Hats and Cats interviews
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Hey so I recently started a recording series of interviewing tf2 players about their competitive experiences, community interactions, and general sentiments regarding the issues we face and recent community events. The general focus of the series is looking back to the past, and seeing what we can learn from it and where we can go as a community, league, and players in the future.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6J7E19AevOo
The American interview is probably my favorite interview so far, I think it best represents the series and the sorts of topics we’ll be covering. Kinda going along with that I’d definitely be interested in covering more topics collaboratively and maybe organizing stuff like class round tables in the future, or trying to inspire other people to do them. I think there’s a lack of these sorts of collaborative class based community projects, and community projects in general these days; that results in a lack of the community feeling like an actual community. Reviving that sense of spirit should help in regards to accountability going forward.To help elaborate on the premise a bit, read this
Feel free to reach out to me if this is something that interests you. Some of the earlier (I think first 4-5? episodes) have audio issues which I believe I have fixed now. New episodes come every Mon/Wed/Fri at 12 pm est. This is a solo project at the moment, and I am constantly looking to improve my game. Most of the formatting of the videos is intentional for the sort of atmosphere I am looking to cultivate.
I would very much appreciate anyone who’s interested in interviews or community collaboration, or some other form of contribution reaching out either through steam or to me on discord. My main concern at the moment, is my lack of contact with and connection to 6s players, as well as just a general possibility of running out of people to cover. I do not particularly feel the need for help otherwise, but I am always interested to hear what people have to say.
https://discord.gg/qZT7faBwbqAfter I run through my reserves of interviews, I’d probably start aiming more towards having multiple people on to talk about things or just generally podcasting about recent tf2 happenings.
Coach’s corner from coach bucks was some inspiration, along with vaguely chocc talk; but this series has a lot of it’s own community focused goals as well that I think help give it an identity of it’s own. Most of these interviews are highly individualized and focused on things a person has experience and developed perspective on.
#anchor(Interview Log:)
Interview 1 - Darzie:
rgl and staff experience focused
Interview 2 - Green Beret:
lots on the transition between ugc and rgl, and the culture surrounding the timeframes and sniper
Interview 3 - Ac130/Ness:
rgl and sa cross regional focus
Interview 4 - Vibeisveryo:
rgl and community initiatives focused
Interview 5 - American/Danny:
lots of older experiences, coverage of present events, pyro class discussion & class identity focused
Interview 6 - Ire:
casting, multiregional, and administratively focused on 6s/hl
Interview 7 - Katryna:
covers a lot of ugc lore and perspective coming from the standpoint of a mentor
Interview 8 - Maven:
I really enjoyed talking about his experience on the RGL channel, content creation experience, and other side projects
Interview 9 - Baconblitz:
First one with a larger content creator and explores a lot more of the personal motivations. Was fun to view it from a more community based stance.
Interview 10 - Rorek:
It was suuuper fun to just talk about mapmaking and the methodology of balancing maps around each class
Interview 11 - blake:
We had a super detailed discussion on class wars and it was great. Bring it back, rgl.
Interview 12 - Submarine:
Covers a lot of the experiences of an asian hl player and the issues their community faces; in no small part due to ugc
Interview 13 - Wasteman:
Covers a lot of Australian highlander stuff from the perspective of a player. Talks a bit about qixalite and concerns regarding it as well.
Interview 14 - Gamemaster:
Covers a loooot of older ugc events and the personal history of the engineering legend. This one was a blast to just experience and be there for.
Interview 15 part 1 - Nabla:
Talks all about basically every format besides regular 6s and a lot of rgl lore from a behind the scenes perspective
Interview 15 part 2 - Nabla:
Talks about 6s in specific and a lot of insight into what it’s like to administrate for the community
Interview 16 - Kegaman:
This one is all about Kegaman and their own experiences including with content creation, with a little on the state of Asian Highlander. I usually prefer to have more of a significance and some takeaways from what I do, but I really don’t mind just delving into some more personal stories for the sake of it; kega’s always a joy and a really nice person.
Interview 17- Mothership:
Mothership does a lot of behind the scenes technical stuff in the rgl community and it was really nice to humanize all of that moderation experience. Also mothership put a ton of effort into increasing the audio quality of this one which is super appreciated
Interview 18- Micahlele:
Mr. Micah has some of the most interesting takes to offer. very insightful talk that puts a lot of rgl decision making methodology into perspective.
Interview 19- DZCreeper:
This one delves primarily into metagames, player improvement and the concept of maincalling.
Interview 20- Paul:
this one covers a lot of the leadership experiences of b&h paul.
Interview 21- Res:
This one covers what it’s like to reach invite in highlander, what pyro is like to a newer pyro, and a generally fresher set of eyes on competitive culture.
Interview 22- Vanxi:
This one covers 6s and tftv from a self described more detached and less community involved perspective
Interview 23- Arcadia:
This one covers a lot of 6s stuff from a community oriented perspective and touches upon a lot of various projects.
Interview 24- Constantly
This one covers a ton of rgl related topics from the perspective of the current hl head admin and really puts you into the mind of the man who has to make a bunch of important decisions for the good of the community, was glad to get it done.
Interview 25- Ghost
This one is more focused on ghost, their own experiences; and context for the past rather than any big overarching community themes. Still has a fair bit on spy as a class though.
Interview 26- Witness
This one covers a lot of the lore and various trivia of the witness gaming brand, as well as a bit of discussion on mentoring, lans, and resup.gg. Will hopefully combine into one part when I can render again.
Interview 26.5- Witness part 2
Same as the above
Interview 27- MattJ part 1
Part 1 talks a lot about the philosophy of MattJ, as well as thoughts on the state of team fortress two and it’s community.
Interview 27.5- MattJ part 2
Hones in much more on the cultural side of things and how it defines europe as a region in contrast to na
Interview 28- Hard Hat Jones
So this one is probably the most unique episode yet, and it ends up becoming a bit more of a traditional podcast as time goes on. It was done while hard hat jones was doing a 24 hour livestream. Naturally, this had an effect on the interview itself, especially towards the end/second timestamp and on. It goes on for a bit due to the interactivity with his stream chat and bounces back and fourth a fair bit. It also features karaoke, and me talking about the series and it’s goals for a bit among other things. Starts off by talking about the streamer life and what that entails if that’s your thing.
Interview 29- Lay
This one covers a lot about pugs, leadership, mentoring, other games, multiclassing, and caffeine usage.
Interview 30- Sovereign
This interview touches on StarCraft, leadership, personal growth, and also how Sovereign approached depression and the struggles of the post-graduation job search.
Interview 31- Equality-7251
This one talks about autism and how we manage to deal with how it impacts us as people. As well as a tooon about starcraft 1, building a bit upon what was talked about with sovereign; while going much more into the depth I was hoping to reach (and with my own mic being captured). Outside of that, it gives a lot of insight into the process of making their engineer essays and the inspirations for them. Puts you into the mind of someone who spends so much of their time trying to build these grand ideas. Give the essays a read sometime please.
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CANT ESCAPE CANT ESCAPE CANT ESCAPE
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@spring-rolls this is why we need new class wars. the mistakes of the past must be rectified.
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good job, keep it up brodie
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coach stamp of approval
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Appreciate it, coach. I made some edits to the original post including linking each interview. Would people be interested in posting requests for who to interview and whatnot here like the coach’s corner; or what sorts of collaborations could be interesting to see when it comes to groups of players?
Again, the formating and goals of the series is a bit different from older forum based ones, and I will not necessarily focus on wider community sentiment when deciding.Also let me know if I should like, give a new forum post for each individual person that gets interviewed, or just add it to the original forum post given the consistent upload schedule, thanks!
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@Bliztank said in Tf2 player community interviews:
Also let me know if I should like, give a new forum post for each individual person that gets interviewed, or just add it to the original forum post given the consistent upload schedule, thanks!
Keep them all in this thread would be preferred.
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Mothership Yeah within the same thread of course. I was just wondering if people preferred new replies to highlight each post, or if they prefer it all just being on the same one.
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@Bliztank
Edit: I need to figure out how to add in Tenor gifs into the forums. manually searching for gifs is dumb.
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alright then
the ire one just came out today, yes i am working on timestamps still
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b74HRFSgtxkthis one covers a lot of ire’s differing experiences as both as 6s and highlander admin and insight into rgl/how they operate, as well as a lot of a focus on the casting experience; and general community sentiments.
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hello yes i have finished timestamping current episodes and will make sure to have them done ahead of time before future episodes release; i hope it makes for a better experience
it only took like 2 280 mgs of caffeinated water and the entire night and most of the morning
also i added a bit more of what each interview means to me personally and talking about how each one is helpful for me to build from in the future with these videos in the descriptions.
should i post these to the tftv forums too tho?
also prolly should include this
Episodes for this week:
Mon 12 pm est, rgl, past ugc drama, mentoring and community focused
Wed 12 pm est, rgl & content creation focused
Fri 12 pm est, also rgl & content creation focusedLots of free time this week if you wanna schedule any interviews!
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revised upload schedule, but do want some input.
https://forms.gle/ZaXoihYZEbbJrkzY9
what’s more appealing between a 3x a week Mon/Wed/Fri upload schedule, and a 4x a week Mon/Wed/Fri and either Sat or Sun upload schedule?
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Spoilers for the week after this one
Class wars & Medic
Asian HL coverage
Australian HL coverage and Qixalite -
Interview 7- Katryna, covers a lot of ugc lore and perspective coming from the standpoint of a mentor https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMs1TePnSVo
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btw is there any interest at potential in person interviews shortly before/during/after the upcoming philly lan with a higher quality mic?
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I will be doing the Mon-Wed-Fri uploads with an occasional Sat upload if I have one that I think gives some really unique insight. Expect there to be one this week covering a super detailed look at mapping and the processes of doing it.
there will probably be one next sat as well.
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Interview 8- Maven https://youtu.be/ELOwM1U5ytQ
This one covers a lot about what it was like for maven to work as a member of the rgl staff and graphics team, a bit about anxiety and impostor syndrome and how that affected his content producing career, and just a lot of lore about the rgl video channel and various side projects of his. -
Interview 9- Baconblitz
First one with a larger content creator and explores a lot more of the personal motivations. Was fun to view it from a more community based stance.
https://youtu.be/qRTKIs8yegM -
Interview 10- Rorek
It was suuuper fun to just talk about mapmaking and the methodology of balancing maps around each class
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7iR2u2FUQAalso shorter side preview of the daff interview
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcEBt1JErxs -
Interview 11- blake
We had a super detailed discussion on class wars and it was great. Bring it back, rgl.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LOyAEjbUVG4i’m super excited for the saturday upload this week, covers an unconventional legend
next week:
super detail rich nabla interview
engineer. tf
kegaman