Riot introduces a global interregional movement policy

This article was originally published on GameSpot's sister site onGamers.com, which was dedicated to esports coverage.

Riot Games has today announced a new global policy on interregional transfers. League of Legends lately has received unprecedented global player movement as Korean. Chinese and European players have moved across the globe to participate in Leagues where they are not a permanent resident/citizen in. This has had so far, more benefits than downsides as the importation of big name talent has lead teams to grow to their fan-base globally and put up stronger results than they would other wise.

But it has hampered the development of players in their local scenes as organizations have opted to bring in big name and proven foreign talent whilst bypassing local talent that has potential to be great. As a result, the players in the local scenes have a diminished opportunity to play professionally as potential positions are filled by foreign, rather than local players. The importation of talent has also lead to many feeling that their local scene now feels alien to them.

To rectify some of the issues, Riot Games has announced a global movement policy for the 2015 season. The rule will apply to all major leagues and their respective amateur leagues. WildCard regions are also considering adapting this rule.

For North America and Europe, the new rule states that a team is required to have 3 regional residents minimum. This means that a future LMQ situation cannot occur.

The move comes after growing concerns that the North American League of Legends Championship Series may not have any local representation in the future as foreign talent in the North American LCS keeps increasing and comes amid complaints that less than half of the North American representatives for the 2014 League of Legends World Championship are actually North American long term residents.

LCS and CS teams that already violate this rule will be grandfathered and players who play for those teams will have an "exempt non resident status". The rules for a exempt non-resident status is below:

The player(s) have:

• Started for an LCS team in 2014.
• Is on the current LCS Active Roster of an LCS team.
• Started for a Challenger Series team in Summer Challenger Series 1 Play-In onward.
• Are on the Active Roster of a team participating in the Summer Promotion Tournament.

Riot Games has also outlined some of the possible and impossible roster moves:

Here are some examples of permissible roster moves:

• Team is starting five residents and wants to replace one with a non-exempt non-resident as a starter.
• Team is starting five residents and wants to replace three of them with exempt non-residents.
• Team is starting three residents, two non-residents, and wants to replace a resident with an exempt non-resident.
• Team has three exempt non-residents, two residents, and wants to replace a resident with an exempt non-resident.

Here are some examples of impermissible roster changes:

• Team is starting three exempt non-residents and two residents. Team wants to replace one exempt non-resident with one non-exempt non-resident.
  The team cannot do this - However, they can replace the exempt non-resident with another exempt non-resident or a resident.
• Team has five exempt non-residents, and wants to replace one of them with a non-exempt non-resident player.
  The team cannot do this - if a team has two or more exempt non-residents, they cannot add an additional non-exempt non-resident.
• Team has three exempt non-residents and two residents, and wants to replace a resident with a non-exempt non-resident.
  The team cannot do this - if a team has two or more exempt non-residents, they cannot add an additional non-exempt non-resident.

Image Source: Riot Games