Originally posted by Adam Zakreski:

If the player says, “I will cast Rampant Growth 5 times with the expected board state to be the same except all my mana is tapped.” This would be legal then?

Consequently, could the judge/player agree to shortcut to the end of that?

If the player is announcing a number of iterations and the expected end state of the game, they are shortcutting the loop. They would proceed to tap all their lands and shuffle their library, and we would be fine with that. I personally encourage that kind of shortcutting, as long as players are clear about what's happening.

The “loop rule” in slow play just lets us call it slow play if that same player casts rampant growth, searches his library and fails to find, announces and resolves the Tamiyo trigger, and then repeats that 4 more times. Even if he performs these actions expediently, the action of repetition is sufficient for slow play, and cause for investigation for stalling.

Edited William Stephenson (Nov. 24, 2012 04:41:07 AM)

See also, Resolving the storm copies of Minds Desire. It is a generally acceptable shortcut not to shuffle the library for each copy of the spell.

I go slightly further than that with Mind's Desire: I ask them to use the
short cut.


On Sun, Nov 25, 2012 at 8:56 AM, Josh Ross
<forum-1960@apps.magicjudges.org>wrote:

> See also; Resolving the storm copies of Minds Desire. It is a generally
> acceptable shortcut not to shuffle the library for each copy of the spell.
>
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–
Gareth Pye
Level 2 Judge, Melbourne, Australia
Australian MTG Forum: mtgau.com
gareth@cerberos.id.au - www.rockpaperdynamite.wordpress.com
“Dear God, I would like to file a bug report”

That was really the point.
Would you go so far though as to give someone a warning for stalling if they tried to insist on shuffling between resolving copies of Minds Desire?

I'm inclined to think that the proper course of action would be to determine the intent of the player, and if it was determined that they were trying to stall the game, give appropriate warning/penalty.

Originally posted by Josh Ross:

and if it was determined that they were trying to stall the game, give appropriate warning/penalty

No warnings for Stalling - it's a DQ, period.

Stalling really isn't hard to understand: if a player is trying to “abuse” the round clock, they're Stalling.

I'll try to clear up a few misconceptions about Stalling. First, you CAN have Stalling without Slow Play - Stalling isn't simply playing slowly, it's taking actions that use up time. Another common misconception: in an untimed round, Stalling doesn't apply - again, it's an effort to abuse a tournament mechanic - the round timer - for your own benefit.

Stalling really is easy to define - but harder to detect; it requires investigation (true for most DQs), and the Head Judge has to believe that actions were being taken to intentionally use more time than is reasonable.

One more misconception - it's only UNLIKELY that someone would be Stalling when they're behind in the game score; it's not impossible. It seems rather silly to try and Stall in a match when your opponent already won game 1 - but we don't judge the sensibility of actions when we determine whether or not an infraction has occurred. Most cases of Stalling DO occur when a player is ahead, and occasionally when the match is tied but the player realizes he may lose if the match doesn't end in a draw.

As for splitting hairs, about shortcuts and Mind's Desire - if a player refuses to use a shortcut, there's a pretty good chance he or she won't be happy with the outcome of the ensuing investigation. What if a player is “going off” with Mind's Desire, shortcuts a couple times, doesn't like the draws, and wants to shuffle the next few times, “to improve his luck”? If you believe it's superstition and not Stalling, allow it. Conclusion: don't be so quick to decide what you'll do in a situation, in advance and from this very remote, abstract perspective. Real Magic doesn't work that way.

As for splitting hairs about “is THIS Stalling/Slow Play? … how about THIS?” … you're free to twiddle your thumbs and durdle about in such a manner, if you find it rewarding - but I'll pass. Like I said at the beginning, Stalling is easy to define, but (usually) not as easy to apply.

Thanks - Scott Marshall, L5, Denver
Judge Program NetRep (yep, that means this post is “Official”)

Originally posted by Scott Marshall:

Another common misconception: in an untimed round, Stalling doesn't apply - again, it's an effort to abuse a tournament mechanic - the round timer - for your own benefit.

Is the misconception that it doesn't apply, or that it can't be abused in a tournament where the mechanic doesn't exist? Or put more simply:

Does stalling apply in untimed rounds or not?

Stalling can't happen if there's no time limit to take advantage of.
“A player intentionally plays slowly in order to take advantage of the time limit.”

So, typically, in the un-timed portion of an event, Stalling does not apply.

I've heard of (corner case) situations where something other than tournament procedures introduce a similar time limit - the last public transit from the venue, or a curfew, or the venue closes (and no nearby 24-hour coffee shops. etc). And if a player tries to take advantage of those time limits? It's every bit as wrong as abusing the round time limit that we normally impose.

Thanks - Scott Marshall, L5, Denver
Judge Program NetRep

Here's one of the places where I have issues trying to deal with Stalling. It only refers to actions taken during the game.

Playing a deck that has a slow victory condition (or even an unreasonably slow victory condition - I'm looking at you Sharazaad) should be considered Stalling. A old-school control deck (i.e. prison) cannot usually finish three games in 50 minutes. How can playing that deck (by definition) not be Stalling? You are planning to abuse the round timer when you construct your deck.

My real point here is that Stalling presumes that you have to try and win - and I don't think any other magic rule or convention enforces that.

-mf

Edited Matt Farney (Nov. 25, 2012 09:19:28 PM)

Originally posted by Matt Farney:

Here's one of the places where I have issues trying to deal with Stalling. It only refers to actions taken during the game.

Playing a deck that has a slow victory condition (or even an unreasonably slow victory condition - I'm looking at you Sharazaad) should be considered Stalling. A old-school control deck (i.e. prison) cannot usually finish three games in 50 minutes. How can playing that deck (by definition) not be Stalling? You are planning to abuse the round timer when you construct your deck.

My real point here is that Stalling presumes that you have to try and win - and I don't think any other magic rule or convention enforces that.

-mf

Let me try this for a rule of thumb - is the player trying to prevent his opponent from winning by removing all his opponent's strategic options (e.g. turtling behind many counterspells and removal spells)? That's a legitimate strategy. Is he preventing his opponent from winning by literally not letting him play, because they are holding priority for an excess amount of time (either by carrying out meaningless actions or just “thinking” a lot)? That's Stalling. He is not required to win but he is required to let priority pass back and forward and not just sit there and hog it all.

Choosing not to win without taking excessive time performing game actions is not slow play or stalling. If nothing else, using your time to get more information about your opponent's deck is a valid reason to choose not to end the game.

If a player has a win on the board, his opponent always has the choice to concede the game. If the opponent chooses not to concede, I would not consider it stalling…

Regarding decks that win slowly, how's this for an example?

Example:
The current score in games is 0-0.

Player A has a Stasis, Eon Hub and Frozen Æther in play, and 40 cards in his library. He has two Islands untapped, a Counterspell and a Hovermyr in hand.

Player B has shown to play red, but only has tapped permanents in play except one Mountain, and 35 cards in his or her library. He has seven cards in hand, and only 1 life left

Player A might be winning very slowly, but can not be certain of the win in a format that has Smelt. In this case, Player B might actually be the one that is stalling, if he has no way in his deck to break the lock.

Edited Mart Leuvering (Dec. 3, 2012 05:36:49 PM)