Fans look on at Season 3 World Championship. © Riot eSports

eSports is in a vulnerable state of growth, making it a ripe target for people to take advantage of in any way they can. Scams come out of the woodwork all the time, whether it’s a new tournament organization or just a team owner hoping to cash in a few extra checks . It happens, mainly because there isn’t much enforcement.

League of Legends is different though. Riot policies the League Championship Series and enforces the rules when necessary, making it known that there’s no place in the LCS for any shenanigans. They’ve done an excellent job of it in the past and have been very transparent about doing so, hoping to ward off any future occurrences. We broke down a few instances of this and explain why it’s so important that it continues.

Allegations and Investigations of Cheating

Accusations of cheating are very tricky situations no matter what setting you’re in. It takes careful examination and massive amounts of time to go through and determine whether the accusations are accurate or simply baseless ploys with ulterior motives.

In the case of Azubu Frost, Riot determined that they were very much accurate claims. According to the report, Jang “Woong” Gun-woong of Azubu Frost looked at the large projector screen –meant for the spectators—during a match against Team SoloMid at the World Playoffs to view TSM’s minimap and give his team a competitive advantage by allowing them to alter their gameplay based on this new information.

This incident was caught on film, but they didn’t just go off the footage. Instead, they reexamined photos, videos, and even renders of the stage layouts to determine exact sightlines of players at the time they looked to the screen. This was a common issue at Worlds, with other incidents beyond the one cited, but no other teams altered their gameplay because of this knowledge, and that “tangible impact” is what Riot deemed to be worth punishment. They fined Azubu Frost $30,000 USD, which was 20% of their tournament winnings, after they went on to take the win and advance to the semi-finals.

Team Poaching Is Not Allowed

In January of 2013, Riot issued a $2,000 USD fine to TSM’s Søren “Bjergsen” Bjerg for poaching another player from Lemondogs when he left Ninjas in Pyjamas for Team SoloMid. One condition for his move from NiP to TSM was that he find a suitable replacement player for NiP and, in doing so, he knowingly approached another professional player and bypassed his manager, which is against the official LCS rule set .

Bjergsen concentrates during a match. © Riot eSports

It states that no player can solicit or make an offer to another team’s player while they’re signed to an LCS team in an attempt to have them break their contract with said team. He clearly violated this and, in order to keep stuff like this from happening again, was personally fined.

Toxicity Will Get You Nowhere

Seemingly most important, Riot have been issuing punishment and fines for exhibiting poor behavior, using offensive and vulgar language in-game and on streams, and even threats to cut off access to teams. They’ve handed out long-term bans before, but never anything to the extent of what they did in January 2013.

Following years of negative, racist, toxic, and downright harassing play, Khaled “StunnedandSlayed” Abusagr of Team Solo Mebdi was issued a lifetime ban from competitive play in any LCS or Riot-affiliated tournaments. At the same time, another member of Team Solo Mebdi, Nicolaj “Veigodx” Jensen was also issued a lifetime ban for “a consistent pattern” of in-game verbal abuse, offensive behavior, negative attitude, and involvement in a high number of DDOS attacks against other players, all of which he had already been punished for by the Tribunal three times prior.

This applies to team owners as well. In June 2014, Riot fined Michael “Odee” O’Dell, managing director of Team Dignitas, for using vulgar and offensive language while streaming, after which he threatened to cut off press access to the team if he were censored.

Zero Tolerance

Riot isn’t messing around. They’ve handed out numerous six-month and one-year bans to professional players who exhibit this type of behavior, showing no leniency because of their professional status. In doing so, they’ve helped curb some of the toxic behavior that was surfacing throughout professional circles.

These punishments are extreme, but fall directly in line with Riot’s promise to uphold the Summoner’s Code and work to keep League of Legends as safe and non-toxic as possible.

That’s why it’s so important that Riot continues to police and enforce the rules of the League Championship Series as it does, leaving no room for any of that nonsense. By doing this, they create an environment that shows no tolerance for unprofessional behavior and that’s exactly what eSports needs.