I would recommend planning any contingency around the notion that these boosters, and the cards in them, are lost; while you could certainly ask them to return the materials, judges are in no position to compel someone to hand over something on their person, and we should never be taking possession by force.

The TO could, in theory, involve law enforcement for recovery, but I'd strongly rethink that position if the $15 of cardboard seems to be worth potentially putting someone in mortal danger by sending police after them.

Then the other question that needs to be asked is “Did the thief commit Theft, with the meaning of the law ?”. I mean, at what point does he cease to be the rightful owner of the set of 15 cards he opens ? Is it when he drafts one ? Or maybe when he passes the 14 (or 13 in our case) remaining card to his left ? Or maybe does he never ceases to be the rightful owner of the cards, and then can walk away with nothing more than a DQ and probably a ban from the Shop Owner ?

My naive impression on this is that, while you are playing the event, you are using the boosters as tournament material, which are the property of the shop, tournament organizer, or whatever, and when you drop from the tournament, or leaves it in any other way, then you become the (legal) owner of the cards you rightfully have at that time. So with my interpretation, at the time you're being DQed, you do not rightfully have the card you've just stolen, it belongs to the person on your left, because if you had not committed theft, the card would be in the set he received. Therefore, if, for instance, the angry player to the left wants it back, and threatens the thief with legal action, he's in his right. Isn't he ?

I know I'm going quite far, but I think that's the whole point for deciding to whom should the stolen card go. Who legally owns it ? Does its ownership change over the course of drafting ? Even if I realized it's not exactly a Judge problem, if the situation presents itself, I'd be glad to be capable of giving advice to a confused TO.

Originally posted by Maxime Eychenne:

Then the other question that needs to be asked is “Did the thief commit Theft, with the meaning of the law ?”.

This is probably a better question for your local lawyer. Despite the name, Judges aren't going to be able to provide good answers about the law, especially not in your locality.

Originally posted by Maxime Eychenne:

My naive impression on this is that, while you are playing the event, you are using the boosters as tournament material, which are the property of the shop, tournament organizer, or whatever, and when you drop from the tournament, or leaves it in any other way, then you become the (legal) owner of the cards you rightfully have at that time. So with my interpretation, at the time you're being DQed, you do not rightfully have the card you've just stolen, it belongs to the person on your left, because if you had not committed theft, the card would be in the set he received.

I agree with this. Also, I remember that any player during a draft can drop at any moment. He will get the cards he drafted, the cards from which he has to take his next peek and all unopened boosters.

So if a player open an expensive rare + expensive foil, he could drop taking the whole pack (with both rares) and the other two boosters.
If he doesn't, I belive he's agreeing to give one of the bomb rares to the left player.

Edited Giovanni Zaninelli (Feb. 12, 2019 10:25:26 AM)

There's two considerations that I see that would inform my approach (please note that I'm using the word “thief” as a designator, not a value judgement):
1) DQs are automatically investigated by the PIC, and may involve additional action. If the thief insists on not giving back the taken card, then I think that including that fact in your DQ report is pertinent. And while I don't have any specific knowledge of how the PIC makes decisions about further action, I suspect that a player failing to show remorse for something that is obviously not allowed is exactly the sort of situation in which further action might be warranted. I also think a store ban might be warranted even if the PIC elects not to take further action, since the player has shown a willingness to ruin everyone else's draft by stealing cards.

2) On the subject of ruining everyone else's draft, I think that drawing the thief's attention to the fact that the player receiving the 13-card pack is in a uniquely disadvantaged position within the draft is a good idea. Guilt can be a powerful motivator, and while it isn't a guarantee that the thief will do “the right thing” by returning the stolen card, I think we should try to give them that opportunity. This is doubly so since the Magic community tends to be very unforgiving of players “scumming” other players, so the risk of social ostracization (and the related opportunity to “buy back” some of that social capital) can do a lot of work for you in getting a beneficial outcome.

So, while walking through the DQ process, I would try to make it clear that the thief's choice is not just between keeping the expensive card or not, but between keeping the expensive card, ruining this other player's draft, and potentially not being able to play Magic for the foreseeable future, or not. I think the kinds of players who are most likely to care about card value and thus commit this infraction are the kinds of players who most value their ability to keep playing Magic in sanctioned events.

Alternatively, if the player indicates that they would have wanted to drop during pack 1 and didn't know how to do that (or if they could), I would still issue the DQ but would suggest (to the players) swapping the 14-card pack they have with the 13-card pack they passed. This seems like the most efficient way to restore some integrity to the draft.

Edited Andrew Keeler (Feb. 13, 2019 04:45:27 PM)