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Riot Games responds to win trading allegations in TFT Set 13 Tactician’s Crown

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Riot Games posted their competitive ruling against Shitouren and the community is not happy.

The latest Teamfight Tactics (TFT) Set 13 – The Arcane Tactician’s Crown has faced accusations of win trading. In response, Riot Games has issued a decision regarding competition integrity, but the issue seems to run much deeper.

Shitouren accused of win trading

Tactician’s Crown is the apex international event for Teamfight Tactics. In the final match of March 15, 2025, Cao “Shitouren” Lian was in a lobby with Li “LiLuo” Guancan and Yin “Saopimi” Shengjie. By this time, Shitouren could no longer qualify for the grand final.

The allegations of win trading, or “underperforming,” as Riot Games refers to them, are posited against Shitouren. In a round against Saopimi, Shitouren allegedly put himself in a worse position to guarantee a loss, his elimination from the lobby, and LiLuo’s qualification to the grand final.

Riot’s Competitive Ruling

A long post by @CompeteTFT, the official X account for Teamfight Tactics Esports, outlined the “competitive ruling” against Shitouren.

Once they learned about these accusations, Riot Games initially investigated the matter by examining the facts, obtaining additional technical data from their Teamfight Tactics team, scrutinizing all available game videos, and holding live conversations with Shitouren and LiLuo to collect personal testimonies and evidence.

@CompeteTFT on X

Feel free to read the whole post at your convenience, but here are the important details.

Riot Games says that they are “not fully satisfied” with Shitouren’s performance and that it “is evident that [he] made suboptimal decisions” in the given round. No disciplinary action will be taken against any player since “Riot Games finds that Shitouren did not breach” the Global Code of Conduct.

Riot says that they had several key considerations in the matter:

  • Shitouren mainly played Fight for the Golden Spatula, the Chinese mobile version of TFT. Thus, he is unfamiliar with the setup and platform, as he had to play on a desktop during Tactician’s Crown.
    • Riot also noted that he was playing on 200ms ping.
  • Shitouren communicated to Riot that his decisions during that round were attempts to “salvage a deteriorating position” and that he “would likely lose the game regardless.”
  • Shitouren had No Scout No Pivot, disallowing him from placing Sevika.
  • There were graphical errors in the broadcast. He placed items on units after Combat started, which did not reflect on the broadcast.

Riot’s conclusion was that there were no indicators of match-fixing.

Community reacts to Riot’s findings

Naturally, the findings were not what the community expected and garnered a negative reaction.

Dan “Frodan” Chou shared his thoughts on a video via X.

I think this is a mistake… a huge mistake. This is just so blatant. By making this ruling, [Riot Games] are basically protecting people with precedent in the future for those who want to be bad actors. This is unacceptable.

Frodan on Riot Games’ competitive ruling

In addition, Frodan mentioned an earlier incident involving win trading during Set 11, which resulted in a penalty against player Gao “A Hao ei” Zihao. He was deemed responsible and had to cover the cost of his wrongdoing with a fine.

In a similar vein as Frodan, participant Kevin “Prestivent” Zou in this Tactician’s Crown shares a similar perspective. He was potentially impacted by the alleged win trading incident, as he would have advanced to the final had LiLuo not qualified.

Another competitor, Joseph “Dishsoap” Goldsmith, also spoke out.

This sentiment is widely shared across the TFT Esports community.

At the moment, the Grand Final of Teamfight Tactics Set 13 – The Arcane Tactician’s Crown competition is underway, but there are accusations of win trading between players Shitouren and LiLuo that have surfaced during this event.

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2025-03-16 18:19

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