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HLTV live ranking is slightly out of sync with reality due to HOTU's "creative" gaming of the VRS model. HOTU has not played a game since these shenanigans described below took place and why would they.. They might deny another team a Blast Bounty invite from this very creative gaming of the VRS system! We can't say they have broken the rules, but they have stretched them to the limit.. A summary of what happened: HOTU wanted to forfeit a game in ESL Challenger League back in October, because they wanted to focus on ESL Pro League. However, if they forfeited it would cost VRS points, so they were "clever" and fielded a roster with only 2 players from their current roster but with 1 benched player so that they still did not break the invite rules.. They played first map and forfeited the next map and went on to forfeit the Lower bracket game completely. hltv.org/matches/238646… Very "clever", but also "too clever" in my opinion.. as in bad sportsmanship. They were obviously gaming the system to avoid getting the minuspoints from forfeiting the games. The only way to defend their actions is if they claim they did it to put a spotlight on an issue in the VRS model. It is objectively an issue that it would cost HOTU points to accept the last minute replacement invite for EPL, but then again, the schedules weren't conflicting and 2 players did play, so I assume all 5 players could have played. They just didn't want to do it "blameF style" and play multiple events while at a LAN! So they decided to be "creative". It gets even worse though.. This "fake" lineup not only absorbed the minus-points from the 2 forfeits from the main roster, it also shared players for some of HOTU's old matches with overall negative ranking impact. 26 old matches swapped from main team to "fake roster" each time they "played" a ranked match respectively. Since the last forfeited match in the ESL Challenger was scheduled some hours after the last match in EPL that the real lineup played, the "fake" lineup now "holds" quite a few minuspoints that belong to the real HOTU lineup. Without even playing!! But as soon as HOTU's real lineup plays their next ranked match they will rightfully get those old matched back again from the fake lineup. I'm guessing that won't happen until after Blast Bounty invites have been handed out though as its very convenient that the fake lineup holds those minuspoints! Be aware (@bentoft) that HLTV live ranking can not handle these shenanigans (HOTU's tricks broke HLTV live ranking! 😉). HLTV live ranking shows HOTU as rank 31 on the December 1st ranking that will decide Blast Bounty invites: However, reality is that HOTU is placed 25th with 1308 points due to their "fake" lineup currently "holding" all their 26 matches from before 10.09.2025. Here from the official Valve gitHub from the November ranking: You can see how this "fake" lineup that only played one map and forfeited the rest (the 2 matches from ESL Challenger in the yellow box), also holds 26 old matches. Matches that HOTU's real roster will claim back when they play their next match. Probably only after the Blast Bounty invite has been secured. I guess a fix is needed on HLTV live ranking as it actually affects the ranking displayed for top teams in a minor way too since HOTU did play in EPL. Example: Vitality lost to HOTU and should have a few more points than HLTV live ranking shows because HOTU should have more points than they have... and so on.. minor differences, but yeah better get it corrected.