Gestern ereignete sich ein nicht unbekanntes und oft in der Vergangenheit vorgekommenes Szenario: Eine Mannschaft verlässt einen laufenden Wettbewerb. Namentlich geht dieses mal um Titan und die ESEA. Da Titans kürzliche Addition kennyS nicht mehr dem Account beitreten darf, verabschieden sie sich kurzerhand aus der Liga und kritisieren im gleichen Atemzug das strenge Regelwerk. Die Liga selbst rechtfertigt sich prompt.
Austritte aus einer laufenden Liga sind bei Weitem nichts neues. Allerdings waren frühere Rückzuge oft begründet durch mangelnde Motivation oder zeitliche Probleme, z.B. wegen eines geplanten Urlaubs.Nun sah sich Titan dazu gezwungen, die laufende sechzehnte ESEA Invite-Saison zu verlassen und zwar aus einem ganz banalen Grund: kennyS darf dem Team-Account nicht mehr beitreten und damit weder die ausstehenden Matches (die nun als Niederlage gewertet werden), noch die möglichen Finals Ende Juni spielen.
Der Wechsel, welcher am Montag verkündet wurde, ist nicht mit dem Regelwerk der Liga konform. So griff am letzten Sonntag, den 27. April eine Regelung, die besagt, dass zwei Wochen vor Ende der regulären Saison, keine Spielerwechsel vorgenommen werden dürfen. Danach werden die Accounts „eingefroren“ und lassen demnach keinerlei Veränderung zu. Ähnlich verfährt unter anderem auch die ESL in ihrer höchsten Spielklasse, der ESL Pro Series.
Was Titan an der Regelung nun primär kritisiert, ist die Tatsache, dass die Finals, für die sie sich höchstwahrscheinlich qualifiziert hätten, erst in etwa zwei Monaten stattfinden (27. bis 29. Juni), also mehr als acht Wochen nach Inkrafttreten der Sperrregel. Solch eine Regelung sei „obskur in der aktuellen kompetitiven Szene“, so der offene Brief des Team-Managers Jérôme ‚NiaK‘ Sudries.
+ Jérôme ‚NiaK‘ Sudries (Team-Manager Titan)
Having begun the new season on March 19th 2014, our current results put us in a good position to claim a spot at the upcoming finals in Dallas. However, the organisers have decided to invoke the player change rule which prevents us from bringing Kenny „kennyS“ Schrub onto the team, despite this happening two months before the actual LAN final.
After a long and unfruitful discussion with ESEA to try and find a solution, we ultimately felt a need to go public with the issue; not only to present you with our side of the story but more importantly to highlight a rule which feels archaic in the current competitive scene.
The rule regarding „Player Eligibility & Roster Restrictions“ for the Invite division states that „Rosters will be locked two weeks before the end of the regular season“. This in turn ensures weeks/months of unaltered lineups at the end of each season, and for this season that translated to a two month roster lock in place from April 27th to June 29th. In our case, coordinating our announcement of a player change with another organisation meant us going public with the news on Monday 28th April, just a few hours too late.
But the issue is not being a few hours late; the issue is that ESEA does not exist in a vacuum. With a yearly tournament calendar including events and organisers such as SLTV StarSeries , ESL, FACEIT League, Gfinity , Fragbite Masters and Fnatic FRAGOUT league (just to mention a few), is it truly reasonable that a single organiser can implement a rule preventing player transfers covering such an extensive time period? With three seasons per year, ESEA is effectively trying to enforce a roster lock which covers way more than just ESEA.
We are not against the idea of roster locks, but these require harmonisation between all major tournament schedules, which is not the case today.
Also, as a personal source of disappointment, Titan and I had actively been working with the promoters of this season to facilitate conditions which would allow all European teams the chance to make the trip in case of qualifying. During ESEA S14, out of all the EU teams only NiP were able to make the trip, and the same pattern repeated itself last season when we ourselves were the only EU team represented at the LAN. For us, working closely with ESEA to prevent this from happening again was important and a way to help sustain the North American scene.
These things considered, its with no small amount of bitterness that we withdraw today. We hope, however, that this open letter will be a move in the right direction towards removing inappropriate rules which do not serve the interest or the progression of high level competition.“
Die ESEA selbst reagierte auf die Kritik ihrerseits mit einem Statement. Hierbei berufen sie sich auf die Verantwortung der Spieler. Diese seien schließlich dafür verantwortlich, sich mit den Regeln der Ligen und Turnier vertraut zu machen, an denen sie teilnehmen. Des Weiteren sei auf der Webseite ein Countdown in roter Schrift sichtbar gewesen, der auf die Sperrung hinwies. Ferner hätte Titan sich im Vertrauen an die Admins wenden können, um sie über einen möglichen Wechsel zu informieren und dann eine Lösung zu finden.
Zu guter Letzt geben sie nur zu Protokoll, dass man in Zukunft verstärkt darauf hinweisen möchte, zum Beispiel über Mediaportale oder aber über direkten Kontakt mit den Team-Captains. Eine Änderung bzw. Anpassung der Regel wird es demnach wohl nicht geben. Dafür aber weiterhin zwei Parteien, die auf ihren Standpunkten beharren.
Titan management claimed that the players were unaware of the roster lock schedule and policy. Players and organizations are responsible for familiarizing themselves with the rules for the leagues and tournaments they compete in, and we do our best to clearly communicate any potentially confusing policies with the community. The roster lock for example was clearly communicated in red letters on the top part of every page on ESEA.net as a countdown clock with how much time teams had left to make any changes. That countdown clock was visible for over one week.
Furthermore, while discussing the situation after we denied Titan a special reprieve, it became evident that their team had been discussing the change since Copenhagen Games. During that period, they could have confidentially approached our League Admins or Commissioner to alert us of their forthcoming roster move and we could have worked with them to find a solution.
It is our position that the roster lock helps ensure that the players competing all season long to qualify for the LAN Playoffs are the same players that have the chance to compete for over $40,000. The policy protects players and organizations from screwing over one another and protects other teams from having ringers unjustly step in at the last minute.
As a league, it has been our position to consistently and fairly enforce all of our rules. The players and management of Titan have been tremendous supporters of ESEA over the past two years, and were disappointed that they wont be able to further participate this season, but it is important for us as a league that we maintain the competitive integrity for all competitors regardless of organization or individual pedigree.
Moving forward we will work to more proactively alert media outlets of the roster lock in the hopes that they communicate it on their website (HLTV.org and ESEA News have agreed) and our League Admins will individually remind team captains of the roster lock window as it approaches.“
