Does a player who registers for an event but does not play any rounds in the event, due perhaps to dropping in order to retain a high-value card which he opened, count towards the 8-player minimum for the event to be sanctioned?

This is a touchy situation with sum but at my store. If you sign up and pay you are in the tournament and if you don't play the first round it is treated as a no show to the table giving the other player the win and then dropping the player that way as long as they have results for the match and then dropped the player will count for the 8 min.

A.J. Reimann
Hobby Invasion
919-963-1336
Hobbyinvasion.com

'O'fficial answer, from Wizards' OP: "Technically, they should not count towards the 8 player minimum; a player has to play in order to count."

d:^D

Scott - As per the MTR (10.1), a player needs only to “participate” in a tournament to count toward the sanctioning requirements. As such, I have a few questions about this ‘O’ answer:

1. Is the definition of “participate,” according to OP, that the player must play a match in some capacity?

2. In the event that, in the middle of an 8-person draft or Sealed event, if a player elects to drop or is otherwise removed from the event pre-round-1, should we inform all remaining players that the event is no longer sanctioned and they will not receive any Planeswalker Points (or any other benefit that may be important to them with a Sanctioned event)?

3. Is it possible that, when OP was asked about “players who register but do not play,” they did not consider situations such as question #2 where event participation begins before Round 1?

EDIT - Looking at MTR 2.10 - “ If a player drops from a tournament before the first round of
play has started, he or she is considered to have not participated in the tournament…” So my questions about this answer seem to be already answered. Leaving questions in case others had similar questions.

Edited Peter Richmond (May 16, 2015 12:19:03 PM)

I'm kindof curious about this. With MM2 on the horizon, if someone opens something in an 8 person draft pod they want to keep, and they stand up and leave… do the other 7 keep drafting? or is that event just not going to happen because they're under the minimum?

Do they get refunded? Do they keep their packs? How would prizes work, since they paid for an event with an intent to win something most likely?

Edit: I suppose the event could still be carried out, just as unsanctioned? This seems like a poor solution instead of pairing and dropping that person in round 1.

Edited Chris Schafer (May 16, 2015 05:44:18 PM)

This is why you put them in the event and treat it as a No show so you don't have 7 other upset people that just payed to draft and play.

A.J. Reimann
Hobby Invasion
919-963-1336
Hobbyinvasion.com

Originally posted by A.J. Reimann:

This is why you put them in the event and treat it as a No show so you don't have 7 other upset people that just payed to draft and play.

That's the curious thing though… Uncle Scott's ‘O’ answer bolded the word “play”, and seems to specifically say it wouldn't count.

As a store owner you have to make the customer happy. I have a small store and it makes it hard sometimes but Is it fair to the other 7 people that paid to play not be able to play due to one person dropping for what ever reason. I don't know what wizards would say but I aim to make my customers happy and I let people know up front if you pay to play you are entered in the tournament and dropped as a no show for not showing up to play your first Match.

I had this happen last night at my Fnm we started with 10 people and they all payed and one player decided to concede his first match as he had to leave. I still counted him as playing and loosing first round dropped and added his packs to the prize pool.

This is what happens if there is 100 people playing. Using the 0-10 rule they are given a first round loss then dropped. Why should it be different for a 8 person tournament.

A.J. Reimann
Hobby Invasion
919-963-1336
Hobbyinvasion.com

As a store owner it is important to have happy customers alright, but running illegal events is worse in the long run for these customers. It's better to try and encourage people to not drop in the first place, difficult as it may be.

As the Event has not started yet (otherwise, it would be a legal 8-player event), it may be a possibility to have a different player as 8th, right?

On a related note - if a player that drops before round 1 - i.e. when opening the first booster during a draft - is not considered part of the tournament, what stops him from re-enrolling with different boosters as the event has not started (besides the TO telling him he won't let him re-enroll) with a new set of boosters?

I do not see this as illegal event. They pay to play there name goes into wer they don't show it is a lose and reported then dropped. It should be the same for 8 players or 8 hundred players. The following is take. From the rules and I know the first part says they don't participate but I look at the latter for an 8 person turny. They are added then treated as a no show.

“Players may drop from a tournament at any time. If a player drops from a tournament before the first round of play has started, he or she is considered to have not participated in the tournament and will not be listed in the finish order nor receive participation Planeswalker Points. Players choosing to drop from a tournament must inform the Scorekeeper by the means provided for that tournament before the pairings for the next round are generated. Players wanting to drop after the Scorekeeper begins pairing for the next round will be paired for that round. If a player does not show up for his or her match, he or she will be automatically dropped from the tournament unless they report to the Scorekeeper. Players that repeatedly and/or intentionally drop from tournaments without informing the scorekeepers of those events may be the subject of DCI penalties up to and including suspension.”

A.J. Reimann
Hobby Invasion
919-963-1336
Hobbyinvasion.com

What if, after opening the second pack, a player drops? You can't seat a new player at the table to draft. He'd be at a disadvantage having to run with an entire pack undrafted. I could see this happening in MM2 sealed events.

I would not add a player at that point as it would be a huge disadvantage. I would love to hear from wizards about there official thinking on this. I'm going to call them now will let you know what they say.

A.J. Reimann
Hobby Invasion
919-963-1336
Hobbyinvasion.com

I think that, overall, it's unlikely to be an issue 99% of the time. If there's one valuable card, someone will just rare draft it and then continue drafting. The odds of two sufficiently valuable cards (ie rare and foil rare out of a limited number of valuable rares/mythics) is small.

I agree with Mark about how rarely this is an issue, and that it's a dangerous road for us to start telling suggesting which sanctioning rules we think should be ignored. But I'll also suggest, AJ, that if this does happen, you just re-sanction the event as Casual (which has a four-player minimum) - players miss out on a couple planeswalker points, but most probably won't care, and they'll still get to play without violating sanctioning guidelines.