Fnatic at The International

There has been a lot of discussion over the last 24 hours regarding our requirement that Fnatic plays with Era at The International, and how it differs from Fear’s substitution in Evil Geniuses. In cases like this, we think being fully transparent is the right approach. Hopefully this sheds some light onto the situation for everyone.

If you are not familiar with the situation we are referring to, please read Fnatic’s update first.

There have been a number of situations over the years, both public and private, where we have had to make difficult decisions around player involvement in The International. A few months ago, Fear from Evil Geniuses developed an injury that could jeopardize his ability to play. As a result, EG had been playing with their proposed substitute, Mason. EG informed us that there was a high likelihood that Fear wouldn’t be cleared medically to compete. With the data of his injury brought to our attention well before invites were decided, we discussed whether or not EG with Mason would still be above the bar for an invite. We agreed they were, and invited EG knowing that it could be either player on the team. When Fear’s medical options ran out, we changed the invite from Fear to Mason.

We review each roster change brought to our attention on a case-by-case basis, with the goal being to make the best decision for players and fans. At the point where there appears to be other agendas in play, our default position will always be to protect the individual players ability to compete in the tournament they were invited to. This is the pattern we followed based on the data we received, specifically the assertion from Era on June 13ththat he was healthy and ready to play, and that the team was not acting in his best interests. All of the correspondence between Valve and Fnatic on this issue can be found below.

On May 29th, we were contacted by Patrik Sattermon from Fnatic. He said that Era was dealing with some serious medical issues, and they had concerns about his ability to play. That e-mail is shown below. We expressed our concern for Era’s health and asked to be kept in the loop on how things were going. Fnatic participated in The Summit with Xcalibur as their stand-in.

From: Patrik Sättermon [mailto:<removed>]
Sent: Thursday, May 29, 2014 8:31 AM
To: Icefrog; Erik Johnson
Cc: Danijel Remus; Sahil Deva; Anne Mathews
Subject: Fnatic Dota 2 – Concern

Dear Erik and Icefrog,

First of all, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Patrik Sättermon and I work as the COO at Fnatic here in our HQ in London, UK.

I’m today reaching out to you regarding an unforeseen and inconvenient situation in our Dota 2 team. We would really appreciate the highest grade of confidentially on the matter I’m about to address, so we can guarantee the integrity and understanding of the player in question that we are currently having issues with.

A few days ago I had to take the decision to urgently send Adrian “Era” Kryeziu back home to Sweden from our pre Summer bootcamp here in London. This was made out of health concerns of the player in question, as Adrian has recently suffered from a lot of anxiety, that the past weeks has grown to severe panic attacks and a full-blown depression. As you can imagine this has put Adrian in an extremely fragile mental state, which obviously requires immediate professional healthcare.

Yesterday I had a follow-up call with Adrian’s family regarding his first contact with the psychiatrists in Sweden and the verdict is that Adrian must be admitted into a programme, as well as being put on anti-depressive drugs that for the first 3-4 weeks will make his mental condition worse.

This for Fnatic, and obviously our Dota 2 team, means that Adrian will not be capable of exercising his profession in the nearest future. Since we have an upcoming tournament in a few days(BTS), we are therefore forced to look into a replacement player so we can not only secure a five-man line up, but also get back to practice which is a must considering we are steadily moving towards the busiest Summer season of all time.

Now, several of our players have raised concerns about what implications our situation can result in when it comes to our participation at TI4. As you can imagine it’s still quite up in the air whether Adrian will be able to return to our team during the Summer season. For the sake of us being able to prepare for the future, and guaranteeing success for our team, we must turn around every stone in order to be as ready as possible for the biggest eSports competition till date.

Finally, I’m hoping to hear back from you as soon as possible so we can explore what options we have. My colleague Danijel has already put me in a Skype chat with you, so please don’t hesitate to reach out there as well.

Best regards,

Patrik Sättermon

Chief Gaming Officer

FNATIC

As we’ve said to the players and management of Fnatic, we’re not happy with the stress this is placing on their organization, players, and fans. We don’t minimize medical problems of any kind, whether physical or otherwise. That said, we believe we have a responsibility to make sure that all professional players are being treated fairly, both by their management, and by the decisions that we make that affect all of them. We take this very seriously.

We believe we’ve included all the relevant details in this post, but in the interest of full disclosure, here is a document* containing the entire correspondence with Fnatic.

Hopefully this explains our position on this specific issue to people in the community. Our offer to the original five invited players still stands for Fnatic.

 *UPDATE 16:50 : We missed a few emails and have added it to the archive.