TFT Pro Team May Have Received Banned Info Ahead of Macao Open
Just a week away from one of the most highly anticipated Teamfight Tactics events in history, the TFT Macao Open, leaks of banned tactical information trading have been brought forward. This could impact the competitive integrity of the $300,000 tournament and potentially violate Riot Games' Terms of Service.
On Wednesday, December 4, a post was made on X showcasing a screenshot from a video content creator “LearningTFT” recently made that showed a leaked DM message from themselves and pro-TFT player Marcel "Marcel P" Puyat, who is sponsored by TFT data analytic website, MetaTFT.com.
In the leaked Discord conversation, Marcel P appears to let LearningTFT know that his sponsor is feeding them private information that is not known to the public in many people quickly jumped to the conclusion they were for recently banned-by-API Augment Stats.
What is MetaTFT?
MetaTFT is a data-analytics website created by Sam “Guthers” Guthrie in which they use API tools to gather massive data from players in TFT and condenses it into easy-to-use tables that showcase which champions, items, compositions and more are the best and which ones are the worse.
MetaTFT is one of many sites like this, but it recently made headlines by signing multiple top players to its esports team. These players will compete under the MetaTFT brand, starting with the TFT Macao Open, the first major tournament of the TFT Set 13: Into the Arcane season.
Marcel P is one of the players that currently plays under the MetaTFT umbrella.
What is the TFT Augment Stat ban
Ever since Riot Games gave the green light for API sites to scrape data for TFT, stats have had a significant impact on the meta. Stats showcase to players what the best champions, items, and compositions. Some players claim the game is easier to digest, while others say it ruins creativity. With people on both ends of the spectrum, Riot Games has drawn a line in the sand as to how much data is too much. At the start of the 13th TFT expansion, Into the Arcane, Riot officially banned API sites from scraping Augment data.
The reasoning for the augment stat ban is that Riot Games believes it affects “game health and competitive fairness”
“We know some players won’t be happy with this change, and we get that. But that does not change that this is the fairest thing to do for future competitions,” Stephen “Mortdog” Mortimer, the lead designer for TFT said in a Reddit post announcement about the stat ban. “This change will also lead to better game health and enjoyment.”
Mortdog echoes that API websites that showcase Augment stats decrease creativity. He also states that certain regions have better API tools than others, which creates an unfair advantage on an international stage. He also claims that the game is much healthier when players are playing “creatively” instead of just clicking automatically on the augments that have the highest average placement.
This isn't the first time Riot has banned Augment Data, they did so back in TFT Set 11 but it was quickly met with backlash. Players highlighted several disagreements with the decision as many believed that Augment data evened the playing field by letting players who don't play as much as the top streamers/pro players try to close the gap in finding what was meta
Other players against the ban cited it's impossible to see what augments were bugged in the right and wrong directions because the stat ban will effectively hide that knowledge from the player base.
The last main argument is that some players will still be able to circumvent the ban by buying stats on a “black market,” essentially saying that there are other ways to gain augment stats outside of a pure API ban. Riot claims this is fixed now but the current leak by MetaTFT may show that it's still possible.
MetaTFT and Marcel P’s Response
Both Marcel P and Guthrie have published statements after the leak was made public. They both mentioned that the “stats” that were being passed to Marcel P and others were not banned Augment stats, but instead were “Anomaly” stats, which is a new mechanic in TFT Set 13.
Guthrie claims that the legality of sharing these stats is unknown as they are not explicitly banned by Riot. Guthrie said that they were “hesitant” to show the data because of that but out of respect for Riot, he has not shared these publicly. He claims that they have decided to “wait for more information before releasing the data and emailed our developer relations contact to find out if we could get some more clarification.”
Related Article: New Arcane Characters Join TFT — 6 Cost Mel, Viktor, Warwick explained
However, he does state that he has shared information about Anomalies with his sponsored players. In their statement, they said they would no longer share this information with their players. However, others have quickly jumped in and claimed that the damage is done and that MetaTFT’s sponsored players have an advantage over the field as they have been fed data that the rest of the player base does not have access to.
At the time of publishing Riot Games has not made an official statement on their end. Esports Illustrated has reached out to Riot for comment. There has been no announcement in terms of potential bans or updates on the Augment or Anomaly stat bans. This article will be updated if or when Riot Games does comment on the situation. EI also reached out to MetaTFT and received the statement linked above.
Disclaimer: MetaTFT previously sponsored content on Esports Illustrated
