I've been betting on SC2 lately and every so often, some of my bets will get voided and refunded due to abnormal and suspicious betting activity. Does this mean the bookies are suspecting of match fixing? I don't know. But I want to open up a thread for discussion on this and to track it. I already got the OK from Waxangel:
Original Message From Waxangel: well I'm always on the side of more information, so as long as you have the proper receipts I'd be good with it
Original Message From geokilla: Hey Wax. I've been betting on SC2 lately and Pinnacle just voided and refunded my bet. They reviewed it for about 26 hour and it looks like they refunded it due to suspected match fixing. Should I post about it or just leave it?
Anyways, the most recent occurrence happened during Crate Drop Invitational, between souL and Zest. I watched the games live and souL destroyed Zest 3-0. This is surprising but what's more surprising is how Zest played the matches. He was favoured to win and rightfully so, but for the first two games, Zest basically played with only 2 gases, building up a Gateway army against Terran bio while floating 1K minerals. Game 3 was a more standard PvT in which more gases were taken, building up a more standard PvT army, but it wasn't enough to win against souL. 26 hours later, Pinnacle voided the bet due to abnormal and suspicious betting activity.
Right now, I'm waiting for Pinnacle to settle TY vs PartinG of Dreamhack Masters Summer finals. I took over 2.5 maps and I think they're going to void the bet again. Weird thing is the line was only open for like two to 3 minutes.
It would help if you had odds movement data, but unfortunately Pinnacle doesn't release this publicly, so it is difficult for people to obtain.
It's worth noting that when MacSed was accused of match fixing last year, Pinnacle refused to void that bet. I am not sure what their criteria is for that sort of stuff, but for that MacSed bet the odds swung wildly prior to the match and they still let it go through.
Is there a place where a record of voided Pinnacle bets are listed? While Pinnacle doesn't void bets that frequently it does happen somewhat regularly across a variety of sports/esports, so having that information would be useful.
Not surprising to me but very sad, the voided bets due to suspicious activity doesn't have to be matchifixing but it its the most likely explanation. The fact is the bets were likely large and very much in favor of soul to such an extent it was judged very unlikely to be a natural occurrence.
If matchfixing got to the stars of SC2 in the age of teams being there to help protect and monitors players chances are the disbanding of the proleague teams made it worse since players got more isolated and open for threats/manipulation. (Prime actually pressuring their players into it was an exception obviously).
This just made me think, ofc Serral and Maru only plays in the tournaments with the big money, since no one would matchfix for a loss there. (its a joke, not serious)
On July 17 2020 08:41 Shuffleblade wrote: Not surprising to me but very sad, the voided bets due to suspicious activity doesn't have to be matchifixing but it its the most likely explanation. The fact is the bets were likely large and very much in favor of soul to such an extent it was judged very unlikely to be a natural occurrence.
If matchfixing got to the stars of SC2 in the age of teams being there to help protect and monitors players chances are the disbanding of the proleague teams made it worse since players got more isolated and open for threats/manipulation. (Prime actually pressuring their players into it was an exception obviously).
This just made me think, ofc Serral and Maru only plays in the tournaments with the big money, since no one would matchfix for a loss there. (its a joke, not serious)
Would it take a large bet to move the odds significantly? The sc2 betting scene isn't exactly enormous.
Additionally while matchfixing is always theory number 1, there's other possibilities like insider information.
On July 17 2020 08:41 Shuffleblade wrote: Not surprising to me but very sad, the voided bets due to suspicious activity doesn't have to be matchifixing but it its the most likely explanation. The fact is the bets were likely large and very much in favor of soul to such an extent it was judged very unlikely to be a natural occurrence.
If matchfixing got to the stars of SC2 in the age of teams being there to help protect and monitors players chances are the disbanding of the proleague teams made it worse since players got more isolated and open for threats/manipulation. (Prime actually pressuring their players into it was an exception obviously).
This just made me think, ofc Serral and Maru only plays in the tournaments with the big money, since no one would matchfix for a loss there. (its a joke, not serious)
Would it take a large bet to move the odds significantly? The sc2 betting scene isn't exactly enormous.
Additionally while matchfixing is always theory number 1, there's other possibilities like insider information.
Yep, could just be the return of online stream-delay cheating (aren't there a few tournament cast from replay even?)
I hope we can see the betting lines because that might be a better tell. The issue with Zest is he floats in MANY of his games. Dude would just micro his heart out while going up to 2k mins and some how still win. Also we might want to check what time in KR were the games played. If its some odd hours like 5 in the morning, I can see betters betting hard against Zest if they know he doesnt perform well at x hours.
I know there's a way to track movement for regular sports like NBA. Don't think there is available for e-sports. At least I haven't found one yet but I don't care cus I just do it for fun.
On July 17 2020 08:41 Shuffleblade wrote: Not surprising to me but very sad, the voided bets due to suspicious activity doesn't have to be matchifixing but it its the most likely explanation. The fact is the bets were likely large and very much in favor of soul to such an extent it was judged very unlikely to be a natural occurrence.
If matchfixing got to the stars of SC2 in the age of teams being there to help protect and monitors players chances are the disbanding of the proleague teams made it worse since players got more isolated and open for threats/manipulation. (Prime actually pressuring their players into it was an exception obviously).
This just made me think, ofc Serral and Maru only plays in the tournaments with the big money, since no one would matchfix for a loss there. (its a joke, not serious)
Would it take a large bet to move the odds significantly? The sc2 betting scene isn't exactly enormous.
Additionally while matchfixing is always theory number 1, there's other possibilities like insider information.
On Pinnacle, there's a limit to how much you can bet. On my "sure win" bets that I've been employing, I've been putting like $200 to $300 down. On that Zest bet, I put $100 on moneyline and $60 on Zest + 1.5. It barely moved the line.
Otherwise I bet $3/U to $5/U depending on my bankroll.
On July 17 2020 09:00 phodacbiet wrote: I hope we can see the betting lines because that might be a better tell. The issue with Zest is he floats in MANY of his games. Dude would just micro his heart out while going up to 2k mins and some how still win. Also we might want to check what time in KR were the games played. If its some odd hours like 5 in the morning, I can see betters betting hard against Zest if they know he doesnt perform well at x hours.
The games were played in the evening KST. Before midnight.
On July 17 2020 08:41 Shuffleblade wrote: Not surprising to me but very sad, the voided bets due to suspicious activity doesn't have to be matchifixing but it its the most likely explanation. The fact is the bets were likely large and very much in favor of soul to such an extent it was judged very unlikely to be a natural occurrence.
If matchfixing got to the stars of SC2 in the age of teams being there to help protect and monitors players chances are the disbanding of the proleague teams made it worse since players got more isolated and open for threats/manipulation. (Prime actually pressuring their players into it was an exception obviously).
This just made me think, ofc Serral and Maru only plays in the tournaments with the big money, since no one would matchfix for a loss there. (its a joke, not serious)
Would it take a large bet to move the odds significantly? The sc2 betting scene isn't exactly enormous.
Additionally while matchfixing is always theory number 1, there's other possibilities like insider information.
What kind of insider info are there though? Isn't that the same as match fixing? Or do you mean like "Player is gonna go this strategy, so bet this?"
On July 17 2020 08:41 Shuffleblade wrote: Not surprising to me but very sad, the voided bets due to suspicious activity doesn't have to be matchifixing but it its the most likely explanation. The fact is the bets were likely large and very much in favor of soul to such an extent it was judged very unlikely to be a natural occurrence.
If matchfixing got to the stars of SC2 in the age of teams being there to help protect and monitors players chances are the disbanding of the proleague teams made it worse since players got more isolated and open for threats/manipulation. (Prime actually pressuring their players into it was an exception obviously).
This just made me think, ofc Serral and Maru only plays in the tournaments with the big money, since no one would matchfix for a loss there. (its a joke, not serious)
Would it take a large bet to move the odds significantly? The sc2 betting scene isn't exactly enormous.
Additionally while matchfixing is always theory number 1, there's other possibilities like insider information.
Yep, could just be the return of online stream-delay cheating (aren't there a few tournament cast from replay even?)
You can't bet tournaments that are casted from replay. Not for SC2 at least. Pinnacle took down live bet for LCS and LEC because of the stream delay.
On July 17 2020 09:13 geokilla wrote: I know there's a way to track movement for regular sports like NBA. Don't think there is available for e-sports. At least I haven't found one yet but I don't care cus I just do it for fun.
On July 17 2020 08:41 Shuffleblade wrote: Not surprising to me but very sad, the voided bets due to suspicious activity doesn't have to be matchifixing but it its the most likely explanation. The fact is the bets were likely large and very much in favor of soul to such an extent it was judged very unlikely to be a natural occurrence.
If matchfixing got to the stars of SC2 in the age of teams being there to help protect and monitors players chances are the disbanding of the proleague teams made it worse since players got more isolated and open for threats/manipulation. (Prime actually pressuring their players into it was an exception obviously).
This just made me think, ofc Serral and Maru only plays in the tournaments with the big money, since no one would matchfix for a loss there. (its a joke, not serious)
Would it take a large bet to move the odds significantly? The sc2 betting scene isn't exactly enormous.
Additionally while matchfixing is always theory number 1, there's other possibilities like insider information.
On Pinnacle, there's a limit to how much you can bet. On my "sure win" bets that I've been employing, I've been putting like $200 to $300 down. On that Zest bet, I put $100 on moneyline and $60 on Zest + 1.5. It barely moved the line.
Otherwise I bet $3/U to $5/U depending on my bankroll.
On July 17 2020 09:00 phodacbiet wrote: I hope we can see the betting lines because that might be a better tell. The issue with Zest is he floats in MANY of his games. Dude would just micro his heart out while going up to 2k mins and some how still win. Also we might want to check what time in KR were the games played. If its some odd hours like 5 in the morning, I can see betters betting hard against Zest if they know he doesnt perform well at x hours.
The games were played in the evening KST. Before midnight.
On July 17 2020 08:41 Shuffleblade wrote: Not surprising to me but very sad, the voided bets due to suspicious activity doesn't have to be matchifixing but it its the most likely explanation. The fact is the bets were likely large and very much in favor of soul to such an extent it was judged very unlikely to be a natural occurrence.
If matchfixing got to the stars of SC2 in the age of teams being there to help protect and monitors players chances are the disbanding of the proleague teams made it worse since players got more isolated and open for threats/manipulation. (Prime actually pressuring their players into it was an exception obviously).
This just made me think, ofc Serral and Maru only plays in the tournaments with the big money, since no one would matchfix for a loss there. (its a joke, not serious)
Would it take a large bet to move the odds significantly? The sc2 betting scene isn't exactly enormous.
Additionally while matchfixing is always theory number 1, there's other possibilities like insider information.
What kind of insider info are there though? Isn't that the same as match fixing? Or do you mean like "Player is gonna go this strategy, so bet this?"
On July 17 2020 08:41 Shuffleblade wrote: Not surprising to me but very sad, the voided bets due to suspicious activity doesn't have to be matchifixing but it its the most likely explanation. The fact is the bets were likely large and very much in favor of soul to such an extent it was judged very unlikely to be a natural occurrence.
If matchfixing got to the stars of SC2 in the age of teams being there to help protect and monitors players chances are the disbanding of the proleague teams made it worse since players got more isolated and open for threats/manipulation. (Prime actually pressuring their players into it was an exception obviously).
This just made me think, ofc Serral and Maru only plays in the tournaments with the big money, since no one would matchfix for a loss there. (its a joke, not serious)
Would it take a large bet to move the odds significantly? The sc2 betting scene isn't exactly enormous.
Additionally while matchfixing is always theory number 1, there's other possibilities like insider information.
Yep, could just be the return of online stream-delay cheating (aren't there a few tournament cast from replay even?)
You can't bet tournaments that are casted from replay. Not for SC2 at least. Pinnacle took down live bet for LCS and LEC because of the stream delay.
There's insider info like knowing that a player is ill or something like that. Also there are bets for non-broadcasted games from WESG, so I'm not completely sure about the policy/reality of when bets close vs when games are played.
I’d assume it’s just betting sites not wanting to lose money and voiding where they can get away with it.
If they don’t want to lose money on Soul 3-0ing a Zest who doesn’t give a fuck don’t offer the bet.
Koreans have historically been so focused on Starleagues and Proleague when it operated that they’d tank even pretty lucrative opportunities all over the shop.
Here we go again Then again, none of the players who had their matches have the bets refunded were convicted of matchfixing, but that MarineKing game is still one of the strangest games I've ever seen.
On July 17 2020 10:15 Wombat_NI wrote: I’d assume it’s just betting sites not wanting to lose money and voiding where they can get away with it.
If they don’t want to lose money on Soul 3-0ing a Zest who doesn’t give a fuck don’t offer the bet.
Koreans have historically been so focused on Starleagues and Proleague when it operated that they’d tank even pretty lucrative opportunities all over the shop.
Pinnacle's a big enough org so I doubt the small amount of money they gain from voiding these bets outweigh the customer confidence hit. I'm sure Pinnacle believes, rightly or wrongly, that there was something suspicious going on here.
While there are still offers of matchfixing out there (as proven by Special and other pros speaking up against it) and I'm sure it unfortunately probably is going on, keep in mind that even during Proleague when confirmed matchfixing was going on there were a couple of false positives, so take it with a grain of salt, but stay open.
Absolutely do not make accusations blindly. SangHo had his BW career ended over this, and MarineKing had his SC2 career ended over this.
Zest basically played with only 2 gases, building up a Gateway army against Terran bio while floating 1K minerals.
This has been his standard PvT play for years, #ZestBank included, the 3-0 result might be surprising but his play style is definitely not. Hell, even the result is not that surprising to me, we've known for a while that souL is a beast in practice who chokes up in tournament, maybe he finally got over his nerve?
MarineKing had his SC2 career ended over this.
While it might have contributed to his decision to retire, MarineKing towards the end of his career was completely washed and couldn't even manage to qualify for GSL anymore, I think that has more to do with it. I agree with your general sentiment though, don't throw accusations lightly, and even if a game looks suspicious, innocent until proven guilty.
Zest basically played with only 2 gases, building up a Gateway army against Terran bio while floating 1K minerals.
This has been his standard PvT play for years, #ZestBank included, the 3-0 result might be surprising but his play style is definitely not. Hell, even the result is not that surprising to me, we've known for a while that souL is a beast in practice who chokes up in tournament, maybe he finally got over his nerve?
I'm a fan of soul, seeing as Serral sees him as a good practise partner also says a lot BUT even with the recent 3-0 result vs Zest aligulac puts the likelihood of a 3-0 in souls favor at around 5%.
While I agree the gameplay in itself is not indicative of anything the voided bets and the one sided stomp in a match that should have gone the other way is suspicious.
Yes,matchifixing is not the only answer for why a lot of money was betted in a skewed manner but insider information is unlikely. If it was insider information that Zest was sick or whatever, would friends and family that got to know that systematically bet large amounts of money against Zest in a match he should win? Its possible but unlikely, the most likley information as to why a lot of betters bet against Zest is obviously some kind of information that Pinnacle lacked but where did they get that information, it needs to be from a trusted source since they are betting their money, is Zest keeping a ring of better friends that he tells inside information? Thats still not legit even if he doesn't matchfix
BUT even with the recent 3-0 result vs Zest aligulac puts the likelihood of a 3-0 in souls favor at around 5%.
While 5% certainly represents a low odd of this result happening, it's still gonna happen once every 20 games (incredible maths I know). This 20 number is actually a good example, because in the case of a 16 players tournament with 4 groups played in a GSL format (like this one), there are in fact 20 series (5 per group) being played in the group stage. Which means, statistically, a 5% odd result is likely to happen around once per group stage. Does that mean there's one series being thrown every tournament? Obviously not.
Yes, Pinnacle voiding the bet makes it somewhat suspicious. But voiding bets is a somewhat common occurrence that proves nothing, and as we have no info as to why the bet was voided, all we have left is unfounded speculation. I'm just saying to proceed with caution when people's careers are at stakes.
BUT even with the recent 3-0 result vs Zest aligulac puts the likelihood of a 3-0 in souls favor at around 5%.
While 5% certainly represents a low odd of this result happening, it's still gonna happen once every 20 games (incredible maths I know). This 20 number is actually a good example, because in the case of a 16 players tournament with 4 groups played in a GSL format (like this one), there are in fact 20 series (5 per group) being played in the group stage. Which means, statistically, a 5% odd result is likely to happen around once per group stage. Does that mean there's one series being thrown every tournament? Obviously not.
Yes, Pinnacle voiding the bet makes it somewhat suspicious. But voiding bets is a somewhat common occurrence that proves nothing, and as we have no info as to why the bet was voided, all we have left is unfounded speculation. I'm just saying to proceed with caution when people's careers are at stakes.
Yeah I agree with caution, I am not trying to say someone is guilty I am just adding in on the topic and saying what my opinion of the situation is. Just because I am of the opinion of it being shady and likley to be some kind of shady business and even though someones career is at stake I will still share my opinion here for the sake of the discussion.
You seem to well versed in math, so tell me what is the likelihood that the 1/20 games situation coincides with such shady betting movments that the bet is voided? You saying voided bets are "somewhat common occurance" is simply not true, what is common to you? 1/5, 1/10, 1/20? Bets are rarely voided across sports, I believe if you randomly made 100 sports bets right now less that 5% would be voided, maybe even none at all. Sure voided bets do happen but that they happen and you see news about them doesn't mean that they are common in other sports.
Lets for the sake of the argument say that the chance of any sportsbet being voided is 5% (which I really think is way higher than reality), the likelihood of both soul 3-0 Zest AND for that bet to voided at the same time is 0.25%. So 1/400, you wanna argue with math as to how this is not "really" suspicious, well you cant, mathematically it is suspicious. Doesn't mean he is guilty but the way you angle it is simply wrong.
On July 17 2020 08:22 geokilla wrote: This is surprising but what's more surprising is how Zest played the matches. He was favoured to win and rightfully so, but for the first two games, Zest basically played with only 2 gases, building up a Gateway army against Terran bio while floating 1K minerals.
Yeah this isn't unusual for Zest at all, especially when a match is minor/online. Also when games are played at strange hours or cross server you kind of expect randomness and weird results every now and again.
What's more likely is betting sites realise they can find an excuse to void a match they'd lose out on and go for it. It's worth them losing money because Zest decides to not try hard once every 20 matches.
BUT even with the recent 3-0 result vs Zest aligulac puts the likelihood of a 3-0 in souls favor at around 5%.
While 5% certainly represents a low odd of this result happening, it's still gonna happen once every 20 games (incredible maths I know). This 20 number is actually a good example, because in the case of a 16 players tournament with 4 groups played in a GSL format (like this one), there are in fact 20 series (5 per group) being played in the group stage. Which means, statistically, a 5% odd result is likely to happen around once per group stage. Does that mean there's one series being thrown every tournament? Obviously not.
Yes, Pinnacle voiding the bet makes it somewhat suspicious. But voiding bets is a somewhat common occurrence that proves nothing, and as we have no info as to why the bet was voided, all we have left is unfounded speculation. I'm just saying to proceed with caution when people's careers are at stakes.
Yeah I agree with caution, I am not trying to say someone is guilty I am just adding in on the topic and saying what my opinion of the situation is. Just because I am of the opinion of it being shady and likley to be some kind of shady business and even though someones career is at stake I will still share my opinion here for the sake of the discussion.
You seem to well versed in math, so tell me what is the likelihood that the 1/20 games situation coincides with such shady betting movments that the bet is voided? You saying voided bets are "somewhat common occurance" is simply not true, what is common to you? 1/5, 1/10, 1/20? Bets are rarely voided across sports, I believe if you randomly made 100 sports bets right now less that 5% would be voided, maybe even none at all. Sure voided bets do happen but that they happen and you see news about them doesn't mean that they are common in other sports.
Lets for the sake of the argument say that the chance of any sportsbet being voided is 5% (which I really think is way higher than reality), the likelihood of both soul 3-0 Zest AND for that bet to voided at the same time is 0.25%. So 1/400, you wanna argue with math as to how this is not "really" suspicious, well you cant, mathematically it is suspicious. Doesn't mean he is guilty but the way you angle it is simply wrong.
1/400 still is not really suspicious considering how many career games Zest has. An occurence like this is pretty likely to happen at one point if you play enough career games.
BUT even with the recent 3-0 result vs Zest aligulac puts the likelihood of a 3-0 in souls favor at around 5%.
While 5% certainly represents a low odd of this result happening, it's still gonna happen once every 20 games (incredible maths I know). This 20 number is actually a good example, because in the case of a 16 players tournament with 4 groups played in a GSL format (like this one), there are in fact 20 series (5 per group) being played in the group stage. Which means, statistically, a 5% odd result is likely to happen around once per group stage. Does that mean there's one series being thrown every tournament? Obviously not.
Yes, Pinnacle voiding the bet makes it somewhat suspicious. But voiding bets is a somewhat common occurrence that proves nothing, and as we have no info as to why the bet was voided, all we have left is unfounded speculation. I'm just saying to proceed with caution when people's careers are at stakes.
I think you misunderstand why Pinnacle void bets. They don't do it simply for low probability outcomes (that would be ludicrous and unfair).
They will have industry-standard algorithms that detect with a reasonably high certainty that a very unusual amount of money has been put on a bet (likely a whole magnitude of money more than normal).
I posted this on another thread, which I think led to be getting banned so I will do so with more caution: These bets are not void on the off chance there's match-fixing - they're void because they believe there's a strong possibility. I don't understand what you mean by "voiding bets is a somewhat common occurrence" but this is highly misleading. This is not a common occurrence - where is your data to back that up?
There are one or two big name players that had VERY suspect matches voided with the last match fixing scandal. It frustrates me to see them still competing because any serious investigation could have seen them banned.
However, I do agree with you that this is not enough evidence to straight up ban players BUT should lead to a thorough investigation by an organisation without a vested interest in minimizing a scandal (i.e. not Kespa). I don't think it was a coincidence that no 'proper' Kespa players were convicted of match fixing when the evidence was really quite plain to see.
BUT even with the recent 3-0 result vs Zest aligulac puts the likelihood of a 3-0 in souls favor at around 5%.
While 5% certainly represents a low odd of this result happening, it's still gonna happen once every 20 games (incredible maths I know). This 20 number is actually a good example, because in the case of a 16 players tournament with 4 groups played in a GSL format (like this one), there are in fact 20 series (5 per group) being played in the group stage. Which means, statistically, a 5% odd result is likely to happen around once per group stage. Does that mean there's one series being thrown every tournament? Obviously not.
Yes, Pinnacle voiding the bet makes it somewhat suspicious. But voiding bets is a somewhat common occurrence that proves nothing, and as we have no info as to why the bet was voided, all we have left is unfounded speculation. I'm just saying to proceed with caution when people's careers are at stakes.
Yeah I agree with caution, I am not trying to say someone is guilty I am just adding in on the topic and saying what my opinion of the situation is. Just because I am of the opinion of it being shady and likley to be some kind of shady business and even though someones career is at stake I will still share my opinion here for the sake of the discussion.
You seem to well versed in math, so tell me what is the likelihood that the 1/20 games situation coincides with such shady betting movments that the bet is voided? You saying voided bets are "somewhat common occurance" is simply not true, what is common to you? 1/5, 1/10, 1/20? Bets are rarely voided across sports, I believe if you randomly made 100 sports bets right now less that 5% would be voided, maybe even none at all. Sure voided bets do happen but that they happen and you see news about them doesn't mean that they are common in other sports.
Lets for the sake of the argument say that the chance of any sportsbet being voided is 5% (which I really think is way higher than reality), the likelihood of both soul 3-0 Zest AND for that bet to voided at the same time is 0.25%. So 1/400, you wanna argue with math as to how this is not "really" suspicious, well you cant, mathematically it is suspicious. Doesn't mean he is guilty but the way you angle it is simply wrong.
1/400 still is not really suspicious considering how many career games Zest has. An occurence like this is pretty likely to happen at one point if you play enough career games.
This line of thinking is also flawed. Simple combinatorics assumes bets are randomly voided. Also 5% voided bets is not even close, it's way less than 1%.
BUT even with the recent 3-0 result vs Zest aligulac puts the likelihood of a 3-0 in souls favor at around 5%.
While 5% certainly represents a low odd of this result happening, it's still gonna happen once every 20 games (incredible maths I know). This 20 number is actually a good example, because in the case of a 16 players tournament with 4 groups played in a GSL format (like this one), there are in fact 20 series (5 per group) being played in the group stage. Which means, statistically, a 5% odd result is likely to happen around once per group stage. Does that mean there's one series being thrown every tournament? Obviously not.
Yes, Pinnacle voiding the bet makes it somewhat suspicious. But voiding bets is a somewhat common occurrence that proves nothing, and as we have no info as to why the bet was voided, all we have left is unfounded speculation. I'm just saying to proceed with caution when people's careers are at stakes.
Yeah I agree with caution, I am not trying to say someone is guilty I am just adding in on the topic and saying what my opinion of the situation is. Just because I am of the opinion of it being shady and likley to be some kind of shady business and even though someones career is at stake I will still share my opinion here for the sake of the discussion.
You seem to well versed in math, so tell me what is the likelihood that the 1/20 games situation coincides with such shady betting movments that the bet is voided? You saying voided bets are "somewhat common occurance" is simply not true, what is common to you? 1/5, 1/10, 1/20? Bets are rarely voided across sports, I believe if you randomly made 100 sports bets right now less that 5% would be voided, maybe even none at all. Sure voided bets do happen but that they happen and you see news about them doesn't mean that they are common in other sports.
Lets for the sake of the argument say that the chance of any sportsbet being voided is 5% (which I really think is way higher than reality), the likelihood of both soul 3-0 Zest AND for that bet to voided at the same time is 0.25%. So 1/400, you wanna argue with math as to how this is not "really" suspicious, well you cant, mathematically it is suspicious. Doesn't mean he is guilty but the way you angle it is simply wrong.
1/400 still is not really suspicious considering how many career games Zest has. An occurence like this is pretty likely to happen at one point if you play enough career games.
Yeah you are very right about that, it is true. That is still without considering why the bet was voided, who or what organization and for what reason bet big amounts of money on Zest losing in that particular series while the rest of Zests games against clear underdogs he won and few bet against him?
The other factor, sure 1/400 games means it is bound to happen at some point by pure chance so IF this was the only game with Zest losing to a lesser player that got voided it isn't really mathematically surprising. That however is arguing with the presumption that you know that any of Zests other games in the last year hasn't been voided by Pinnacle. This is simply the first time a bettor brings it up, doesn't mean it is the only time it happened.
Once again I'm not saying Zest is guilty I just find it shady and I am arguing from my perspective as to why I don't think its unlikely that something not entirely above board is going on.
It seems unlikely that the Zest-Soul game was fixed mainly because it is so obvious. If I remember rightly weren't the games that Life and YoDa match fixed single maps? Having an entire series be fixed seems both way too obvious considering the respective calibre of Zest and Soul and doesn't seem to be the modus operandi of match fixers in the past.
BUT even with the recent 3-0 result vs Zest aligulac puts the likelihood of a 3-0 in souls favor at around 5%.
While 5% certainly represents a low odd of this result happening, it's still gonna happen once every 20 games (incredible maths I know). This 20 number is actually a good example, because in the case of a 16 players tournament with 4 groups played in a GSL format (like this one), there are in fact 20 series (5 per group) being played in the group stage. Which means, statistically, a 5% odd result is likely to happen around once per group stage. Does that mean there's one series being thrown every tournament? Obviously not.
Yes, Pinnacle voiding the bet makes it somewhat suspicious. But voiding bets is a somewhat common occurrence that proves nothing, and as we have no info as to why the bet was voided, all we have left is unfounded speculation. I'm just saying to proceed with caution when people's careers are at stakes.
I think you misunderstand why Pinnacle void bets. They don't do it simply for low probability outcomes (that would be ludicrous and unfair).
They will have industry-standard algorithms that detect with a reasonably high certainty that a very unusual amount of money has been put on a bet (likely a whole magnitude of money more than normal).
I never implied that a bookmaker would void a bet because of a low probably outcome lol, that would indeed be insane.
I probably shouldn't have said "somewhat common occurrence" regarding voiding bets, I don't bet myself so all I have is second hand information, and I agree that all things considered, it remains pretty rare. My point is: voiding bets has happened several times before, and that didn't results in anyone getting busted for match fixing. Now does that prove it never happened? Obviously not, but it doesn't disprove it either.
Again, algorithms detecting unusual sums of money being put on a bet are cause for concerns, and I guess that's a good enough reason for a bookie to void a bet, but it's certainly not any proof of match fixing.
I also feel like some people here are having doubts about this result due to TL's famous Korean elitism. I know Zest is a legend and he's still very good, but it's 2020, foreigners can and do beat top koreans, even in TvP thanks to a more favorable patch. Did Parting also throw against Gabe yesterday? The playing field has leveled, expect those kind of results more and more.
BUT even with the recent 3-0 result vs Zest aligulac puts the likelihood of a 3-0 in souls favor at around 5%.
While 5% certainly represents a low odd of this result happening, it's still gonna happen once every 20 games (incredible maths I know). This 20 number is actually a good example, because in the case of a 16 players tournament with 4 groups played in a GSL format (like this one), there are in fact 20 series (5 per group) being played in the group stage. Which means, statistically, a 5% odd result is likely to happen around once per group stage. Does that mean there's one series being thrown every tournament? Obviously not.
Yes, Pinnacle voiding the bet makes it somewhat suspicious. But voiding bets is a somewhat common occurrence that proves nothing, and as we have no info as to why the bet was voided, all we have left is unfounded speculation. I'm just saying to proceed with caution when people's careers are at stakes.
I think you misunderstand why Pinnacle void bets. They don't do it simply for low probability outcomes (that would be ludicrous and unfair).
They will have industry-standard algorithms that detect with a reasonably high certainty that a very unusual amount of money has been put on a bet (likely a whole magnitude of money more than normal).
I never implied that a bookmaker would void a bet because of a low probably outcome lol, that would indeed be insane.
I probably shouldn't have said "somewhat common occurrence" regarding voiding bets, I don't bet myself so all I have is second hand information, and I agree that all things considered, it remains pretty rare. My point is: voiding bets has happened several times before, and that didn't results in anyone getting busted for match fixing. Now does that prove it never happened? Obviously not, but it doesn't disprove it either.
Again, algorithms detecting unusual sums of money being put on a bet are cause for concerns, and I guess that's a good enough reason for a bookie to void a bet, but it's certainly not any proof of match fixing.
I also feel like some people here are having doubts about this result due to TL's famous Korean elitism. I know Zest is a legend and he's still very good, but it's 2020, foreigners can and do beat top koreans, even in TvP thanks to a more favorable patch. Did Parting also throw against Gabe yesterday? The playing field has leveled, expect those kind of results more and more.
You still don't get it. It has nothing to do with Korean elitism. It has almost nothing to do with it being vs soul. Pinnacle void bets when the betting pattern is so unusual that they do not plausibly believe that it is genuine. We're talking, say, (yes I'm making up these numbers) $1k being bet on each Crate Drop match then $20k being bet on the Zest match.
On July 17 2020 20:32 llllllllllIIIIIlllll wrote: didn't read the whole thread but want to say that alastor posted about zest's matchfixing many many times, you should definitely take a look
Can you give a link/ tell us who "alastor" is please?
On July 17 2020 20:32 llllllllllIIIIIlllll wrote: didn't read the whole thread but want to say that alastor posted about zest's matchfixing many many times, you should definitely take a look
Can you give a link/ tell us who "alastor" is please?
Spanish zerg. I went through his twitter feed (kind of cringe) and he complains about lines moving from time to time. Last he complained about apparently the match went against his "prediction" so he just went "Seems like this one was legit". Unless he does something more sophisticated outside of Twitter, seems like a dude angry about life ^.^
On July 17 2020 20:32 llllllllllIIIIIlllll wrote: didn't read the whole thread but want to say that alastor posted about zest's matchfixing many many times, you should definitely take a look
Can you give a link/ tell us who "alastor" is please?
Spanish zerg. I went through his twitter feed (kind of cringe) and he complains about lines moving from time to time. Last he complained about apparently the match went against his "prediction" so he just went "Seems like this one was legit". Unless he does something more sophisticated outside of Twitter, seems like a dude angry about life ^.^
I'll take you on your word on it, got too depress scrolling through his feed to get to the match fixing stuff lol.
By curiosity, someone know how Pinacle odd work? Are the odds just decided by betting or is there an "in-house" odd and if so where does it come from?
On the topic of Aligulac predictions, they are known to be inaccurate for lopsided matchups, underestimating the likelihood of upsets. I believe the site even states that. so 5% may be closer to 8-10% in reality. There are other issues with using that function for such as the partially separated player (and thus, rating) pools in the different regions, the questionable validity of the individual matchup ratings, etc. If you want to make allegations of this gravity, you should consider staying away from Aligulac
That last clip is really making me wonder. Zest doesn't seem to be much behind and he is still banking ca. 1000 minerals and gas, while not really microing anything. It could be he was just tired of course but it's still surprising that a pro veteran would have such a bad spending skill. I thought after all these years of practice they do it almost automatically without thinking about it.
I actually just watched the VODS and to be honest, Zest caliber player shouldn't make that many mistakes, here are couple clips I just made and I explain whats wrong with them:
1st: https://clips.twitch.tv/DullClearPistachioBudStar He has observer and sees 2 medivacs, there are no other things on the map that needs attention. Let me be clear, if you see that happening you don't do anything else than make sure that you kill that medivac, it should be very easy and normal task to do. BUT WHAT Happens is that Zest blinks (shows he sees them), attacks moves the stalkers, DOES SOMETHING else(unselecteed) and surprisingly no vacs get destroyed and on top of that he takes bad fight behind that.
I ended that clip there because I don't think this next one after that is that obvious, but I mention it anyways: The drop that comes to his 3rd after is not scouted, so I can't blame him that he didn't left any units there, but he sees the mines being burrowed and chooses to recall weakened stalker army on top of that nexus... The mines do their job.
2nd: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/680307115?t=1h23m11s This is too long me to clip it, but it starts there, he scouts reactor factory and sees 2 hellions, he sees NO STARPORT (which SHOULD be next to factory / barracks.) I mean there are 2 ways the attack comes, straight runby to natural OR with drop. Well he makes a wall to natural, which is correct play, but SOMEHOW doesn't want to build pylons to the edge of the base, so he would see the drop coming(which was pretty obvious at this point)... I MEAN LOOK AT THIS MINIMAP https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/451771912570535952/733677011670794300/unknown.png . On top of that he builds ?sentry? AND gets supply blocked so he can't warpin from the 2nd warpgate.
Outcome is clear, he loses 16 probes for amateur mistake.
3rd: https://clips.twitch.tv/SmellySteamyGuanacoCurseLit scouts with hallusination phoenix that there is medivac, also he knows there is more likely more medivacs because the other observer haven't seem them going any other way, so its very likely there is more (watch the VOD how the vacs came to this position, clip is only 60s), what Zest does: "Well I just leave now, welcome to my base", "Oh he came with 4 full of units. I guess I attack there with my 5 stalkers, colossus and sentry"... Someone insert a surprised pikachu face here...
After that Zest attacks while floating money and without warpprism, which obviously doesn't go too well...
4th: https://clips.twitch.tv/SuaveWealthyEelShazBotstix This is kinda 2 minor things but they just caught on my eye... Even on 6000 MMR Protoss players won't make these kinds of mistakes, even they know how important units colossies are: He sees vikings chasing he even attacks them with Stalkers but then he just stopped caring, Stalkers went to "wrong way"... Also that Sacrifacing DT:s on that point to kill couple SCV:s are never worth it, and player of his caliber knows it. I mean he saw that PF aint going to die, he blinked them and killed 6 SCV for 3 DTs when the 2nd option wouldve been just back off for now and come back later, which would ALWAYS been the correct choice.
Also if someone says that he moved Stalkers back because he was afraid the bio, he already sees BIO is far away and secondly he knows BIO can't chase because he has 2nd disruptor shot ready, so getting 3-4 vikings and saving colossus for max 1-2 stalkers IF Vikings continue the chase is always FAR better deal.
I watched the VODs closely and I have to say there are way more mistakes than these I clipped... There are LOT of mistakes, LOT. I mean I'm MMR is 5.8k on EU and the Protoss players I face there have better decision making and micro than Zest had on these games and Zest is WORLD CLASS player.
So if Pinnacle had way more activity on this series than there normally is I think my opinion is clear. BUT correct me I'm wrong, it ain't confirmed that there were way more activity by Pinnacle?
Edit. Fucking Luolis posted my clips beforehand 8D
That last clip is really making me wonder. Zest doesn't seem to be much behind and he is still banking ca. 1000 minerals and gas, while not really microing anything. It could be he was just tired of course but it's still surprising that a pro veteran would have such a bad spending skill. I thought after all these years of practice they do it almost automatically without thinking about it.
he does this all the time. its called the zest bank. I think its so he can react to drops and stuff but I dont think its optimal at all
He had only 6 gates + 1 robo on 3 bases, he used warp cycles without any significant delays.
During souL's drop he Zest was bulding additional 4 gates + dark shrine + second robo, +2 weapon and warp prism speed, a bit later he added a nexus + 3 pylons.
Zest had no optimal way to spend that bank during drop on the main. He also mostly used nexus energy. Plus we all know he tend to bank
The only thing I can clearly see is that Zest played with ping higher than average, well and maybe a bit sloppy. Base layout wasn't good either.
The MKP vs byul's case and other weird stuffs like this weren't voided before right ? It sounds quiet fishy, I think time to time some players resort to these usages just because sometimes, it might be hard to decline easy money.
That last clip is really making me wonder. Zest doesn't seem to be much behind and he is still banking ca. 1000 minerals and gas, while not really microing anything. It could be he was just tired of course but it's still surprising that a pro veteran would have such a bad spending skill. I thought after all these years of practice they do it almost automatically without thinking about it.
Zest is the one player where floating a lot of resources should never be a cause for concern. Sure, it mostly happens when he's focused on micro but it's not only then. For a player like him, uncharacteristic micro mistakes are more suspicious imo. None of the clips are too egregious but I suppose they do provide circumstantial evidence. #3 is clearly a bad F2 in case anyone doesn't realize, he didn't just move the drop defense away alone, that would have looked pretty bad.
Edit: Oh, and #2 isn't bad imo. He's move commanding the stalkers for what, half a second longer than he should have? He had to stutter step them, if they just stood still and attacked the vikings, the bio army could have caught up
That last clip is really making me wonder. Zest doesn't seem to be much behind and he is still banking ca. 1000 minerals and gas, while not really microing anything. It could be he was just tired of course but it's still surprising that a pro veteran would have such a bad spending skill. I thought after all these years of practice they do it almost automatically without thinking about it.
Zest is the one player where floating a lot of resources should never be a cause for concern. Sure, it mostly happens when he's focused on micro but it's not only then. For a player like him, uncharacteristic micro mistakes are more suspicious imo. None of the clips are too egregious but I suppose they do provide circumstantial evidence. #3 is clearly a bad F2 in case anyone doesn't realize, he didn't just move the drop defense away alone, that would have looked pretty bad.
Edit: Oh, and #2 isn't bad imo. He's move commanding the stalkers for what, half a second longer than he should have? He had to stutter step them, if they just stood still and attacked the vikings, the bio army could have caught up
Fuzer posted the clips above with better explanations. I just posted them cause im a weasel.
On July 17 2020 23:11 Fuzer wrote: I actually just watched the VODS and to be honest, Zest caliber player shouldn't make that many mistakes, here are couple clips I just made and I explain whats wrong with them:
1st: https://clips.twitch.tv/DullClearPistachioBudStar He has observer and sees 2 medivacs, there are no other things on the map that needs attention. Let me be clear, if you see that happening you don't do anything else than make sure that you kill that medivac, it should be very easy and normal task to do. BUT WHAT Happens is that Zest blinks (shows he sees them), attacks moves the stalkers, DOES SOMETHING else(unselecteed) and surprisingly no vacs get destroyed and on top of that he takes bad fight behind that.
I ended that clip there because I don't think this next one after that is that obvious, but I mention it anyways: The drop that comes to his 3rd after is not scouted, so I can't blame him that he didn't left any units there, but he sees the mines being burrowed and chooses to recall weakened stalker army on top of that nexus... The mines do their job.
It's pretty clear that he deselects his stalkers to move the army at his third to his nat. Doing that rather than just microing the stalkers to defend (and moving the probes away! they didn't have to die like that) is questionable in itself but it's not like he's doing something completely unrelated to the drop defense
On July 17 2020 23:11 Fuzer wrote: I actually just watched the VODS and to be honest, Zest caliber player shouldn't make that many mistakes, here are couple clips I just made and I explain whats wrong with them:
1st: https://clips.twitch.tv/DullClearPistachioBudStar He has observer and sees 2 medivacs, there are no other things on the map that needs attention. Let me be clear, if you see that happening you don't do anything else than make sure that you kill that medivac, it should be very easy and normal task to do. BUT WHAT Happens is that Zest blinks (shows he sees them), attacks moves the stalkers, DOES SOMETHING else(unselecteed) and surprisingly no vacs get destroyed and on top of that he takes bad fight behind that.
I ended that clip there because I don't think this next one after that is that obvious, but I mention it anyways: The drop that comes to his 3rd after is not scouted, so I can't blame him that he didn't left any units there, but he sees the mines being burrowed and chooses to recall weakened stalker army on top of that nexus... The mines do their job.
It's pretty clear that he deselects his stalkers to move the army at his third to his nat. Doing that rather than just microing the stalkers to defend (and moving the probes away! they didn't have to die like that) is questionable in itself but it's not like he's doing something completely unrelated to the drop defense
You don't get it, there is NOTHING more important to do than destroying that medivac. If you kill the medivac you don't need to take the army. You don't make mistakes on basics.
Obviously we can say mistakes happen, but you need to remember, ZEST is WORLDCLASS player. There are way too many "mistakes" like this on these games.
On July 17 2020 23:11 Fuzer wrote: I actually just watched the VODS and to be honest, Zest caliber player shouldn't make that many mistakes, here are couple clips I just made and I explain whats wrong with them:
1st: https://clips.twitch.tv/DullClearPistachioBudStar He has observer and sees 2 medivacs, there are no other things on the map that needs attention. Let me be clear, if you see that happening you don't do anything else than make sure that you kill that medivac, it should be very easy and normal task to do. BUT WHAT Happens is that Zest blinks (shows he sees them), attacks moves the stalkers, DOES SOMETHING else(unselecteed) and surprisingly no vacs get destroyed and on top of that he takes bad fight behind that.
I ended that clip there because I don't think this next one after that is that obvious, but I mention it anyways: The drop that comes to his 3rd after is not scouted, so I can't blame him that he didn't left any units there, but he sees the mines being burrowed and chooses to recall weakened stalker army on top of that nexus... The mines do their job.
It's pretty clear that he deselects his stalkers to move the army at his third to his nat. Doing that rather than just microing the stalkers to defend (and moving the probes away! they didn't have to die like that) is questionable in itself but it's not like he's doing something completely unrelated to the drop defense
You don't get it, there is NOTHING more important to do than destroying that medivac. If you kill the medivac you don't need to take the army. It's the most common thing to do to focus the medivac.
Obviously we can say mistakes happen, but you need to remember, ZEST is WORLDCLASS player. There are way too many "mistakes" like this on these games.
Oh I definitely get that but what you said sounded like he stopped microing stalkers to do something completely unrelated when that's not really the case. He definitely should have attacked the medivac and also stutter stepped so the stalkers didn't get stuck on the minerals like that. And just for the record, there wasn't time to just kill the medivacs, best he could've done was let only 1 or 2 units unload from the first one and maybe kill the second one with 1 or 2 units left
On July 17 2020 23:11 Fuzer wrote: I actually just watched the VODS and to be honest, Zest caliber player shouldn't make that many mistakes, here are couple clips I just made and I explain whats wrong with them:
1st: https://clips.twitch.tv/DullClearPistachioBudStar He has observer and sees 2 medivacs, there are no other things on the map that needs attention. Let me be clear, if you see that happening you don't do anything else than make sure that you kill that medivac, it should be very easy and normal task to do. BUT WHAT Happens is that Zest blinks (shows he sees them), attacks moves the stalkers, DOES SOMETHING else(unselecteed) and surprisingly no vacs get destroyed and on top of that he takes bad fight behind that.
I ended that clip there because I don't think this next one after that is that obvious, but I mention it anyways: The drop that comes to his 3rd after is not scouted, so I can't blame him that he didn't left any units there, but he sees the mines being burrowed and chooses to recall weakened stalker army on top of that nexus... The mines do their job.
It's pretty clear that he deselects his stalkers to move the army at his third to his nat. Doing that rather than just microing the stalkers to defend (and moving the probes away! they didn't have to die like that) is questionable in itself but it's not like he's doing something completely unrelated to the drop defense
You don't get it, there is NOTHING more important to do than destroying that medivac. If you kill the medivac you don't need to take the army. It's the most common thing to do to focus the medivac.
Obviously we can say mistakes happen, but you need to remember, ZEST is WORLDCLASS player. There are way too many "mistakes" like this on these games.
Oh I definitely get that but what you said sounded like he stopped microing stalkers to do something completely unrelated when that's not really the case. He definitely should have attacked the medivac and also stutter stepped so the stalkers didn't get stuck on the minerals like that. And just for the record, there wasn't time to just kill the medivacs, best he could've done was let only 1 or 2 units unload from the first one and maybe kill the second one with 1 or 2 units left
Lets imagine a situation, you need to lose a game, but you need to lose it so that everyone thinks your opponent just played better:
Would you agree that doing these kind of amateur mistakes would be the best way to do it? So that normal eye (I say that I have played this game enough to find these bizarre plays that shouldn't happen) won't see anything suspicious and just take it that Soul played better, shit happens.
I mean this would be the way I would do it.
Also for the record that would've still been better scenario than this what happened.
On July 17 2020 23:11 Fuzer wrote: I actually just watched the VODS and to be honest, Zest caliber player shouldn't make that many mistakes, here are couple clips I just made and I explain whats wrong with them:
1st: https://clips.twitch.tv/DullClearPistachioBudStar He has observer and sees 2 medivacs, there are no other things on the map that needs attention. Let me be clear, if you see that happening you don't do anything else than make sure that you kill that medivac, it should be very easy and normal task to do. BUT WHAT Happens is that Zest blinks (shows he sees them), attacks moves the stalkers, DOES SOMETHING else(unselecteed) and surprisingly no vacs get destroyed and on top of that he takes bad fight behind that.
I ended that clip there because I don't think this next one after that is that obvious, but I mention it anyways: The drop that comes to his 3rd after is not scouted, so I can't blame him that he didn't left any units there, but he sees the mines being burrowed and chooses to recall weakened stalker army on top of that nexus... The mines do their job.
It's pretty clear that he deselects his stalkers to move the army at his third to his nat. Doing that rather than just microing the stalkers to defend (and moving the probes away! they didn't have to die like that) is questionable in itself but it's not like he's doing something completely unrelated to the drop defense
You don't get it, there is NOTHING more important to do than destroying that medivac. If you kill the medivac you don't need to take the army. It's the most common thing to do to focus the medivac.
Obviously we can say mistakes happen, but you need to remember, ZEST is WORLDCLASS player. There are way too many "mistakes" like this on these games.
Oh I definitely get that but what you said sounded like he stopped microing stalkers to do something completely unrelated when that's not really the case. He definitely should have attacked the medivac and also stutter stepped so the stalkers didn't get stuck on the minerals like that. And just for the record, there wasn't time to just kill the medivacs, best he could've done was let only 1 or 2 units unload from the first one and maybe kill the second one with 1 or 2 units left
Lets imagine a situation, you need to lose a game, but you need to lose it so that you won't get caught:
Would you agree that doing these kind of amateur mistakes would be the best way to do it? So that normal eye (I say that I have played this game enough to find these bizarre plays that shouldn't happen) won't see anything suspicious and just take it that Soul played better, shit happens.
I mean this would be the way I would do it.
Also for the record that would've still been better scenario than this what happened.
I agree that it's suspicious, it's just that it's all circumstantial and I don't think we should assume the absolute worst by default
man sometimes i just want for betting in esports to no longer exist; it causes more trouble than it's worth.
edit: i say it without wanting to put any blame on those who do it because that is their right and it's fun and harmless when it comes to intent. I just don't like that it causes so many unintended consequences.
Analyzing the game is pointless unless there really is a HUGE mistake "a pro player would never make" like the MKP vs Byul game or that one MacSed game. When analyzing games with confirmation bias you could say that every other pro game looks "fishy". I see pro players do enormous mistakes all the time
On July 17 2020 08:22 geokilla wrote: Zest basically played with only 2 gases, building up a Gateway army against Terran bio while floating 1K minerals.
I know this is a serious topic but haha that does sound like something Zest would do
On July 17 2020 23:53 Charoisaur wrote: Analyzing the game is pointless unless there really is a HUGE mistake "a pro player would never make" like the MKP vs Byul game or that one MacSed game. When analyzing games with confirmation bias you could say that every other pro game looks "fishy". I see pro players do enormous mistakes all the time
Don't you see that thats the thing here. You don't want anyone to know you didn't want to win, so you make lots and lots of small mistakes. And when those small mistakes gather up it makes a huge pile.
And if you want to have a conversation about the things I brought here, please lets have one.
On July 17 2020 23:53 Charoisaur wrote: Analyzing the game is pointless unless there really is a HUGE mistake "a pro player would never make" like the MKP vs Byul game or that one MacSed game. When analyzing games with confirmation bias you could say that every other pro game looks "fishy". I see pro players do enormous mistakes all the time
Don't you see that thats the thing here. You don't want anyone to know you didn't want to win, so you make lots and lots of small mistakes. And when those small mistakes gather up it makes a huge pile.
And if you want to have a conversation about the things I brought here, please lets have one.
And what's different about a fixed game where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes compared to the thousands of legit games where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes?
On July 17 2020 23:53 Charoisaur wrote: Analyzing the game is pointless unless there really is a HUGE mistake "a pro player would never make" like the MKP vs Byul game or that one MacSed game. When analyzing games with confirmation bias you could say that every other pro game looks "fishy". I see pro players do enormous mistakes all the time
Don't you see that thats the thing here. You don't want anyone to know you didn't want to win, so you make lots and lots of small mistakes. And when those small mistakes gather up it makes a huge pile.
And if you want to have a conversation about the things I brought here, please lets have one.
And what's different about a fixed game where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes compared to the thousands of legit games where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes?
It's pretty easy to spot the difference when player fucks up and when he is trying to make mistakes on purpose that would look normal for normies, if you spend time to find them. As I did here. I mean some of these are (ex. Stalker focusing medivac) equal to football player forgeting how to pass the ball.
On July 17 2020 08:48 Nakajin wrote: I remember someone on reddit talking about Zest games getting voided by Pinnacle a few times, I'll try to see if I can dig it out.
Edit: I should add there were no proof or link with it as far as I remember Re-edit: Found the thread but the original poster deleted his post...
IIRC the post was mainly about Zest - Ptitdrogo first series at StayAtHomestory Cup 2 which ended up 3-0 for Drogo.
I spent some time looking for the games, cannot find them casted anywhere on Twitch or Youtube, and the files themselves are not supported anymore by the SC2 replay engine... If someone gets a link or remember watching them it'd be quite interesting I believe !
On July 17 2020 23:17 stilt wrote: The MKP vs byul's case and other weird stuffs like this weren't voided before right ? It sounds quiet fishy, I think time to time some players resort to these usages just because sometimes, it might be hard to decline easy money.
- MKP vs Byul (Proleague) was void and because it was such an unrealistic throw it also gained additional attention (e.g. some pros calling it out as obvious match-fixing). I think this is the most notorious case of 'no proof but looks extremely fishy'.
- Byul vs Terror (Proleague) was void as a lot of money was on Terror to win BUT Byul won. This is important to note as it bucks the trend of void bet --> very suspicious loss.
- Innovation vs. Super in GSL - 1st map had extreme betting that Inno went on to lose (but won series 2-1).
- San vs Dark (Proleague)
- Soulkey vs Creator
I've bolded the names of the alleged match-fixer as I think it is very important to distinguish who the alleged match-fixer is, and who is simply the unlucky opponent. I'm not going to throw accusations around - of course this is all alleged and unproven but I strongly believe there are some names above that got extremely lucky to escape justice.
I would recommend reading the liquipedia page for an objective look at the 2015 scandal: 2015 Match-Fixing Scandal
Edit to add:
IMO, analysing the match in question is a waste of time:
1) Zest CAN play very poorly. He's a very on/off player.
2) Hindsight/confirmation bias makes any objective observation impossible.
3) It relies too much on opinion.
However, the void bets...this is done for a reason. This isn't just one person that took a big punt on soul winning. Their software is way more sophisticated than that and I am sure they limit voiding bets unless absolutely necessary.
On July 17 2020 23:53 Charoisaur wrote: Analyzing the game is pointless unless there really is a HUGE mistake "a pro player would never make" like the MKP vs Byul game or that one MacSed game. When analyzing games with confirmation bias you could say that every other pro game looks "fishy". I see pro players do enormous mistakes all the time
Don't you see that thats the thing here. You don't want anyone to know you didn't want to win, so you make lots and lots of small mistakes. And when those small mistakes gather up it makes a huge pile.
And if you want to have a conversation about the things I brought here, please lets have one.
And what's different about a fixed game where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes compared to the thousands of legit games where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes?
It's pretty easy to spot the difference when player fucks up and when he is trying to make mistakes on purpose that would look normal for normies, if you spend time to find them. As I did here. I mean some of these are (ex. Stalker focusing medivac) equal to football player forgeting how to pass the ball.
and still I can probably watch a random GSL group and find at least 1 game that did look more like matchfixing (when analyzing the games with confirmation bias) then this game.
On July 17 2020 23:53 Charoisaur wrote: Analyzing the game is pointless unless there really is a HUGE mistake "a pro player would never make" like the MKP vs Byul game or that one MacSed game. When analyzing games with confirmation bias you could say that every other pro game looks "fishy". I see pro players do enormous mistakes all the time
Don't you see that thats the thing here. You don't want anyone to know you didn't want to win, so you make lots and lots of small mistakes. And when those small mistakes gather up it makes a huge pile.
And if you want to have a conversation about the things I brought here, please lets have one.
And what's different about a fixed game where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes compared to the thousands of legit games where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes?
It's pretty easy to spot the difference when player fucks up and when he is trying to make mistakes on purpose that would look normal for normies, if you spend time to find them. As I did here. I mean some of these are (ex. Stalker focusing medivac) equal to football player forgeting how to pass the ball.
and still I can probably watch a random GSL group and find at least 1 game that did look more like matchfixing (when analyzing the games with confirmation bias) then this game.
So show me one and analyze it and I'll listen.
But that doesn't change the fact that what I brought up looks VERY suspicious that you can't rationally explain. I mean its very simple thing, I brought up proof, Pinnacle voided bets (most likely because it had lots of bets, way more than normally) and you say that we can't be objective here?
On July 17 2020 23:53 Charoisaur wrote: Analyzing the game is pointless unless there really is a HUGE mistake "a pro player would never make" like the MKP vs Byul game or that one MacSed game. When analyzing games with confirmation bias you could say that every other pro game looks "fishy". I see pro players do enormous mistakes all the time
Don't you see that thats the thing here. You don't want anyone to know you didn't want to win, so you make lots and lots of small mistakes. And when those small mistakes gather up it makes a huge pile.
And if you want to have a conversation about the things I brought here, please lets have one.
And what's different about a fixed game where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes compared to the thousands of legit games where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes?
It's pretty easy to spot the difference when player fucks up and when he is trying to make mistakes on purpose that would look normal for normies, if you spend time to find them. As I did here. I mean some of these are (ex. Stalker focusing medivac) equal to football player forgeting how to pass the ball.
and still I can probably watch a random GSL group and find at least 1 game that did look more like matchfixing (when analyzing the games with confirmation bias) then this game.
So show me one and analyze it and I'll listen.
But that doesn't change the fact that what I brought up looks VERY suspicious that you can't rationally explain. I mean its very simple thing, I brought up proof, Pinnacle voided bets (most likely because it had lots of bets, way more than normally) and you say that we can't be objective here?
The bets getting voided is somewhat suspicious. Zest losing 0-3 to a player he is favored again is somewhat suspicious. The mistakes he did were not suspicious at all though.
I really have to wonder how much sc2 you watch if you think the mistakes Zest did are anything special.
On July 17 2020 08:48 Nakajin wrote: I remember someone on reddit talking about Zest games getting voided by Pinnacle a few times, I'll try to see if I can dig it out.
Edit: I should add there were no proof or link with it as far as I remember Re-edit: Found the thread but the original poster deleted his post...
IIRC the post was mainly about Zest - Ptitdrogo first series at StayAtHomestory Cup 2 which ended up 3-0 for Drogo.
I spent some time looking for the games, cannot find them casted anywhere on Twitch or Youtube, and the files themselves are not supported anymore by the SC2 replay engine... If someone gets a link or remember watching them it'd be quite interesting I believe !
I'd be really interested if anyone knows of any other voided SC2 matches (other than the Zest ones)?
On July 17 2020 23:53 Charoisaur wrote: Analyzing the game is pointless unless there really is a HUGE mistake "a pro player would never make" like the MKP vs Byul game or that one MacSed game. When analyzing games with confirmation bias you could say that every other pro game looks "fishy". I see pro players do enormous mistakes all the time
Don't you see that thats the thing here. You don't want anyone to know you didn't want to win, so you make lots and lots of small mistakes. And when those small mistakes gather up it makes a huge pile.
And if you want to have a conversation about the things I brought here, please lets have one.
And what's different about a fixed game where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes compared to the thousands of legit games where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes?
It's pretty easy to spot the difference when player fucks up and when he is trying to make mistakes on purpose that would look normal for normies, if you spend time to find them. As I did here. I mean some of these are (ex. Stalker focusing medivac) equal to football player forgeting how to pass the ball.
and still I can probably watch a random GSL group and find at least 1 game that did look more like matchfixing (when analyzing the games with confirmation bias) then this game.
So show me one and analyze it and I'll listen.
But that doesn't change the fact that what I brought up looks VERY suspicious that you can't rationally explain. I mean its very simple thing, I brought up proof, Pinnacle voided bets (most likely because it had lots of bets, way more than normally) and you say that we can't be objective here?
The bets getting voided is somewhat suspicious. Zest losing 0-3 to a player he is favored again is somewhat suspicious. The mistakes he did were not suspicious at all though.
I really have to wonder how much sc2 you watch if you think the mistakes Zest did are anything special.
I really wonder how much SC2 to you play and how good are you in the game if you don't find these things fishy.
This what I write now is really egoistic, but true:
I mean the thing is simple: I have played this game more than you have, I'm way better than you are, I see things differently than you do. You don't see the big picture. If you think I'm talking bullshit here, you can go ask any decent player (above master, NA above GM 50) their opinion and ask them to rationally explain what I wrote.
You need to understand that mission for match fixers is: They must play good enough and not to make any obvious throws. The way to do is to make many minor mistakes that doesn't look huge.
So if you are skillfull enough and look at the VODS and look at the match from Zests eyes, you see him doing lot off rookie mistakes. You must nderstand they are unacceptable for a player of his level. But if you are normie, they don't look like a mistake at all. But if you do these "invisible" mistakes enough, your opponent will get the edge and will be able to close the game off and you lose without suspicion.
Are they voiding bets after the match has taken place? If so why would you ever bet with them? Anytime here is more money on the winning side they can cancel due to "suspicious activity".
On July 18 2020 00:27 greenturtle23 wrote: Are they voiding bets after the match has taken place? If so why would you ever bet with them? Anytime here is more money on the winning side they can cancel due to "suspicious activity".
Ok, so lets assume there is tourament. Normal bet amount for a match or map is on this example 50-100, sometimes even more.
BUT if suddently there is a match or map with HUGE odds to other sides (on this case I think it was more than 4) and bets on that match / map skyrockets to 1000-4000 range, just for this one.
It could be that the odds are wrong on that match, but how odds work is that if enough bets are put on the other side the odds on that bet goes down, so that can't be the case.
The most common for this is that the match is fixed.
On July 18 2020 00:27 greenturtle23 wrote: Are they voiding bets after the match has taken place? If so why would you ever bet with them? Anytime here is more money on the winning side they can cancel due to "suspicious activity".
Pinnacle never voids bets unwarranted and that is why people bet there in the first place.
I hope i have explained this monstrous logical problem.
On July 17 2020 23:53 Charoisaur wrote: Analyzing the game is pointless unless there really is a HUGE mistake "a pro player would never make" like the MKP vs Byul game or that one MacSed game. When analyzing games with confirmation bias you could say that every other pro game looks "fishy". I see pro players do enormous mistakes all the time
Don't you see that thats the thing here. You don't want anyone to know you didn't want to win, so you make lots and lots of small mistakes. And when those small mistakes gather up it makes a huge pile.
And if you want to have a conversation about the things I brought here, please lets have one.
And what's different about a fixed game where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes compared to the thousands of legit games where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes?
It's pretty easy to spot the difference when player fucks up and when he is trying to make mistakes on purpose that would look normal for normies, if you spend time to find them. As I did here. I mean some of these are (ex. Stalker focusing medivac) equal to football player forgeting how to pass the ball.
and still I can probably watch a random GSL group and find at least 1 game that did look more like matchfixing (when analyzing the games with confirmation bias) then this game.
So show me one and analyze it and I'll listen.
But that doesn't change the fact that what I brought up looks VERY suspicious that you can't rationally explain. I mean its very simple thing, I brought up proof, Pinnacle voided bets (most likely because it had lots of bets, way more than normally) and you say that we can't be objective here?
The bets getting voided is somewhat suspicious. Zest losing 0-3 to a player he is favored again is somewhat suspicious. The mistakes he did were not suspicious at all though.
I really have to wonder how much sc2 you watch if you think the mistakes Zest did are anything special.
I mean the thing is simple: I have played this game more than you have, I'm way better than you are, I see things differently than you do. You don't see the big picture. If you think I'm talking bullshit here, you can go ask any decent player (above master, NA above GM 50) their opinion and ask them to rationally explain what I wrote.
I don't think we have to compare dick sizes here but I'm master with all 3 races with a 5.4k MMR peak and over 20k games played. Also I have watched every single non-mirror korean offline tournament game since 2013 so I'd say I know a little bit about the game.
I have seen players do worse mistakes than Zest did here so many times that this just doesn't raise any concern for me at all (speaking of the games alone - the voided bets are another story)
On July 17 2020 23:53 Charoisaur wrote: Analyzing the game is pointless unless there really is a HUGE mistake "a pro player would never make" like the MKP vs Byul game or that one MacSed game. When analyzing games with confirmation bias you could say that every other pro game looks "fishy". I see pro players do enormous mistakes all the time
Don't you see that thats the thing here. You don't want anyone to know you didn't want to win, so you make lots and lots of small mistakes. And when those small mistakes gather up it makes a huge pile.
And if you want to have a conversation about the things I brought here, please lets have one.
And what's different about a fixed game where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes compared to the thousands of legit games where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes?
It's pretty easy to spot the difference when player fucks up and when he is trying to make mistakes on purpose that would look normal for normies, if you spend time to find them. As I did here. I mean some of these are (ex. Stalker focusing medivac) equal to football player forgeting how to pass the ball.
and still I can probably watch a random GSL group and find at least 1 game that did look more like matchfixing (when analyzing the games with confirmation bias) then this game.
So show me one and analyze it and I'll listen.
But that doesn't change the fact that what I brought up looks VERY suspicious that you can't rationally explain. I mean its very simple thing, I brought up proof, Pinnacle voided bets (most likely because it had lots of bets, way more than normally) and you say that we can't be objective here?
The bets getting voided is somewhat suspicious. Zest losing 0-3 to a player he is favored again is somewhat suspicious. The mistakes he did were not suspicious at all though.
I really have to wonder how much sc2 you watch if you think the mistakes Zest did are anything special.
I mean the thing is simple: I have played this game more than you have, I'm way better than you are, I see things differently than you do. You don't see the big picture. If you think I'm talking bullshit here, you can go ask any decent player (above master, NA above GM 50) their opinion and ask them to rationally explain what I wrote.
I don't think we have to compare dick sizes here but I'm master with all 3 races with a 5.4k MMR peak and over 20k games played. Also I have watched every single non-mirror korean offline tournament game since 2013 so I'd say I know a little bit about the game.
I have seen players do worse mistakes than Zest did here so many times that this just doesn't raise any concern for me at all (speaking of the games alone - the voided bets are another story)
On July 17 2020 23:53 Charoisaur wrote: Analyzing the game is pointless unless there really is a HUGE mistake "a pro player would never make" like the MKP vs Byul game or that one MacSed game. When analyzing games with confirmation bias you could say that every other pro game looks "fishy". I see pro players do enormous mistakes all the time
Don't you see that thats the thing here. You don't want anyone to know you didn't want to win, so you make lots and lots of small mistakes. And when those small mistakes gather up it makes a huge pile.
And if you want to have a conversation about the things I brought here, please lets have one.
And what's different about a fixed game where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes compared to the thousands of legit games where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes?
It's pretty easy to spot the difference when player fucks up and when he is trying to make mistakes on purpose that would look normal for normies, if you spend time to find them. As I did here. I mean some of these are (ex. Stalker focusing medivac) equal to football player forgeting how to pass the ball.
and still I can probably watch a random GSL group and find at least 1 game that did look more like matchfixing (when analyzing the games with confirmation bias) then this game.
So show me one and analyze it and I'll listen.
But that doesn't change the fact that what I brought up looks VERY suspicious that you can't rationally explain. I mean its very simple thing, I brought up proof, Pinnacle voided bets (most likely because it had lots of bets, way more than normally) and you say that we can't be objective here?
The bets getting voided is somewhat suspicious. Zest losing 0-3 to a player he is favored again is somewhat suspicious. The mistakes he did were not suspicious at all though.
I really have to wonder how much sc2 you watch if you think the mistakes Zest did are anything special.
I mean the thing is simple: I have played this game more than you have, I'm way better than you are, I see things differently than you do. You don't see the big picture. If you think I'm talking bullshit here, you can go ask any decent player (above master, NA above GM 50) their opinion and ask them to rationally explain what I wrote.
I don't think we have to compare dick sizes here but I'm master with all 3 races with a 5.4k MMR peak and over 20k games played. Also I have watched every single non-mirror korean offline tournament game since 2013 so I'd say I know a little bit about the game.
I have seen players do worse mistakes than Zest did here so many times that this just doesn't raise any concern for me at all (speaking of the games alone - the voided bets are another story)
But isn't the point here that those mistakes happened along with the voided bets, against a player Zest should be favored against? Sure the mistakes alone can happen, Zest could be immensly drunk for example. But the voided bets may suggest some people got insider information about Zest being drunk at that point which resulted in suspicious activity. Or match fixing.
On July 18 2020 00:44 Scarlett` wrote: Please don't bet on games (:
also mistakes happen like this all the time Fuzer; especially in small online cups
Sure they do, I agree with that. But these mistakes + Pinnacle voided bets... I mean its just 1+1 that I would wish to be something else than 2.
I mean let me ask you: IF you would have to lose but you had to lose so that you wouldn't get caught, would this be the way you would do it? Small little ones?
And even you have to agree some of those are very rookie mistakes taht should never be happening.
I mean sure, maybe he was drunk or had hangover... Who knows, maybe someone gave him a pill on bar that made him dizzy and after he bet him to lose.
On July 18 2020 00:27 greenturtle23 wrote: Are they voiding bets after the match has taken place? If so why would you ever bet with them? Anytime here is more money on the winning side they can cancel due to "suspicious activity".
On July 18 2020 00:27 greenturtle23 wrote: Are they voiding bets after the match has taken place? If so why would you ever bet with them? Anytime here is more money on the winning side they can cancel due to "suspicious activity".
Pinnacle never voids bets unwarranted and that is why people bet there in the first place.
I hope i have explained this monstrous logical problem.
On July 18 2020 00:44 Scarlett` wrote: Please don't bet on games (:
also mistakes happen like this all the time Fuzer; especially in small online cups
Sure they do, I agree with that. But these mistakes + Pinnacle voided bets... I mean its just 1+1 that I would wish to be something else than 2.
I mean let me ask you: IF you would have to lose but you had to lose so that you wouldn't get caught, would this be the way you would do it? Small little ones?
And even you have to agree some of those are very rookie mistakes taht should never be happening.
I mean sure, maybe he was drunk or had hangover... Who knows, maybe someone gave him a pill on bar that made him dizzy and after he bet him to lose.
They're bad mistakes that you wouldn't expect from a player from Zest's caliber, but those do happen. Like if you analyzed (to name just one recent series which did not have suspicious betting activity) TY vs Bly from the Douyu Cup, you could come up with just as many 'rookie mistakes'.
On July 18 2020 00:44 Scarlett` wrote: Please don't bet on games (:
also mistakes happen like this all the time Fuzer; especially in small online cups
Sure they do, I agree with that. But these mistakes + Pinnacle voided bets... I mean its just 1+1 that I would wish to be something else than 2.
I mean let me ask you: IF you would have to lose but you had to lose so that you wouldn't get caught, would this be the way you would do it? Small little ones?
And even you have to agree some of those are very rookie mistakes taht should never be happening.
I mean sure, maybe he was drunk or had hangover... Who knows, maybe someone gave him a pill on bar that made him dizzy and after he bet him to lose.
They're bad mistakes that you wouldn't expect from a player from Zest's caliber, but those do happen. Like if you analyzed (to name just one recent series which did *not* have suspicious betting activity) TY vs Bly from the Douyu Cup, you could come up with just as many 'rookie mistakes'.
Totally agreed. But example the adept scout into total fuckup is something you can't explain anyhow and I doubt that there is anything like that on TY vs Bly.
Also I wouldn't even care about this if Pinnacle wouldn't have voided. But because they did I watched the games that do they look suspicous. They do.
On July 17 2020 11:05 RPR_Tempest wrote: and MarineKing had his SC2 career ended over this.
After playing the fishiest game in the history of SC2.
The fishiest game must surely be that macsed vs some diamond player game.
MKP played far worse than any diamond in that game. Gold level macro(missing SCV production before building his first supply), silver level decision making and bronze map awareness.
On July 17 2020 23:53 Charoisaur wrote: Analyzing the game is pointless unless there really is a HUGE mistake "a pro player would never make" like the MKP vs Byul game or that one MacSed game. When analyzing games with confirmation bias you could say that every other pro game looks "fishy". I see pro players do enormous mistakes all the time
Don't you see that thats the thing here. You don't want anyone to know you didn't want to win, so you make lots and lots of small mistakes. And when those small mistakes gather up it makes a huge pile.
And if you want to have a conversation about the things I brought here, please lets have one.
And what's different about a fixed game where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes compared to the thousands of legit games where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes?
It's pretty easy to spot the difference when player fucks up and when he is trying to make mistakes on purpose that would look normal for normies, if you spend time to find them. As I did here. I mean some of these are (ex. Stalker focusing medivac) equal to football player forgeting how to pass the ball.
and still I can probably watch a random GSL group and find at least 1 game that did look more like matchfixing (when analyzing the games with confirmation bias) then this game.
So show me one and analyze it and I'll listen.
But that doesn't change the fact that what I brought up looks VERY suspicious that you can't rationally explain. I mean its very simple thing, I brought up proof, Pinnacle voided bets (most likely because it had lots of bets, way more than normally) and you say that we can't be objective here?
The bets getting voided is somewhat suspicious. Zest losing 0-3 to a player he is favored again is somewhat suspicious. The mistakes he did were not suspicious at all though.
I really have to wonder how much sc2 you watch if you think the mistakes Zest did are anything special.
I mean the thing is simple: I have played this game more than you have, I'm way better than you are, I see things differently than you do. You don't see the big picture. If you think I'm talking bullshit here, you can go ask any decent player (above master, NA above GM 50) their opinion and ask them to rationally explain what I wrote.
I don't think we have to compare dick sizes here but I'm master with all 3 races with a 5.4k MMR peak and over 20k games played. Also I have watched every single non-mirror korean offline tournament game since 2013 so I'd say I know a little bit about the game.
I have seen players do worse mistakes than Zest did here so many times that this just doesn't raise any concern for me at all (speaking of the games alone - the voided bets are another story)
All you do is you talk and talk and talk but you don't explain these things. Example the game 2 adept scout into hellion harras, looks very normal.
Imagine braging about your 2013 peak and saying that you understand it all because of that, you just sound like Sardoche.
I don't think KKoma ever was Grand Master, let alone Challenger, and yet he was a successful coach. It's okay to say to a diamond player that he doesn't get anything in SC2 but Charoisaur is quite legit.
On July 18 2020 00:27 greenturtle23 wrote: Are they voiding bets after the match has taken place? If so why would you ever bet with them? Anytime here is more money on the winning side they can cancel due to "suspicious activity".
On July 18 2020 00:27 greenturtle23 wrote: Are they voiding bets after the match has taken place? If so why would you ever bet with them? Anytime here is more money on the winning side they can cancel due to "suspicious activity".
Pinnacle never voids bets unwarranted and that is why people bet there in the first place.
I hope i have explained this monstrous logical problem.
This. It's not like I'm on some sketchy site.
If I understand correctly, players bet against the site. In an ideal situation for the site, 50% of the money would be on player A, 50% would be on player B, and the house would just win the fee money regardless of who wins. But if the line is unbalanced, 90% of the money could be put on player A. Then if player A wins the site loses.
It seems to me if there is suspicious activity, the bets should be voided before the match occurs. Otherwise, the site could void bets if they lost on an unbalanced line, but not void them if they won an unbalanced line.
I am not saying Pinnacle is doing anything sketchy, I am saying the system relies on Pinnacle acting in good faith. I think a better system would be that bets get voided before the match takes place, not after.
I should not have said "why would you ever bet with them", because I would also probably bet with them. I just think voiding matches after they have taken place is not great.
Don't you see that thats the thing here. You don't want anyone to know you didn't want to win, so you make lots and lots of small mistakes. And when those small mistakes gather up it makes a huge pile.
And if you want to have a conversation about the things I brought here, please lets have one.
And what's different about a fixed game where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes compared to the thousands of legit games where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes?
It's pretty easy to spot the difference when player fucks up and when he is trying to make mistakes on purpose that would look normal for normies, if you spend time to find them. As I did here. I mean some of these are (ex. Stalker focusing medivac) equal to football player forgeting how to pass the ball.
and still I can probably watch a random GSL group and find at least 1 game that did look more like matchfixing (when analyzing the games with confirmation bias) then this game.
So show me one and analyze it and I'll listen.
But that doesn't change the fact that what I brought up looks VERY suspicious that you can't rationally explain. I mean its very simple thing, I brought up proof, Pinnacle voided bets (most likely because it had lots of bets, way more than normally) and you say that we can't be objective here?
The bets getting voided is somewhat suspicious. Zest losing 0-3 to a player he is favored again is somewhat suspicious. The mistakes he did were not suspicious at all though.
I really have to wonder how much sc2 you watch if you think the mistakes Zest did are anything special.
I mean the thing is simple: I have played this game more than you have, I'm way better than you are, I see things differently than you do. You don't see the big picture. If you think I'm talking bullshit here, you can go ask any decent player (above master, NA above GM 50) their opinion and ask them to rationally explain what I wrote.
I don't think we have to compare dick sizes here but I'm master with all 3 races with a 5.4k MMR peak and over 20k games played. Also I have watched every single non-mirror korean offline tournament game since 2013 so I'd say I know a little bit about the game.
I have seen players do worse mistakes than Zest did here so many times that this just doesn't raise any concern for me at all (speaking of the games alone - the voided bets are another story)
All you do is you talk and talk and talk but you don't explain these things. Example the game 2 adept scout into hellion harras, looks very normal.
Imagine braging about your 2013 peak and saying that you understand it all because of that, you just sound like Sardoche.
I don't think KKoma ever was Grand Master, let alone Challenger, and yet he was a successful coach. It's okay to say to a diamond player that he doesn't get anything in SC2 but Charoisaur is quite legit.
Still the difference from 2013 peak performance to this day 5400 peak seems to be pretty big if the 5400 doesn't see the mistakes as big gamechanging mistakes lol. I mean what you want me to tell him when hes obvious just not experienced enough to have talk about this topic regarding the effect oft the mistakes I showd? I've waited for rational explanation for these topics but none have delivered.
Also I'm not that I'm good at this game anymore, I'm old and bad... But still these old eyes see the obvious bugs in the gameplay that you cant deny with logic.
On July 18 2020 00:27 greenturtle23 wrote: Are they voiding bets after the match has taken place? If so why would you ever bet with them? Anytime here is more money on the winning side they can cancel due to "suspicious activity".
All bets related to the match were voided.
On July 18 2020 00:34 Ej_ wrote:
On July 18 2020 00:27 greenturtle23 wrote: Are they voiding bets after the match has taken place? If so why would you ever bet with them? Anytime here is more money on the winning side they can cancel due to "suspicious activity".
Pinnacle never voids bets unwarranted and that is why people bet there in the first place.
I hope i have explained this monstrous logical problem.
This. It's not like I'm on some sketchy site.
If I understand correctly, players bet against the site. In an ideal situation for the site, 50% of the money would be on player A, 50% would be on player B, and the house would just win the fee money regardless of who wins. But if the line is unbalanced, 90% of the money could be put on player A. Then if player A wins the site loses.
It seems to me if there is suspicious activity, the bets should be voided before the match occurs. Otherwise, the site could void bets if they lost on an unbalanced line, but not void them if they won an unbalanced line.
I am not saying Pinnacle is doing anything sketchy, I am saying the system relies on Pinnacle acting in good faith. I think a better system would be that bets get voided before the match takes place, not after.
I should not have said "why would you ever bet with them", because I would also probably bet with them. I just think voiding matches after they have taken place is not great.
Lets say that Fuzer vs Luolis is on betting site. Fuzer has 1.92 odds and Luolis has 1.92. Then you come and you put money on Luolis. What happens to the odds after? Well Fuzer odds goes above and Luolis below so after your bet it odds would be something like Fuzer 2.05 Luolis 1.84.
This way it's really hard for house to lose money.
On July 18 2020 00:00 Charoisaur wrote: [quote] And what's different about a fixed game where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes compared to the thousands of legit games where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes?
It's pretty easy to spot the difference when player fucks up and when he is trying to make mistakes on purpose that would look normal for normies, if you spend time to find them. As I did here. I mean some of these are (ex. Stalker focusing medivac) equal to football player forgeting how to pass the ball.
and still I can probably watch a random GSL group and find at least 1 game that did look more like matchfixing (when analyzing the games with confirmation bias) then this game.
So show me one and analyze it and I'll listen.
But that doesn't change the fact that what I brought up looks VERY suspicious that you can't rationally explain. I mean its very simple thing, I brought up proof, Pinnacle voided bets (most likely because it had lots of bets, way more than normally) and you say that we can't be objective here?
The bets getting voided is somewhat suspicious. Zest losing 0-3 to a player he is favored again is somewhat suspicious. The mistakes he did were not suspicious at all though.
I really have to wonder how much sc2 you watch if you think the mistakes Zest did are anything special.
I mean the thing is simple: I have played this game more than you have, I'm way better than you are, I see things differently than you do. You don't see the big picture. If you think I'm talking bullshit here, you can go ask any decent player (above master, NA above GM 50) their opinion and ask them to rationally explain what I wrote.
I don't think we have to compare dick sizes here but I'm master with all 3 races with a 5.4k MMR peak and over 20k games played. Also I have watched every single non-mirror korean offline tournament game since 2013 so I'd say I know a little bit about the game.
I have seen players do worse mistakes than Zest did here so many times that this just doesn't raise any concern for me at all (speaking of the games alone - the voided bets are another story)
All you do is you talk and talk and talk but you don't explain these things. Example the game 2 adept scout into hellion harras, looks very normal.
Imagine braging about your 2013 peak and saying that you understand it all because of that, you just sound like Sardoche.
I don't think KKoma ever was Grand Master, let alone Challenger, and yet he was a successful coach. It's okay to say to a diamond player that he doesn't get anything in SC2 but Charoisaur is quite legit.
Still the difference from 2013 peak performance to this day 5400 peak seems to be pretty big if the 5400 doesn't see the mistakes as big gamechanging mistakes lol. I mean what you want me to tell him when hes obvious just not experienced enough to have talk about this topic regarding the effect oft the mistakes I showd? I've waited for rational explanation for these topics but none have delivered.
Also I'm not that I'm good at this game anymore, I'm old and bad... But still these old eyes see the obvious bugs in the gameplay that you cant deny with logic.
Yes so you had a superior level in 2013, now lower, and you think the "experience" of another patch is still relevant and more than an actual high master watching a lot of pro games ? Delu.
It's pretty easy to spot the difference when player fucks up and when he is trying to make mistakes on purpose that would look normal for normies, if you spend time to find them. As I did here. I mean some of these are (ex. Stalker focusing medivac) equal to football player forgeting how to pass the ball.
and still I can probably watch a random GSL group and find at least 1 game that did look more like matchfixing (when analyzing the games with confirmation bias) then this game.
So show me one and analyze it and I'll listen.
But that doesn't change the fact that what I brought up looks VERY suspicious that you can't rationally explain. I mean its very simple thing, I brought up proof, Pinnacle voided bets (most likely because it had lots of bets, way more than normally) and you say that we can't be objective here?
The bets getting voided is somewhat suspicious. Zest losing 0-3 to a player he is favored again is somewhat suspicious. The mistakes he did were not suspicious at all though.
I really have to wonder how much sc2 you watch if you think the mistakes Zest did are anything special.
I mean the thing is simple: I have played this game more than you have, I'm way better than you are, I see things differently than you do. You don't see the big picture. If you think I'm talking bullshit here, you can go ask any decent player (above master, NA above GM 50) their opinion and ask them to rationally explain what I wrote.
I don't think we have to compare dick sizes here but I'm master with all 3 races with a 5.4k MMR peak and over 20k games played. Also I have watched every single non-mirror korean offline tournament game since 2013 so I'd say I know a little bit about the game.
I have seen players do worse mistakes than Zest did here so many times that this just doesn't raise any concern for me at all (speaking of the games alone - the voided bets are another story)
All you do is you talk and talk and talk but you don't explain these things. Example the game 2 adept scout into hellion harras, looks very normal.
Imagine braging about your 2013 peak and saying that you understand it all because of that, you just sound like Sardoche.
I don't think KKoma ever was Grand Master, let alone Challenger, and yet he was a successful coach. It's okay to say to a diamond player that he doesn't get anything in SC2 but Charoisaur is quite legit.
Still the difference from 2013 peak performance to this day 5400 peak seems to be pretty big if the 5400 doesn't see the mistakes as big gamechanging mistakes lol. I mean what you want me to tell him when hes obvious just not experienced enough to have talk about this topic regarding the effect oft the mistakes I showd? I've waited for rational explanation for these topics but none have delivered.
Also I'm not that I'm good at this game anymore, I'm old and bad... But still these old eyes see the obvious bugs in the gameplay that you cant deny with logic.
Yes so you had a superior level in 2013, now lower, and you think the "experience" of another patch is still relevant and more than an actual high master watching a lot of pro games ? Delu.
Well, fuzer is still on a top 100 gm level on EU and also watches this game, so i wouldn't say that his experience should be completely ignored...
On July 17 2020 23:17 stilt wrote: The MKP vs byul's case and other weird stuffs like this weren't voided before right ? It sounds quiet fishy, I think time to time some players resort to these usages just because sometimes, it might be hard to decline easy money.
- MKP vs Byul (Proleague) was void and because it was such an unrealistic throw it also gained additional attention (e.g. some pros calling it out as obvious match-fixing). I think this is the most notorious case of 'no proof but looks extremely fishy'.
- Byul vs Terror (Proleague) was void as a lot of money was on Terror to win BUT Byul won. This is important to note as it bucks the trend of void bet --> very suspicious loss.
- Innovation vs. Super in GSL - 1st map had extreme betting that Inno went on to lose (but won series 2-1).
- San vs Dark (Proleague)
- Soulkey vs Creator
I've bolded the names of the alleged match-fixer as I think it is very important to distinguish who the alleged match-fixer is, and who is simply the unlucky opponent. I'm not going to throw accusations around - of course this is all alleged and unproven but I strongly believe there are some names above that got extremely lucky to escape justice.
I would recommend reading the liquipedia page for an objective look at the 2015 scandal: 2015 Match-Fixing Scandal
Edit to add:
IMO, analysing the match in question is a waste of time:
1) Zest CAN play very poorly. He's a very on/off player.
2) Hindsight/confirmation bias makes any objective observation impossible.
3) It relies too much on opinion.
However, the void bets...this is done for a reason. This isn't just one person that took a big punt on soul winning. Their software is way more sophisticated than that and I am sure they limit voiding bets unless absolutely necessary.
Thanks for the info and my bad, I totally forgot it had been voided. Well, I guess this case won't lead anywhere regardless of what happened.
It's pretty easy to spot the difference when player fucks up and when he is trying to make mistakes on purpose that would look normal for normies, if you spend time to find them. As I did here. I mean some of these are (ex. Stalker focusing medivac) equal to football player forgeting how to pass the ball.
and still I can probably watch a random GSL group and find at least 1 game that did look more like matchfixing (when analyzing the games with confirmation bias) then this game.
So show me one and analyze it and I'll listen.
But that doesn't change the fact that what I brought up looks VERY suspicious that you can't rationally explain. I mean its very simple thing, I brought up proof, Pinnacle voided bets (most likely because it had lots of bets, way more than normally) and you say that we can't be objective here?
The bets getting voided is somewhat suspicious. Zest losing 0-3 to a player he is favored again is somewhat suspicious. The mistakes he did were not suspicious at all though.
I really have to wonder how much sc2 you watch if you think the mistakes Zest did are anything special.
I mean the thing is simple: I have played this game more than you have, I'm way better than you are, I see things differently than you do. You don't see the big picture. If you think I'm talking bullshit here, you can go ask any decent player (above master, NA above GM 50) their opinion and ask them to rationally explain what I wrote.
I don't think we have to compare dick sizes here but I'm master with all 3 races with a 5.4k MMR peak and over 20k games played. Also I have watched every single non-mirror korean offline tournament game since 2013 so I'd say I know a little bit about the game.
I have seen players do worse mistakes than Zest did here so many times that this just doesn't raise any concern for me at all (speaking of the games alone - the voided bets are another story)
All you do is you talk and talk and talk but you don't explain these things. Example the game 2 adept scout into hellion harras, looks very normal.
Imagine braging about your 2013 peak and saying that you understand it all because of that, you just sound like Sardoche.
I don't think KKoma ever was Grand Master, let alone Challenger, and yet he was a successful coach. It's okay to say to a diamond player that he doesn't get anything in SC2 but Charoisaur is quite legit.
Still the difference from 2013 peak performance to this day 5400 peak seems to be pretty big if the 5400 doesn't see the mistakes as big gamechanging mistakes lol. I mean what you want me to tell him when hes obvious just not experienced enough to have talk about this topic regarding the effect oft the mistakes I showd? I've waited for rational explanation for these topics but none have delivered.
Also I'm not that I'm good at this game anymore, I'm old and bad... But still these old eyes see the obvious bugs in the gameplay that you cant deny with logic.
Yes so you had a superior level in 2013, now lower, and you think the "experience" of another patch is still relevant and more than an actual high master watching a lot of pro games ? Delu.
I mean the thing is very simple, I posted the facts that I think are the facts. We can have conversation about the so called facts and you can tell me why I'm wrong. But looks like you are only defending someone because "someone told someone else that hes not experienced enough to talk abou the topic", so this conversation aint leadint anywhere.
On July 18 2020 00:44 Scarlett` wrote: Please don't bet on games (:
also mistakes happen like this all the time Fuzer; especially in small online cups
Sure they do, I agree with that. But these mistakes + Pinnacle voided bets... I mean its just 1+1 that I would wish to be something else than 2.
I mean let me ask you: IF you would have to lose but you had to lose so that you wouldn't get caught, would this be the way you would do it? Small little ones?
And even you have to agree some of those are very rookie mistakes taht should never be happening.
I mean sure, maybe he was drunk or had hangover... Who knows, maybe someone gave him a pill on bar that made him dizzy and after he bet him to lose.
They're bad mistakes that you wouldn't expect from a player from Zest's caliber, but those do happen. Like if you analyzed (to name just one recent series which did *not* have suspicious betting activity) TY vs Bly from the Douyu Cup, you could come up with just as many 'rookie mistakes'.
Totally agreed. But example the adept scout into total fuckup is something you can't explain anyhow and I doubt that there is anything like that on TY vs Bly.
Also I wouldn't even care about this if Pinnacle wouldn't have voided. But because they did I watched the games that do they look suspicous. They do.
In TY vs Bly, TY salvaged his bunker against a 1 base proxy hatch ravager all-in, and lost a game after having a 50 supply lead, so idk if Zest vs souL would be considered (in a vacuum) to be the game with the larger number of mess-ups. Though of course we aren't in a vacuum, and we're looking at this through the lens of the bets from Zest vs souL having been voided.
I guess my point would be that if the bets had not been voided, people wouldn't consider this game suspicious, since while mistakes like this from top players are relatively uncommon, they aren't so rare as to be of themselves suspicious.
On July 18 2020 00:44 Scarlett` wrote: Please don't bet on games (:
also mistakes happen like this all the time Fuzer; especially in small online cups
Sure they do, I agree with that. But these mistakes + Pinnacle voided bets... I mean its just 1+1 that I would wish to be something else than 2.
I mean let me ask you: IF you would have to lose but you had to lose so that you wouldn't get caught, would this be the way you would do it? Small little ones?
And even you have to agree some of those are very rookie mistakes taht should never be happening.
I mean sure, maybe he was drunk or had hangover... Who knows, maybe someone gave him a pill on bar that made him dizzy and after he bet him to lose.
They're bad mistakes that you wouldn't expect from a player from Zest's caliber, but those do happen. Like if you analyzed (to name just one recent series which did *not* have suspicious betting activity) TY vs Bly from the Douyu Cup, you could come up with just as many 'rookie mistakes'.
Totally agreed. But example the adept scout into total fuckup is something you can't explain anyhow and I doubt that there is anything like that on TY vs Bly.
Also I wouldn't even care about this if Pinnacle wouldn't have voided. But because they did I watched the games that do they look suspicous. They do.
In TY vs Bly, TY salvaged his bunker against a 1 base proxy hatch ravager all-in, and lost a game after having a 50 supply lead, so idk if Zest vs souL would be considered (in a vacuum) to be the game with the larger number of mess-ups. Though of course we aren't in a vacuum, and we're looking at this through the lens of the bets from Zest vs souL having been voided.
I guess my point would be that if the bets had not been voided, people wouldn't consider this game suspicious, since while mistakes like this from top players are relatively uncommon, they aren't so rare as to be of themselves suspicious.
On July 18 2020 00:44 Scarlett` wrote: Please don't bet on games (:
also mistakes happen like this all the time Fuzer; especially in small online cups
Sure they do, I agree with that. But these mistakes + Pinnacle voided bets... I mean its just 1+1 that I would wish to be something else than 2.
I mean let me ask you: IF you would have to lose but you had to lose so that you wouldn't get caught, would this be the way you would do it? Small little ones?
And even you have to agree some of those are very rookie mistakes taht should never be happening.
I mean sure, maybe he was drunk or had hangover... Who knows, maybe someone gave him a pill on bar that made him dizzy and after he bet him to lose.
They're bad mistakes that you wouldn't expect from a player from Zest's caliber, but those do happen. Like if you analyzed (to name just one recent series which did *not* have suspicious betting activity) TY vs Bly from the Douyu Cup, you could come up with just as many 'rookie mistakes'.
Totally agreed. But example the adept scout into total fuckup is something you can't explain anyhow and I doubt that there is anything like that on TY vs Bly.
Also I wouldn't even care about this if Pinnacle wouldn't have voided. But because they did I watched the games that do they look suspicous. They do.
In TY vs Bly, TY salvaged his bunker against a 1 base proxy hatch ravager all-in, and lost a game after having a 50 supply lead, so idk if Zest vs souL would be considered (in a vacuum) to be the game with the larger number of mess-ups. Though of course we aren't in a vacuum, and we're looking at this through the lens of the bets from Zest vs souL having been voided.
I guess my point would be that if the bets had not been voided, people wouldn't consider this game suspicious, since while mistakes like this from top players are relatively uncommon, they aren't so rare as to be of themselves suspicious.
On July 18 2020 00:00 Charoisaur wrote: [quote] And what's different about a fixed game where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes compared to the thousands of legit games where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes?
It's pretty easy to spot the difference when player fucks up and when he is trying to make mistakes on purpose that would look normal for normies, if you spend time to find them. As I did here. I mean some of these are (ex. Stalker focusing medivac) equal to football player forgeting how to pass the ball.
and still I can probably watch a random GSL group and find at least 1 game that did look more like matchfixing (when analyzing the games with confirmation bias) then this game.
So show me one and analyze it and I'll listen.
But that doesn't change the fact that what I brought up looks VERY suspicious that you can't rationally explain. I mean its very simple thing, I brought up proof, Pinnacle voided bets (most likely because it had lots of bets, way more than normally) and you say that we can't be objective here?
The bets getting voided is somewhat suspicious. Zest losing 0-3 to a player he is favored again is somewhat suspicious. The mistakes he did were not suspicious at all though.
I really have to wonder how much sc2 you watch if you think the mistakes Zest did are anything special.
I mean the thing is simple: I have played this game more than you have, I'm way better than you are, I see things differently than you do. You don't see the big picture. If you think I'm talking bullshit here, you can go ask any decent player (above master, NA above GM 50) their opinion and ask them to rationally explain what I wrote.
I don't think we have to compare dick sizes here but I'm master with all 3 races with a 5.4k MMR peak and over 20k games played. Also I have watched every single non-mirror korean offline tournament game since 2013 so I'd say I know a little bit about the game.
I have seen players do worse mistakes than Zest did here so many times that this just doesn't raise any concern for me at all (speaking of the games alone - the voided bets are another story)
All you do is you talk and talk and talk but you don't explain these things. Example the game 2 adept scout into hellion harras, looks very normal.
Imagine braging about your 2013 peak and saying that you understand it all because of that, you just sound like Sardoche.
I don't think KKoma ever was Grand Master, let alone Challenger, and yet he was a successful coach. It's okay to say to a diamond player that he doesn't get anything in SC2 but Charoisaur is quite legit.
Still the difference from 2013 peak performance to this day 5400 peak seems to be pretty big if the 5400 doesn't see the mistakes as big gamechanging mistakes lol. I mean what you want me to tell him when hes obvious just not experienced enough to have talk about this topic regarding the effect oft the mistakes I showd? I've waited for rational explanation for these topics but none have delivered.
Also I'm not that I'm good at this game anymore, I'm old and bad... But still these old eyes see the obvious bugs in the gameplay that you cant deny with logic.
nowhere did I say the mistakes weren't big game changing mistakes lol. Of course they were but those happen every other game even at the pro level.
I mean people are overestimating how "extremely rare" this is. Just searching "bet canceled due to suspicious activity" gives me a thread on sportsbookreview about Pinnacle where tons of bettors (who mainly bet on small (e) sport leagues) give their experience with pinnacle and voiding their bets with this reasoning.
There are people in that thread who every year get 10-15 of their bets canceled due to this exact reasoning. Just like other people stated they prob do it when larger amounts of money are being bet on underdogs who then win in either a convincing or just fishy matter. Especially in sc2 and other smaller e-sports 500-1500 euro bets are a decent % of the total amount bet on some starcraft matches, especially in these small tournaments where on some matches you only have a few minutes to bet on before they start.
I would say in only a extremely small amount of these cases fixing is involved, most of the time however its just fishy and pinnacle has to make the decision to void bets and probably start some research (I hope). So ye I understand your concern if its the first time you saw this, but if you bet a lot on smaller (esports) it just happens here and there.
It's pretty easy to spot the difference when player fucks up and when he is trying to make mistakes on purpose that would look normal for normies, if you spend time to find them. As I did here. I mean some of these are (ex. Stalker focusing medivac) equal to football player forgeting how to pass the ball.
and still I can probably watch a random GSL group and find at least 1 game that did look more like matchfixing (when analyzing the games with confirmation bias) then this game.
So show me one and analyze it and I'll listen.
But that doesn't change the fact that what I brought up looks VERY suspicious that you can't rationally explain. I mean its very simple thing, I brought up proof, Pinnacle voided bets (most likely because it had lots of bets, way more than normally) and you say that we can't be objective here?
The bets getting voided is somewhat suspicious. Zest losing 0-3 to a player he is favored again is somewhat suspicious. The mistakes he did were not suspicious at all though.
I really have to wonder how much sc2 you watch if you think the mistakes Zest did are anything special.
I mean the thing is simple: I have played this game more than you have, I'm way better than you are, I see things differently than you do. You don't see the big picture. If you think I'm talking bullshit here, you can go ask any decent player (above master, NA above GM 50) their opinion and ask them to rationally explain what I wrote.
I don't think we have to compare dick sizes here but I'm master with all 3 races with a 5.4k MMR peak and over 20k games played. Also I have watched every single non-mirror korean offline tournament game since 2013 so I'd say I know a little bit about the game.
I have seen players do worse mistakes than Zest did here so many times that this just doesn't raise any concern for me at all (speaking of the games alone - the voided bets are another story)
All you do is you talk and talk and talk but you don't explain these things. Example the game 2 adept scout into hellion harras, looks very normal.
Imagine braging about your 2013 peak and saying that you understand it all because of that, you just sound like Sardoche.
I don't think KKoma ever was Grand Master, let alone Challenger, and yet he was a successful coach. It's okay to say to a diamond player that he doesn't get anything in SC2 but Charoisaur is quite legit.
Still the difference from 2013 peak performance to this day 5400 peak seems to be pretty big if the 5400 doesn't see the mistakes as big gamechanging mistakes lol. I mean what you want me to tell him when hes obvious just not experienced enough to have talk about this topic regarding the effect oft the mistakes I showd? I've waited for rational explanation for these topics but none have delivered.
Also I'm not that I'm good at this game anymore, I'm old and bad... But still these old eyes see the obvious bugs in the gameplay that you cant deny with logic.
nowhere did I say the mistakes weren't big game changing mistakes lol. Of course they were but those happen every other game even at the pro level.
Indeed, Zest playing bafflingly poorly for a player of his calibre isn’t really in question, more that players make baffling mistakes all the time.
There are few games more demanding with so many small stakes online tournaments going, if we apply the lens to all sorts of series we’ll see things that look suspicious.
Zest floated over 3K minerals at a HomeStory Cup before and died with 3K minerals in the bank. Zest always floats minerals, he just isn’t the greatest macro player.
Please note that I am not defending Zest in this particular betting situation and series against Soul. I’m just saying that Zest floating minerals and resources is nothing new.
That last clip is really making me wonder. Zest doesn't seem to be much behind and he is still banking ca. 1000 minerals and gas, while not really microing anything. It could be he was just tired of course but it's still surprising that a pro veteran would have such a bad spending skill. I thought after all these years of practice they do it almost automatically without thinking about it.
Again, why are some people that are suspicious of Zest so unaware of Zest’s playing style? Zest died with over 3K minerals in the bank at Homestory Cup before, 1K minerals in the bank is nothing for Zest.
On July 18 2020 07:46 mikedupp wrote: zest is a habitual floater but so are many protoss players.
though I do recall a few reddit posts accusing zest of suspicious activity or the lines being suspicious.
I have no idea.
but it seems like someone has a hate boner for zest.
The argument isn’t that he was floating, it’s that he was floating while botching everything else.
Everyone posting in the thread knows Zest has that reputation, but he usually floats when he’s microing his heart out, or doing a bunch of army repositioning and prioritising that over a warp round.
It’s long been his approach and has what made him such a successful player. He finds angles and timings that to other players don’t exist because they’re concerned with always keeping their money low.
My personal opinion is that Zest was either ill or really hungover or something and people became aware of this. The Korean pro scene seems pretty close-knit after all.
Doesn’t have to be anything malicious at all. All it takes is a few players to be out with Zest and ‘man he was fucking wasted’ and people start placing bets there.
About the Zest vs SouL game, I had Zest to win. This means I personally lost the bet. So for Pinnacle to void the bet, they really did me a favour because they could have kept my money while voiding only the people who had SouL spread or moneyline.
On July 18 2020 08:32 geokilla wrote: About the Zest vs SouL game, I had Zest to win. This means I personally lost the bet. So for Pinnacle to void the bet, they really did me a favour because they could have kept my money while voiding only the people who had SouL spread or moneyline.
Why would you ever bet against Serral’s preferred practice partner?
Since it was zest who did this, I can completely believe he threw without any intention of doing so or shady business. Zest is the master of inconsistent performance.
On July 17 2020 11:05 RPR_Tempest wrote: and MarineKing had his SC2 career ended over this.
After playing the fishiest game in the history of SC2.
The fishiest game must surely be that macsed vs some diamond player game.
yes. this game should serve at the prototype of a 'fishy' game and always needs to be linked when this is brought up. because this wasn't a player losing a series; it was a player going 2-1 vs some one they should absolutely go 2-0 against. not an insane upset.
On July 18 2020 07:46 mikedupp wrote: zest is a habitual floater but so are many protoss players.
though I do recall a few reddit posts accusing zest of suspicious activity or the lines being suspicious.
I have no idea.
but it seems like someone has a hate boner for zest.
The argument isn’t that he was floating, it’s that he was floating while botching everything else.
Everyone posting in the thread knows Zest has that reputation, but he usually floats when he’s microing his heart out, or doing a bunch of army repositioning and prioritising that over a warp round.
It’s long been his approach and has what made him such a successful player. He finds angles and timings that to other players don’t exist because they’re concerned with always keeping their money low.
My personal opinion is that Zest was either ill or really hungover or something and people became aware of this. The Korean pro scene seems pretty close-knit after all.
Doesn’t have to be anything malicious at all. All it takes is a few players to be out with Zest and ‘man he was fucking wasted’ and people start placing bets there.
players need a masterclass in believably throwing games, apparently. since they are generally awful at hiding it, this makes for some hilarious spectacles
On July 18 2020 07:46 mikedupp wrote: zest is a habitual floater but so are many protoss players.
though I do recall a few reddit posts accusing zest of suspicious activity or the lines being suspicious.
I have no idea.
but it seems like someone has a hate boner for zest.
The argument isn’t that he was floating, it’s that he was floating while botching everything else.
Everyone posting in the thread knows Zest has that reputation, but he usually floats when he’s microing his heart out, or doing a bunch of army repositioning and prioritising that over a warp round.
It’s long been his approach and has what made him such a successful player. He finds angles and timings that to other players don’t exist because they’re concerned with always keeping their money low.
My personal opinion is that Zest was either ill or really hungover or something and people became aware of this. The Korean pro scene seems pretty close-knit after all.
Doesn’t have to be anything malicious at all. All it takes is a few players to be out with Zest and ‘man he was fucking wasted’ and people start placing bets there.
players need a masterclass in believably throwing games, apparently. since they are generally awful at hiding it, this makes for some hilarious spectacles
It’s a skill.
Granted for my money there’s not much difference between Zest having a bad day at the office and him throwing games.
that mkp game will always be ingrained in my memory. a player on his decline looking for an easy payout or a washed out pro who doesn't have the map awareness of a diamond player
weirder things have happened than Zest losing 0-3 to Soul in online cups. Like Hurricane having a pretty positive record on Serral or Zhugeliang beating Serral in an offline ZvZ. With so many SC2 series happening all the time, 5% chance is pretty high. Especially in an online tournament, where players aren't as pressured to play well.
So I don't know if there is enough evidence there but I have no idea how the betting lines stuff works tbh.
edit: Also would seem odd for him matchfix since he's been doing well this year. Most BW and SC2 match fixers were slumping pretty badly when they did matchfixing (maybe except for Life).
On July 18 2020 15:57 Anc13nt wrote: edit: Also would seem odd for him matchfix since he's been doing well this year. Most BW and SC2 match fixers were slumping pretty badly when they did matchfixing (maybe except for Life).
This just seems like a typical Zest fail series he always floats minerals and sometimes he just brainfarts and collapses we've seen it in plenty of important series.
Factor in this is a tournament he probably doesn't care about and he has an upcoming gsl group he may want to hide builds for. This could just be a dodgy move by the betting company or someone just going for broke on a big bet for souL that distorts the market.
While it might have contributed to his decision to retire, MarineKing towards the end of his career was completely washed and couldn't even manage to qualify for GSL anymore, I think that has more to do with it. I agree with your general sentiment though, don't throw accusations lightly, and even if a game looks suspicious, innocent until proven guilty.
So like, MarineKing was already doing quite poorly but after the matchfixing accusations he got even worse, became an absolute mess. I can understand why. Nearly everybody in the world thought he was a matchfixer when he wasn't. Like imagine playing a game of SC2 that was so bad you literally can't get people to believe you didn't throw it deliberately. That would crush you mentally I think.
While it might have contributed to his decision to retire, MarineKing towards the end of his career was completely washed and couldn't even manage to qualify for GSL anymore, I think that has more to do with it. I agree with your general sentiment though, don't throw accusations lightly, and even if a game looks suspicious, innocent until proven guilty.
So like, MarineKing was already doing quite poorly but after the matchfixing accusations he got even worse, became an absolute mess. I can understand why. Nearly everybody in the world thought he was a matchfixer when he wasn't. Like imagine playing a game of SC2 that was so bad you literally can't get people to believe you didn't throw it deliberately. That would crush you mentally I think.
All we know is he didn't get caught. I for one will never believe he wasn't paid to throw that game. He missed SCV production at the start of the game when there's nothing else to do, doesn't look at his minimap for 2 straight minutes, and decides to go 3CC against what was a 1 base baneling bust(if we pretend he doesn't see the hatchery and doesn't realize there's a proxy hatch somewhere). Not a single professional player could come up with a thought process behind that other than ''He had a stroke''. Voided bets due to suspicious betting patterns are the cherry on top.
While it might have contributed to his decision to retire, MarineKing towards the end of his career was completely washed and couldn't even manage to qualify for GSL anymore, I think that has more to do with it. I agree with your general sentiment though, don't throw accusations lightly, and even if a game looks suspicious, innocent until proven guilty.
So like, MarineKing was already doing quite poorly but after the matchfixing accusations he got even worse, became an absolute mess. I can understand why. Nearly everybody in the world thought he was a matchfixer when he wasn't. Like imagine playing a game of SC2 that was so bad you literally can't get people to believe you didn't throw it deliberately. That would crush you mentally I think.
All we know is he didn't get caught. I for one will never believe he wasn't paid to throw that game. He missed SCV production at the start of the game when there's nothing else to do, doesn't look at his minimap for 2 straight minutes, and decides to go 3CC against what was a 1 base baneling bust(if we pretend he doesn't see the hatchery and doesn't realize there's a proxy hatch somewhere). Not a single professional player could come up with a thought process behind that other than ''He had a stroke''. Voided bets due to suspicious betting patterns are the cherry on top.
MKP did go 3CC in 99% of the games he played no? This was such a long time ago i cant remember.
While it might have contributed to his decision to retire, MarineKing towards the end of his career was completely washed and couldn't even manage to qualify for GSL anymore, I think that has more to do with it. I agree with your general sentiment though, don't throw accusations lightly, and even if a game looks suspicious, innocent until proven guilty.
So like, MarineKing was already doing quite poorly but after the matchfixing accusations he got even worse, became an absolute mess. I can understand why. Nearly everybody in the world thought he was a matchfixer when he wasn't. Like imagine playing a game of SC2 that was so bad you literally can't get people to believe you didn't throw it deliberately. That would crush you mentally I think.
All we know is he didn't get caught. I for one will never believe he wasn't paid to throw that game. He missed SCV production at the start of the game when there's nothing else to do, doesn't look at his minimap for 2 straight minutes, and decides to go 3CC against what was a 1 base baneling bust(if we pretend he doesn't see the hatchery and doesn't realize there's a proxy hatch somewhere). Not a single professional player could come up with a thought process behind that other than ''He had a stroke''. Voided bets due to suspicious betting patterns are the cherry on top.
MKP did go 3CC in 99% of the games he played no? This was such a long time ago i cant remember.
Yeah it's one of those cases where it was literally any other player it'd be a sure thing, but MarineKing has been playing like that his whole career.
"Oh I play someone who 6 pools every single game? CC First for SURE."
I think what ultimately exonerates MarineKing is how suspicious he actually was. His team did a full investigation, found nothing. KeSPA did an official investigation and wasn't able to find anything (I remember people at the time being like "Well DUH of course they're gonna say they didn't find anything, if this gets out Proleague is finished" well uhhhh) and the police did a full investigation and arrested a few people.
There is absolutely no way that the most suspicious of the bunch didn't have his life passed over with a fine-toothed comb. I guarantee the police would have been checking his bank accounts and snooping in MKP's private life as much as they possibly can within the confines of the law. If they got people who hid it well like Life, they woulda got MKP IMO. I remember after Life was arrested the police statement said "We believe we have caught all matchfixers at this time." which is quite the statement of confidence.
While it might have contributed to his decision to retire, MarineKing towards the end of his career was completely washed and couldn't even manage to qualify for GSL anymore, I think that has more to do with it. I agree with your general sentiment though, don't throw accusations lightly, and even if a game looks suspicious, innocent until proven guilty.
So like, MarineKing was already doing quite poorly but after the matchfixing accusations he got even worse, became an absolute mess. I can understand why. Nearly everybody in the world thought he was a matchfixer when he wasn't. Like imagine playing a game of SC2 that was so bad you literally can't get people to believe you didn't throw it deliberately. That would crush you mentally I think.
All we know is he didn't get caught. I for one will never believe he wasn't paid to throw that game. He missed SCV production at the start of the game when there's nothing else to do, doesn't look at his minimap for 2 straight minutes, and decides to go 3CC against what was a 1 base baneling bust(if we pretend he doesn't see the hatchery and doesn't realize there's a proxy hatch somewhere). Not a single professional player could come up with a thought process behind that other than ''He had a stroke''. Voided bets due to suspicious betting patterns are the cherry on top.
MKP did go 3CC in 99% of the games he played no? This was such a long time ago i cant remember.
The problem is not that he was greedy, the problem is he did mistakes a dude with 100 games wouldn't make like not looking at the minimap for 2 straight minutes, it's not only the pros who can call it suspicious, any starcraft players can understand it.
MKP scv scouted Byul and saw a gaz/pool and no B2. He brought back his vcs to his B1 without searching any proxy hatch which already doesn't make any sense. (or at the very at least, he could have wait to see which units came, or come back to see if there is a b2, that's super basic stuffs, no need to be gm to understand it) Then he decided to make 2 reapers, kept them at home and then did a 3cc while he could see for 2 minutes not only the creep but a spine crawler in the making. I know, innocent until proved guilty but still, this is super obvious. It's not on fuck up, it's a combinaison of massive ones about very basic stuff.
Mental health can do weird things to a player. Starcraft is a super demanding game too. MKP was always a heart on the sleeve kind of guy too.
Back in the day I just quit playing, was starting to push into Masters and I did the same macro builds basically every game.
In one ladder session I forgot warpgate multiple times, did my vT build because I forgot I was playing a Zerg and eventually culminating in me forgetting my 9 pylon.
The will and the passion for the game was there, my brain simply refused to function normally.
I’m not suggesting this as the explanation for that MKP game, merely a possible one. While I feel society is more understanding in people having issues with stress and depression, I’m not sure people quite understand the level it can impair your basic ability to do tasks. It doesn’t just sap motivation (which people do understand) it saps capacity too.
Mental health surely must be a problem with some people in eSports, I haven’t heard too many talk about it outside of some foreign pros who have control over their own practice and life regimes.
I’m unsure how that would have worked in Korea, especially under the team regimes. If a player was having issues would they be able to come forward and get taken out of the firing line or not?
It’s still entirely possible MKP threw a game and left the scene after the scrutiny on him, I don’t think it’s unlikely either that he threw himself out/got thrown out while in really bad mental shape, played a game so bad that people couldn’t fathom any other possibility other than him throwing it and having already been struggling, having people think that of him caused him to quit.
Add to that the mystery of ByuN disappearing and not playing in Proleague, I think it’s a plausible if not proven angle.
On July 19 2020 00:09 rotta wrote: That MKP game is hard to forget, would still be nice to see his replay.
Yea, that game was really really suspicious. On the silver lining, MKP's play was so strange that I bet no one would ever ask him to fix games after that (not saying that he was necessarily doing something nefarious that game), because he would make it too obvious lol
Suspicious activity refers to bets being placed not to player activity. Since sc2 is a relatively small betting attraction its relatively easy to go beyond the tolerance allowed by the system. However indeed the bets should be voided before the games are played.
3rd party betting companies are the cancer, reason, and mainstay of the problem, along with the SC2 following guys who place bets.
Blizzard should take control over betting (and maybe make some profit from it).
If every player are mandated to bet... hmmm.... 75%-95% of their potential winnings (in every scenarios) to themselves, betting environment controlled by Blizzard... Hoccuspoccus, match fixing scenarios cease to exist.
But, that scenario won't ever happen because Blizzard is all about the money, profit.
A good player Mulchany wants fix a game. He knows that Blizzard Betting Co. provides an incentive for him to play for his money (he actually benefits from playing good, honest, winning game/match), because his income is directly related to bets placed on him (within Blizzard Betting Co.)
Now, if he/she is a rotten case, bubble, he/she of course can still accept 3rd party money for playing foul, but his/hers trail of misconduct is fuck-load of easier to track when the 1st party controls a most of traditional 3rd party environs.
Where he/she got all that money with that shitty losing play?
Background assumption of my is that the most of bet placers would go with the most established and legit broker with best data available, presumably the Blizzard corp. Now, if the corporation forces players always bet themselves in all games they play...
Disclaimer: Imaginary player 'Mulchany' could be 'McRotten', Xhammer', 'Stenchgerm', 'LaViot9' or 'Murmara'. If there are such named player in the ladder, the name is purely coincidental in this comment.
If your best idea for betting is for the same company to control the development of the game and the odds on players then I really don't know what to say. Except that accusing a company that does not do it of having no integrity is ironic.
Not to mention that it wouldn't solve shit. Betting is completely illegal in South Korea and, what a shocker really, matchfixers just sell games to illegal underground bettors .
If your 2nd best idea is to force players to bet on themselves, effectively turning Starcraft into a money game like poker which I suspect would not be fucking legal for anyone below 18 and could be subject to very rigorous gambling laws in many countries, making it dodgy to play at all then maybe stick to the first one where betting is just invisible and odds potentially crooked!
On July 19 2020 06:53 Ej_ wrote: If your best idea for betting is for the same company to control the development of the game and the odds on players then I really don't know what to say. Except that accusing a company that does not do it of having no integrity is ironic.
Not to mention that it wouldn't solve shit. Betting is completely illegal in South Korea and, what a shocker really, matchfixers just sell games to illegal underground bettors .
If your 2nd best idea is to force players to bet on themselves, effectively turning Starcraft into a money game like poker which I suspect would not be fucking legal for anyone below 18 and could be subject to very rigorous gambling laws in many countries, making it dodgy to play at all then maybe stick to the first one where betting is just invisible and odds potentially crooked!
You're right in every point you say, however, what would be lesser problem here?
This whole thread is still about speculation, hypothetics, and about alleged misconduct in a match. Until otherwise proven.
The problem in this general context is coming from the 3rd party operators. How complex and difficult it would ever be to simplify things by elimination of those parasites, it would immediately make SC2 Division of Blizzard corp. more lucrative business. In ideal world of us, Blizzard's internal subdivision would handle with betting, collecting profits from that sector for the benefits of the game's development, future, balance, and continuity.
I honestly think that would be much lesser evil for these aims, than current situation were all kinds of parasitic business entities drain millions out from the future of the game. Why it would be exactly bad if the game developer could get some profits from betting money, particularly when they can provide intrinsically the best data available for such enterprises (i.e. minimize the risk to them while still giving best odds - on average)?
Why limiting "freedom" of professional players to minimize changes of foul play would be bad thing, if same time same players would be rewarded for playing as good and honest game as possible with generous share of all that betting money (drained by parasites) that has now null-impact to every SC2 player, follower, fan, and organisator all alike?
Of course it's problematic, but when the question is about who benefits, I personally prefer 1st and 2nd parties, and if 3rd party-influenced bloodsucking can be largely removed from the calculations by rearrangements and mutual agreements of 1st and 2nd parties, I can't see there any unsurmountable problems to overcome. If its legal to establish betting company by anyone, it is certainly legal to establish it by company who controls the game of object of betting. Just remove non-essentials from the scenario, offer the fans a legit platform to place bets, and put 5% of betting income to your company's own product. Reward the players for playing good and sincere.
eSports betting is still (relatively) a fringe part of the activity. Sure it’s sizeable but it’s avoidable.
If Blizz or any other company take direct control of betting relating to their games, if they’re managing the bets and taking the odds surely that seeps into the game UI and the associated broadcasts.
I’ve read enough testimony from gambling addicts that struggle to enjoy regular sport as they used to because there’s so much gambling advertising in and around the sport.
Now this wouldn’t necessarily have to happen, but what’s the incentive of taking charge to such a degree if you don’t push the gambling along with it?
It’s using a sledgehammer to crack a walnut. We have had some match fixing problems, but in a decade of competition all over the world it hasn’t been too huge. At least not to clamp down in such a manner imo
Actually a blast from the past to hear moonglade again. This game is funny because its such blatant matchfixing, he scouted and saw there was a proxy hatch so he knew. Also really find the situation when he pretends to notice hilarious, its so obvious his main focus at that point is "look surprised". Sure you see pros actually appear shocked at times but the expressions are muted because they are focused on actually trying to win.
The Mcsed game is even worse though, when he pulled away the probes when he almost killed them is the one moment when you know he doesn't want to win. There simply is no explanation in the world for playing like that besides trying to lose.
In regards to Zest his gameplay is not suspicious, the betting line makes it look bad for him but thats it
Also want to give a shoutout to the San game, I remember watching that game being a fan of San and then he lost his MSC to a queen in the first couple of minutes of the game when literally not controlling anything else...
Doesn't stuff like this happen when betting with a bookie? Like you go to your local guy who handles your bet, but you want to make a 50,000 dollar bet and he normally only handles bets up to 500. He tries to give that bet over to a larger bookie, but nobody bites on the bet because they can't cover the bet for whatever reason. Like maybe even the odds are go just not enough people interested or whatever. Now with online this might not be in an instant. One company trying to hold the bet, but keep a balance of betters so they don't lose their ass. It might not just be due to being a suspicious bet, maybe people actually thought the underdog could win, but there was too much action on the long shot that the bet itself is a risky endeavor. Yes it could be a fixed match, but even if it wasn't and the underdog wins and you don't have enough bets to cover it that money comes out of your pocket. So, instead the safer move is to cancel that bet rather that you yourself becoming the gambler. Not sure if I'm right on this, just my thought.
On July 17 2020 23:53 Charoisaur wrote: Analyzing the game is pointless unless there really is a HUGE mistake "a pro player would never make" like the MKP vs Byul game or that one MacSed game. When analyzing games with confirmation bias you could say that every other pro game looks "fishy". I see pro players do enormous mistakes all the time
Don't you see that thats the thing here. You don't want anyone to know you didn't want to win, so you make lots and lots of small mistakes. And when those small mistakes gather up it makes a huge pile.
And if you want to have a conversation about the things I brought here, please lets have one.
And what's different about a fixed game where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes compared to the thousands of legit games where the player made lots and lots of small mistakes?
It's pretty easy to spot the difference when player fucks up and when he is trying to make mistakes on purpose that would look normal for normies, if you spend time to find them. As I did here. I mean some of these are (ex. Stalker focusing medivac) equal to football player forgeting how to pass the ball.
So you believe that its "pretty easy" to tell that Zest was match fixing here? This is a very strong implication. It truly sucks as a pro to have an awful game and then have people claiming you match fixed. By definition in 5,000+ games across the pro scene in a year there are going to be monumentally poor performances that only occur once every 5,000 games. I see that after Scarlett called you out you backtracked to "mistakes happen" and "maybe he was drunk or had hangover", which seems like a much more reasonable position to take.
On July 19 2020 08:02 Shuffleblade wrote: Also want to give a shoutout to the San game, I remember watching that game being a fan of San and then he lost his MSC to a queen in the first couple of minutes of the game when literally not controlling anything else...
I still don't think it makes sense to just donate your msc on purpose if you're matchfixing. That's like, matchfixing as terran and losing your reaper on purpose. Like, ok? You'd rather not do that, but you're not going to lose the game off of that. This is one of those things that sounds like a good idea, because you want to simulate a bad game so you make a lot of small mistakes, but it's really not a small mistake at all so it achieves neither the simulation of slightly substandard play, nor the actual purpose of losing the game.
Generally speaking the betting lines are the suspicious stuff, and talking about the games is silly. Reminder that PartinG lost a game because he forgot warpgate in the semifinals of GSL...
I've been tracking Zest for the last 2 years, and of course i have my own opinion about this matchfixing drama...
Anyway its really sad that someone who has won a lot in prizes is doing this... he doesnt give a shit, for example i've seen him losing a GSL match on pvz recently, where he made Dark Shrine, he saw the zerg got no detection, no lair, no spores, and instead of warp DT's, what you are suposed to do when you go for dt's ( :D ) he warped Adepts, and you could say, ok ok, he is nervous, he missed the first warp and warped adepts because he was nervous and the timing about his Dark Shrine and the Warping was so close, but when you see that his second round of warping is Adepts again, when he is SEEING everything with his adept's shadow, knowing he has no lair no spores... even the casters were shocked, but i feel like nobody of the scene wana talk about this because they are afraid about another big Matchfixing drama that could end finishing their careers...
(Forgot to say that Zest plays in 90% of his games (pvz) Adept pressure into DT's and he is one of the best players in the starcraft 2 history, how would you miss a dt warping when you are a player like zest, he is superclean doing this, still remember when he only played archon drop, and he was that clean doing this that players like lambo lose against him in 4-5 minutes once and once again just vs 2 archons... so imagine, how would a player with that good mechacnics confuse warping adpets 2 times? )
I dont know, i'm a big fan of starcraft 2 (also starcraft bw) i'm here watching Starcraft 2 every single day, every random tournament, and i can say that i would even understand that an amateur player fix, because when you are investing 10 hours per day in a game and you recive 0€ or almost 0€ you need something to see that your time training is worth... Even when you need to win 10 proplayers like Soul,Bly,Mana (examples) to catch a 50$ Prize... its understandable that you think, i can just lose in first round and make 400-500€ and nobody will notice about that... but when i see players like Zest with that earnings matchfixing (its just my opinion, i cant be sure 100% about that, because that its imposible for me) ... well, what can i say...
Also, as someone said here, we need to remember when Macsed "matchfixed", nobody said nothing in his favour, and it was just 1 time, and in my opinion im not even close to be sure about his matchfixing, but the thing is that players like Zest got tons of games with suspiccious loses, and also a lot of void bets due to suspiccious activity in many bookies...
I dont know, i feel like the pro scene, the casters, the scene itself wants to ignore it because another big matchfixing case would finally destroy sc2 and their jobs...
On July 19 2020 20:07 AlaStOrSC wrote: I've been tracking Zest for the last 2 years, and of course i have my own opinion about this matchfixing drama...
Anyway its really sad that someone who has won a lot in prizes is doing this... he doesnt give a shit, for example i've seen him losing a GSL match on pvz recently, where he made Dark Shrine, he saw the zerg got no detection, no lair, no spores, and instead of warp DT's, what you are suposed to do when you go for dt's ( :D ) he warped Adepts, and you could say, ok ok, he is nervous, he missed the first warp and warped adepts because he was nervous and the timing about his Dark Shrine and the Warping was so close, but when you see that his second round of warping is Adepts again, when he is SEEING everything with his adept's shadow, knowing he has no lair no spores... even the casters were shocked, but i feel like nobody of the scene wana talk about this because they are afraid about another big Matchfixing drama that could end finishing their careers...
(Forgot to say that Zest plays in 90% of his games (pvz) Adept pressure into DT's and he is one of the best players in the starcraft 2 history, how would you miss a dt warping when you are a player like zest, he is superclean doing this, still remember when he only played archon drop, and he was that clean doing this that players like lambo lose against him in 4-5 minutes once and once again just vs 2 archons... so imagine, how would a player with that good mechacnics confuse warping adpets 2 times? )
I dont know, i'm a big fan of starcraft 2 (also starcraft bw) i'm here watching Starcraft 2 every single day, every random tournament, and i can say that i would even understand that an amateur player fix, because when you are investing 10 hours per day in a game and you recive 0€ or almost 0€ you need something to see that your time training is worth... Even when you need to win 10 proplayers like Soul,Bly,Mana (examples) to catch a 50$ Prize... its understandable that you think, i can just lose in first round and make 400-500€ and nobody will notice about that... but when i see players like Zest with that earnings matchfixing (its just my opinion, i cant be sure 100% about that, because that its imposible for me) ... well, what can i say...
Also, as someone said here, we need to remember when Macsed "matchfixed", nobody said nothing in his favour, and it was just 1 time, and in my opinion im not even close to be sure about his matchfixing, but the thing is that players like Zest got tons of games with suspiccious loses, and also a lot of void bets due to suspiccious activity in many bookies...
I dont know, i feel like the pro scene, the casters, the scene itself wants to ignore it because another big matchfixing case would finally destroy sc2 and their jobs...
Even Artosis is making fun about Zest not making DT's and warping first adepts and then stalkers
I dont know, as i said its imposible for me to be sure about this at 100% but... In Spain we say something like " Cuando el rio suena, agua lleva " i think its similar to this in English " if there is a rumor there must be something to it express "
On July 17 2020 20:32 llllllllllIIIIIlllll wrote: didn't read the whole thread but want to say that alastor posted about zest's matchfixing many many times, you should definitely take a look
Can you give a link/ tell us who "alastor" is please?
Spanish zerg. I went through his twitter feed (kind of cringe) and he complains about lines moving from time to time. Last he complained about apparently the match went against his "prediction" so he just went "Seems like this one was legit". Unless he does something more sophisticated outside of Twitter, seems like a dude angry about life ^.^
I think you need to read better, i said that i was succesfull on my prediction, and still complain about that, so thats not about wining or losing money with that, im not angry about life and less about wining money, but im angry about wining money in that way, when i make a prediction im gratefull when i see my player wining legitly not wining because his opponent is trolling/matchfixing
So what i wanted to let clear on that tweet was that even when im winning money with this "shit" that i think its matchfixing (just my opinion) im still complaining, because i really love Starcraft 2 and its really sad for me to see that kind of shit, anyway for my profit its good, as i've said, years tracking that kind of players and i know what to do and when to do it.
On July 17 2020 20:32 llllllllllIIIIIlllll wrote: didn't read the whole thread but want to say that alastor posted about zest's matchfixing many many times, you should definitely take a look
Can you give a link/ tell us who "alastor" is please?
Spanish zerg. I went through his twitter feed (kind of cringe) and he complains about lines moving from time to time. Last he complained about apparently the match went against his "prediction" so he just went "Seems like this one was legit". Unless he does something more sophisticated outside of Twitter, seems like a dude angry about life ^.^
Nevermind i was confused about the tweet you refer, i have thousand of proofs, and the one that you refer was just one that didint ended like it should according to odds dropping hard, but thats not happening 100% of the times, it was just a really huge odds drop on a match that suposed to be 50/50 at least, maybe they realised or something i dont know, anyway as i said, you can think whatever you want, i know its a lost fight, its imposible for me or for anyone here to catch them unless they get involved in something with mafia like Life did for example...
On July 17 2020 23:11 Fuzer wrote: I actually just watched the VODS and to be honest, Zest caliber player shouldn't make that many mistakes, here are couple clips I just made and I explain whats wrong with them:
1st: https://clips.twitch.tv/DullClearPistachioBudStar He has observer and sees 2 medivacs, there are no other things on the map that needs attention. Let me be clear, if you see that happening you don't do anything else than make sure that you kill that medivac, it should be very easy and normal task to do. BUT WHAT Happens is that Zest blinks (shows he sees them), attacks moves the stalkers, DOES SOMETHING else(unselecteed) and surprisingly no vacs get destroyed and on top of that he takes bad fight behind that.
I ended that clip there because I don't think this next one after that is that obvious, but I mention it anyways: The drop that comes to his 3rd after is not scouted, so I can't blame him that he didn't left any units there, but he sees the mines being burrowed and chooses to recall weakened stalker army on top of that nexus... The mines do their job.
2nd: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/680307115?t=1h23m11s This is too long me to clip it, but it starts there, he scouts reactor factory and sees 2 hellions, he sees NO STARPORT (which SHOULD be next to factory / barracks.) I mean there are 2 ways the attack comes, straight runby to natural OR with drop. Well he makes a wall to natural, which is correct play, but SOMEHOW doesn't want to build pylons to the edge of the base, so he would see the drop coming(which was pretty obvious at this point)... I MEAN LOOK AT THIS MINIMAP https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/451771912570535952/733677011670794300/unknown.png . On top of that he builds ?sentry? AND gets supply blocked so he can't warpin from the 2nd warpgate.
Outcome is clear, he loses 16 probes for amateur mistake.
3rd: https://clips.twitch.tv/SmellySteamyGuanacoCurseLit scouts with hallusination phoenix that there is medivac, also he knows there is more likely more medivacs because the other observer haven't seem them going any other way, so its very likely there is more (watch the VOD how the vacs came to this position, clip is only 60s), what Zest does: "Well I just leave now, welcome to my base", "Oh he came with 4 full of units. I guess I attack there with my 5 stalkers, colossus and sentry"... Someone insert a surprised pikachu face here...
After that Zest attacks while floating money and without warpprism, which obviously doesn't go too well...
4th: https://clips.twitch.tv/SuaveWealthyEelShazBotstix This is kinda 2 minor things but they just caught on my eye... Even on 6000 MMR Protoss players won't make these kinds of mistakes, even they know how important units colossies are: He sees vikings chasing he even attacks them with Stalkers but then he just stopped caring, Stalkers went to "wrong way"... Also that Sacrifacing DT:s on that point to kill couple SCV:s are never worth it, and player of his caliber knows it. I mean he saw that PF aint going to die, he blinked them and killed 6 SCV for 3 DTs when the 2nd option wouldve been just back off for now and come back later, which would ALWAYS been the correct choice.
Also if someone says that he moved Stalkers back because he was afraid the bio, he already sees BIO is far away and secondly he knows BIO can't chase because he has 2nd disruptor shot ready, so getting 3-4 vikings and saving colossus for max 1-2 stalkers IF Vikings continue the chase is always FAR better deal.
I watched the VODs closely and I have to say there are way more mistakes than these I clipped... There are LOT of mistakes, LOT. I mean I'm MMR is 5.8k on EU and the Protoss players I face there have better decision making and micro than Zest had on these games and Zest is WORLD CLASS player.
So if Pinnacle had way more activity on this series than there normally is I think my opinion is clear. BUT correct me I'm wrong, it ain't confirmed that there were way more activity by Pinnacle?
Edit. Fucking Luolis posted my clips beforehand 8D
I'm in shock that people like you or others are really surprised about that "mistakes" for me that mistakes are nothing compared to what zest has been doing these last years, i'd never say that Zest matchfixed here because of his gameplay... these are normal games for zest, there are TONS of games where he really make things suspiccious, not shit like this where we need to supose he is really good so he should see the medivac or focus the medivac etc... i really ask you guys to keep watching his series on random tournaments, you'll be surprised about things like what i've posted, not making dt's when he is rushing them and seeing the other has no detection, stay 2 minutes supply block with 3 K minerals doing literally nothing, scout banshee cloack and do nothing, scout a 2 base terran allin from a good terran (inno,cure etC) and go for 5 bases 80 probes... these examples are the real examples where you can start to think that what he does is on purpose.
just for some reference, there are definitely still upper-level match fixers/scammers out there trying to get korean players/foreigners who can beat korean players in tournaments to help matchfix/rig games for betting sites. while i wont say too much, on may 15th i was contacted by a person via discord. he attempted to convince me to play in kr tournaments with a special, still undetectable mh and try to pull a game/series of people for betting sites. i tried to get information off of him, but after talking for like an hr he eventually just blocked me. obviously, he didn't contact just me, and there are other people he has probably contacted, but it's definitely something that is still happening behind the scenes.
money can tempt a lot of people, and there really is no telling who will make irrational choices in the moment. never forget that even players like Life were taken advantage of, and ruined their own career, so it's not outlandish to wonder about current pro players either. that said, always be courteous when examining clips and games....
from the clips i saw in this game... i couldnt say anything looks 'definitely throwish' as compared to those chinese games we had last year (i think it was?).
until anything like that comes out, please treat the players well.
ah and edit: i posted the chat log from discord on my twitter on that day, so any1 could see all the things we talked about
On July 19 2020 23:14 -Kyo- wrote: just for some reference, there are definitely still upper-level match fixers/scammers out there trying to get korean players/foreigners who can beat korean players in tournaments to help matchfix/rig games for betting sites. while i wont say too much, on may 15th i was contacted by a person via discord. he attempted to convince me to play in kr tournaments with a special, still undetectable mh and try to pull a game/series of people for betting sites. i tried to get information off of him, but after talking for like an hr he eventually just blocked me. obviously, he didn't contact just me, and there are other people he has probably contacted, but it's definitely something that is still happening behind the scenes.
money can tempt a lot of people, and there really is no telling who will make irrational choices in the moment. never forget that even players like Life were taken advantage of, and ruined their own career, so it's not outlandish to wonder about current pro players either. that said, always be courteous when examining clips and games....
from the clips i saw in this game... i couldnt say anything looks 'definitely throwish' as compared to those chinese games we had last year (i think it was?).
until anything like that comes out, please treat the players well.
ah and edit: i posted the chat log from discord on my twitter on that day, so any1 could see all the things we talked about
Is there any reason you "won't say too much" if you're recounting your own experience?
On July 17 2020 23:11 Fuzer wrote: I actually just watched the VODS and to be honest, Zest caliber player shouldn't make that many mistakes, here are couple clips I just made and I explain whats wrong with them:
1st: https://clips.twitch.tv/DullClearPistachioBudStar He has observer and sees 2 medivacs, there are no other things on the map that needs attention. Let me be clear, if you see that happening you don't do anything else than make sure that you kill that medivac, it should be very easy and normal task to do. BUT WHAT Happens is that Zest blinks (shows he sees them), attacks moves the stalkers, DOES SOMETHING else(unselecteed) and surprisingly no vacs get destroyed and on top of that he takes bad fight behind that.
I ended that clip there because I don't think this next one after that is that obvious, but I mention it anyways: The drop that comes to his 3rd after is not scouted, so I can't blame him that he didn't left any units there, but he sees the mines being burrowed and chooses to recall weakened stalker army on top of that nexus... The mines do their job.
2nd: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/680307115?t=1h23m11s This is too long me to clip it, but it starts there, he scouts reactor factory and sees 2 hellions, he sees NO STARPORT (which SHOULD be next to factory / barracks.) I mean there are 2 ways the attack comes, straight runby to natural OR with drop. Well he makes a wall to natural, which is correct play, but SOMEHOW doesn't want to build pylons to the edge of the base, so he would see the drop coming(which was pretty obvious at this point)... I MEAN LOOK AT THIS MINIMAP https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/451771912570535952/733677011670794300/unknown.png . On top of that he builds ?sentry? AND gets supply blocked so he can't warpin from the 2nd warpgate.
Outcome is clear, he loses 16 probes for amateur mistake.
3rd: https://clips.twitch.tv/SmellySteamyGuanacoCurseLit scouts with hallusination phoenix that there is medivac, also he knows there is more likely more medivacs because the other observer haven't seem them going any other way, so its very likely there is more (watch the VOD how the vacs came to this position, clip is only 60s), what Zest does: "Well I just leave now, welcome to my base", "Oh he came with 4 full of units. I guess I attack there with my 5 stalkers, colossus and sentry"... Someone insert a surprised pikachu face here...
After that Zest attacks while floating money and without warpprism, which obviously doesn't go too well...
4th: https://clips.twitch.tv/SuaveWealthyEelShazBotstix This is kinda 2 minor things but they just caught on my eye... Even on 6000 MMR Protoss players won't make these kinds of mistakes, even they know how important units colossies are: He sees vikings chasing he even attacks them with Stalkers but then he just stopped caring, Stalkers went to "wrong way"... Also that Sacrifacing DT:s on that point to kill couple SCV:s are never worth it, and player of his caliber knows it. I mean he saw that PF aint going to die, he blinked them and killed 6 SCV for 3 DTs when the 2nd option wouldve been just back off for now and come back later, which would ALWAYS been the correct choice.
Also if someone says that he moved Stalkers back because he was afraid the bio, he already sees BIO is far away and secondly he knows BIO can't chase because he has 2nd disruptor shot ready, so getting 3-4 vikings and saving colossus for max 1-2 stalkers IF Vikings continue the chase is always FAR better deal.
I watched the VODs closely and I have to say there are way more mistakes than these I clipped... There are LOT of mistakes, LOT. I mean I'm MMR is 5.8k on EU and the Protoss players I face there have better decision making and micro than Zest had on these games and Zest is WORLD CLASS player.
So if Pinnacle had way more activity on this series than there normally is I think my opinion is clear. BUT correct me I'm wrong, it ain't confirmed that there were way more activity by Pinnacle?
Edit. Fucking Luolis posted my clips beforehand 8D
I'm in shock that people like you or others are really surprised about that "mistakes" for me that mistakes are nothing compared to what zest has been doing these last years, i'd never say that Zest matchfixed here because of his gameplay... these are normal games for zest, there are TONS of games where he really make things suspiccious, not shit like this where we need to supose he is really good so he should see the medivac or focus the medivac etc... i really ask you guys to keep watching his series on random tournaments, you'll be surprised about things like what i've posted, not making dt's when he is rushing them and seeing the other has no detection, stay 2 minutes supply block with 3 K minerals doing literally nothing, scout banshee cloack and do nothing, scout a 2 base terran allin from a good terran (inno,cure etC) and go for 5 bases 80 probes... these examples are the real examples where you can start to think that what he does is on purpose.
Well, this is the first time someone tells me about series Pinnacle voided and brought it to my attention.
On July 17 2020 23:11 Fuzer wrote: I actually just watched the VODS and to be honest, Zest caliber player shouldn't make that many mistakes, here are couple clips I just made and I explain whats wrong with them:
1st: https://clips.twitch.tv/DullClearPistachioBudStar He has observer and sees 2 medivacs, there are no other things on the map that needs attention. Let me be clear, if you see that happening you don't do anything else than make sure that you kill that medivac, it should be very easy and normal task to do. BUT WHAT Happens is that Zest blinks (shows he sees them), attacks moves the stalkers, DOES SOMETHING else(unselecteed) and surprisingly no vacs get destroyed and on top of that he takes bad fight behind that.
I ended that clip there because I don't think this next one after that is that obvious, but I mention it anyways: The drop that comes to his 3rd after is not scouted, so I can't blame him that he didn't left any units there, but he sees the mines being burrowed and chooses to recall weakened stalker army on top of that nexus... The mines do their job.
2nd: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/680307115?t=1h23m11s This is too long me to clip it, but it starts there, he scouts reactor factory and sees 2 hellions, he sees NO STARPORT (which SHOULD be next to factory / barracks.) I mean there are 2 ways the attack comes, straight runby to natural OR with drop. Well he makes a wall to natural, which is correct play, but SOMEHOW doesn't want to build pylons to the edge of the base, so he would see the drop coming(which was pretty obvious at this point)... I MEAN LOOK AT THIS MINIMAP https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/451771912570535952/733677011670794300/unknown.png . On top of that he builds ?sentry? AND gets supply blocked so he can't warpin from the 2nd warpgate.
Outcome is clear, he loses 16 probes for amateur mistake.
3rd: https://clips.twitch.tv/SmellySteamyGuanacoCurseLit scouts with hallusination phoenix that there is medivac, also he knows there is more likely more medivacs because the other observer haven't seem them going any other way, so its very likely there is more (watch the VOD how the vacs came to this position, clip is only 60s), what Zest does: "Well I just leave now, welcome to my base", "Oh he came with 4 full of units. I guess I attack there with my 5 stalkers, colossus and sentry"... Someone insert a surprised pikachu face here...
After that Zest attacks while floating money and without warpprism, which obviously doesn't go too well...
4th: https://clips.twitch.tv/SuaveWealthyEelShazBotstix This is kinda 2 minor things but they just caught on my eye... Even on 6000 MMR Protoss players won't make these kinds of mistakes, even they know how important units colossies are: He sees vikings chasing he even attacks them with Stalkers but then he just stopped caring, Stalkers went to "wrong way"... Also that Sacrifacing DT:s on that point to kill couple SCV:s are never worth it, and player of his caliber knows it. I mean he saw that PF aint going to die, he blinked them and killed 6 SCV for 3 DTs when the 2nd option wouldve been just back off for now and come back later, which would ALWAYS been the correct choice.
Also if someone says that he moved Stalkers back because he was afraid the bio, he already sees BIO is far away and secondly he knows BIO can't chase because he has 2nd disruptor shot ready, so getting 3-4 vikings and saving colossus for max 1-2 stalkers IF Vikings continue the chase is always FAR better deal.
I watched the VODs closely and I have to say there are way more mistakes than these I clipped... There are LOT of mistakes, LOT. I mean I'm MMR is 5.8k on EU and the Protoss players I face there have better decision making and micro than Zest had on these games and Zest is WORLD CLASS player.
So if Pinnacle had way more activity on this series than there normally is I think my opinion is clear. BUT correct me I'm wrong, it ain't confirmed that there were way more activity by Pinnacle?
Edit. Fucking Luolis posted my clips beforehand 8D
I'm in shock that people like you or others are really surprised about that "mistakes" for me that mistakes are nothing compared to what zest has been doing these last years, i'd never say that Zest matchfixed here because of his gameplay... these are normal games for zest, there are TONS of games where he really make things suspiccious, not shit like this where we need to supose he is really good so he should see the medivac or focus the medivac etc... i really ask you guys to keep watching his series on random tournaments, you'll be surprised about things like what i've posted, not making dt's when he is rushing them and seeing the other has no detection, stay 2 minutes supply block with 3 K minerals doing literally nothing, scout banshee cloack and do nothing, scout a 2 base terran allin from a good terran (inno,cure etC) and go for 5 bases 80 probes... these examples are the real examples where you can start to think that what he does is on purpose.
Well, this is the first time someone tells me about series Pinnacle voided and brought it to my attention.
That happened to me many times, at pinnacle, at bet365, at egb, and i know for someone who is not used to bet, it could sound weird, but bookies can do whatever they want... sad but true, and practice like this for bookies are standard, so its not a "proof" of matchfixing, i think for that is better to make a tracking, check how the odds dropps, you dont need to see a super huge drop to see a matchfix, they are not trying to get rich in 1 match, wardi's, esl's, tons of tournaments where they can just make 1-2 small fixes per week, and get like 4-5K per month with 0% chances of being caught... Imagine, Zest, losing to Inno, its not something weird, so if Zest is playing an Alpha pro X tournament with 50$ prizepool he can just say ok, i lose and get 500-1000 (just an example) But as every scammer/thief etc, they start to make mistakes, they get greedy, they think they can do whatever they want, and then you see series like 2-3 monhts ago at alpha pro series, Zest-Inno where zest if i dont remember wrong, lost 3 times going 5 bases vs 2 bases, not only 4 nexus, wich is already greedy, but 5 knowing inno was allining or semi-allining in every single game...
When Zest enters an online tournament played cross server, you should expect him to either win the whole thing or get bounced in an uncerimonious 3-0. I saw nothing in these games that was outside of his M.O.
On July 19 2020 23:14 -Kyo- wrote: just for some reference, there are definitely still upper-level match fixers/scammers out there trying to get korean players/foreigners who can beat korean players in tournaments to help matchfix/rig games for betting sites. while i wont say too much, on may 15th i was contacted by a person via discord. he attempted to convince me to play in kr tournaments with a special, still undetectable mh and try to pull a game/series of people for betting sites. i tried to get information off of him, but after talking for like an hr he eventually just blocked me. obviously, he didn't contact just me, and there are other people he has probably contacted, but it's definitely something that is still happening behind the scenes.
money can tempt a lot of people, and there really is no telling who will make irrational choices in the moment. never forget that even players like Life were taken advantage of, and ruined their own career, so it's not outlandish to wonder about current pro players either. that said, always be courteous when examining clips and games....
from the clips i saw in this game... i couldnt say anything looks 'definitely throwish' as compared to those chinese games we had last year (i think it was?).
until anything like that comes out, please treat the players well.
ah and edit: i posted the chat log from discord on my twitter on that day, so any1 could see all the things we talked about
Is there any reason you "won't say too much" if you're recounting your own experience?
And may as well refute actual points, cuz psychoanalyzing pro play is kind of a joke, and using it to attempt to prove matchfixing is somewhat infurriating.
1st Clip - This was probably his most egregious and preventable mistake. Stalkers are clearly A-Moved rather than medivac targetted, which definitely IS a mistake, but without his first person point of view it's harder to tell exactly what was going on. It could have been as simple of an error as rightclicking just slightly off the medivac rather than on it, resulting in an A-move over target.
His follow up as he realizes he fucked the defense is to F-2 everything over to defend. Easy to tell, cuz his warp prism moving across the map turns around, and the 3rd base army moves.
The attack on his 3rd is pretty brutal at that point. It comes via medivac boost so it happens very quickly, and it also mostly threads his outward scouting. His defense is to warp in a round of stalkers at the 3rd, which simply isn't enough so he recalls to help with the defense. I doubt he had enough screen time to both notice mines, AND register how that would alter his defense, particularly as he was already scrambling to defend. You'll also notice that they burrow in between the warp in and the recall, so his screen was pulled elsewhere for that recall on top of it. This isn't even evidence of a bad defense, much less an intentional one.
The only actual mistake was that A-move. Ping alone would have been enough to explain it (although I don't know what kind of ping/servers they were working with here.) Either way, it's hardly evidence of matchfixing.
Also souL was pretty ballsy for zooming in with what should have been a half dead drop of 1 medivac into 6 stalkers.
The 2nd video/nonclip is a complete nothing. He scouts hellions/marine with the factory/rax. There could be a proxy starport, there could also just be a starport in base. You can do the same exact build that souL did without the proxy. His defense of it was perfectly fine. You mention that he doesn't have scouting in his base. He made a minor mistake in building his pylon behind his 3rd - which WAS a scouting pylon, it was just scouting a natural drop which people do sometimes to be tricky. You'll also notice that his probe went and built a pylon to scout his base, right before the drop was happening. If it wasn't proxy'd literally 2 inches away, or was done 2 seconds earlier, it WOULD HAVE been scouted exactly as you wanted.
He sort of got supply blocked. I think the 46 pylon is probably the most common supply block that protosses derp into, and happens as a mistake pretty frequently. He wasn't even classic supply blocked - where you go to make something and realize you are 46/46 and have to build a pylon. He started a pylon well before a full block and then warped in and then an attack hit 5-10 seconds later.
Warping a sentry is totally fine. It was warped in well before the attack, and even if it was defensively done specifically to aid in the defense, it STILL would have been fine because you can use FF to limit hellion mobility in the same vein as zergs using evo chambers in minderal lines. He even uses that FF to separate and kill what looks like 2 hellions (although one manages to barely slip through a crack. Force Fields are petty unforgiving that way, and almost universally protoss pros are shit at using FF. Half the time you see a slightly off FF like Zest's and almost rarely do you see FF's like partings from the last GSL.
Yeah, all in all a big nothing.
3rd game - if you look at the game pre-clip, Zest had observers below his base, so he sees a couple medivacs approach and kill his observers. He positions his army to defend the drop. SouL then proceeds so sit there for a solid minute+. Zest THEN makes his phoenix to check for the drop and go scout. He sends it out to check, but it only skirts the edge of vision for the drop. It WAS close enough that if you were paying attention you could tell, but you will notice that right as the hallucination goes out, souL runs away with his medivac behind the other base, and Zest is microing to kill that drop.
How many times have you watched a game where something flies by and people miss what they "could have" seen, simply because they weren't paying direct attention and didn't catch the little blip that was there for half a second? Answer: All the damn time. So now Zest probably thinks the drop is gone, and even if it wasn't, based on his information the drop should be 3 medivacs. You'll notice that souL adds medivacs to that group as time goes by, something Zest is not aware of. 6 stalkers + 1 sentry + 1 collosus should be plenty to defend 3 medivacs provided that they are already in position.
So now Zest either thinks the drop is totally gone, because he didn't see it OR he makes the most classic SC2 mistake in the world and F2s his army moving stuff that was in position out of position.
The very delayed drop comes in now that he's out of position. Creighton incorrectly makes the claim that "Zest isn't responding at all to the drop" - but you should notice a few things. 1) Zest did a round of stalkers literally right before the drop zoomed in - meaning he had no warp ins he could do to defend. 2) His army is split into 2 groups, one is pretty out of position to defend a drop, the second VERY out of position to defend the main drop. 3) Zest moves the close one to defend, and warps to support it as soon as the CD is up, and his far group, defends the drops on the left side of the map. He is very much responding.
Zest did make a fairly major mistake in moving his army, but it was perfectly understandable given the time elapsed and the fact that he may have seen nothing on his rescout. Working with incorrect information/assumptions will often result in major blunders much more frequently than NO information.
4th clip - Alot going on on this one. Where you have simultaneously a HUGE potential engagement on the leftside, and DT harass going on at the terran base. So attention is going to have to be managed to both (or abandoned on one front or the other at times.) So the micro needed is pretty intensive.
So looking at the left fight. The masses of armies start to clash, vikings are positioned pretty far forward, and the protoss starts moving backwards, to take advantage of tha position and to utilize disruptors as he runs away.
Zest blinks his stalkers off to the left so that the AI focuses on the vikings and not on the bio. Zest has a clunkiness problem here though - the army is on one big hotkey. The bio is currently disengaged so the Collossi are doing nothing, but the vikings give chase. So Zest moves his army backwards, while simultaneously also firing off a disruptor shot but since he's on 1 hotkey, Zest immediately realizes he's moved his stalkers, so switches it to an attack command. You can see the entire army immediately take kind of a half stutter step towards the terran as he does this.
Now the situation is actually pretty good for him. souls vikings start dropping heavily, so he turns them around to rejoin them with the terran army. As soon as the AI switches off the vikings Zest immediately starts running away with his stalkers (a generally correct decision, actually.)
Again - Zests problem of all units on one hotkey bites him again. When he retreats with his stalkers, he's still using this same group, so the retreated collosus (and the rest of his army retreatihng north) turn around for a little bit, its only for a second but its enough for the vikings to start shooting again and they take out the remaining collosus.
One army hotkey groups are not throws, they are mistakes of poor general unit control and are "mistakes" that many many pros do on a regular basis. Don't attribute a level of perfection to 5k players that simply doesn't exist even in 6k+ players.
Then we look at the DT action down at the Terran base. Zest has 8? DTs go in for a base kill. Now the thing with blink DTs is you want to just blink on to the base and right click it down and have it die very quickly, ideally before the terran ev en really responds. Creighton incorrectly says that he wants to kill missle turrets and force out scans for some reason. (One of the two turrets was built right before the attack, so Zest isn't even sure what's there.)Ideally what Zest wants is for the DTs to attack when the fight is happening to try and force this kill window open. Turrets don't even factor into it. You don't kill a missle turret, run around a planetary, kill another turret, then go for the CC, that's not what you are trying to do here, that gives the terran ample time to respond.
Since I'm operating only off the twitch video, and not via replay its hard to see exactly what's happening, but from the looks of it when Zest blinks onto the CC because there ius both a turret and sensor tower flush against the CC, the 8 DTs don't get immediate surface area from the blink. 2-3 have to kind of run around the building to attack. Soul sees the DTs incoming, and he's a good player, so he responds to it immediately, he's repairing the CC before the DTs can even get full surface area - which means the CC simply doesn't die. Zest is busying deal with his clunky control groups, he checks back in on the DT attack but by then its too late. He's down to like 4 dts, the CC is totally fine. Ideally he'd retreat from the DTs but in the chaos he attacks SCVs and trades (poorly). I don't know if you've seen pro protoss DT play recently but they've been throwing away DTs like nobodies business in poor trades for quite a while now. It's definitely not good play, but protoss players are doing it constantly atm, this is not remotely noteworthy.
As an extra thought: People fuck up all the time, even when they "shouldn't." I don't know how many times I've watched a Harstem stream and he'll say something like "All I need to do is X and not Y and I will win easily", then he'll proceed to do Y, lose, and go "Why the fuck did I just do Y?"
Answer: Starcraft is hard and people fuck it up constantly.
TLDR: Your analysis is off, your perception of how well people play on a regular basis is WAY OFF, and using analysis of pro play in this way as evidence of match fixing is a total joke.
On July 19 2020 23:14 -Kyo- wrote: just for some reference, there are definitely still upper-level match fixers/scammers out there trying to get korean players/foreigners who can beat korean players in tournaments to help matchfix/rig games for betting sites. while i wont say too much, on may 15th i was contacted by a person via discord. he attempted to convince me to play in kr tournaments with a special, still undetectable mh and try to pull a game/series of people for betting sites. i tried to get information off of him, but after talking for like an hr he eventually just blocked me. obviously, he didn't contact just me, and there are other people he has probably contacted, but it's definitely something that is still happening behind the scenes.
money can tempt a lot of people, and there really is no telling who will make irrational choices in the moment. never forget that even players like Life were taken advantage of, and ruined their own career, so it's not outlandish to wonder about current pro players either. that said, always be courteous when examining clips and games....
from the clips i saw in this game... i couldnt say anything looks 'definitely throwish' as compared to those chinese games we had last year (i think it was?).
until anything like that comes out, please treat the players well.
ah and edit: i posted the chat log from discord on my twitter on that day, so any1 could see all the things we talked about
Is there any reason you "won't say too much" if you're recounting your own experience?
yes, there is. it has to do with websites and links to things which may get me banned if i randomly posted too much information about them here. i am always careful with posting about such things. as i mentioned in the post, if ppl really care they could check the chat log i posted on the day, but chances are, no1 cares about more info than what i posted... so...
Looks like Pinnacle isn't allowing anyone to bet on Zest games in Douyu Cup tomorrow. They're all available to click on but when you try to put in a wager, it says bet is offline.
For GSL yesterday, Pinnacle didn't offer any lines related to Zest. At least not the opening match. I'm beginning to think they don't want to offer anything related to Zest because they always have GSL lines up.
I can say with 99% certainty Pinnacle won't be offering betting lines in matches that involve Zest. They have Alpha X available for tomorrow and like GSL, no Zest related lines.
On July 28 2020 09:35 geokilla wrote: I can say with 99% certainty Pinnacle won't be offering betting lines in matches that involve Zest. They have Alpha X available for tomorrow and like GSL, no Zest related lines.
Almost a month has passed and any SC2 games related to Zest are not coming up anymore. Safe to say Pinnacle has blacklisted Zest.
On July 28 2020 09:35 geokilla wrote: I can say with 99% certainty Pinnacle won't be offering betting lines in matches that involve Zest. They have Alpha X available for tomorrow and like GSL, no Zest related lines.
Almost a month has passed and any SC2 games related to Zest are not coming up anymore. Safe to say Pinnacle has blacklisted Zest.
That is crazy, we can speculate as much as we want but the ones with perfect inforamtion about how suspicious Zest games have been in the past is chosing to blacklist him?
Does that mean his games is so often rife with suspicious activity that its not worth the income that they get from "normal" games. The workload and energy going into looking at the suspicious lines makes it more worthwhile to just outright blacklist him?
If nothing else this totally disproves the whole "Pinnacle is just voiding games for their own monetary gain" argument. Pinnacle literally has the option to keep the betting open but void it when its suspicous but instead they are choosing to stop earning any money on Zest games period.
On July 28 2020 09:35 geokilla wrote: I can say with 99% certainty Pinnacle won't be offering betting lines in matches that involve Zest. They have Alpha X available for tomorrow and like GSL, no Zest related lines.
Almost a month has passed and any SC2 games related to Zest are not coming up anymore. Safe to say Pinnacle has blacklisted Zest.
That is crazy, we can speculate as much as we want but the ones with perfect information about how suspicious Zest games have been in the past is choosing to blacklist him?
Does that mean his games is so often rife with suspicious activity that its not worth the income that they get from "normal" games. The workload and energy going into looking at the suspicious lines makes it more worthwhile to just outright blacklist him?
If nothing else this totally disproves the whole "Pinnacle is just voiding games for their own monetary gain" argument. Pinnacle literally has the option to keep the betting open but void it when its suspicious but instead they are choosing to stop earning any money on Zest games period.
It's very possible. For what it's worth, Pinnacle has the GSL lines out already and Zest vs Taeja lines aren't offered. Of course they don't state the reason why it's not offered. It just isn't.
Also not all SC2 events are offered. A lot of times, AlphaX best of 9 showmatches aren't offered either.
I kind of wish Korea would have embraced gambling back in the day. If the profits were being pumped into tournaments and the players, they wouldn't be fixing matches, just playing great StarCraft. Gambling can ruin lives but for many it's way to win/lose beer money while watching a sport. Besides, gambling addicts are always going to find a way.
On August 25 2020 09:49 justinpal wrote: I kind of wish Korea would have embraced gambling back in the day. If the profits were being pumped into tournaments and the players, they wouldn't be fixing matches, just playing great StarCraft. Gambling can ruin lives but for many it's way to win/lose beer money while watching a sport. Besides, gambling addicts are always going to find a way.
Gambling money has legitimacy in the UK and active involvement of gambling companies in sponsorship both grew and expanded the snooker circuit, still were a fair few match fixing kind of scandals. The temptation will still be there, and in places where gambling is totally legalised it doesn’t necessitate shady underground folks making the approaches.
There’s no perfect solutions to many things I guess. On a personal level I’d like to keep gambling (as an industry) as far away from eSports as possible, especially given the young demographic and how mechanics in many free to play games (and increasingly ones that aren’t even free) already functionally service as gambling.
I’ve never gambled outside of going blind 2 rax on a 4 player map, but to say I’m not a huge fan of the industry is rather an understatement. It functionally exists to deprive people of money on average (ok obviously) and it’s not a coincidence that you’ll find most of your bookmaker shops over here in the poorer areas.
If you do siphon off profits back into the circuit, bookmaker’s are going to want something in return potentially, likely some kind of visibility in broadcasts. Which for regular folk is something can shrug off, for those with gambling problems that can be really difficult for them.
We saw it over here in the UK when smartphone ubiquity came in, and the need to physically go in and place bets was removed. Gambling industry went ham on sports advertising up to the peak where a good chunk of advertisements in a half time break for the football were gambling, gambling firms sponsored more and more teams, actual live odds for that specific game would appear in the break etc etc.
Despite being made aware of a huge spike in gambling related financial problems across the populace it took quite some time for regulation to at least step in there.
I’m fine with a site like Pinnacle because it’s kept at a certain distance where one can just consume Starcraft, indeed it’s mostly from this thread I’m particularly aware of it. People can still have their fun and show their Starcraft knowledge or lack thereof, but those who do struggle with gambling or would be hypothetically so inclined at least have some distance.
Wow this ended up being a longer post than I’d initially intended.
On August 25 2020 09:49 justinpal wrote: I kind of wish Korea would have embraced gambling back in the day. If the profits were being pumped into tournaments and the players, they wouldn't be fixing matches, just playing great StarCraft. Gambling can ruin lives but for many it's way to win/lose beer money while watching a sport. Besides, gambling addicts are always going to find a way.
Even if gambling were legal in Korea, I'm pretty sure GSL wouldn't want to be associated with it, especially after matchfixing schemes came close to destroying BW and SC2.
On July 21 2020 14:13 elluel wrote: imreallydissapointedthishappened.neverhtoughtzestwouldbetheonetodothis.unforutnatelymyspacebarbrokeaswellsoican'ttypespaces
[E Sports] [StarCraft 2 - Dreamhack Masters Europe] [Match] Couguar vs SouLeer has been cancelled due to the following reason: [Abnormal and suspicious betting activity has been detected for this event. All wagers from all customers have been cancelled. This action is taken very rarely and is for the protection of all our customers.] . Your bet with ticket-ID: 1162307054 has been refunded. If this game was part of a parlay, please be aware that the parlay will be reduced and recalculated. Thank you!
On August 25 2020 09:49 justinpal wrote: I kind of wish Korea would have embraced gambling back in the day. If the profits were being pumped into tournaments and the players, they wouldn't be fixing matches, just playing great StarCraft. Gambling can ruin lives but for many it's way to win/lose beer money while watching a sport. Besides, gambling addicts are always going to find a way.
Even if gambling were legal in Korea, I'm pretty sure GSL wouldn't want to be associated with it, especially after matchfixing schemes came close to destroying BW and SC2.
That was his original point, if they could have embraced gambling from the beginning there wouldn't be matchfixing scandals if the money was being pumped back into the scene. Sure some players would still matchfix but it would be as big of an issue if the money was "clean" and put back into the scene.
[E Sports] [StarCraft 2 - Dreamhack Masters Europe] [Match] Couguar vs SouLeer has been cancelled due to the following reason: [Abnormal and suspicious betting activity has been detected for this event. All wagers from all customers have been cancelled. This action is taken very rarely and is for the protection of all our customers.] . Your bet with ticket-ID: 1162307054 has been refunded. If this game was part of a parlay, please be aware that the parlay will be reduced and recalculated. Thank you!
Another one.
This seems silly, wouldn't you agree? This is the kind of "fix" that convinces me not to assume match fixing every time a bet is voided.
On August 25 2020 09:49 justinpal wrote: I kind of wish Korea would have embraced gambling back in the day. If the profits were being pumped into tournaments and the players, they wouldn't be fixing matches, just playing great StarCraft. Gambling can ruin lives but for many it's way to win/lose beer money while watching a sport. Besides, gambling addicts are always going to find a way.
Even if gambling were legal in Korea, I'm pretty sure GSL wouldn't want to be associated with it, especially after matchfixing schemes came close to destroying BW and SC2.
That was his original point, if they could have embraced gambling from the beginning there wouldn't be matchfixing scandals if the money was being pumped back into the scene. Sure some players would still matchfix but it would be as big of an issue if the money was "clean" and put back into the scene.
Savior would have organized match fixing regardless and thats what disincentivized major sponsorships. it was about as main stream as it could be with big companies sponsoring (skt, kt, samsung, cj, shinhan bank) and matchfixing ruined the leagues image. The image would be ruined regardless of whether the gambling was legal or not
I think you guys need to be suspicious of Pinnacle as well. They are purely profit minded and will use matchfixing as a reason to void matches they might lose money on. Definitely matchfixing does exist but only a subset of voided matches are fixed, the rest are Pinnacle trying to pull a fast one.
Pinnacle is a market maker. They make money off the bid-ask spread, hence their best case scenario is when people bet on both sides with equal volume (pay-out weighted), then they make money regardless of which side wins. If there is more volume on one side, then Pinnacle's algorithm will adjust the odds accordingly to reflect that.
However, being a market maker is not totally risk-free, especially when there is high volatility. The only scenario where a market maker for betting markets is exposed to risk is when there is a sudden change in prices, i.e. there is sudden heavy betting on one side. Pinnacle claim to be voiding these matches in public-interest because they might be fixed, but it's actually purely in self-interest to minimize the risk involved where they could lose a lot of money if one party wins.
Betting markets are not properly regulated and they can take advantage of consumers. It's the same as trading financial products with a bucket shop, versus on a regulated exchange.
On August 25 2020 09:49 justinpal wrote: I kind of wish Korea would have embraced gambling back in the day. If the profits were being pumped into tournaments and the players, they wouldn't be fixing matches, just playing great StarCraft. Gambling can ruin lives but for many it's way to win/lose beer money while watching a sport. Besides, gambling addicts are always going to find a way.
Even if gambling were legal in Korea, I'm pretty sure GSL wouldn't want to be associated with it, especially after matchfixing schemes came close to destroying BW and SC2.
That was his original point, if they could have embraced gambling from the beginning there wouldn't be matchfixing scandals if the money was being pumped back into the scene. Sure some players would still matchfix but it would be as big of an issue if the money was "clean" and put back into the scene.
Savior would have organized match fixing regardless and thats what disincentivized major sponsorships. it was about as main stream as it could be with big companies sponsoring (skt, kt, samsung, cj, shinhan bank) and matchfixing ruined the leagues image. The image would be ruined regardless of whether the gambling was legal or not
Agreed. Not an absolute expert on worldwide sports, I can recall a higher number of bans in professional snooker for match fixing than I can from any other sport off hand. It’s in a sweet spot in that money in it is decent but not crazy if you’re not one of the top guys, and gambling sponsorship has been heavily courted over the years. Its growth audience is out in China too, so a few parallels with the SC scene I guess.
Legitimate gambling being embedded and pushed ramps up the amount of gambling money being on the line, so there’s more incentive to approach people for throws. Not to mention it’s easier to make an approach if you’re working for a sponsor of the league, you get some degree of access say shady illegal gambling types have to work to establish.
Aside from a personal qualm pushing gambling at such a youthful demographic, I imagine there’s some problems practically that would pop up. Gambling not being legal everywhere for example.
On September 17 2020 09:10 Pangpootata wrote: I think you guys need to be suspicious of Pinnacle as well. They are purely profit minded and will use matchfixing as a reason to void matches they might lose money on. Definitely matchfixing does exist but only a subset of voided matches are fixed, the rest are Pinnacle trying to pull a fast one.
Pinnacle is a market maker. They make money off the bid-ask spread, hence their best case scenario is when people bet on both sides with equal volume (pay-out weighted), then they make money regardless of which side wins. If there is more volume on one side, then Pinnacle's algorithm will adjust the odds accordingly to reflect that.
However, being a market maker is not totally risk-free, especially when there is high volatility. The only scenario where a market maker for betting markets is exposed to risk is when there is a sudden change in prices, i.e. there is sudden heavy betting on one side. Pinnacle claim to be voiding these matches in public-interest because they might be fixed, but it's actually purely in self-interest to minimize the risk involved where they could lose a lot of money if one party wins.
Betting markets are not properly regulated and they can take advantage of consumers. It's the same as trading financial products with a bucket shop, versus on a regulated exchange.
I don't agree with this. I tail Chinese soccer, NBA, Russian hockey, CS:GO, LoL, etc. I've have no bets voided aside from SC2 bets. With best of 3 matches in CS:GO, sometimes it's quite obvious the line shifted and there's heavy money on say EG to win map 2 because it's their map pick. Pinnacle doesn't void these bets, and the amount of money they stand to lose is far greater than anyone match in SC2.
For what it's worth, I haven't had any bets voided since my last post. Maybe it's because I didn't bet on some of the matches, but I think I saw some Zest games available to bet.
On September 17 2020 09:10 Pangpootata wrote: I think you guys need to be suspicious of Pinnacle as well. They are purely profit minded and will use matchfixing as a reason to void matches they might lose money on. Definitely matchfixing does exist but only a subset of voided matches are fixed, the rest are Pinnacle trying to pull a fast one.
Pinnacle is a market maker. They make money off the bid-ask spread, hence their best case scenario is when people bet on both sides with equal volume (pay-out weighted), then they make money regardless of which side wins. If there is more volume on one side, then Pinnacle's algorithm will adjust the odds accordingly to reflect that.
However, being a market maker is not totally risk-free, especially when there is high volatility. The only scenario where a market maker for betting markets is exposed to risk is when there is a sudden change in prices, i.e. there is sudden heavy betting on one side. Pinnacle claim to be voiding these matches in public-interest because they might be fixed, but it's actually purely in self-interest to minimize the risk involved where they could lose a lot of money if one party wins.
Betting markets are not properly regulated and they can take advantage of consumers. It's the same as trading financial products with a bucket shop, versus on a regulated exchange.
It could be possible that that is low volume of bets for some matches and hence a disproportionately large bet could cause a large line swing and hence it is picked up by Pinnacle's algorithm. This large bet could be due to to the better having inside knowledge (e.g. they knew that a player is hungover for instance). You could argue that Pinnacle is being a little shady to void bets for these reasons.
On September 17 2020 09:10 Pangpootata wrote: I think you guys need to be suspicious of Pinnacle as well. They are purely profit minded and will use matchfixing as a reason to void matches they might lose money on. Definitely matchfixing does exist but only a subset of voided matches are fixed, the rest are Pinnacle trying to pull a fast one.
Pinnacle is a market maker. They make money off the bid-ask spread, hence their best case scenario is when people bet on both sides with equal volume (pay-out weighted), then they make money regardless of which side wins. If there is more volume on one side, then Pinnacle's algorithm will adjust the odds accordingly to reflect that.
However, being a market maker is not totally risk-free, especially when there is high volatility. The only scenario where a market maker for betting markets is exposed to risk is when there is a sudden change in prices, i.e. there is sudden heavy betting on one side. Pinnacle claim to be voiding these matches in public-interest because they might be fixed, but it's actually purely in self-interest to minimize the risk involved where they could lose a lot of money if one party wins.
Betting markets are not properly regulated and they can take advantage of consumers. It's the same as trading financial products with a bucket shop, versus on a regulated exchange.
It could be possible that that is low volume of bets for some matches and hence a disproportionately large bet could cause a large line swing and hence it is picked up by Pinnacle's algorithm. This large bet could be due to to the better having inside knowledge (e.g. they knew that a player is hungover for instance). You could argue that Pinnacle is being a little shady to void bets for these reasons.
Well what is a "disproportionatly large bet", I am sure Pinnacle knows very well what is normal for starcraft matches and if matchfixing is going on you can be sure its not one bettor going in with one crazy huge bet. That waaay too obvious, instead what would happen is that multiple bettors will go in and bet a large sum of money but not outrageous. Pinnacle surely looks at the line but also the factors behind it.
The people saying Pinnacle is shady has no idea what they are talking about, Pinnacle rarely voids bets in any other sport and the money at stake in sc2 matches is peanuts for that company. Why be shady and risk the whole companies trust for a tiny amount of money, no company would do that its just sutpid, its only risk no gain.
Starcraft is easy to rig, hard to prove matchfixing and its players aren't making bank playing the game normally. Its ripe for matchfixing, you can believe whatever you want but the argument that Pinnacle would be voiding bets to earn some cents here and there is the wrong approach.
On September 17 2020 09:10 Pangpootata wrote: I think you guys need to be suspicious of Pinnacle as well. They are purely profit minded and will use matchfixing as a reason to void matches they might lose money on. Definitely matchfixing does exist but only a subset of voided matches are fixed, the rest are Pinnacle trying to pull a fast one.
Pinnacle is a market maker. They make money off the bid-ask spread, hence their best case scenario is when people bet on both sides with equal volume (pay-out weighted), then they make money regardless of which side wins. If there is more volume on one side, then Pinnacle's algorithm will adjust the odds accordingly to reflect that.
However, being a market maker is not totally risk-free, especially when there is high volatility. The only scenario where a market maker for betting markets is exposed to risk is when there is a sudden change in prices, i.e. there is sudden heavy betting on one side. Pinnacle claim to be voiding these matches in public-interest because they might be fixed, but it's actually purely in self-interest to minimize the risk involved where they could lose a lot of money if one party wins.
Betting markets are not properly regulated and they can take advantage of consumers. It's the same as trading financial products with a bucket shop, versus on a regulated exchange.
It could be possible that that is low volume of bets for some matches and hence a disproportionately large bet could cause a large line swing and hence it is picked up by Pinnacle's algorithm. This large bet could be due to to the better having inside knowledge (e.g. they knew that a player is hungover for instance). You could argue that Pinnacle is being a little shady to void bets for these reasons.
Well what is a "disproportionatly large bet", I am sure Pinnacle knows very well what is normal for starcraft matches and if matchfixing is going on you can be sure its not one bettor going in with one crazy huge bet. That waaay too obvious, instead what would happen is that multiple bettors will go in and bet a large sum of money but not outrageous. Pinnacle surely looks at the line but also the factors behind it.
The people saying Pinnacle is shady has no idea what they are talking about, Pinnacle rarely voids bets in any other sport and the money at stake in sc2 matches is peanuts for that company. Why be shady and risk the whole companies trust for a tiny amount of money, no company would do that its just sutpid, its only risk no gain.
Starcraft is easy to rig, hard to prove matchfixing and its players aren't making bank playing the game normally. Its ripe for matchfixing, you can believe whatever you want but the argument that Pinnacle would be voiding bets to earn some cents here and there is the wrong approach.
Don't forget bet limits are low on SC2 too. For example, Clem vs Special bet limits are all triple digits. No matter what bet I choose, I can't bet more than $1k on it at each time.
I'd argue CS:GO is easier to match fix. It's so apparent in ESEA MDL. Over/under rounds are easy to fix in CS:GO as are best of series.For example, there was a best of 5 series last month involving Sprout and AGO. Sprout had a 1-0 lead going into the series because they were in the winners bracket. Sprout ML odds were about 1.2. Look how that turned out. Best part is after that series, Sprout started playing like they normally do again while AGO was losing matches you expect them to lose.
On September 25 2020 14:28 elluel wrote: so i guess nothing came of this? what if life's incident wasn't actually what it was?
Nothing came out of what? I think you should read the liquidpedia article about the matchfixing scandal because you don't seem to understand what happened. Several players have had bets voided by pinnacle without being charged for matchfixing, voided bets are not even part of the reason the dirty zerg got sentenced so what does this have to do with him?
Tilting the way that most sc2 fans a priori defend these players. If you had any objectivity at all you'd be questioning these players. it's us that support them with subscriptions and tuning into matches. Nobody in the community is willing to speak up and say "Zest is suspicious as fuck and he should be investigated" or "Why haven't players that were involved in the last matchfixing scandal been investigated?" (MKP, Innovation, etc.)
It's a case of when not if there's another betting scandal and honestly I think it's the biggest threat to SC's future. Blizzard will want to distance themselves if it happens again. There's such a disconnect between those that say they care about SC2 but won't even bother to think about the implications of these voided bets.
As mentioned - no, this is not a regular occurence; no, it is not really in Pinnacle's interest to void bets (it's awful PR); no, this is not usually a false positive.
On September 26 2020 00:11 1gragequit wrote: Tilting the way that most sc2 fans a priori defend these players. If you had any objectivity at all you'd be questioning these players. it's us that support them with subscriptions and tuning into matches. Nobody in the community is willing to speak up and say "Zest is suspicious as fuck and he should be investigated" or "Why haven't players that were involved in the last matchfixing scandal been investigated?" (MKP, Innovation, etc.)
It's a case of when not if there's another betting scandal and honestly I think it's the biggest threat to SC's future. Blizzard will want to distance themselves if it happens again. There's such a disconnect between those that say they care about SC2 but won't even bother to think about the implications of these voided bets.
As mentioned - no, this is not a regular occurence; no, it is not really in Pinnacle's interest to void bets (it's awful PR); no, this is not usually a false positive.
Ye lets acuse players because they float 1000+ minerals, play strange and bets are voided. Cmon man, if there is hard evidence then yes cleary its a different story. But thats not the case is it, you cant just accuse players of fixing matches because of these things. Thats way too hard of a accusation to make.
In tennis for example low lvl players get harassed every single day when they lose matches or even sets because some degens bet on them and cant handle losses. A tennis player that leads 6-3 5-2 and loses? Bam 100+ death threats and their social media is full of people accusing them of fixing. Luckily this isnt the case for sc2 as its much smaller and not that many ppl bet on it. But there is a reason you dont jump to the gun when it comes to match fixing.
On September 26 2020 00:11 1gragequit wrote: Tilting the way that most sc2 fans a priori defend these players. If you had any objectivity at all you'd be questioning these players. it's us that support them with subscriptions and tuning into matches. Nobody in the community is willing to speak up and say "Zest is suspicious as fuck and he should be investigated" or "Why haven't players that were involved in the last matchfixing scandal been investigated?" (MKP, Innovation, etc.)
It's a case of when not if there's another betting scandal and honestly I think it's the biggest threat to SC's future. Blizzard will want to distance themselves if it happens again. There's such a disconnect between those that say they care about SC2 but won't even bother to think about the implications of these voided bets.
As mentioned - no, this is not a regular occurence; no, it is not really in Pinnacle's interest to void bets (it's awful PR); no, this is not usually a false positive.
Ye lets acuse players because they float 1000+ minerals, play strange and bets are voided. Cmon man, if there is hard evidence then yes cleary its a different story. But thats not the case is it, you cant just accuse players of fixing matches because of these things. Thats way too hard of a accusation to make.
In tennis for example low lvl players get harassed every single day when they lose matches or even sets because some degens bet on them and cant handle losses. A tennis player that leads 6-3 5-2 and loses? Bam 100+ death threats and their social media is full of people accusing them of fixing. Luckily this isnt the case for sc2 as its much smaller and not that many ppl bet on it. But there is a reason you dont jump to the gun when it comes to match fixing.
Especially when Zest is affectionately known for being a great player despite floating. Ffs the term ‘Zest bank’ exists for a reason.
Maybe there’s cause for suspicion, I wouldn’t just jump on players without really strong evidence.
Apart from anything else it seems a fools errand to bet on small weeklies and get pissy.
I’m not a top tier SC2 pro but if I was I’m coasting trying to keep in shape, hiding my good builds, experiment with weird stuff and if I win it’s just a bonus for my practice schedule.
For players slightly lower than that who haven’t burst through to decent tournament money, if I was one I’d bust my ass to keep some money coming in and the pro gaming dream alive.
Given such an environment you’re going to see weird results that go against the form book.
Well this is interesting. ESIC just banned a bunch of players in CS:GO for betting on their own matches and Pinnacle is refusing to void the matches they were involved in. Is this not a form of match fixing? What do they consider suspicious betting activity then?
On October 23 2020 23:15 geokilla wrote: Well this is interesting. ESIC just banned a bunch of players in CS:GO for betting on their own matches and Pinnacle is refusing to void the matches they were involved in. Is this not a form of match fixing? What do they consider suspicious betting activity then?
They want to get ahead of match fixing. Going back months and years to refund bets would be a mess. If they knew beforehand the matches were fixed they would have never been available to begin with.
But actually on this topic... Ever since the pricepool of the GSL was reduced so heavily, that makes this type of activity all the more tempting, with how low the prizepool got and how itseems inevitable the GSL only last a couple of years at most.
I've noticed many games, particularly in long series where players just make 1 stupid decision suddenly and they lose. But of course, that is not proof of anything at all, I lose all the time that way.
Still, I believe we as a community should be weary of these type of activity returning, and if we notice anything weird in betting sites or games, cause the reduced pricepool would make winning thousands for throwing 1 game more tempting.
Since I'm very drunk I'll use this opportunity to state one of my unpopular opinions, which is that the fact that Life was banned for life for losing games on purpose is embarrassing, he should absolutely have been let back in
EPT
![[image loading]](https://i.imgur.com/41UhxyF.jpg)
2015 Match-Fixing Scandal
Here is mine: 
