I'm Steve Arhancet, Owner for TL - AMA!

We've had really rough scrims of late vs. TSM, our record is not great versus them. If you base it off just that I would say TSM has the advantage in our match. With that being said, TSM's teamfighting and rotations have not been as clean in LCS as they seem in scrims. I think the match is going to be close, we'll likely both have a decent early game and it's going to come down to how the mid-game is played. This is all assuming there isn't some odd-picks or team comp that either team may not be aware of. It's one of the first matches on the new patch, which means strategy in bans and picks plays a greater role.

Regarding DIG, I think we should come out with a win. Our laners are stronger in each position and we seem to have cleaner mid and late game teamfighting and rotations. As long as we don't mess up the bans and picks, we should be in a good position to win this match.

Fenix and Piglet are doing great, it's night and day from when they first joined the team. I would say Fenix did a better job adjusting to joining the house when we were living in redondo beach last split. He was a little quiet, reserved - but a work horse. He's definitely opened up, he's more playful - a massive troll and a bit of the glue that holds the team together. He speaks decent english and understands more than he can speak. I can't speak for him, but from what I see he's really enjoying and synergizing w/ the team. For Piglet, his english has improved considerably, he understands quite a bit but is still a bit apprehensive on speaking when on camera or stream. In the house, he talks with the guys in english all the time. In all - there's a considerable improvement from last split.

- I saw Jacky the last time I was in NYC, he streams under our network and I keep in touch but he's been really busy with school
- I haven't seen Voy, I know he's been kicking ass on his stream with great numbers. Few twitter interactions here and there but nothing substantial
- I just had drinks with Saint last week, we try and hang out few times a month. He's living at the Coast house now.
- I see Cop at LCS, I try and get him to Duo with me but he always rejects me

Thanks for being such a loyal fan of the team, we've definitely have had our ups and downs. We've got a great staff this year and the team is playing well. We still have a long way to go if we want to compete with the best in the world but we are committed and I see everyone working hard.

It's been relatively smooth, with any large merger between two companies it's going to require a lot of consideration to HR, Finance, Management and of course alignment on vision and planning. No large deal wouldn't be without hiccups but we are steadily moving along and I think we've accomplished quite a bit in such a short time. It's only been about 6 months and we've added numerous teams, signed additional sponsorships and now have some of the top competing players/teams in each of our respective eSports.

For the league guys (challenger and main team), there's usually a daily interaction (skype, social, gaming house, office, training, analyst, coaching staff, sponsorship events, etc.)

For the CSGO guys, there's some skype and social. I would like to play more but anytime I queue up with them I get smashed

For the starcraft guys, there's not too much - Victor has a much closer relationship with those players than I do. I used to play starcraft back in the day (Diamond), but I haven't followed the competitive scene as much as I do CSGO and League

For the smash guys, I chat with the players weekly - but not on a daily basis. Typically more around events and upcoming sponsorship plans.

For our Halo guys, there's not too much daily interaction - Caleb manages our team really closely. I've always been a big fan of halo.

Our Heroes team, Victor is really close to many of those players (some of them were ex-starcraft pro)

For our Hearthstone guys, I watch their matches all the time and closer with Savjz but our players are EU, don't get a chance to play with them from NA

1. At the time, I had limited resources to properly manage a team in EU. I think now, we could manage it effectively but with the new riot rules this is not possible.

2. There were absolutely concerns regarding language barriers but the other benefits of having peter on the team outweighed those potential conflicts imo. We sent out a post for a coach, we received hundreds of applications, we had video interviews, narrowed it down, had a few interview with the team and then we had a test run in the house and then we made the offer to Peter.

3. There's a decent amount of separation on the work we do. We collaborate on key aspects of the business but also play to our strengths and by splitting up responsibilities we are able to get more done.

lol - we are working on Victor's. It takes a while and not easy process.

We used to play these events called the CCC. Basically they were 10-20 man teams, there were about 30 or so competitive teams in the world. It was like the olympics, with a ton of events over a weekend. 5v5 Ancient start seperated, 3v3 medi, occ (one city challenge) and a bunch of other events. You would sub in players into the events and accumulate points and the team with the most points from all the events would win. I played for a few teams, we always got smashed by the German team, but we would place top 3.

I'm so down to do this

Way too many, I've had my fair share of free coffee. They love me, lol.

Nearly zero, but not without effort. We made offers to multiple teams and tried to put together a few teams but with no success. We are committed to picking back up on it after TI

Love this, I would go with SKT. I probably wouldn't have time to get players to synergize so roster changes don't make sense and SKT is one of the best teams in the world atm.

Favorite movie is braveheart, just watched the jinx on hbo - that series was done really well. Jaw dropping.

I really like John legend and Ellie Gouilding

Favorite current game is league, past time game is spades and chess

Book, there's so many good ones. The best one of late is probably the hunger games series, read all three books over a weekend.

The biggest thing eSports needs is structure. In order for the industry to grow it needs a regulatory body to govern teams, players, events - because there are multiple developers they would all need to come together with all the other parties and agree. Difficult to say the least.

This question actually came up in conversation. There's this 15 dollar bottle called retinol that's red and clear that I use everyday.

Feels great but I want to do more. I want my actions and the work I do with victor to make a bigger difference in an industry I love to much.

Yes, we have a handful of games planned. We are debating about vision and the future of TL - I think it will result in some exciting stuff.

I think that the EU scene is more developed, a much larger user base and fan base. The players there take the game more seriously and have been playing in a dedicated fashion for longer. NA players are just now going 'full time' in csgo.

We are creating new scrim chats for players, trying to have a more routine schedule, there are new gaming houses for the players and adding staff (coaches/managers/analysts) for the teams. Will take time.

Sona - Mid
Ashe Sona - Bot Lane
Aatrox into Ryze - Top Lane
Teemo - Mid
Karthus, Nocturne, Kill lane bot team comp

Would love to see these, there's some things to catch off guard but none of them are strong enough to be better than the broken meta atm. I think you get away with more off-picks when the meta is more balanced.

1. I think it's a real issue and I hope that owners/managers/staff are more serious about player health. Our team luckily goes to the gym and stays active, which helps but not as much as focusing on exercises and taking the proper breaks from the PC after long sessions of practice. I think knowledge / education is the best place to start (focusing on educating players about what they can do to impact the sustainability of their career).

2. We used him and a few others, it was helpful for some - but not all. It became expensive and I don't think it was having the impact that we were looking for. It's about finding the right person and some of the sports psychology benefits take time. You also need to be receptive to it as a player, these things all have to kind of fall together to have an impact. We just reallocated resources.

3. I'm glad that Business Insider's content team is taking an interest in eSports and I'm glad that we were able to share our story of our industry. I think it's always good to get the word out there, I don't think the articles were bad. I think any issue was a lack of understanding of the space. I think as their reporters become more informed the future content will improve.

I'm not 100% sure but I know I helped approve an order for 1k jackets. Not sure what the date is though, but likely soon.

dedicated

1. Absolutely, always looking. Sometimes tough because there are so many smurfs. Solo q rank is like a pre-qualifier, then you need to find out about the person. What drives them, do they have the will to compete and train, how well do they take feedback and coaching.

2. There's a really good business insider article, type business insider and my name into google (on my HTC phone atm). Will give you walk through of a typical day in the life of.

3. It's a difficult question to answer, there is so much that was going on and how things were handled. In short, when players don't adhere to basic ingredients to a winning formula, then I'll find someone else who will make it happen. I hate doing it but sometimes a player will improve instantly, other times it takes losing something to know what you had.