For Team Dignitas, the best team in Europe and, arguably, the biggest roadblock Gen. G Esports will need to overcome if they want to be crowned back-to-back Heroes of the Storm World Championships at BlizzCon, their entire season’s work comes down to this event.

Winning the two Western Clash tournaments and finishing second place at the Mid-Season Brawl international event in Sweden is nice, sure. But for Dignitas’ captain, Josh “Snitch” Bennett, taking home the lion’s share of the $1 million BlizzCon prize pool and hoisting the trophy in a couple weeks is all that matters and all that will define their 2018 when looking back on it.

Coming up short is simply not acceptable to him.

“I think we would be very disappointed. The way we are as players, everybody but (Vilhelm “POILK” Flennmark) perhaps is kind of at this point in the game where this is the only thing that matters, you know? This whole year, every Heroes Global Championship (HGC) match, MSB, every Clash match culminates in this moment. All the growth and all the practice we've had is really for this moment. It is nice to say that we went really far at Mid-Season Brawl and it is nice to say that we have won the Clashes but our drive and our focus is always on the World Championship. I think we are all at the point where we think this is one of the best shots we've ever had.”

Snitch is no stranger to the bright lights of the BlizzCon World Championship stage as this event will be his fourth time competing in the live event, a true testament to his talents. Although he has never raised the trophy or been able to call himself “World Champion,” that’s not to say he hasn’t taken away anything from past events, mainly the way he has prepared over the years.

“I think it is drastically changed over time, I feel like I've put in more time and effort into the game each year. I have played more than I ever have this year and I am more motivated in scrims than I ever have been. I have so much experience at these international events that I pick up little things each time. For example, when we lost in the group stage to Tempest at MSB we did not scrim beforehand and we felt really rusty. So now I’m like, ‘We need to scrim before the tournament,’ which seems really obvious but you don't really pick up these hard lessons until you get punished by it. I have just become a lot better of a communicator and a player. I think I have raised the standard in Europe through me putting in a lot of work and finding a really, really, really good team.”

For this year’s tournament, Dignitas took their preparation to another level by training against the beast itself. This past week, the team traveled to Korea to boot camp against Gen. G and Miracle, another team in the tournament. Bootcamping can best be described as practicing against an opponent in person on a LAN-like setting, a valuable opportunity for all teams involved.

Snitch felt they got a lot out of the opportunity.

“The best way to refine your game is to take on the best opponent. I think the best opponents in the world are still the Korean teams, for the most part. Obviously, we have other attendees such as Liquid, Leftovers and Tempo Storm but I just think that in terms of raw ability it will always be Miracle, Gen. G and Tempest that will rise to the top, naturally. I think just having the experience of playing our style against these teams and seeing the ways that they approach play against us will benefit us greatly.”

At the end of the day though, it will come down to execution on the big stage for Snitch and his team. He admits that if he does win this event there is something he wants to see.

“My desire for Heroes of the Storm is to leave a legacy. Money is nice I'm not going to say no to money but my ambition is to leave a mark. ‘This year Snitch and his team were the best team in the world and there's no way to debate that because they raised the trophy on the BlizzCon stage.’ That is what I want to see on Reddit. I want turkey007 to talk about me, talk about HGC and I read it and that is the moment.”

While he is more confident in an odds than ever, he’s well aware that the difference between victory and defeat can be only a few percentage points. Only a few months ago, at the Mid-Season Brawl event, that’s all it took for Gen. G’s Jae Won “Rich” Lee to have bragging rights over Snitch.

“Rich pokes me from time to time and says ‘Final Cut’ which is fine because I can take it. I will poke him and say ‘BlizzCon trophy’ when it’s over,” said Snitch.