To get an idea into how World Elite has succeeded so well and to the shape of the stars, I sat down with Hotlips, World Elite's manager, for an interview.

Sky and InFi have been doing great in many leagues and tournaments lately, how do you think their shape is right now?

Sky and Infi are on fire at the moment. I believe that the Chinese New Year holidays back in February were really important for them as they returned with high motivation and a clear mind to be able to perform their best game at every point.

What is the training regimen like in World Elite? How often do your players train, and what do they do to train?

Actually the guys are practicing every day and depending on our schedule also up to 10 hours daily. But especially Sky, he had a lot of other events going on recently, for example a film shooting in Beijing, meetings with our sponsors as well as photo shootings. Right now there is also a European film crew in China to portray Sky’s life but still he is trying to practice as much as possible. At the moment we have our internal team match going on where every player has to play everyone, including our WE.09 talents. We also try to change the map pool and the rules from time to time to have a good preparation for the next big tournament. To answer your question, how the players exactly train, it is a mix of both strategy and micro-management.

Sky and InFi used some strategies at NSL that they hadn't used before, had they been working on those before and was it planned they would use them on this tournament?

Those strategies were definitely planned and practiced before the match. Of course every gamer wants to use the most powerful strategy according to the map and player he meets to have the best chances for the victory. It is also a question of confidence, if you feel much better using the Mountain King first against an Orc player because your latest practice results showed that you lost much more games using the AM, then you won’t choose an old strategy just because you used it many times before. I actually like it when gamers change their style and their strategies frequently, because it makes the game much more interesting these days. But still more people stick to old strategies for a couple of reasons.

Sky playing at IEF 2007

Does it bother you when people say that Sky and InFi aren't as skilled because of their use of towers?

No, it doesn’t bother me at all, because it is also part of the game and the fascination around it, that people talk about balance “problems” and it is quite natural that everyone thinks his own race is too weak in the game. To quote Infi here at this point: “Human can’t win without towers”, I think we can all agree on that he knows what he is talking about since he is one of the best 3 human-players in the world and it is really hard to understand how high the level of professional gaming actually is, if you never played against a pro yourself.

Do Sky and InFi have any new strategies planned for ROTK and WC3L?

There are new strategies in mind, but I don’t know whether they will use them at ROTK. But due to the map system of the match, you guys might expect one or two new strategies for sure. Especially when it comes to matches like Human v Undead or Human v Night Elf on Gnoll Wood since that map is really difficult to play for Sky and Infi, but we are preparing for this match and therefore we also think about how to handle this problem.

How do you think World Elite will do in ROTK? Are there any teams that you think will give you an especially hard time?

I am quite optimistic that we can reach the top 2 at this event. First of all the match is held in China, which gives us a natural advantage since there will be many fans to cheer for us. Secondly we don’t have a lot of trouble with traveling, jet-lag and things like that and last but not least we are just very well prepared and self-confident enough to beat very other team out there. Still matches against SK and MYM would be the hardest ones for us, but I am really looking forward to meet one of these 2 teams in the grand final.

Infi playing at NSL2

Do you think Sky or Infi deserve the MVP award of this season of WC3L?

I think their results speak a clear language. Infi didn't lose any matches this season and Sky only dropped one best of three on the first playday. Both did a great job and it would be nice to see them getting an award for playing such a nice season.

Are you looking to add any new talent or are you satisfied with your current roster? What about any WE.09 players that are ready to move up?

We are considering adding another player to the WE.09 team but yet there is nothing decided. Of course none of the talents are ready to move up yet. It definitely takes more time than just 2 or 3 months. But I am sure that one or two will be at the end of the year.

Any plans to add any talent from outside China, or are you sticking to Chinese players from now?

We thought about it, but our philosophy is that we want all players to live together and practice together. This aspect is quite important for us, because we can easily work together with the players and offer them good conditions to become one of the best in the world. And as you can see, it did work pretty well in the past with our WE.08 team, so I do believe that this way is simply the best for us.

How did WE manage to recover so quickly after losing 4 world class players like Lyn, Remind, Soju and Reign?

Due to our hard work with our WE.08 players we didn't have to buy new players from other teams because of talents like Infi, TeD and Like that turned into really strong players who are now able to take down almost everyone on a good day. I think that the idea with the WE.08 team was one of the best moves we made and naturally we founded the next talent team this year.

SK and MYM have been at the top of WC3 for the past few months, do you think you can surpass them with your players playing so well recently?

Actually I don't think that SK and MYM were that dominant during the last months. There were also other players and teams who did really well and I would also count us as one of them. However, when it comes to finals, these 2 teams are for sure the ones to watch out for, but I am quite sure that we have at least a 50% chance against them right now and especially our human duo is almost unstoppable at the moment.

Do you have any plans to re-enter NGL?

No, not at the moment. We have a really tough schedule this year with one match after another and therefore we don't want to compete in another online league. We are happy with playing WC3L and that's also what our fans and sponsors mostly care about.

Anyone you want to thank or give a shoutout to?

First of all I would like to give a big shoutout to our new sponsor Kingston and I am really looking forward to a successful partnership. Then I also like to thank our fans for all the birthday greetings and gifts we received these days for our 3rd birthday. Last but not least thanks for the great support of our sponsors Intel, Razer, nVidia, Kappa, Replays.Net, Gigabyte, DxRazer and of course Kingston. Thanks for the nice interview.