AP has 3 Cloudfin Raptors and 1 Thassa, God of the Sea, which aren't summoning sickness. NAP is currently at 3 life and has no blockers. AP casts another Thassa, and puts one of them without specifying which of the new/old he puts into his graveyard as a SBA. He puts his counters on his Rators and then the NAP says that he can't do this. They both called “Judge!”. After investigating, the AP is unable to remember which Thassa he killed but his intention was to evolve his raptors. The NAP says that he killed the old one (which would give him the advantage of not being killed by the raptors yet).

How do you rule this?

Thassa, God of the Sea
Cloudfin Raptor

Edited Samuel Tremblay (Feb. 24, 2014 12:38:51 PM)

I would rule that AP put the old Thassa into the graveyard and therefore the Cloudfin Raptors don't get +1/+1 counters because the new Thassa's p/t doesn't exist anymore because it lost its creature card type.

My reasoning is that NAP sounds certain that he observed the old Thassa go into the graveyard but AP cannot confirm exactly which Thassa he binned. I'm sure there's more to this situation but I'm making my decision based on the info given above.

There are several factors that influence every investigation. However I'm more inclined to believe players who demonstrate that they have observed a situation with absolute certainty.

Personally, I would back up to the point where both players have a point of confusion, in this case where a Thassa was to be put into the graveyard. This is a very simple backup at Reg REL, and it encourages players to be explicit with their opponents when making ambiguous actions.

At Regular REL educate the players to communicate better, back up to the
point where the choice had to be made and have the player make the choice
(while in reality nothing needs actual backing up, just have them make the
choice and move on). Unfortunately for the NAP they are likely not going
to survive this.

We had something similar at the Legacy Open this weekend involving dark depths and Thespian stage. The AP picked up both stage and DD and placed them both in the yard. NAP claimed he had picked up the thespian stage first, as if it were the one that sac'd to state based actions, but the APs clear intent was to get the 20/20 out of it. It was ruled as out-of-order sequencing. In this scenario, the intent is there, to get the +1/+1 counters, and the AP could have gotten confused which of the ones on the table were new and old and just picked one up.

In my opinion AP showed what his intentions were -> to have one Thassa alive and to evolve his Cloudfin raptors, which is legal outcome if he have binned the new Thassa.

If I would be called to a table in this situation I would simply ask AP “Which Thassa did you want to sacrifice” and would would use this answer to determine what happen. If he would say “new one” I would let him put the counters on (of course opponent would have a chance to respond), but if he would say “old one”, I would not let him put counters on and proceed with the game.

Especially in Regular REL, I would like to see games played as players want them to and their intentions would have greater value than their physical actions. If we want to know what choices players made and they weren't clear we should rather ask that player than ask their opponent decide for them.

This situation

@Eric Pare: how would you rule here if AP said he binned new Thassa and NAP claimed he binned the old one?

Originally posted by Jernej Lipovec:

@Eric Pare: how would you rule here if AP said he binned new Thassa and NAP claimed he binned the old one?

In this case, the AP is indicating that he certainly put the new Thassa into his graveyard and not the old one whereas in the situation mentioned above AP doesn't remember for sure. This could change my ruling because now there are two contradicting observations that each player may claim are 100% correct. I would need to investigate more to see whose side of the story holds more truth.

And I wouldn't rewind the game because I don't see any comprehensive or tournament rule violation that occured during this misunderstanding. What I would do is educate AP to comminicate more with NAP so misunderstandings like these are less likely to occur in the future.

Thanks everyone for their answers, but most of you gave different remedies, so could I know what would be the final verdict?

Let the AP gets his counters, rewind, or assume that the old Thassa was sacrificed and therefore AP doesn't get his counters?

Edited Samuel Tremblay (Feb. 24, 2014 02:44:18 PM)

I would simply ask AP what he really did, regardless of which identical physical object was moved. This isn't MTGO. If AP says “I binned the new one” then that's what he did. If he says “I binned the old one” then that's what he did. I'm more interested in play decisions than anything else.

This conversation reminds me of the Koth of the Hammer problem, where a player might accidentally target a mountain he just played when he has others he could be targeting instead. I rule this the same way. If the player says “I was targeting a mountain that would be able to attack this turn!” then that's what happens.

Edited Josh Stansfield (Feb. 24, 2014 02:46:56 PM)

The problem here is that he doesn't know, he just picked up one of the two Thassa and tossed it in his graveyard, regardless of everything else. The AP doesn't anyway understand what difference it makes if he sacrifices one or another ; that's why he picked up one randomly.

Ok, if the player doesn't know the difference and the opponent is sure which one was sent to the graveyard, then you can allow the player that play mistake and explain why it doesn't work the way he intended. He won't make the mistake again.

That sounds great. One last question : What if the NAP is more experienced than AP and is trying to take advantage of this situation, what would you do?

I was reading the Judge Study Group posts and while discussing this scenario with a friend he said “What would you do if the NAP tries to get advantage of this situation?”

Edited Samuel Tremblay (Feb. 24, 2014 04:06:15 PM)

The NAP is trying to gain advantage through superior rules knowledge. There's nothing illegal about that. If NAP is lying, then that's something else, and earns a Disqualification.

That's what I thought. If both the NAP and AP don't know which Tassa was put into AP's graveyard, would a rewind then be correct?

(Sorry for asking so many questions, just want to have all the scenarios covered)

If he states that he played Thassa to evolve his Raptors, wouldn't that make his intentions clear enough?

Even at competitive REL, it is stated: “Players are expected to know the game’s rules—but not to a technically detailed level—…”

Wanting to evolve the Raptors and putting one of the two Thassas in the bin seems like a proper shortcut and sufficient rules knowledge to me…