NiP become the first team in CS history to lose 0-3 in a best of three.

ESL Pro League Season 20 is off to a controversial start with Heroic’s map victory over NIP being overturned due to the former using Snap Tap. For context, Snap Tap is disallowed in ESL Pro Tour events. 

Heroic forfeit map against NiP due to use of Snap Tap

Heroic’s inaugural match in the ESL Pro League Season 20 kicked off with a best-of-three series against NiP. ESL Pro League Season 20 is a $750,000 prize pool event featuring a total of 32 teams. The Group stage of the event has a double-elimination bracket and Heroic fans would hope

Soon after the conclusion of the first map, the broadcast confirmed that Heroic’s victory would be overturned. Instead, NiP would secure a map lead in the series. 

"We have an official statement coming in. The first map has been overturned as HEROIC have been caught using SnapTap", said Adam "Dinko" Hawthorne on the stream.

The first map of Ancient saw HEROIC march on ahead to reach 13 first. The team had a spectacular performance, however, the result was marred by ESL’s decision after the first map. It is still unclear which player used Snap Tap and fell foul of ESL’s rules.

Despite initially revealing they will allow Snap Tap, ESL later announced Snap Tap will not be allowed in ESL Pro Tour events. 

Ahead of the next ESL Pro Tour in-person event for Counter-Strike, the upcoming ESL Pro League Season 20, we’re announcing that the use of Snap Tap, Rappy Snappy, SOCD or similar assistants that produce the same outcome will no longer be allowed. 

The announcement was specifically for ESL Pro League Season 20 with ESL promising updates on future events. 

What is Snap Tap?

Razer’s Snap Tap prioritizes your most recent input whenever two keys are pressed at the same time, without you having to release the previous key. Sna Tap means you can change direction quickly and this gives you a bigger competitive advantage over your opponents. 

There are three keyboards that currently allow Snap Tap: 

With the new feature’s popularity, it will be interesting to see how the new feature finds its way into Counter-strike esports. Strafing is one of the core features in Counter-Strike and Snap Tap provides a significant boost to this core feature.

Players have had varied reactions to the ESL decision. G2 player, mONESY, blamed the software itself for auto-starting when players change computers. 

Stay tuned to esports.gg for the latest Counter-Strike news and updates