G2 Dylan Falco – “[We] talked about [Arcane S3] all the time at G2”

Dylan "Dylan Falco" Falco sat down with esports.gg at the end of Week 4 of the LEC, after his team had won their sixth consecutive game, locking a third place regular season finish.

With one week of understandable weakness behind them, G2 Esports has been on a tear ever since. The team has gone undefeated in the last three weeks of play, and hammered out a solid end to their split at 6-2 by defeating G2 alums Jankos and Wunder. Dylan chats about the Doctor Mundo pick in their draft, the meta at large, and nerds out about him and his team's love for Arcane and Fortiche's version of Runeterra.

Dylan "Dylan Falco" Falco: You've locked in third place with your series against Team Heretics, how do you feel about the series and about the split placement overall?

"I obviously go into every tournament hoping for us to be the best, so us only finishing third is a little bit of a disappointment. But the fact that we won our last six matches straight and it’s very clear why we were a bit out of it for the first week, means that I’m okay with the results, I would say. "

What helped the team turn things around so quickly after the first week?

"We just had a bit more time, we took a little bit of a break after MSI. There wasn’t a lot of time to take a break but we took a few days off and, I think, we were just a bit behind when it came to meta. And when it came to just practice. We also had to level up all of our solo queue accounts again, they had decayed while we were in China. We only had like four days, I think, to catch up. I think the main thing was just time. "

We're seeing some pretty wild tiebreaker matches today, why do you think the bottom of the LEC has been so volatile this year?

"I think that some teams I can understand why they’re a bit lower, maybe they’re lacking in talent or some rosters are stronger, but some of the teams for sure that are in the bottom of the standings could have done better for sure. This split has seen a very volatile meta, I think the stark difference between these crazy AP jungle picks, some of the hyper-carry vs aggressive picks in bot lane and AD vs AP mids are all major strategic points in the draft.

"There are a lot of ways you can problem solve this, but it also makes this very volatile. You don’t get to scrim against every different thing that can happen, so match preparation is very important, and also sometimes it’s just a bit random. I think the meta is just really volatile this split, and some teams are just underperforming." 

How do you feel about the midseason update and the meta that has come after it? We spoke to Brokenblade at MSI and he was not at all happy with the state of lane swaps, how are you feeling now?

"I’m not sure. I like it when there are a ton of strategic options in the draft, especially when you’re winning. It’s a lot of fun when you’re winning too, to feel like you have the enemy counter-drafted. Like, today, we played Zyra Mundo against triple tank and I feel like it’s very hard for them to win, and it feels very good. But it can also feel pretty scary, going into the match and not knowing what you’re up against. I think it kind of works both ways. I take on the challenge.

"As far as lane swaps are concerned, they’re nerfed but not gone entirely, some teams are still doing them in Europe, for sure, we’ve seen them to mixed results. I like lane swaps when there’s a large amount of options that can be done.

"I think we used them very well, we were one of the largest users of it for MSI, I’m not a huge fan of them when it’s a bit more repetitive and dry, the way the lane swaps ended up being played out. There should either be a lot of options with what can be done with the top lane turret, or I’d prefer that they just remove them entirely, I think. I haven’t actually put too much thought into it, I’m just worried about what we’re doing. "

Sure, working with what you've got.

"Yeah, being ready. "

Speaking of the meta, Doctor Mundo top for Brokenblade is definitely the spicy pick from this series. How early were you guys looking at Doctor Mundo and why do you think he works right now?

"Doctor Mundo has been on our radar for a few weeks, but we only really picked it up this week, in our practice. We’re just always looking for new tank picks, because Riot keeps nerfing them. Mundo, specifically, was one we thought could be okay. It uses Warmogs, which is a currently OP item and it also is very good when the enemy top/jungle combination doesn’t have enough damage to actually kill you. A lot of the AP junglers and tank junglers, like Sejuani, that are being played are very bad at killing Mundo. If they had a carry jungler that’s better at killing tanks, that would be better. All of these together is the reason why, I still don’t know how strong it actually is, we haven’t looked into it that much. "

Why do you think health stackers like Skarner, Sejuani, and Mundo are so strong coming out of the midseason?

"These health stackers are strong because they nerfed a bunch of percentage health things, like Blade of the Ruined King got nerfed. Warmogs got buffed on the same patch, I believe. It was a combination of these changes, and we saw a lot of health stackers go up greatly after the changes. So, that’s why we picked them up very aggressively. "

If you could decide which region Fortiche brings the Arcane universe to for Season 3, what region would you choose, and what champions from that region would you want to get screentime?

"Yeah, okay, what a great question. We’ve actually talked about this all the time at G2. We also had the take that we hoped that they went to different regions instead of just staying with Piltover and Zaun forever. I can’t speak for everybody at G2, but I very much encourage and like the idea of Riot to do that. I think, the one, as a team, we were most excited for was Shurima, get some Azir, some Taliyah. We thought that would be really cool, it’s a cool world. I also would like Freljord, I think that would be very cool. Regardless of region, I’d like to see Nunu, that’s my OTP."

Any words for G2 fans heading into the break and playoffs?

"Thanks to the fans, we’re playing EWC next week, we get to hopefully play against some Korean and Chinese teams again. Cheer for us!"

Dylan Falco and the G2 Esports LEC roster will compete at the Esports World Cup, the Saudi government organized third-party event happening next, before returning to the LEC for playoffs.