ImperialHal on the ALGS Year 3 Champs and how TSM won

Esports.gg recently sat down with Phillip “ImperialHal” Dosen to talk about his recent ALGS Champs win with TSM, where he thinks TSM will go from here, and his relationship with his TSM teammates:

ImperialHal, alongside his teammates Jordan “Reps” Wolfe and Evan “Verhulst” Verhulst won the ALGS Champs on Sunday with a commanding back to back to back win.

As TSM began their streak of wins at the end of the tournament, they felt that they could just do it, simple as that.

“After the second game we won, Jordan, our teammate Reps, was saying ‘we’re going to go for back to back to back right now.”

“Yeah, we’re doing it and then it happened. It’s crazy, Raven was saying this is not going to happen ever again. I agree, to win three games in a row of a battle royale, close as it was, it’s like magic.”

The conversation turned to the big win in front of the family for the first time. The last time the families of the TSM players were at an event, the team came in seventh while Dark Zero took home the trophy. For them to be present at this ultimate victory was something ImperialHal was happy to have finally done.

“Trying to win in front of my family, because you know, last time they were here was last Champs and we got seventh. I think I’m just happy that I was able to fulfill what I wanted to do.”

Right after ImperialHal was awarded the Monster Energy MVP Award on stage, he said that he didn’t care about the award and he just wanted to win as a team. He elaborated on that statement during the interview, though adding that he does believe he deserves the award.

“You know, I was talking about it earlier. I think I deserve it, yeah. At the same time it’s kind of redundant to me just because, you know, I’m always the first person going into the fight. I’m the first person running around looking for a pick on somebody else. You know, I’m always going to get the most clout because I get the most kills but I don’t know. I don’t really see any, like, importance with the MVP to be honest.”

So far, ALGS LANs have been won by one of two teams; TSM or DarkZero. Though Hal is happy to have won, he does think that there were other worthy victors that could’ve taken the trophy.

“OpTic, obviously. They had more points than us even though we won the tournament. You know, six more points, they had 89. They were playing lights out in the finals. It was us and OpTic and then the drop went to like 60 something points and it was BLVKHVND in third. OpTic was playing insane, I definitely think they deserve it too. Just because they were so ahead of everybody else in the lobby for the entire tournament.”

Besides OpTic, ImperialHal was also impressed by the APAC South team BLVKHVND, who seemingly rose out of nowhere to a top three position at ALGS Year 3 Champs. He was also impressed by the Dojo, though they initially annoyed him by taking out TSM in 20th in an early match.

“[BLVKHVND] impressed me. I didn’t think they were going to do as well as they did. Usually in scrims we don’t really see them or hear about them. I think BLVKHVND has a good team, a great team, to be honest.”

“[The Dojo] actually pissed me off because they actually killed me, they killed us, one of the games early. We got 20th because they late landed on me because they know where we land and how we loot. So I’m like split from my team, so they landed on me and killed me. I don’t like them for now, for the time being just because of that. To be honest, at the same time they also impressed me. You know, they came from LCQ, NA LCQ. Timmy, even though he’s a content creator, he’s not a professional player. They showed up, like honestly, they’re way better a team than I think everybody probably thought. They did great, but yeah, I’m more impressed with BLVKHVND.”

To some a hero and to some a villain. ImperialHal can play both roles, but what he likes to do the best is just be himself.

“I like playing both sides. That’s just who I am and I like being who I am am and that’s not going to really change. Obviously, you know there’s always moments, am I doing the right thing, am I saying the right thing, am I acting the right way? But at the end of the day, I’m just going to be who I am because, one, it’s working and, two, who cares?”

Reps and ImperialHal are one of the oldest duos at Champs and even in Apex Legends esports. But what exactly makes them work together so well?

“We’ve been playing since the beginning. He’s just a great player, simple as that. Great player, you know, I picked him out of everybody in the beginning of the game to play with me on TSM. Don’t have to get rid of somebody that’s good at the game, right?”

“Me and him are always on the same page, when it comes to IGLing and we both know what we’re going to do, basically. You can’t replicate that. Just because of how much experience we have as a team, or you know, as a duo. So Evan’s getting there, I feel actually Evan’s already there. After this final, like that was the most perfect Apex I’ve ever seen. Three wins in a row, you can’t replicate that to be honest.”

When asked about his teammate Verhulst winning the EA Positive Player Award at Champs, ImperialHal seemed excited to talk about him.

“Evan is, even though he’s young, he’s very mature. He just like the little brother, or like my little brother, on the team.”

“Sometimes like, you know, if I piss him off or something, he doesn’t cuss at me or anything. But he’ll let me know, right? So, that’s rare though he doesn’t always do that. I think Evan is amazing. Just as much as Jordan. I wouldn’t place him with anybody else in the game right now at all.”

Raven, the member of TSM that tends to stay in the shadows (quite literally), has had a big impact on helping TSM get to this ultimate win. His effect on the team was certainly helpful, but Hal believes that the major changes Apex Legends has had recently called for the team to adapt more from their plans.

“Because the game changed a lot, after they changed the loot, evac tower, or beacon spawn rate, stuff like that. The other LANs were a lot of planning and just following the plan.”

“In this tournament, it really felt like it was adapt what came, you know, what’s in front of you. That was like obviously due to the players. The coach was not in the game so, obviously it happened from prior LANs. The players have to do that, but his preparation was way more impactful the prior LANs.”

“In this tournament, we still had the same plans from the prior tournament because we were still landing in the same spot and the meta was still kind of similar. I’m not saying Raven’s not putting in the work, but he said on the stage himself. Us as players literally just stood out as a team to kinda win this. Compared to just following the plan because there’s a lot of situations in the majority of the games where we were put in positions that we’ve never been in. We never practiced that position and that’s obviously when we have to adapt as a player and as a team. I think that’s how we won.”

After winning three LANs and establishing their Apex Legends dynasty, it’s easy to wonder what TSM could possibly do next. After reaching the highest peak in their esport, what else is there to do? Even Hal wasn’t sure, but he is sure that they’ll be making changes for the next competition.

“That’s hard to think about.”

Hal was sure that he wouldn’t be switching up his Legend.

“I love Horizon way too much to be honest. I love that character.”

“We’re going to definitely change our POI on Storm Point. Wall kind of sucks so, even though we just won back to back on that, I think just change the POI.”

For the full interview with TSM ImperialHal, make sure to check it out on the esports.gg YouTube channel. More coverage of the ALGS Year 3 Championship can be found here.

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