Originally posted by James Winward-Stuart:

Is this Comp. or Regular?

The Scenarios are usually designed for Competitive REL, althought this time there is no indicator for it. A clarification from the Knowledge Pool team would be nice :-)

Edited Auzmyn Oberweger (June 6, 2014 05:23:29 AM)

Let's just assume this is Competitive REL, how would you handle it James?

and if it's Regular REL, is there any difference in your ruling and fix?

Comp REL answer:
There are two possibilities in this scenario - one is that Ajani completely forgot the draw trigger until this moment, the other is that he did not. His statement might mean “Oops, I had this draw I forgot until now”; alternatively, it might mean “Oh, and there's still this draw trigger on the stack as well”.

However, which one he meant does not matter. Policy talks about “missed” triggers, not “forgotten” triggers. Ajani needs to demonstrate awareness of the trigger the first time it would matter, which he has done (even if had perhaps forgotten about it in the interim). It could be argued that he missed the trigger, then the stack was empty when Nala cast Last Breath, but there is no conversation between the players to suggest that the game has moved on in such a way. Nala can't cause the trigger to be missed by prematurely advancing the game; if she wanted Ajani to have missed the trigger and then be casting the Last Breath on an empty stack, she needed to directly query “OK, so the stack is now empty, do you pass priority to me?” - which she did not.

This might not go down well with Nala, so it might be worth chatting to her later about how you can't “gotcha” people into missing triggers, how it's always a good idea to ask how things stand in the game if there is any ambiguity… and how long, if you are hoping for your opponent to miss their triggers, you need to wait.

Regular REL answer:
Trigger not missed, no problem - but ask both players to communicate more clearly about what's happening, what's on the stack, etc.

In both cases - no infraction, no fix, request for clearer play.

Edited James Winward-Stuart (June 6, 2014 08:22:38 AM)

How do people feel about Ajani just going “oh, the draw trigger” and immediately grabbing the card without waiting for acknowledgement that the trigger is going to resolve, or without allowing Nala a chance to respond to the draw trigger? Does this change anything?

Let's not change the scenario on the main thread please :) Side chats are more than welcome on variations but in the main thread we prefer to stick to the scenarios as written. Thanks guys!

I'm not changing it - I'm pointing out a part of the original scenario that nobody has really addressed yet.

“Ajani says “oh yeah, I need to draw for Dragon Mantle,” and immediately picks up a card”

I understood this to mean that Nala didn't have a chance to say/do anything about the card draw trigger.

As with all the scenarios we've run this year, this is at competitive REL. That's always a safe assumption here unless we say otherwise, though I'll make sure we return to mentioning it in each scenario after this week.

To reinforce what Ben said, we present each scenario after working on it behind the scenes for at least a few weeks. The question we present is the one we would like you to answer. Presenting similar but changed scenarios, while it may seem like a mentoring/thinking exercise from your point of view, serves mostly to confuse readers about what each post is answering. Please feel free to do that in other places, but keep this thread focused on the scenario given.

That said, we greatly appreciate your participation in the Knowledge Pool and I'll let you return to the regularly scheduled discussion at this time :)

To Mark's question of whether or not Nala should have been given a chance to respond to the trigger before the card was drawn: if Nala had a response, she should have said something before now. Because a trigger is only considered missed when there's 100% certainty from subsequent game actions, the IPG includes a reminder that a player might need to acknowledge a trigger before its controller demonstrates any awareness in order to make a response at the proper time. Calling a judge here implies (but we'll ask to make sure) that Nala let the trigger go without any response and considered it missed. Since the original scenario doesn't say anything about Nala wanting a chance for a response then it probably doesn't figure into the situation anyway.

As others have said, there's no infraction. Both players get a suggestion to be more clear about what exactly is going on, and get thanks for calling for help on the unusual situation.

Originally posted by Patrick Vorbroker:

Ajani controls a Satyr Rambler. He casts Dragon Mantle on it. Nala says it resolves. Ajani then casts Last Breath on Nala's Anvilwrought Raptor. After writing down and confirming the new life totals, Ajani says “oh yeah, I need to draw for Dragon Mantle,” and immediately picks up a card, putting it into his hand. Nala calls for a judge. What is the appropriate infraction, penalty, and fix?

No infraction or penalty. I would explain to Nala that a trigger is not missed if it is acknowledged when it would of affected the game, and that Ajani has done so after resolving the last breath and stating that he needed to draw a card.

In this case it is a little bit tricky because Ajani is saved by his choice of plays and the game rules. Since Nala did not state she had anything to do in response to the trigger, we assume the trigger went on the stack and that Nala passed her chance to interact. Ajani did not play anything that implied he missed his trigger, since last breath is an instant, once it resolved and he acknowledges that he needs to draw he has fulfilled his requirement to not miss the trigger.

It's not a missed trigger. As explained above, A announces his trigger when he changes the visible game state (even if he forgot the trigger earlier). Drawing the card then is a part of the resolving trigger and is not an infraction to anything.

The issue here is that A didn't let N the chance to do anything between the instant resolution and the trigger resolution, causing N to ask for a judge (even if N thought she called the judge for an other reason). I don't think it is an infraction. I would remind A to explicit when he wants to resolve his triggers especially where actions has been made between the trigger being put on stack and being resolved.

It's my first post, i hope it will help!

Hello,

Originally posted by Olivier Besnard:

I would remind A to explicit when he wants to resolve his triggers especially where actions has been made between the trigger being put on stack and being resolved.

What if this situations comes up again later in the tournament? Would you then rule that the trigger is missed? Would you give a Warning based on a UC-Minor (failure to follow a request of a tournament official)?

Is there actually a rule you can “remind” the player of? Is there a rule saying “you must explicitly declare that you still remember your triggered ability when casting a spell in response to it”?

I don't think you can rule a missed trigger here, as A announced it at the right time.

Is there actually a rule you can “remind” the player of? Is there a rule saying “you must explicitly declare that you still remember your triggered ability when casting a spell in response to it”?

Not really indeed. I lack experience in Comp REL judging and i think even if i don't see any infraction from IPG, there's still something “wrong” in here. Maybe as you suggest you just state there is nothing and let it go.

Nope, if the exact same thing happens again he gets to skate by without an infraction again.

Ajani is getting away with a mistake on a technicality. Not letting the same technicality apply again would result in an unfair and inconsistent ruling.

It would be unlikely that the second time it's the exact same thing, though. If he makes the same mistake again, chances are he'll notice a little bit earlier or a little bit later, or maybe he did cast a sorcery-speed spell this time. And that can completely change the situation.

Alright, solution time! As was correctly identified by many of you, casting an instant does not cause a trigger to be missed because the instant could have conceivably been cast with the trigger on the stack. As such, there is no infraction in this scenario, and no fix is necessary. Give a time extension if your ruling took more than a minute and let the players get back to playing Magic.

Some judges may be inclined to rule this as Drawing Extra Cards because the player didn't give their opponent an opportunity to act after the last breath but before the trigger resolved. While we would certainly prefer to have the player communicate better, there's no harm done unless their opponent had a response for that time. If the opponent wanted to do something, that would make this a GRV before the card was drawn, and as a result we would issue that GRV to Ajani and rewind the card draw.

As always, thanks for your participation in the Knowledge Pool, and be sure to check back on Wednesday for our newest scenario.

Edited Patrick Vorbroker (June 10, 2014 08:46:17 PM)

Originally posted by James Winward-Stuart:

This might not go down well with Nala, so it might be worth chatting to her later about how you can't “gotcha” people into missing triggers, how it's always a good idea to ask how things stand in the game if there is any ambiguity… and how long, if you are hoping for your opponent to miss their triggers, you need to wait.

I've been wondering… How long is that?

Edited Jochem van 't Hull (June 15, 2014 07:20:44 PM)