I posted a scenario yesterday on the MTGJudges.ca Facebook page yesterday and it inspired quite a bit more debate than I'd thought it would. After 100 comments we're no closer to a consensus. Chris suggested I re-post it here for a more global audience.

Anna and Natalie both have a bear cub in play. Anna declares her bear cub as an attacker and says “Trade?”. Natalie thinks for a second and says sure and blocks. She bins her bear cub. And points at the other and says that dies too. Anna says nope and points at her Spear of Heliod. “JUDGE!”

Investigation reveals Anna knew her bear cub was a 3/3.

Thoughts?

Since you posted this in the Competitive REL forums, can we safely assume that this is in a sanctioned Competitive REL match?

Yes.

My gut reaction would be: Nice Jedi mind trick, well played. It feels too implicit to state that she is misrepresenting public information here, she just makes a false statement about a possible future game state, which is allowed, AFAIK.

Originally posted by Dustin De Leeuw:

It feels too implicit to state that she is misrepresenting public information here

I thought P/T of creatures is derived information?

I do not really see a DQ here either, the wrong statement is about a future gamestate and you are allowed to lie about that as much as you like. The only thing about the current gamestate you could interpret into her statement is the P/T of her bear cub which she is indeed not allowed to lie about. But as “Trade” is neither an official shortcut nor really a clear statement (well, Nathlaie traded the lifepoints she did not loose for her bear ;-) but even if you harshly hard-translate “trade” to “both creatures will die” it is really not a statement about P/T but about a future gamestate), I would have a very hard time DQing here.

So as long as no official statement states the opposite, you can do that on my tournaments.

EDIT:
After discussing this for a bit with my roommate (L 0.9 ;) I think I came up with a clear chain of arguments:

1. For it to be cheating, Anna has to lie about derived information
2. For that we have to translate “Trade” to a statement about the Power/Toughness of her creature
3.1 Consider an alternative scenario where the attaccking creature is a 1/1 with Deathtouch instead, “Trade” would mean the exact same thing: “If our creatures fight, they both die”. It would obviously not be a statement about P/T.
3.2 Thus you would have to translate “Trade” to a specific statement only involving the P/T of the both bears in one case, but into a statement about a future gamestate / consequences the game rules will have in another case, but it is obvious that the statement is really the same (not taking the fact into account that it is a lie in one case, this is just about formalizing the statement).
4 Thus I consider the statement “Trade” not as a statement that directly and only says something about the P/T of creatures
5 Thus I cannot disqualify Anna for this statement, as this would have been the only type of statement that justifies a DQ.

Edited Leon Strauss (Dec. 6, 2013 03:06:22 PM)

If misrepresenting future game state is OK, can I swing with my 2/2 exalted guy and ask “Take 2?”. (As long as I'm not stating “take 2” as if the damage was already assigned… me:“Take 2? opponent: ”ok.“ me:”Take 3, haha!." just doesn't seem right)

I didn't say his toughness was two, right? So I'm not misrepresenting things, nor did I miss the trigger because getting +1/+1 isn't a visible change in the game state.

Is a change in inflection really enough to make the difference?

MTR 3.7 Players may not represent derived or free information incorrectly.

Based on the info given in this scenario, I believe that Anna is not representing derived information correctly by saying “trade”. She is implying that both creatures will die in the exchange. Which is not the case. She intentionally broke a rule. Now we would need more information on if she knew that she broke a rule. That comes from more investigation.

At this current point i could not DQ unless more info was provided. So I issue CPV.

Originally posted by Nick Rutkowski:

Based on the info given in this scenario, I believe that Anna is not representing derived information correctly by saying “trade”

I think she does not have to represent it correctly, she is allowed not to represent it at all, she is implying that something will happen, which is a statement about a future gamestate isnt it?

We seem to have the same position here, I just want to clarify

Edited Leon Strauss (Dec. 6, 2013 03:34:18 PM)

Actually, from what I understand… players may choose not to communicate derived information, yes. But if they go ahead and do it anyway, they aren't allowed to lie about it. If you were permitted to do so, then theoretically I could show up with an all-foreign deck and then proceed to lie about what every single one of my cards did whenever my opponent asks. That's clearly shady, ergo why we don't allow it.

Originally posted by Colleen Nelson:

Actually, from what I understand… players may choose not to communicate derived information, yes. But if they go ahead and do it anyway, they aren't allowed to lie about it. If you were permitted to do so, then theoretically I could show up with an all-foreign deck and then proceed to lie about what every single one of my cards did whenever my opponent asks. That's clearly shady, ergo why we don't allow it.

But that implies that Anna is actually misrepresenting (aka making a statement about) derived information, which I think is the core point of the discussion.

If I attack with a Hill Giant and my opponent has a Woodland Changeling and a Griffin Canyon I can ask “trade?” even though the current P/T's don't indicate a trade.

If I put my opponent on a Titan's Strength, I can attack with my Hill Giant into a Traveling Philosopher and ask “trade?” to show my opponent I'm onto him, even though there might not even be a possibility for the creatures to trade.

Thus I would also say that saying “trade” is not representing anything incorrectly. Or the above scenarios would also not be allowed which seems strange to me.

Edited Toby Hazes (Dec. 6, 2013 04:08:46 PM)

Originally posted by Nick Rutkowski:

MTR 3.7 Players may not represent derived or free information incorrectly.

Based on the info given in this scenario, I believe that Anna is not representing derived information correctly by saying “trade”. She is implying that both creatures will die in the exchange. Which is not the case. She intentionally broke a rule. Now we would need more information on if she knew that she broke a rule. That comes from more investigation.

At this current point i could not DQ unless more info was provided. So I issue CPV.

What does “trade” mean? Where in the MTR or the CR is that term defined because I'm having trouble finding it…

Could trade mean “Trade your creature for life points?”?

To simplify this scenario, let's say neither player has any cards in hand.

There are many tangentially related scenarios that steer this into lighter or darker grey, so lets just look at the here and now.

There's nothing else on the board, (not even lands!), and their graveyards have somehow been exiled away. And their exile zone has some how been… oh you get the point.

Edited Adam Zakreski (Dec. 6, 2013 04:12:17 PM)

Agree with everybody up here…

Originally posted by Chris Nowak:

If misrepresenting future game state is OK, can I swing with my 2/2 exalted guy and ask “Take 2?”. (As long as I'm not stating “take 2” as if the damage was already assigned… me:“Take 2? opponent: ”ok.“ me:”Take 3, haha!." just doesn't seem right)

True, you missed the trigger

Originally posted by Ward Poulisse:

Agree with everybody up here…

Chris Nowak
If misrepresenting future game state is OK, can I swing with my 2/2 exalted guy and ask “Take 2?”. (As long as I'm not stating “take 2” as if the damage was already assigned… me:“Take 2? opponent: ”ok.“ me:”Take 3, haha!." just doesn't seem right)

True, you missed the trigger

But it didn't have a visible effect on the board state until the damage was assigned. So I didn't need to demonstrate knowledge of it until that point. So when I asked “take 2?”, I hadn't missed it yet.