Player A casts Aven Mindcensor.
Player B controls it, say via Vedalken Shackles, not important.

Player B cracks a fetchland, searches only the first four cards of his deck, and doesn't find a land.

a) Player B isn't saying anything.
b) Player B is saying “I can look only the first four cards…”
c) Player B is saying “Damned Mindcensor, I can look only the first four cards…”

In each of these cases, would you step in?
In each of these cases, player A has obligations?

Edited Francesco Scialpi (May 27, 2015 06:19:48 AM)

I don't see any issue here. Player B isn't understanding the cards in play. Player A isn't obligated to say anything unless B does something illegal (which hasn't happened). To me it's much like AP attacks with a creature with intimidate, and NAP says "damn, I can't block with my ". Say nothing, and move along.

Originally posted by Mark Mc Govern:

To me it's much like AP attacks with a creature with intimidate, and NAP says "damn, I can't block with my ". Say nothing, and move along.

And what if NAP says “damn, the attacking creature has intimidate and is black, my creatures are black, I cannot block”?

I still wouldn't say anything. Players aren't misrepresenting game rules by making inferred statements about their effects on a game state, IMO.

If they directly linked their statement to the definition of Intimidate, I might step in, but it would very much depend on the language used.

As long as A is not lying (he says: “B, you are allowed to search 4 cards”) or B break rules (fetch for wrong cards) I would Not do anything, too.
You have Not to find a land while searching, so no grv was committed.

But Player B isn't searching his library and failing to find something, but he searches only his top four cards. Searching the top four cards and searching the library are just different things (if they weren't, Aven Mindcensor's ability wouldn't be called a ‘replacement effect’), and they're easily distinguishable from each other just by looking at the player's actions.

So, please tell me, how is Player B not breaking the rules of the game here by failing to resolve the activated ability of his fetchland properly? The ability tells him to search his library, but he does not. Sounds like GRV to me.

So, if Player B searches only the top four cards, GPE-GRV for Player B and GPE-FtMGS for Player A if he allows this to happen would be my ruling.

Edited Jasper König (May 27, 2015 11:22:48 AM)

Originally posted by Jasper König:

So, please tell me, how is Player B not breaking the rules of the game here by failing to resolve the activated ability of his fetchland properly?

So if Player B finds a land in the top 4 cards do you give him a penalty for not searching the rest of his library? Since you're allowed to fail to find in this case there is no CPV or GRV that I would issue.

Originally posted by Jasper König:

But Player B isn't searching his library and failing to find something, but he searches only his top four cards. Searching the top four cards and searching the library are just different things (if they weren't, Aven Mindcensor's ability wouldn't be called a ‘replacement effect’), and they're easily distinguishable from each other just by looking at the player's actions.

So, please tell me, how is Player B not breaking the rules of the game here by failing to resolve the activated ability of his fetchland properly? The ability tells him to search his library, but he does not. Sounds like GRV to me.

So, if Player B searches only the top four cards, GPE-GRV for Player B and GPE-FtMGS for Player A if he allows this to happen would be my ruling.

I don't see how that's substantially different from a player who resolves Sleight of Hand, then cracks a fetchland, puts the bottom card of his library onto the battlefield, and shuffles. (Or does the same thing with Ponder or Brainstorm and the top card of the library.) The player is not obligated to look through their entire library to find a card meeting the conditions of the search.

Originally posted by Chris Vlastelica:

So if Player B finds a land in the top 4 cards do you give him a penalty for not searching the rest of his library?

Although I have to admit that this would look a little bit odd, yes, if I have no doubt that the player fails to resolve the ability properly, I have to issue a warning.

Originally posted by Chris Vlastelica:

Since you're allowed to fail to find in this case there is no CPV or GRV that I would issue.

You're allowed to fail to find while searching your library, but in this situation, that's just not what the player does, is it? The player is clearly only searching his top four cards. We can _see_ that he's not resolving the ability properly. How are we allowed to say that's legal? Searching the top four cards is not the same as searching the library. If I have no doubt that the former is what's happening, I can clearly say that a rule of the game is being broken. I have to step in there.

Edited Jasper König (May 27, 2015 11:46:43 AM)

I think people are confusing the statements of “illegal action” and “resolving not correctly.”

As for the rules, we care about the illegal actions. If they resolve something not correctly and it broke a rule then we interject. But as it was pointed out no rules have been broken. It is sub-optimal search, but legal.

Originally posted by Nick Rutkowski:

It is sub-optimal search, but legal.

Nick is correct; please, don't work so hard to find infractions and penalties for the players. Instead, direct that energy to improving the play experience.

How many of us would contact that player after the match, and explain how Aven Mindcensor really works? (Hopefully, the answer is “everyone who has a moment & doesn't forget first”!)

d:^D

Well, the initial question wasn't pointing at infractions and penalties, but rather at the question: “Should we step in?”

I feel like we should. If the game instructs a player to do something, and he doesn't, that line of play can't be legal. At least that's the assumption I was working under for a long time. Given the fact that we have a statement of an L5 judge supporting the opposing statement, I just accept that that is what's current policy and I will working accordingly. Apparently, not doing what the game tells you to do can still be legal. I have a logical/semantical problem with this, but never mind. I just wanted to let you know that I don't particularly like that philosophy, even though I'll work accordingly.

A short annotation: You were talking about improving the play experience. I suppose every player would happily accept the warning and just search his whole library and most probably find a card. ;) It's not like my ruling would've been exceedingly harsh or punitive.

Edited Jasper König (May 27, 2015 12:16:12 PM)

You should only be stepping in a Comp Rel match if you are issuing a penalty. If you are giving information to a player about to make a sub-optimal play that is strategic advise. DO NOT DO THAT!

Originally posted by Nick Rutkowski:

You should only be stepping in a Comp Rel match if you are issuing a penalty.

I know that… I just wanted to emphasize that I didn't set up my argumentation in the urge to punish player B, but rather in the urge to have the players stick to the rules. The argument itself is flawed (aka “you're trying to punish the player”), although it comes up quiet frequently, because the motivation for a statement says nothing about the correctness of the content.

Originally posted by Nick Rutkowski:

If you are giving information to a player about to make a sub-optimal play that is strategic advise. DO NOT DO THAT!

Well, that's what the whole discussion was about. Is it illegal, or is it just sub-optimal? I now know the official answer to this, and I'll judge accordingly. Everything's fine? ;)

Originally posted by Jasper König:

You're allowed to fail to find while searching your library, but in this situation, that's just not what the player does, is it? The player is clearly only searching his top four cards. We can _see_ that he's not resolving the ability properly. How are we allowed to say that's legal? Searching the top four cards is not the same as searching the library. If I have no doubt that the former is what's happening, I can clearly say that a rule of the game is being broken. I have to step in there.

What if a play who has cracked a fetch picks up their library to search it, spots a land that they want at the bottom of their library, and puts it into play then shuffles? They technically haven't physically searched all of the cards in their library, but I can't imagine giving them a penalty for not doing so.