Please keep the forum protocol in mind when posting.

Competitive REL » Post: UN-sportsman ship.

UN-sportsman ship.

July 5, 2014 01:41:01 PM

Yoshitoki Sakai
Judge (Level 3 (Judge Academy)), Tournament Organizer

Japan

UN-sportsman ship.

I'm just wondering.
While playing a tournament, If a player says (my opponent is cheater) or (my opponent did cheat at the last round.) on FaceBook or Twitter or something SNS which is very easily to be looked by anyone.
Is it UN-sportsman ship?If so What infraction would be given to him?

Edited Mark Brown (July 7, 2014 03:23:57 PM)

July 5, 2014 01:43:16 PM

Yoshitoki Sakai
Judge (Level 3 (Judge Academy)), Tournament Organizer

Japan

UN-sportsman ship.

Why some words deleted?

July 5, 2014 04:19:40 PM

Kim Warren
Judge (Uncertified)

United Kingdom, Ireland, and South Africa

UN-sportsman ship.

I am not sure why some words would have been deleted. It might be good to file a bug about that.

There have been two instances of players being suspended by WotC for acts on social media. In both cases, they were taking mocking photos of tournament attendees without their concent and posting them online. It is certainly not behaviour that we are happy with. These infractions are very hard to catch during a tournament, however. They tend to spread and become obvious a few days after - or else are just never noticed.

July 7, 2014 03:25:10 PM

Mark Brown
Forum Moderator
Judge (Level 2 (Oceanic Judge Association)), Scorekeeper

Australia and New Zealand

UN-sportsman ship.

Just to note anything between
[
and
]
will not display as the forum things it's a formating command. I've edited the original post to replace them with ( )

July 7, 2014 05:18:05 PM

Auzmyn Oberweger
Judge (Level 2 (International Judge Program)), Tournament Organizer

German-speaking countries

UN-sportsman ship.

I can see that this is a bad behaviour from that player and wont help him to get a good reputation amoung the community. Did he mention a specific player (aka name calling) or just “that random guy i played against Round X”? Is there any evidence for an infraction?

At my LGS sometimes players complaining that theyr opponent did “cheat” on them, usually they are just complaining that the top deck skills from the opponents are better then the own ones.

July 7, 2014 06:15:14 PM

Yoshitoki Sakai
Judge (Level 3 (Judge Academy)), Tournament Organizer

Japan

UN-sportsman ship.

Originally posted by Mark Brown:

Just to note anything between
[
and
]
will not display as the forum things it's a formating command. I've edited the original post to replace them with ( )
OH. I see. Thanks!

July 7, 2014 06:32:26 PM

Yoshitoki Sakai
Judge (Level 3 (Judge Academy)), Tournament Organizer

Japan

UN-sportsman ship.

This is exactly what happened.

At round 1 , A and B matched up then they got some trouble though they didn't call for a judge and nothing happen.
Nothing happen means no proof B did cheat.
After round 1, A posted on Twitter ‘my opponent did ’cheat'
A's account is easily to identify who A is because it is written on his profile of twitter also A's opponent is easily to identify as well since we use an online pairing system.
As a result of , it had became diffuse about who is an opponent(his exactly name.).
If he says like you are cheater or you did ‘cheat’ face to face even though with out proof , would he gets penalty alright?
The question is , is it not penalty able?because what different between did it at online and real world like face to face.


Edited Yoshitoki Sakai (July 7, 2014 06:48:29 PM)

July 7, 2014 08:18:10 PM

Anniek Van der Peijl
Judge (Level 3 (Judge Academy))

BeNeLux

UN-sportsman ship.

You could say that calling your opponent a cheater face to face might be unsporting condut - minor. It seems similar to inappropriately demanding a penalty or taunting him (which are some of the examples from the IPG). Posting it online, to me, feels both better and worse than saying it face to face. Better because if the opponent never reads this tweet, there is no tension at the table and he won't feel offended. Worse because the accusation of someone being a cheater is now out on the internet for everyone to read. I could see myself giving the USC-minor warning and a stern lecture on sporting conduct and some advice about calling a judge if you think your opponent is a cheater instead of posting it online.

July 7, 2014 11:34:56 PM

Evan Cherry
Judge (Uncertified)

USA - Southwest

UN-sportsman ship.

I agree with Anniek here.

It would be hard to find these posts, but if it comes to our attention, I think it's an issue worth addressing with the player posting disrespectful things to social media.

At the minimum, you engage and educate the player to approach the judge staff with concerns about cheating.

You should recommend that they take it down. It reflects poorly on them as a player and can cause significant distraction and negative attention to the tournament.

If it's particularly disturbing or specifically calls out the opponent, I agree that a USC-minor might be warranted. Determining whether or not it disrupts the tournament is not required to issue USC-minor.

July 7, 2014 11:50:55 PM

Scott Marshall
Forum Moderator
Judge (Level 4 (Judge Foundry)), Hall of Fame

USA - Southwest

UN-sportsman ship.

Let's not lose sight of the definition of Unsporting Conduct:
Unsporting conduct is disruptive behavior that may affect the safety, competitiveness, enjoyment, or integrity of an event in a significantly negative fashion.
If an online post is having a disruptive effect on your event, then UC (probably Minor) may be appropriate. However, it's hard to imagine that something on Facebook could impact your event.

More likely, players will see that post on Facebook, and their reactions to it may disrupt the event - that, not the post, may be the source of UC-Minor actions.

Having said that, I'd still encourage the player to (a) remove the post, and (b) get judge(s) involved ASAP the next time they suspect something. Note that I would do that in the role of TO or store owner, but not as a Judge. What that player is doing, in public, is implying that my store or my tournaments aren't well-run.

As a Judge, focused on the tournament itself, I'm likely unaware of the problem - until & unless it does begin to impact the event.

d:^D

July 8, 2014 11:54:22 AM

Yoshitoki Sakai
Judge (Level 3 (Judge Academy)), Tournament Organizer

Japan

UN-sportsman ship.

Thanks for replying:)
Then I talked to A and taught him that what he were supposed to do , though I was really wondering about that because now I've seen like somebody did at twitter or online something like SNS then they got punished by law and something like fired by employer etc in NEWS.
According to NEWS , doing at online is treated exactly same as doing at real world , If able to identify each other.
if so I thought , A should be got penalty though I've never hard like this situation in MTG.
It's the reason why I posted here.

Thank you so much! It's resolved in the my mind :)