The Brazilian team paiN Gaming has been stripped of their right to participate in BLAST Premier Open Season 2. The reason is a direct ban in Valve’s official rules that applies to teams that have previously declined invitations to the same tournament.
Unexpected replacement in London
Earlier this summer, paiN made headlines when they replaced Aurora at BLAST Open London 2025. The reason for this decision was not officially explained by the organizers at the time, but the move gave the Brazilians an unexpected opportunity to compete on the international stage.
Their participation in the London event looked like a kind of bonus for a team that had not qualified through sporting merit but entered due to reshuffles in the participants list. Now, a similar replacement scenario has occurred — but this time, not in paiN’s favor.
Disqualification under Valve rules
BLAST announced that paiN Gaming has been excluded from BLAST Premier Open Season 2 based on clause 3.2.5(c) of Valve’s official tournament rules. This clause clearly states: a team that has previously declined an invitation to the same tournament is not eligible to participate in it later.
paiN Gaming has been removed from participation in the BLAST Premier Open Season 2. This decision follows Valve's official tournament rule 3.2.5(c), which states that teams who have previously declined an invitation to the same tournament are not eligible to compete.
paiN…
— BLAST Premier 💥 (@BLASTPremier) August 12, 2025
Initially, paiN declined a direct invite to the closed qualifiers for BLAST Open S2 in South America, but later received an invitation as a replacement team. This became the basis for their disqualification.
The organizers informed the team about the decision, and their slot was passed to the next team in the VRS ranking at the date of invitation — Legacy. Since Legacy already had a spot in the qualifiers, it went to the runner-up of the South American qualifying tournament — Imperial.
Selective enforcement by the developers
In practice, Valve forced BLAST to comply with rules that are officially set to take effect only for tournaments held after October 2025. This case highlights the developers’ selective approach: strict control over the Danish operator BLAST, but complete indifference to similar violations at other events — CS Asia Championship, StarLadder, Thunderpick, and others, where such situations remain unnoticed.
