Welcome to another week of the Knowledge Pool! This week's scenario is Silver, which means that L2s and L3s should wait until Friday.

Here's the blog post and the scenario:
http://blogs.magicjudges.org/knowledgepool/2014/10/08/lights-turtle-action/

You are the head judge of a GPT. You are watching a match when Nancy casts Act of Treason on Arthur’s Meandering Towershell. She attacks and exiles it, then passes the turn. When Arthur enters his declare attackers step he places the Meandering Towershell in play tapped and attacking. They both go to record the life total change. What do you do?

Edited David Larrea (Oct. 10, 2014 05:52:53 AM)

My personal response would be to step in and intervene–This is Comp REL, and Nancy correctly resolved her spell and exiled the meandering towershell. There is definitely potential for abuse here as Nancy is not the owner of meandering towershell, and it is possible(probable) she is unfamiliar with exactly how the meandering towershell's triggered ability works. I would step in, rewind it back to Arthur's attack step, explaining to both players exactly how this delayed triggered ability works/resolves, issue a GRV warning to Arthur, and probably a FTMGS warning to Nancy as she technically is the controller of the meandering towershell at this time. Definitely a chance to educate both players briefly, and probably requires a brief time extension.

Step in, explain the mistake.
Give Gpe:GRV to Arthur and Gpe:FTMGS to Nancy.
Arthur resolves a non existing delayed trigger, While Nancy goes along instead of calling a judge.
Fix the situation by rewinding till before the incorrect trigger.

Looks like a GPE-GRV to me. Iwould, upon intervention, rewind to Arthur's
beginning of combat step, and issue the associated Warning to him. Since
life totals have already changed and there was no indication either player
would call a judge, I think a FtMGS Warning to Nancy is appropriate as well.

Before reading other responses:

First, game-rules: the Towershell's trigger returns the Towershell to Nancy's control, not Arthur's.

Nothing instructed Arthur to remove the Towershell from exile to the battlefield, but he did so anyway. This is an error that's not covered by any other section, so it's a GPE-GRV for Arthur. Nancy had a chance to catch the error, but did not, so she committed GPE - FtMGS. Both receive a warning.

The fix at this point is to either leave the game state as is, or rewind to the point of the error. This seems simple enough, and not too disruptive, to rewind. to rewind:

• Reset Nancy's Life Total
  
• Move the Towershell from the Battlefield to Exile.
  
• It's now Arthur's turn, in the Declare Attackers step.
  

Remind both players to play carefully.

After reading other responses:

I didn't address the other implicit question of the scenario - do we intervene, or not? Because a rule has been broken, and it's serious enough to warrant an infraction and a penalty (i.e., not a missed non-generally-detrimental trigger), we should intervene.

Since Nancy attacked with the Meandering Towershell, she controls the delayed trigger that will return it to the battlefield under HER control. Arthur has committed a GRV by resolving a delayed trigger that doesn’t exist, and Nancy has committed FtMGS by allowing him to do this. Since this infraction has just happened and the situation is not sufficiently complex to rewind, we can rewind all actions back to the declare attackers step, with the Meandering Towershell in the exile zone. We explain how the delayed trigger for the Meandering Towershell works, and we remind both players to play more carefully. Both receive warnings. Have them play on from there, giving them the appropriate time extension.

I would intervene and explain to both players that the delayed trigger is placed on the stack under the control of who controlled the Towershell when she was exiled, and not under the control of its owner. Since Arthur resolves a non-existing delayed trigger, he committed a GPE-GRV, and Nancy committed a GPE-FTMGS by allowing Arthur to commit an error. Warning for both players.

As a rewind is safe here, to fix the situation, I'd rewind to Arthur's declare attackers step, returning the Towershell to the exiled zone and fixing life totals.

Not reading the other responses, I feel we have to intervene here. Clearly neither player is aware of how Meandering Towershell's delayed triggered ability works in this case. Pause the game in progress and explain to both Arthur and Nancy that the controller of the triggered ability which exiles it also controls the delayed triggered ability which returns it tapped and attacking during the declare attackers step on the next turn, meaning that it will return under that player's control. It also might be advisable to explain that it will stay with its new controller as there is no effect in play at this time that will return it to its owner.

Once the players have understood, this is a GPE - GRV and a Warning for Arthur and a GPE - FTMGS and a Warning for Nancy. It is simple enough to rewind to the declare attackers step on Arthur's turn, returning Meandering Towershell to the exile zone, and allow the game to proceed from there. Optionally, we can avoid a rewind if no other creatures were attacking and simply return the Towershell to exile and proceed from Combat Damage. If the players had manage to record the life total change from the Towershell attacking under Arthur's control, ensure that is corrected as well.

Nancy controlled Meandering Towershell's triggered ability, Arthur took an action resolving it incorrectly, and no one caught it. This is a double GRV situation, not GRV/FtMGS. The issue gets explained to both players, both players get Warnings for GRV, and the game is rewound to the beginning of Arthur's declare attackers step.

Edited Michael Shiver (Oct. 10, 2014 10:21:33 AM)

Originally posted by Michael Grimsley:

Arthur has committed a GRV by resolving a delayed trigger that doesn’t exist, and Nancy has committed FtMGS by allowing him to do this.

Do we really consider “resolving a non-existent trigger” an error in itself?

Originally posted by Chris Nowak:

Michael Grimsley
Arthur has committed a GRV by resolving a delayed trigger that doesn’t exist, and Nancy has committed FtMGS by allowing him to do this.

Do we really consider “resolving a non-existent trigger” an error in itself?

The active player's actions demonstrated that he thought he was resolving a trigger and the non-active player allowing it demonstrated that she thought there was a trigger there as well, since the trigger was not actually on the stack, it is non-existent. This is the GRV/FtMGS infraction.

Am I on the wrong track here?

Originally posted by Michael Grimsley:

The active player's actions demonstrated that he thought he was resolving a trigger and the non-active player allowing it demonstrated that she thought there was a trigger there as well, since the trigger was not actually on the stack, it is non-existent. This is the GRV/FtMGS infraction.

Am I on the wrong track here?

Nancy controlled the original ability which created the delayed trigger. Since she “created” the delayed trigger controlled by the wrong player, you could argue that she's committed a GRV by resolving the original ability incorrectly.

So I'm sure there's GRV & warning for Arthur for taking Turtle out of exile zone. And I suppose, also FTMGS for Nancy for allowing Arthur to do thing that's not a result of any game actions. Fix there's quite easy, we back up game to declaration of attackers and put Turtle back in exile zone, correct life totals and let game progress from there.

Originally posted by Jacob Milicic:

Optionally, we can avoid a rewind if no other creatures were attacking and simply return the Towershell to exile and proceed from Combat Damage.

What part of the Policy supports this partial fix?

Originally posted by Nicholas Brown:

Jacob Milicic
Optionally, we can avoid a rewind if no other creatures were attacking and simply return the Towershell to exile and proceed from Combat Damage.

What part of the Policy supports this partial fix?

Until you asked, I was confident there was a clause in one of the policy documents that supported a partial fix that resulted in the same game state or something to that effect. Reviewing after your question, I have found myself to be in error. While it is true that partial fixes are supposed to be considered before backups in cases where allowed, such that backups are a solution of last resort only, there is no clause in the IPG indicating when a partial fix should be considered with respect to a Game Rule Violation; it states either backup or leave the game state as is.

I suppose I was interpreting IPG 1.4 beyond its intended scope. Since few decisions appeared to have been made after the error, I believe a backup is still the most reasonable solution in addition to assessing the penalties.