LGD Gaming punished for fixing ranked game

Those who have been following China's Overwatch Premier Series should be familiar with the two teams fighting for the right to be called the best team in China: LGD Gaming and Miraculous Youngster. One of those teams, LGD, will be beginning the playoffs under the cloud of disciplinary action officially announced on Weibo.

LGD was playing in ranked in a three-stack and four-stack when they queued into each other on King's Row. The two opposing stacks threw to get a draw so that neither stack would end up with a loss on the game. Someone in the game posted a video of their POV and Chinese Overwatch players took exception with the incident, often stating that as members of Team China, which four of the team's players are, throwing for a draw sets a bad example for their countrymen.

As a result of the incident, LGD was fined ¥2,000 CNY (~$300 USD) as a team, the players' accounts were banned for 30 days. Furthermore, the team will lose two map picks in the OWPS playoffs.

On top of the issues of the players attempting to manipulate match results, another issue has been raised by the Chinese Overwatch community as a result of this. Suggestions that LGD, as well as MY, are paying their players based on their ladder ranks have sprung up in the community, leading some to direct their anger at the teams rather than the players.

Despite their punishments, viewers will get to see the players of LGD in playoff action this Friday as they play against Lucky Future in the first round.