How YOU Can Grow Your Online Community with LuckyShots

Welcome to a captivating discussion, where our guest, Lucky, a successful full-time content creator, takes us on a journey, sharing his experiences from the early days of working at a call center to now, where he dominates the gaming community on Twitch and TikTok. Guaranteed, you'll gain insights into how he started, the impact of platforms like TikTok and Twitch on his career, and his strategy for time management to maximize his content creation. 

We delve into Lucky's early gaming experiences, a saga of offline gaming on Gamecube and PS2, a lucky win of an Xbox from Taco Bell, and his transition to other games from Halo, all made possible by his supportive mom who backed him as long as he kept his grades up. Moreover, you'll hear about his journey from console to PC gaming, and his current passion for Apex Legends and PUBG. 

The final act of our riveting conversation reveals Lucky's invaluable strategies for growing a Twitch community, his tips on succeeding in the streaming world, and the importance of making people care about you and your content. He wraps up, reflecting on the significance of valuing time with family and friends, and imparting insight into what success looks like to him. Don't miss this episode, brimming with great insights, tips, and a unique peek into the life of a full-time gamer and content creator!

IG: @luckyshotsmix
TT: @luckyshotsgg

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How to find us:
Whiskey & Wisdom: @whiskey.and.wisdom
Chris Kellum: @ctkellum
LinkedIn: Christopher Kellum
Tyler Yaw: @tyler_yaw_
LinkedIn: Tyler Yaw

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:31

Welcome back here on the whiskey and wisdom podcast. As per usual, you have co-host Chris Callum. This is Tyler Y'all.

Speaker 2: 0:39

Hey, what's going on, guys? My name's lucky. I do a bunch of stuff with video games and content creation and I like to. I like to make videos.

Speaker 3: 0:47

This is a super special episode for us for multiple reasons. So first is, chris and I are on the same side of the table, which has never happened before in the history of whiskey and wisdom podcast. And the other very special part of this, too is lucky, is actually coming to us from all the way in Indiana, and it's going to be our very first remote interview that we've ever done before. And also, to go on top of all of the new stuff and brand new things that we're bringing to the podcast, the very first gamer we're having on board as well.

Speaker 2: 1:21

Hey, thanks for having me guys. Nice to meet you guys and it's got to be a little weird for you guys. I didn't know that. It was the first time you were on the same side. It's like that couple that goes into the restaurant. It's the same side of the booth. What do I? Where do I look? You know what I mean.

Speaker 1: 1:35

I don't understand how people do that.

Speaker 3: 1:38

I know me either. Jennifer tried to do that a few times. My wife and I was like now we sit on the opposite side of the table. I don't want to look to my left or right, I want to look straight ahead. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:46

It's like, it's like one of those things that I used to be on the server, but they like, it's like weird for everybody, cause it's like why are they you know? You know what I mean Like, oh no, we got one of those couples. It's the same side of the table. I don't know about the seat.

Speaker 3: 2:02

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 2:03

I can only imagine to be like Hmm, okay, it's gonna be interesting surfing situation here.

Speaker 1: 2:08

Reaching over people. But before we get too deep into the conversation, um, this week we are bringing on something, I mean kind of different. Yeah, it's, it's. We've sifted way, way in the past we didn't really go deep into it. It's the Evan William 1783. It's our small match, so it's supposedly extra aged and white oak. That's a 90 proof, supposedly on the nose. We should be getting our classic chart oak and caramel flavors with a light marshmallow, supposedly palette. You should get some vanilla, oak, toasted brown sugar and some caramel swirls. Despite the fact that typically we spend way too much money on whiskey, this is a plastic bottle, so this is actually going to be our least expensive whiskey we've tried. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 3:00

This is actually one of the ones that always come up on the best bang for your buck, though. Yeah, every time I research what's the best way to get the most for your whiskey for the least amount, this, evan Williams, is always the one that comes up the most and, believe it or not, it's one that gets used quite often, as if you're going to a very nice cocktail bar that still has a well liquor, this ends up being their well. That I've noticed more times than not. Anyway, cheers, cheers, like he's drinking on some angry orchard which is actually one of my favorite ciders.

Speaker 2: 3:35

It's a little bit less classy than what you guys are drinking, but I mean it's refreshing and hot out there, so it's good.

Speaker 1: 3:40

Yeah Gosh, having an angry orchard in so long.

Speaker 2: 3:44

I gotta say, most of the time with whiskey I'm like hotter, cold, like I'll have it and it'll be really good or it'll be really awful, and I feel like you really sold me on what you guys are having now. Now I want to try it, but usually plastic bottle would be like a red flag for me. You know what I mean.

Speaker 1: 4:01

Right, yeah, I've looked into it and some trust me there are some really bad plastic bottles but, like Tyler said, this one definitely gets a lot, of a lot of people like it and it's not like super, super expensive. So it's a great thing to throw into your, your bar, at the house, if you're like. Well, I don't really make drink whiskey, but I everyone's small and need like a good, like a quick drink because my friends are coming or like you're throwing a party and need something.

Speaker 3: 4:30

Yeah man, it's complex enough to.

Speaker 2: 4:33

It was seven. You said Evan Williams, 1738 is what you said 83.

Speaker 1: 4:37

83. 1738 is a song.

Speaker 2: 4:42

Oh, okay, yeah, there it is, there it is.

Speaker 3: 4:44

I wasn't, I just didn't know.

Speaker 1: 4:47

You heard that song. Maybe I'm not going to do it, because it'll just ruin everyone's day. It'll be sucking your ear.

Speaker 2: 4:54

This will become your least viewed podcast of all time, so Right.

Speaker 3: 4:59

So, enough about the whiskey Lucky. Tell us a little bit of it, a little bit more about yourself and what you do, why you do it and kind of how you got involved in the gaming and content creating community.

Speaker 2: 5:10

Yeah, so again, I just want to say thanks for having me on here today. I was really excited, looking forward to it, but it's it's cool to have like a chance to kind of like tell your story a little bit. You know, I guess Now I've been doing content creation full time for a little over five years. Right now I'm on Twitch and I'm on kick kind of go back and forth. I split my days just because kick is kind of doing a lot for creators as far as like giving us a chance to kind of monetize our content a little bit better, right. But I also do a lot of stuff on Tik Tok. I started out when I first started streaming, I was actually working at like a call center in New Mexico and I was doing that and me and my buddies started a like kind of like a hobby shop. We had like a comic books and trading cards and video games and stuff like that. So I was doing that and then also working full time at this call center and funny. It's really funny to think back like how things started, because one day I used to play. I used to play yes, I used to play. Like what games do you guys play?

Speaker 1: 6:12

Well, Tyler plays classic Call of Duty.

Speaker 3: 6:14

Yeah, call of Duty is kind of my staple, don't worry.

Speaker 2: 6:18

I'm excited for the new one.

Speaker 3: 6:20

What's up?

Speaker 2: 6:20

Sorry, Excited for the new one.

Speaker 3: 6:23

Yeah, so I haven't really touched it for a while. I saw that new one coming out and I was like I might have to get back into it again.

Speaker 2: 6:29

You know, that's how a lot of people feel, Right? What about you?

Speaker 1: 6:32

I'm the big nerd over here. I play League of Legends and I used to play World of Warcraft, but it destroyed one of my laptops.

Speaker 2: 6:41

Oh no, yeah, league is League is a tough game, but with you know, with Call of Duty shooter shooter guy, right when I first started I really, I really only played Halo. It was a huge Halo game and so I always make this joke that I didn't. I didn't own an Xbox. I owned like a Halo machine. Like that was the only game I owned, is the only game I played. This is like the only game that existed for me and so I used to play all the time I was hiring to my state. At one point I've been to a bunch of events and stuff and me and my buddies like we had that hobby shop and everything, and then Twitch started really like growing. This was in 2016. And one of my one of my friends is actually the one who mentioned it. He said you know, hey, you should, you should like think about like trying out this streaming thing. Like maybe you stream to Twitch and like I mean like you do pretty good and like maybe people would like watching you or whatever. So when I started out, I was, I was streaming. I was like sitting on my bed or like on this, like old, like little wooden chair, one monitor. I was reading chat on my phone. I was streaming straight to Twitch from my Xbox, like real, like the most basic setup that you could have, and I did that and I started doing that and I was like I really do love this. Like this is it for me, I think, kind of like with what you guys are doing, you know, just getting to like meet people right or like interact with people that you would never meet otherwise, and like kind of learn other people's stories and like just it's like a different kind of interaction and stuff. And so I really started to enjoy it. But I wasn't I wasn't big Like I think I would average anywhere from like five to 10. Like like, if I had like over 10 viewers, that was like a banger day. That was like I get off stream, I'm on like cloud nine. I had 15 viewers day. This is insane. And I I did that for a while. That was in 2016. And then then I mean, did you guys ever heard of mixer at all?

Speaker 1: 8:37

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, the short.

Speaker 2: 8:41

Yeah, a short lived, really sad, but a lot of people never even like heard of it. And I remember I was, I was streaming on Twitch one day and I had this guy he lives in Texas. I'd become friends with him online where I'd get off work and race home to to go live for two or three hours before I had to go to bed and get up and do it again the next day and we just play Halo. And one day I I messaged him and I'm like I'm going to be ready to play some games tonight, whatever, and he goes yeah, but I'm going to be streaming on this thing called beam. He's like this new website that Microsoft is or well, the Microsoft thing came later but he's like, uh, this new site that people have been talking about and there's like no delay and like that was like a big, that was like a big deal, right. It's like I remember going and checking it out the first time and you'd say something in chat and they would respond immediately and at that time Twitch was like 30 to 60 second delay.

Speaker 3: 9:33

So, oh wow, I didn't know that.

Speaker 2: 9:35

Yeah, for somebody to respond to you like instantly was unheard of. It was like magic. And I remember that very first stream that he was on. Somebody who was a big streamer on the platform big streamer being, like you know, 7,500 people or something rated him and I was just like there's like this huge, like community vibe and stuff, and I was like this is super cool. And I was like I end the the. The no delay thing blew my mind. So then that's whenever I switched over. That was at the end of 2016. I was on mixer until the downfall, you know, the black day in 2020. And so I was just streaming every day, working my full time job, trying to run this business with my friends. We're doing comic books and card games. You guys play like MTG or Yu-Gi-Oh or Pokemon or anything like that. When I recently but what? Yeah?

Speaker 3: 10:25

I have yeah.

Speaker 2: 10:26

Yeah, back in the day.

Speaker 1: 10:28

Yes, I think MTG is the only one I never, never got into.

Speaker 2: 10:32

Really that's really the only one that I even still like. This was. But yeah, we would host like tournaments and stuff. And then it started to get a little overwhelming because I had this business that I was trying to run. And then I had this like this, like passion that I was really like starting to like put more of myself into, and I was really loving it and like I wanted to be able to focus on it more than I also had a full time job, life and friends and all this stuff. And so my friends actually ended up being the first ones to say, like I think I want to do something else, like I like what we're doing here, but in New Mexico, where we were at specifically, there isn't like a lot of money. It's kind of a smaller town and it was really hard for us to kind of like break through that ceiling and and so we kind of just decided they like they wanted to do other things. I had this thing that I was trying to grow with and so we just kind of like separated from the business and sold out, sold out everything, and then I was putting in more hours. I was kind of like doing full time at my job and then also streaming like 30 to 40 hours a week. Oh, wow, and it was. It was getting to be like it was a lot, but I was enjoying the grind. I guess you could say, you know, like the long hours felt like they were paying off. I was growing, I was like starting to get like a community and stuff. And then I remember one day I just hated my job, man I was, I was over it, like I just I couldn't, I just couldn't do it anymore. I was, I was really not not excited. So I went on like a. I took my two week vacation that I had saved up and I told my community like for the next two weeks I'm going to stream, like I'm a full time creator and we'll just like see what happens. And I could just, you know, go from there. And they supported me a lot and there was like a very good viewership and stuff like that. I had like, honestly, if you guys are listening to this and you end up and you're trying to like make it and go full time with content stuff, do it. Don't do what I did, because I didn't have any money, saved, nothing. I literally my two week vacation was almost up and I let my manager know like I'm not coming back and I finished out my vacation. I ended up like having to sell my car and I was walking everywhere. I would have to like like walk to the grocery store or whatever, and like I was like the sacrifice that I was willing to make in order to do it and it was. It was like tough for a while and I was literally just making enough to like pay all my bills, pay for my food and have like a tiny bit of money left over, but like for me it felt like it was worth it because I was like getting to do something that didn't feel like work anymore, and that was in 2018. And so now, now I'm here and I'm still doing it full time, and now tick tick talk is like taking over the world. You know, tick talk wasn't even around. Yeah, tick tock is honestly, like I think, one of the main things that has like made it possible, really like the reach and like finding new people and expanding your community and stuff, and it's I'm thankful for it. And so I did get a little scared when we had that thing about like, oh, they're banning tick tock in the United. States. It's the same way and I was just like man, if that happens, like I, you know, I don't know, you know, I don't know what's going to happen. But I mean I guess we're good right now. And so now I just do in tick, tock and twitch and kick and trying to like kind of expand my skill set and stuff, you know, like trying to learn photography and videography and editing and just try and like be better. I guess you know.

Speaker 3: 14:02

I guess, that being said to, we'll make this part of a plug as well, for us is so. I know you also work with sway creations as well, just like we do, so I'm sure that helps you a lot, too in the editing process and just being able to focus on the actual gaming and content creation side and letting them just know what you take it, you deal with it, you work, you work it out.

Speaker 2: 14:23

Absolutely, man, I can't. It's almost because I've been working with them for a few months now and I remember before it was it was kind of a struggle trying to do everything, like all the full time stuff. But then also it's like you got to find time to record and edit and then also scheduling and putting your stuff out. And then like, honestly, sway has like really given me so much more time back from like just taking over that part. Like I just record, now I make the content, I send it over to them and then we've gotten, in the three months that I've been working with them, millions of views on tick tock and that's like the editing yeah.

Speaker 3: 14:59

I was actually just talking to Grace the other day and she was like all right, if you need any help on tick tock, we have that under control for you. So, we know how to make stuff blow up on tick tock and I was like I will have to lean up on that.

Speaker 2: 15:13

Yeah, absolutely. I think you guys like just posting your podcast stuff on on tick tock would be. I mean, people love that. Like you know, there's swiping and then you guys are just talking about something that they're interested in. They're going to watch that whole clip because, like, what are these guys talking about? Like I want to know, like what's going on, I want to be part of the conversation, you know like. I think you guys would do good on tick tock.

Speaker 3: 15:34

So I know one of my main questions is how'd you get the name Lucky Shots?

Speaker 2: 15:39

So it used to be. It hasn't always just been Lucky Shots, but when I started, like I said, you know I did a lot of Halo and everything and we would I mean if you were playing games back then you might remember it like lands, like we would have all our friends come over and they'd all bring over their TVs and their consoles and we'd all hook them up to the router We'd have, like in our living room. We'd have somewhere between like four and eight setups yeah, we're in stuff off the off the counters and like we're making room for people. We have like a whole room full of these Halo kids and we're all just playing on land all day for like 12 hours and we're just playing like custom game modes or a team slayer or whatever, free for all shoddy snipers. And one of my, one of my friends well, a couple of my friends would say things like I would hit these like crazy flicks with like the sniper, like I would always, like I would always go for sniper, like that was my gun, like if I was playing, I'm always going for it, and like most of the time my team would let me get it and I would get some crazy clips sometimes and people were just like I remember, you know, you you kind of like talk trash with your boys. Like you know, especially when you're all landing and playing and stuff, you can literally just stand up and like talk crap to the guy sitting right behind me and stuff. And so I just remember there was a lot of times where you just like bro, there's literally no way he's hitting these on purpose, like these are just lucky shots. Like he is getting lucky every time, like it was literally no way he's spinning around and sniping me like that and he's getting so frustrated. And so when I made my Twitch account, I was like what's my name going to be? And so I originally it was lucky shots. All day was was my, my name and and then I went to my first like a PAX event. You know what PAX is? It's a penny arcade expo.

Speaker 3: 17:24

Oh, okay.

Speaker 2: 17:25

Yeah. So I went to that. My first one in like I think in like 2017, and there was a panel, was like streaming one on one. I was still really little and I I was like trying to learn and they had some big creators there and I remember asking them afterwards like you know, you know my name's lucky shots all day Like do you have any like what is like some tips or whatever? Just like the stuff that you still see from people now, and he's like first thing you got to do, your name has to be shorter, it's way too long. And he's like there's just it's so hard to market that like lucky shots all day. Like that doesn't fit on like a T-shirt. Well, that doesn't like like the branding, it's super long. If you tell somebody, oh, come over to my Twitch, it's twitchtv slash lucky shots all day, like that's, that's so much. She's just do lucky shots. And so when I got home, I was like I'm going to take his advice, I'm just going to do that and I cut the rest of it off and then that's it. I've just been lucky shots since then. So there's always memes and stuff in chat where it's like you know, you might say that was a lucky shot. Oh.

Speaker 3: 18:23

I'm sure yeah, and put a number of memes right there.

Speaker 2: 18:28

Yeah, exactly, and so honestly, I guess I'm an idiot for not making some kind of like lucky shot compilation of lucky shots. I'm probably slipping on that, but yeah, so this is just been my name ever since. Obviously, I would love to just get the name lucky, like that would be super cool, but to get that on on all the socials and stuff is like impossible. I think the lucky grocery store or something has it on Twitter and you're never going to get it from them.

Speaker 3: 18:52

Oh yeah, that makes sense.

Speaker 2: 18:54

There's literally no way. So yeah, so that's like. I guess that's kind of like how I got to where I'm at now and I love it. Honestly, it can be stressful sometimes, but I mean it's better than working for somebody else, I guess. Very true.

Speaker 3: 19:07

So my, I have one more question before I hand over the reins to Chris, because he's he's the true, real gamer on this um, this team here, and I know he has a million questions for you. But the other question I had to that need to get out is so did you have the parents where they were like, oh my gosh, stop playing video games, this is going to lead to nowhere? And then here you are, or was it the complete opposite?

Speaker 2: 19:30

So growing up it was just me and my mom and my sister, but my dad was in the picture, but it was more so with my mom. She would, she would be okay with me gaming. But when I was growing up, like I was, I had my setup and I'm in my room with my stuff, but it was all offline. And so then online started to become more prominent with like. Uh, I remember getting like a, an Xbox. It was actually really cool because we didn't have a lot of money. When, when I was growing up and the new Xbox was coming out and as a kid that loves to play games, you know I was playing on like Gamecube and the days before right.

Speaker 3: 20:08

And.

Speaker 2: 20:09

I had those consoles and I had a PS two for a little bit. And like the new Xbox is coming out and I'm bagging my mom, can we please get this Xbox? Like I will, you know, as a kid I will do anything like all all mow the yard every single weekend. I'll, I'll do, you know, abc it, can we please get it? And my mom was like pretty straightforward with me. Like I don't have the money to buy you an Xbox. Like, if you want to, you're going to have to go and wash cars and mow yards and do yard work and save up the money yourself. If you want to get one, cause I can't, I can't buy that for you. And then I remember I came home from school one day and there was an Xbox sitting on the table and I'm like I'm I'm so confused and my mom told me that she had gone and got Taco Bell for lunch and we won the Xbox.

Speaker 3: 20:58

No what.

Speaker 2: 20:59

It's like give away. They gave one Xbox away at every Taco Bell nationwide and we won the one for our town.

Speaker 3: 21:08

Oh, my God.

Speaker 2: 21:09

And so I remember like I think I was so happy I could cry, but I was freaking out. It came with games, two controllers, the Xbox, it was nuts, wow. So I got super lucky and I got a hang of it. I don't know man. And so obviously then I started getting more into it. Halo was like that gateway game for me for like competitive games. I started playing Halo and I started loving it. And so on the weekends we had, you know, really crappy dial up internet where it's like you, you can't use the phone and stuff. But my mom would let me. She told me on the weekends you can play online, but only until I need the computer and then I'm taking the internet is what she would say. So I'd get up as early as I possibly could on Saturday morning. Like 430 in the morning I'm sneaking out of my room, taking all my stuff to the living room so I could play online. My mom was always really cool. As long as, like, my grades were doing good, I wasn't getting in trouble at school, she would. She'd be fine with me playing games with my friends on the weekends and we'd take turns like we're all at my house this weekend, we're all at the other, the other person's house, and it'd be like those parents would feed us and then next weekend it'd go to a different house and they'd feed us. And so I I mean that was my weekends man I would just game. I would play games with my friends and we'd have sleepovers and stay up all night and just carry all of our stuff to the next person's house and, like my mom was fine with it as long as I was getting good grades and stuff, she wasn't. I'm thankful for that because if she had been one of those parents that didn't let me game, I mean I might be in like a completely different place now because I didn't grow up gaming, you know.

Speaker 1: 22:49

Yeah, yeah, so you, you played Halo. When did you transition out of it?

Speaker 2: 22:57

So Halo Halo five was was like the game I. I like I really liked Halo five, but there was a certain point where it felt like we were still playing the same game, like we weren't getting anything new, we weren't getting new maps, we weren't getting. It felt like it was at that time that they you could kind of tell that they were working on other things and they had kind of put it on the back burner and people started transitioning out of Halo. They were playing other games or getting into like you know, I can't say specifically what, what games, but at that time like people were less about Halo and they started playing other stuff and and everybody sort of kind of started moving away. And so at that time I was still playing on on Xbox and stuff, but I was like maybe I want to learn how to play like a I was saving this for for this question, actually, because you mentioned this earlier but I was like I want to start learning how to play computer games because I hadn't played anything on mouse and keyboard. Really. Like I played Diablo and like some Starcraft, but nothing that was like a competitive, like required me to have super fast reactions against other players, like on mouse and keyboard and the game that I learned how to play competitively on mouse and keyboard was actually League of Legends and I played it for a long. I played it for a long time and that was actually the game that kind of took me away from Halo a little bit and I started playing that and we would all hang out and we would play that instead of having our weekend sessions and playing Halo. Now we were all hopping online and we were playing five man on on League and I was. I was around for a really long time. I think I stopped playing like right after NAR came out. I was like the last time, the last time I played it. I played Vlad top lane or like I don't know, like at vain bottom lane sometimes, but I would, I would play League. And then there was just a day where I was playing and it felt like every single game I was just getting roasted by people being not, not, not like like. I was like losing games, but it was more how toxic the community was on my team. And it was like every game like I get into another game with a completely different set of people and every single one of them was just terrible.

Speaker 1: 25:14

people Like yeah, super toxic, so toxic.

Speaker 2: 25:18

And when I just I was over that, and so that's when I was like, well, I want to go back to shooters what, what, what kind of like learn how to play on mouse and keyboard. And so the first shooter that I really learned how to play on mouse and keyboard was a PUBG.

Speaker 1: 25:34

That's kind of how I got into the battle royale.

Speaker 2: 25:36

This was like through PUBG and I I was addicted to that game. I could not stop playing it and I was playing it on stream and actually went to. I've been to like every PUBG party that they've had at like E three or packs and like still says that I have like this, like PUBG, it's like a insulated water bottle and I I use this like every day. It's like they gave us merch and PUBG was big for me, like I, I love that game and then the cheaters kind of ruined it.

Speaker 1: 26:07

I feel, about what was done?

Speaker 2: 26:08

Like it became unplayable so. But yeah, league of Legends, man it was. It was like. That was like a game changer for me. I had never experienced a game like that, and so learning it on mouse and keyboard and people are good on that game your nuts.

Speaker 1: 26:22

It's definitely a gateway to like. It's a good way to transition Like one. If you don't like World of Warcraft, you can shift to, because World of Warcraft is just walking around clicking on stuff and then League gets you that. True, you have to know what you're clicking, you have to have good like fingers on there and then you kind of.

Speaker 2: 26:43

So many World of Warcraft players any World of Warcraft players listening is like, yeah, you know, wow, you just didn't really take any skill, you just all of them listening to the podcast.

Speaker 3: 26:55

Like, yeah, we just go all the downboats and all the one stars and subs.

Speaker 2: 27:00

So much, Chris. I mean, wow, it's just like you're not even doing anything really like him.

Speaker 1: 27:07

So I feel I'm not hating. I actually like wow. But I got to a point when I was playing where everything was just a macro and it's like, okay, as long as you have these three macro set up, you're, you're good to go and I'm like so. So what am I doing? Just clicking at this person and make sure I rotate through? So I mean, yes, you do have to have good coordination and you have to learn a lot of stuff, but it is to me it's not a bad game. It's just a stepping stone for a lot of people to other leagues Absolutely way harder than wow, like yeah, league is.

Speaker 2: 27:42

I mean you've got a. It's the timing, the you know the CS, the team fights the coordination, like it's. I mean that there's a reason why it's like I think it's still one of the highest paid competitive games.

Speaker 1: 27:54

Yes.

Speaker 2: 27:55

Like League of Legends, so there's a reason for that. It's a hard game. Like I remember, I couldn't get past gold when I when I did play I got so hard, yeah, and I'm. I'm getting frustrated too, cause I'm coming from a game where I would literally hit on X, you know immediately, which is like the top rank, like I would do that consistently and it wouldn't be a problem. It wasn't like am I going to hit on X? It's like how fast can I get the onyx? And then I go over here. I'm like I'm gold. I'm gold Like I don't understand. I'm playing for hours, I'm learning, I'm like every. I feel like I have so much knowledge like burned into my brain about League of, like abilities and and locations, and all of a sudden, like it's just never go away from thousands of hours of freaking playing the game and then I couldn't even get past gold. It's crazy.

Speaker 3: 28:45

So we're. The majority of my experience comes in for gaming Isn't necessarily playing it as much, but as soon as draft kings adopted, betting on gaming is when I really started diving into it more. So League was one that I bet quite a bit of money on. And then Counter Strike is another one, and that's actually a small niche because, like everyone's like talking about NFL season coming around the corner, getting ready to get on draft kings for that. I've been on draft kings doing gaming, drafting teams, for years now and that's been a whole lot of fun. So yeah that's what's that? Do you win a lot? Oh yeah, I do win, like 70% of the time.

Speaker 2: 29:25

Dude, that's cool. Yeah, that's really cool. I think it's really neat to see that like companies are starting to pick up on that. Like you watch, you watch like a lot of Counter Strike and stuff too.

Speaker 3: 29:36

Oh yeah, I probably watched more Counter Strike than anything else right now.

Speaker 2: 29:40

That's cool. Yeah, counter Strike is one of those games that like if I'm just swiping through tech talk or something or it like pops up, I'll watch it because like I understand what's happening but I'm like I don't play the game, so but then watching the plays is like really exciting. It's kind of how I feel about Valorant, like do you?

Speaker 1: 29:56

watch it. Yeah, yeah, it looks so dope.

Speaker 2: 30:00

It's exciting to like watch people they're playing like tournaments and they're in like a 1v3 and then they clutch it up and they, they win it because you know what that takes and stuff, and like that's got to be really hyped too when you're you're betting on somebody and like, oh man, this guy has to win this, or like I'm going to lose money and then for them to clutch it, that's got to be like a rush. I'm going to start voting on our betting on Valorant games. Just like that sounds. That sounds awesome.

Speaker 3: 30:25

Yeah, I just started looking into Valorant a little bit more. I don't have quite the win streak on there as I do. I'm Counter Strike more than anything, but you, you primarily play Apex, right.

Speaker 2: 30:35

Yeah, I do a ton of Apex. So I went after PUBG started getting like a lot of cheaters and stuff, I went to Fortnite for a while I was still stuck in that. I mean, I guess not was I'm still stuck in the battle royale thing. I went from PUBG to Fortnite and then I went from Fortnite to war zone and that's whenever I was playing with my buddies that I told you I moved here with. We would just play warzone all day, every day. And then on the weekends, when my one friend who wasn't full time whenever he was on, we'd just be on all weekend just grinding warzone, playing it hours and hours and hours. And then the cheaters started to become a problem with warzone, and that always kills it. For me, man, I mean on warzone, it got to the point where it was so bad that you would you would probably die to a cheater. Four out of five games. It would be somebody that was hard embodying or they're walling Like you can just tell because they're they're watching people through the wall after they kill you. You can you can see that they're cheating and the cheaters just killed it for me. And so then I went to Apex and at first it was kind of rough. That game is pretty hard whenever you first start playing, and then I kind of fell in love with it and now I have this whole community around around Apex and I'm just, I guess I'm just waiting for the next battle royale that's going to take its place, I guess.

Speaker 3: 31:54

So is your community so strong that they'll follow you from game to game? Or is it kind of like you find that you're finding a new community each time you move to a different game?

Speaker 2: 32:04

So I think right now it's like 90% or 95% of my streams are Apex and I've been enjoying other games off of stream. For a while. I was in a, a special mixer because they they allowed us to like they kind of did the promotion for your channel for you, because you would go live with like Fortnite or something and then you would pop up on the Xbox dashboard for everybody who was on Xbox and they could just find your stream, and so I didn't need to do YouTube, I didn't need to do TikTok. I didn't because I was just getting. I mean, I had like 200,000 followers on mixer and I would average anywhere from like one to two to 300 viewers and and I didn't have to do that. So it kind of spoiled me and and I could play whatever and I would give viewers. Then, when I came to Twitch, I realized like I literally got babied by a mixer because I can't do that here. So now I feel like I'm kind of in like a niche as far as the stream goes. I've stopped streaming as long of hours I was streaming eight to 10, like every day eight to 10 hours, and now I stream from like four to six and then I can actually enjoy other games outside of my niche when I'm off stream, like I've been playing some Baldur's Gate, my girlfriend and I would be some Diablo I can play other stuff whenever I'm. If there's an echo I'm sorry, I think somebody was opening up the garage it kind of echoes a little bit. Now I'm able to enjoy those off off genre games when I'm not streaming. If, if I'm streaming and I play a different game, if it's a shooter, it will carry over pretty well. Like I'll start, I can like start with Apex and be like hey guys, we're going to move over to Fortnite and, like some people will leave because a lot of like. There are a lot of people in my community that are just hardcore Apex players. They they only watch Apex, only play Apex. So when you switch, like, hey, it's fun playing today, fun hanging out, whatever, I'll see you in the next stream, I'm going to go and find somewhere else to play Apex, whatever. But if I switch to a shooter, people will stay. If I switch to something that's very off, like off brand or off genre, whatever I do, I do find it that it's like I'm probably going down like like a lot with my viewership because the people who play Apex will still stick around and watch other shooters because they like shooters. But if I switch over to World of Warcraft or League of Legends, I'm not. Like most of those people are going to like those super hardcore community members will hang out and they'll just be in there all the time. They don't care. But some of the like in the middle community members they're going to they're going to like go and find more Apex to watch. You know, and I I think it's interesting that you asked me that, because that's something I've been like thinking about recently is how I want to. I want to start transitioning to playing a couple of different games on stream instead of just Apex all the time, and then kind of grow my community in multiple areas. But that's really scary for like a lot of streamers We'll tell you that that's kind of scary because if you have like an off stream, it'll make you feel like you are like not growing, even though you're growing a different audience. And then you're worried like what if, like you know what, if my viewers or my community don't come back because they don't think I'm playing Apex or something, and I think that's something that you have to just kind of come to terms with and like be okay with, like slower streams at first for whatever game you're switching to, and then just slowly build it up, like you did with your original content, you know.

Speaker 1: 35:37

Right Makes sense. So I got a couple of questions now. One what do you play when you're on Apex Like? Which character are you using most?

Speaker 2: 35:50

So I'm a Bangalore main, that's like my primary, primary legend is Bangalore. There's like a lot a lot of like debate about like mouse and keyboard versus like controller and stuff like that, and then Bangalore kind of disrupts the controller gameplay a little bit because of aim assist and everything. So it's when you're playing on like mouse and keyboard that doesn't really happen. So it's it's kind of cool to like have that effect on the lobby sometimes or like in the team fights, and Bangalore is like a little bit more aggressive with like her passive and stuff. So I really enjoy that character and it's really just been her or like. I don't know how much Apex you watch, but it was recently a redid revenant.

Speaker 1: 36:31

So we got like a whole deal.

Speaker 2: 36:33

Yeah, he's really fun now. So I've been playing him a little bit this season. I play Bangalore and then once in a while I'll play ballistic. But I used to play a lot of Watson and stuff. But man, it feels like, so I host like a lot of like custom lobbies and stuff and then my community will all come and play. That's what we were doing today before the podcast. People in the lobby yeah, it's like doing. It's like doing games with your community, but instead of getting like two people in at a time, I'm getting 58, 59 people and so we all just hang out. We play customs and I do like a little bit like shout casting and stuff like that. But it seems like horizon is everywhere. It horizon like it seems like everybody's just playing horizon when we're in customs, like every team has one, they're everywhere. Just driving me crazy, man, they're everywhere. I mean you don't? I mean you do play sometimes or like, who do you play?

Speaker 1: 37:24

So I just watch switching. Doing mousing Keyboard like first person shooters is not my thing, just because I'm just coordinated enough but not good enough to sit there and like actually do anything productive for my team. So I'll just watch.

Speaker 2: 37:42

That's cool, though. I mean like that's kind of like what the valorant thing I go is saying like I don't even play valorant, but if I'm swiping through like TikTok or something and something pops up like an ace or something, I'll watch it because, like this is exciting, this is the watch and I'm I can't do this, so I enjoy watching like the pros play and stuff. It's cool.

Speaker 1: 38:02

I like it. So, because we've talked a little bit about your games that you're playing and kind of like transitioning to do kick and Twitch and kind of growing your channel, what does success look like for you?

Speaker 2: 38:16

So do you mean, like, how do I feel that I'm succeeding right now? Or what? Like what would success in the future look like?

Speaker 1: 38:25

What's the success in the future?

Speaker 2: 38:27

I think for me, I want to continue to like grow the community and everything that I have and keep keep doing apex as long as it's relevant and fun and still having a good time. But for me, I think I think success would be kind of like what you were talking about earlier the ability to swap to any game and be be one of those variety streamers that can switch to any any game on any day. You can go live and say today we're playing this game and your, your community, will show up and be a part of that without, without feeling like they, they want something, like they want to be like. You know, right now we do a lot of customs and so a lot of people get to play at the same time. But if I, if I, were to swap and start playing something else, you know that might not be the case, and so I think being able to stream whatever you want, whenever you want, I think that's something that you you have to earn as a streamer and I think a lot of people view it as something that they, they want to be able to do. But I think you earn that over time by building your community and like earning their trust and then eventually you get to that point where you can you can just play any game. So for me, I think success is being able to just go live and retain your, your community and your viewership, no matter what you're playing, and and still have them in there, Cause I don't I don't want to like worry about, you know, when apex isn't around anymore, like what's the channel look like at that point. But I also want to start really putting in some work on like YouTube and I want to try to even if it doesn't start until, uh, you know, after TwitchCon in October or something, and like it starts at the end of the year, I really want to try to like set my sites on 50 K on YouTube next year or something like that, and really started diving to long form content and like just get to a point where it feels like I'm making an impact on like different platforms and not just, not just like live stream apex, Like I want. I want to like impact and like help make, make people's days better on all the platforms, regardless of the game, and obviously still make money to be able to do that, you know, so I don't have to like stop streaming or something.

Speaker 3: 41:00

Right, so I have. I have two more questions, definitely for you, and so the the first question I would have is I have a couple of friends that are kind of in that spot that you talked about way back in the beginning, where getting between five to 15 views getting on a Twitch. So if you were to give them one or two pointers or tips to grow the community that they have, what would that?

Speaker 2: 41:24

be. I think I think this is like a very I think this is a really it's a really good question, but I don't think the answer is going to is what a lot of people want to hear. They want, they want you to ask that question and then they want me to give some magic, right.

Speaker 3: 41:44

Right.

Speaker 2: 41:45

So a great partner response is going to solve everything tomorrow, and I think the truth is to grow, especially on Twitch right now. The trick to growing is to streaming less, and it sounds super counterintuitive because a lot of these people who are stuck in the five to 10 range, they're probably doing what I did, where they have their full-time job and they have families and friends and things that people want them to go and do on the weekends, and then they're like okay, I can stream, I can stream these five days and on these three days I can stream for like three hours, and on these two days of my weekend I can stream for eight hours each day. Okay, cool, now I'm getting in like almost 30 hours for the week. Okay, that's a super solid schedule and it sounds like a good schedule because you're streaming more. But if more especially with the way like Twitch is different than it used to be before, if you just streamed all day, every day, you probably would grow and like you would eventually like just start pulling people in because less people streamed. But since COVID, a lot of people picked it up because it was all they could do is stream or watch streams or be at home, and so now tons of people stream. There's a bunch of people who streamed to one to five viewers, which is fine, like we all started at zero. I started at zero and they think that they saw all these other people who just streamed 50, 60, 70 hours a week, whatever, and they grew. They're like that's what I got to do. I got to do as close to that as possible and I think right now, if I was starting brand new, truthfully, I probably wouldn't stream on Twitch. If I was brand new and I was starting up, I would probably stream. I probably multi-streamed to kick and YouTube at the same time. Or I would stream to kick YouTube and Twitch and not take Twitch's affiliate program and not take subs there at all. That way you could expand your reach. But if you were just going to pick one platform and you wanted it to be Twitch, then I think you pick three or four days out of the week, you stream for three to four hours on each of those days and then whatever time is left, like if, like the example I gave earlier, two, eighths and three, threes instead make it four, four, or like three, threes and a four, and then all that other time that you have. You just take that and you record content. You make videos on TikTok, you make content on YouTube. You figure out something that's niche within your series or like a series within your niche that's what I meant and you figure out, okay, what's something I could do that I can make 10 videos about for this game that I really love, like you know. Say, you love Valorant, right? What's something like? I know Valorant like the back of my hand. I fucking play it all the time. I'm nuts at this game. How can I do, instead of streaming high level ranked to five viewers, what if you started a series that was top five tricks for X character on X map? in ranked Okay. So now I have episode one. Now I'm going to do the exact same thing with that same character, because I made that character, and I'm going to give you five tips with this character on this other map. Now you have two videos. You have in depth videos that you can do for YouTube that are long, and then you can chop it up into clips and you can make it a TikTok content. And then you start growing and then now you have 5,000 people that follow you on TikTok and you can go live on TikTok. So then you go live on TikTok. You say, hey, guys, like I'm a, you know I'm what is it radiant? I'm radiant on Valorant. Right, I'm live on Twitch. Right now. You guys should come and hang out with me. They leave TikTok, they come over to your Twitch. Now you're streaming to 20 or 30 people, because you stopped streaming to five people and you started making content that people cared about on TikTok and now they actually care. Like that's the thing is. Like people think that they go live for a long time and then they're they're streaming to five people, like I'm a stream for a long time and eventually I'm going to blow up, but, like A, you're not going to blow up because people don't know you exist and B. You're not going to blow up Because right now, truthfully, people don't care about you. You haven't given them a reason to care about you over. Why should I watch you instead of Shroud, like I'll just go out and play Valorant. Give me a reason to care about you over Shroud. You start making content. They start liking what you're doing. They like your jokes in your videos or they like your personality, like hey, I kind of like this dude. Then, oh, they're swiping through TikTok. They watch your video, they like it. The next time they swipe, oh he's live right now. They click on the live. They come check you out. They like your vibe. Now you have somebody who comes back every day Like you have to give people a reason to care that you're live streaming. Every. You know truthfully, everybody's live streaming Like what makes you unique. You know. So like, yeah, back to it. If you're streaming to five viewers, you probably might like truthfully, you might be streaming too much Like you just need to stream less.

Speaker 3: 46:47

That's genius. Yeah, I mean to your point too. There's some people out there that they wanted that like magic bullet overnight, but guess what? That doesn't exist. So the exact game plan that you gave. If someone really wants to grow it, if you follow that game plan, I find it very hard to believe that you won't grow by following that game plan. That's fantastic. Thank you so much for sharing that.

Speaker 2: 47:08

Yeah, man, absolutely. I want like that's like kind of going back to what I said before like making an impact, like a lot of people say that, but my favorite moments that I can like remember from like stream isn't like the crazy, like crazy clutch win or the crazy victory. It's more like when somebody comes in and they're like hey, like I know I was, I just want to let you know. Like they come in, they drop like 10 subs and like hey, I just want to let you know that, like over the summer, like you know, I broke my leg and I couldn't do anything. I don't really talk in your chat, but your streams like helped me get through that. Wow, like that. Like that's the, that's like what drives me, like that's the best feeling. It was like knowing that like the content you made or what you were doing on stream or whatever like actually made somebody's life like better, because they might not have they might not have anybody right Like maybe they won, their friends moved away, like and and so like your stream actually like made their life better by like being there every day, you know.

Speaker 3: 48:10

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 48:11

That. That's what it's about.

Speaker 3: 48:13

That's really cool. So I guess we are coming up on an hour pretty darn close here now. So my my last question for you would be if you could tell your younger self one thing, what would it be?

Speaker 2: 48:26

I don't know if any. I don't know if anybody's asked that I could tell my younger self in anything. I think I think it would be like completely unrelated to to games. I think it would be like really value the time you have with your, your family and your friends, because you never, you never really know when it might be that last moment or that last time with your family or friends. Like I think, when you're younger, things are going by really fast and time is like you know time is going by really fast. You're really excited for summer, than you're really excited for winter break and then you're excited for vacation and the next game and like things are going really fast and then like next thing, you know, you know you're you're, you're all grown up and like friends and family like pass away and like you can never really go back and get that time. So I think, valuing your time, even though as a kid you're you're like man, I don't want to go, do this family get the other thing right, but later you may not have the option to and you take advantage of that. So I think you should value that.

Speaker 3: 49:37

I love that. I don't think we've ever had that answer before. No, that's fantastic, thank you.

Speaker 2: 49:43

I actually wanted to ask you guys a question. Yeah, Like what you. What you asked me is I want to know from your point of view, what, what does success look like for you guys?

Speaker 3: 49:55

Well, chris, you're the one that came up with that question first. I'll let you take it first.

Speaker 1: 49:59

So for me I think success with the podcast would be to just grow and reach more people in general and then pretty much expand the studio so we would end up eventually having like two areas to record, so like just to sit down like comfy spot, and then once sitting at a table, just kind of figuring out the vibe and just kind of growing like our setup and everything.

Speaker 3: 50:26

Yep, yeah, I probably agree. Like podcast wise, the reason why we started a lot of this podcast was for networking and building a network and building a community and helping kind of bring people together more within Wilmington. Wilmington is a really small area and people know of each other a lot in Wilmington but a lot of people don't really know each other, and so that's kind of where we started. This kind of groundbreaking thing was just like right, let's focus on Southeast North Carolina. We've done a really good job at that and I think kind of working with you now too and doing a first one outside of North Carolina, we can really start doing that just because the world has become such a smaller place, only because there is Riverside, there is Zoom, there is Twitch that can bring people together. So I think this was the first time that really I noticed that you know what? Why are we focusing so small when the world is already so small itself? So they kind of went to a bigger portion of like what success is outside of that question. But I think that kind of is what success looks like for me.

Speaker 2: 51:30

Yeah, I think I think I watch a lot of clips from like a lot of different podcasts and stuff and I feel like you guys have like this like good energy and like this really great vibe and so I think that you guys are definitely where you're supposed to be and I think that like, as far as like podcasting, like you guys are definitely good for this and I think you guys have like a lot of success in your future coming your way and I'm excited to see what you guys do next and like I'm definitely going to go and like subscribe to everything everywhere and I expect to see you guys on on on TikTok and like posting your clips and stuff and, you know, getting swayed to do that for you guys. I think you guys really succeed on there and I was just honestly, this has been great. I'm really thankful you guys invited me on here. Like I've been having a good time.

Speaker 3: 52:20

Yeah, awesome. Thank you so much, and again shout out to Sway for setting this up for us too, for getting us both together, and I foresee this partnership going further with you as well, and I'm sure we'll have you back on the podcast and hopefully work with you more soon.

Speaker 2: 52:34

Yeah, absolutely, man, I would love that.

Speaker 1: 52:36

So my question where can people find you? Because you said you're on pretty much all the social medias, but what's the easiest way to look you up so they could follow and keep up with what you're doing?

Speaker 2: 52:46

Yeah, anybody who just I mean, even if you don't play Apex or you don't play shooters or whatever like we have. You know a lot of people probably say this, but I feel like we have one of the best communities on the whole platform. Everybody's great. A lot of people have made a ton of friends just from being in chat with our community and stuff. So if you're ever on Twitch, you can find me at Lucky Shots. All one word I'm the same name on kick. I'm on Twitch Monday, Wednesday and Friday. I'm on kick Tuesday, thursday and Saturday, and then Twitter Lucky Shots in my X. I just haven't changed it from the whole mixture thing. I was just like kind of left it as a meme for a little bit. Now I feel like it's been too long. So once at Lucky Shots becomes available on Twitter, I'll try and snag it up, but until then, yep, lucky Shots in my X, and I mean that's, that's about it. I don't really do a lot on Instagram, so I feel like this is where I say, like go check out my pictures, but I've been posting like six months, so don't do that, yeah.

Speaker 1: 53:39

Yeah, thank you for coming on. It's been a blast. Everybody who's listened to the podcast check them out. On all of this social media is for those who stream or who just like watching people stream, like me, definitely check his stuff out. I was bored this afternoon. I was like you know what, let me go check something different, because I'm always watching like whatever showing up on TV. He really does have really good setup and community. They're all super chill. I love his overlays.

Speaker 3: 54:02

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 54:02

Totally different. But yeah, definitely, if you're listening to our podcast, leave us a five star review on all all the things Instagram follow us. We post pretty much weekly, if not daily close to daily, pretty much because.

Speaker 2: 54:18

Tyler.

Speaker 1: 54:19

Tyler's always posting something and sway is helping us post more stuff. So yeah, five star reviews definitely help us out. Like comment, share, subscribe and hopefully we'll see you guys in the next one.

Speaker 3: 54:31

Thank you so much again, lucky. Well, sure See you soon.

Speaker 2: 54:34

Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for having me, man.

Speaker 3: 54:36

Yes.

Speaker 2: 54:37

Cheers.