading to Shanghai, China to represent the United States in the global finals. Will this be your first time playing in China?

qxc: No, I went to China last year for a CPL event. I ended up getting third place there, so this will be my second time.

 

How do you think you'll do in the WCG Finals?

qxc: I hope that I do well, but I don't know the player list and I don't know the conditions. I just want to play good games.

 

Many players older players have a fond place in their heart for WCG because it was the only tournament for so many years. For you where does WCG place in terms of tournaments?

qxc: It's pretty low. WCG is probably one of the least important tournaments in terms of coverage and publicity. Usually people complain about poor production value and things like that. Obviously that can all change, and that's just going off what I know right now.

 

Last weekend you were in Dallas for the MLG Fall Championships where you dropped out of the tournament relatively early. Can you tell us a bit about what happened?

qxc: The first day I had a pretty bad headache. I didn't sleep as well as I would have liked. I didn't manage my condition as well as I should have so I think I lost to Yoon in a series that I really shouldn't have lost. The next day I ended up playing my teammate [goswser] who has pretty good ZvT.

I have a decent amount of trouble playing against him in practice games, and I lost to him. The second day I don't really feel like I played poorly. Obviously you can always play better. Going 1-2 against him, in the third game there was a window, an opportunity where I was ahead and I could have won, but it didn't bother me too much.

 

Combined with that lackluster performance at MLG Dallas you're also going into the last week of the NASL regular season with an 0-7 record. What is your mindset after these events?

qxc: I'm trying to focus on the positives and the future. I've had a lot of pretty poor performances lately, but that's all behind me. This is definitely the last season of NASL that I'll be in. I'll try to re-qualify for season 5 obviously, but my record is such that there is no way that I'll be able to continue on. I'll be one of the players knocked out of the league. I'm just going to focus on the next event, the next tournament and go from there.

 

Your next event is this weekend, once again close to home. With Lone Star Clash 2 only a couple hours drive from the Gamma Gamers house do you feel that the lack of travel time will give you an advantage in this weekend's tournament?

qxc: Considering that the majority of the players participating are actually staying somewhere in Texas because they were just at Dallas and people are putting them up I don't think that it lends me any particular advantage.

 

You had great success in Wings of Liberty beta and just after the release. With the Heart of the Swarm beta now in full gear are you investing much time practicing the new expansion?

qxc: I've actually barely played Heart of the Swarm since the first week or two. I don't find it to be a very good investment of my time. In general I'd rather focus on Wings of Liberty and continue preparing for tournaments. It seems like they're doing a lot things with it though. Recent patches, recent changes that they've announced. Changing the interface and looking at how they're altering the game balance it all seems like its going in the right direction.

 

When do you see yourself starting to invest more time in Heart of the Swarm?

qxc: Its going to depend a lot on tournaments. When big tournaments decide that it is time for Heart of the Swarm then it will be time for Heart of the Swarm.

 

Alright, well I think that about does it for questions from me. Any shout outs before we wrap this up?

qxc: Shout out to my fans and friends for supporting me. Big shout out to my team, Complexity Gaming for making this possible and to Gamma Labs for making the house possible. And to our sponsors Creative, PNY, SoundBlaster, Origin, G8. Check me out on Twitter, @col_qxc , check me out while I'm streaming at Twitch.tv/colqxc and thanks for having me for this interview.

 

Thank you for being here. I've been Beef from Team-Dignitas.net and with me has been qxc from Complexity Gaming. Thanks again and have a good one.

qxc: Take it easy.