Hello all,

A situation arose yesterday in a PTQ I was head judging which I think is worthy of further discussion.

Player Andy lost game one of his match, and then after sideboarding and presenting for game two, his match was selected for a mid-round deck check. As a result of the deck check, his opponent received a game loss penalty. When Andy asked whether he was permitted to re-sideboard before game three, his request was denied by a floor judge, citing MTR 2.8:

(…) Players may not sideboard after a deck check, though they may continue to mulligan if they had not
finished the process.

Andy did not appeal, but approached me after the match to confirm that this was indeed the correct rule. He was concerned because, based on the particular circumstances of his match, his sideboarding strategy would have been materially affected by the fact that he was now on the draw as a result of his opponent's penalty, whereas he had sideboarded with the expectation that he would have been on the play. After some reflection, I was inclined to agree with him, and promised I would bring it up here with a view to proposing a rule change, such that players may re-sideboard in the case that a deck check results in a penalty which alters which player has choice of play-or-draw.

My fundamental reasoning is that a player should not ordinarily be put in a worse situation as a result of a penalty assigned to an opponent than he would have been in if no infraction occurred. Consider that if his opponent had received no penalty and Andy had won his second game, he would have been entitled to re-sideboard for game three based on his virtually certain knowledge that he would be on the draw. (Although a point could be made here that the choosing player makes the choice to play or draw only after sideboarding is completed, I don't think it is particularly relevant, as the vast majority of players choose to play, and in any case the strategic evaluation of which option his opponent is likely to pick should be left to the player when sideboarding).

Any thoughts or comments would be appreciated.

I'm guessing that this may be worded imprecisely or it is being read that
way. Players are not allowed to resideboard because they have already
presented for the game, and cannot sideboard after that point, regardless
of a deckcheck. They shouldn't get the benefit of additional chances to
sideboard before that game.However, if there is a Game Loss applied, then
that game is over and a new one will begin. In that situation, players may
sideboard before presenting for that game.

What Shawn says, and for precisely the reason cited by your “Andy”.

d:^D

Thanks for the quick response! Would it then be worthwhile to consider a minor update to the wording of MTR 2.8 to clarify this?

I am not sure that it is necessary. After the gl given to a player, the procedure is the same as any new game of magic, including sideboarding. The quote from the mtr if read carefully is clear enough that it is about the game that has started before the deckcheck and continuing afterwards. I think that all the necessary information is already available in the IPG, infraction description section.


T_O

Originally posted by Théo CHENG:

I am not sure that it is necessary. After the gl given to a player, the procedure is the same as any new game of magic, including sideboarding. The quote from the mtr if read carefully is clear enough that it is about the game that has started before the deckcheck and continuing afterwards. I think that all the necessary information is already available in the IPG, infraction description section.

T_O

It may not be necessary but it is far from obvious. “Players may not sideboard after a deck check” is a pretty straightforward sentence and it is not easy to come to the conclusion that it is overruled by the fact that penalty ends the game.

Apologies for necro'ing the thread, but my question seems directly relevant.

The MTR 2.8 line “Players may not sideboard after a deck check, though they may continue to mulligan if they had not
finished the process.” appears to have been taken out in the last iteration of the MTR, when that section was updated to disallow deck checks after drawing starting hands.

I can't seem to find anything similar in either the MTR or IPG. Was this an accidental deletion, a change in the rules, or is there something else I'm missing that implies no sideboarding after deck checks?

Quotes from documents or ‘O’ answer strongly preferred. =)

That line implied that, if we did a deck check at the end of game one, you wouldn't be allowed to sideboard for game two. That's not at all what is meant, so we pulled it.

It's not a question of sideboarding in connection with deck checks; there's no direct correlation there. Once you present your deck, you are committing to that as your deck for that game - either no sideboard (game 1), or sideboard choices completed (games 2+).

d:^D