A player labels his maindeck cards with a small white freezer dot, on the bottom left corner of the front side. He labels his sideboard cards with a small red dot. He informs his opponent what his system is before the match.

1) Assuming the dots are in *roughly* the same place on each card, but can be felt through the sleeve, is this marked cards?

2) The player has a maindeck Lightning Bolt and a sideboard Lightning Bolt. In Game 1, he draws his sideboard Bolt and realises he has forgotten to de-sideboard. I assume not calling a judge here would be grounds for DQ. If he did call a judge, would the fact that the Bolts are distinguishable be enough to avoid the upgrade to a Game Loss?

1. I wouldnt give out marked cards from the get go. If he goes on, picks up the topcard of his library and feels around the bottom to “feel” that dot I would go with Cheating.

2. Most likely he will check his sideboard at that moment. If he sees a “mainboard” bolt in the sideboard there is no problem. If there's no bolt in the sideboard then we got a problem, and if he doesnt call a judge then it's a real problem.

Edited Johannes Wagner (Feb. 4, 2018 08:00:11 PM)

Agree with Johannes 100%. I especially like the call to attention to verify that the “maindeck” Bolt isn't in the sideboard. That's an easy part of this to forget about here!

One thing to remember is that policy tells us, assuming both Bolts are in the maindeck, to handle this with an upgrade to a game loss. It would be a deviation that would be up to the head judge to not upgrade, even though it seems the individual cards should be very distinct.

I don't think either of you have actually answered the main question. Clearly, this is a Deck Problem, upgraded to a Game Loss, as per the IPG. The question is whether sufficiently distinguishing between maindeck and sideboard cards is enough to allow us to deviate, and not upgrade the penalty.

I think there is at least an argument for it, when we look at *why* the penalty is a Game Loss in this case - the potential for cheating is high, and it's impossible to fix the game state when a card is drawn and we don't know whether it is a maindeck or sideboard card.

Originally posted by Huw Morris:

I don't think either of you have actually answered the main question. Clearly, this is a Deck Problem, upgraded to a Game Loss, as per the IPG. The question is whether sufficiently distinguishing between maindeck and sideboard cards is enough to allow us to deviate, and not upgrade the penalty.

Why should it be a Deck Problem?
We dont distinguish between Mainboard and Sideboard Bolt.

Originally posted by Huw Morris:

I don't think either of you have actually answered the main question. Clearly, this is a Deck Problem, upgraded to a Game Loss, as per the IPG. The question is whether sufficiently distinguishing between maindeck and sideboard cards is enough to allow us to deviate, and not upgrade the penalty.

I think there is at least an argument for it, when we look at *why* the penalty is a Game Loss in this case - the potential for cheating is high, and it's impossible to fix the game state when a card is drawn and we don't know whether it is a maindeck or sideboard card.

I don't believe it is distinguishing enough, because we can't prove (and certainly can't take the players word) that they have been 100% consistent in which bolt was main/side. It's completely possible they have been leaving in the “SB” one and putting the “MD” one in the board every round since there is nothing illegal about that (number of bolts is still correct). Because of this we can't actually say that the white dot bolt that was drawn is in fact the one that should be in the SB, because either of them could be put in the SB legally.

Originally posted by Huw Morris:

I think there is at least an argument for it, when we look at *why* the penalty is a Game Loss in this case - the potential for cheating is high, and it's impossible to fix the game state when a card is drawn and we don't know whether it is a maindeck or sideboard card.

Let's talk about the reasons behind the upgrade.

Suppose the two Bolts are indistinguishable.
Player draws the first copy, and it seems everything is ok.
Player draws the second copy, and hopefully calls the judge - but when he drew the first copy, he benefitted from a higher chance to draw it. No remedy to that.

If the two Bolts are distinguishable, player will call as soon as he draws the one belonging to the sideboard.

I see Huw point here.

Edited Francesco Scialpi (Feb. 5, 2018 10:21:41 PM)

Originally posted by Johannes Wagner:

2. Most likely he will check his sideboard at that moment. If he sees a “mainboard” bolt in the sideboard there is no problem. If there's no bolt in the sideboard then we got a problem, and if he doesnt call a judge then it's a real problem.

Isn't that what I already said here?

Originally posted by Johannes Wagner:

Originally posted by Johannes Wagner:

2. Most likely he will check his sideboard at that moment. If he sees a “mainboard” bolt in the sideboard there is no problem. If there's no bolt in the sideboard then we got a problem, and if he doesnt call a judge then it's a real problem.

Isn't that what I already said here?

I believe there is a misunderstanding here of the question. He isn't saying the player has a “SB” bolt in deck and a “MD” bolt in sideboard. The player has both the MD and SB bolts in the deck, and draws the SB one. At this point there is a problem, and Huw's question is whether or not we can choose not to apply the upgrade for Deck Problem here because the bolts are distinguishable from one another, to which I'd say no for the reasons stated above, but that is the question at hand.

If he has 2 Bolts in the Maindeck in game 1, but on the decklist he has a 1/1 split its textbook upgrade.

I do agree that it's a good catch to confirm that the main deck is, in fact, incorrect, and not assess the Game Loss just because the player thinks there's a problem.

However, to Huw's question: no, the distinguishing characteristics of the cards is not reason to deviate. I admit that it may be reason to want to deviate - but we must resist! ;)

As for whether or not they're marked? I fear that's likely a “you had to be there” thing, to really judge whether or not the marks are noticeable and "might allow them to be differentiated from each other while in the library" (emphasis mine). From your description, it seems like these would be hard to notice in the library.

d:^D

If you're proposing a change in policy here (and I assume that's what you're doing, not just suggesting that judges “legislate from the bench” and deviate), it's probably worth considering the implications. Right now, I suspect that only a tiny fraction of deck problem GLs are the result of this clause. An exception-to-the-exception would affect an even smaller percent of players who commit the infraction but had previously painstakingly planned against it.

To change policy here, you'd have to be clear about how you distinguish main and sideboard cards - is it enough to say “Main deck Lighting Bolts are Beta, Sideboard are Judge Foils”? Is it enough to sharpie on the perfect fit?

What's more, if you make a change to policy, you'll get some percentage of players who will, in the process of attempting to avoid a GL for one infraction, end up committing another: marked cards. While your hypothetical player here may have perfectly stickered cards to make them indistinguishable, I expect that not all players who attempt to do so will succeed. And some might distinguish cards in other ways that make them marked.

I don't think a policy change here is worth the overhead it would cost.

I wasn't proposing a policy change here, and I'm quite happy to accept Scott's answer as ‘O’. Thanks for the clarification.