An all-women Valorant team competing in Game Changers has been accused of account sharing to gain an advantage. Fallacy player ‘Mars’ allegedly let her boyfriend, former TSM Academy player Nate ‘Payen’ Lopez, play for her in the Astral Clash qualifiers.
Account sharing in the VCT Game Changers space has been thrown into the spotlight once again after an all-women Valorant team competing in a major tournament has been accused of using ringers during online qualifiers.
Fallacy, who have qualified for the Astral Clash LAN final, and their player ‘Mars’ has been accused of letting her boyfriend, former TSM Academy member Payen, play for her during the online qualifiers.
An anonymous dossier has gone viral citing a “multitude of evidence” pointing towards the team using Payen as a ringer.
The key pieces of evidence include Twitter clips which show Mars using different keybinds and settings between games. The keybinds she swaps between are identical to those Payen uses, while her minimap size is also adjusted between games. Crosshairs and screen resolutions were also changed.
They also pointed towards a drastic increase in performance on Mars’ behalf. She went from averaging around the mid-100s in ACS before the Astral Clash, but she posted an average of 297 during the event.
Account Sharing Concerns in Galorants Astral Clash (@/MarsArxa and Fallacy) https://t.co/UysGbE0Cxx
— public court of opinion (@nicekeybinds) July 25, 2022
This is not where the evidence ends. Payen was seen practicing with Fallacy the day before the event, with Mars notably missing from the lineup. Clips posted on Twitter around the event exclude Mars’ voice comms — including a 1v4 ace clutch against Dignitas — with suspicions piquing about them hiding something.
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“This is out of line with how Fallacy typically reacts after tournaments, as there’s multiple tweets from all members of Fallacy posting clips after tournaments,” the document outlines. “It would seem that they were trying to conceal the fact that Payen was probably coming, and posting their clips would expose Mars for having her boyfriend play for her.”
Mars and Payen are yet to address the allegations. Mars has since privated her Twitter account since the dossier was published, while Payen hasn’t made any public statement. Fallacy has also stayed quiet about the claims.
According to the VCT Game Changers rulebook under Section 3.1 “all players on a team’s roster must be women players”. Riot asks all players to provide verification of their gender before competing.
Riot is looking into the account sharing claim, according to a report by Jake Sucky, ahead of the August 6 LAN event.
Fallacy has been accused of using male substitutes in the past in VCT Game Changers, which is meant to highlight women and other marginalized genders. Two players used non-binary pronouns to substitute for Game Changers, with one changing back to male ones after the event ended.
It also comes after a spotlight was shone on the VCT Game Changers space in this last week with two players handed suspensions over an argument in the GALORANTS Discord server equating teabagging to sexual assault.
