ORDER Corporal: “We stylistically match up against G2 better. So I’d say EG is better against us.”

The LCO’s ORDER and their support Corporal are making the best of a difficult group at MSI 2022. The team have been placed alongside Evil Geniuses and G2 Esports in the smallest group of the competition.

But the team isn’t eliminated yet, and Corporal especially, thinks the team could potentially still make the Rumble Stage. However, the team will have to play perfectly to do so. We spoke to Corporal after ORDER’s losing efforts against G2 and EG on day three. He talked about roaming as a support, EG’s mistakes, and why ping doesn’t matter for supports.

Playing in front of an international audience in Korea, are you nervous?

Corporal: I don’t think there’s nerves. I think the teams that were facing and just straight up better than the ones that were used to facing on a regular basis. And even though we have a really good chance to win, in my opinion—I think we will still be able to make it out of the group—The mistakes that were showing just kind of characteristic and how the games play out. I wouldn't attribute it to nerves.

The format for your group is pretty crazy with just the three teams, you're playing the four times, do you like that? Or would you prefer to be in like a four man group where you only pay to play people three times?

Corporal: I don't really care. I think if we were to make it to the Rumble Stage, we should be deserving of it. So I don't really care either way.

I've noticed that in your games, you prefer to roam quite early and kind of get out of bot lane? Is that just something to match the kind of level of support that you're playing against? Or is it just a general tactic that you use?

Corporal: I'd say, I would describe myself as stylistically a more roam-heavy support. And I think in this particular tournament, the way that the enemy supports are playing is to leave early and try and find out where Junglers are. And in order to fight that, I have to go as well, because we're playing pretty farm heavy junglers as well. So if he gets caught out, if he gets spotted, then it's pretty bad for the game. So in order to combat that, I get early vision down, I sweep that vision. And that's why I'm playing that way.

Against G2 you guys gave up bot priority in the draft. Is it standard for you guys to give a different lane priority and to sacrifice your botlane, in a way, in the draft? Or is that just something you had to do for that game?

Corporal: I think the way that we draft is pretty heavily around solo lanes and jungle. With consideration to that, I think I'm always very happy to take my pick early. Because I think I do enjoy playing melee supports. And I think it's my better side. Although, I mean, admittedly, I haven't played that amazingly at this moment. But um, yeah, I do prefer melee sports. And even if I get counted, I don't really care. As long as my team has a winning matchup. I'm pretty happy. 

Okay, brilliant! What do you tend to do when a game kind of falls apart? Which seems to have happened to Order a few times. Do you guys just try and force kills? Or try and get some highlights? Or does it become more of a learning experience for you guys?

Corporal: I mean, I think all the learning comes out of the game. When you're in-game, you know, you don't really think like “Oh, I'm gonna just stop and learn here.” So in-game, when the game kind of falls out of hand, you just wait for the enemy's mistakes and you're always ready to capitalize on it. I think even throughout the EG game, once it got really, really far behind Biopanther was saying, this game, it's really hard for us to make plays to come back. We just have to wait for their mistake. And hopefully, we can get their gold bounties and get a chance back.

Do you think EG has made a lot of mistakes? Because it felt like that felt like a game that at some point, you could just tip the scales and get back into it.

Corporal: Yeah, I mean, we had the Herald fight, obviously when we won that. And I think in that sense, yes. But then afterwards, we kind of couldn't really find our footing so I wouldn't necessarily say that we had a close game. It was close to tipping, I think. Don't know... Like we won the fight, but I don't think the way we played was good enough for us to be able to win the game.

I spoke to Pure about this briefly, but the ping seems to be like the constant talking issue about this tournament. Do you think it's affected your play and what's your opinion on it?

Corporal: I mean, I'm a support. My mechanics, they really don't matter. I kind of just press Q every once in a while and die. So, like I'm either Q-ing in, doing nothing, or looking at a gray screen most of the time. So, for me, it doesn't really matter. But I know that it has affected my teammates, and we have adjusted our picks in order to consider the ping that's happening. Because the other roles play more mechanically-intense roles. So we actually have forgone champions because of the ping.

Okay, that's really interesting. So you guys have now played EG and G2, three times?

Corporal: Two times, each

Sorry, I'm losing track. Okay, yeah. So do you think G2 is that much stronger than EG? Or do you think it's kind of close?

Corporal: We stylistically match up against G2 better. So I'd say EG is better against us. I don't really know objectively. I would say G2 is probably better objectively, but they do like to flip a lot of stuff. So it's fun versus G2, and I mean, I’d say we do better against G2.

You guys are going to head back to the LCO and have a lot of experience from MSI. Do you think it's going to give you an advantage domestically?

Corporal: Oh, yeah, for sure. I think the way the teams play as a team [at MSI],  no one ever really plays their own lane, they always every time they get a pressure timing, or they want to do something they always play to meet up and do something with each other. And I think that's something that hasn't really shown up in the LCO much. 

Like for example, in the EG game, where we were pushing in, as Vayne/Nautilus, we pushed in Ezrael/Alistar. And then once Jarvan and got the reset and pushed back Alistar just left vision. And like, currently sat there. We can't just shove up. And we're kind of just waiting for them to build the wave. And we can't contest because it's 4v2. And then we just get dove and shoved off like four waves.

Do you think this is kind of the foundation for a world run for ORDER? Or do you think that's looking too far in the future?

Corporal: I mean, it is quite far in the future. However, like the learnings I've had this tournament is crazy valuable. And I think I'm positive that coming to MSI will be the deciding factor of whether we go to Worlds or not. And the way that we apply this information will definitely carry us through in my opinion.

Brilliant. That's all the questions I have today. Thank you so much. I really appreciate the interview and good luck with the rest of your matches. 

Corporal: Thank you.

Corporal and the rest of ORDER will face both EG and G2 once again on Day 4 in a marathon of matches. You can catch all the action live on Riot Games’ official stream.