Hi everyone! :D

during a pPTQ, Alex casts (in his first main phase) Dig Trought Time, resolving it correctly.
After putting 5 cards on the bottom of his library, he puts his deck back in its spot…
and Nico (the opponent) cuts it.

JUUUDGE!

No cheating or something like that, Nico was just lost in thoughts.

Well, how do you handle this? Infraction? Penalty? Fix?

Jacopo :D

Edited Jacopo Strati (Feb. 24, 2015 06:24:42 PM)

Hi there Jacopo,

I think that I would issue a Game play Error - Game Rule Violation, as essentially the player has taken a game action that is not appropriate in this situation, as you've mentioned, due to their lack of focus. I wouldn't be too concerned apart from that, but would ask them to be more careful in future, and not “autopilot” through the motions. I would also explain to them that I understand totally how it could happen. The potentional for abuse here is low.

As far as a fix is concerned, I would lean towards shuffling the library. In an ideal world the the cut would be simple, and easy to reverse, but since that is unlikely to be the case, I think shuffling may have to be it.

Matt

This is almost certainly a Game Rules Violation for Nico. They get a Warning. I might be issuing a FTMGS depending on what transpired before Alex called a judge, but probably not as it's very easy to perform a cut motion quickly before they would be able to stop it.

As to a fix, there is none. We can't return the library to its proper state, and I feel shuffling it is likely more damaging than leaving it alone (as shuffling can cause one of the 5 cards on the bottom to end up at the top, vs the “middle” area that they now occupy.) The shuffle isn't really supported by policy, either, since we're talking about GRVs and not LEC.

If it was single cut, we could ask Alex if he remember order of that 5 cards, if so, we could search for them and reverse that cut.

You can't ask Alex for the cards as they were not revealed to Nico. Alex could name any 5 cards he doesn't want to draw. I think shuffling the deck is the best fix. GRV for N, no penalty for A.

Originally posted by Bartłomiej Wieszok:

If it was single cut, we could ask Alex if he remember order of that 5 cards, if so, we could search for them and reverse that cut.

That's a fair idea, and it works should AP remember which cards he put on the bottom and in which order, more helpful if they can identify where the cut is. (It would be even more helpful if it is visually obvious where the cut should be).

But let's take the more helpful scenario, that being that the opponent cuts, the Dig player doesn't remember what he put on bottom, and where the cut occurred isn't obvious. Nico has committed a GRV by shuffling (even though he had only cut) a deck when he should not have. As per the IPG Remedy for GRV's, our options are to either backup the cut/shuffle or leave the game as is.

With no information to go off of, a backup seems trivial. Taken from the IPG 1.4: “backups are regarded as a solution of last resort, only applied in situations where leaving the game in the current state is a substantially worse solution.” With this in mind, are we making the game any better by performing further randomization in this case? I believe not, so I would leave the game state as is, strongly reminding Nico to be more careful, and reminding Alex to also do his best to prevent these kinds of errors whenever possible.

GPE-GRV for Nico.
I don't see any fix supported in the IPG.
I don't like it but I would leave the library as it is.
I would not issue a penalty to Alex unless he asked his opponent to cut his deck or acknowledged the cut before it happened.

So to add some fuel to this fire:

So for those who suggest shuffling the deck, what in the IPG supports your position, especially if you are going to assess a Game Play Error - Game Rule Violation to the non-active player Nico?

I also see mention of assessing Failure to Maintain the Game State, how does that infraction apply in this situation? If this infraction applies what are my responsibilities and how can I as a player carry out those responsibilities such that I avoid committing this infraction in the future? Essentially what actions would indicate that I did try to maintain the game state?

Originally posted by Nicola DiPasquale:

So for those who suggest shuffling the deck, what in the IPG supports your position, especially if you are going to assess a Game Play Error - Game Rule Violation to the non-active player Nico?

For argument's sake, in 1.4 of the IPG for backups, one of the actions stated is that “a shuffle is reversed by shuffling again.” Assume that we agree that this is a GRV and we are backing up. Is this or is this not supported by this portion of the IPG?

Originally posted by Huw Morris:

Alex could name any 5 cards he doesn't want to draw.

While it's still possible, I find it very unlikely that Alex could name 5 cards in exact order in his deck, that wasn't part of DTT.

Edited Bartłomiej Wieszok (Feb. 25, 2015 01:33:04 AM)

Originally posted by Bartłomiej Wieszok:

Huw Morris
Alex could name any 5 cards he doesn't want to draw.

While it's still possible, I find it very unlikely that Alex could name 5 cards in exact order in his deck, that wasn't part of DTT.

Very much so this. I would have to receive a very firm, certain answer from this player in order to consider this path. Otherwise, I would go down the more likely road of leaving the game where it is (with the relevant penalty and reminders).

Let's not open the door and give players the opportunity to try to cheat,
even if we don't think they'll do it successfully.

KEvin

Shuffle the deck. If Alex knows one card in the pile that's unique, was on the top of the pile, and draws it, he now knows the rest. If he can name the 5 cards and I find those 5 in a row, I'll pull them and shuffle the whole deck. Otherwise a shuffle is less disruptive I believe than giving him a potential knowledge of a streak of his deck.

I feel that leaving the deck alone is the best action. If the player
offers that he knows the exact order of the 5 cards then I'll check if
that order exists and reverse the cut.

There does exist a reasonable chance that the deck visibly shows where
the cut was made and I'd be happy to reverse the cut in that situation
as well.


On Wed, Feb 25, 2015 at 8:30 AM, Olivier Jansen
<forum-16448-0df5@apps.magicjudges.org> wrote:
> Shuffle the deck. If Alex knows one card in the pile that's unique, was on
> the top of the pile, and draws it, he now knows the rest. If he can name the
> 5 cards and I find those 5 in a row, I'll pull them and shuffle the whole
> deck. Otherwise a shuffle is less disruptive I believe than giving him a
> potential knowledge of a streak of his deck.
>
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–
Gareth Pye
Level 2 MTG Judge, Melbourne, Australia
“Dear God, I would like to file a bug report”

I'm fundamentally against using any fix that involves asking for hidden information from AP which NAP is unable to verify. It's inappropriate to for a judge to simply trust AP's word - and to expect NAP to trust it as well. I think this idea is exemplified strongly by the fact that we are instructed to upgrade the penalty for GRVs where the opponent can't verify the legality of the error. It's just too damaging to the integrity of a game to assume that AP will give a correct answer. So I'm absolutely not going to just ask AP what the 5 cards were.

As for “do we shuffle or not?” - it's not supported by the IPG, so based on that alone I don't really want to shuffle.

It's a weird case, so it's worth at least thinking about it in terms which aren't addressed in the IPG…

If the game had continued without error, we can reasonably say that the player was “not supposed to draw” the cards which went to the bottom. If those cards are left together in the middle(ish) of the library, then the game continues in a way which means the player isn't going to draw those cards, and is still drawing from a portion of the library which represents the remaining randomised cards - this is fundamentally the same as before the error. Conversely, if we shuffle, there's a reasonable chance that the player will draw at least one of the cards they're “not supposed to draw” in the next few turns of the game. Using that (admittedly imperfect) logic it seems that not shuffling represents a less corrupted gamestate than shuffling (unless the game lasts for a large number of turns after the error - if the game goes very long, with no more natural shuffles, the player will draw all 5 cards in order, which is potentially very problematic).
TL;DR - don't shuffle, hope the game doesn't go on long enough without shuffles for the player to draw into those 5 cards. This means AP is still drawing from “random library minus 5 specific cards”