On the hunt with Karsa and the Flash Wolves

If ever a team was the embodiment of their namesake, it would be the Flash Wolves. They are the closest thing we have to a wolfpack here in professional League of Legends.

Before their match against Cloud9 at Worlds 2016, the Flash Wolves' practice room was filled with laughter. Support SwordArt was cracking jokes about a scrim they had just wrapped up as they lounged on chairs and were draped over each other. It was more reminiscent of a family than a professional esports team.

“I think family means a group of people who can support me and help me chase my dreams,” says FW jungler Karsa. “So if Flash Wolves was actually a big family, I would think that our manager is the dad of the family, our team captain would be the mom of the family, and as for the rest of the team, I think they’re all my little brothers because they’re all so clumsy.”

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While the rest of the team was sitting around joking, Karsa was noticeably silent. He sat behind his computer with a custom game open, running through jungle pathing. He seemed every inch the older brother he described. A silent hunter, aloof from his younger brothers. 

According to the Flash Wolves management, this is relatively normal of Karsa. He lets his voice be heard inside the game, but outside, he’d rather let the others talk. He’s not the only one who is different outside of the game, though. Their mid laner Maple is renowned as the ‘clumsiest’ out of all Karsa’s clumsy younger brothers. He’s constantly losing his mouse, forgetting to do what management asks him, and generally needing the 24 hour support of his team.

It’s distinctly different from who Maple is on the Rift. As the Flash Wolves' primary carry, the team frequently lives or dies on his shoulders. Outside the game he’s a just a pup, but inside, he’s an alpha predator. He’s proven time and time again that if the team puts their faith in him, he’ll lead them to LMS titles, international tournaments, and Pool 1 berths for Worlds 2016.

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This, of course, is greatly facilitated by Karsa. He was the only LMS player to hit the Top 20, and he lives up to his older brother status by helping the rest of his team to shine, be it Maple, NL, MMD, or roaming with SwordArt. Outside of the game, though, Karsa doesn’t feel a particular amount of responsibility towards Maple -- and was more than happy to make jokes at his expense.

“In reality, if Maple actually tripped and fell I would just laugh at him,” says Karsa with a grin that almost splits his face in two. “I wouldn’t go over and help him. But in a game, depending on our team comp and which champions we chose, it depends -- whichever lane has the better advantage, I’ll go snowball that lane. I don’t particularly help Maple,” he laughs.

Despite the work that Karsa's been putting in for the team here at Worlds 2016, his team had a rough start. After amassing a sizeable lead over China’s No. 3 seed I May, they failed to close out the game -- lacking the killer instinct expected of the wolfpack. Surely they could put the loss behind them, focus on the good, repair the bad, and take a win off a Cloud9 squad that had been destroyed by SK Telecom T1 in their previous game. Right?

They stepped out onto the Rift against Cloud9 and again pulled ahead with an early lead, snowballing it into objectives all across the map. Their gold lead ballooned, and they had no problem taking Barons and inhibitors into the mid-to-late game. But there was a strange scent in the air. Something wasn’t quite right. The wolfpack, again, were unable to sink their fangs into the game and come away with the kill. According to the team’s handler, SwordArt was calling them off sixty-forty plays. The loss to I May seemed to live on in the minds of the Wolves.

In the end, the 70 minute game was the 2nd longest game in Worlds history. A Meteos pick onto Maple was enough to bring it all crashing down for the Flash Wolves, and the No. 1 seed from the LMS suffered their second loss of the tournament.

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“The first two games, even though they were a loss, we always had an early advantage,” says Karsa. “But we knew we weren’t able to capitalize on that. We could win, we had a chance to win, but we just never capitalized and we got turned over at the last second and the enemy team won.” 

If they were going to keep their Worlds campaign alive, they were going to have to beat the indomitable SK Telecom T1. But this wasn’t the Flash Wolves first rodeo with the reigning World Champions -- the last time the two teams met was at the 2016 Mid-Season Invitational, and there, Flash Wolves went 2-0 over the Korean powerhouse. The Wolves, it seemed, could work together to take down a king.

“Going into the game with SKT we were actually really relaxed,” says Karsa. “Everyone knows that we’re the kryptonite of Korean teams, so we weren’t very nervous at all.”

It would have been easy for them to buckle under the pressure, and most pundits had SKT taking this game easily. But it’s when the survival of the pack is at stake that wolves become most deadly. They banded together in the bitterness of their prior losses, and as they took to the stage, they did something they are now famous for -- they sang. Led by, of all people, MMD, who blamed a good deal of the previous losses on himself.

“Before the game started, our coach came up to me and said ‘you can win against Blank, you can win against Blank, you can win against Blank’ over and over again,” says Karsa. “He kept repeating that, so in my mind it actually stuck there and I started believing it. Yes, I can win against Blank."

"And so I did.”

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Flash Wolves took the game off SKT and retained their title as the Korean slayers, something which Karsa was more than happy to joke about. “It’s a lot of pressure to live up to this name,” he said with a laugh. 

If Flash Wolves want to live up to their namesake, they’ll have to complement each other’s strengths, shelter each other’s flaws, and work as a family unit to come back from a win deficit. But that’s all part of the game plan for the Flash Wolves.

“Wolves always fight in packs, they work in packs, and succeed in packs," says Karsa. "That symbolizes the unity of our team.”

Watch Karsa and the Flash Wolves compete for their spot in the Worlds 2016 Quarterfinals when the Group Stage wraps up today at 1 PM PT.