I spent yesterday after CRL thinking about this a lot and trying to find the words to describe my frustration but it ultimately boils down to this: if you are an organizer in the space, abide by the precedents set elsewhere and do what is best for the players, not just your tournament. I understand the organizer has previously stated they would not make exceptions, I do not care. There are tons of LANs that happen every year in collegiate and almost every single one accommodates so players can play in CRL or RLCS. Hell, we had a LAN this weekend at a Comicon and not only did they accommodate the competing players, they even provided @BepicCasts a setup to cast CRL from (s/o to the Scenic City team). You cannot run a 10k LAN in a scene you are not familiar with and then set new rules to act as if you are the top of the food chain automatically. You have to earn that spot and CRL has been the top of collegiate for years. CECC has done this every year for 4 years, if a National Championship LAN can accommodate and make time for players to compete in RLCS, so can a one-off tournament the same weekend as CRL quals. The other thing that frustrates me here is that this LAN has basically had to walk back rules and things they’ve said at every step. So if you’ve shown you can understand and make changes before, why draw the line at CRL quals, ESPECIALLY when it wasn’t even interfering with your event. Overall, this organizer needs to own up to its failures and apologize. Banning 2 teams from some of the most historied schools in collegiate esports midway through an event, stripping them of thousands in winnings, and essentially wasting their weekend, is a gross misuse of power and the organizers should be ashamed. Do better, this event was a failure and people need to be held accountable for this absurd decision.