Disputes are normal
Any tournament where players report their own results will produce disputes. Most of them are not cheating. Somebody pressed the wrong button, a team counted a forfeited map differently, a game crashed halfway through and the two sides disagree about what happens next. A small number are attempts to steal a result. The organizer's job is to handle all of them with the same process, so that the honest mistakes are fixed quickly and the dishonest attempts fail without drama.
How a dispute arises in Clutchat
In a Clutchat tournament, each side of a match gets a direct message from the bot. One side reports the result with an "I won" or "I lost" button, and the opponent is asked to confirm or dispute it. If the opponent confirms, the result stands and the winner moves on. If the opponent disputes, the match freezes: neither side advances, and the dispute is posted to the server's log channel with buttons for an organizer to award the match to either side, or to void it so it can be replayed.
Organizers and moderators can also settle a disputed match by command with Resolve dispute in /tournament-admin manage, choosing the match and the winning side. If a result has already been recorded wrongly, Revert match in /tournament-admin manage puts the match back to pending so it can be reported again.
For this to work, two things must be set up in advance: a log channel bound with /config channel, and organizer or moderator roles bound with /config role. If nobody with the right role watches the log channel during an event, disputes sit unresolved and the bracket stalls.
Before the event: write the rules that decide disputes
The best time to settle a dispute is before it happens. Most arguments come from situations the rules did not cover, so cover the common ones in writing:
- Evidence. Tell players to take a screenshot of the end-of-match screen every time, whether or not they expect a problem. A dispute without evidence is one player's word against another's.
- Disconnects and crashes. Is the game replayed, resumed, or does the score at the time stand? Different games have different conventions; pick one.
- Late starts. How long does a side wait before it can claim a no-show? Ten or fifteen minutes is typical.
- Wrong players. What happens if a team fields someone not on its roster? Usually a forfeit of the affected game or match.
- Time limits. If you set a round deadline with Round time limit in
/tournament-admin manage, say that unreported matches will be advanced automatically in favour of the higher seed.
During the event: a five-step process
- Acknowledge quickly. As soon as a dispute appears, tell both sides in the match thread or by message that you have seen it and are looking at it. Silence makes people angrier than any ruling.
- Ask both sides for the same thing. A screenshot of the result screen, and one or two sentences on what happened. Ask both at the same time and in the same words, so neither side feels singled out.
- Decide on the evidence and the rules. If a screenshot clearly shows the result, award the match to the side it shows. If the rules cover the situation, apply them as written, even if you would personally have chosen differently.
- If you cannot tell, replay. When the evidence is missing or genuinely unclear, voiding the match and asking for a replay is usually fairer than guessing. If there is no time for a replay, fall back on the rule you announced, such as the higher seed advancing.
- Record and explain. Award the result, then post one line explaining why: "Awarded to Team North: end screen shows 13-9." Players accept rulings they understand far more readily than rulings they do not.
Staying neutral
In a community tournament, the organizer often knows the players, and sometimes plays in the same clan as one of the teams. That is fine as long as conflicts of interest are handled in the open:
- If you are on, or close to, one of the teams in a dispute, hand it to another organizer or moderator. Binding more than one person to the organizer and moderator roles makes that possible.
- Do not discuss the dispute privately with one side only. Keep the conversation where both can see it.
- Rule on the match, not the players. A team's reputation should not decide whether a screenshot is believed.
- Be consistent. If you voided a crashed match in round one, void the same kind of crash in the final.
Keeping the bracket moving
A dispute freezes one match, not the whole tournament. Other matches in the round can and should carry on while you look at it. If the dispute is taking a long time, set a limit (for example, ten minutes to provide evidence) and rule at the end of it on whatever you have. If a whole round is held up by unreported or disputed matches, Force-advance round in /tournament-admin manage forfeits the unreported matches and moves the bracket on, but use it only after you have dealt with the disputes you know about.
When it is not a mistake
Occasionally the evidence shows that a player reported a result they knew was false, used an unregistered player, or cheated. Deal with the match first, then the behaviour. Award the match correctly, then decide on a penalty under your server's rules. Removing a player or team from a live event with Remove participant in /tournament-admin manage counts as a disqualification. Repeated or serious cases, such as harassment of an opponent or an organizer, may also break Clutchat's community guidelines, and you can report them to us through the contact page.
After the event
Read back through the disputes you handled. If the same kind of argument came up twice, the rules need a line about it. Over a few events, a short, specific rule sheet does more for fair play than any amount of judgment on the night. For more on running the rest of the event, see the bracket guide and the tournament features.