The Move needs to do something about Pikaboo

First off, I am a huge TM fan. I love the community, I love watching the team play, and I always root for them to win. I post this not as a hater, but as a concerned fan.

If you asked who is the best Rogue player in AWC, it would be Pika, hands down. And it really isn’t as close as someone might think. The gap between Pika and Snutz/Whazz hasn’t closed in the last 4yrs. He manages to pull things out of the hat that make people rewatch just to see how he pulls it off.

However

If you ask me who the best AWC player who plays Rogue, Pika would not be on that list at all. Fact is (using the previous examples)… Snutz can crush on Rogue, Warlock, Warrior, Monk, Spriest. He is a top level player who can multi-class withoutdetriment. Whazz is amaze on Rogue but also on other classes. He is a top level player who can multi-class without detriment. Pikaboo… Is a rogue. He has made one or two appearences as monk… But the fact is, when TM make a comp change, their choices are XXR or bench pika. He is the only person on the team who does not multi-class. Jelly is on the Hunter, Mage, Warrior etc. Wizk is on the Spriest, lock, DH, boomkin. Even Sterge is multi-classing well as healer.

2 out of 3 AWC seasons The Move has failed to hold a dominant position. Sad as it is to say… If they don’t make circuit this year, I think they are gonna have to have a real sit down with him and figure out how they are gonna move forward.

It isn’t even just him being a single class hero. He has been getting way too agressive and putting himself in terrible positions/situations in matches. Every team knows that the key to win is pressure Wiz/Jelly until Pika goes on the assault and then hard swap to him. by the 3rd swap, he is out of CDs and dead.

If he is working on something in the background, he really needs to bring it out for cup 3 and show the world he can adapt with an ever changing meta. Even just adding the monk consistently opens up all kinds of comp alignments, or try at ret pally. Something. This one-trick pony of “play rogue, but better” isn’t cutting it anymore and if they are to remain competitive, something needs to change.

Just my 2 cents.

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I seriously don’t think they care about being #1 as much as OTK, C9, Kawhi or even Jah’s team. The four of them have basically built a brand on twitch together. They’re the RPS team. If RPS is not A+ tier they’re just not gonna be top 3. Been that way since BFA came out and will probably continue onwards. Also, Pikabo is also working pretty hard to bring WW to the table, its just he lacks experience on it and gear. He’s capped it the last four(?) weeks but he’s way behind Trill or Kawhi’s monk on the gear curve.
Also, you pat Sterge on the back but he’s arguably just as resistant to main swapping as Pikaboo or even Jellybeans is. Only real times I’ve seen Sterge shift off of Shaman was the BFA S2 tournament where Rdruid was like 30x better than any other healer and now with Hpal being on that same level or better. Every other time he goes directly back to Shaman even if its not the best.
Jellybeans also sat the entire expansion of BFA, 2 full years bench riding sticking to Hunter for AWC play. He’s finally starting to play Warrior and being a valuable asset to the team outside of strategizing in discord calls.
Only person on that team you can say has actively tried to multi-class is Wizk. He played Destro in BFA s2 and helped them get some top 6 finishes with it. He’s played some Moonkin, and here lately we’ve seen him playing Mage.
I think they’re trying as a team to put more effort in this expansion but its The Move effort. I told Absterge in his stream that being a fan of them is watching 4 S-tier players play with unoptimal gear and setups and somehow stay relevant. Sterge is running around with green conduits on both Rsham and Hpal, Pika is running around with green conduits on rogue, I assure you Jellybeans is probably doing the exact same thing.
Lastly, winning doesn’t mean as much as the brand for them. They’re all making careers off of Twitch just streaming and keeping their persona up. I did the math on Pika’s stream by pulling a 7 day average on subs (check the end of each day sub count, he provides it). Just in subs alone if things held he was set to make 270k that year. During my 7 days watching he pulled roughly 350 subs a day. After donations and sponsors he’s netting north of 325k. Compare winning a couple 8k/4 tournaments versus sustaining his Twitch success. I know which one I would devote the effort to.

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Alright I’ll let them know to drop pika from the team.

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Only positivity for my boy. I don’t play in the 3k bracket so I’m not sure what the right play is there - however, Pika’s ability to translate what’s going on in his head in excruciating detail is an amazing talent and worth it’s weight in gold during a match.
It’s not his first time finding himself in a rough spot with his class - they’ll figure it out.

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Pika IS The Move. What you’re saying doesn’t make much sense.

Also, I think they’re mostly promoting their brand and having fun more than winning at all costs.

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Sterge is resistant to Multi classing, but he does it when needed. Also, JB didn’t sit out all of BFA at all. The thug cleave was brought out multiple times 2018 (heck, it was the comp that took Method Black out in the lower finals), and last year.

I can see the logic of the twitch product. But doesn’t part of that come from performing well in the AWC? His subs boosted crazy after the 2018 Grand Finals coming in 2nd.

Thanks for the advice ill kick him from my team what other suggestions do you have?

I was more so making the point about Jellybeans not at all wanting to play off specs the entirety of BFA. I know he was clutch in some situations as Hunter but those were few and far between.
His stream was on the rise at the start of BFA. The blizzcon performance helped it but even if they got 3rd that year without that incredibly hype finals he would have still gotten to where he is today. He’s imo the hardest working WoW streamer. He’s got a schedule, he always shows up, always delivers a positive ernteraining product, and he’s always interacting with chat.

The Move Annual Conference Itinerary

  • White claw break
  • Pikaboo and what to do with him.
  • Multi-classing and how it can benefit you.
  • Leveraging the AWC.
  • White claw break
  • Lunch.
  • White claw break
  • Social media etiquette.
  • Balancing streaming and family life.
  • Networking on Twitch.
  • White claw break
  • Closing statements by special guest speaker.
  • White claw after party.
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Does pika really stream 7 days a week?

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Not sure what the “what claw break” is for… the man can whiteclaw while doing 2’s.

Nearly every single day of the week 5 hours on average. Also throw in they stream AWC top 8 Qualifiers.
Any break is talked about for two weeks straight and has to the best of my knowledge never been more than 2 days in a row.

That dude streams like every single night.

Yeah I qualified with “nearly” before some inbred on here went back like 7 months and went “well, actually…” on me.

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I misread what you had said, I thought you were saying he doesn’t stream more than 2 nights in a row.

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I think the learning curve on rogue is probably the highest of any class so he doesn’t really have as much time to get good with other classes. Rogues usually don’t have to change anyways since they’re guaranteed to be S tier forever with RMX. Also big fan of The Move, hope they win next time.

The Move is a brand name based off the team name they used to compete with.
These days they compete as part of the Golden Guardians which is a esports team sponsored by the Golden State warriors basketball team.

Pikaboo aka Jason Smith is currently working on a degree in media/communications.
The guy streams on Twitch almost every day, has 314,000 people following his Twitch channel content, and 30,000 Twitter followers.

I imagine his priorities at this point in his life have changed.
I suspect the primary reason for competing was to show up on that stream for publicity, and based on the existence of this thread it seems to have paid off.
Subs/follows = $$$
The more people has has following his content, the better his resume will look once he graduates.

The dude probably makes more in a month streaming than he does winning a tournament. I don’t think he gives a sht.

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This guy gets it.

This guy too.