Originally posted by Philip Körte:

Isn't that exactly the new infractions? We resolved the intial problemby leaving things as they were.
At some point in time after that, A put the removal into his hand and N the creature onto the battlefield. Which, by the comprehensive rules, they clearly were not entitled to do. Which makes them Game Play Errors, even if both players agreed on doing this, does it not?
And since they are GPEs, if nothing else, they would be GRVs. Or where is the flaw in that logic?

The players are not so much violating the rules, so much as they are ignoring a judge's ruling and the policy that exists in support of the ruling. Yes, the card physically changes zones; but the players didn't move it because of some rule or incorrectly resolved spell, they moved it because they were trying to fix things. They didn't understand the reason (or perhaps just didn't want to accept it) why the judge made that ruling, so they do what players sometimes do… Come up with their own fix that feels “fair.”

Originally posted by Philip Körte:

Going at this from another angle: If you were called to a table where players have put cards from their graveyards into play for any reason that is not because they reanimated that creature, you would give out a GRV, too, right? So why not here?

Because it's comparing apples to oranges. And I would hope that we would treat one situation the same as another situation, when the reason for those situations (e.g., “Why the player did what they did.”) are different. The situation you propose is not comparable, and clearly should not be evaluated in the same context as the one that started this thread.

Originally posted by Bryan Li:

At competitive REL, though, wouldn't it be DEC? The definition is “A player illegally puts one or more cards into his or her hand and, at the moment before he or she began the instruction or action that put the card into his or her hand, no other Game Play Error or Communication Policy Violation had occurred, and the error was not the result of resolving objects on the stack in an incorrect order.” Andrew has clearly put a card (the removal spell) into his hand, and there was no GPE or CPV beforehand and nothing on the stack. I would give Andrew DEC and Nathan GRV (for illegally returning the creature to the battlefield).

IPG
If the player received confirmation from his or her opponent before drawing the card (including confirming the number of cards when greater than one), the infraction is not Drawing Extra Cards.

N acknowledged and agreed that the removal should go back to A's hand, knocking out any potential for DEC.

Originally posted by Trenten Novak:

Nicola DiPasquale
This would not be USC - Minor based on that example because no direct instruction was given to those players for them not to change the state of their game in the manner they did.

These examples are not a be all and end all what the infractions are. Ignoring a Judges ruling and doing whatever you want is disruptive to the tournament, thereby meeting the requirements for UC-Minor. By ignoring the Judge's ruling, the players are undermining the authority of the Judge. By not issuing some penalty here, we are essentially saying “unless we tell you otherwise, our rulings are just suggestions that you can ignore without repercussion.”

Rhetorical question: How is it disruptive to the tournament?

USC infractions should be used as scalpels first, and as a hammer only as a last resort. Why? Because they are a tool via which we try to influence and affect change in player behavior. In this case, coming down with the hammer is only likely to upset the players even more, cause them to go home with bad feelings about “power hungry judges” and possibly drive them away from competitive play altogether.

This doesn't mean that we shouldn't issue infractions for fear of this all the time. But consider my original rhetorical question, and now try to answer it. Who is now having a negative experience because these players did this? Seems like the thing that is most likely to be hurt is… our ego as judges. I agree with other posters like Nicola and Evan. Have a talk with the players. Explain why judges are there, and why it is important to follow our rulings.

I will also say that this type of thing should be rare. In most cases, a ruling favors one of the players, and hence there is a natural incentive for that player to agree with the ruling. Where I've seen players go “off book” is usually an out of contention match at the end of the day. The players just want to play Magic in a way that is natural to them, and some of our policies go against that naturalness. The most notable time this has happened to me is when a player wants a Tardiness Game Loss to be waived for their opponent. What I've said in these situations is “That's my ruling. I'm going to walk away from this match now. I can't stop you from playing up to 3 games when I leave.”

I'll say again that this is a rare case (once or twice in my entire career), and obviously isn't how I handle normal rulings, even when both players disagree with me. But in some special cases, players just want to play Magic: the Gathering. It turns out that's what they came to do. I will make efforts to educate players about our policies, but I won't go out of my way to stop them from doing what they came to do, and I certainly don't think we should be penalizing them for trying.

James, oops. I thought that only applied to the specific action of drawing from the deck.

Originally posted by Brian Schenck:

The players are not so much violating the rules, so much as they are ignoring a judge's ruling and the policy that exists in support of the ruling. Yes, the card physically changes zones; but the players didn't move it because of some rule or incorrectly resolved spell, they moved it because they were trying to fix things. They didn't understand the reason (or perhaps just didn't want to accept it) why the judge made that ruling, so they do what players sometimes do… Come up with their own fix that feels “fair.”

Thank you for this clearing this up for me. I was confused on how a GPE-GRV wasn't going to be given the infraction, I now see that it's the philosophy behind it.

Edit: spelling

Edited Walker Metyko (Feb. 9, 2015 10:36:53 PM)

Originally posted by Riki Hayashi:

Rhetorical question: How is it disruptive to the tournament?

-The players around them might have had a ruling that they didn't like, and now seeing that the judge isn't doing anything about the players that didn't listen feel upset because they would have liked a mutually agreeable solution instead too.
-The players around them see this interaction and think that coming up with their own “fix” is acceptable and do so in their next match.

There was a lot of mentioning about how the players feel about receiving the penalty. I'm really not concerned about that at Comp Rel+. The players should know that their actions have consequences, even if unintended. Furthermore, if I were to consider how the players feel, I'd be giving out far fewer penalties for things like D/DLP (had a brain fart and didn't count to 60, forgot to desideboard) and L@EC (Courser of Cruphix, dexterity errors) because they're silly little mistakes that make you feel bad for doing. Additionally, there's no provision in the IPG that states “if you think the player is going to feel bad about receiving the penalty, don't issue it.”

USC- Major and Minor should be used as tools to reinforce why the actions are undesirable/unwanted. You don't just issue a penalty and walk away you explain why you are issuing the penalty (this is true for all penalties). In this situation, I'd explain why I gave the initial ruling and penalties, what could have been done to avoid the ruling, why I'm giving the USC-Minor, and why it's important to follow the rulings of the Judges. If they still look upset about it, I invite them to come find me after their match is over to talk about it. This isn't a hammer or a scalpel, it's just good customer service. At the end of it all, I hope that they don't walk away feeling bad, but walk away with a better understanding of the rules.

I would like to clarify that I never said nor meant to suggest that the examples in the IPG were exhaustive in any way shape or form. The original poster was asking why this scenario would not fit under USC - Minor using that example as a guideline, so my reply was focused on that.

I think that Riki hit the nail on the head here with his question. USC - Minor is about disruption to the event. The players in this scenario are just playing Magic. Our job is to make that experience the best possible experience we can make it. They already received an infraction and penalty for the illegal play once, so there is no need to assess them another infraction for that same transgression. As far as them ignoring the ruling and creating their own fix, we want players to understand that is not an acceptable thing, especially in a tournament setting such as this. We are there for a reason; to maintain balanced and fair play for all of the players in our events. We do this in a very customer service oriented manner, so as to provide the best possible play experience for our players.

Both Even and Riki have pointed out there is no need for us to hammer down on these players with additional penalties because they want to play Magic. That is in fact, what they have come to our event to do. Do we want them creating their own fixes, no, so we have a chat with them about it. But we do not want to kick them repeatedly for no particular reason. This does not fit into one of our nice and neatly packaged infractions and so we should not be engineering an infraction that this fits into. Could this potentially be an infraction, or should we change policy so that it is an infraction? Those are different questions. I would say no to both of those because, as Riki has pointed out, this is such a rare thing to have happen. I believe we can rely on judges to use their best judgement in handling the individual situations when they do occur.

TL;DR: Re-read Evan's post, and remember our now defunct slogan: KIFKIF.

Originally posted by Trenten Novak:

There was a lot of mentioning about how the players feel about receiving the penalty. I'm really not concerned about that at Comp Rel+. The players should know that their actions have consequences, even if unintended. Furthermore, if I were to consider how the players feel, I'd be giving out far fewer penalties for things like D/DLP (had a brain fart and didn't count to 60, forgot to desideboard) and L@EC (Courser of Cruphix, dexterity errors) because they're silly little mistakes that make you feel bad for doing. Additionally, there's no provision in the IPG that states “if you think the player is going to feel bad about receiving the penalty, don't issue it.”

There's a big difference between having empathy and having sympathy. And I think those two things are being confused.

What Riki and Nicola have suggested is to have empathy, understand the players and their motivations, presenting the ruling and even handling the entire situation in a fashion that helps build trust between the player community and the judge community. Neither is suggesting, in any way shape or form, to issue a different ruling and let their feelings get in the way; that is, by being sympathetic with the player(s) and adjusting the ruling that is issued. It's a question of education and building understanding, rather than coming down harshly and risk being “that #@$hole judge.”

This is a question in how one might approach a situation and handle it. And even as judges, how we handle a situation is on a spectrum rather than a binary approach. What the players are doing may be “disrespectful” to tournament procedure, but it isn't disruptive to the event as a whole; they need to be educated and helped to understand why those procedures exist, versus being infracted again. We absolutely should be concerned with how players perceive rulings, because one of the reasons we can serve the community as judges is because we have their support and belief that our rulings are fair and reasonable.

And I would rather they believe our rulings fair and reasonable, rather than having to backup a ruling via another infraction.

Originally posted by Joshua Feingold:

Let's first assume there was no judge call following the initial error, and you (somehow?) discover the players applied their own mutually agreed-upon fix. Would you do anything? If so, what and why?

Now, going back to our original situation, the players have called a judge and received Warnings. Then they did something that without this intervention would not have been an infraction. Does it make sense that the players should now receive a harsher penalty because they talked to the judge?

Actually, to me the penalty seems like it could be harsher for applying a mutually agreed-upon fix without a judge involved. In the described case, the players motivation appears to be preserving the game state as they see it (albeit at the cost of ignoring a judge ruling). If they didn't call a judge at all, I'd ask if they were aware that game play errors should be tracked with a warning. Intentionally trying to avoid a warning seems to qualify as “attempting to gain advantage,” one of the pillars of USC-cheating.

+1

From: Trenten Novak
Sent: Monday, February 09, 2015 7:38 PM
To: Heckt, Andy
Subject: Re: Judge! We don't like your solution! (Competitive REL)

Riki Hayashi
Rhetorical question: How is it disruptive to the tournament?
-The players around them might have had a ruling that they didn't like, and now seeing that the judge isn't doing anything about the players that didn't listen feel upset because they would have liked a mutually agreeable solution instead too.
-The players around them see this interaction and think that coming up with their own “fix” is acceptable and do so in their next match.

There was a lot of mentioning about how the players feel about receiving the penalty. I'm really not concerned about that at Comp Rel+. The players should know that their actions have consequences, even if unintended. Furthermore, if I were to consider how the players feel, I'd be giving out far fewer penalties for things like D/DLP (had a brain fart and didn't count to 60, forgot to desideboard) and L@EC (Courser of Cruphix, dexterity errors) because they're silly little mistakes that make you feel bad for doing. Additionally, there's no provision in the IPG that states “if you think the player is going to feel bad about receiving the penalty, don't issue it.”

USC- Major and Minor should be used as tools to reinforce why the actions are undesirable/unwanted. You don't just issue a penalty and walk away you explain why you are issuing the penalty (this is true for all penalties). In this situation, I'd explain why I gave the initial ruling and penalties, what could have been done to avoid the ruling, why I'm giving the USC-Minor, and why it's important to follow the rulings of the Judges. If they still look upset about it, I invite them to come find me after their match is over to talk about it. This isn't a hammer or a scalpel, it's just good customer service. At the end of it all, I hope that they don't walk away feeling bad, but walk away with a better understanding of the rules.

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Originally posted by Eli Meyer:

Actually, to me the penalty seems like it could be harsher for applying a mutually agreed-upon fix without a judge involved. In the described case, the players motivation appears to be preserving the game state as they see it (albeit at the cost of ignoring a judge ruling). If they didn't call a judge at all, I'd ask if they were aware that game play errors should be tracked with a warning. Intentionally trying to avoid a warning seems to qualify as “attempting to gain advantage,” one of the pillars of USC-cheating.

Players fix mistakes all the time without calling a judge. A player points out that his opponent tapped the wrong mana and he simply fixes it. This is fine. We would need to increase our judge staffing if players called judge every time any infraction occurred. When my opponent messes up graveyard order in legacy, I tend to point out that whatever goes underneath entomb or careful study, and leave it at that.

Noticing an error and not pointing it out, is a problem. Pointing a game play error out to your opponent and letting them decide whether or not to call judge is fine.

MTR 1.10
Players are responsible for:
…
• Calling attention to any rules or policy infraction they notice in their matches.
• Bringing to a judge’s attention any offers of bribery, wagering, improper game result determination,
and any discrepancies in their tournament match record.