Ankh and Nile are both playing control decks that are nearly incapable of winning Game 1 in the mirror. In a previous tournament, they'd discovered that fact after narrowly averting a 0-0-1 draw.

Neither is thrilled about being paired up again.

Ankh proposes “Do you want to both concede a game? Sideboard and go to game 3?” Nile quickly agrees.

Is this okay? Would it still be okay if Ankh was less of a rulesmith and instead asked “Want to play a best of 1 instead?”

Well, if the two players just wanted to play with SBs and “skip” game 1,
they could agree to draw game 1 and then play from there. They are still
playing a “first to 2 wins” match, but it let's them avoid the slog of a
pre-boarded match.

If I understand correctly, what is being proposed by Ankh is that he'll concede game 1 to his opponent, and Niles will concede game two, leaving match score at 1-1-0. They'll then play out game three to see who wins it 2-1.

102.3a A player can concede the game at any time. A player who concedes loses the game immediately.

As far as I can find, the situation is acceptable. The match hasn't been conceded or drawn in exchange for or influenced by being offered an incentive.

The game also isn't being decided in a random or arbitrary way, so the section of the MTR that brings that up shouldn't apply.

It's a gentlemen agreement by the way, the player who did'nt concede the first game is not forced to concede the second one. As Shawn said, they could have agreed on a “draw the first game” and play their match correctly

Edited Gilles Demarle (Oct. 22, 2014 03:25:08 AM)

While a player can concede a game at any point, this isn't exactly what is going on here. Ankh isn't saying “I concede”, he's saying “I will concede if you then also concede”. To play devil's advocate, has he tripped himself up in his choice of phrasing here?

The legal way to phrase this seems to me: let's draw game 1, sideboard, and the loser of game 2 will also concede game 3 (or we don't play game 3 at all).

Originally posted by Dustin De Leeuw:

and the loser of game 2 will also concede game 3

Why is that not IDaW? (“A player uses or offers to use a method that is not part of the current game (including actions not legal in the current game) to determine the outcome of a game or match.”)

It looks a bit like they're using a method that is not part of game 3 (by using the arbitrary the result of game 2) to determine the outcome of game 3.

I'm pretty sure this is just an educational opportunity, rather than an
excuse to penalize inexperienced players.

“You guys are overcomplicating things. All you need to do is to agree to
draw game 1, then you can sideboard for game 2 and continue playing your
match. Just please make sure to report all of your games on your results
slip.” is all that is required here.


2014-10-22 9:44 GMT-04:00 Chris Nowak <forum-13447-a9dc@apps.magicjudges.org

Originally posted by Chris Nowak:

Dustin De Leeuw
and the loser of game 2 will also concede game 3

Why is that not IDaW? (“A player uses or offers to use a method that is not part of the current game (including actions not legal in the current game) to determine the outcome of a game or match.”)

It looks a bit like they're using a method that is not part of game 3 (by using the arbitrary the result of game 2) to determine the outcome of game 3.

There is some precedent that this would not be IDaW. In GP San Jose 2012 (team sealed), several teams did this with entire matches. In that tournament, Day 2 involved teams drafting and then playing two consecutive matches against their opponents. Since 1-1 results were likely to knock both teams out of T2 contention, arrangements were made that the loser of the first match would also concede the second.

See this tournament report for details: Rule of Law – Taking the Team GP *1st*

GP San Jose 2012 taught us a few things about team events. Also, the behavior you describe was what teams were doing - not what the judges were approving or allowing.

Back to the original topic - what the players want to do is skip a meaningless game 1, and sideboard before playing a game that they're more likely to enjoy. They're not trying to damage the integrity of the event, or even their match. There's no outside incentive being offered - just common sense.

We should help them avoid poor choice of words, and get to a legal outcome.

d:^D

Actually, they can't do this as they would violate MTR 3.15

If a penalty causes a player to lose the first game in a match before that game has begun, or the first game is intentionally drawn before any cards are played, neither player may use cards from his or her sideboard for the next game in the match.

So, they actually need to agree to draw the first game after they play something in order to use their sideboards. I guess this is important because the decision can change after seeing the number of mulligans of an opponent or something.

EDIT: I ment the posibility of intentional drawing before gameplay in order to play with side, obviously not the conceeding option :)

Edited Joaquín Ossandón (Oct. 22, 2014 12:53:07 PM)

Originally posted by Joaquín Ossandón:

Actually, they can't do this as they would violate MTR 3.15

If a penalty causes a player to lose the first game in a match before that game has begun, or the first game is intentionally drawn before any cards are played, neither player may use cards from his or her sideboard for the next game in the match.

So, they actually need to agree to draw the first game after they play something in order to use their sideboards. I guess this is important because the decision can change after seeing the number of mulligans of an opponent or something.

EDIT: I ment the posibility of intentional drawing before gameplay in order to play with side, obviously not the conceeding option :)

This doesn't really matter too much. Since they're agreeing to draw and sideboard, I don't see any reason why we need to actually make them draw meaningless hands and play a meaningless land, that just wastes everyone's time. Besides, what are you going to do if you intervene here? Make them desideboard and play a land? Issue D/DLPs?

Seems like it's fine to let them “shortcut” to just starting to sideboard (as long as they do correctly report the drawn game), rather than wasting time on actions that both players have already agreed to skip.

I agree with Dan, but it also seems to me that the MTR specifically addresses this case. Can someone clarify?

The “normal” way that players end up IDing game 1 is that they mulligan into oblivion and agree to draw the game in order to draw back up to 7 for “game 1.” Since their intent is to play an un-sideboarded game here, the rules were written to make that clear. This eliminates the possible advantage of scouting and “pre-sideboarding” for the new “game 1.”

In this post, what the players want to do is to begin playing the match as game 2. Since the OP states that they know what they are playing, they will presumably sideboard accordingly. There's no need to go through the motions of playing out a turn just to make it official that they started playing the first game and are now allowed to sideboard. Think of it as a shortcut.

There seems to be a clear concensus that the players can draw the first game, and start their match sideboarded with the game score at 0-0-1.

The original proposal was to start on game 3 with a game score of 1-1-0, which functionally turns the contest into a pre-sideboarded “first to 1 win” match (with virtually no chance of an unintentional draw). While there's a consensus that we should discourage that behavior, it's been an even split among the few comments on its permissibility.

It would be nice to have an official ruling on that permissibility, even if the plan is to tell players “Don't do that!” either way.