“Take all our points”: s1mple’s team asks Valve to reset its ranking for a shot at the Major

Valve has closed a popular tournament loophole involving competitive region swaps, hitting BC.Game directly — the team that fields Oleksandr s1mple Kostyliev and Emil Magisk Reif. In response to the tightened rules, the club’s management took an unprecedented step: the organization’s CEO asked the developers to wipe all of its earned VRS ranking points so the team could earn the right to qualify for PGL Major Singapore 2026 from scratch in the weeks that remain.

The conflict was triggered by a fresh amendment to Valve’s rules published on October 6. Under the new rule, a roster can only claim a qualifying slot for a specific region if it has not appeared in another subregion’s ranking table during the previous three calendar months. The rule kills the “regional tourism” tactic, in which lineups with a European core rushed to switch their registration to a less competitive Asia ahead of a key qualifying cutoff.

One step away from a direct invite

BC.Game turned out to be the main casualty of the new restrictions. Having recently signed Australian Tyson asap Paterson, the organization built an Asian majority of three players alongside Mongolian talents Senzu and mzinho. Under the old rules, that was enough to carry its accumulated European points over to the Asian standings.

The maneuver worked perfectly: in Valve’s official ranking for October 6, s1mple’s team shot up to second place in Asia with 1,307 points, trailing China’s TYLOO by just three points. That would have guaranteed the team a direct ticket to the main tournament of the fall without a grueling European qualifier. The new rule retroactively canceled the move.

All in three weeks before the deadline

Instead of legal action or public accusations, club CEO Ali “Ako” Muhanned proposed a radical compromise to Valve through HLTV. Management is ready to give up every point it has earned and start the current five (s1mple, Magisk, asap, mzinho, Senzu) from a clean zero in the ranking column.

“Take all our points. No inherited baggage, no advantages. Just let us play with the current roster,” the organization’s head said.

The situation looks like a risky gamble. The final VRS ranking cutoff is set for November 2 — that is what will determine the distribution of the 32 slots at PGL Major Singapore, which has a $1.25 million prize pool (Asia will receive five quotas). Earning enough points from scratch in less than three weeks of tournaments is practically impossible, but for s1mple it is the only faint chance of avoiding a second straight Major on the sidelines.

There is no answer from Valve yet, though the developers have previously said they are ready to look for solutions on a case-by-case basis with teams hit by the abrupt rule change.