My side of the story

[Chrazini]

I am incredibly disheartened to see how fast our community is at pulling out their torches and pitchforks. I have received some really unpleasant messages already, which genuinely hit me pretty hard. I am also incredibly disappointed seeing such a great name in our community, with such massive outreach, use their voice to call out people in such a distasteful manner.

I feel the need to express my side of the story before I get publicly crucified - and while you may still disagree with my decision or find it too harsh, I hope you can at least find some reasoning, logic or rationality to it.

I will attempt to go over everything in chronological order in hopes that it will give the most accurate view of the situation.

---

The matchup prior was delayed. This was mentioned a few times, and I am not entirely sure what relevance it has. Nobody likes to wait - I understand that. However, when you are playing for a chance to win part of $100,000.00, you just got to bite into the sour apple. Delays happen, and it has no impact on how the situation evolved later.

Belgium has to leave to run a somewhat lengthy errand and could, unfortunately, not finish his last series. This is where we run into the first complication, and there are a few things we need to digest. It is Belgiums responsibility, and Belgiums responsibility alone, to ensure that he is available to finish all of his matches as expected, as described in the handbook. It states you must immediately play your next match once it becomes available. However, contrary to popular belief, I am, in fact, not some power-hungry administrator using every chance I get to disqualify someone. As with the Sitaux vs slam set, I am entirely okay with them postponing and playing later the same day. Belgium offers to play tomorrow, which I decline and let him know I would still like him to play today. Belgiums persist and reach out to the opponents asking them to play the day after. Once again, I am letting him know that tomorrow is not an option and that he needs to prioritise his time when it comes to an event this size - it is worth saying that the errand was not incredibly crucial and that other solutions could have been used to avoid it.
At this point, Belgium does not respond for over an hour. I presume he already left, but he left before an agreement was made, which leaves me in an awkward state where I do not know whether he took what I said seriously or is still going by his own plan, which is to play tomorrow.
Once I hear from him again, I am told that he will be home in about three hours. Three hours from then will be about midnight for Belgium. That is a very sub-optimal time to play, but he only had himself to blame for this, so I hope that games can commence once he is home. Two hours later, I am asking him to let me know once he is home, so we can immediately look into the possibilities. I let him know, once again, that he will most likely be playing today. He tells me he is home in about one hour.
Two hours and thirty minutes later, I nudge him, asking where he is. He responds, telling me he is home in one minute. At this point, his relatively lengthy yet simple errand had apparently branched out, and he tells me that something more (rather mundane) came up, which delayed the situation by another 1.5 hours. At this point, he once again persists that he will play tomorrow, which I once again tell him that he is not.
At this point, he is home, it is late, but it is only late due to his own actions. I, therefore, ask him to play in 30 minutes, as both players will be available then. He agrees. I explain that they must play privately, send me drafts and recorded games once they have finished, as I will not be available during the matches, to which he once again agrees.

The next day, I wake up with nothing from Belgium. No games, no drafts and not even a single message. I had to hear everything from F1Re instead. Belgium had not wanted to play due to being too tired and told F1Re that they should play tomorrow at 11.00 GMT. Belgium also told F1Re that he would be fine with an admin loss if I did not accept this.

You cannot convince me that Belgium did not know that tomorrow was not an option. I had repeatedly stated the same thing, yet he went against what I said and did it anyway. After doing this, he did not provide me with any information but merely told F1Re to let me know.

There are many reasons why I do not allow games to be played so close to deadlines. I have enough experience to know how many things can go wrong during a set, which can cause massive delays. If this had happened, it would have pushed the entire second day of the qualifier, which was a risk that I could not take. Directly and deliberately ignoring my requests to play on a specific date or time is unacceptable.
Belgium failed to show up at the original time and also failed to show up at the, be it, less optimal time, but one that he did agree on.

---

I have also seen accusations on how I treat players differently. If this were TheViper, it would have allowed anything. No, I would not. I believe I made it pretty clear in The Open Classic that I treat everyone equally. I had to exclude one of the best players in the world - I did not enjoy doing that. I did that because that is exactly what my job is. Enforce the rules and don't make exceptions. That does not mean that I cannot be reasonable and allow minor adjustments when possible. I understand things can come up unexpectedly, and I allowed Belgium many hours to return and play.

 

[LordTrolldemort]

I have also seen accusations on how I treat players differently. If this were TheViper, it would have allowed anything. No, I would not. I believe I made it pretty clear in The Open Classic that I treat everyone equally. I had to exclude one of the best players in the world - I did not enjoy doing that. I did that because that is exactly what my job is. Enforce the rules and don't make exceptions.

#JusticeForHera

Kappa

 

[MembTV]

Since I started to work with you from long ago, we have got many discussions that we agree or maybe not, but what I know 100% is that if I have to go sleep, my family need me, or whatever that I can’t check about any event that I’m Involved is that I don’t have to worry because you will be a PRO and take the right decision.

You are one of the few truth professionals in this community, hope you never lose your motivation.

Take care.

 

[vyshka]

Thank you for all your work @Chrazini

 

[Lord_patito]

I was gonna say something but @MembTV already said everything. He has far more, experience both working with you and working in big tournaments than I do, so I believe his words are a huge statement.

You're a great admin and a great guy

 

[SlipperySteve]

Name a more iconic duo than aoezone and jumping to conclusions based on one-sided 2nd hand information, I'll wait

 

[HyunaOP]

An admins job is hard enough as it is. As much as the situation may seem unfortunate, Chrazini did not deserve to come under fire like that and things could have been handled much better.

Also the fact most people simply didn't wait until both sides of the story was posted kinda makes me feel a little disheartened, why are we so quick to attack someone and throw them under the bus when they're simply just doing their job?

The only reason I'm upset over this is because I've seen big influencers (from outside of aoe2) accidentally call out people in a similar manner call out someone over something without hearing their side, and then that person who's called out gets affected mentally.

Whether you agree or disagree with the decision is at the end of the day up to you and your opinion. But please in future don't attack any admins like this again.

Aoe2 community is better than that.

 

[DaisyChain]

Name a more iconic duo than aoezone and jumping to conclusions based on one-sided 2nd hand information, I'll wait

Twitter and Twitch chat and jumping to one-sided 2nd hand information beats AoEZone to that game fair and square.

 

[Spring_]

I was really surprised tbh that the admin loss didnt happen the round prior on fire or stark. I played belgian and waited to cast the series final for 3 hours and stark and fire did not play their set when they were supposed to. You could tell the two brazils made some arrangement and both afk'ed completely. May I ask, what the situation there was? I feel like something pretty unfair probably happened to belgian and to you for having to figure out what party slowed the tournament progression. I know there was tuns of server issues and alot of players probably afked many times taking small breaks instead of just sitting there doing the same sign in, sign out action over and over hoping DE would work. We all had this issue though so unless there was some admin conformation with the brazil set prior to belgian afking its sort of hard to imagine belgian should sit patiently for hours and then play at +5 or +6 gmt to the brazil players especially if they just afked for lunch while beglian is waiting at night. Anyways, its nice to have an admin explain they're decision in an open manner so kudos for the perspective!

 

[SlipperySteve]

Also the fact most people simply didn't wait until both sides of the story was posted kinda makes me feel a little disheartened, why are we so quick to attack someone and throw them under the bus when they're simply just doing their job?

To be fair, I think plenty of people probably saw the thread and didn't get ahead of themselves, it's just those that did were more compelled to comment. At least I hope...

 

[Seahorsegallop]

I am glad you added your side, to date it had all been very one sided and I have no doubt that generated a lot of bad feeling against you.

I would have loved to see Project Belgium in the tourney, at least for one more match, however as you say this is a big tourney and players have a responsibility to make themselves available not only for the scheduled match times, but to allow additional time as things can be delayed or go wrong. We all saw the issues of creating lobbies, for example.

I think it would be worth pointing out that it may appear that the Slam match was deferred to the following day, however it was played the same day and recorded matches made available the following day.

I think you and all tourney admins do a great job and without admins there would be chaos or even no tourneys, you don't deserve to end up feeling bad for doing your role the best you can.

 

[FolderOfDoom]

Twitter and Twitch chat and jumping to one-sided 2nd hand information beats AoEZone to that game fair and square.

Fuse those 3 with AoEZone and you get a dark hole made up from a super critical mass of bullshit

 

[USC_kiky]

#JusticeForChrazini

 

[b1gwalt]

Twitter and Twitch chat and jumping to one-sided 2nd hand information beats AoEZone to that game fair and square.

Agreed, the situation was made much worse by the twitter thread... I don't think name dropping Chrazini as the person who made the "terrible call" was particularly wise, especially with 2nd hand and one sided info.

The community is growing, and will continue to do so as prize pools increase and twitch streams get more and more views, so it's important to have respect for each other.

This is especially important on Twitch/Twitter which are more popular with the fringes of the fanbase compared to AoEzone, so the values broadcast on these media will shape their own values going into the future. For example, I'm sure many people reading the tweet did not know who Chrazini was but know consider him a terrible admin which is obviously not true.

 

[Ser Pounce]

If an admin tells you something, and there’s a slight good reason for it…. You do it.

You don’t try and do what you like despite being instructed not to. Players behaving like this don’t deserve to be at major tournaments. Approach tournaments with a professional attitude and respect admins.

 

[Philippe le Bon]

Plot twist: F1Re showed up extremely late on purpose, because he knew PROject_Beigium had things to do on Saturday evening, and will get mad learning his set is delayed
…and will probably give him an free win.

Imagine if it was real (and maybe it is). It'd be 200 IQ strat from F1Re right there. Before we had meta-game in game, now in 2021 we have meta-game out of the game. Minds = B L O W N

Whether it was planned strategy or not, respect. If it is, total next-level arsenal. If it's not, this was a juicy drama, so juicy that I can get on board with, even if I usually hate drama.

Of course no man should get lowered from this episode — even less BUGUM —, it was entertaining, and ultimately just chance taking a piss out of people. Respect to everyone involved. Life isn't always smooth sailing.

 

[SmellyLeopard]

You are a good lad chrazini. Much love!

 

[Hearttt]

I don't know the full story, but to me this comes down to how much delay there was on fire and stark's set, as it would be unreasonable to expect Belgium to literally have freed up the whole rest of his day in case there was an insane delay for sets which he was not involved in, and then playing at a pretty terrible time for an european player. How much delay is too much delay? Well, that is for an admin to decide, but reading the circumstances and the fact that both players agreed to play on Sunday at a time that would very likely not interfere with the planned schedule, or at worst delay sets by no more than they were on the previous day, I would personally have taken a different decision for this set, based on what I've read here and on Hera's twit.

It's true; rules are rules, but it's also important that in these cases with extraordinary circumstances the admins use their human side and take decisions that benefit all partys involved, otherwise we might as well have bots doing the decision making for us.

Either way, nothing justifies attacks on the admins for making these calls, as they are trusted with the power to do so for a reason, nor on the people who respectfully disagree with them.

 

[Nomadophobia]

I have also seen accusations on how I treat players differently. If this were TheViper, it would have allowed anything. No, I would not. I believe I made it pretty clear in The Open Classic that I treat everyone equally.

I seem to remember (by which i mean I do remember) in RTG you were more than hostile towards the idea of disqualifying Secret because of who they are. Which was after they refused to schedule with the first team who politely backed out of the tournament so Secret could play, and then refused to actually schedule within the entire week they had to for future rounds, and would then show up on the threads a day late after a further reminders, to ask to schedule two days later into the middle of the next round.

You would have, more than ten thousand percent, allowed select players to have done what Bugum and fire agreed to on the next day because you did it before, and were so strongly against disqualifying them because of who they were.

I'm all for disqualifying people in these situations and Bugum was happy to take the AL. Even if it would have panned out, letting people play on the day of the next round will lead to others saying "Well they did it" and at some point one of those games is going to delay games in the next round. There's also a lot of admin time between games and expecting an admin to have to sort things at that exact time is unreasonable. I was the same way back then - but for a fact, you weren't.

Edit: I do agree Hera's tweet was irresponsible. He has a lot of people following him, a lot of casual people outside of the competitive scene and he knows it. Many of these people don't know who admins are, what they've done, what they have to do. It was a stupid tweet to take sides on, particularly when most of the people seeing it don't know who the opposition is - but, the people who take it too far are still to blame. Haters gonna hate, even if they don't know why or who they are hating.

 

[Hera_]

Even though Im not one of the players involved in this I did speak out and would like to follow up as well now that all the details have been made public.

Before I get into it I have to say that I don't approve of people sending you DMs and saying whatever they said, and the point of my tweet wasn't to simply call you out, but to shine light on something that was otherwise gonna be swept under the table, which I couldnt sit back and watch tbh. Notice I hadn't even mentioned your name initially chrazini, and simply focused on the admin loss decision and why I felt it was unfair for belgium. Sticking up to a player in a difficult situation DOES NOT equal attacking the other person. I never said anything about u other than claiming this decision was terrible. So idk what crucifixion your talking about, and I hope nothing too serious happened in DMs.

Now more on topic, the main issue I have is how easily were handing out admin losses and how little the voices of the players matter. I also believe theres not enough flexbility for players and they often have to over-compensate for other things going wrong (example server issues, crashes,etc) . I understand its the job of the admin to enforce rules and make things run smoothly, but I also understand that theres 100k total on the line, and 3k + lan event as a base prize is potentially life changing for players. So therefore in situations where there are delays it cant ONLY fall on the responsibility of the players to adjust and keep the show rolling, especially when there are so many different time zones. I'd much prefer the broadcast to announce some delay, games be played at other times and casted, or other viable although not optimal solutions. Spread the damage thin rather than have it all drop on one guy because he couldn't overcompensate and cover the delays of others.

Firstly I have to question why its ok to play the game later that day and not the next day. We allowed stark-f1re 3 hours to my knowledge to finish their games (for whatever reason thats fine) but then we want Belgium to play right after that regardless of the situation? You said "It states you must immediately play your next match once it becomes available" but surely this is in the context of matches finishing early or late depending on how long sets take, right? If this rule is meant to include 3h long delays and potentially longer ones in the future, then in my opinion thats just an unreal expectation and further proves my point about players having to constantly over-compensate for mistakes other than their own.

I agree we dont wanna delay the broadcast too much, because then every player would have a delay in their set and the casters would need to wait more. However there is no reason to not have the players play at 11gmt the following day, when the next set started at 14:30gmt. Belgium and F1re playing at 11gmt is causing absolutely 0 delays in this case, and they both agreed to play at that time. I just wanna point out that we chose to disqualify a potential contender who invests hundreds of hours into this game, and dozens of hours specifically to train for this tourney. and you preferred to disqualify him rather than notify streamers there might be a MAX delay of 30 mins to the tourney (and in this case literally 0). The argument that you don't want things to go wrong right last minute is also flawed, because it can be arranged that should there be server issues from 11gmt-13gmt then in that super rare and unfortunate case we give belgium the admin loss. It just seems like we jumped straight to the harshest punishment instead of trying to salvage the situation. Easy way out for everyone except belgium eh?

The result for the streams would be the exact same if the players play the night before or the morning of, the only difference is we don't follow your rule of having to play that same day no matter what. There are countless things that couldve been done to lesson the punishment on Belgium without hindering anyone else. Why are we not exploring those options? Why is it ok to give someone an admin loss but not delay the broadcast 30 mins? Why should ONLY Belgium suffer because stark-f1re was delayed 3h? He showed up on time ready to play and offered some solutions after things came up.

I get it, it woulda been ideal if Belgium could cancel what he had to do and just play right after the delays. I dont know what he had to do, and there may have been better cooperation. However I also think there were many many solutions to this, and players being ultra-flexible isnt the only thing to look for.

For the record I have no reason to be speaking up about this other than feeling gutted for a fellow player being treated injustly. Me and belgium aren't best friends, I'm not out to get chrazini or disrespect any admins, I always respect their tough decisions and their work. However I felt like there was some clear injustice done here, and I for one don't wanna stand idly by and watch someone lose out on a huge opportunity because of something outside his control.

I don't care if this reflects poorly on me from the public eye, belgium reached out and was happy I spoke out on his behalf, and we might see some changes to how things are run going forward which would make this all worth it. The saddest part is that after all this, belgium will likely receive 0 compensation.

If people think my tweet was irresponsible, lemme ask you this: had I not spoke out would this be getting talked about? Would we hear both sides of the story? Seems to me that it woulda been swept right under the rug, think about that for a second. I'll take a bit of irresponsibility rather than see these kinds of things go unnoticed

 

[homers84]

if the admin told him that playing next day is not an option, he should have better taken the admins word over his own agreement with the opponent.

 

[masuderman]

The player signs up for the tournament and agrees to the rules, the admin doesn't sign up for the player's schedule.

 

[malamadre]

Man this is the kind of drama that makes everything in life worth it.

Rules are rules. If you dont agree to have your whole saturday occupied then dont sign up. People need to start taking admin seriously if the dude said today then it has to be today.

Also Hera going all out on the admin that left him out of TOC tournament?

 

[Daniel]

if the admin told him that playing next day is not an option, he should have better taken the admins word over his own agreement with the opponent.

I believe the point was that, why was playing next day not an option? it would have had 0 effect on the cast - f1re and belgium would've played at 11gmt, and then f1re vs slam didnt start til 14:30, for an EW bo5.
If there was a server issue at 11 gmt - sure then belgium should get the AL. but if the games were allowed to be played with 0 effect on casting - why was it not allowed?

I understand that this is one of the biggest tourneys in aoe2 ever, and that is why we want 0 issues. but is it really belgium's responsibility to wait for 3 hrs for something that he does not know the time that it would take f1re/stark to solve, or whether f1re/stark can solve? Was the above option really not the better solution as it could've avoided an AW to the best of everyone's ability?

I am sorry that Chrazini has to deal with the DMs as no one should be DM-ing insults to the admins.

 

[DaisyChain]

If people think my tweet was irresponsible, lemme ask you this: had I not spoke out would this be getting talked about? Would we hear both sides of the story? Seems to me that it woulda been swept right under the rug, think about that for a second. I'll take a bit of irresponsibility rather than see these kinds of things go unnoticed

I think that's exactly the point, and mostly about the timing.

Even if you disagree with Chrazini's decision - which is absolutely fine - and find it unfair for Belgium - which is absolutely fine - and feel the need to speak up and use your platform - which is very respectable - doing it in the heat of the moment, without being entirely certain on the details, and while Chrazini is working and can't take time off to explain the situation is very unfair to him.
I can't imagine how stressful it already is to run such a big tournament but to be insulted by idiots while you're doing it without being able to take time to respond is honestly horrible.

With an audience comes the ability to do great things, like what I'm sure you wanted to do here, but also comes some responsability. The more followers you have, the more idiots there risks being in the lot. It's maybe frustrating, but being a bit cautious and waiting a day to give your opinion might be seen as more reasonable.

It may also come from a good place and from a genuine feeling that you need to clear robo when people initially assumed it was him because they believe he makes all AOE2 decisions, but tweets like these are probably not wise when you have a massive audience:

That's not your initial intent, but that's exactly the kind of tweets that indirectly cause online abuse.
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