Rebuilding from Ruins: DAMWON Gaming signs “peri” as coach for Valorant roster

3 Oct

Foo Zen-Wen

Powering Up for Next Year

South Korean organization, DAMWON Gaming (DWG), has signed Bum-gi “peri” Jung as the coach for their Valorant roster. The 31-year-old is most well known for his time on the Nuturn Gaming roster during their Masters Reykjavik run in 2021.

[twitter url="https://twitter.com/DWGKIA_Esports/status/1587732496166182912"]

On the 21st of September, Riot announced the 30 teams that made partner for their 2023 VCT international league. DAMWON Gaming (DWG), was unfortunately not one of those teams. BLEED analyst and reputable source Ominous reported that there would only be three slots for Korean teams. The teams that ultimately received those slots were: T1, Gen G, and DRX.

[twitter url="https://twitter.com/_SushantJha/status/1572584996149526533"]

While DWG shall be missed in competitions at the highest levels, the organization has decided to remain in the Valorant space. DWG shall instead be competing in Riot’s new Tier 2 ecosystem: the Challengers League.

What is the Challengers League?

According to Riot, the Challengers League system is designed to encompass more than 20 leagues around the world, ‘ensuring every Valorant player has a path to realize their competitive dreams.’

Rebuilding from Ruins: DAMWON Gaming signs “peri” as coach for Valorant roster

Image credit: Riot Games

These leagues will ‘provide highly organized competitions,’ beginning with an open qualifier, following by a selection of the best teams based on performance in two splits of multi-week regular season play.

Image credit: Riot Games

Separate to that, 2023 will also include a new event series in each of the three main region: EMEA, AMERICAS, and PACIFIC, labelled Ascension tournaments. Winning such an event earns the organization a spot in the following year’s international league.

Image credit: Riot Games

They’ll be back

As with every top organization that failed to make the cut for partnership, and who decided to remain as a Challenger team, the ultimate goal is to win the Ascension tournament in July. For DWG, it represents a chance to return to the top, and it appears that is exactly what they are preparing for.

The DWG roster is a top tier calibre roster that has regularly placed top 4 in multiple A-tier tournaments. Most recently, they placed 3rd in the Korea Stage 2 Challengers. Since then, they have parted ways with Lee “Hate” Ye-hun and Kim “t3xture” Na-ra and added Park “allow” Sang-wook and Kim “Lakia” Jong-Min to the active roster.

Veteran of the Scene

“peri” has been a mainstay of the Korean FPS scene for over a decade now, having begun his career in Counter-Strike back in 2010 on WeMade FOX. He would shift over in 2016 to Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, where he would remain with his only team, MVP PK, for over a year. In 2020, he would return to FPS, as part of the NUTURN Gaming lineup, then known as PROPARTY.

Due to the infancy of the Korean CS scene, “peri” had little notable accomplishments in his first two games. However, in Valorant, the rise of the Korean scene saw “peri” alongside his squad win big. Taking 2nd place in Stage 1 Masters in 2021, they would storm back with 1st place at Challengers 2 and a 3rd place finish at Masters Reykjavik in 2021.

Transitioning to coach, he helped accomplish a 2nd place finish at both Stage 1 Challengers and the East Asia Last Chance Qualifiers in 2022.

As it stands, the DWG roster now looks as follows: