Yatoro on smoke bug: "This is entirely the TO's fault. ESL screwed up, and put the blame on players and teams"
2025-02-18 10:02:00Team Spirit carry Illya "Yatoro" Mullyarchuk commented on the ESL's decision on the smoke bug abuse. In the latest team's YouTube video, he blamed Valve and the tournament operator for what happened. In his opinion, players should be able to use everything that is in Dota 2, unless the rules of a competition prohibit it.
This is the developers' fault. <...> Tournament operators did not warn. They are also to blame. The fact that players used that [bug]... Why can't I use something that's in the game if it's not prohibited? If they didn't warn me. I didn't play at professional scene for three months. I don't even know what was forbidden or not at the previous tournaments. Why can't I use something I use in matchmaking?
I think ESL's verdict is bad. They shouldn't have banned anyone. This is entirely the TO's fault, who should have warned the teams in advance. ESL screwed up and put the blame on players and teams.
During ESL One Raleigh 2025 qualifiers, the TO discovered that NAVI Junior abused smoke bug and banned them from participating. The team's slot went to AVULUS. Soon after that, the community spotted many other cases of foul play, which led to ESL conducting additional investigation.
As a result, the organizers also disqualified 9Pandas and Aurora Gaming, who didn't qualify anyways. 10 more teams were fined or warned, including Team Spirit. They promised to penalize their midlaner Larl while the investigation was ongoing. Overall, the outcome of the qualifiers didn't change: The banned teams didn't make it to the main event anyway.
