Puppey: "A captain has to be fun. If you’re not making people feel comfortable, you just end up being a dictator" Interview
2025-01-18 15:14:00Team Secret leader Clement "Puppey" Ivanov spoke about the importance of being fun as a Dota 2 captain. He thinks this aspect is underestimated, and it helps to deliver opinions and overcome resistance from other team members. The player shared this in a big interview with Sayang for her Medium page.
I think a captain has to be fun. If you’re the kind of guy who just shows up trying to lead — like, “I know how to fix this team. Everyone shut up and listen to me” — sure, you can say that. But if you’re not fun, if you’re not making people feel comfortable with following that direction, you just end up being a dictator. And that sucks. I try my best not to be one. Sometimes I am.
Because at the end of the day, the things I’m talking about still need to get done. But when I lose that fun aspect, it messes with what I actually want to do. If the team’s in a bad mood, I start to feel that too. It just… is what it is. Fun is such an important part of a game like Dota, where everything needs to flow. I think that applies to most games.Teams that run on some kind of urgency and fear will never succeed against the team that’s having a fun time and enjoying their time while doing so.
Another important aspect is to be good at the game. Although Puppey thinks it's not a must, individual performance also helps pushing ideas.
I think the most important thing for a captain is to be better at the game than the rest of the team. It’s not a requirement, but in my experience, when I was the best player on the team — not necessarily mechanically, but overall — we succeeded a lot more. If I’m doing better than you, then I know what I’m talking about, and that makes a huge difference.
If I’m just some guy that sucks and I’m the one doing all the talking, that’s not going to work. I need to be trustworthy, right? And trust comes from respect. That respect usually comes from being really good at the game.
Maybe it’s getting harder for me now because I’m older and not as sharp as I was 10 years ago. But back then, I was probably the best player on my team. Because of that, I could push ideas that made sense, and everyone understood them better. I wasn’t looking for information elsewhere — I knew what was good.
When asked about best team he ever witnessed, Puppey named OG from TI9. He was impressed with the level of execution with very fast-paced tempo and perfect synchronization.
They just played at a level that felt impossible to replicate. At TI8, OG was shaky. They almost lost everything, and it felt like it could have gone either way. But at TI9, they were on a completely different level. The way they moved, the speed they played at — everything was just impressive. It felt like their pieces were moving too fast for anyone else to keep up, and in a way, it was like they were one computer.
Puppey presented new Team Secret in November 2024. The team is continuing to go through a rebuild. They recently added Parker after his scandalous departure from Heroic. The team will play next match at ESL One Raleigh 2025 qualifiers against Tundra. The game starts at 16:00 CET on January 18.
