Our monthly Community Spotlight articles intend to highlight the most active members of the For Honor community, giving more visibility to the cool things they do. Create and share on Reddit, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Reddit, YouTube or Twitch and you too can appear here someday!
This month features Verbalosity, one of our first For Honor enthusiasts, part-time Knight (hi Conqueror!), and part-time Caster. We’ve had the pleasure of chatting with him about his experience as a Caster.
What’s the meaning behind your username?
It is a matured version of an old name I used to have that I made when I was about 10-11 years old by the moniker of V3Rb4L OWN4GE. When I first got access to an internet connected console, I needed a name and while I was thinking my Mother had come into the room to bring me lunch. I wanted to talk to her about something a bit inane and she was busy so she had to just walk out saying something to the effect of "Sorry Oliver, you talk too much but I gotta go do some stuff now."
Me thinking I was the coolest s**t for talking too much at the time, I came up with that name. The L33T SP33K composition was because I also thought that was the coolest thing at the time.
How and when did you discover For Honor?
I discovered the game where many people did. At E3 2015 when Jason Vandenberghe walked on stage and showed it off to the world publicly for the first time.
Which faction do you belong to?
It was a preference. Being English I was raised on Arthurian Folklore to an extent so the fantasy of Knights was something I liked from an early age, combined with my learning about the history and techniques of the Knightly class as I got older.
It was an easy choice for me.
What made you want to be a part of our community?
I initially got into the community by joining a Fan made discord server called Hall Of Heroes. I joined because I needed a place to vent my excitement about the game that was not my immediate friend circle, as to not annoy the living daylights out of them.
A while later Handheld Brando (the owner of the server) pinged me and said that he had been asked to compile a list of people to be let into the early alpha of the test around September 2016, I want to say - maybe slightly earlier - and that is how I got my first taste of the game.
What other hobbies do you have? What do you do outside For Honor?
It's mainly a lot of other video games. I do not like to spread my efforts thin across a lot of different hobbies (I tried that as a kid, got bored fast) so I pretty much spend my free time, when I am not casting, playing video games of all kinds with friends.
On which social media do you feel most comfortable sharing your passion with the community and why?
Twitter by far for me but closely followed by Discord and Reddit.
The ease of use of the format allows for quick consumption and also for less waffling unless you make a thread. This is a double edged sword of course as many know but for me the upsides are a net gain for me personally.
What’s your favorite For Honor moment/story?
For me it was getting into the Alpha for For Honor with all the lads from Hall of Heroes back in the day. Seeing the stuff in there in a pretty raw and early form was exciting for me.
Also being invited to Ubisoft Montreal last month (July 2019) was incredible, utterly fantastic. I had so many anxieties as it was my first time flying, traveling out of the UK, seeing all the players there IRL for the first time, meeting the devs, etc., but everything went extremely smooth and Ubisoft welcomed me like a family member.
How did you get into casting?
Initially I accepted a casting call from an organisation in the SMITE scene back in early 2014 called SMITE Scrims. Gave it a go and I really enjoyed it so I just kept giving it a go. Ended up hopping from organisation to organisation from the likes of EGL to Tiermonster to eGr to Anchor Esports, etc. Mostly staying in the games Tier 2 challenger scene.
What’s your casting style?
Very much the Chair 1 or Play by Play style. My ability to analyse things has never been the greatest even across games. However, like my Mother said at the very start of my journey... I talk way too much so I just let that carry me forward!
What was your favorite moment when casting a tournament?
Even though I enjoy the hype moments as much as anyone else, I have always had a soft spot for teaching new players the basics so whenever I do VOD review of my work and see one person say in chat "Hey I actually understand more than I did before thanks to that one guy" that is what fulfils me. I got into SMITE esports initially even before casting off of a new player stream of the original SMITE Worlds done by Drybear and Squiiddish on Tiermonster so I have always had that want to help new players get into stuff.
What would be your #1 advice for a new caster or anyone interested in casting?
Three bits of advice that I have learnt over the years:
- Get a good dedicated mic. You can be the best voice on the planet but if your microphone is not good, nobody will want to listen.
- Cast only the stuff that TRULY excites you WHEN it excites you. If you are not having fun on the cast and not actually interested in what is happening, people will notice that and just tune you out.
- Keep the practice up but more importantly listen back to your stuff afterwards and also listen to what others have to say about your work. I cannot count how many times I have thought I aced a cast one day, ask for feedback from people and they point out VERY good things I either missed or did wrong.
We hope you enjoyed this month's Community Spotlight. Can’t get enough of Verbalosity’s casting? Find him on Twitter and Twitch!
And if you haven’t already, join the For Honor Community on Twitter, Twitch, and Reddit.
