Bwipo: Creativity & Consistency

Creativity // Consistency

“I want to be able to deliver the same type of creativity without having to pay the burden of [it], the fallout, the backlash. This is my main goal moving forward in these years.”

Bwipo understands who he is, in your eyes.

“I’ve always been known as someone that has averaged very high highs [and] those outweigh my lows [but] they exist - I recognize that. That’s something I want to get rid of. I really want to be recognized for my highs and minimize the lows.”

Across a space of 7 years and 3 different roles, Bwipo has long made the play that puts his team ahead - or the misplay that sets them behind. High highs, low lows. You could catch both in Fnatic’s first game against Hanwa, where Bwipo secured an early lead in what was an absolutely unhinged invade that was the first of its kind at the tournament.

As you can see in the clip above, it’s not the red steal that’s notable, it’s the presence of mind to flash over Willer’s Lee Sin, in between towers, to deny the blue side jungle from his opponent. The play secures Bwipo a level advantage and around double Willer’s CS for most of the early game.

About 4 and a half minutes later, the low comes. After showing bot lane, Bwipo moves to take the crab near drake and keep up the vice-grip. Only, because of the earlier flash play, Bwipo’s bot lane gave up some experience and lane presence to hold his blue buff against Willer. Both Fnatic’s mid and bot aren’t in a great spot to help Bwipo’s crab play. So Hanwa collapses on him, shuts him down, and takes the crab.

The real turning point will be a Herald fight - a team blunder on Fnatic’s part. It’s hard to hold it against the Fnatic players, all launched into internal disarray by one of the more controversial, strange, and unlucky Worlds scenarios in recent memory. But it is a good indication of the code that Bwipo plays by, the ideal game he wants to realize.

“Within League of Legends, it’s pretty simple,” Bwipo starts to sum it up, “if you know you can kill someone, you probably should. Hiding from that, or not killing someone because you’re not sure, usually is a sign of being unskilled. You’re just not skilled if you cannot kill someone when you’re supposed to kill them. That’s just how it works.”

Initially, it’s a bit of a truism to say “if you can get a kill, you should.” But for Bwipo, it’s indicative of an aggressive, sometimes high-risk, and often unorthodox style that neither TL nor NA are known for. The play could be high or low percentage, the risk-reward could be awkwardly skewed…

But if the kill is there, you take it.

So it goes for Bwipo’s solo kill on Revenge. Against an ignite Akali, team pinging “danger” in the jungle quadrant near him, it doesn’t matter. The kill is there, so you take it and if the Hecarim comes to trade you out - that’s fine, your team still has the advantage in pace and composition.

Bwipo’s approach to the wider draft isn’t much different. You pick for the kill, not for safety. When Bwipo saw the Immortal’s draft, he counter-picked Rengar specifically to shut down an Akali that he felt was the only real threat to Liquid’s comp.

“From what I remember, I felt like the only threat to our composition was Akali. Our composition, we were very like a ball comp. We had Xin Zhao in the front, we had two enchanters in Lux and Zilean, and then we had Caitlyn. So, the only thing I needed to pick was something that was relatively beefy that can still provide frontline for my team, provide space for my team.”

“But at the same time, I wanted something that neutralized the threat of Akali because if Akali gets to wreak havoc on our backline, we have a big problem. And Rengar has this incredibly interesting interaction with Akali where his thrill of the hunt will reveal her during her shroud. So the idea of the matchup is you sit in your ultimate while she’s in shroud and you wait until she reaches a lethal breakpoint that you jump and kill her in.”

“Not to mention the matchup’s fuckin’ hard,” Bwipo chuckles. “1-v-1, the matchup’s really fuckin’ hard for Akali.” Fitting to his word Bwipo, invalidated Revenge’s Akali, who ended 0/8/3.

However, Bwipo understands that this is still not the level he wants to be at. The solo kill was a high, but it was only a sliver of HP, one good auto, from being a low. And his distance from the out-of-meta champ led to some sloppiness, like overextending for the IMT mid-laner and giving away a free kill.

(“I didn’t play the matchup well because I hadn’t touched Rengar in months,” Bwipo says, in search of room for improvement.)

Then, there are examples where he’s cut himself on these competitive edges he’s seeking out. Take for example his Hullbreaker Sion against EG, a game that saw him earn another solo kill and another slate of overextensions. Whether it’s communication or an improper estimation, Bwipo sees these overextensions as individual failings.

“An isolated death is always an individual error,” Bwipo emphasizes. “There is no way you can excuse an isolated death as anyone else’s fault unless you communicated what you need and that person has given consent on executing that - and then doesn’t do it. In that case, it would not be your fault [...] but it’s rarely the case and even then, the habit you should be practicing is even if someone approves, you should still check what his champion is doing in the moment to make sure you’re on the same page.”

Bwipo isn’t necessarily trying to remove all individual error. Brawly since his debut, he’s not the kind of player to seek spotless play. Instead, he wants a consistency that mediates the lows, keeping the costs down well below the payouts of the highs.

“I’m not saying I’m gonna be perfect, I’m [not] gonna show up and not drop a single game - anything like that, nothing close to that. Just, consistent enough where I won’t be recognized as a player that has low lows. I want to be recognized as a player that has high highs and manages his lows well enough that it’s not noticeable for his team.”

Role models

“You wanna be that prime TheShy, back in the day…” I ramble a bit before Bwipo interjects.

“Everyone uses that example, and he was a fuckin’ great player, but I don’t think that’s the goal I’m looking towards, to be honest with you. I don’t think he was the player that would make his lows minimal by any means. He would have pretty low-lows,” Bwipo chuckles, “even in 2018.”

Bwipo speaks from visceral experience. He challenged TheShy when the LPL legend reached a zenith. He even shares some of the unorthodox, limit testing elements with TheShy - but this largely means his view of the player is more honest, more holistic.

“There were moments where his flaws were pretty noticeable. For example, he was 60 CS up against me in the group stage but one of his flaws was that he really wanted to play Fiora and that cost him the game. That’s what I mean. That, for me, is also letting your team down. [...] That is a pretty low low to go towards, being egotistical when it comes to champion picks.

“There’s no room for that in a World Championship team and as I say that, when they fixed the issue, they won quite swiftly.” Bwipo chuckles but there is a hint of an old wound under the laugh.

In an interview with ELLE, TheShy said that he was benched against KT for game 4 because he picked Fiora in game 3 against the coach’s wishes. TheShy went Fiora all of twice, both times accruing a lead that was so transparently for the split push that he could not close out the game. (Though it was about as close as possible against KT). After that, TheShy would stay on the main lineup, no Fiora, and iG would clean sweep G2 and Fnatic.

In the interview, asked if he would choose Fiora all over again, TheShy said yes. “I want to avoid that at all costs,” Bwipo continues, “I want to be well-rounded before the game starts.” Known as a team and teamfight oriented top laner for a reason, Bwipo doesn’t emulate TheShy’s intense individualism.

If Bwipo does have a role model, it’s not within a rival - or even within his role.

Another relationship that I thought was fascinating is you and Hylissang. It seems like you 2 had a really strong relationship on Fnatic. What do you think connected you guys?

Playing together for a split. I think the commitment we both showed to each other as well as the team… Our decision making, it always ended with we want to win. No matter what. I felt that from him more than anyone else I ever worked with, day in and day out. [...]

I reached a point where me talking to him… Whenever he would bring up something in review, or he would be frustrated or something would bother him, sometimes with other players, I’d be like, “Wow this guy, why’s he so angry?” But with him it was always, “OK. He’s upset. He wants to win, how do I help him?”

That simple conversion of emotions into, “How do I help him? How do I turn his frustrations into something that will win us the game?” [...] This is why I think our bond was so strong, because whenever he would feel very strongly I would still remain calm and be able find a solution for him. And the other way around as well, when I got very heated he would always find a way to help me. [...]

We trusted each other. If he told me, “Next time I want you to be here, no matter what.” There was no doubt in either of our minds that I would show up there. Because he asked me to. It’s that type of bond I’m looking forward to having with my new teammates. [...]

I imagine that that was core to you and Hyli being famous dive buddies in the game

Absolutely. If he made a call I would commit to it all the way until the end - and the other way too. [...]

He’s the only player that ever made me look at the amount of damage being dealt in the game and actually understand why. [He made] plays that made me go, “Why the fuck would someone do that?” Watching him play and then actually committing to what he asked of me, helped me realize that holy shit, I was just so much worse at the game than he was. He knew what I didn’t know.

This gathered so much respect from me towards him. Holy fuck, this guy actually has a clue of what he is doing and I just had no clue and I assumed that he was dumb. I didn’t think that my champion would do that much damage, or both our champions combined would do that much damage, I didn’t believe.

He knew and he was incredibly confident. He told me, “Next time, do it exactly as I say.” That’s the thing, at his level of insight it has to be pixel-perfect. You can’t just wing it. [...]

Do you feel that’s kind of why he has this high-risk high-reward style as well?

[Referring to the idea that in League, if you can kill someone, you should] For me Hylissang is the embodment of that. He kills people - or tries to kill people - because he knows he can. But he does play a role where he relies on other people to execute, that’s why his communication is incredibly important. It is not easy by any means.

When we played together, it took me just fucking blindly believing in this guy. One of the reasons why we worked so well together is because naturally my playstyle is so similar but he pushed me to a level beyond that. Where it was like…

All-in had a different meaning, let’s put it that way.

He shaped your game as a rookie, it sounds like.

As a bot laner, yeah. As a top laner, he also did. [Chuckles] As a top laner my mid-game play is very much based on how much effort Hylissang put into making sure that his top laner was there at the right place at the right time. It wasn’t about me specifically, sOAZ was also held under the same expectations. Before that, Vizicsacsi as well.

He really helped me with that mid-game decision making. Where to be on the map, how to have a greater influence. That’s something I’ll always be grateful for. I always have the utmost respect [for Hyli] because I know that no matter who plays with him, if they are willing to listen to him and his ideas, they will be a much better player. Even if you don’t follow him rule by rule - I don’t either - you will walk away with a lot more knowledge than you came in with.

The Unorthodox Carry

“People don’t know [how good he is].” Bwipo concludes about Hylissang. “Honestly it took me reflecting and not playing with him to realize it. Right now, after my official matches he messages me and tells me he watches them. He gives me some pointers sometimes. [...] He is a phenomenal player; he is definitely the most skilled support player that I had the pleasure to work with,” he gives a cheeky pause, “up until Core.”

A solo laner trained by a playmaking support - it’s part of what makes Bwipo the most unorthodox top Liquid has had since Voyboy. Many great supports thrive by finding gaps in the opponents’ offense, taking less predictable positions on the map, less predictable champions, or even a change in runes or itemizations - like IgNar’s fervor Leona. Bwipo operates similarly, looking for a competitive edge in niches that might mix the opponent up.

“Professional players, they try to recreate the same environment as much as possible so when you throw them off that environment that naturally gives you the competitive edge. At least in my opinion. If recreating the same environment consistently is what’s considered to be successful practice, then creating an environment that you’ve practiced but the opponent has not is the biggest success you can create.”

“So when I pick a champion like Singed and some guy has played against 3 games of Singed over the last year and I’ve played 50 of them I would argue that I have the upper hand because I know what I’m doing. The question is: Does he know what I’m doing? Now, when you think about different runes, different builds, he might think he knows what I’m doing, but does he?”

(Singed is not rhetorical in this case. Bwipo utilized the champion to success a number of times in 2020, most notably against TOP esports.)

Of course, Bwipo’s style isn’t all - or even mostly - borrowed from Hylissang. It’s not entirely supportive either, Bwipo never being known as a pure tank, weakside player. Before he’d even entered the EU LCS, he already had a penchant for the unorthodox. That was, as Bwipo explains it, because of World of Warcraft.

“I played a lot of World of Warcraft in Cataclysm back in 2012. I played warrior - I’ve always played a warrior, it’s my favorite class.”

“Basically there are spellcasts and you can interrupt them [as a warrior]. In the past, there was a 10 second cooldown on this interrupt. If you miss it, the spellcaster can cast freely. I would always miss it.”

“The solution for that is there was a talent in the tree where you would silence the opponent after you cast your interrupt. So you would [only] lose 1 second of uptime on your interrupt if you didn’t hit it.”

Bwipo’s gameplan was to pressure spellcasters by making them think he was holding onto his interrupt for one of their big spells. In reality, he knew it would silence even if he cast it early, so he just wasn’t scared of holding onto it and missing his window.

“Even if I miss it, it doesn’t matter because I have so much pressure on them regardless. I would use it as crowd control instead. People were not used to doing that in the games that I played. ‘Why the fuck is this guy doing that? Who the fuck does that?’”

“I checked the ladder, no one played this talent because maybe it wasn't optimal. But it helped me get to a rating that I was definitely not deserving of because no one else played it and I did. That’s kind of the situation I like to recreate. For example, my Graves build - I play Eclipse Graves. I don’t think people are used to Graves jumping on your forehead and one-shotting you.”

“That’s what it’s about for me. It’s recreating those scenarios where people go, ‘Wait, what? That jus happened?’ This is what a competitive advantage looks like in real-time. A competitive professional getting caught off guard by something happening in the game is a humongous advantage.”

Dictate the game

Though, at the highest level, mastering the unorthodox isn’t enough. In the old days, it sometimes could be. Voyboy’s full-tank, Sunfire Cape Katarina became downright game-changing for Curse in the early days of LCS. International examples existed too, in form of MakNooN’s Kha’Zix or Stanley’s Nidalee.

(Do you think this was the game that made Edward want to play on Curse?)

As time wears on, League becomes more honed, footage more available, and coaching staffs more padded. The result is that it’s harder to maintain that competitive edge and nowadays very, very difficult to win a series off of a single sucker punch adaptation. Even to be regionally dominant, a team needs a good sense of how to play meta and balance resources within it. In order to have that sense across most metas, the players all need to know how to use their resources to support the carry or carry the game themselves.

Moving from bot lane to top lane to jungle, Bwipo has at least a more hands-on understanding of the resource game than most players. Perhaps because of that, when it comes to top lane, he has a more demanding idea of what a carry performance looks like. Especially when it comes to the traditional carry tops - like Jayce.

“When I see people lock in Jayce and then their jungler runs top lane over and over again and they do jack-fucking-shit to win the actual game…” Bwipo intones in the video above. “Don’t get me wrong, sure they might be doing something, but to win the actual game they do nothing.”

Bwipo goes on to talk about the state of western Jayce players and what he sees as a lack of earnest carrying from them. Taking a disproportionate amount of resources for the damage they deal and the impact they have. The point he makes is an ancient one - as old as the West vs. East gap and just as emblematic of it.

The true top lane carry has long been more prominent in the East than the West and Jayce is the constant face of that dilemma. More often meta-relevant than not, Jayce is the top lane carry. Jayce’s relevance shines in Nuguri and TheShy all the way back to Shy and Stanley. Across that span, the West has struggled hard to pull the same value from the pick - to the point where banning him was occasionally a real draft detriment abroad.

To you, what does it look like to properly carry with a champion like Jayce?

“It means that you deal enough damage to kill the enemy team. You basically dictate the game. That is the biggest thing. You’re not there because your team is, your team is there because you are. This is the defining factor of a carry performance on a champion like Jayce. It doesn’t even have to be Jayce, it can be any champion in top lane.”

“Resources coming to you because you’re there is different from resources being migrated towards you and I think that that is a defining trait that can be improved on in the West - and something that I’m looking to improve.”

I think that, in Bwipo’s Graves games, you can see a kernel of what he means. These are matches where his damage numbers tend to be high even for the champion - topping the charts even when a Corki is present. Additionally, he’s applying a lot of pressure in the side lane and in fights, sometimes proxy farming in laning phase or hard engaging in the mid-game.

Even as Rengar, he very nearly topped the game’s damage chart - only losing to his team’s Caitlyn. In the (admittedly very small sample size of) Lock-In, Bwipo has the highest damage share, highest kill participation, and second highest DPM of any top laner that’s played more than 1 game. (Sorry Bradley).

To meet his own demands, he should be putting up these numbers. The team has also given him the 2nd highest gold share of all top laners. After a year with Alphari, the team likely feels comfortable playing through top and giving Bwipo a position to carry from.

It’s a position that Bwipo doesn’t feel he’s a natural at, but it is something he wants to consistently excel at. Enough that, if the time comes where he needs to lock in the Jayce and carry, the team trusts him nearly as completely as he trusted Hylissang.

“I want to have the right mentality of: ‘I don’t wanna pick for my matchup, I don’t wanna pick for myself, I still wanna pick what’s good for my team.’ However, I also want to be able to take the responsibility for my team. ‘I’m gonna carry this game guys. Pick me the Jayce, pick me the Graves.’ ”

“Don’t worry, I’ve got this.”

Bwipo understands who he is in your eyes, but he’s got different plans than that. Looking at a new year, a new team, and a new region, he's got a strong idea of who he is and the game that he wants to play. Keep the creativity and playmaking that's long rivaled even the Eastern top laners and find the consistency to match them.