Talking Counter
Episode 172: The mad dash for VRS points - FaZe and Liquid still at risk, CS2 update, PGL Bucharest
03 Apr 2026
Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is discussed at the start of this section?
Welcome to Talking Towner.
from Bucharest Romania it's sunny outside the weather is beautiful crisp brisk spring air and a ton of counter-strike coming that's that's all I got we got uh Yanko's coming in a little bit late obviously he's uh he's got a little obviously well it's not obvious that he's coming in late he is late that's true not obvious that he's coming in late it's obvious that he's not here at the moment
He's not with us. But he will pop in at some point and probably be quite startled that we have started. Normally we just sit and wait, but we thought we may as well get going with the prelude to all of this.
It's going to be a fun peek behind the curtain as we try and test his microphone live and make sure everything works.
I know your hotel room so well at the moment, right? Like I know, and here's the thing, right? Been in that hotel many times before, you know, the rooms, they're not big, but they do have everything you require, right? There's no qualms there, but it's just more about, you know, how have you, I can see what you've done with your coffee situation that you haven't had to replace that.
Where have you placed your suitcase? Is that, that's not on the ground behind you, is it?
Other side of the bed, I got a couple of things I still got to put away in it. I just got in yesterday afternoon. So it's other side of the bed between the bed and the bathroom, you know, a little gap.
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Chapter 2: What updates are being discussed around AnimGraph2?
Okay, so you've placed it there. Yeah, put it there for now. Have you done the TV strategy?
I'll probably show it over back in these corners.
uh what's the tv strategy have you checked your speeds right you change oh yeah yeah the internet speeds is all good i i haven't even set up the pc yet though they dropped it off just before we went live so it's all that's perfect timing yeah yeah it's all great um are you on the laptop right now then i'm on the laptop right now oh it's working man oh the mac dude the mac it's uh i just thought you would have gone to the pc you you didn't have time to get there
No, I didn't want to set it up and get into issues.
Don't say anything that could get you cancelled, Janko. We're live right now, okay? Yeah, we did start recording. We just needed to get that out of the way. Why? We just wanted to get a prelude out, get the recording started, talk about Jason's aura ring.
Yeah, the aura ring. No, you guys, I don't know if you guys remember... thank you well that's just that's just for this that's just for the website to make it easier for i don't know i don't know whatever um yeah uh i thought i lost my wedding earlier me me jason's got magic he wants to play bro No, I have a podcast I want to edit before I eat dinner or while I eat dinner.
And then I have to upload it and then I got to post it. And then if I get all of that done, all the adult stuff done, then my reward to myself is a couple of games of magic before going to sleep.
You've already played a couple today, Jason. Let's be real. I haven't played any. Nothing.
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Chapter 3: What are the implications of the Major Qualification cutoff?
You've already had a couple. You've already played a couple of games. You had a couple under your belt. I see Parler already posting content about it.
That was last night. Yeah, we played a few games last night. We got stuck in. It's spreading, man. It actually is kind of like a virus in a way. I didn't think Henry would get infected.
Exactly. That's what I was going to say. You know things are bad if Henry is...
getting into it like that's how out of the loop he feels like there's no one doing anything anymore outside of playing magic so if you want to you know i thought this i thought the same way but remember when he collected pokemon cards for a while yeah but you don't play pokemon well you do but no one you can yeah but no one does no yeah but he likes the collectible shit he likes the cardboard you know this is this is right up his alley i think when you when you get into it maybe not the actual game itself but yeah it's yeah it's been fun he's doing some ninja troll shit
Ninja Turtle Ship.
Yeah.
Okay, interesting. It's probably something about some type of a build. I want to let the viewer know just early, I do have a strobe effect that's on my camera. Now, this is the budget. We're swimming in money at the moment.
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Chapter 4: What are the latest rumors surrounding Aurora?
So we've got strobe effects on my camera. If you guys like it, we'll add it to all cameras next week for the next week's episode. But yeah, just me for right now. I set up today for the remote casting. And the camera that I use for that is the one I use for recording here. But it's got priority out there. So on an old webcam.
So this one has just a built-in strobing because of the wallpaper or the power or my type of lights. So all those things combine pretty much.
Listen, I think it's in line with the production value that the people are used to getting from us. Very high? Yeah. Some of the best, top of the line. Absolutely.
Hey, we've had three episodes. No one said anything about audio, so I think we're fucking killing it. Maybe it's only two.
We're fucking back.
Or we've just jinxed it.
One of the two.
In a big way. Yeah, something's going to happen.
Guys, have you been keeping up with all the news lately?
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Chapter 5: What are the implications of roster changes for FaZe and Liquid?
I think that people are starting to... We're not starting to. The story is at its conclusion. We're at the conclusion of the story. I think that people are hoping that someone takes the horse out the back and does what needs to be done. But the horse is still fighting, Janko. The horse is still kicking.
And it's really sad, man, because you guys know this even better than I do as casters, right? Like FaZe, when they're good... Counter-Strike is better off for it. It's exciting, man. They're a great playoff team when they're good. They play exciting Counter-Strike.
Chapter 6: How does the team dynamics affect performance in Counter-Strike?
They're explosive. They have great personalities on the team. They get the crowd going. They have tons of fans wherever they show up. I want a good FaZe clan in our scene. We're all better off for it. But this roster ain't it. It's been obvious from day one. And honestly... Whoever at that fucking organization decided to be more hands-on with the roster, back the fuck off. It's too late now.
You got to ride the coals.
Whoever took initiative, fucking stop. I took a wrong turn here. I should have stayed in my lane. I changed the lane. That's on me. We're going back.
Chapter 7: What are the main challenges facing teams in the upcoming Major?
I'm giving the keys back to Kerrigan. Do whatever the fuck you want. I'm going to try to scrounge up whatever money I have for you so you can get a... decent roster and I'm not going to meddle in the esports affairs ever again. Because it has just been a disaster class of roster mismanagement. It's just FaZe and Liquid.
Those are the two massive ones where you just look at it and it's unbelievable how mismanaged Liquid is. We haven't seen one of these every couple of years though, boys.
Because Liquid is over longer.
Liquid is over...
Chapter 8: How do the recent events shape the future of teams like NRG and BC Game?
Liquid is over a longer period of time. Faze is more recent. It's been a couple of years ever since. They're just letting players go on free transfers.
Even the Shanghai final, I guess. The Shanghai final you could even bring into conversation at one of those ones for Faze where maybe it extended it for longer than it should have been. Because Janko is bang on. The thing that you want is the exciting games. But they're nowhere near that.
Shanghai and Budapest. They also got like the miracle run.
I mean, Rob's left after Shanghai, so it didn't, you know, that was a big deal.
But that also meant, that might have also been why they played so good at that event too, just because they knew he was gone.
Could have had an impact, yeah. Knocked out G2 in the semifinal, who would have, you know, then played Spirit in the final, who they beat every single time that year, sick. Yeah, I mean...
we've talked about it so much. So it doesn't like at the end of like, this team just is dead.
It feels, but like the next level problem is like the mentality of this team has got to be in such a hole at this point with such with these losses that when you talk about that really exciting, really good phase team, they were never like the most structured and the most like obsessed with the, with the details of the X's and the Y's and inside the server.
But like, they were always so good at improvising and playing off of each other by feel by sense. And that takes an incredible amount of trust. And once you lose that, it's so fucking hard to get it back. I don't, I don't really know how to put it into words, the feeling in a team when you can tell that nobody trusts each other. And so communication is lessons.
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