Reclaiming the Brazilian throne: paiN Gaming
If you ask a paiN Gaming fan, they'll say this has been a long time coming.
It has been two years since paiN's last Wildcard experience -- a disappointing loss at 2013 Gamescom where the favored Brazilian team lost to GamingGear.eu. It has been under a year since the team's last international experience, IEM San Jose, where they were thoroughly outclassed by North America's Cloud9. As it is with many strong teams in Wildcard regions, paiN knows all too well the nebulous space between being the best in one's region while still unable to advance far enough to take an international win.
Brazil made noise last year, when their fourth-best team, KaBuM! e-Sports, rode a wave of momentum through the CBLoL Regional Qualifier, Wildcard tournament at PAX Prime, and ended on a high note by improbably taking a game off of top-seeded European team, Alliance.
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While paiN is inarguably a better team than 2014 KaBuM!, parallels are easily drawn between the two from a progression standpoint. paiN wasn't the best team in their region until recently. Prior to that, their organization was solidly in 3rd place, with both Keyd Stars and the 2015 CBLoL Summer winners INTZ e-Sports taking the second and 1st place positions. After a few rough losses -- to INTZ Red and INTZ -- paiN refocused, unexpectedly beating out INTZ in the CBLoL Finals.
With a year's worth of regular, offline play, and a more diligent approach, paiN Gaming carries with them the hopes of not only their own massive fanbase, but those of the region as a whole.
The Play
For paiN, talent was not an issue. With some of the strongest lanes in the region, paiN could easily best opponents in lane, especially following their Winter acquisition of top laner Mylon from Keyd Stars.
However, this wasn't enough to beat INTZ in Week 6 of CBLoL Winter, and it certainly wouldn't be enough to perform internationally.
paiN showed progress in their 3-0 Finals sweep over INTZ e-Sports, but were still out-maneuvered on the map. Fast-forward a few weeks to the Desafio Internacional Wildcard Final and paiN Gaming looked like an entirely different team. Setting up coordinated tower dives, juggling aggro correctly, and most importantly, squeezing every last advantage from the map as humanly possible, paiN had finally learned macro play. Their Dragon control was impeccable -- opponents Kaos Latin Gamers didn't get a single Dragon across all three games -- and with every fight, paiN snowballed not only their lanes, but their stranglehold on the map.
They still rely on their strong laning, which will seemingly always be a paiN Gaming focal point. Rather than aggressively roaming or diving, paiN saves their fighting to control neutral objectives or take turrets.
Knight of the Jungle
Orchestrating these map movements is paiN's jungler, SirT. SirT has never been an aggressive ganker -- vastly preferring farming -- but even with his predictable pathing, he has a good sense of where to be when his team needs him.
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"I'm kind of biased, but I would say SirT is the steadiest player on the team, and it's not only because we've been playing together for over three years," paiN's mid laner Kami says. "It's extremely rare for him to have a bad game, and the guy really keeps up with his theorycrafting. His personality is also very constant."
Throughout CBLoL Winter, and additionally the Wildcard tournament, SirT has shored up his pathing through more purposeful map movements. Whether setting up vision, counterjungling, or counterganking, SirT was anywhere and everywhere in paiN's 3-0 sweep of KLG. He racked up the highest kill participation of any player at the Desafio Internacional at 78.1%, and had the second highest KDA -- after paiN's own Kami. While Kami, Mylon, and AD carry brTT are indubitably the stars, they are supported by the foundation of SirT, and his partner in both vision control and map pressure: support Dioud.
Talk of the Rift
Upon asking paiN Gaming's coach MiT what the team's largest improvement this season has been, he quickly answers: teamwork.
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"It is complex to work with a team of stars as paiN. All players have a lot of individual experiences and my main work has been and is still uniting them as a TEAM."
Kami also echoes these sentiments.
"For a long time people looked at paiN Gaming and saw the best individual players at their roles in Brazil, but with a poor teamwork and coordination. These would be our greatest strength and weakness respectively. But our weakness is finally changing and I can feel it more and more every match we play. We are on the same page more often than not, and that's a great sign for the team. It also says a lot about our recent improvement," Kami says.
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Interested in learning more about the other teams competing at Worlds? Check out the whole lineup, now.
