When BC.Game signed the core of SAW, alarm bells should have been ringing in your head immediately.

Not only was that core not even particularly strong, but it would also involve three relatively mild-mannered Portuguese folks having to team up with s1mple and electroNic, two of the biggest hotheads in CS history.

In short, it was a disaster waiting to happen.

On the other hand, 100 Thieves, who were expected to join in by signing a core, also signed a Portuguese player from SAW, but instead threw him into a blend of both experience and youth from Scandinavia.

Both moves were bold, but so far, it seems that only one is working out.

What does that mean for the remainder of the scene, though? And what lessons can be learned for future orgs looking to take a VRS leap?

Buying a core is a delicate art

What BCG seemingly failed to realise, and what they should have understood already from 2024 Falcons, is that buying a core isn’t as simple as it seems.

Of course, on paper, it’s fundamentally the easiest lay-up of your life:

You sign (at least) a trio of players who have already shown they can be successful together, throw them into a situation with better resources and perhaps a firepower upgrade or two, and that team then skyrockets into a position better than they were in before.

Except, it’s just not that easy. Because nothing ever is.

In the case of 2024 Falcons, they messed up right off the bat by keeping BOROS around, and that should have been obvious from the get-go, but that also didn’t matter to Falcons at the time.

Because they wanted to see a Middle Eastern player win a Major, and because they didn’t want to sign NertZ, the star of that ENCE team, for reasons that are… yeah…

It should have been obvious that, thrown into a team that already possessed Maden (who is also a better player than non-Paris Major BOROS), the Jordanian simply wasn’t needed.

It should also have been obvious that BOROS, who struggles to throw utility at even a basic level, would not fit in with the likes of Magisk, Snappi, or zonic.

And, well, as for the RMR situation, we’ll let zonic words speak for that one.

As we all know, Falcons did a much better job of buying a core for 2025.

Free from a mentally-deficient BOROS, a dupreeh who could only frag against ecos, and a SunPayus who has looked checked out ever since CS2 released, the arrivals of TeSeS, degster, and kyxsan turned Falcons’ fortunes around.

Oh, and the arrival of NiKo gave them the firepower they’d been missing since not signing NertZ.

The signing of the HEROIC core gave Falcons a competitive roster that didn’t sacrifice any part of what had made HEROIC successful, as they had with the ENCE core. It even won them an event, which, ironically, hasn’t happened since they enacted the remaining parts of their plan: bringing in kyousuke and m0NESY.

It’s clear that with the SAW core, BCG were hoping they could pull off a similar plan: purchase a decently ranked core, use them to hold a steady position in the rankings, upgrade on a piece when possible, and qualify for the Major.

There’s just one problem with that: SAW to BCG is even worse than ENCE to Falcons.

First off, there’s the obvious firepower problem. electroNic isn’t what he used to be, and neither krazy nor aragornN are that strong, either. MUTiRiS is solid enough by IGL standards, but that’s not the same as having blameF IGLing for you.

Poor s1mple is left doing it all himself, and to be fair to the bloke, he’s clearly still f-cking got it.

Then, and there’s a degree of speculation here, there’s the obvious cultural concerns.

There’s some historical context to this, Vitality needed Spinx to arrive in place of misutaaa to put an end to the Danish/French culture clash when they went international, but then there’s the more speculative points, the case of personality.

Everyone remembers what old NAVI teams were like. The shouting, the screaming, the seeming toxicity that just somehow worked for them. SAW, though, were not like that. And if you’d ever met MUTiRiS and had the pleasure of having a conversation with him, it’s easy to make the assumption that he would never thrive like that.

There’s also the question of whether players with resumes like s1mple and electroNic would ever truly respect their new Portuguese teammates.

How many times on the more puggy maps are they trying to call their own plays? How much more do they just shut up and play on more tactical maps like Nuke and Overpass? Again, it’s speculation, but we’d be willing to say a reasonable amount given that those two maps are BCG’s highest win-rate maps at 63 %and 50%, respectively.

All of this has contributed (likely) to BCG taking a slide down the rankings, to a point where, just two months and quite a few embarrassing defeats later, BCG will have a monstrously difficult time qualifying for the Cologne Major.

Source: ESL / Adela Sznajder

From the ground up

On the other hand, 100 Thieves ended up going a completely different route. Once touted to buy the GamerLegion core, they ended up signing rising stars from Scandinavia and partnering them with some legendary names.

So far, it’s gone pretty f-cking well, too.

Well, as long as you ignore device’s form, but I digress.

The result of doing this, as seangares has now stressed multiple times in the most LinkedIn way possible, is that it allowed them to control the culture of the team. It allowed them to use all the wealth and knowledge that experience provides, and combine it with youthful hunger and raw talent, picking up players that can become stars on the time, rather than ones whose heads will obviously soon be on the chopping block.

Looking at you, aragornN.

By following this methodology, 100 Thieves could build a team where roles made sense, and no one was uncomfortable. They also - in theory - don’t have to already be looking ahead for their next move, and can instead focus on building the best possible roster right now, without the need to say, “Well, we just need to be here for when X arrives, and we can get serious.”

It also gave them another big benefit: time.

Where BCG were instantly thrown into competition due to the necessity for them to accept their Bounty and Katowice invites, 100T could bide their time and practice. They could be patient and get a structure in place that has already allowed them to beat the likes of NIP and FlyQuest.

They also have messioso, who might understand VRS better than anyone. Instead of playing in risky qualifiers - a mistake BCG made - 100 Thieves (outside of their non-VRS-ranked debut) have only really participated in small LANs like DraculaN or the Roman Imperium Cup, picking up so many wins in the process that HLTV currently predict them to be 38th on the VRS rankings, and they’ve now also hit their LAN-win cap for the time being.

And in doing so, also put themselves in a more favourable position to qualify for Cologne than BCG, thanks to the remainder of their schedule.

Funny how that works out.

It’s borderline impossible to argue then, given the success the roster has already had, and the performances of its young stars, that in the case of these two teams, 100 Thieves didn’t win in terms of building a team more capable of holding a solid spot in the VRS ranking.

Of course, we’re yet to see where these two teams end up in a few months time, and both are still likely to miss out on the Major, but it’s also fairly reasonable to say that 100 Thieves - regardless of who BCG inevitably sign - will also be in a better position then, too.

And that’s just down to the strength of their approach. Instead of spending the absolutely exorbitant amounts of cash BCG had to spend in order to acquire a rather uninspiring core, 100 Thieves instead stacked their roster with the strongest piece from that team, and with two young stars capable of firing them into their future.

Again, device aside, it’s hard to see 100 Thieves even needing to make changes for a while. rain has already out-called Snappi to a BO3 win, and the trio of Ag1l, poiii, and sirah are putting up as good numbers as you can ask for from a rifle trio.

Everything is looking rosy for 100 Thieves, but does that mean they have already redefined the landscape of future roster-building projects?

The rosters of the future

With all the money being pumped into CS by the likes of BLAST, ESL, PGL, and other TOs circling the scene, there are always more organisations looking to jump on the bandwagon.

Over the winter break, I heard rumours of a big Chinese org looking to get in, while H3CZ has also been dropping plenty of hints about an OpTic return, but what would the best tactic for these teams - or any other for that matter - be if they look to sign a team?

Honestly, it’s quite hard to say.

Let’s look at some other teams, NIP and PARIVISION, for example. Both teams banked on tenured IGLs, Snappi and Jame, to build them from the ground up, and both teams ended up making the same Major at StarLadder Budapest.

For NIP, that took the benching of a player halfway through the year, and although it hasn’t worked out yet, they benched another at the end of the year in an attempt to retain their ranking. PARIVISION also did the same to greater effect, but also entered a military-esque bootcamp away from their family in order to grind up the rankings.

What this shows is that building from the bottom is possible - and especially so given the amount of sign-up LANs like DraculaN that now exist - but you have to be willing to make personal sacrifices, as well as make difficult choices regarding your roster if you want to consistently climb.

Looking back at Falcons, they’ve shown both sides of the coin when it comes to signing a core from another team. Pick up the right pieces that breed the right culture, and you’re set. Miscalculate even slightly, and soon that ranking you paid such a high price for seems pretty worthless.

The fact of the matter is that it could’ve gone right or wrong for any one of these teams, and I’m including BCG and the ENCE-Falcons in that, too.

Had BCG instantly clicked and performed at both Bounty and Krakow, we’d be having a completely different conversation right now. The same would be true if 100 Thieves had built a team and rushed things, taking too many losses before they even realised the damage they had done, or if one more of their pieces hadn’t quite cut it.

Both teams, just as any we’ve previously mentioned, took risks. Some, of course, were more calculated than others - how much better would BCG be faring if they had bought fnatic’s core, for instance - but no plan survives first contact with the enemy.

So let’s say you’re a new org looking to get in, and you’re presented with the opportunity to sign a strong core, such as HEROIC, or Astralis. Do you do it? Or do you risk starting from scratch, with maybe one marquee signing, and potentially languishing somewhere close to irrelevancy?

There’s no right answer, except for this: the biggest win of all of this, the greatest chance for success any of these organisations gave themselves, was 100 Thieves when they signed messioso.

So, it’s simple, really: if you’re an org looking to find success in VRS, then get yourself a strand of messioso’s hair and clone him, because that’s the best shot you’ve got.

Or just find another nerd. That’s probably more ethically sound.

Sorry, Graham. If you get cloned, TLDR takes no responsibility in the matter.