The probably best mage player from Hearthstone has been banned from a tournament. The reason is so silly that he is really annoyed.
If you are interested in the best playstyles of mage decks in Hearthstone, you have surely come across the streamer Jacob “Apxvoid” Coen. He is considered one of the best mage players in the world. He was disqualified in the current HCT tournament with the reasoning: He cheated.
What happened? The eSports team of Hearthstone did not provide any specific details, it was only mentioned that he was disqualified for a rule violation (cheating). However, Apxvoid reports in a post what actually happened.
Apxvoid explains that he was sitting next to another player during the tournament. Both were preparing for their matches and waiting for their opponents to be assigned. Because Apxvoid was quite nervous, he typed in the chat window “Should I play ‘Hard Fatigue’ in the warrior match?” and did not send this message. He just wanted his neighbor to read this message and hoped for a “nod of agreement” or something from him. However, the other player did not notice it.
It should be noted that this question was not meant to be serious and Apxvoid just wanted some distraction and agreement to lose the tension. The answer to this question was obvious, it was a purely suggestive question.
Wrong chat message leads to ban: A few minutes later, after Apxvoid had played his match, he was supposed to message one of the admins to tell him which deck he would use next. He hit “Enter” to open the chat and accidentally sent the previous message – to the admin. This raised immediate alarm and the admin suspected collusion and strategy talks during the matches. As a result, Apxvoid was disqualified.
A conversation would have been fine: The most absurd part of the situation is that Apxvoid would not have been disqualified if he had simply asked his seat neighbor out loud. Because at that time both were not in a game and a conversation – even about possible tactics – would not have been a violation of the rules. However, Apxvoid only typed to avoid disturbing the other players with conversations. That clearly backfired.
In the meantime, Apxvoid has calmed down and decided to continue his Hearthstone career anyway. The community shows compassion and finds the ban from the tournament “unusually harsh, but a rule is a rule”. This mistake is unlikely to happen to Apxvoid a second time.
How would you have decided in this matter? Is this a clear rule violation and is the disqualification justified? Or should they have been lenient here?
