Welcome to a fresh, pine-scented week of the Knowledge Pool. This week we have a Bronze scenario, which means it is aimed judge candidates and newer L1s. If that doesn't describe you, we would like you to wait until Thursday to add your thoughts.

Here's the blog post: http://blogs.magicjudges.org/knowledgepool/?p=982

Arthur and Neil are playing in a Modern GPT. At the end of Arthur's turn, Neil taps out to cast Deceiver Exarch. Arthur responds with Cancel. Neil responds with Pact of Negation. Arthur thinks for a moment, then casts Mana Leak.

Neil pauses, says “Ah, nuts…” then puts his spells in his graveyard. Arthur does the same.

Neil untaps and draws for his turn.

Arthur says, “You didn't pay for Pact.”
Neil replies, “You Leaked it.”
“No, I Leaked the Exarch.”
"Judge!”

What do you do?

Unfortunately for Arthur, he didn't target the Exarch with Mana Leak. He targeted the Pact of Negation.

“A player who casts a spell or activates an ability that targets an object on the stack is assumed to
target the legal target closest to the top of the stack unless the player specifies otherwise. ” MTR 4.2

Because Pact of Negation was the top item on the stack and no target was declared it was countered. Neil does not lose the game. Advise Arthur that if he wants to target something further back in the stack, he needs to specifically declare the target of his spell or ability.

No infraction, no penalties.

I completely agree with Marc; however, I'd definitely ask Arthur (and then, of course, for consistensy, also Neil) one simple question: “Why do you think that a target of Mana Leak was the one you claim it was?”. For example, there's always a slight possibility that Arthur pointed with his card at the Pact, and Neil failed to pay some attention to that.

However, my primary reason here would be a bit different: Arthur's claims sound a bit strange. He either doesn't know how shortcuts work (and, as shortcuts themselves sound quite logical to me, that means that, also, his logic is a bit twisted), or he just tried to cheat, trying to force his opponent to lose current game due to Pact's trigger (although he knew about how that shortcut actually works).

Although it's highly unlikely that I'd DQ Arthur right away, I think that asking some questions won't hurt.

I agree with Mark's assessment as well. The official shortcut clearly states that a counterspell targets the object closest to the top of the stack. Intentions which are not clearly spoken aloud do not come into consideration.

Alex, I disagree with your claim that most players know the shortcuts. The majority of players I have come into contact with don't even know the official shortcuts exist. The shortcuts were created in order to avoid having issues arise from players not executing a technically perfect game. In other words, they were made because that's how players played anyway. Yes, they are logical in most cases, but that doesn't mean players automatically know that official shortcuts exist.

As for their being logical, this shortcut in particular is a bit iffy in my opinion. It must exist in order to have a way to judge consistently on this type of situation; however, the player could argue that the logical target of his Mana Leak is the Deceiver Exarch as that is the spell that truly matters.

Honest question: Why are you guys always trying to DQ players in the KP scenarios?

Originally posted by Julien de Graat:

Honest question: Why are you guys always trying to DQ players in the KP scenarios?

I don't think folks are really trying to DQ. It's just really easy to accidentally overanalyze a situation when staring at the screen and forget to focus on the scenario as stated (I know I've done this on several occasions). “What if”s come easily, and often lead to Dairy Queen.

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Back to the scenario: It says he cast Mana Leak. It didn't say he announced a target, so we use that as the basis for our response.

It looks to me like Marc DeArmond got it right off the bat. You explain how the tournament shortcut works, and that he actually leaked the Pact. I don't think this would take long enough to necessitate a time extension, but it wouldn't hurt to give them a minute.

I would definitely ask Arthur some questions, starting with “How did you denote which spell Mana Leak targetted?”
If he didn't (which looks like the situation), I'd ask him “How did you announce Mana Leak without a target?”

If he shows knowledge of MTR 4,2, then he knows it targetted the Pact and he is in trouble.
If he does not show knowledge of the shortcut, then he is intentionally being vague in his declaration of Mana Leak to gain a benefit which is imo approaching trouble pending additional questions.

-mf

Another hole in one this week, this time by Marc DeArmond.

As we see under the MTR 4.2 Tournament Shorcuts, “A player who casts a spell or activates an ability that targets an object on the stack is assumed to target the legal target closest to the top of the stack unless the player specifies otherwise.”

As Magic players, we all know it is clearly the tactically correct choice to counter the original spell, rather than counter the counter. And this is doubly true when it's a counter with a big downside like Pact of Negation. So, while we should probably ask Arthur a couple questions to make sure nothing fishy is going on, it is very likely that he simply assumed that it was so obvious he would make the overtly correct play that he didn't need to spell it out for Neil.

However, as judges we do not assume that players are making tactically correct choices. We assume they are adhering to established shortcuts. And it is exactly to clear up this sort of ambiguity within a counter war that this particular shortcut exists. So Mana Leak counters Pact of Negation, there is no infraction, and Arthur learns a valuable lesson about stating the obvious.

Thanks to everyone for participating, and we'll be back soon with another scenario for your continuing judicial edification.

EDIT: Player names had been accidentally reversed in original solution.

Edited Joshua Feingold (Jan. 29, 2014 12:18:09 PM)