by JR Cook - 9 years ago     show comments

Recently, we had the chance to talk with one of Hearthstone’s greatest players. Despite a lack of popularity, Austin “SilentStorm” Li, is a top ranked player in the NA region, standing currently at number 2 in Blizzcon points. He is a Chinese-Born Canadian, and he represents Team Celestial. Check out our exclusive interview and learn more about the Winner of ESL Legendary Series – Season 1 .

DR23: Good day Silentstorm, glad to get this chance to talk to you today. To start things off, why don’t you tell us a bit more about yourself. Who, is Silentstorm?

SS:  I’m 18 years old and I’ve been playing Hearthstone since the open beta, I never played other card games or other Blizzard Games before Hearthstone. I will study Computer Science. I was born in China and I grew up to 12 years old in China before moving to Canada.

DR23: For somebody who’s new both at Card Games,  and Blizzard Games. You seem to doing quite good for yourself in Hearthstone. You currently represent Team Celestial, how did you end up joining them?

SS: Tiddler was starting a team and he invited me to be part of it. I really like him as a player and his ideas like connecting the Western and Eastern scenes.

DR23: That’s cool. How did you get to know Tiddler?

SS: I first saw him in the World Championship, and I got to know him through our team manager.

DR23: Speaking about Tiddler and Celestial, the team has been going through a rough patch lately, with a less-than-stellar performance on ATLC.  And  also Tiddler and Xichen being eliminated from the China Championship. How do you feel about this, and how will the team bounce back?

SS: Well It’s a card game with RNG elements in it so we can’t be that unhappy about it. I think we will be fine and we still have chances to make it through the NA and Taiwan championships.

Team Celestial Struggled during ATLC, Silentstorm had the best record at 9 wins, 10 losses

DR23: Do you think that timezone issues could have affected your teams performance in the ATLC? FrozenIce and Tiddler were having to play deep into the night, and had significantly worse records that you. Was this a factor or just a coincidence?

SS: I think the timezone issue is there, but I think the lack of practice as a team is a slightly bigger issue. We sort of went with what we personally think are good decks but we also needed some more strategy behind them.

DR23: I’m sorry to hear that your team had some trouble adapting to the new Team Format. It’s quite unfortunate since you were only the Eastern Team on ATLC. Speaking about Eastern and Western Scenes, how would you compare them? Which one do you think its currently superior, and what do you think they can learn from each other?

SS: It’s hard to tell. Maybe the western scene is stronger from what I;ve seen in tournaments. I think the Eastern scene is more creative at deckbuilding while the Western scene is stronger at perfecting mechanics of existing decks.

DR23: You are currently number  2 in the NA Hearthstone World Championship standings, was it hard to get there? Can you talk us through your journey this year?

SS: The biggest point boost was from the HSL season 1 which awarded 100. I also got a few points from smaller tournaments. The other points were from ladder finishes. I think I got top 20 twice and top 50 three times.

DR23: You got most of your points before the newest expansion was released, but you will have to play the Blizzcon Qualifiers in this completely new meta. What have you thought about The Grand Tournament? What’s has been your favorite new deck using these new cards?

SS: I think it’s a great expansion. They are trying to make control decks superior to Aggro decks. My favorite deck to play is the “Lock and Load” Hunter because it’s so fun and hard to play.

DR23: Hey man, thanks for taking the time to talk to us, and double thanks for giving us this fun decklist. Best of Luck in all your future tournaments!

SS: Thanks for having me!