Octane hints at major role swap with Karma for Seattle Surge

Jacob Hale

Seattle Surge Call of Duty League star Sam ‘Octane’ Larew appears to have confirmed that some members of the team will be undergoing major role changes as they continue to struggle through the league’s inaugural season.

Seattle currently sit in 11th place in the standings, ahead of only rivals Los Angeles Guerrillas by 10 CDL points, and they have been attempting to find the right fit with swaps between Casey ‘Pandur’ Romano and Ian ‘Enable’ Wyatt on the starting line-up, but now it appears they’re going to be taking a different approach.

During a stream on May 24, in which Octane was playing Warzone with Pandur, coach Joey ‘Nubzy’ DiGiacomo and Guerrillas star Reece ‘Vivid’ Drost, he revealed that there was a big change coming in the Surge camp.

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While Octane has been arguably one of the best assault rifle players in the game for a number of years now, he said that he will be switching to a submachine gun going forward, running the MP5 at future tournaments.

This is a bit of a strange step considering how much of a dominant player Octane is with the assault rifle, but the change was later explained by Nubzy.

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After commenting that “people think [I’m] trolling,” Octane confirmed that he is “literally running around with an MP5” and Pandur said that “Octane is the new flex for Seattle Surge,” citing Sam’s slaying abilities as a major factor, especially considering how much more impact MP5 players have on the map than AR players.

A little while later, while playing in Modern Warfare’s CDL playlist, one of Larew’s team asked him for his honest opinion on Surge teammate Damon ‘Karma’ Barlow, and he gave a very telling response, calling Karma “the GOAT… and also my main AR.”

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While we’re yet to see any gameplay from Surge with their new roles, the reasoning behind the swap makes sense. Octane’s raw gunskill is at a level many could only dream of and, if he can get the same number of kills with an MP4 as he does with an M4, this switch could be the making of Seattle Surge.

That said, we’ve seen similar moves in the past that didn’t work out so well. Austin ‘Slasher’ Liddicoat running a sub at the start of the current season raised some eyebrows, and the infamous fall of the GreenWall in World War II saw Matthew ‘FormaL’ Piper attempting to use one, and the way that turned out is one of the biggest stories in CoD esports history.

We’ll have to wait to see how this turns out for Seattle Surge, but a change is clearly needed, and this could be the right one. We have reached out to the Surge team for comment.

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About The Author

Jacob is Dexerto’s UK Editor and Call of Duty esports specialist. With a BA (Hons) in English Literature and Creative Writing, he previously worked as an Editor at Ginx TV. Jacob was nominated for Journalist of the Year at the 2023 Esports Awards. Contact: jacob.hale@dexerto.com.