The only issue I see here is, barring Rain Man, once they shuffle away it seems to me that it no longer meets the

Originally posted by Dan Collins:

“know the position or distribution of one or more cards in his or her deck”.

I mean, maybe I'm just erring on the side of people not being inherent cheaters but I just don't see it like that.

If I'm wrong - cool, I'll learn. But as is, I would just advise them to shuffle differently to ensure that there's no ‘funny business’.

Two problems I have here:

Even if we assume that once they shuffle away, they no longer could know
the position or distribution of any of their cards, there are problems
here. From the OP, we know that they are shuffling once towards
themselves, once away, and doing that sequence several times before
presenting. I think we can all agree that shuffling towards themselves is
not preferred behavior, and in fact is the root of our concern. Once the
player knows the position of his cards, his deck is no longer randomized,
undoing all of the randomization done up to that point.

Given that, would you be ok with a player looking through her deck, then
riffling once and presenting? I think we can all agree that would fall
under Insufficient Shuffling, right? Well, that's essentially what we're
looking at here.

My second issue is that, while I agree with everyone that the fix is very
simple and straightforward, I am confused why we are considering delivering
a Warning to be a Big Thing. A Warning is, simply put, a warning. We are
informing the player that their actions/behavior/etc. is not acceptable and
that they should correct it. We are also (or at least certainly we should
be) giving the player helpful guidance as to how to correct their behavior.
The Official Warning is simply there as an official tracking method to
ensure that, should this behavior continue to be an issue, we have a record
that this player has already been Warned and therefore stronger education
in the form of a Game Loss may be warranted. This Official Warning,
however, will only carry that concern through this tournament (although we
would certainly hope that this player would take our advice to heart and
change their shuffling going forward) except in rare circumstances.

My point is, let's not make a Warning out to be more of a concern than it
is by declining to give one when it is warranted. If the player is honest
and on the up-and-up, the Warning won't affect them in the slightest. If
they're not, then perhaps it will, but in that case I think we can agree
that's a good thing. The only person who is benefitting from a Warning not
being issued is the person who is committing the infraction unscrupulously.

Originally posted by Justin Miyashiro:

My point is, let's not make a Warning out to be more of a concern than it is by declining to give one when it is warranted. If the player is honest and on the up-and-up, the Warning won't affect them in the slightest. If they're not, then perhaps it will, but in that case I think we can agree that's a good thing.

This is a really important point that I'm always coming to terms with as a new judge. At first glance a warning feels like a very stern measure to simply inform someone that they made a mistake. But in the overall scope of a tournament, a warning is a very important measure to formally document that the player did something wrong. Imagine if you were at a big event like a GP and this individual was using his shuffling method to identify the location of cards in his deck. Simply giving a caution once and passing on could lead this individual to receiving 4 or 5 different cautions over the course of the event, and being able to look through his deck each time.

A warning at Comp REL doesn't say “you're a bad person” it says “you did something we can't allow, if it doesn't stop there will be serious consequences.” We give warnings for drawing 8 cards at the start of the game which is almost always more accidental and less potentially dangerous than this. You get a warning for forgetting to attack with “must attack” card. Warnings for not noticing your opponent's mistakes. There's warnings for accidentally dropping an opponent's card when you shuffle. A warning is not a big deal, we shouldn't make it one. A game loss is a big deal.

Before reading other responses:

This sounds like a TE - Insufficient Shuffling. While the player might only know the position of 1 or 2 cards in the deck, this is enough for it to be considered “not fully randomized”. Issue the player a warning, and instruct them to not look at their cards while shuffling. As part of this, we may need to help the player find a new way to shuffle without looking at their cards.

As an additional bit of investigation - riffle shuffling is associated with unsleeved cards - it's easier than mash shuffling in unsleeved cards, and it's difficult to riffle sleeved cards. Is the player playing without sleeves? I would caution them about the potential for marked cards in a competitive tournament, and suggest that they might want to move to sleeves + mash shuffling.


After reading other responses:

Everyone pretty much agrees on TE-IS. There's some debate over whether this ‘really’ merits a Warning. I believe it does. In general, judges should not deviate from the IPG, to maintain consistency and fairness for players. Also, while this particular example of Insufficient Shuffling might have limited potential for abuse (especially if the opponent correctly adds their additional randomization), there's still some potential. When there's potential for abuse, it's important to give out Warnings for tracking purposes, and the potential to upgrade to a Game Loss if we (or other judges) later discover that this is an ongoing pattern.

This one feels like a slam dunk as regards TE-IS, especially in that we are told that the bottom was shown to the opponent, and thus one player knows the position of at least one card. I felt like the earlier judges answered well so I refrained from my comments which generally would solely have mirrored their own. I only add my comments here in that I feel that the Warning is absolutely required, as not issuing the Warning may not firmly remind the player to never do this again. Any given opponent could be tempted into quietly responding to this undue knowledge by moving a small number of cards from the bottom of the deck onto the top - or perhaps they already normally do that - and then we would be unfortunately dealing with a situation at the very least bordering on cheating.

As such, when presented with this scenario I would step in, give the player a TE-IS Warning and as a fix have them reshuffle in such a fashion that the bottom of the deck is not visible to either player at any time.

This is clearly TE-IS, and should absolutely recieve a Warning.

There are 2 separate issues with the shuffling technique here:

• Riffling only
  
• Being able to look at the cards

Both of those carry large potential for abuse.

One of the purposes of Warnings is so that players/infractions can be tracked, and there is the possibility here that we are wrong in our belief that the player is not cheating.

• In the 99.9% of cases where the player is innocently using a bad shuffling technique, then the Warning does no harm and perhaps helps to reinforce the request to shuffle better.
  
• In the 0.1% of cases where the player is cheating, giving the Warning increases the chance his behaviour will be caught in the future.

It's not bad customer service to be giving a Warning; with a clear explanation of what the problem is and some advice on shuffling technique, this can easily be a positive interaction from the players point of view. You've been friendly and helpful, given them some useful advice, and perhaps saved them from getting into trouble down the line.

Edited James Winward-Stuart (July 8, 2014 11:42:20 AM)

Originally posted by James Winward-Stuart:

This is clearly TE-IS, and should absolutely recieve a Warning.

There are 2 separate issues with the shuffling technique here:

• Riffling only
  
• Being able to look at the cards

Both of those carry large potential for abuse.

There is nothing that makes Riffling only against the rules, while it is stated they should use multiple methods, the only one that they say alone is insufficient is pile shuffling. It is not uncommon for most players to simple do a lot of mash shuffling, or riffle shuffling. So I wouldn't say using only riffle carries a huge potential for abuse.

Those besides that I agree with everything you say

I would explain to the player that what he is doing constitutes insufficient shuffling, explain how, and give the appropriate infraction; in this case, TE-Insufficient Shuffling: Warning.

Edited William Blanks (July 8, 2014 07:53:31 PM)

Thank you everyone for your discussions and input on this scenario!

By shuffling his own deck with the cards facing himself, even with one shuffle afterwards away, it is possible for the player to know the position of cards in his deck when it should be completely randomized. From the IPG: “A deck is not shuffled if the judge believes a player could know the position or distribution of one or more cards in his or her deck.” The player has committed Insufficient Shuffling and should be given a Warning as well as a chat about proper ways to shuffle.

Various shuffling techniques were discussed; it's important to note that players may - probably should! - use a variety of techniques, as long as the end result is a random, unknown ordering of the cards in their deck. Pile shuffles, riffles, mash/insert, etc. - these are all fine, even if some seem less effective by themselves. It's also legal to shuffle your own deck with the cards facing you, or to mana-weave, etc., as long as you subsequently perform adequate randomization of the deck.

It also came up in the discussions this week that some judges would simply talk to the player and verbally caution them instead of giving them a Warning. It is important for organized play to give a consistent experience to players around the world when they are dealing with judges. The Infraction Procedure Guide is in place to be a guide and should be followed except under conditions outlined in the IPG for deviating from the written policy. If a player commits an infraction, then it is appropriate to give the player the penalty prescribed for that infraction and enter it into the tournament so it can be properly tracked.

Thanks again everybody and stay tuned for the next Knowledge Pool Scenario tomorrow!