International 11 ticket sales – bots, scalpers and chaos

At 10 p.m. EST on Thursday, the International 11 tickets came up on sale for the general public. Fans from all around the world were gathered in a Ticketmaster queue to get their chance at attending the first ever International to take place in Southeast Asian soil. What was a dream for many fans quickly became a nightmare as a randomized queue, bots and scalpers would take advantage of a broken ticketing system.

Tickets to The International 11 are now LIVE!! GO GO GO!! https://t.co/mPIUZloZga #TI11 #Dota2 pic.twitter.com/mMioNpfr5S

— Wykrhm Reddy (@wykrhm) August 13, 2022

The randomized International 11 ticket sale queue

As fans loaded Ticketmaster, they were notified that there would be random queue; that they would not be purchasing tickets according to the order that they logged into the website. Instead, the line essentially shuffled every time someone purchased their tickets — in a queue of 41,000 people at its peak.

The limited amount of tickets for the event sold out within the first 20 minutes, and many fans took to social media to express their discontent. The problem was not that there were a limited number of tickets, but that the tickets were mostly bought by scalpers instead of real fans.

This scumbag with 60 tickets ti11 for sale – $1000 each – /u/Fit-Pickle-5908 https://t.co/FURJsaYvYT #dota2 pic.twitter.com/24bCHpXBvr

— Reddit Dota 2 (@redditdota2) August 13, 2022

The International 11 ticket prices were already much higher than usual this year; each of the playoff days cost $90 each. The finals? A staggering $500 for both days. For reference, The International 10’s finals in Bucharest, Romania cost fans about half the price.  With scalpers getting their hands on the tickets, the prices have skyrocketed to as high as $1500 for both days.

A larger concern is that even if fans do buy the tickets from scalpers, is fans won’t be able to get their tickets unless the scalper is located in Singapore. Any person who buys a ticket outside of Singapore must present two forms of identification on the day of in order to receive their ticket. Without the scalper present, players wont be able to receive their tickets.

The debacle has left a sour taste in the mouths of a lot of fans, as the community were already discontent with the extremely high ticket prices. With the event less than two months away, the hope is that fans are able to get the tickets they need.