An in any other case unremarkable (at the very least for the broader public) weekend of DOTA 2 motion received much more controversial on Saturday when Virtus.professional’s Ivan ‘Pure’ Moskalenko was caught allegedly drawing an emblem of help for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine over the in-game minimap.
As Yahoo first reported, throughout a qualifier for the ESL One Stockholm Major, Pure could possibly be seen drawing the letter “Z” on the map. That letter, seen painted on Russian army {hardware} throughout the first weeks of the assault, has grown to develop into an emblem of help amongst Russian individuals for the actions of their armed forces and president Vladimir Putin.
(If you wish to learn extra on the thriller of the image and the way it has blown up, The Guardian has a rundown on a number of the theories of its origin, that are murky since there’s no “Z” within the Russian Cyrillic alphabet”)
You can see Pure draw the “Z” within the top-left nook of the map within the video beneath, earlier than he pauses and begins to cross it out. His teammates, drawing in several colors, can be seen rapidly attempting to attract over the letter.
Their efforts have been for naught; individuals did discover, and rapidly, main Pure and Virtus.professional to difficulty a proof/apology, which boiled all the way down to Pure claiming the image—drawn by a Russian on a Russian workforce taking part in in opposition to opponents that includes two Ukrainian gamers— “occurred by chance”.
The organisers of the qualifying match have been having none of it. A press release launched by Beyond The Summit the following day mentioned:
Outsiders is disqualified from the DPC EEU Tour 2 Regional Playoffs. Mind Games will obtain a retroactive forfeit win for his or her match earlier at present.
All future matches Outsiders would have performed are forfeit as effectively.
Following that motion, Virtus.professional themselves launched an announcement, which spends most of its time disputing the severity of the punishment (“Valve has a sure historical past of imposing disciplinary measures, however disqualifying the entire workforce from a DPC match based mostly on a drawing on a minimap by single participant units up an entire new precedent”), earlier than including on the finish that Pure has had his contract terminated for “quite a lot of hurt to our relationship with the worldwide esports society”:
Right after the incident with Pure throughout sport 1 we contacted Valve and the match organizer whereas conducting our personal investigation. Sergey Glamazda, CEO of Virtus.professional, personally talked to the gamers between the video games to search out out extra about what occurred. Pure publicly defined himself proper after the sport. BTS additionally contacted different gamers of our workforce to listen to their facet of the story. We have been notified that the ultimate choice was as much as the writer.
The severity of the punishment is stunning. Valve has a sure historical past of imposing disciplinary measures, however disqualifying the entire workforce from a DPC match based mostly on a drawing on a minimap by single participant units up a entire new precedent.
Any actions have penalties, whether or not intentional or not. Virtus.professional has been constantly opposing any circumstances of inciting hatred in esports. The membership terminates contract with Ivan “Pure” Moskalenko for his diminishing actions that led to disqualification from the match and triggered quite a lot of hurt to our relationship with the worldwide esports society.
Further adjustments in our roster will probably be introduced individually.
