Rumay Wang or Hafu is a Chinese-American Twitch streamer known for her Morning Among Us Lobbies. She used to be a pro player of World of Warcraft, Bloodline Champions, Hearthstone, and Teamfight Tactics.
Background[]
Hafu was born in Newton, Massachusetts to parents who immigrated to the United States from Beijing. She grew up in Lexington, an affluent Boston suburb.[2] She can speak Mandarin but can't really read it.[3]
Hafu has played games since she was 14.
She went to Bentley University for Finance, but dropped out in 2012 (by her third year).[2]
Early Gaming Career[]
High School[]
Hafu was introduced to World of Warcraft (WOW) in high school by her then-boyfriend and then-best friend. After a breakup she got addicted to WOW and became a top player.
At 17, going into her senior year at Lexington High, Hafu took a year off from (i.e. dropped out of) high school to play WOW competitively.[4] She made around $30k–$40k from boosting WOW teams.[5] Her parents were initially unsupportive of her gaming, but came around when they saw that she could be successful.[2][5]
Hafu was usually the only female pro player at tournaments and faced a fair amount of misogyny, including an instance that year in which a group named their team "Gonna Rape Hafu at Regionals" prior to a tournament.[6][2]
After an expansion changed gameplay for her class, she lost interest in playing competitively. She went back to and finished high school the next year in 2010.[4][5]
For a couple of years Hafu played Bloodline Champions (a game that was succeeded by Battlerite) and crushed it despite playing on EU with NA ping. [5]
College[]
During college she played Bloodline Champions and League of Legends casually.[5]
Streaming[]
Diablo III[]
Despite it being a PvE game, Hafu started playing Diablo III when it first came out. She and her group progressed very quickly due to being a bunch of sweaty gamers. She made around $3000 in a week of selling gear in-game. At the suggestion of her friend, HD Starcraft, she tried the hardcore mode and fell in love with the adrenaline a player feels in that game mode.[5]
Hafu had known about how lucrative streaming on Twitch could be, but was initially hesitant due to concerns about reception and the potential for harassment. However, HD Starcraft convinced her to try it out, and her first stream, on June 13, 2012, had over 3k viewers. After four months, in October, she got a sub button.[5]
League of Legends[]
After beating Diablo III Inferno Hardcore, she moved onto playing League of Legends (LoL). At first she was carried by pro-League player, Aphromo, but she was unsatisfied with being bad at the game and eventually managed to climb to Diamond I in solo-queue. She played primarily mid and some support.
Hearthstone[]
During its beta, Hafu saw that Hearthstone was receiving a lot of interest and viewership, so she bought the beta access for $100. This turned out to be a good investment, as she earned much of her streaming success through playing the game.
Hafu would practice by pausing VODs of Hearthstone streamers Kripparrian and Trump before a play, narrate what she would do, and then compare it to their own actions.[5] She is a five times legend Hearthstone player. She finished at rank #7 during Season 3 and peaked at rank #2.[7]She played Hearthstone for Cloud9 from 2014–2015.[8]
Hafu blew up in popularity for being one of the most successful streamers doing the 100 in 10 Arena Challenge. She scored 96 in her best run.[5][9][10]
She started getting tired of Hearthstone around 2017 due to a lack of novelty or potential for growth, but continued playing through early 2019.
Teamfight Tactics[]
In 2019, Hafu switched to primarily streaming Dota Auto Chess and took a 60% loss in viewership, but slowly worked her way back up to averaging 3k viewers in May.
When Teamfight Tactics (TFT) and Dota Underlords (both inspired by Auto Chess) were announced, Hafu tried both and then played the one that was more popular: Teamfight Tactics. She became very skilled and was the #1 player by MMR on the public beta as of June 2019.[11] This information was announced by Riot, and her viewership increased rapidly, averaging 11k viewers (with peaks of 17k–18k) in July 2019.[5] In August 2019, she joined G2 Esports to play TFT.[8]
Among Us[]
In September 2020, Hafu started playing Among Us. She started regularly hosting Morning Lobbies with regulars of 5up, DK, and Steve Suptic. Among Us had a huge explosion of popularity and she was the second most-viewed female streamer in November 2020, the first being Valkyrae.[12] Throughout the hype of Among Us, in the Morning Lobbies, both Hafu and 5up averaged around 10K viewers for each of their AU streams. Steven Suptic and TinaKitten would soon follow suit, but only when the latter two began to decline in viewership.
In April 2021, Hafu announced she would no longer be regularly playing Among Us because a lack of new content had made the game stale for her.[13]
Personal Life[]
Hafu married fellow streamer David "DogDog" Caero in April 2021. They moved from Fort Worth, Texas to Las Vegas, Nevada to live their lives together.[14]
Trivia[]
- During college, she tried to be more social and joined a sorority.[15][5]
- Hafu is one of Disguised Toast's strongest rivals, as both main the same games around the same time periods.
- Coincidentally, both share "Wang" as their surname.
- Hafu has "little to no life skills," evidenced by the fact that she learned how to boil water in 2020 and was learning how to cook meals in AriaSaki's 2021 cooking streams.
- When Hafu was first introduced to Auto-Chess, she immediately played for 24 hours straight.
- She lost to the Hearthstone tutorial on-stream.[5]
- Unbeknownst to her at the time, her first mod indiscriminately banned Chinese people in chat on her first day of streaming.[5]
- Hafu and Dogdog are the only ones in the OTV Universe that are married (to each other).
- Hafu is one of several people that resides in Vegas. The others include her husband, Ryan Higa, Voyboy, KristoferYee, 5up.
Quotes[]
- "You're so annoying [name]!"
- (to 5up) "Stupid Pink Man..."
- (undirectly to Dakotaz while dead, unmuted in dismay) "How?"
- (singing) "When will I poop..."
References[]
- ↑ Wang, Rumay (2018-05-14). Tweet. Twitter. Retrieved on 2021-07-28.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Yap, Audrey Cleo (2016-04-26). In the World of Professional Gaming, Rumay 'Hafu' Wang Found Her Niche. NBC. Retrieved on 2021-07-28.
- ↑ Wang, Rumay. About. itsHafu. Twitch. Retrieved on 2021-07-28.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Lexington High School. (2010). Revolution [Yearbook]. https://archive.org/details/lexingtonhighsch2010lexi/page/196
- ↑ 5.00 5.01 5.02 5.03 5.04 5.05 5.06 5.07 5.08 5.09 5.10 5.11 5.12 Gheesling, Daniel (2019-08-05). From 1500 to 15000 Viewers on Twitch - itsHafu Interview - Dan Gheesling Podcast #52 (Video). DanGheeslingPlays. YouTube. Retrieved on 2021-07-28.
- ↑ Wang, Rumay (2021-07-28). Tweet. Twitter. Retrieved on 2021-07-29.
- ↑ Wang, Rumay. About. Hafu. YouTube. Retrieved on 2021-07-28.
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 Abbas, Malcolm (2019-08-15). Hafu joins G2 Esports. Dot Esports. Retrieved on 2021-07-29.
- ↑ Hafu Arena Stats (Spreadsheet). Google Sheets. Retrieved on 2021-07-29.
- ↑ AbrielNei. Did Hafu actually beat the 100 in 10 arena challenge?. r/hearthstone. Reddit. Retrieved on 2021-07-29.
- ↑ Abbas, Malcolm (2019-06-25). Hafu ranked first in MMR during Teamfight Tactics beta. Dot Esports. Retrieved on 2021-07-28.
- ↑ Pineda, Carlos (2020-12-09). Valkyrae dominates November viewership among female streamers. ClutchPoints. Retrieved on 2021-07-29.
- ↑ Wang, Rumay (2021-04-24). Hafu on Among Us (Video). OTV COPIUM. YouTube. Retrieved on 2021-07-29.
- ↑ Wang, Rumay (2021-04-13). Tweet. Twitter. Retrieved on 2021-07-28.
- ↑ Wang, Rumay (2014-07-31). Tweet. Hafu. YouTube. Retrieved on 2021-07-28.