Originally posted by Jonas Drieghe:

Joaquín Pérez
It's a perfectly legal mind-trick, not nice nor sportive, but in fact has been used quite a lot of times :)

Saying you're searching up Resto is a perfectly legal mind trick, but targeting/blinking the maggot with a non-existing ability into making your opponent reveal his hand is something i'm a lot less comfortable with.

We should always assume there are (corner) cases where policy doesn't really add up. With specific cards a specific case can result to something we feel uncomfortable with. The fact that you feel uncomfortable with maybe suggests that there is something wrong in either policy or philosophy, but you should act according to what current policy states.

That's why it's important to know what exactly goes wrong in the original posts scenario and if (or not) policy applies. Like I have said on the BeNeLux boards: I really feel that some of us try to defend poor old Nigel because there is such a feel bad surrounding the situation. But let's be honest, Nigel in fact stepped with both his feet right in the sales talk of his opponent.

To rule GRV a rule needs to be broken, clearly no actual Game Rule has been broken. It's clearly not a CPV as the information Andreas is talking about is considered private information. Also no short cuts apply that we can hold against Andreas as something he now needs to comply with.

Assume Andreas has done this by accident:
- Though luck for Nigel, but we can not back this up

Assume Andreas does it with the intent so his opponent reveals his hand:
- We could -after investigation- assume he willingly tried to misrepresent a future board state, but this is not something I can DQ for. I think we can not DQ because we already established that no rule was broken.
- True it's not sporting at all and he's not going to make a lot of friends with it
- Yes we should wonder if the IPG should cover this corner case. I think not, because the only way I see on adding this is making it more complicated or we would encourage players from saying nothing at all, which would again be counter productive. But maybe somebody can throw in an idea
- Yes we can have a word with the player that we do not like to see this! Would it be possible to give him an official instruction here for the rest of tournament? (just a random though)


I like the scenario of Joaquín Pérez, although not exactly the same, ask yourself can you DQ or give a warning for somebody who says “I'm going to win the game” when a player (knows) he can not win the game with the Scapeshift combo? Look at the tense of the statement “I'm going to win” future tense, it must be a bluff!

You could argue that it's harder to track how many Mountains are still in the deck etc. but that does not add to the actual core of the discussion. We should all be on the same page on this I believe, hence it's a valuable discussion and I'm glad we are having it!

Note that I'm only doing estimated guesses here, but I would love to be corrected and convinced otherwise ;)

- double post -
- note to developers: add bug: prevent double posts from happening ;) -

Edited Niki Lin (Dec. 22, 2014 05:28:44 PM)

Originally posted by Niki Lin:

- note to developers: add bug: prevent double posts from happening ;) -

Response from developers: Submitted request to Microsoft.be to disable your double-click capabilities. :D

I don't believe there's a problem here.

I maintain the position I held in the dutch forums: Andreas is proposing a shortcut here by stating a sequence of actions and the game state that will be the result of those actions. I see nothing in policy that excludes the deck from being involved in shortcuts, and it fits the definition perfectly.

This means that when Nigel accepts the shortcut by revealing his hand, all steps in the proposed shortcut have been executed in order. So Andreas either found an Angel that didn't exists, or he targetted the brain maggot with a non-existing trigger. Which means he violated the rules of the game, and receives a warning for GRV.

Michel, while I understand your point of view, I'm trying to explain that it's simply not correct. (Although, if you were Nigel in that scenario, I'd be very surprised if that wasn't *exactly* how you saw it…)

d:^D

Originally posted by Florian Horn:

I think I'd rule it as I would rule a premature reveal for a Vendillion Clique. If AP tells his opponent immediately to take his hand back, then nothing. NAP should have been more cautious before he revealed his hand.

If AP writes down the hand, I will investigate to know if it was an honest mistake … or a voluntary trick …

If I decide that it is an honest mistake … the game continues without penalty.

If that was a trick, there will likely be a discussion along these lines:
- Why do you think NAP revealed his hand ?
1- I have no idea. I thought he was exercising his right to reveal his hand at any point. -> DQ for lying to a Judge.

The “I have no idea” is awkward, but if the player simply says “My opponent is allowed to reveal their hand at any time; I'm allowed to write that down” then this isn't actually a lie at all. The player is just taking advantage of his opponent's mistake / faulty assumption by writing down what he has already seen anyway, that's it. The player probably believes that what they are doing is acceptable, so they would have to say something particularly stupid to somehow end up telling a lie.

Originally posted by Florian Horn:

2- Because he thought that he was targeted with my Brain Maggot when he was not. -> DQ for Cheating (I deliberately misled my opponent about public information in order to gain advantage).

For it to be Cheating, we require that the player knows they have broken a rule. For various reasons already pointed out in the thread, it's unlikely that this is the case - it's far more likely that the player believes what they are doing is legal, in which case Cheating cannot apply.

It feels to me like you are trying very hard to justify a DQ just because you don't like the player's behaviour (it's really scummy behaviour, I know) rather than because policy actually supports a DQ . This is a Very Bad Thing™ and we shouldn't do it.

Also, be careful with phrases like ‘public information’ - there are specific terms that relate to kinds of information in Magic, and using them incorrectly can lead to bad rulings. “I'm going to fetch Restoration Angel and Brain Maggot will trigger” is neither an example of Free Information nor Derived Information, which is why you correctly identified that it was not a CPV. So it's not “I deliberately misled my opponent about public information” - it's “I deliberately misled my opponent about a future gamestate by making legal statements and performing legal actions,” which is not an infraction.

I think the real important note that Nigel made a technical play mistake here. He responded to an effect that hadn't happened yet. Imagine a scenario with a multiple lands in play but no swamps and Ansel attempts to cast a Brain Maggot.. While Ansel would get a GRV in this case, it is Nigel's responsibility not to show his hand until the legal card is fully cast. The GRV happens regardless of whether Nigel reveals his hand or not since Ansel attempted to cast a spell with mana he doesn't have. It's a GRV for Ansel regardless of if it's a Dark Confidant or a Brain Maggot. If Nigel reveals his hand, he has given the information about his hand which no backup will totally fix

In the pod example, it is Nigel's responsibility to make sure that everything is taking place correctly before he moves forward to reveal his hand. While Ansel hasn't made a GRV with the pod example, Nigel still jumped ahead and gave away information that he didn't have to. If your opponent is attempting to offer the shortcut “resolve the effects of my spell before I show you I have them” it is in your best interest to reject the shortcut.

Edited Marc DeArmond (Dec. 23, 2014 01:44:16 AM)

I think that the bigger problem with my “Lying to a judge option” is that I am fishing for a lie, something that is not acceptable if there is not an underlying DQ able offense. Otherwise, I don't think that the “technically true” argument would stand : “Players must answer all questions asked of them by a judge completely and honestly, regardless of the type of information requested” as per the MTR. “My opponent is allowed to reveal his hand” is a misdirection, not an answer.

The information I was referring to in the second case was the action of putting a Brain Maggot ability on the stack, which would be public, if it was not about the future. Was there a definite answer to the “Vendillion Clique, write your hand, target myself” scenario?

Edited Florian Horn (Dec. 23, 2014 12:26:41 PM)

I guess I simply do not yet understand your explanation, uncle Scott.

It seems to me that any shortcut proposal must describe the resulting gamestate and can therefore be seen as “predicting a future gamestate”. If you state that in this particular situation Andreas is not proposing a shortcut, I guess you are correct, but I would like to understand how that follows from the documents.

In short, why is there a difference between “I play a restoration angel from my hand and target Brain Maggot with it's ETB trigger” (which is a valid shortcut to which the player will be held, as far as I am aware) and “I search my deck for a restoration angel and target Brain Maggot with it's ETB trigger” (which is not a valid shortcut, apparently)?

It all depends on how you formulate the “I play a restoration angel from my hand and target Brain Maggot with it's ETB trigger”

If you do that while revealing an Angel out of your hand you basicly say with the above: if the Angel is not countered I'm already short cutting to the point where the Angel his ETB is relevant. The moment the Angel is revealed it becomes public information as it technically is at the Stack.

Now the part where the Angel is fetched out of a deck due to Birthing Pod, the Angel is not verified yet. The searching is not considered choosing. (Warning: In Dutch we often say “choose a card from your library” vs. “search a card from your library, this suddenly hit me; so I hope this is not a case of ”lost in translation"). Searching for a card is even defined in the CR as a type of keyword action. The CR does not mention that there is a choice involved with searching:

701.15a To search for a card in a zone, look at all cards in that zone (even if it’s a hidden zone) and find a card that matches the given description.


So because there is no verification of an Angel when you start to activate your Birthing Pod; because we do not consider searching as a part of shortcut (so that we can uphold a player to it). We must conclude that a player at that time is talking about a possible future. A player can say whatever he likes and pleases (as long as it's civil off course).

Edit: punctuation and removed an example that made it too difficult

Edited Niki Lin (Dec. 23, 2014 01:36:43 PM)

Niki, no one is saying searching IS choosing or should be a choice. People are trying to look for philosophy, as I stated earlier, and are indicating this just so it might help us to correctly tackle this issue. By repeatedly stating it is not according to policy you are beating a dead horse, that is not what this discussion is about.

For the judges comparing this to a bluffing a future state where the other player scoops I would like to refer to my original post, the second one in this thread explaining why this is not the same.

All of this is irrelevant though, as Scott has already stated there is no penalty here and considering his level that is the current fficial answer we have.

That is not to say I am now convinced my point of view is wrong, I feel this could easily get added into shortcuts with minimal and clear text, making this a CPV. But that is not the case right now.

edit: Removed a half sentence that could be interpreted as me not respecting Scott, which wasn't my intention.

Edited Niels Viaene (Dec. 24, 2014 10:22:49 AM)

My confusion on this scenario is with the overly technical approach with a policy (and philosophy) that is generally guiding us away from a very technical and strict approach when it comes to the rules and playing a game of Magic. It seems that a lot of elements from various bits of the MTR are being combined in order to support this overly technical approach. Especially with characterizing one player as “perpetrating” something on the other player; largely this seems a grey area with both players goofing up a bit (the one forgetting what is in his library, the other jumping too far ahead).

I can see why people want to apply an infraction here, especially given the one player has gained a bit of information to which he is not entitled. But that seems a misuse of the infraction/penalty system we have in place. The situation sucks, but I think this is where we need to step in without relying on the MIPG, perhaps via education or with a less heavy hand.

Originally posted by Michel Degenhardt:

In short, why is there a difference between “I play a restoration angel from my hand and target Brain Maggot with it's ETB trigger” (which is a valid shortcut to which the player will be held, as far as I am aware) and “I search my deck for a restoration angel and target Brain Maggot with it's ETB trigger” (which is not a valid shortcut, apparently)?

My understanding, the fact one applies completely in public and only requires priority passes, the other has something happening in a private zone and requires you to find something in that zone. Simply one has actions that the opponent can verify they will happen legally before hand and the other has actions that we don't know can happen until they actually happen due to it being in a hidden zone

Originally posted by Michel Degenhardt:

It seems to me that any shortcut proposal must describe the resulting gamestate and can therefore be seen as “predicting a future gamestate”. If you state that in this particular situation Andreas is not proposing a shortcut, I guess you are correct, but I would like to understand how that follows from the documents.

A shortcut - whether proposed or one of those defined in the MTR - explains what actions or steps you're going to skip, in order to reach a point in the game state (usually saving time in the process).

What's happened here, however, is predicting what's going to happen at some future point, and the opponent actually decides to shortcut ahead to that point.

Maybe these examples will help illustrate the difference?
* Attack? –> shortcut past a few priority passes, right to Declare Attackers
* Attack for the win? –> yeah, the same shortcut is implied, but it's also predicting an outcome

* Done. –> shortcut past priority passes again, and most likely we'll end up in your Untap step, or maybe you've got something for my end-of-turn.
* Done, you lose (after milling your library down to zero cards) –> yep, the same shortcut, followed by yet another future game-state prediction.

Another way to put it: shortcuts are an agreement to skip unnecessary steps, to an agreed-upon future point; bluffs are usually a prediction of a future game-state (that might actually be impossible).

d:^D