Another DPC season and yet another debacle concerning Valve and ESL and communication; this time involving roster locks, smurfing, and account sharing.
The DPC season 2021-22 Spring Tour was set to kick off with roster locks, followed by open qualifiers for teams vying for a spot in Division II in mid-late February. What should have been a fairly smooth process at this point proved to be nothing of the sort —thanks once again to issues in communication and changes in rules mid-stream.
Originally the rosters were set to be locked on the Thursday following the end of the first Major. However, with the cancellation of the Major due to increasing cases and travel restrictions with COVID-19 and the announcement of the replacement regional finals, not all of the pertinent information for the following season was updated or communicated fully to hopeful teams.
The regional finals were staggered and hard dates per region, or even globally, were not announced. That left many in several regions unsure of the roster lock dates.
The NA debacle
In North America, three teams were impacted by the poor communication of the roster lock date, Darwashan, Let's Go (Team Magnus), and Sneake. Team Magnus had issues with the locks and ESL gave them the green light to use smurf accounts but indicated they would need to go through the open qualifiers. They then became Let's Go for the event.
While teams were already competing, other players in the NA scene began to complain on social media about the use of smurf accounts in the qualifiers. ESL then decided to disqualify those teams, despite no hard rules on the subject and having had even approved at least one team to use them.
As confusing as this was and still is (yes, it is all very hard to wrap your head around really) the brackets were then disrupted to such a level that the way that the event progressed after the teams were removed was just as much of a mess. Leaving many to question the integrity of the final results.
Valve; Lack of Communication
Lack of communication and Valve. Name a more iconic duo.
It is no secret that Valve has some significant issues in relaying information and being upfront with not just the community but even their 'partners' in the scene. Over the years we have covered the various instances and the fall out from such.
ESL; History of changes and backlash
It's not the first time that ESL has been under fire for adjusting rules in the DPC.
According to multiple teams competing in the ESL and DreamLeague Western/Eastern Europe DPC leagues in May 2021, the tournament organizer informed the teams via a paragraph in a general email about the guide rules change which allowed coaches to be present and active during official matches via team communications. But, despite the fact that the Dota 2 professional scene never operated under such a rule, the change was not properly highlighted and most of the competitors missed the brief mention in the email that they received.
Alliance had come under heavy heat for reading the information and utilizing their coach during the matches, sparking attention and subsequent drama about the change of rules and overall poor communication. The rule was later reverted back to the Dota 2 standard.
Four years ago the organization released details regarding their schedule for ESL One Katowice Major for which they received backlash from the community. Several weeks prior they announced their exclusive streaming deal with Facebook for all of the Pro Circuit events and started to ban and remove any stream outside of their official broadcast, issuing a statement on their interpretation of a previous statement issued by Valve on independent streamers broadcasting games from the client.
Shortly later, Valve stepped in to clarify their stance on the debacle essentially reiterating that it will be allowed and "It’ll be our judgment alone on who violates this guideline and not any other third party’s." ESL then issued an apology to fans.
Continued hopes
Last year, we looked at some of the DPC rules that we didn't know needed, which applied mostly to players/teams. This year we explored an issue that Valve continues to be *mostly* hands-off about — DPC slot ownership.
There is still clearly much work to do regarding the rules/implementation/communication between Valve, Tournament Organizers, teams, and the community when it comes to the DPC.
Is it too much to hope that changes will be made? We won't hold our breath.
