One day before the new season of E-Sports for Hearthstone starts, Blizzard has banned one of the 48 Grandmasters, Paul “Zalae” Nemeth, from the tournament. This is referred to as “allegations” against him.
This is the short-term ban: On April 9, the new season of the “Hearthstone Grandmasters” begins. 16 selected players from each region will compete against each other. These are the Grandmasters, handpicked super players, of which there are only 48 in the world.
But in the “Americas” region, one is now missing: Instead of 16 players, only 15 will compete.
For Blizzard announced just before the tournament started:
“Hearthstone Esports is aware that there are allegations against the Americas Grandmaster, Paul “Zalae” Nemeth.
Until the investigation is complete, we have excluded Zalae from participating in all E-Sports events in Hearthstone.”
Hearthstone E-Sports, Tweet
Ex-girlfriend made allegations already in January
What are the allegations? Blizzard does not elaborate further. But it is obvious that they refer to allegations made three months ago by Zalae’s ex-girlfriend (via twitter).
On January 19, the streamer and community manager from Mythgard, Rini, published a post on Twitter and a video on YouTube:
- The two had lived together and according to Rini, during the end of the relationship, there were situations where she felt threatened by Zalae: He had loomed over her and pressured her.
- At the end of the relationship, he became so angry once that he grabbed her, threw her onto the bed, sat on her, and held a pillow over her face, so that she could not breathe – only when she shouted “I can’t breathe anymore”, did he let go of her.
- The next morning, he woke her up early and told her she needed to leave the house quickly, as he no longer felt safe.
Rini describes in detail the difficulties in the relationship with Zalae. The problem is that they had a strong connection with each other, but Zalae is a control freak who urgently needs anger management therapy.
After the ban of Zalae, Rini wrote that she now feels so “heard” that she is speechless.
Grandmaster was introduced as a participant, then banned
Why is the ban coming so late? It is unclear why Zalae was introduced as one of the 16 participants only to be banned afterward. Blizzard is refusing to comment to the parties who have inquired, stating simply: They do not discuss internal investigations.
However, Zalae’s ban is said to last for at least a year.
It can probably be assumed that a 16th player will be found for the big tournament in Hearthstone.
The problem is that there are only these 48 Hearthstone Grandmasters – these are the 16 best players in a region. It is difficult to be promoted to Grandmaster. Blizzard has also been criticized for the Grandmaster system: It only promotes the best players, while all others can hardly earn money with Hearthstone.
In 2021, Blizzard finds itself for the second time in a situation where they have to deal with allegations against a prominent player of one of their games. The former Overwatch superstar, Sinatraa, was also accused by an ex-girlfriend of serious allegations:
Blizzard distances itself from the former best Overwatch player in the world
