From January 1, 2025, every large Counter-Strike tournament has had to follow a set of rules Valve calls the Tournament Operation Requirements. They ended the partner leagues, in which a few teams held permanent places and shared revenue, and made invitations depend on Valve's ranking or on open qualifiers. Here is what the rules say as of their latest revision, and what they changed in practice.
Why Valve stepped in
Valve announced the change on August 3, 2023, in a post titled "A Level Playing Field". It said professional Counter-Strike had drifted from that ideal, with "access to the highest levels of competition increasingly gated by business relationships". The post set out three principles:
- Tournament organisers would have no "unique business relationships or other conflicts of interest" with the teams at their events.
- Invitations would use Valve's ranking system or open qualifiers.
- All compensation for teams, prize money or otherwise, would be public and based on "objective criteria that can be inspected by the community".
Because organisers had long-term deals in place, the rules only took effect from 2025. HLTV noted at the time that ESL and BLAST, the two biggest operators, had both built their circuits around partner teams with guaranteed invites and shared revenue.
What the rulebook requires
Valve published the full Tournament Operation Requirements on GitHub on July 16, 2024, and has revised them often since; the latest change listed is from December 8, 2025. Any event that goes beyond Valve's limited tournament licence needs a broader licence from Valve, and the organiser chooses whether the event is ranked or unranked.
| Type | Main rules |
|---|---|
| Unranked | Invite anyone, but total compensation is capped at $100,000 per event and $250,000 per organiser per year; results don't count for the VRS |
| Ranked | Invites from the Valve Regional Standings (VRS) in order, open qualifiers, or both; results count for the VRS |
| Tier 1 (ranked) | At least 20 rosters invited from the VRS, starting with the world number one; at least 8 in the main stage |
| Tier 2 (ranked) | Can be filled entirely by open qualifiers; any VRS invites must be at least four rosters, all ranked below 12th in the world |
Ranked events have more rules on top of that:
- Wildcards. For every eight rosters invited from the VRS, two wildcards may be added. A wildcard roster must be ranked below 12th and either include three players who were recently in a top-12 roster, or have finished first or second at a recent event of the same tier or lower.
- Wildcard events. For every three completed tournaments, an organiser may run one event with unlimited wildcards.
- Intact rosters. An invited roster can only play if at least three of its five players were on it on the invite date, and a team that fields fewer than three of them forfeits the match.
- Early announcements. Tier 1 events for 2026 had to be announced by January 1, 2025. From 2027, Tier 1 events must be announced at least 22 months before the main event.
- Publish everything. Organisers must publish the prize pool and any other payments to teams, such as appearance fees or revenue shares, on a platform where past posts can't be quietly edited.
The integrity section bans exclusivity deals that stop teams playing other events, requires every team at the same stage to be treated identically, and requires any business link between organiser and team to be disclosed and approved by Valve.
Our VRS guide explains the ranking these invites come from.
Exceptions
Valve keeps a public list of approved exceptions. For 2025 it includes ESL Pro League Season 21 inviting some teams based on earlier Pro League seasons, BLAST running its Rivals wildcard event after two Tier 1 events rather than three, and BLAST Open and three PGL events filling four places through regional VRS qualifiers. Several events were also allowed to add third-place matches.
The 2026 list is shorter. It lets two events, ACL X CS2 2026 and XPL 2026, invite 16 VRS rosters instead of 20, and on October 7, 2026 Valve added an entry assigning the BC.Game roster to the Asia region so it could be invited to the Singapore Major.
How events changed
The partner leagues ended. ESL and BLAST said in 2023 that they would stay in Counter-Strike under the new conditions, and HLTV reported that ESL planned to extend its revenue share from selected teams to all teams at its events.
More organisers returned. When the rulebook appeared in July 2024, HLTV counted 23 events planned for 2025, after PGL and StarLadder announced plans to host Counter-Strike events regularly again.
Teams pushed back on the details. In February 2025, 22 organisations including Ninjas in Pyjamas, FURIA, MOUZ and Falcons signed an open letter to Valve. They said the only route into the rankings for a new roster was a Tier 1 open qualifier, leaving a "dead zone" below, and complained that some events had their ranked status removed or added mid-tournament.
The calendar filled with LANs. Because the VRS rewards recent results and LAN wins, teams chased points before each Major's invite date. In September 2025 HLTV described teams "scrambling to attend as many LANs as possible" before the cut-off for Budapest.
The Majors followed. From Budapest 2025, all 32 Major places have come straight from the VRS, with no separate qualifiers. Our Major format guide covers how those invites are split.
Sources
- A Level Playing Field — Counter-Strike 2 news
- Tournament Operation Requirements — Valve (GitHub)
- Tournament operation exceptions — Valve (GitHub)
- Valve to end team and tournament organizer partnerships starting in 2025 — HLTV.org
- Valve unveils rulebook for hosting licensed events from 2025 — HLTV.org
- Teams write open letter to Valve about "significant flaws" in new ecosystem — HLTV.org
- How the CS scene got into an arms race for last-minute VRS points — HLTV.org
