League Dispute Case List

Any major league judgement calls, against clans, players, referees or even Admins themselves will be fully detailed here - as and when they occur. You will be notified on the main news page of the League when this page is updated.

Admin Report: -=EN=- vs. [UsD|

21:00 Thursday 17th October

At the above time, an ECSL match was scheduled between the above clans. The match was played on the -=EN=- Server, which has been approved for ECSL use by the Admins.

Players for -=EN=- were: Angelus, Bu||3t, c4r|, Pete and Sn0wy

Players for [UsD| were: Carb3h, Monk, ReNt-A-kiLL, Spartacus, Zone

What Occurred:

[UsD| dropped after 6 rounds, claiming that they did not know the match had started, when -=EN=- told them it had. There was also a Merc allegation involving two -=EN=- members.

Admins were consulted. As Divisional Admin for Division 3, Lemo took responsibility for sorting the conflict out.

Had the Game Started?:

The Recorded Demo and the Server Logs clearly show that the game had started. There were two restart rounds as required, and RCON SAY was used to state that the game was live. A player from [UsD| did drop from the game before the restarts had completed, however, they were already underway and thus -=EN=- had no obligation to stop the game. The game was not paused, which is fine as Section 4 IV of the ECSL rules state 'The game will not be paused, clans will have to play at a disadvantage until the player reconnects.'

[UsD| should have continued playing under the circumstances. However, although everything was legal and within the rules, -=EN=- could be considered unsporting, as a shot had not been fired or any enemies seen when the player dropped, and they could have easily agreed to not continue until the player had reconnected, or suicide a player to even the teams up. However, they were not obligated to do so.

Merc Allegation:

A picture from the status screen shows that -=EN=- Sn0wy had a different WONID from that listed in his player profile. This was said to be a mistake, with Sn0wy playing on a different computer which had a different copy of HL installed. Section 6 III of the ECSL rules state that 'A Merc is a player that is not a full member of the clan - We will not accept any more excuses that the player is "trialling".'This Merc claim was investigated, and it was decided that it was Sn0wy who was playing, and not someone else. Sn0wy has been found to be a full-member of -=EN=-.

Player Behaviour:

Everyone was angry, there were arguments. -=EN=- were unhappy about some of the language used by [UsD|. Looking at the recorded demo, server logs* and the IRC logs, this is quite unreasonable. (*Although team chat messages were visible in the server logs, these were ignored as private messages).

Lemo, who was investigating what happened, has also complained about the language used by Spartacus in a PM whilst he was sorting the conflict out. The ECSL rules, Section 8 I, clearly state that 'The Admin's and Referee's work constantly behind the scenes of the ECSL for your good and enjoyment. They will not and never deserve to take shit from anyone as they do this out of their spare time and voluntarily. If you slag off clans during a match, on the IRC servers or in the forums, then your clan will face penalisation, or face banning from all of the ECSL servers and the ECSL league. Sorry no behaving like kiddies in our League.'

In IRC, some [UsD| players felt it was unfair they were banned from the #ecsl-admin channel. However, in such circumstances, the ECSL likes to talk to one single person from each clan. Thus all players were removed from the channel except Zone, who, as Clan Leader, was asked to represent the clan.

Resulting Action:

Lemo decided on the following course of action:

• The match should be replayed. This will take place on a neutral server and a League Referee will be present.
• Sn0wy gets a one-match ban for failing to have the correct WONID.
• Spartacus is banned from the ECSL for abuse towards an independent admin.

Having investigated all the facts, Senior Admins at the ECSL believe that Lemo made the correct choices within the rules of the ECSL. We also feel he acted independently, regarding the -=EN=- players as clan players rather than other Admins for the purpose of this conflict. However, we feel that the following should also occur:

• Spartacus be allowed to play when the game is replayed. However, the ref may remove him from the server without warning if he is being abusive.
• All further -=EN=- games for the rest of the season have an independent ref, even if the games are on the -=EN=- server.
• Some aspects of the rules will be clarified/expanded to prevent similar problems occurring in future.

The ECSL allows Admins to play for clans within the League. The Admin's job is voluntary, and we would not allow them to have to stop playing for the clans they love just because they spend time and effort to make the League work for everyone. The Divisional Admins do not play for clans within their division. Lemo acted independently to decide on a course of action that is fair to all those involved. If any clan should feel that they are being unfairly treated in a game against a clan containing an Admin, then feel free to talk to your Divisional Admin.