League of Legends MLG Summer Championship scandal

So I don't know how many of you keep up with competitive League of Legends, but today during the MLG Summer Championships Team Curse Gaming and Team Dignitas were both disqualified. The official announcement from MLGstates that they were found guilty of collusion. Both teams decided to essentially throw the final game after they had both agreed on splitting the grand prize pot. I admittedly found the whole thing pretty shocking. I know this kind of stuff happens in the competitive Starcraft scene a lot, but this is the first time League of Legends has had such a scandal. With Riot's big push towards making LoL a leading game in the E-sports circuit, this certainly sets them back a bit. What say you Giant Bombers?

I read a Tweet about it and I began to wonder how many people actually cared about LoL and why it was at MLG. 
Turns out, a lot of people do care about LoL for some reason.  
 
Anyways, this is nothing new and to me it was only really a matter of time before this would happen. 
Heck it has probably already happened before but only just now that some people got busted trying to do it, this time that game just happened to be LoL. 
As you mentioned, it has happened before in the Starcraft scene and those games are still at MLG so I don't see Riot running into that many problems with it in the future.  
 
But hey, drama is always fun. No matter how weird and kinda sad and pathetic it is :P

I'm not surprised it was curse for one. The fact that they want to push it harder to be an e-sport makes me feel like this would help. Now that competitors are playing the "game", it's totally a legit e-sport. Apparently curse is also saying they didn't rig the games and a statement will be released soon.

If Team Marn would have won, I wouldn't be surprised.

aaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeespoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooorts

The problem was that it was so obvious that they weren't playing to win in the Grand Final. It was making a mockery of the entire thing.

No-one else was awarded 1st and 2nd place or the money from those places, just kept it 3rd onwards.

@FLStyle said:

The problem was that it was so obvious that they weren't playing to win in the Grand Final. It was making a mockery of the entire thing.

No-one else was awarded 1st and 2nd place or the money from those places, just kept it 3rd onwards.

Yeah, the fact that they went ARAM made it totally obvious that something was up. Also, Riot's VP of esports said that the prize money would be distributed to the rest of the other teams.

I doubt the people from the curse gaming team could afford this type of publicity as a professional gaming site and we will likely be looking at a entirely new roster for the next contest.

So far what I see most people bitching about(Mostly the LoLfanbois) is that MLG apparantly knew about this before they had to play each other in the finals. 
So MLG decided, according to these "people", to just let them play and then DQ them after that, that way "MLG COULD STILL EARN MONEY herpa derp derp. We don't like companies trying to make money" 

Wow this is pretty crazy. I don't really follow MLG, so I was totally unaware this kind of stuff happens in e-sports. Hopefully this at least sets a precedent for people to have a little more integrity in the future with these things, scandals like this doesn't help anyone involved.

@President_Barackbar said:

@FLStyle said:

The problem was that it was so obvious that they weren't playing to win in the Grand Final. It was making a mockery of the entire thing.

No-one else was awarded 1st and 2nd place or the money from those places, just kept it 3rd onwards.

Yeah, the fact that they went ARAM made it totally obvious that something was up. Also, Riot's VP of esports said that the prize money would be distributed to the rest of the other teams.

Huh, MLG were saying otherwise. This whole thing with Riot being in control and MLG merely hosting it, I don't like it at all, luckily the two of them agreed on this issue.

It's really bad how Riot has control of the MLG, they should have done what Valve is doing with The Intenational or just let MLG have control of the games but it's sad seeing how they need to have their actions approved by Riot.

Yo, ESports.
AAAAaaaaaAaaaAaah

@President_Barackbar said:

I know this kind of stuff happens in the competitive Starcraft scene a lot,

No it doesn't lol. In 12 years it's happened twice.

This scandal isn't nearly as interesting as I had hoped when I clicked on the topic thread. Talk to me when people are throwing shit at each other.

The whole thing was a mess, but it sounds like MLG did what they had to do. If the teams are splitting the prize money and agreeing to screw around instead of using their best strategies or actually trying to win, then what's the point of watching? I can watch people fuck around in games on tons of other places - you come to MLG for high level competitive play.

This wasn't as big a "scandal" as people are making it out to be since it's not like a team was throwing the match for serious material gain. But if you let players agree to not compete it kind of ruins the point of MLG.

It's shit like this that makes it difficult for e-sports to gain mainstream recognition. This sort of behavior hurts everyone.

I dont see how this sets Riot back with their plans for LoL, but it kinda sucks for those teams. They shouldnt have done what they did and hopefully they learn from this experience, but LoL as a competitive game is going to remain the biggest out there for a while.

Ok, I just got around to reading the post and it says nothing about an agreement to split the pot. Was this confirmed? I know they agreed to an ARAM, but I think that is all. If that is all that was agreed to, then this is pretty harmless. In fact, it sounds like a bunch of adults getting pissed about some kids having fun in a competitive environment.

"I know this kind of stuff happens in the competitive Starcraft scene a lot"

Stop spewing your shit when you clearly don't know anything.

@Ravenlight said:

It's shit like this that makes it difficult for e-sports to gain mainstream recognition. This sort of behavior hurts everyone.

I don't think mainstream folks will care. This sort of thing is short lived and will only tarnish the reputations of the players involved. Sports in general have much bigger and more controversial scandals but it never turns people away from playing the sport, only to denounce the people involved.

This might seem like a weird way to look at it, but who cares? Up to that point they've proven they were the two best teams, if they want to prize split that should be acceptable. It's money they've earned and they should be able to do what they want with it. I also find it odd that the viewers are such self entitled babies that they believe they're entitled to watching a good match. Why? I think the only biggest problem in all of this is that people care so much about prize splitting. It isn't that big of a thing.

I know calling your team Dignitas is in really poor taste.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dignitas_(assisted_dying_organisation)

@A_Talking_Donkey said:

This might seem like a weird way to look at it, but who cares? Up to that point they've proven they were the two best teams, if they want to prize split that should be acceptable. It's money they've earned and they should be able to do what they want with it. I also find it odd that the viewers are such self entitled babies that they believe they're entitled to watching a good match. Why? I think the only biggest problem in all of this is that people care so much about prize splitting. It isn't that big of a thing.

The point of the tournament isn't to decide the better team. The point of the tournament is to DRAW EYEBALLS AND MAKE MONEY.

@President_Barackbar: I hate to tell you but this doesn't happen often in SC:BW or SC2. In 12 years it happened twice.

@President_Barackbar: I hate to tell you but this doesn't happen often in SC:BW or SC2. In 12 years it happened twice.

@President_Barackbar said:

@kingofpeanuts

@President_Barackbar: I hate to tell you but this doesn't happen often in SC:BW or SC2. In 12 years it happened twice.

I honestly didn't know, I was just going based off some Bombcast chat from a while ago where they made it sound like it happens all the time.

Don't base your knowledge of competitive gaming from any member of the Giant Bomb staff, not even Brad. They mean well but pay far too little attention to competitive gaming to be able to credibly inform you of anything.

@Jumanji said:

@A_Talking_Donkey said:

This might seem like a weird way to look at it, but who cares? Up to that point they've proven they were the two best teams, if they want to prize split that should be acceptable. It's money they've earned and they should be able to do what they want with it. I also find it odd that the viewers are such self entitled babies that they believe they're entitled to watching a good match. Why? I think the only biggest problem in all of this is that people care so much about prize splitting. It isn't that big of a thing.

The point of the tournament isn't to decide the better team. The point of the tournament is to DRAW EYEBALLS AND MAKE MONEY.

This makes the assumption that those who don't follow/play the game have enough understanding to care about it at all. Reality is the only people who are interested in e-sports are those with enough understanding to care about who the best is. What other incentive is there to watch other people play video games competitively? As far as I can tell there isn't a big demographic of people interested in teams of isometric fantasy dudes throwing fireballs at each other. The point of competition is to know who the best is, and those who are interested in competition are people interested in knowing who the best is.

Hey isn't theres the tournament at pax with a lot of money on the line?

@Ravenlight said:

It's shit like this that makes it difficult for e-sports to gain mainstream recognition. This sort of behavior hurts everyone.

i wouldnt say so there been stuff like this in actual sports the biggest one to come to mind is the black socks scandal of baseball....a comeptitive scene be it sports or mlg has this type of crap

It's really bad how Riot has control of the MLG, they should have done what Valve is doing with The Intenational or just let MLG have control of the games but it's sad seeing how they need to have their actions approved by Riot.

Hey isn't theres the tournament at pax with a lot of money on the line?

Awww man, I was hoping this was about poo flinging again. Oh well that sucks big time. Makes their community look bad, and it's already LoL so it doesn't look that great to begin with.

@Jumanji said:

@A_Talking_Donkey said:

This might seem like a weird way to look at it, but who cares? Up to that point they've proven they were the two best teams, if they want to prize split that should be acceptable. It's money they've earned and they should be able to do what they want with it. I also find it odd that the viewers are such self entitled babies that they believe they're entitled to watching a good match. Why? I think the only biggest problem in all of this is that people care so much about prize splitting. It isn't that big of a thing.

The point of the tournament isn't to decide the better team. The point of the tournament is to DRAW EYEBALLS AND MAKE MONEY.

exactly, if I paid money to go watch some play or stream e-sports, you're damn right I'd be upset that they threw the match.

You would never see real Pro Sports take this sort of thing lightly for good reason. You don't treat your customers that way.