Renegade Master?

Renegade, joint owner of widely successful multi-gaming clan Reason Gaming, has been involved in the UK Gaming Scene in one way or another for as long as I can remember. Today i had a chat with to talk about his past, present and future.


Splodge: Hi Renegade, you are widely known within the UK Gaming Scene in both Enemy Territory and other online games. But for those who don’t know you so well, tell us about yourself.

Renegade: My name is Gavin Baillie I am the Team Manager/Joint Owner of Reason Gaming, I’m 28years old, have 4 Children and currently employed by Cisco.EU. I have played ET/RTCW to a fairly high level, but my real accomplishments started as a manager in ET when I helped lead the uQ.ET squad consisting of Fatal, Risk, Razz, Squirrel, H20, SYK and mZtik to Summercup Victory 2005 (all credits to the players). I also helped lead the UK.ET squad consisting of Ste, Marvel, Risk, Razz, Squirrel, nGotie, SYK and mZtik to bronze (again all credits to the players).


Splodge: You say much of your success came from management rather than playing, what was it that made you take that step into management?

Renegade: It was an idea that I had been toying with for a while, what really made me move into management was that the UK really wasn’t represented in the games that Reason supports. Clans such as 4Kings , although they had UK players, in my opinion it wasn’t enough to say they were a UK team (which they claimed to be), and the UK gaming scene was suffering partially because of this lack of other big teams in many of the popular online games.
I wanted another team to come from within the UK and take the vast majority (if not all) of its players from the untapped talent, that was in the UK gaming scene, to give the players a chance to show how good they are.

Things like this take time however, it doesn’t happen overnight but and it can only benefit the UK gaming scene. There are so many players out there who have talent, just unproven and need to be given a chance – and if we don’t give them an chance then who will?



Splodge: What do you see when you think about the future of online gaming? There are many organisations and Multigaming clans within Enemy territory which somewhat dominate the successful clan scene such as sFx and cdap - do you see the same happening within the games you support? If so, what are your views on the matter?

Renegade: The ET scene has always been a lively one, when big teams who have previously dominated fold, there has always been teams stepping up to take there place etc, and from what I can make out the ET game is still as competitive as it was when I was active as a player/manager in the scene.

In any game there will always be a team that’s a cut above of the rest in terms of skill and appeal to sponsors in ET it has been idle.ee for some time now, COD2 it had been speedlink but after they were beaten they lost focus on themselves and seemed to concentrate on the loss which hurt them hard, and now there is no true #1 dominate team in the EU at the moment but I’m sure that will be sorted this year with various events and competitions for the games taking part.

The same is in CS:S there is no true #1 dominating team as of yet, mainly because of the various competitions for the game and the lack of LAN events but again 2007 is bigger and better for the game so we will definitely find the answer to that one. Quake 4 has been totally dominated by SK Toxic, johan is a machine winning 8 straight competitions and the bench mark for the game, and Battlefield 2 has been dominated by Dignitas if I’m honest online and at LAN they have been what every BF2 squad has been aspiring to but none really have come close id probably go as far as saying they are the world number 1 but I don’t think we will get to see them playing the best teams around the world so maybe that should be dismissed.



Splodge: Do you see some games becoming too "commercial" with the amount of big name sponsors around now? Or do you feel that its beneficial to online gaming?

Renegade: Its a circle that most teams need to survive, for example the sponsor gives the team money to endorse or use the products which they then in turn use to go to LAN events etc and most of the teams have contracts which are renewed every 6 or 12months. There are only a few teams in the world that are self sufficient and don’t rely on there sponsors to get them to events they generate their own money in certain ways. We are just waiting for the Media to come into gaming in a big way etc and then we will see things move in a similar way to football with more sponsors come into the gaming scene from outside the computer industry.



Splodge: What games are you looking forward to in 2007 and why?

Renegade: From a personal point of view I’m looking forward to 3 games really; Supreme Commander as its going to be a whole new era for RTS games, to UT2007 as if its as good UT2004 then its going to be a huge hit but it needs to stay close to its roots though and of course ET:QW which is looking like a fantastic game!



Splodge: What are your and Reason Gaming’s plans for the future in regards to games you are going to support, and any other plans you have?

Renegade: Well for 2007 we will be supporting squads in CS:S, COD2, Quake3&4 and BF2 but the BF2 squad will be come the Reason ET:QW squad when its available and wont play BF2 anymore, as for other games we will be supporting at the moment we have a few games we are considering but we are focusing on the previously mentioned games for 2007



Splodge: One of Enemy Territory's best aimers, ferus, is currently involved in your successful CSS Squad, do you have any plans to incorporate enemy territory players in the ET:QW squads?

Renegade: No not at the moment mainly as the current Reason.BF2 squad is a tight nit family with bags of potential and the team play required to possibly be successful and good at ET:QW, they plan to switch over to ET:QW as soon as it is available.



Splodge: With some people seeing ET:QW a "half-way" point between Enemy Territory and the Battlefield series. What type of teams do you think will come out on top with teams from both Battlefield 2 and Enemy Territory planning to play this game?

Renegade: It depends really if ET:QW had different modes. For example I would expect the BF2 players to be better at 8v8 with infantry and vehicles whereas ET players would most likely be better at 5v5/6v6 infantry type of play.



Splodge: Okay thanks for your time Renegade, do you have any shoutouts you would like to make?

Renegade: A big shoutout to the remiaining UK ET players in the scene (nice to see Luke aka syk back and active), all the players i have had the privalge of playing and managing, to the Sponsors of Reason Gaming, Gladiator Computers, Steelseries, Western Digital and BT.com and to you for doing the interview.