Should a player have a right to the amount of time left in the round? It has been, in my experience, common policy to give a player the amount of time left whenever possible, and so for consistency's sake we should try to give that out where possible, but to what effort should judges go to inform a player about the remaining time?

This isn't an entirely pointless question: strategy can change due to the time limit. If you are a player and know that you're nearing the limit, you might make riskier moves that are your only chance of winning quickly, or might play defensively in hopes of dragging the game out to the time limit.

Yes, players have the right to know. Whether it's because they want to play more aggressively, or they want to know if they can run to the MacDonalds down the block, when you can, you should inform them.

Using round clocks is obviously best, but if you don't have that, post a sign saying “round ends at:” with the time the round ends. Post this directly below/above/next to a clock, and you have your own improvised round timer.

Sorry, Jasper, but I have a quick followup question, since you used a word and I'm unsure of your definition: By “right to know”, is this codified in MTR or implied by something in MTR, or is it a gentleman's agreement between the judges and the players? If the latter, is there a reason why the latter and not the former, if we are always going to tell them anyway?

In MTR 1.10 Players, they are responsible for:
* Complying with announced start times and time limits.

If they don't know the time, they can't fulfill it :-)

It's not somewhere spelled out, there is no rule that grants them this right as such. But as it is information relevant to the match, it's something they can request from a judge. Like the oracle text of a card that is currently in play / on the stack / referenced by something in the game.

If a judge can't comply with all requests from all players in a timely manner, he or she may forego announcing time in the round, and oracle lookup questions in favor of making actual rulings.

From the Tournament Rules:
Floor Judges are available to players and spectators to answer questions, deal with illegal plays, or assist with reasonable requests.

Asking how much time is left in the round is reasonable, so we comply :)

For the sanity of judges everywhere, I strongly recommend the use of “Round Ends” signs when a large timer is not available. The failing that I see most often with that is answering the “how much time” question directly.

Instead, direct the player's attention to the sign stating the end time. 95+% of players have a reasonably accurate timepiece on their person as either a cell phone or a watch.

Time and time again I've seen entire populations of players learn to look for the posted time and figure things out on their own, but it does take some gentle direction to get them started.

If you find you're answering time questions more than twice per round on average or having to tell the same player the remaining time multiple times, then your population could probably benefit from being directed to time posting rather than specific numbers of minutes.

Originally posted by Sean Hunt:

Should a player have a right to the amount of time left in the round? It has been, in my experience, common policy to give a player the amount of time left whenever possible, and so for consistency's sake we should try to give that out where possible, but to what effort should judges go to inform a player about the remaining time?

This isn't an entirely pointless question: strategy can change due to the time limit. If you are a player and know that you're nearing the limit, you might make riskier moves that are your only chance of winning quickly, or might play defensively in hopes of dragging the game out to the time limit.

As a general rule when a clock is not visible I do not announce time left in round past 10-15 minutes. If they ask, I always give it to them, but in particular announcing 2 minutes left seems problematic as it can lead to slowing down and even stalling. John's suggestion is a great one as well.