Hello eveyone,

we have a discussion about outside assistance philosofy and whether it applies in the following situation:

Competitive REL.

Player A: “Juuuudge!!!!”

Judge: “May I help you..?”

(The player points at his only card in hand, a basic land)

Player A: “So, if my opponent tries to go off with splinter twin, this deals with that and he can't do anything, right?”
“Ye ok, I figured it out, nevermind, thankyou!”

Judge: “?!?!?!?” <Judge walks away confused>



So this player is clearly using the judge to try and bluff his opponent. A similar situation happened in a tournament recently and that spawned the question of whether this Should be considered outside assitance.

Thoughts?

How could this even potentially be Outside Assistance?! When you read the definition of that infraction, you'll see it has nothing to do with this scenario.

It is strange, it is a bluff, but I'm fine with this, as the player never made you a real part of his bluff, he didn't force you to play an active role here. It can easily becopme awkward when the judge doesn't know how to respond properly and is tempted a head-nod or any kind of respons… so I would discourage this behaviour.

My main concern here is with wasting the judge's time. In a busy tournament, with many judgecalls, having to spend the time to go to a judgecall that is actually a bluff in diguise would probably lead to me having a lengthy chat with the player in question at a later time.

This is not something I would necessarily penalize for, but is something I
would have a chat with the player about. This can be disruptive to the
tournament and I do not want for the player to think this is ok behavior to
continue with in the future.

Well… looking at IPG we can find out this little gem:

A player has two lands in his hand, no options available to significantly affect the game, and spends excessive time “thinking” about what to do to eat up time on the clock

It's example for UC-Stalling. Question is, are we considering asking that question with land in hand as a way to eat up time on the clock. For sure it will take us a while to get to that table, especially if we arrive from other side and he ask us to go to his side (since it need to look like card question).
On the other hand, it feel for me like forging infraction for some unwanted behaviour.
I will be glad for others thoughts on that.

I guess you could answer “no” to his original question, if he's going to ask questions so his opponent can hear them - you can answer them so they can hear them to.

That would be one way to discourage the behaviour.

Nullo poena sine lege (no punishment without a “written” rule). And i also think that it does not fit the definition of outside assistance. If it did it should also apply to the judge who offered the assistance and that can't be right.

If at all, I think the only infraction that could be applied is. Unsporting Conduct - Minor.
Definition:
A player takes action that is disruptive to the tournament or its participants. It may affect the comfort level of
those around the individual, but determining whether this is the case is not required.

The action of calling a judge for no reason is disruptive to the tournament. It does not belong to the duties of a judge to be utilized in a bluff. While bluffing is allowed and an essential part of the game using anything else but the own body language or “talk” is not OK.

In my opinon it also does not matter if the opponent falls for it or calls it. The pure fact that he calls a judge apparently for a rule question but only has a basic land on his hand is a misuse of Tournament Personel and therefore disruptive.

However it is very difficult to punish the behaviour. If the judge does that right away he also “reveals” information. But then again it is against the person commiting the infraction.

It is pretty obvious that someone used a loophole in the IPG - that by itself is not “punishable”. So either the gap is closed by new rules or as a subcase of Unsporting Conduct (for example).

Honestly, basically what George said. I'd probably do a “Hey let me answer
that over here” and then tell him not to keep doing this, mostly because
it's a waste of the judge's time. There's no real infraction. I disagree
with Stalling because he's not doing this with the express purpose of
running down the clock, he's just trying to bluff.

Originally posted by Cj Shrader:

I'd probably do a “Hey let me answer
that over here” and then tell him not to keep doing this, mostly because
it's a waste of the judge's time

I don't think so. Calling the player aside this way maybe look like you're taking his/her side, trying to help or whatever. I think the correct way to carry this is saying something like: “As you should know, I can't give you advices on results of your actions or your opponent's actions during the game”. To me there's no real infraction, maybe UC-M, bluff is just part of the strategy, since you don't activelly participate on, it's ok.

Edited Gregory Farias (June 15, 2015 05:37:05 PM)

I don't think there is an infraction here, but - like many of the other judges here - I'd probably have a quick chat with the player after the conclusion of their game.

I like Denis Leber's consideration of whether or not his is USC-Minor. The first time it happens, I don't think I'd rule that it is. If, despite a conversation with the player, this happened again, I would consider USC-Minor more strongly.

It's true that this sort of bluff is technically “disruptive”, so we don't want to encourage it, but ultimately it's pretty harmless as far as “disruptive” behaviors go. Sure, we're going to end up watching this match to make sure nothing fishy is going on, and then spend a moment talking to the player in question - but these are both things we are, ultimately, on the floor to do (in one form or another).

I would mostly caution the player that some judges might take a much more dim view of these sorts of antics, and therefore you probably should avoid it. If I'm in a less generous mood myself, and/or the player just looked like a prankster, I might simply tell them not to do that again.

As an aside - If a player calls you over like this, don't worry about “leaking” information about their bluff if you do feel the need to penalize this behavior. It isn't you that's actually doing the “leaking”, it's the player - by making a loud verbal bluff that involves an outside party. No part of being a judge requires us to play along with that, or provide a poker face for players when they try to cast us as their accomplices in these bluffs.

First of all: the situation, as described, is NOT stalling. The player doesn't take advantage of the time limit.

As an aside - If a player calls you over like this, don't worry about “leaking” information about their bluff if you do feel the need to penalize this behavior.

This is absolutely wrong. Judges' range of penalty doesn't include leaking information. If you believe that he's committing USC-minor (which I don't, but this can be discuss), give him a Warning after the game.
Leaking information to the opponent would count as outside assistance from a judge (and that's bad).

I don't see the issue here. If anything, I think it would show that the players are comfortable enough with judges to make us a “natural” part of the event. And honestly, how often are you so busy that you don't have the time to answer a judge call? I'm always super happy to recieve a judge call (that isn't “Here's my result slip.”) and I wouldn't want to discourage players from calling me.

Mitja,

Imagine then that you're working a 100 player event with 3 judges… 50
players think this is ok to do. How many calls per round do you think you
might get that are not actually calls? Could that be disruptive to the
event?

Having it happen once from a player isn't something I'm going to get up in
arms about and give USC - Minor. But because of how easy it would be for it
to become disruptive if players learned that this was acceptable behavior
and it spread, it is something I want to discourage in the future. Thus why
I, and others, have advocated that a quick chat about how this is
unacceptable behavior is appropriate.

How many calls am I expecting? Zero to one per round, I guess, if we're looking at examples of what has been described here. But otherwise, I guess it depends on how you define an “actual call”.

What if the player actually had a Combust in hand? Or what if they had a French Go for the Throat? Or a Japanese Counterbalance that they mistook for a Judge promo Force of Will? Or a Maze of Ith and they just have no idea about how the game works? We soon enter the land where a judge decides what an acceptable/actual judge call actually entails.

Personal anecdote: during Lorwyn block constructed, I was playing a Kithkin mirror and my opponent had me dead on board. So I called a judge and asked (loudly): “I can let damage go on the stack and then cast something to prevent it, right?” The judge said: “Yes, of course.” I smiled and told my opponent that, yes, he can procede to combat. He decided to play around my bad bluff, fearing Pollen Lullaby (which I didn't have in my deck, let alone hand), and I had another turn to win the game.
Now: was my judge call unacceptable? Would it be acceptable if I had had the Lullaby in my hand? Would it be acceptable if I hadn't known how the rule works?

Edit for minor correction

Edited Mitja Bosnic (June 15, 2015 09:13:05 PM)

Thanks for the correction, Alexis! Much appreciated :)