Team Empire enter VALORANT for CIS First Strike

Team Empire is one of the oldest, largest, and most successful esports organizations in Russia. They currently field major teams in games like Rainbow Six: Siege and Dota 2, and have former rosters in League of Legends, Starcraft 2, and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, among others. Today, Team Empire have announced their VALORANT roster, as they prepare for First Strike in the CIS region.

Team Empire’s roster consists of Denis "m0z" Kanukov, Vadim "Tian" Filkin, Artem "DieZzz" Lipatov, Seymon "purp0" Borchev, and Andrew "braveaf" Gorchakov. m0z has his background in CS:GO, where he was banned by Valve for cheating in 2015, though it was lifted in 2019. In 2016, he attempted to qualify for a Minor under a different name, but the gig was found out and m0z and his entire team were disqualified. Once his ban was lifted, he came back legitimately, and has played several unsuccessful events since. DieZzz, the other notable member, was a PLAYERUNKNOWN'S BATTLEGROUNDS professional. He’s played since 2018, originally with AVANGAR and more recently with Team Phantom. He finished second in the CIS Qualifier for the PUBG Global Invitational in 2018, good enough to earn him a spot among the world’s best teams, where he and AVANGAR ultimately finished 5th. In 2019, DieZzz and Team Phantom participated in PUBG Europe League Contenders, the tier 2 scene in Europe, where they did very well for themselves, even winning Phase 3 of the competition, but failed to earn promotion to the tier 1 PUBG Europe League. In 2020, he participated in Series 1 of the PUBG Continental Series - Europe East, the qualifier for the main PUBG Continental Series in Europe, in May and June, finishing 10th.

In VALORANT, these players have all been playing various competitions in the CIS region. m0z has been playing with Clan123, a relatively successful team. Their biggest success came when they finished 2nd in July’s Moscow Five Open. Recently, m0z stood in for forZe at the GLX Elite Series Main Event, helping them to the semifinals. Tian was a trial member of ROX TEAM, playing Jett for them throughout several GLX EU Battles, but ROX ultimately decided against keeping him after about a month. Finally, purp0 has played many events with various teams, though ultimately with little success. DieZzz and BRAVEAFb0Y don’t have any notable results in the game yet.

Team Empire bring another large brand into VALORANT, and have grabbed themselves a pretty good mix of CIS free agents. In the official announcement, Team Empire noted they were specifically preparing for the CIS version of First Strike. It’s safe to say that anything other than victory would be somewhat of a disappointment.

Team Empire are:

Denis “m0z” Kanukov Vadim “Tian” Filkin Artem “DieZzz” Lipatov Seymon “purp0” Borchev Andrew “BRAVEAFb0Y” Gorchakov

Slozhenikin “Ups” Artyom (Coach)