As you all know, this weekend we will have the Journey To Nyx Prerelease, and some of us (including me) will have to manage a 2HG tournament. I feel a lot of cards of this set are working differently in 2HG, and I am pondering how much I should talk about this when I welcome the players before they open their product.

For example, I cannot know who will open a Tromokratis, but I know how to manage it: which line of speech should I assume?

A) “If anyone opens this card, please call me”
B) “If anyone opens this card, this is how it works: *insert wall of text*”
C) Nothing, scout the players around and if one open that card give the appropriate advice to that team
D) None of the above :D *please specify*

I can't understand if I'm going to give strategic advice to one of (or some of) the players, if I'm educating them, if I'm getting them bored, or whatever. I can't know if they will not play around a Spear of Heliod, if they will manage correctly Decorated Griffin's ability, if they will be fine with that Akroan Horse generating two tokens every time… and the list could go on….

I only wish to give the best customer service *and* the best gaming support.
Could you please suggest me the best way to balance this out? :)

Thanks in advance!

Option D.

The audience at a 2HG prerelease event is likely to be super casual, and in particular you'll probably find people who bring their father/son/mother/daughter/boyfriend/girlfriend etc along to be the other head, and who has played almost zero magic. This means there is a big risk that any announcement you make may be too complicated - even if it's a simple one!

My advice would be to just say to the players in the announcement that lots of cards work a little unusually or differently in 2HG, so if anyone has a card that talks about “a player” or “an opponent” and they're not sure what it does when there are 4 players or 2 opponents, then call you over. That's what I've done in the past and it worked well enough.

The only thing that I would include for definate is that you can't trigger your teammate's heroic creatures. Make that one nice and clear :)

For cards like Spear of Heliod and the Griffin, if they ask what happens (during deck construction) I'll explain how it truly works (i.e. the attacking team can choose to damage the other head). And for Akroan Horse, I'll explain that they get two tokens (even if they don't ask). Basically, given how laid back and fun 2HG is meant to be, I'll err on the side of giving them more strategic advice than I normally would.

+1 what Mark said.

Other things that may come up with newer players:

Bestowing/Ordeals on a creature my partner controls- who gets the trigger?
Who is the “defending player” and what if they must control an enchantment to attack? (i.e. Godhunter Octopus)
Who chooses to pay Tribute?
How do I control one player's turn? (i.e. Worst Fears)
Owner/Controller/Opponent and Target/Each

These are things WE have to know, and hopefully you get the opportunity to teach newer players to see some subtle differences in how their cards work. Taking up time in your announcements for individual cards isn't worth it- be a personal presence in helping your casual players grow.

“If you have any questions about how a card works in multiplayer, please ask a judge.”

Edited Evan Cherry (April 22, 2014 11:37:08 AM)

As my other two teammates there, i'll only say something about a particular card if it has a change in the oracle, is bad impressed or there is knowledge that are cards from other editions coming in this expansion.

Another ruling that's more simple to explain i'll go to instruct the player only if he/she ask me.

Hoping you get a excelent weekend ruling/playing this prerelease!

ChristoffV

I've HJ'd quite a few 2HG sealed events, and I've learned there are certain things you should cover with players before the tournament begins.

1) Each team begins at 30 life
2) The team that plays first skips their draw step
3) Each player receives a free mulligan
4) First team to win 1 game wins the match
5) Teams share their card pool (this is important, as I've talked to players after some of the 2HG events and they didn't realize they could use the combined pool between the two players)
6) When time is called there is only a 3 turn extention instead of 5 turns.

As noted above there may be other situations you may want to address too, like heroic and devotion. The main reason I do this is because it saves time from having to answer the same questions over and over again to individual players, and I found that covering the basics of 2HG in the beginning tends to answer many of the questions players have.

I find a simple “You means you, not you and your team mate. Opponents means
both of the people on the other side of the table” starts players towards
the correct answer for 90% of their questions. In theory it'd get them
through the heroic and devotion questions. In practice it does help a fair
bit.

Is there a particular reason we're worried about giving out strategic
advice *outside* of a match? (Especially in a casual event?)


2014-04-22 19:26 GMT-04:00 Gareth Pye <forum-9658-cb71@apps.magicjudges.org>
:

It's not a concern of giving OA (or it shouldn't be) its a concern of
boring players so they don't listen to anything

My question stems from OP mentioning it as giving strategic advice, as well
as occasionally experiencing judges at other events being worried about
giving away strategic advice outside of a match.


2014-04-22 20:11 GMT-04:00 Gareth Pye <forum-9658-cb71@apps.magicjudges.org>
: