MAD Kaiser: “At the start of the season I already knew we had a lot of potential”

MAD Lions look unstoppable right now after beating G2 Esports, qualifying for LEC finals. We spoke to Norman “Kaiser” Kaiser about their current form, the team dynamic and their biggest challenge yet.

Hi Kaiser! Congratulations on beating G2 Esports, that must be an incredible feeling?

Kaiser: “Yes, It’s pretty surreal actually. This year, especially in the last few weeks, we played on an incredibly high level and in scrims we already saw we weren’t too far off G2 Esports in terms of play and skill. That means I’m actually not that surprised we beat them today. I hope they come back stronger and make a run through the losers bracket to meet us in the finals again. I think we’ve put up some close games and I’d really like to play such a series again.”

How did you feel going into the series itself? Did you identify a way to contest G2 Esports and play around them?

Kaiser: “I think the meta is really favoring us right now with a lot of the picks we like to play, for example the Orianna in the mid lane or ganking junglers. They kind of came back into the meta and the last patch also changed things up a bit, which played to our advantage. We tried thinking about how G2 can prevent us from playing our style and identified the Seraphine combo they brought against Schalke 04 in game 5. That setup would basically counter our style. They tried to do the same strategy with Karma in the bot lane, but she is just a worse champion then Seraphine at it. She can’t heal and support her teammates in the same way, so we never thought them picking her up was a big deal to us.”

That first game was a real rollercoaster, got to say. Obviously Caps got really ahead and it looked like G2 was set to win, but then that Baron play happened and all of a sudden you’re in control. How did you close the game out from there on out?

Kaiser: “We identified that the only player who can turn the game around is Caps on that Tristana, while the rest of their composition was tanky except for the Karma. What we did was to always try to force Caps’ flash or force fights where he’d be in a bad position, which we could do because we had so much engage. He just couldn’t deal with that and couldn’t play as aggressively as he wanted, just out of fear of our engage or the fact that I could just flash on him. With Tristana as their sole win condition we could just threaten and abuse G2.”

In game 2 you never really looked like you were in trouble. G2 obviously came in with an early game focus, how did you manage to counter that?

Kaiser: “They made a few mistakes in the early game, like Caps making a Teleport play in bot lane we were able to avoid and then going the greedy path into mid lane which we were able to catch through a ward. We effectively stopped their early game composition from snowballing.”

We effectively stopped their early game composition from snowballing.

“When we started scaling in the late game, got Orianna more involved, things played out a lot like in the first game, as Lucian was basically the only thing they had. Lucian is even easier to deal with than the Tristana in game 1 because we had the Gold Card of our Twisted Fate and could just run at him. Then we just ran them over.”

Did you think, in any way, G2 Esports played a bit uncharacteristically?

Kaiser: “Not really, I think G2 looked mostly the same way they looked in their series against Schalke 04. Maybe they’re trying new stuff or the meta doesn’t suit them. We just noticed a lot of their mistakes, like MikyX getting caught or Jankos not prioritizing his farm. If you respect Jankos in that defending role you can get a lot done on the other side of the map and get your jungler ahead. That way we can draw them out while getting stronger over time. We did an amazing job at analyzing them and punished their mistakes.”

G2 Esports eventually slowed themselves down a little and won the third game. Did you feel like they kind of got a grasp on what you were trying to do with your style and compositions?

Kaiser: “For sure. First thing is they identified Orianna is just insanely broken (laughs)! Normally there was always a facilitator in our wins, that Orianna was very important to us and Humanoid plays it incredibly well, so G2 decided to take it away. We got an even trade in junglers, we got Hecarim who wants to gank more and they got Volibear who wants to look for invades and 1v1’s. I also feel like them picking a champion like Kai’Sa in the bot lane where Rekkles is more comfortable on helped them a lot, especially as they played through that bot lane. They basically changed their whole draft.”

Game 4 felt really chaotic at times but you did win out early on. What were the biggest factors there that eventually helped you snowball to the win?

Kaiser: “Game 4 was mostly just better teamfighting from us, I think. G2 really got caught a few times and we were able to force some flashes, meaning they can’t step up as aggressively to us anymore. Our composition also had a lot of follow-up with Udyr, Leona, Ezreal and Orianna. I have to say G2 Esports sometimes played their fights really well, especially that fight for Baron where Kai’Sa immediately got one-shot but they turned it around.”

“Then we got Soul and the game is just so much harder to play for them. I (on Leona) can just ult, Orianna can just ult and they all die. All this while Ezreal is shooting from the back. We just had such a big frontline and they only had a bit of poke, I guess, they can’t really commit that hard. They had to look for a pick but we didn’t give them the opportunity. We just played for objectives and ended the game.”

A great example of that had to be your E on caps in that final teamfight.

Kaiser: “Yes, exactly. The Orianna shockwave killing Rekkles and Wunder was also an insane play and just ended the game on the spot.”

It’s safe to say you and Carzzy, The MAD Lions bot lane, has really started to shine in the playoffs. What’s different now compared to the regular season, is it perhaps just consistency?

Kaiser: “I think we were already looking a lot better in the second half of the split, as our first half was pretty rough. I guess we were just trying out a lot of new things and didn’t really play well. After Worlds we sort of had the problem of us thinking we were not aggressive enough and that we are too passive in lane. That often resulted in us dying often, going too deep, getting caught, … .”

Carzzy can basically play any ADC that’s in the meta and I’m really comfortable on the engaging supports.

“Right now we have a better view of what we can do, I guess you can say we just tested limits a bit. Some of that was also just us slumping, that of course happens too. We are just in insanely good form and we understand the bot lane matchups more. We’re now really comfortable on the Jinx, Kai’Sa and more. Carzzy can basically play any ADC that’s in the meta and I’m really comfortable on the engaging supports.”

You’ve now qualified for the LEC Finals, how does that feel and did you expect that at the start of the season?

Kaiser: “At the start of the season I already knew we had a lot of potential. After the first scrims we had done I could already tell that Armut and Elyoya were just really insane at the game. That made me think that we could actually go far. The start of the season was obviously more rough, that’s partly on me and Carzzy, but as a team we also didn’t perform as well yet.”

“As the end of the season came closer everything just clicked and came together. Going into the series against Rogue I was already expecting us to win. Our potential has now turned into confidence, which we’re being rewarded for.”

Once again congratulations on the huge victory, Kaiser, and we’re excited to see you compete in the LEC finals.

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