Worlds 2018: A Lightning Round with Blaber

After winning an exhausting best of five against Gambit Esports to grab the team’s spot in the 2018 World Championship Group Stages, Cloud9’s jungler, Robert “Blaber” Huang sat down to have a short chat with us.

While Blaber was prepared to answer questions about the tumultuous series he just played in, that’s not how we’re doing it at The Rift Herald this time around. Instead, we’ve prepared a little baggie of about 25 questions (and growing) provided by our team, Polygon staff and even Vox Media staff, like our systems and product team.

Questions vary from simple things such as preferences about cake versus pie, Pokémon starters and Halloween costumes, though there are League of Legends related questions in the bag.

With less than 10 minutes to interview the players, we decided to have them answer as many questions from our little bag of doom as they could. The Rift Herald presents our first Lightning Round.

The interview below has been edited for clarity and length.

What champion would you delete from the game if you could?

Blaber: Huh. Probably Evelynn right now. I’m permabanning her in solo queue. I hate her so much. Or maybe Skarner?

The Rift Herald: Do they give you a hard time in Korean solo queue specifically?

Blaber: Evelynn just does nothing and then kills all my laners because she’s invisible. And I just hate Skarner. So either one of those two.

The Rift Herald: That’s fair.

Riot Games

What champion would you want your skin for if/when you win Worlds?

Blaber: Probably Rek’Sai. Rek’Sai is my favorite champion for sure, but she’s not very good right now. If it was a champion I played in Worlds, it would be Kindred.

You have to make an impressive dinner for your partner. What are you making?

Blaber: I can’t make anything! I can make ramen. I’d make ramen.

What is your favorite candle scent?

Blaber: Watermelon, maybe? I’m not sure!

Imagine you just got your milk out of the refrigerator to pour it into cereal, coffee, whatever you like. Do you shake your milk before you pour it?

Blaber: I need to think.

The Rift Herald: Yeah, you gotta immerse yourself into this one.

Blaber: If I’m getting the milk ... no, I don’t shake my milk.

What are you being for Halloween? (Of course, you’re making it to Finals, so you won’t be celebrating Halloween, but what would you be for Halloween?)

Blaber: What would I be for Halloween? I haven’t done Halloween in so long. I don’t know! I was a Power Ranger when I was a kid.

The Rift Herald: Would you be a Power Ranger again as an adult?

Blaber: Probably not. I don’t know!

Cake or pie?

Blaber: Pie. I hate cake.

What is your favorite holiday?

Blaber: Probably ... Christmas? Well, maybe not Christmas. It was my favorite holiday because of how much time we had off school. [laughs]

If you had to play a different game competitively instead, which would you pick?

Blaber: If it wasn’t League, I probably wouldn’t play any game competitively.

The Rift Herald: Nothing? Not even like, Dota 2?

Blaber: No, I’ve played games. I’ve always played games other than League, but I can’t play one game besides League for more than a couple weeks or a month. I get bored. So I probably wouldn’t be playing professionally if it wasn’t League.

If you could only play one champion for the rest of your life, who would you pick?

Blaber: I feel like this is the same thing as the favorite champion question!

The Rift Herald: No, no! Because you have to explain this to your team now. Like, “Sorry, man. Can’t. I literally just have to play ...”

Blaber: Ooh. Maybe I’d ... probably Nidalee. Nidalee is situationally good and I always have fun when I play Nidalee. Some champions I play too much and I get bored.

Riot Games

What console is/was your favorite?

Blaber: Well, my favorite console right now is PC. I did like the GameCube, though. I love the GameCube.

Who is your favorite Pokémon starter?

Blaber: Torchic? Or ... Mudkip? No, it’s Torchic.

The Rift Herald: Something from gen 3.

Blaber: I played Emerald a lot.

The Rift Herald: That was the best one!

Do you prefer trains or planes?

Blaber: When was the last time I was on a train?

The Rift Herald: You’re about to take one [to Busan]!

Blaber: True, I am about to take one. Probably planes. I feel like American trains aren’t that nice.

What game would you use to describe your childhood?

Blaber: I don’t know a lot of games, actually. I could tell you about it and you can choose.

The Rift Herald: What?

Blaber: I’m going to describe my childhood and you can think of a game.

The Rift Herald: Okay.

Blaber: So when I was a kid, my parents wouldn’t let me play video games because they said it was useless. So I did sports and instruments, and I would just play when they go to sleep. When I got older they were more accepting.

The Rift Herald: Do you know about the computer game called Pajama Sam?

Blaber: No.

The Rift Herald: It’s like a kids game. And he goes on all these adventures but when his parents aren’t looking. That’s you.

Blaber: I feel like that story is kind of normal. That happens to a lot of people.

The Rift Herald: It’s a pretty standard gaming story.

The final task: Contribute a question to the bag to ask players in the future.

Blaber: A question from me?

The Rift Herald: It could be anything. Those were all very random questions.

Blaber: This is too much work.

The Rift Herald: Oh my gosh, I’m sorry. You were ready to answer questions about that game.

Blaber: Yeah, I actually was ready to answer questions about the game. Okay. What’s been their favorite moment in their League career? Like, their most memorable moment?

The Rift Herald: Oh, that’s good!