Greetings!

I would like to present new constructed Deck Check technique of my own.
It is inspired by Australian Deck Check Technique in Limited. The whole idea is based on not changing order of cards in players library.

We (Polish judges) already tested it at some local events (PPTQs and WMCQs). Big thanks to Adam Kolipiński for spreading this method to other judges in Europe - resulting in some great feedback.

I am already convinced that method works and is a bit faster than classic one. I would like you to try it and share your feedback too. I plan to write an article covering questions from feedback and some general advices not included in the video.

https://youtu.be/IgP4kyEjte4

I hope you will enjoy the video (I'm sorry for my english).
If you have any questions just ask here or PM me.

Wow! I think it's fantastic. I've never known how actually make a good deck check. I'll tray this method at home before the GPT I'll judge in a few weeks :D

Thanks for sharing. I'll let you know when practice ;)

Regards, Fran.

This is a really neat idea. I'll give it a try sometime.
What do you do for sideboarded games? My first thought is to mark the
sideboard cards as well in that case, so that you can check off all 75 the
same way as the main deck for game 1.
My primary concern here is that we might miss some forms of marked cards
that really only become apparent when the deck is sorted out, e.g. when a
player sleeves a deck in fresh sleeves without shuffling and so all their
lands or spells are in sleeves that are very slightly longer. Those cases
are rare, though.
One thing that's worth pointing out is that you can sort out the sideboard
as normal because it doesn't have an order we're trying to maintain here.
This technique could probably also be used for limited by judges who have
trouble with the Australian technique.

Excellent, I'll try tomorrow at my GPT.
I love the video as an exemple. :)

Looks nice and streamlined. I'll file that away in the memory! Thank you.

I watched this video this morning, and decided to give it a try at a PPTQ I am running today. I also had an L1 do it from basic instructions without watching the video. We were both able to complete a check in this manner in 4-5 minutes.

My main concern with this (which I also had when the “Australian Method” for limited was gaining attention) is that the time extension this method results in, while shorter, is not actually supported by policy (currently). The MTR does define the time extension for a deck check as being the time it took to complete the check, plus 3 minutes.

Overall though, this method of checking a deck compared to the manual sort and count I was previously doing is faster, so I'll certainly be keeping it in mind for future events. Perhaps we will see some kind of policy change that takes into account if the order of a deck was modified by a judge when it comes to time extensions.

Adam Hubble
L2, SE-USA (MS)
Judge Wiki Manager

Sent from my iPad

Charlotte, the players are going to be playing with a shuffled deck, so if it takes being sorted for the markings to stand out, are we really all that worried about it? You're already going through the deck… so you likely will notice an unrippled card after a bunch of rippled ones.

For example, either it's lesser used sleeves and nobody notices because they're not looking for it. Or they player is looking at the deck in a weird way and you might be investigating something else very shortly.

Though maybe when searching for card names you look through the sideboard cards first, and turn the card sideways. Then when you're done focusing on quick counting, you can glance through them to see if they stand out in a way that's likely to be visible.

I really like this method. I will be head judging and IQ next week so I'll definitely be giving this a try.

Wielkie dzięki Jarku za ten innowacyjny sposób, wypróbuję na PPTQ.

gratuluję innowacyjności

2015-09-13 19:13 GMT+02:00 Rich DiLeo <forum-21224-9e29@apps.magicjudges.org

Originally posted by Adam Hubble:

The MTR does define the time extension for a deck check as being the time it took to complete the check, plus 3 minutes.

Since the philosophy behind that three minutes is to give them time to shuffle, I am fine with not adding those 3 minutes when shuffling isn't necessary. (And I'll suggest a slight enhancement of that language in the MTR, so “rules lawyers” can't argue for their extension.)

I have some … concerns? … that seems like too strong a word, but:

• Players are accustomed to shuffling after a deck check; not only do we have to be very clear about the difference, but we'll get objections (change is hard, m'kay?);
  
• In Eternal formats, it's becoming more common for players to observe the deck check - to keep a very close eye on their valuable cards! - so we will need to have them shuffle after they see the order of their deck. :p
  
• If this is implemented at an event with coverage, be sure to discuss this with coverage ahead of time; they also won't be used to this, and may insist you only mark up photocopies, not originals. (Seems silly, perhaps, but - please ask first!)
  

Edited, since someone is still looking at this old, obsolete post as ‘O’fficial; we add the three minutes regardless of the deck check method. (for reasons, just be sure you read current posts…

This does look very efficient, and I'm actually anxious to give it a try!

d:^D

Edited Scott Marshall (Sept. 14, 2017 10:41:40 AM)

I have a little concern about the whole idea of “not changing the order of the cards in the deck”.

Yes, I do love the australian tecnique for limited, and I use it succesfully.
Yes, I do think that this new tecnique for constructed is at very least worth testing and that may speed tournaments further up.

But I also think our first concern when checking decks should not be to find deck/decklist mismatches, but more severe problems, such as deck manipulation or marked cards.
There are some cheating tecniques that can be catched only if the deck is sorted at the end of the deck check: I'm not speaking theoretically, players have been caught cheating this way. Almost casually, and only because the deck was stacked at the end of the deck check.

We're emphasizing speed in the least important, but most time-consuming part of the deck-check (checking deck-decklist mismatches, which may eventually lead to penalties because of polluted delta listed in place of flooded strand in a mono-blue deck), leaving behind what might lead to more severe situations.

I like this tecnique and will definitely try it, but I'll try to alternate with the classic one.

To answer Charlotte's question, I think your way of handling sideboarded games is correct, and I think it's a feature of this new technique. One of the more challenging parts of checking sideboarded decks is having to keep track (usually mentally) of what sideboard cards are in the main deck and what you expect to find in the sideboard. This way naturally translates that tracking onto paper in an intuitive way.

I tried the technique last weekend at a PPTQ and found it interesting but somehow way slower than my normal sorting technique. That may well have to do with a lack of practice and on the other hand me being quite efficient while sorting so I'll give it another try at the next PPTQ.
A problem I see is with barely legible decklists since you have to repeatedly search the hard-to-read card names while with the normal technique you just walk through the list once line by line and check whether the cards are actually present in the deck which makes it at least for me way faster…

I agree that we need to be careful when dealing with players after using such a method where they will be instructed to not reshuffle their deck. Do you return the deck to them IN the deckbox? If so, is it not somewhat easy for them to accidentally see the position of some cards while removing the deck from the box, or perhaps they pull the deck out but miss some cards, and as a result end up seeing some cards or altering the order of the deck unintentionally?

How have people who have tried this method dealt with issues such as these?

I really like innovations to processes that have been the same for a long time, so I was excited to watch this video. I have a few comments/concerns.

1) This is great as an alternative deck-check technique for a judge who isn't as good at other techniques. I have seen some judges struggle to get quick at checking the ways I show them, having 1 more tool is useful.

2) Marking up the decklist is fine, but I would avoid large tick marks like you showed in the video. If we need to check someone's deck multiple times, this will make it difficult. Having multiple extra colors, besides red/blue/black, could help.

3) Maybe this is just practice, but 6 minutes to check a deck is still on the slow side. I know we have the potential to not award 3 shuffling minutes, but if your DC partner at a large event doesn't do it this way, you lose that option.

4) There is a lot more time risk for mistakes. If you miss a card or two, or mismark something, you may need to re-do the entire check. When I pile out a whole deck, if I make a mistake and put something in the wrong pile, I lose 3-5 seconds, not 3 minutes.

5) The fundamental reason I believe that the 1 pile for every card method is the best is that quickly sorting cards by art is the easiest. With this method, you still need to identify by appearance, but now you're needing to search for text on a page of similar text every time. With some practice this can be made better, but fundamentally I feel like it is more difficult than matching art/borders.