Valorant Tournament Rules

This rulebook outlines the rules that should at all times be followed when participating in any Varsity Esports competition or tournament. Failure to adhere to these rules may be penalized as outlined. Varsity Esports administrators' decisions are final where they are taken to preserve fair play and sportsmanship, regardless of whether they are specifically supported or detailed in this rulebook. We reserve the right to extend, change, exchange or delete these rules if necessary. We undertake to ensure that the competition is enjoyable, fair, fun and exciting for everyone involved. Please be aware that only the current iteration of the rules are valid. Rules used in previous events no longer apply.

Player Eligibility

• All players participating in the Varsity esports Valorant Tournament must have a valid PSN ID, Xbox ID or Origin ID.

• Bona fide student

• 60 credits in last year of study

• 25 years or younger in age

Nationality and Residence

• All players must be a registered student at participating Universities.

• All players must have a valid Riot ID

• South African teams can be paid their winnings via their South African bank accounts OR PayPal accounts.

Tournament Format

• Game mode: Kick-off. Online Friendlies.

• THIS TOURNAMENT IS NOT USING ULTIMATE TEAM. It is using Normal Online Friendlies.

• All players will be in a single bracket

• All games will be best of 1 and finals best of 3

Game & Platform

• Valorant

• PC Only

Match Settings

• Party Status: Closed

• Allow Cheats: Off

• Tournament Mode: On

• Overtime Win by 2: On

• Map bans can be done here

• All matches must be played on the Cape Town server.

Map Pool

The map pool will be as follows

• Abyss

• Ascent

• Bind

• Corrode

• Haven

• Lotus

• Sunset

MAP SELECTION

Seeding will determine which team begins the veto process. High seed decides which team they want to be. In case of no seeding, flip a coin will let the winners decide if they want to be TEAM A or TEAM B.

For BO1

• For Best-Of-One events, teams must ban maps until there is only one remaining, The remaining map will be played

For BO3

For best-of-three events, map ban will take place as follows:

• Team A will ban first map.

• Team B will ban second map.

• Team A will pick map 1 (played first in the best-of-three)

• Team B will pick a side for map 1

• Team B will pick map 2 (played second in the best-of-three)

• Team A will pick a side for map 2

• Team A will ban a map

• Team B will ban a map

• The last map will be the map that is left after bans.

BANNED AGENTS

• N/A

SCRIPTS & IN GAME ACTIONS

The following actions are strictly prohibited during the event and will result in a round loss

• Using pause during a round is forbidden (except for technical problems at the end of a round or during freeze time.).

• Using bugs that change the game principle (i.e. spawn bugs, leaving the map, etc.).

• Using bugs that allow players to see through floors and walls.

• Out of map Cypher cameras as well as cameras that are unable to be destroyed.

• Any form of script is forbidden.

• Any custom (game) files.

All players are required to follow the VALORANT anti-cheat rules.

How to win

The first team to 13 rounds, or win by 2 rounds in overtime, will be declared the match winner

Match Results

• All players are responsible for reporting the results of a match

• Screenshots need to be submitted for each match round.

• You will need to submit your teams score as well as the screenshot to confirm this. If you have any difficulties, just contact an admin on the Match page chat or on the Mettlestate Discord.

• The league bracket will be updated automatically once all your scores for the match have been submitted and accepted by the opposing team.

Match Pages

Match pages allow for communication between 2 teams, scheduling games and uploading scores. To find your match page, click on your match in the current bracket. A popup will show with the selected match and match details. Click on the "MATCH PAGE" button to go to the matching page.

To find out more on how to use match pages, follow our guided tour here.

How to submit your score

• Once you have finished your lobby, click on the "SCORES" tab on your match page.

• Submit the score for both teams, and don't forget to upload the screenshot for validation

DISCORD

• All participating teams must add themselves to the Varsity Esports Varsity Esports Discord, and communicate in the Valorant channel, as ALL team communication and important league announcements will be made there and also through your Coordinators .

• Mettlestate will not be held liable due to the team's failure to know of updates made to the league due to not being on our discord.

• To get to the Valorant channel on discord first, follow the link above then go to bot-commands and click the Valorant emoji

Substitute Players

It is only allowed to substitute a player before the match starts, this player needs to be registered as a reserve for your team. If the match is started, all 5 players of a team must play the game until the end. It is possible to switch players in a Bo2 between the maps. A team is allowed to have 2 substitute player.

No show

If a team cannot play at the scheduled start time, there will be a 15 minute grace period after which the team that did not show up, will forfeit that match.

Number of players

5 players

Disconnects

In the case that a player(s) disconnects during a match, the team is allowed to continue to play the match.

Forfeit

Participants can choose to forfeit a match if they wish. Forfeiting will result in 0 points from that match and possible penalty points.

Coaches

Coaches may be used by their teams in the coach's slot

Roster

Team rosters must consist of at least 5 members to participate in our event. Teams are only allowed to play with players registered to their team roster and a valid Riot ID. All roster changes must be made before the start of the event. Playing with different players and/or illegal ringers will result in a match forfeit. The team must play with their registered roster of 5 players for the duration of the whole event.

The roster must consist of 5 players. 2 reserves is allowed.

Game version

All players must install the newest version of the game to participate in the Mettlestate league. Ensure that updates are installed before your match starts, so delays will be at a minimum.

Technical Issues

Teams are responsible for their own technical issues (hardware/internet). Matches will not be rescheduled because of technical issues and matches will be played regardless.

General rules

1. Global Rules

1.1. General

The league administration has the right to decide outside or even against the rulebook in special cases to guarantee fair play.

1.2. Code of Conduct

Every participant has to behave with respect towards the representatives of Varsity esports, press, viewers, partners, and other players. The participants are requested to represent esports, Varsity esports, and their Sponsors honourably. This applies to behaviour in-game and in chats, messengers, comments, and other media. We expect players to conduct themselves according to the following values:

• Compassion: treat others as you would be treated.

• Integrity: Be honest, be committed, play fair.

• Respect: Show respect to all other humans, including teammates, competitors, and event staff.

• Courage: Be courageous in competition and in standing up for what is right.

Participants must not engage in harassment or hate speech in any form. This includes, but is not limited to:

• Hate speech, offensive behaviour, or verbal abuse related to sex, gender identity, and expression, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity, disability, physical appearance, body size, age, or religion.

• Stalking or intimidation (physically or online).

• Spamming, raiding, hijacking, or inciting disruption of streams or social media.

• Posting or threatening to post other people’s personally identifying information (“doxing”).

• Unwelcome sexual attention. This includes unwelcome sexualized comments, jokes, and sexual advances.

• Advocating for, or encouraging, any of the above behaviour. Please refer to the AnyKey Keystone Code to learn more about good sporting behaviour. Refer to the ESIC Code of Conduct for detailed conduct rules and penalties

Violation of this Code may include disqualification or banning from future Varsity esports events.

1.2.1. Insults and offensive behaviour

All insults that happen during a Varsity esports match or on Varsity esports platforms, may be punished. This includes but is not limited to in-game chat of the corresponding game, guestbooks, forums, Match- or News-Comments, Varsity esports messages, Match-Chat, game ID's. Insults that happen on external messengers are not taken into account.

Severe incidents including, but not limited to the following points, may be punished in other ways:

• Extremist statements

• Threat of violence

• Sexual harassment

• Stalking

• Severe insults

• Pornographic linking

The right to appeal is only with the injured.

1.2.2. Spamming

The excessive posting of futile, annoying, or offensive contributions within Varsity esports is considered spamming. Spamming on the website (forums, player comments, support- and protest pages, etc) is penalized as follows:

• Written warning for the first offense

• 1-week ban for the second spamming incident.

• 2-week ban for the third spamming incident.

• 3-week ban for the fourth and any further spamming incidents.

The decisive factor, therefore, is the number of active penalties for spamming.

1.2.3. Public behaviour

All participants shall abstain, at all times, from poor, undesirable, or negative behaviour towards anybody involved with the tournament in any way.

All participants shall abstain, at all times, from any action or inaction that brings anybody involved with the tournament in any way into public disrepute, contempt, scandal, or ridicule or reduces the public relations or commercial value of any involved party. This includes derogatory comments aimed at Varsity esports, its partners, or products in interviews, statements, and/or social media channels.

1.3. Matches, competitions, meetings

In all competitions, there should be a fair playing field for all players. Every encounter, whether a ladder match or other competition must be played according to the rules until it is complete and the result on the Varsity esports page entered, or at events the result sheet is completed. Any encounter that did not take place, should be deleted. Matches will be opened only by admins to delete exceptions. Matches that did not take place will be considered fake matches and will be punished. It is not allowed for participants to bet on matches in their competition. Betting against yourself (in team leagues: against your team) will get you (in team leagues: your team) disqualified and the betting player(s) banned.

Players and teams that are already qualified for or participating in an event (e.g. Pro Series or any offline event) or the later stages of a tournament (e.g. Open/Challenger Series) are not allowed to participate in any of its ongoing or upcoming qualifiers. In the case of a player or team breaching this rule, they will be disqualified from the current qualifier and may face further punishment, up to and including disqualification from the event.

1.4. Game/client

In general, all programs which are not part of the original game, including custom data and modifications, are not allowed in any Varsity esports game. All external voice programs are allowed (e.g. Discord, Teamspeak, Ventrilo, etc.). Scripts and changes to the game's configuration are allowed unless they are partly or completely forbidden by the league-specific rules. Programs that provide an advantage during gameplay (e.g. drivers that allow the removing of walls) are forbidden. Any programs that change the game itself are forbidden.

1.5. Game Coverage

Varsity esports reserves exclusive right to the coverage of Varsity esports matches. This includes all forms of transmission, including IRC Bots, Shoutcast-streams, HLTV, and Varsity esports Twitch Broadcasts. Varsity esports can assign the coverage rights of a match or several matches to a third party or the actual players themselves. In this case, terms and conditions would have to be arranged with the Varsity esports management before the match.

In general, Varsity esports will contact any player or team if they wish to broadcast one of their matches. If no contact is made, individual players are allowed to arrange their broadcasts. Should the game take place on a server that Varsity esports administrators have no direct access to, it must be made sure that enough slots are available for the according to clients.

1.6. Internal Texts

All texts written in either protest or support tickets or written by the administrators to members of a certain league or tournament, cannot be published without the permission of Varsity esports.

1.7. Language

The official language of this national section is English. All players should be able to communicate in English and to do so.

2. Fraud/deception

2.1. Deception

The attempt to deceive admins or other players with wrong or fake statements, information, or data will not be tolerated.

2.2. Other unauthorized offenses

Including but not limited to the abusing of bugs on the website. These penalties are at the discretion of the responsible admin and are penalized according to severity.

2.3. Cheating

All forms of cheating in Varsity esports matches are forbidden and will be penalized by Varsity esports. Players found cheating outside Varsity esports may be barred from Varsity esports competitions depending on the evidence available. Note, we do not accept publicly submitted demo or screenshot evidence in these cases. Should it become known to Varsity esports administrators that any form of cheating was used to the advantage of a player or a team during a Varsity esports match, Varsity esports reserves the right to punish them to the full extent of the rules available. By breaking any rule, a player risks being barred or completely excluded from a specific league or all leagues. This also includes their team.

The use of programs (or "hacks") or other methods to circumvent, modify or in any way manipulate Varsity esports Anticheat is forbidden. Any use of such programs or methods will be punished as cheating. Even testing of such programs or methods in a match not happening within the Varsity esports will be punished.

2.3.1. Distribution of cheats

Contributing to the distribution of cheats in any way is not allowed on Varsity esports. This includes but is not limited to referring to the name, website, or logo of cheats anywhere on Varsity esports, such as player profiles, team profiles, forums, comments, guest book entries, etc.

Violating this rule will be punished from a warning up to exclusion from Varsity esports competitions.

2.3.2. Cheating Sanctions

Disqualification from the tournament results voided, forfeiture of prize money, ban between 2 years and lifetime depending on age and level of player and nature/size of tournament and how the player cheated. Cheating at a professional level (i.e. where qualification for a professional event is at stake) should normally result in a 5-year ban, but, in aggravating circumstances, can result in a lifetime ban.

2.3.3. Rehabilitation

Nevertheless, first offenders willing to intensively deal with their situation can get a second chance. This will be dealt with on a case-by-case basis with Varsity esports management.

2.4. Match-Fixing/betting fraud

Engaging in any action that improperly influences the outcome of a game or match by any means.

2.4.1. Match-Fixing Sanctions

Results voided, 5-year ban unless significant mitigating factors or, in the presence of aggravating circumstances, a longer ban, forfeiture of prize money, and monetary fine (if discovered before the end of a tournament, disqualification).

2.5. Doping

Any kind of doping is forbidden.

2.5.1. Prescribed medication

If players have an active prescription for a substance on the WADA list, they must send proof to the tournament administration before the first day of the tournament (deadline in local time). They may still be subject to a doping test, but a positive result for the prescribed substance will be disregarded.

2.5.2. Doping Sanctions

Mild cases of doping will be punished with a warning for the participant. Severe cases (i.e. use of drugs containing performance-enhancing substances, like Adderall) will be punished as follows: Results voided, ban of between 1 and 2 years, forfeiture of prize money (if discovered before the end of a tournament, disqualification).

2.6. Competition manipulation and bribery

Bribing or attempting to bribe a referee or organizer or trying to manipulate the competition.

2.6.1. Competition manipulation and bribery Sanctions

Results voided, ban of between 1 and 2 years, forfeiture of prize money, and monetary fine (if discovered before the end of a tournament, disqualification)

2.7. Second and subsequent offenses

For second and subsequent offenses, participants should expect far harsher sanctions and in all likelihood a lifetime ban from esports.

3. Accounts

3.1. Player

A Varsity esports Account can only be created if the user is at least six years old. When registering, each player must provide an up-to-date and correct email address, and it is the player’s responsibility to keep this up to date. To play in a ladder, a method of contact must be available and visible to all users in your player profile.

3.1.1. Multi-Accounts

Each player in Varsity esports must only have one account! If a player cannot access his account and then creates a new one, then he/she must open a support ticket explaining in detail the reason for not being able to access the account.

3.1.2. Nicknames, Team Names, and URL Aliases

We reserve the right to edit Nicknames and/or URL aliases if they fail to comply with the following requirements.

Nicknames/aliases are forbidden if they:

• are protected by third-party rights and the user has no written permission

• resemble or if they are identical to a brand or trademark, no matter whether it has been registered or not

• resemble or if they are identical to a real person other than themselves

• use names of Varsity esports Gaming products

• resemble or if they are identical to the names of Varsity esports employees

• are nonsense

In addition to the above, any nicknames/team names/aliases that are purely commercial (e.g. product names), defamatory, pejorative, offensive, vulgar, obscene, anti-Semitic, inciting hatred, or offending against good manners are forbidden. Using alternative spelling, gibberish, or wrong spelling to avoid the requirements mentioned above is illegal. We reserve the right to extend, change, exchange or delete these rules if necessary.

3.1.3. Country

A player's country must be set to their country of residence. Deliberately faking the country of residence is punishable.

If a player's country of residence is changed to avoid any country restrictions or if the player is trying to fake or abuse, they will be punished with 2 penalty points. If the player does so and plays in a team match, the team will get 3 penalty points and the match is deleted.

3.1.4. Account sharing

Each Varsity esports account is strictly personal and cannot be shared with other Varsity esports users and/or other players that do not have a Varsity esports account. Failure to comply with this rule will result in a ban of up to 6 months.

The original registrant must always be the final user of the account, which cannot be lent or transferred in any case. This will be considered as account sharing or multi-account and pursued according to Varsity esports rules.

3.2. Teams

A team's name does not have to be unique, but Varsity esports reserves the right to refuse clans with the same or similar names as a well-known clan (e.g. If you named your team “Dimitri’s Boys" or “Dimitris Bois” etc, that would not be allowed).

Names that are restricted by law will not be accepted and will be deleted if found. Also, names that go against all forms of etiquette and good manners will not be accepted.

The logo must represent the team and have some reference to the team's name or the team's short handle. Copyrighted logos or logos which go against etiquette and good manners will not be accepted.

3.2.1. Changing team names

A team can change its name at any time. This also applies when a team is restructured.

Changing a team's name to fool other teams is forbidden. Extremely long names or consistent changing of team names is prohibited and can be punished.

3.2.2. Players in the team

A player may only play for one team in a tournament or league. Participants in a Varsity esports Pro Series may not also play in the Varsity esports Open Series underneath it.

3.2.3. Sponsors/partnerships

Varsity esports administration reserves the right to prohibit or remove teams with sponsors or partners that are solely or widely known for pornographic, drug use, or other adults/mature themes and products from partaking in Varsity esports events at any time.

3.2.4. MULTIPLE TEAM OWNERSHIP

No Team is permitted to be completely or partially owned or controlled by a person or entity that owns or controls another esports team or organisation participating in a Varsity esports tournament.

4. Participation in prize tournaments

Unless otherwise explicitly permitted, it is not allowed for employees of Varsity esports, its subsidiaries or partners, volunteer or contractor staff or employees that are in some way connected to a respective tournament including sponsors, publishers, or game developers, to participate in prize-winning tournaments, qualification for prize-winning tournaments or pro qualifiers.

Prize-winning means any tournaments with physical (e.g. hardware) or money prizes.

In case you win prize money, depending on the payment method you choose, there might be fees. Varsity esports will cover the fees on the sender's end and the recipient will cover the fees on the recipient's end.

If in doubt, please contact support.

5. Copyright

The participating teams acknowledge that any Copyright and Intellectual Property Rights used, created or embodied in connection with the Tournament will remain the exclusive property of Varsity esports and/or its sponsors. All Varsity esports graphics, logos, designs, page headers, icons, scripts and names are registered trademarks, trademarks or trade dress of Varsity esports, may not be used, including as part of trademarks and/or as part of domain names, in connection with any material produced as a result of this tournament or in any manner that is likely to confuse and may not be copied, imitated, or used, in whole or in part, without the prior written permission of Varsity esports. The participating teams warrant that the material produced and broadcasting respect of the Tournament does not infringe upon, or violate any intellectual Property Rights or Copyrights of any third party. Ownership of all Copyright and Intellectual Property Rights in any material produced by Varsity esports in respect of the Tournament shall vest solely and exclusively in Varsity esports.

6. General

The participating teams warrant that they are allowed to participate in the Tournament with any restriction, and duly accept all Terms & Conditions contained on the Varsity esports website. Furthermore, the teams warrant that Varsity esports, sponsors and partners will not be infringing on the rights of any party when broadcasting the teams during the tournament. By accepting the invitation or qualifying to participate in the tournament, teams and players agree to defend, indemnify and hold harmless Varsity esports, its directors, employees, agents, sponsors and partners, from and against any claims, damages, losses, liabilities, costs or expenses (including but not limited to legal fees) arising from: (i) the team's breach of any of the terms contained herein; (ii) the team's breach of any third-party rights, including without limitation any copyright, intellectual property, or privacy right; (iii) your breach of any laws and regulation in creating, posting and/or subsequently amending your submissions; or (iii) any claim that any one of the team's submissions caused damage to a third party. This indemnity shall have no limit in time. If any court of competent authority decides that any of the provisions of these rules are invalid, unlawful or unenforceable to any extent, the Rule will, to that extent only, be severed from the remaining rules, which will continue to be valid. Varsity esports, its directors, members, partners, employees, agents, consultants, suppliers, contractors and sponsors assume no liability whatsoever for any direct or indirect loss or damage arising from a participants participation in this Tournament or for any loss or damage, howsoever arising.

7. Contact

Teams and players can contact the tournament administration via email. info@mettlestate.com