Fnatic Kamyk: "Playing Sentinel Was Really Hard For Me In The Beginning"

Maks "Kamyk" Rychlewski from Fnatic has gained a lot of attention ever since his debut against Giants Gaming. He came into the playing five in place of Alfajer because of the visa issues he is facing, and even though he has played only two games in the tier 1 VCT circuit, he is already a star player. 

He played a crucial role in taking Fnatic to win in a close game against BBL Esports and was also the top fragger in Haven. Rabia from GINX sat down with Kamyk after the match to discuss how Kamyk got into Fnatic, his experience of LAN, the close game against BBL, and more. You can read the complete interview below.

Interview With Fnatic Kamyk

Kamyk, congratulations on the win against BBL; it was such a close game. How are you feeling right now?

I am feeling pretty good because I went to this match with a really good mindset and I played really well individually. We kind of slipped on all of the maps, but overall we won, so that's all that matters, and I am feeling good.

You are one of the youngest players in the EMEA region, and you have never played with any tier 1 organization in the past. So, how did you join Fnatic? What's the story behind it? I am sure a lot of people are curious to know about it.

I was supposed to join Fnatic Akademy and play in tier 2 regional leagues, but the project was cancelled because you can't play as an Academy player in tier 2 and tier 3. You just go up and up and get into the franchise, and because of that, I was proposed if I want to be a sub at Fnatic, I am gonna just like learn and watch them play so I can grow up.

You came to a LAN tournament to play in place of a huge player, Alfajer, on such short notice. Did you feel any sort of pressure in terms of crowd, the expectations that everyone had from Fnatic because of them being the LOCK//IN champions? How did you control those nerves?

I was not under pressure, but I was really excited to play the first match. I was trying not to get over-excited because I will start to do stupid things and try to be the star of the game and do random stuff. During the first game, I was containing myself so I don't make mistakes, and it worked pretty well.

In the second game, I was more confident in myself than in the first game because the first game is always the hardest one, and the second game was pretty easy for me. I had a really good day individually, and it kept growing, you know.

Before joining Fnatic, you mostly used to play as a duelist or initiator, but right now, you are playing as a sentinel, did you feel any sort of discomfort while switching up to this role?

To be honest, in the beginning, it was really hard for me because the last time I played sentinel in a team was two years ago when sentinels were completely different than they are now. To be honest, each day, I am getting more and more comfortable with the sentinel role because I used to play it, but at the beginning, it was kinda hard because I didn't know what to do, but Boaster and Mini guided me through those things along with our assistant coach SLK as well.

Usually, with a 6th player, we see teams facing synergy issues because they might not have that sort of practice in comparison to the regular playing five. However, that was not the case with you and the rest of the team. How did you and the team manage to close out that gap and have that smooth transition?

Ever since I joined Fnatic, I was always treated like a part of the team, so it was not big of a deal because I was with them in LOCK//IN and I was doing stuff with them. I was playing games with them and doing random stuff for example, we ate together, we played some basketball together, and I even got minutes to play in some practice sessions before the LOCK//IN because there was a doubt about whether Leo can play or not due to COVID. I almost played, but we got lucky, and Leo got a separate room because of COVID.

Ascent is a strong map for Fnatic; however, BBL was still able to take nine rounds back-to-back on the attacking side. Did you guys expect that sort of aggression, and what went wrong for you guys on that map?

We did not expect that, but we did expect them to play good because it is a really good map for them, and I think most of the people in Fnatic would say it's their best map. With the game, we went into it with a really sleepy mentality; we weren't active in the game overall; we were just saying, "Oh one short, I am gonna ultimate" (in a sleepy tone), and after that, we didn't come into the game as we should and like we always do but in the second map, we had a reset, and we filled the gap and played pretty well.

A question beyond VCT, Bind is coming back to Valorant with some major changes, especially around the teleporters. What are your thoughts about these updates, and which map do you want it to replace in Valorant?

To be honest, Bind changes for me are pretty weird, especially with the teleporters; there are not many things that changed in the map. I am actually curious about one thing, the new vent on the B side. I am actually curious about what it is, but overall the changes are good for the T side and the CT side because both sides can use teleport.

In terms of what map it should replace, I think it should replace Pearl because I don't like the map overall. It's a pretty new map, but I think it has to be changed a bit because it's sometimes really weird to play. 

Coming back to VCT, which team do you think is Fnatic's biggest competition in EMEA and globally?

For now, I can say it's Navi, even if their form is pretty flippy right now, but overall they are a really solid team. They are really good individually, they are really good as a team, and are the biggest competitor in the league actually for now because the other teams need to wake up from what I see a bit.

With all these amazing performances, you have gathered a lot of new fans across the world. Do you want to say anything to them?

Thanks for cheering for me; thanks for your support because there are a lot of people that support me ever since I started playing the matches, and I love you.

We would like to thank Kamyk for his time! You can watch him playing against Team Heretics on April 6, and you can tune into the game live on the official Valorant EMEA channel on Twitch and YouTube.