“Go off, flame us as much as you want, we are frauds!” – 100T Sniper on critics, the loss against R7 at Worlds 2024 and the NA T2 scene

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The unexpected happened at the 2024 League of Legends Worlds Championship yesterday, where underdogs Movistar Rainbow7 from Latin America upset the North American favourites, 100 Thieves, in their opening match 2-1. Historically, North America has often outperformed Latin America on the international League of Legends stage, but R7 turned the tide with smart picks and commanding team fights, especially in the last game of the match. With R7 pulling ahead in the competition, 100T were left to contemplate what went wrong. 

We caught up with 17-year-old Canadian rookie top laner, Rayan ‘Sniper’ Shoura (aka 100T Sniper), one of the youngest players at Worlds 2024, who shared his thoughts on the loss and his personal experience at the tournament so far, while also reflecting on his journey to Worlds and the lack of a clear path to pro in North America. 

Thank you so much for joining me, Sniper. Today was rough, can you share what went wrong in the match against R7?

Experience. I think our lane phases are pretty good, but we tend to just not know how to, or for me at least, I tend to just not know how to [play on] two lanes at certain times.

So I’m either pushing away too far into the game or, I don’t know, I’m just basing at the wrong time. I just need to make sure that our two lanes are good. And then, yeah, I think we’ll start winning games, but I didn’t do that today, so yeah, I mean, we just ended up losing, unfortunately.

Can you tell me more about why you picked K’Sante three times? Is that something that you talked about with your coach or did you want to go in a different direction?

I did play three K’Sante games, we just think it’s OP and I think it’s good as well. It was more so just like a gameplay issue. I don’t think it was the pick itself. It did look good all three games.

Like I said, I didn’t know how to [play on] two lanes at certain times and I was just missing a lot of timers in the game.

Are those mishaps something you feel like is connected to the inexperience of this being your first Worlds or maybe is there something else that you have to work on?

I wouldn’t say it’s inexperience because in split one, or even in split two, I just always perform on stage. I would just say it’s a gameplay thing that not only me, but my teammates also need to fix, and then we’ll start winning way more games for sure.

Can you explain a bit more what you mean when you say it’s a gameplay thing?

It’s just in-game stuff, lane swaps or just knowing when to team fight, knowing when to push waves and then moving to mid or whatever else it might be. It is kind of just like macro and stuff. 

Now I want to move out from Worlds for a second and focus on you. You’re here as a rookie, but at 17, you’re also here probably as the youngest player in the entire competition. Do you feel the pressure of that?

I don’t feel pressure at all, to be honest. I’m just trying to have fun and I’m trying to play my own game, but unfortunately it didn’t work out today.

But yeah, I just got to keep moving forward and good things will come.

I saw in the Worlds Play-In Stage Opening Tease video you like to take things a day at a time. How it has been for you, coming into Worlds as taking it one day at a time? 

I dunno really [laugh]. I just always thought about going to Worlds and now that I’m finally here, it just feels unreal. But at the same time, I do need to adapt to all the adrenaline and everything. 

I just need to learn how to control myself just because everything is super cool.

Everyone is super cool and I’m here against the best teams in the world. That’s insane. So I mean, it’s just been an amazing experience. It’s an amazing experience.

In a past interview, you said that your team is very supportive of you and your growth with them throughout the years. How do they help you to control the excitement of being at Worlds?

I mean, they just tell me, ‘relax, you still need to focus on the game. You can’t just get too ahead of yourself and kind of just stay in the moment’.

So they definitely just reassure me that you still have to win one more game or whatever it is, and kind of just stay relaxed. That’s what they tell me normally.

And I know you feel very relaxed right now, but I opened Twitter earlier and there were a couple of people saying, ‘oh, how did Cloud9 lose to that’. Is there anything that you’d like to say to those calling you names like ‘frauds’?

We are frauds (laughs). This is a time where you can just say whatever you want. I personally don’t care about what anybody says about me, whether it’s good or bad, just as long as I feel good about myself, that’s all that really matters. And well at the moment, it’s absolutely true we lost. 

So yeah, I mean, go off. Just blame us as much as you want! We are frauds. We did lose today for a reason.

Honestly, I think that’s very mature of you. How did you get to this place where you’re like, ‘I’m just going to do my thing, take it one day at a time,’ what was your growth like as a pro player over the years?

To be honest, I kind of learned most of the stuff that I’ve learned right now from myself or just from Google or YouTube or whatever there was. So yeah, it’s definitely been an experience and as I’m getting older and older, I’m learning more things about myself, more things about the player I am as well.

I’m learning new things in-game. I kind of just keep moving forward and just learning as much as possible. That’s kind of where I get all this from.

Besides your brother V1per, do you have any player that you feel like is a role model for you?

I think probably [G2 Esports] BrokenBlade, to be honest. I feel like he’s a great top player. I say him just because he went to NA, won a championship and he’s won so many championships in Europe as well. So he’s definitely a top-laner I look up to.

Another thing that I wanted to talk with you about is how NA fosters its local talents. A lot of people (including Elyoya) are saying NA also imports a lot of players from other regions instead of growing its own talent. And when those kinds of talents like yourself come out, then they’re called ‘the next star player of NA,’ like it’s happening with you. What are your feelings about the fact that it’s really difficult from your region to have the career that you had?

Yeah, I mean, I’m super grateful for my career. For me, I was very lucky because I peaked at the right time or I got the highest LP when the scene was popping off and it was really easy to go pro. But for the people right now, I feel like you kind of just have to, because it’s definitely possible to still make it to the LCS, you just have to really grind your way there.

You just have to play a bunch of Solo Q, make sure that you’re climbing as well on top of that because at least getting top 10 is very important to even try to make it into pro. 

Cecilia Ciocchetti

Hi, I’m Cecilia! A freelance writer mainly focusing on League of Legends and its esports scenes. Find me at events interviewing anyone who has a story to tell, from players to the talented people working behind the scenes. Do you also have a story to share? Reach out to me via Twitter.