Frustration. Rage. Impotence. Disbelief. Injustice.

Five words are all it takes to describe what was experienced during the series between Team Vitality and Giants Gaming in the seventh week of the EU LCS. To be more specific, during the pause caused by a League of Legends problem that meant a game Giants Gaming had in the bag was repeated, a game that would have almost certainly ensured they remained in the highest continental category. 

Let me emphasise the fact that it was a problem with League of Legends and, therefore, Riot Games. A mistake, apparently reported for over a year, which prevented both teams from seeing Orianna's ball when Erlend "Nukeduck" Holm placed it either on an ally or on his own character.

In accordance with EU LCS regulations, Team Vitality immediately paused the match and requested the referees' assistance. The competition officials found that the effect of the bug was decisive for the two teams and, after considering that Team Vitality was wronged according to the regulations, they were offered the possibility of repeating the game under the conditions of article 7.10.5. That is, with the conflictive character disabled and a new champion select phase.

At the moment of the pause, Giants Gaming had a lead of about 8,000 pieces of gold over Team Vitality, as well as two infernal dragons — the most valuable ones — and a cloud dragon. They were also going to kill the Baron Nashor after assassinating Charly "Djoko" Guillard. However, this superiority did not reach the parameters established in article 7.10.8 of the regulations and the referees ruled out the possibility of awarding the giants an automatic victory.

The possibility of restarting the game without altering its development was not on the table since the Recovery Tool, better known as Chronobreak, is only available in North America during its testing phase. The reasons for not being able to transfer the first version of the tool to other regions until the Summer Split, an estimated date for its expansion, are not exactly known.

Team Vitality accepted the offer. Giants Gaming was not asked if they wanted to remake, although Trevor "Quickshot" Henry said that they accepted the proposition when he tried to shed some light on the situation on Twitter. The series continued its course, and the French team obtained two consecutive victories that almost certainly guarantee their presence in the next split.

So far, these are the facts.

Before addressing the subject, I would like to clarify one aspect that may tarnish the discussion on the issue. The integrity of Team Vitality can be called into question by accepting a refereeing decision that clearly hurt Giants Gaming, but the blame does not fall on their shoulders. No matter how much you talk about sporting values, it is logical for an organisation whose place in the EU LCS is at stake to accept the possibility of repeating a virtually lost game if the rival is also going to be psychologically affected by the situation.

Once this issue is resolved, it can be said that the decision taken by Riot Games' referees was truly shameful and reaffirms the need for an arbitration body that is independent from the League of Legends developer. 

The resolution was embarrassing because it deprived Giants Gaming of a game in which victory was theirs. Of course, there is always the possibility of a comeback, and even more so when they are relatively low level, mistake-prone teams, but the advantage was so huge that a real calamity would have to have taken place for the giants not to destroy their rival's nexus. To extrapolate the situation to a traditional sport, it would be like defending a much more unlikely scenario, if that is possible, than the 13 points scored by Tracy McGrady in 35 seconds.

Being shielded within the parameters proposed by the regulation to guide referees in awarding victories or repeating games is another misleading argument for several reasons.

Firstly, because Article 7.10.8 states that they are merely a road map that can be used to measure an advantage, which means they are not requirements but guides. Therefore, it is a decision that belongs solely and exclusively to referees, not to the ruleset.

Secondly, because the parameters are not representative. The norm was incorporated at a time when, among other factors, objetives such as dragons provided global gold, so it was much easier to amass a gold difference over 33%. To recommend a difference of more than seven towers or three inhibitors is absurd, plain and simple.

Thirdly, because a disadvantage of gold, towers and even inhibitors don't have to imply a real disadvantage in the game.

It is true that all organisations that participate in the EU LCS accept these rules and, therefore, validate them rules, and it is understandable that the regulations on esports are still not perfect due it being a relatively young industry. In any case, justifying the decision by claiming that it is the teams' responsibility to demand the modification of this article seems like pointing to the wrong agent.

For many months there has been talk of the need for Riot Games to lose their current monopoly of powers in favour of a more honest competition, something which apparently they fight for tooth and nail but which has not translated into practice.

The inconsistent application of the rules, a current issue due to the transfer of Yiliang "Doublelift" Peng to Team Liquid and its similarity to the Renegades-Team Dragon Knights case, and the incomprehensible interpretation of the rules, as is the case of Giants Gaming, has brought the matter back to the public sphere. 

Unfortunately, Giants Gaming had no choice but to refuse to dispute the rest of the series. If they actually had chosen to leave, the organisation would probably have received not only an automatic defeat, but an important penalty, be it economic or sport-based. After all, as indicated in section 8.3 of the regulation, any act that the league considers punishable will receive a penalty.

None of this would have happened if there were a neutral arbitration body, independent from both Riot Games and the teams. Giants Gaming probably would have requested the provisional suspension of the series until the body in question made a ruling. The process would force the outcome of the series to be postponed should a decision be made to repeat the game, something that has been considered unfeasible at Riot Games but in actual fact is not.

During the Playoffs of the last Summer Split, Riot Games kept the quarterfinals between Fnatic and H2K paused for several hours due to an audio problem. Again, Riot Games' issue. Unable to solve it, the series was postponed from Sunday to Tuesday. In addition, article 7.12.1 of the regulations indicates that the league may modify the schedule of matches where appropriate and notify the teams as soon as possible.

It has been proven that there is no problem with pausing the broadcast for hours, so removing the peripherals of the players on stage for Team ROCCAT and Origen to get ready would not have been impractical. The public would have been the most affected, especially those who had gone to the Berlin studies, although they can always be compensated.

If the problem is rescheduling the series between Team Vitality and Giants Gaming, there are also precedents of it being solved. During the Spring Split of 2015, technical problems prevented Riot Games from broadcasting the game between Gambit Gaming and Elements. After a long pause, a decision was made to play the game and upload it later on YouTube. Therefore, it is possible to play a series behind closed doors.

The possibility of postponing the series should have been considered even without an external arbitration body. However much mental strength a professional team may require, not being affected by such a situation is almost impossible. Both David "Lozark" Alonso and his players unrestrainedly showed their discontent during the broadcast or on social media - the anger of Olof "Flaxxish" Medin was such that he left the stage without picking up his peripherals.

To see the result as valid for Team Vitality constitutes a joke in bad taste. Even though Giants Gaming had two more games to win the series, its members were competing with a major handicap against which it is not possible to practice.

As a conclusion, it is inadmissible, on the one hand, that a game of League of Legends' stature produces so many errors. As much as Riot Games says that they face a technological debt or that they never anticipated that the game would reach such a huge volume of players, it is unacceptable that the integrity of an esport that aims to last generations is affected so often by failures of the game. As it happens, FlyQuest suffered no less than 22 unique bugs last week in their series against Team EnVyUs.

On the other hand, clearly there is a need for an impartial arbitration body to mediate these cases and ensure the integrity of the competition. However, given that it is not expected for Riot Games to confer powers of this kind, at the very least they would have to reform the regulations to avoid the real disadvantaged team, in this case Giants Gaming, being harmed.