Attending a conference costs me, at minimum, 200 dollars. So that's not really an option for me.

That the most obviously “for judges” promo they've ever created is only going to be available to people who live in or can easily travel to a larger population centre continues to highlight how many WOTC policies simply disregard anybody in smaller markets or more isolated markets. I should stop being surprised by it.

> On Dec 3, 2017, at 3:10 PM, Daniel Ruffolo <forum-40079-14e7@apps.magicjudges.org> wrote:
>
> Attending a conference costs me, at minimum, 200 dollars. So that's not really an option for me.

And you have just hit upon the reason mini-conferences exist.

As I said in my previous reply, you can contact your regional coordinator about organizing one.

This thread has gone pretty far off topic a few different times now - though I suppose I should stop being surprised by that.

This thread is for discussing the changes to the Exemplar program which are discussed in Bryan's article. There are a number of other places to discuss other topics - ranging from abuse of the Exemplar program (exemplarprogram@gmail.com), to the Conferences foil packets (the Conferences sphere), to the Exemplar foil selection (WotC, I guess?), to the availability of conferences in your region (your Regional Coordinator).

I'm not going to further derail the topic with a discussion of the viability of even a mini-conference. It still stands that it is made substantially more difficult for people in small and/or isolated markets to access the system, and the rewards for accessing the system in the apparantly desired ways. Adding in randonness, and making proxy nominations harder just amplifies those problems.

Edited Daniel Ruffolo (Dec. 4, 2017 04:52:23 AM)

I, for one, do not hate the changes. I realize that guaranteed foils are a problem (because payment, lawyers, yadada).
And while I am a person that likes information to be shared, I can also see that, depending on how the setup is, it cannot be revealed to have people not try to game it.

The thing I do not understand, however, is why the numbers of foils cannot be publicized.
Not only for Exemplar, but also Sphere-contingents, PC-contingents, Conference-contingents (which are by region now I think?).

I think being open about those would take away a lot of skepticism and notion of “they're coming for our foils!”.
You could say “Hey look, beforehand we had 1.000 foilpacks for exemplar, 300 for spheres, 50 for PCs, and 600 for conferences per season. Starting next year, we will randomize exemplar and take away 200 of those from exemplar, but add 100 to conferences, 70 for spheres to these spheres, and 30 to PCs for this and that reason”.


The only reason I (and this is, I think, the base of many problems not only concerning exemplar, as seen in this thread) can think off for not making information like this accessible is that the distribution is not fair, or being tampered with.
Which I choose not to believe, but rather that there's a good reason not to disclose this information.
But this reason is ALSO not being disclosed. The only thing being disclosed is that information will not be disclosed - without no, or very vague (non-)reasoning.


But that may only be my personal idea - that information should be accessible unless there is good reason for it not to be. And in that case, the reason should be good and accessible instead.

This unrefined thought sprung out of various discussions about this on the UK judges channel.
Idea:

• Reduce the number of nomination waves to X per year, where X is the number of the large regional conferences in your region
  

• Award the exemplar packets during the conference - the organizers can do an awards ceremony & personal thanks on the stage.
  

• Allows the regional leadership to review nominations for their regions, shortlist the best & most worthy nominations - this caps the number of exemplar packets if needed. Basically collapse the mailing into conferences/regional gatherings.
  

• Post the winners online afterwards.
  

• Nominations can still be made year round.
  

• If the person is unable to attend, mail them just like now.
  

• Have a month (how long do they take now?) for exemplar team reviews, a month for regional leadership review before the date of the regional conference. Can also delegate that to the area conference organizers.
  

I think the manual review and shortlisting of the most exemplary actions by the committee and/or regional leadership would seem a far more fair process than a random roll of the die. And nominations definitely don't guarantee a foil this way. They could even come up with their own nomination categories, e.g. Deckchecker of the year, etc. Yes, that is a load of extra work for the leadership, but maybe worth it in the longer run?

Curious to hear what you think of these.

Dear Bryan, and everyone else who will read this,

I have never participated neither to the Exemplar program, nor to any of its discussions. I've been a level 2 judge since 2014 (before Wave 1 started) but seeing how the program was shaping and how discussions played out was always disappointing and even frustrating at times for me. Today we are in a dire situation, my frustration has reached a boiling point and I feel the need to discharge the weight and speak up for the first time. I do realize that a lot of what I am going to say here will sound like I am a Cassandra or a genius that nobody understands. I want to assure you that I'm neither of those and even if this will be a long post, I want to ask you all to read it through the end.

So, why do I find this frustrating? Is it because the change is a net loss on Expected Value (EV)? No, the problem is more deeply rooted than you might think, as many of the discussions in the past years completely missed the point. Again, I do realize that I will sound like the annoying “I told you” guy, but please, bear with me for a while.

The first question that I need all of you to ask yourselves is: why are we at this point now? There are many reasons, but for me, the main answer is Human Nature. In the past Exemplar Program (EP) discussions, multiple people raised concerns over the years for the potential exploits within the system, and the answer from the higher ups was, in pretty much all the cases, something in the line of "We understand where you're coming from, but we think that your concerns are overblown. Everything will be fine. Even if the system isn't perfect, we trust judges as they take pride on NOT exploiting it.“ (I won't directly quote anyone because personal attacks are not in my interest) Today is the day in which the situation hit a wall because:
1. Judges are people and people respond to incentives;
2. Fighting against human nature is a losing battle;
3. When something of monetary value is involved, you don't trust.

This might be a bit too cynical for some of you, but sadly the supposed need to diminish the ”value-giving power“ of the EP confirms it. In many games and real life situations, including competitive Magic (such as building the most optimized decklist for an archetype), you ”win“ by ”min-maxing", which means maximizing the results while minimizing the effort. Some people min-max more than others (with some staying within the rules boundaries, some others breaking them), but it's perfectly human to do so (the perfect example is people soliciting or trading for leftover recognition slots, but there are many more). I am not trying to absolve anyone or to start a witch hunt against the rule breakers, it's just an analysis of the situation.

So, we are here because it is human to attempt to maximize EV and some judges did what some people trusted them not to. The supposed solution implemented by the Exemplar Program Team (EPT) is to add a random chance of not receiving foils when receiving a recognition. Some people in this thread have already commented on how this will be a patch that is worse than the hole, but very few, if not nobody, have actually grasped how this has a disastrous implication on the image of the EP as a whole. The mission of the EP is to be a meritocratic system: you recognize merit where it is (with a bunch of official parameters defining merit), you don't recognize it where it isn't. Adding a random component on the system is an admission of failure on being able to effectively recognize merit. This bears repeating, so I'll make it bigger for you:

Adding a random component on a meritocratic system is an admission of failure on the system's true mission. If it's even partially random, it's not meritocratic.

The fact that the difference between Judge A and B, both receiving one recognition each but only one of them receiving foils, is solely that a computer program didn't randomly select one of them throws the meritocracy in the garbage can. Not to mention that denying foils to a random set of judges because some people are gaming the system is like a mayor taxing random citizens to fund the police forces because the crime rate is increasing. You might randomly penalize a criminal, but you will most likely tax innocent citizens, maybe even someone who is struggling to pay the bills.

So, where do we go from here? Bryan, I do understand that, according to your words, you don't feel like willing to negotiate the introduction of the random selection, but I, as many other people (I hope), do want to strongly advise you to reconsider: the foil distribution within the exemplar program needs to stay purely meritocratic. I'm fairly sure that a better system CAN be designed without having to resort to randomness, and if a way cannot be found then either the foils or the program as a whole need to be scrapped altogether because this “middle-ground” solution of randomly phasing out foils will just make honest people disappointed while exploiters will still have a chance to receive something when they should have nothing.

And at last, if the situation is going to stay as announced, my final request is to add a way for people to opt out of the EP. I'm confident that many of them, including myself, would rather have the certainty of not receiving anything rather than the disappointment of being deemed worthy of recognition by a fellow judge, but not worthy of foils by a random number generator.

Greetings and very many thanks if you kept reading me this far,
Marco

Edited Marco Storelli (Dec. 5, 2017 08:27:50 AM)

As someone who lives in a remote area (Newfoundland, Canada) I think I should put in my 2 cents on this conversation. As this will likely appear rather rambling, I will also provide a TLDR at the bottom for those of you who don't want to read this whole post :)

In our province, we have 4 total L1 Judges (one of which lives a 4 and a half hour drive from the rest of us, and 1 of which isn't active as a judge any more), 1 L2 (myself) and 1 L3.

I deal with 2 of the 4 L1 judges on a regular basis, as they are generally my floor staff for PPTQ's and other events held locally. Since I've become L2 (earlier this year) I have tried to recognize what they are doing for the community each wave, only missing a nomination for them in a single wave since hitting L2 (due to being overly busy with overtime at work and various other items).

These two L1's are the backbone of the local community, not just in helping judge local events, but also with making FNM fun through additional side games, in organizing fun events outside of the regular FNM's and the like, and by being available to answer everyone's judge questions, even when they are not actively judging events (we get many people messaging us on facebook and the like looking for specific rulings, etc.). I feel that they most definitely deserve the nominations I give, and the foils are an added bonus to them that either helps them get foils they were looking for (such as getting a foil mana drain for my EDH deck before they got reprinted) or help give them a bit of extra cash selling them to our rather large EDH community (generally their friends who are trying to track down judge foils specifically).

I feel that these judges definitely deserve the reward of the Exemplar foils, and it will be sad to see them possibly get nothing for their actions. I will try to do more myself to give them some sort of reward for being exemplary, but my resources and time are generally limited.

This being said, given my limited interaction with judges outside of the province, it is also hard for me to fill my exemplar slots each wave. I personally have asked for people to forward any over cap recommendations to me, because I want to make sure that everyone gets the chance to be recognized for their actions. Saying that we are no longer allowed to recommend someone by proxy, but saying that we can still recognize them over things we may have heard, but not directly witnessed truly feels like a cop out to still allow this to happen, but just require different wording in the recommendation itself.

As an L2 in a remote area, I also find it hard to get my own exemplary behavior recognized. Our local L3 judges at least a dozen GP's a year, and as a result, generally fills up their Exemplar slots rather quickly as they deal with many exemplary judges at these events. I also feel that the quality of judges at these GP's can easily overshadow what local judges are doing for the community, so the things that may seem exemplary to the local community and local judges may not appear as exemplary as things done by these GP judges. As is likely the case with many other judges, I also feel uncomfortable “tooting my own horn” as per say and telling others about the extra stuff I am doing in my community, because I don't do these things specifically for the exemplars. That said, it goes a long way to receive an exemplar nomination (even if it's once a year at most) as it does make me feel that my extra effort has been recognized by someone. While it doesn't entirely motivate me to go the extra mile, it also don't hurt to say the least and truly acts as positive reinforcement.

The next thing I want to address is the ability for our local judges to attend conferences. Being based in Newfoundland means that travel to any kind of major event (like a GP), or to any conference in mainland or even Atlantic Canada can be rather cost prohibitive. If I were to book a flight nearly 2 months away, I would be looking at a cost of at least $300.00 to fly as far as Halifax, and anywhere from $420 to $500+ dollars to fly to Toronto or Montreal. Once you add in accommodations, transportation, and food, you are likely looking at anywhere from $600 to $1,000 for one of us to attend a GP or conference. We don't simply have the ability to drive to these locations either as we are an island, and if you include gas a ferry costs, it's generally cheaper for a person to just fly where they need to go. These costs also make it difficult to hold a conference in Newfoundland. Given that we would likely have only 3-4 local judges able to attend, possibly 1-2 judge candidates, and it being cost prohibitive for people outside the province to attend, conferences (even mini ones) don't appear to really be a viable option for us.

With all the above being said, there are a few things that I can likely suggest, many of which have already been mentioned in this thread.

• First, if someone would only get a single recommendation in a year, I feel they should get a packet. While this may come off as somewhat self serving (as I am generally in this boat) I feel that if a judge is to feel truly recognized, then they shouldn't get just a token when someone who regularly gets many nominations has a much greater chance at getting at least one packet in a year.
  
• Second, I believe we should have some ideas in place on how allow judges to fill unused exemplar slots. RC's are generally limited on how many extra slots they have per wave. Would it be possible for an RC to see how my unused slots are available that the end of a wave, and have at least a portion of those slots reallocated to the RC for them to be able to make sure everyone mentioned or reported to them is recognized? If not, would there be a way to identify which judges are not regularly using all of their slots in order to form a group of people who can regularly submit proxy recommendations in order to assure that no exemplar is left behind?
  
• Third, I believe we need to either institute more channels for Stores and Players to be able to submit their positive feedback on a judge, or make it more widely known how these stores and players can use the existing channels to submit feedback (whether it's positive or negative). I know that myself, and most other judges here, won't feel comfortable asking players or TO's at an event to submit positive feed back for them as it comes across as rather self serving.
  
• Fourth, we should have some way to put emphasis on truly great exemplar recommendations to assure that they may get some reward for their actions. Under the current described changes, someone who shows up in an Exemplar of the Month article may not have received a single packet for their actions. If they were deemed great enough to be spotlighted, shouldn't they be deemed great enough to receive some foils? (Though this does have the catch 22 of some people feeling that their actions are more worthy of others).
  
• Fifth and finally, we should put some thought into how we can help people in remote areas attend conferences. This may be as simple as awarding more foils as a travel stripend for people who have to travel much further to attend their closest conference.
  

TLDR

• We only have truly 4-5 active judges in the province, most if not all of which are regularly doing exemplary things, but not all of which can be recognized due to level limitations (most being L1) or their behavior not seeming exemplar in the face of GP quality judges whom also deserve those nominations.
  
• For judges who may only get a single nomination a year, if they were to suddenly not get any kind of reward, it would end up being rather disheartening, and while they are getting recognized on paper, they may feel that their actions just weren't good enough to deserve the foils.
  
• Judges should have some way to still submit exemplars by proxy, because the current description still appears to allow it, just with different wording. No exemplar should be left behind, and RC's extra recommendation slots are generally limited.
  
• For our local judges, it's rather cost prohibitive to fly event to the closes conferences or GP's. This makes them less likely to be able to attend conferences to get the foils, or even get more exposure at a GP in order to show how exemplary they may be.
  
• For my recommendations on things we can try, look just above this TLDR
  

*Edited for Formatting*

Edited Adam Jennings (Dec. 5, 2017 02:30:59 AM)

Hey Brian, I wanted to second Mani Cavalieri regarding this change. I think there is some genuinely effort in this changes, and that there must be some problems you needed to adress with it. Evenso, I believe the lack of transparency is a big issue that need to be take into account. Why? The problem is that the lack of transparency produce several consequences:

1. Inconsistency
You are not willing to tell us what the problems are, by using very abstract and/or normative explanaitons and leaving ton of space for inferences about what are the “true” reasons for this change. But evenso, you are “willing to hear” new ideas about how to correct the issues. Issues you don't explain us. Hoping to recieve solutions to problems we don't have access to, makes really hard for us to participate in the process. It just creates an illusion of participation. Also, apparently is funny to hear theories about why is this happening. It's not funny to be in the need to made them, and is disrespectful to the people who are honestly interested in improving the situation.

2. Trust
You are willing to assume that we need to trust the decision that are being made, even if we don't know the issues, and why this specific solutions are implemented. But in return, it looks like there is no trust on the rest of the judges. For example, we don't know what “randomization” even means in this context. You expect us to believe that the randomization process is fine because there are great people working on it. I agree they are. Still, if the system is great, why don't you want to share it? Why there must be only 1 judge evaluating if the process is appropiately done. I'm not implying that there is something fishy with it. I'm saying that the decision to try to be shady about it only diminishes the same trust you are asking us to have.

3. Program Construction
Transparency has been a big issue in the judge program for some time now. Therefore, it's not impressive that this change has taken place without much consideration for it. Evenso, it's disappointing. There has been some mild efforts to improve this situation, and it would be nice to see that change in the attitude of the people that are in charge of such an important part of the program.

4. Information
I also haven't seen any effort to investigate the problems with the exemplar program. The issues are apparently based on problems that are easily identifiable from the top. The problem is that not involving the rest of the community in identifying the characterstic of the issues gives you a biased view on the situation. Just for example: did you know that in my region's mini-conferences are not supported with foils? Or did you know that there are communitary projects regarding “proxies nominations”, which where extensively discussed by comunities in conferences? I believe a better input of information could have result in both a better sense of what the problems are, and would fortify the trust in this complicated matter.

Well, some of this things cannot be corrected. Still, it would be nice to see answers to some of the questions the community have, such as:

What is the impact of Wizards decisions regarding this change? Are they printing less judge-foils? And if it is so, how big is this change?
Why are the “proxies” recognition really a problem? How could you control that a judge can just removes the “this recognition is from…” to it to bypass the change?
Why aren't you explaining the randomness-algorithm to us? How could someone take advantage of that information?

Maybe with a bit more transparency, this could have been a much better recieved change.

To those who feel legitimately unsatisfied with the new random allocation system, I humbly beg for a second of your attention please, in order to stress a peculiar possibly neglected detail, and to offer a suggestion as food for thought.

Indeed your current approach of the matter until now seems to be solely focused on convincing the Exemplar lead to promptly alter or even give up this specific change, seemingly with mitigated success so far. Therefore I would like to suggest you an additional complementary approach, inspired by Elsa's song in Frozen: let it go. As far as I know, there is only one single person in each Region who is compelled to scrupulously apply the random outcomes of the new foil allocation system: the Regional Coordinator. As a result, nothing and nobody forbids or prevents you from deciding, either individually or collectively, to redistribute your foils as you see fit afterwards. If you receive some packs, of course it is OK to keep them for yourself, you deserve them and no one will criticize you. Nevertheless it is also OK to give some of them to other exemplary but less fortunate people, if you believe this is the right thing to do for the greater good. Be the change you wish to see in the world of judging.

Here is an example. Every wave from 2 to 10, I always received at least 2 foil packs. I am very grateful to the many nice people who were so kind and gracious as to nominate me, but to be really honest, I feel I did not deserve most of those recognitions, because my main ‘merit’ was simply to have a lot of free time and a computer. Nonetheless I had no reason to refuse those gifts either: like Tamatoa (the sparkling crab in Moana/Vaiana) I love shiny trinkets, and I deprived nobody by accepting them. However my own personal opinion is that L1 judges are the backbone, the blood, the heart and the soul of the Judge Program, and I deem their exemplary contributions as worthier than mine. As a consequence, now that I have weaved some precious bonds with the awesome German-speaking judges community and their no less awesome RC Stefan Ladstätter, I joyfully declare this: as long as that new unjust random system applies, if I am blessed again by Exemplar recognitions, and if I am lucky enough to be randomly selected to receive any number of foil packs, I will happily offer all of them to any L1s of that Region who also got Exemplar recognitions in the same wave but earned no pack at random. If enough other L2+ there agree to do the same, then no exemplary L1 in that Region will ever have to endure the dreaded “bad feeling”, which is more valuable to me than any expensive glittering bauble.

Originally posted by Loïc Hervier:

as long as that new unjust random system applies, if I am blessed again by Exemplar recognitions, and if I am lucky enough to be randomly selected to receive any number of foil packs, I will happily offer all of them to any L1s of that Region who also got Exemplar recognitions in the same wave but earned no pack at random. If enough other L2+ there agree to do the same, then no exemplary L1 in that Region will ever have to endure the dreaded “bad feeling”, which is more valuable to me than any expensive glittering bauble.

This is fantastic Loïc. The bonds in your community must be amazing.

For the life of me I cannot understand the merit of someone that receives 6-7 nominations, often times multiple judges recognizing the same person for the same thing in the same wave, getting 4-5 random packets, and a person getting a single nomination getting none. We need to establish a baseline. If we already have a review process in place, that should establish a baseline when compared to the number of foils, or else that committee/committees needs to realign its expectations to allow an appropriate number. I've seen a wide variance between a L2 judge stepping up, cancelling their plans, driving a couple hours to a store, and saving their first pptq not get an award to you were positive when hosting an event for other judges getting an award. Both are good, but there is a disparity.

Originally posted by Joseph Thomas:

I've seen a wide variance between a L2 judge stepping up, cancelling their plans, driving a couple hours to a store, and saving their first pptq not get an award to….

Yes, there is a disparity. The things you are describing are NOT exemplary, as in, we don't want to say that you should follow that example.
Cancelling plans and driving far to a tournament with no previous notice, is remarkable, and I'm glad someone did it. But that's not an example of “how to be a great judge” that the program wants to highlight. The same goes for working without getting paid (or for really low compensation)

I've been holding off replying to this thread for a little while because I wasn't sure if I wanted to join this discussion. However, I talked with a few people today who convinced me to share my bit of the story.

I got my first Exemplar Nomination in Wave 9. I had no idea it was coming and quite frankly, thought the word exemplary was as far from a word to describe me as one could have. I was a fresh L1, having just gotten into formal judging. My first event had been plagued by issues, most notably DQs and had made my local community ostracize me. At the same time, I was going through tremendous turmoil in my life and was considering withdrawing from school.

Then I got an email saying that I had gotten a nomination. That someone had determined that my efforts were exemplary and I was astounded. That nomination legitimately made me stay in the judge program. And it quite frankly started to pull me out of a very dark place in my life. I was fortunate enough to have received the Elesh Norn promo in that wave. A promo I'd long since regarded as mythic and one that I would never lay my hands on. Since I received that promo, there have been times when life is kicking me around, that I have pulled out that promo and that letter and just looked at it. As a way to pick me up and remind me that there are reasons to stay positive and keep trucking on.

I've since entered a much better state of mind and I haven't had to do that in a while. But that promo is never leaving my collection. Maybe I'd have thought the same way about getting just the letter and a token and I'd be cherishing that token in equal regard. But we'll never know. For me that promo means so much more than just being a monetary reward. And I doubt I'm the only one who feels that way about some of these promos.

Hi there,

Here are my 2 cents:

DISCLAIMER: Of course people don't like Changes. Magic Players don't Like Changes. After analyzing this new “random” change, peacefully, I came to the conclusion that this time, this change is a bad one. I am not raging out loud, here is my considered thoughts about this new system…

What the hell are you doing? (I care about the new Randomization system, other changes are cool)
You will lose a lot of new L1 due to frustration (I'm not saying that because I'm a L1 too, sincerely, I'm an elder one)

Let me explain and be serious now.. What if my Boss, where I work, told me today: “Hey Steph, this year the End-Year Bonus salary will be given randomly! Thanks for your great job and extra unpaid hours, but sorry this time your colleague got the bonus. Keep up the good work, better luck next year!”

Okay, I admit that the Exemplar Program is more frequent per year, and not due. But the frustration is the same: You involve a lot of time and efforts to maybe see someone less rewarding be recognized. This will not help people to continue to involve themselves into the Exemplar Program.

I am 32 years old with two children, one at hospital atm (nothing to worry, just to point out I'm a busy man). Finding free time for judging, reading rules update, playing Magic and improving the community with my involvements in projects is really harsh. Recognitions are a boost to my devotion to the Judge Community, mainly during those time, but they're only words. Getting the shiny cards is ZE real boost! I can touch them, put a story on them (who, why, anecdotes), play them in my Commander decks, et cetera. It feels rewarding!
After all the sweat and sometimes white nights to end some projects, the foils are really welcomed. It feels like I did a great job, like if I got a promotion at Work. Sure, wordy recognitions are nice, but you are done with them quite too fast because it's just a few lines a web page.

I'm a Judge because I Dislike injustice (and love the Rules), and this randomness element added into our efforts' recognition will bring too much frustration. Please, don't. I already have Magic if I want to enjoy with randomness and Murphy's Law.

Please, find another solution. Judges Niels Viaene, Toby Haze and Emilien Wild already gave some good feedbacks and inputs.

Edited Stéphane Van Cauwenberghe (Dec. 13, 2017 12:26:19 AM)

Honestly,

I appreciate the effort to try and make things work for everyone.

However, this is coming off as insulting and frankly, not encouraging.

Yes, some people will say that the real reward is being recognized at all, and that's great for those people, really I am happy for them. However, flat out shaming people who feel that getting the foils should be a part of that process is not in the least bit fair. Some people who receive these foils will get a huge smile on their face as a reward for doing a job well, and that is a great thing.

I am a therapist by trade, and it has proven for years now that people do get a sense of happiness out of doing a good deed, that is completely important to note here. That does not mean they adding a reward such as foils to the process will take away from that feeling of doing a good deed, they are not combined in such ways. Are there people who abuse the system? absolutely. Does that mean that it should be randomized because that makes it “fair”? No, no it does not.

I am sorry but the sentence (paraphrasing) You should be doing this because you want to do good things for the community, is frankly a poor argument and insulting to the judges in the program who want to have both.

Also noteworthy, I have only been recognized three times, and I am not receiving boatloads of foils. I like to believe I am considering the larger group of judges, not just myself.

Edited Nick Casali (Dec. 13, 2017 12:36:51 PM)