just my take but...

while Arirana wasn't a Djinn Hellsreaper or Kalante or Kono game changing cornerstone...but he was on AE's team and he was on my radar as a great player even in beta.

Kalante was a well known beast in beta with Unreal.

Was he not considered Hellstorm a-team going into PC?

Reg and Dia were superstars long before Uprising ever dropped.

Reg has been the face of Dust's skilled players since he posted his strafing video and his hilariously comical war room propaganda posts for Imps/TP

Reg is literally the answer to the theoretical question: "Say the first thing that pops into your head...best dust player"

Only the OG vets who really know wtfcuk we're talking about remember James5955. It's just been the last year where the dust community has begun to heal from the emotional scars Protoman inflicted before he hung up his controller.

Think of the best KDR in the game you can think of that's not sitting in a vehicle or sniping...Reg had a KDR of 21.87...Protoman a 22.46

And this was in beta when no one had a protosuit until the nerds in Imps finally started obtaining their first one in late april (and really <150 or so people had protosuits before Uprising hit and the SP refunds)

Tibs is the only name on that list that is remotely close to applicable imo...and Tibs was a well known beast about 4 months after Uprising...and he was a beta vet. Tibs had obtained widespread notoriety maybe 2 months after Arirana lit the world up with his '10,000 fists in the air' routine.

Anything pre december...that's like the 2nd wave of OG. (maybe they are just 'og' not 'OG' )

At this point I consider all players like Roner or CatDog og.