Red Bull Wololo is here! | Town Center - Ep. #13 - feat. Memb

Welcome to our bi-monthly podcast format "Town Center" - where the lovely duo of @TheViperAOE & @MasmorraAoE discuss everything around the world of Age of Empires II.
This episodes guest:
@MembTV_
www.redbull.com/ca-en/events/...
liquipedia.net/ageofempires/W...
liquipedia.net/ageofempires/W...
0:00 Intro & Agenda
3:28 Red Bull HYPE!
15:16 The Qualifiers!...or the lack thereof...
28:16 Hera still favorite? Despite EW?
32:20 Why EW again?...
36:07 AoE 4 makes it to the main event
41:38 AoE Mobile and the Age of Noob controversy
48:50 World Rumble 2
50:57 Welcome Memb!
54:33 Why no King of the Desert?
1:00:45 Are Team Games really less competitive than 1v1's these days?
1:04:21 Warlords 3
1:15:02 The Pressures of Streaming
1:22:47 Memb's Dream Team to beat GamerLegion
Early access and 48 hours after KZbin on Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/0pv1c2C...
We're excited for your feedback. Let us know what you think!
Check out our socials and follow to stay updated!
Twitter: / gamerlegionaoe
Instagram: / gamerlegion
Facebook: / gamerlegion
Twitch: / gamerlegion

[@draganescuconstantin2380]

Memb is a pillar of the aoe2 community. Nothing but respect for him WE LOVE THIS GAME

[@karnazacss]

this has become a staple in my podcast "routine", thank you. Masmorra you are so good at your job.

[@MasmorraAoE]

Thanks a lot man 🥰

[@PurpleBraveGiraffe]

Next video : why viper got banned from the insider team for trash talking aoe mobile

[@nick______m]

3v3 nations cup hype!!! 🎉

[@danielchauvin9317]

Best weather podcast out there.

[@Bayernkripostar]

Memb is a fine guy - thx for the interview!

[@petrseghman4283]

Another one of the adults who started to care about the weather here. And of course - a briliant podcast as always!

[@kartiksaraf4676]

The smaller tournament seems to be them making the tournament sustainable and stay on longer. RBW Legacy was 25th anniversary, of course they can't match that everytime

[@stooge_mobile]

Best podcast on the internet. That isn't history based. But Age of Empires is kinda history. So maybe it's just the best period.

[@charleyruwart8983]

Sounds logic, I follow, I agree

[@kathykat367]

Thanks for having Memb! Very enjoyable! Best streamer!

[@DukePegasus]

GOTTA LOVE MEMB

[@OytheGreat]

I am disappointed that the conversation about the weather was so short. What is Masmorra's favourite weather? At what temperature does Viper start feeling the airco is needed? What do you guys feel is the impact of the weather on your mood and physique? So many questions unanswered. I'm only half-kidding too. I'm getting old. 11

[@GLAgeOfEmpires]

Were gonna make sure that there's a 20 minute segment in each episode talking about the weather.

[@konradpyszniak976]

And what about Game of Thrones? What Viper thinks about season 6,7,8, what Masmorra have to say about battle of Bastards. So many question and you still had 5 min before reaching 1.5h video. 11

[@OytheGreat]

@@GLAgeOfEmpires Looking forward to it! 👴🌤

[@gebhard128]

i really like the el reinado ladder format, beeing a single player main since DE I actually jumped into this ladder to explore the maps and had much fun with it, even with regular qualifiers the idea of a tournament ladder with the maps and settings is fantastic and I wish we could have such a ladder for evry big tournament.

[@jacobwood3326]

21:54 shots fired! 11 thanks as always for the podcast!!

[@SMalicett]

111111111111111

[@zackc3767]

Make sure to like and subscribe to GL, Viper, and Memb.

[@Mermaidkilla]

I honestly love 2v2 tournaments, fully agree with Nelson

[@janwicha2711]

Loving this podcast. Great to hear the honest opinions from people in the community

[@Maldonado240183]

I loved this video because of Memb's honesty, sincerity, and accurate game knowledge.

[@floydroid772]

There is no way someone unexpected could cheat their way in when there are only 4 spots.

[@donaldfarquar]

Yeah as viper said, it'll be obvious if someone cheats. Maybe if it was top 64 I could see it, but if top 4 has a random in the last month the scrutiny on them will be massive.

[@dontmugurself]

Ya 4 spots is too small. If it was like top 48 maybe. But 4? Even if you cheat your way to top 10, youre gonna be playing and having to beat Viper, Hera, etc to rise into the actual top 4- and even if you had someone else playing your acc, how are they gonna beat the world’s best to get your acc into those spots? They simply cannot. It’s completely fair to assume ppl will cheat- but no one who does will cheat their way THAT far.

[@ashley-paul]

I totally agree. Cheating will happen, but not all the way to qualification. You have to be a Top 15 player to even have a chance of finishing Top 4 by cheating, and none of those players is dumb enough to try to cheat.

[@MasmorraAoE]

It doesn't have to be a qualifying player cheating to break the system. What if someone who finishes 5th on the ladder loses 50 points to someone who was provably cheating in the last week leading to the deadline? Will you give him the points back? What happens to the guy who was 4th? What if this happens to 5 people? I can think of so many pitfalls...

[@No_Complaint_9790]

@@MasmorraAoE would this be a possibility where a team of 3 or 4, training together but clearly wants one of them (or the best player of them) to qualify and they try hard to win against other players but pick a specific time to queue with their team mates and lose to one (‘accidentally’) and boost him up? Edit: specifically leading up towards end of the qualification. Also, I can imagine a scenario where one player who knows he may not make it but choose(work with) another player who has potential to make it and systematically lose to boost.

[@brianpeyton6083]

For the Rebull qualifier, I plan on playing a lot so I can take elo off easy Hera games and dump it to Viper.

[@CptSquirrel]

Yay you covered my question! Great podcast as usual, keep up the good work!

[@abhirama7574]

Best AOE2 Caster -> Memb 😎 Great Episode !

[@noahbrandyberry7126]

Would love to have this on Apple Podcasts!

[@lherrero]

Yes please!

[@ar1sm70]

Always enjoy your talks gentlemen, thanks for another great show :)

[@TheVisionites]

Memb

[@pierrez8570]

20:12 "They are not gonna have any AI tools monitoring suspicious activity" -> Of course they will! AI doesn't have to be sophisticated, and is an umbrella world that is very clearly overused. That being said, anomaly detection is one of the EARLIEST forms of AI that were designed, long before the fancy generative AI stuff that stormed the world last year. Stuff like spam detection and the like, etc. I guarantee you they will have tools like this to help with the monitoring of accounts.

[@Nysyarc]

From the perspective of a long-time AoE2 casual gamer and shorter though still relatively long-time watcher of AoE2 as an e-sport, I always thoroughly enjoy watching the Redbull events, and from the standpoint of a viewer, I don't find that the Empire Wars gamemode takes a whole lot away from the experience. Dark Age at a competitive level is so finely optimized now that it doesn't usually last all that long, and it's quite rare for aggression such as laming to mix anything up, so you can't really ever go into a game of pro-level Random Map thinking that there's a good chance the game will be decided in Dark Age or because of something that happens in Dark Age. There is definitely something to be said for including Dark Age in terms of completeness or "how it's supposed to be done", and it gives the commentators a bit more time to discuss the players, civ match-up and map generation before the action begins. All that said, I love tournaments that feature Random Map and I also love Redbull for mixing it up and featuring Empire Wars. Maybe I'm not a good person to judge because I just love it all! Great podcast as always!

[@richardmaska1818]

I like that empire wars has an S-tier tourney in Red Bull. It kinda feels like the British Open in golf or the French Open in tennis, tournaments with unquely and substantially altered versions of their game.

[@pierrez8570]

French Open in tennis is not an altered version of the game... More than 40% of all tournaments are played on Clay. Wimbledon would be the more accurate comparison, since it's one of the very few tournaments played on grass on the circuit.

[@richardmaska1818]

@@pierrez8570 Interesting! I stand corrected. Maybe my perception as an American shaped that assumption.

[@paweborkowski6959]

1:24:27 I see in Memb's eyes: okay, I'll run with this idea.

[@The_Lag_Monster]

Love Memb! Great podcast as always!

[@Nathan-zw9sr]

Memb, great to hear that you are hoping to do another KOTD at some point! It's a classic and a personal favorite. Hyped for Warlords 3!

[@Clickomancer]

Another fantastic episode. im always very excited when one is released. good work. Memb is so honest. how not to like him. best of luck to all the Franchise. ❤️

[@ellycat5703]

LOVE these podcasts!

[@OytheGreat]

I'm always amazed the Champions of AoE2 are so modest and mature. Guys like Viper and Hera are constantly breaking a lance for non-full time players. They're advocating fairer distribution of prizepools which now benefit the winners more. They're saying qualification favours full-time players. And they're saying how grateful they are for a diminished prizepool size because it's still high and because times are changing. Never have I heard Viper say he's the most talented or complain about not getting enough money, unless he's clearly joking. In other games, the best players are so often douchebags, which makes me very grateful I'm part of THIS community instead.

[@skunkrebell]

What a great podcast!

[@87JJosh]

We love this game!

[@seifboumiza3801]

Nice content ❤❤

[@MRRookie232]

Memb is honestly one of the most likeable people in the community and within gaming, full stop. I wish him the very best success with warlords and future within aoe2 🙏🏿

[@david_oliveira71]

22:00 "Like T90 qualifies" -TheViper 2024 1111

[@salmanmunir1657]

We love this game and Memb 😍

[@AlwinMonteiro]

Domination caster ever!!

[@victors2011]

Love this podcast soooo muuuch comment

[@AEGISAOE]

actually nice

[@kartiksaraf4676]

I think this is one of the reasons why everyone loves Viper so much. Most of the other pro players only have had negative things to say about the tournament and what the tournament should do to suit them. Its RB money, they get to decide what is good and what is not and what is enjoyable for the viewers. RB have no obligations to do things a certain way. We should be happy that there is this much support for the game and learn to adapt somewhat. From the perspective of another investor, what we show is negativity to probably half a million dollar investment from them. His is the only take that seems to understand that. The community seems to have no trust at all in RB. They have shown that they can deliver excellent tournaments and excellent games. RBW have been some of the most competitive tournaments in the last few years.

[@cmaples]

So fun! Love Memb!

[@paweborkowski6959]

Thank you for giving the Saudi football scheme a stab :)

[@goncal7099]

Tatoh and Daut definitely would have a chance to qualify for aoe1

[@paweborkowski6959]

25:00 for me the qualifiers are the best part of the tournament

[@KurtFan69]

nations cup team tourney would be sickk

[@zaptosmedia4707]

A Red Bull without Lierrey? The guy who reached almost every final? I hate this system. Lierrey does not play ladder.

[@JonasAnandaKristiansson]

He may have to now!

[@SirQuantization]

Imagine a tournament that is both a team tournament and a singles tournament. It starts off as 4v4, teams get split half way through the tournament and it becomes a series of 2v2s, then the top 8 2v2 teams split again and it becomes a 1v1 tournament. Sounds fun in theory. Might be a nightmare to set it up though 11

[@Rainst0rm4759]

$150,000 is a great prize-pool, but it's also more money going to fewer players, which is very disappointing when we've been seeing, especially in recent events like World Rumble, how great the 9-16th and 16th-32nd best players are.

[@donaldfarquar]

What would redbulls return be on reducing the prize pool but giving more money for top 32? I get what you're saying but redbull have these big events to get publicity and sell more redbull. If the community wants more people there, they need to watch games not involving Viper, Hera, Tatoh, Leirrey, daut, Yo or Mbl. When over 10 times more people watch a near meaningless game between Hera and Viper than say Heart vs Andy in an S-tier tournament will be hard for company's other than microsoft to justify.

[@konradpyszniak976]

To be fair the invitation by ladder make it interesting enough that people who are really strong but dont play often can have trouble (thats why i think they may directly invite Lierey as second person). Anyway people like FreakingAndy have big chance to get into even if they arent in top8

[@wadas9042]

nations cup hype!

[@user-mg3pp8jc5l]

Epic!

[@joaquimllera3544]

Lets go meeeeemb

[@yveskelders6840]

TheViper can't seem to stop mentioning Margougou 11, looks like a bromance incoming

[@duncanmccabe8071]

I wondered if there should be a calculation beyond elo, which will always favour people who grind the most rather than are the most skilled. E.g. Elo x Win rate X games played or something. I am no mathematician but there is surely a better way of rewarding consistency over volume. Note elo is for match making so this should not be changed, I just mean for ladder position.

[@christianherderich458]

53:10 wholesome

[@david_oliveira71]

49:51 - TheViper - Good 1 xD

[@SHiX11]

Big fan

[@thesquid8823]

What we have learnt from this redbull EW tournament is that they can freeze ladders. What i want to see going forward is a 1 month freeze of the 3 vil start and add in the 9 vil start to see if this is taken well by the community.

[@prathamesh5497]

World cup hypeeeee! 2v2 preferable; but works either way!

[@donaldfarquar]

Great podcast as always. Maybe I'm overthinking it but feel Warlords 3 should be in the title as well, especially with Memb being on the podcast and its before Redbull?

[@MasmorraAoE]

There will be at least one more episode covering warlords 3 (probably around mid-May) and most likely a Post-Match Talk! Can't have "warlords 3" on every single video!😅

[@donaldfarquar]

@@MasmorraAoE ah fair enough, thanks for the response.

[@Mindbaster]

I actually really like the idea about Redbull using the ladder. At least for now, right at the start, it feels awesome as a viewer to tune in and see how active all the pros are. RM felt really dead for a while now. We will have to see if it stays this way until the end. I don't think cheating will be a big issue because the top player pool is very small. If someone unexpected suddenly gains ranks alot microsoft can easily look at their history. Masmorra seems to think there needs to be constant supervision during the whole process but i assume microsoft keeps alot of data of ranked matches and can look at that afterwards to see if there was pattern of behavior. I also doubt any of the top 16 players right now would even try to cheat.

[@tokagerkun]

WOLOLO!!!

[@larsdonkor7943]

So warlords will have a 4vs4 showmatch to advertise the nationscup

[@LaddRusso91]

Vamos!

[@monstertruck4694]

21:55 t90 catching strays

[@jonskog7263]

Even though I personally think 3v3 in general is more interesting, 2v2 is the format Memb should be going for. It's much easier to organize and people - like Masmorra said - prefer it.

[@krarch6959]

soooooo, is there gonna be a 4v4 with lierrey, yo, accm and Vincester now? pleaaasee!! :D

[@lbridet]

the biggest problem with empire wars is the amount of blind luck involved. your opening is decided without any scouting, and a game often turns on wheter the 2 archers and spear went left or right around a woodline at minute 2. it's the antithesis of a strategy game.

[@piatansfair]

Regarding the ladder qualifiers, maybe requiring the top 4 players to stream 100% of their ladder matches? That could hamper cheating

[@AlexB-vt5xe]

what is the name of the castle?

[@hansoskar1911]

this is all a plot to get Lierrey to finally play ladder.

[@FloosWorld_AoE]

39:21 - I guess you recorded this before Red Bull announced that AoE 4 won't be in Empire Wars :D

[@GLAgeOfEmpires]

Yep, at least I read about it after we recorded. Great change though

[@david_oliveira71]

1:23:10 - 4v4? Lyx, Yo, Hoang and ACCM? 11 or Yo, Villese, ACCM, Lyx

[@MrSwordstroker]

27 degrees 11 come to Aus

[@puzzles45]

In a 4v4 against GL my team would be: Lierrey, Yo, ACCM, Sitaux

[@KalleStrid]

Which country did Viper move to?

[@Gringomaniac]

Still Germany

[@AOECafe]

the reason why AOE2 wins over AOE4 is the balance was perfected over so many years - same reason why chess is still one of the most popular games in the world - should never make the mistake of thinking new is always better.

[@jackwaite4035]

Is Viper gonna try for this event or is he still not going to train? 11

[@Claus-MariaSperling]

I don’t think BoA is unattractive due to competition. Much more important is that all stars that draw viewers are in one team. It was always that GL had most viewed but aM was liked as well. So 2 teams with good viewership. But how many people will tune in for amigos vs mYI?

[@Level7Monkey]

Hello vipurrr

[@pmApostic]

love the podcast. having memb on was a treat, love his interactions with the rest of the community. I can't imagine cheating to get into the main event and then your true skill showing live in front of tens of thousands of people... I couldn't live with myself after that embarrassment.

[@viniciusbonatto3943]

Viper is the goat! Masmorra is king!

[@KurtFan69]

one thing you didnt point out about this redbull qualifier is that it's gonna basically be half a year of top players and streamers playing and covering a lot of empire wars, a mode that is clearly enjoyed in smaller doses but the community as a whole hasnt adopted it as a mode they play or watch regularly masmorra complained about the tournament being empire wars and viper countered that is fine because it's only one tournament a year, which was valid with the qualifier systems used in redbulls 5 & 6 but this new system forces the community to focus on empire wars for 6 months, the "once a year" argument doesnt work here thanks to memb for Warlords 3 so that amount of empire wars doesnt become too insufferable

[@Patchnote2.0]

I don't entirely disagree with your take, but my understanding from memory here is that the ladder qualifiers end in July, so it's at most only 3 months of it.

[@KurtFan69]

@@Patchnote2.0 theres a last chance qualifier in august and then qualified players (lets assume this will include the 4 GL players) will probably still be playing/streaming empire wars in september to train or keep in shape and then in october its the tournament

[@guidodepietro1017]

no 2-2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 3-3 for best!!!!!!!!!!

[@kilianm5947]

Hm, especially for teams like GL leaderboard cheating seems quite easy and hard to prove. Lets say nili, jordan and tatoh grind the ladder and win some games and lose some games, but against their teammates, which they will meet often in ladder cause of the timezone, they have a quite bad winrate. This can give their teammates the deciding 50 points to qualify.

[@fritzwalter46]

Yeah, GL crew can push someone or 2 players, so can lierey/heart/mbl/nicov, or yo/vivi...

[@AidenCral]

Masmorra trying not to laugh while Viper tries to convince him that Microsoft will monitor the ladder 11 At least we will see some new up and coming players like the turkish prodigy Ertug.

[@ashley-paul]

I honestly don’t see how cheating will happen when the top players are all well known and they also will be streaming the ladder matches regularly. It’s possible that a fringe player is able to finish top 4 through clever time zone manipulation and stuff like that. But even then, that player would be a top 15 player and well known within the community. If anyone outside that group finishes top 4, they’ll be heavily investigated.

[@Usernameforsf]

Great episode! Love your channel! My only critic (and I hope you take it in a good way, if not I can erase the comment) is that Masmorra came out a little bit negative in this episode (this is prior to AoE mobile section).

[@GLAgeOfEmpires]

Constructive criticism is always welcome and appreciated!

[@JimCullen]

AoE1, AoE2, AoM, and AoE4 all get included. Poor AoE3 gets nothing 😔

[@LaddRusso91]

It's what we deserve :(

[@carlson8334]

EW also means less costs for caster, if they get paid per hour or days. The time you save by playing EW instead of "normal"you prolly safe a bigger amount of money. Same with qualifiers: In these days, qualifiers give some money. With taking the Ladder, they dont need to spend that too. Also Prizepool: Its 138k on 8 People. Before Redbull 5 was 100k on 16... They are not saving mponey, they just give more to less people. Just as an example, first place this rb gets nearly double the amount of money viper did in rb . This is not helping to grow the community. The money will go to the same grouß of people again and people who dont make it to the main event have no chance of getting any money through qualfiiers, thus amounting to basically "wasting" their time.

[@donaldfarquar]

There's 12k for the people that come close but don't qualify in the last chance qualifier. Redbull are an energy drinks corporation looking to get their name out there and sell more redbull. It's not their job to grow the community. Also linked to this is the fact games with Viper, Hera, Larry, Tatoh, Yo, Daut and Mbl in roughly that order will get far more views than games that don't. Just look at the Nac5 main event playlist. I'm just thankful they've invested probably over couple of million now in Aoe2.

[@MarkusAnstots]

World cup 2v2 please:)

[@zahin_awosaf]

two Europeans complaining about 27C...while me watching this half naked in 40C 😒

[@GLAgeOfEmpires]

Why only half naked? 11

[@greenhouset23sJ9t65rululu]

@@GLAgeOfEmpires Because of you, you sexy beast.

[@RedBloodSandman999]

1

[@gaspar215]

14

[@alexandredeschiever8304]

another comment

[@markblackburn2343]

How is the beaten mentality on the team game any different to 1v1. Hera, viper, tatoh, or daut could also make a mistake that could cost their team. Why not make it open teams an whats to stop Mr Yo, Lierey, and accm for example forming a team they could easily challenge GL.

[@jeffmcarpenter]

$150000 for Microsoft is such a small budget item it probably didn't even get reviewed for an update.