aAa, Mousesports Players Banned from League Championship Series

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Riot has made an extensive post on their forums outlining the bannings of two European layers from the upcoming League Championship series. Ilyas “EnVision” Hartsema and Damien “Linak” Lorthios have both been barred from competition under similar circumstances as Christian “IWillDominate” Rivera was late in 2012. This will leave Mousesports and against All authority down a player with less than a week before the European LCS qualifier is set to begin.

Hartsema had received 18 punishments over multiple accounts, two permanent bans, and with one alias having one of the “highest harassment scores ever recorded”. Another had amassed 436 reports in 136 games, which is an astronomical 3.2 reports per game average. He had been punished five times in the last two months alone, and at peak, he was among the worst 0.06% of all European accounts.

As a result, Hartsema is ineligible to compete in both the EU LCS qualifier from January 25-27, and the LCS itself for one year. Riot also had this to say in their thread:

Hartsema has consistently engaged in behavior which violates the letter and spirit of the Summoner¢s Code. His persistent tendency to engage in verbal abuse, insults and offensive behavior is unacceptable for any player, especially a high-profile eSports competitor who has a regular opportunity to lead the community by example.

Lorthios had statistics pointing towards a large amount of reports stemming from Offensive Language, Verbal Abuse, and Negative Attitude; apparently he had been reported in 20% of total matches, which Riot reports as four time greater than the average EU player. He received 7 punishments on another permanently banned account, and apparently worsened as aAa prepared to compete in the LCS qualifier.

Public opinion seems to be fine with the banning, but not with the timing of it. The teams will have days to scramble for replacement players, possibly affecting their performance in the qualifiers. A post from Joey “YoungBuck” Steltenpool’s Facebook outlined the situation that Mouseports was facing:

I am sorry to inform all the fans of myself, Arthana, Kujaa, Warhunter, Envision (formerly known as ShookL2) and mouz sports that I have some very bad news.
This morning we were informed by RIOT that they prohibit Envision from playing the Season 3 offline qualifier.
With only 4 days left to train this is the worst thing that could happen to us, not only is Envision punished severely but the dreams and hopes of 4 other individuals are destroyed by this extremely late decision.

The post continues, acknowledging EnVision’s past record, but points out that Riot seemed to be fine with it.

It is no secret that Envision used to be a summoner with bad behavior however when he found his first pro team in October 2012 he changed his attitude severely when realising that being a professional comes with certain responsibilities.
To leave his bad past behind him he decided to change his name to Envision and played with us for several weeks while showing a good attitude and teamspirit throughout every match.
Riot has known since the Season 3 Online qualifier that Envision used to go by the name of Shookl2 and they allowed him to play the online qualifier without any issues.

While these bans are obviously ill-timed, Riot has a responsibility to shape the player base to what they think is beneficial. However, while these bans don’t seem to be undeserved, dragging four other players down with them seems a bit awkward, at best. Hopefully Season Three will serve as a place to smooth out these logistical problems for future seasons, and these bannings will serve as a message for teams to be a bit more careful of who they sign.

Category: Scene News