You cannot identify which card was drawn for the turn. That means you cannot identify what card was tutored for. Seems like a clear GPE-GRV Game Loss to me. I would site the rule, but it's done a lot in previous posts already.

I think I could take the position here that in the moment between when you remove the card from the library and move it towards your hand, that card is in a “uniquely identifiable position”.

I think Nicholas touches on what I'm trying to get at, that the salient point here is, “there is no reasonable chance for an opponent to stop this action while the card may be identified”.

Yep, I think that is absolutely the point. With this infraction, if the
opponent had a chance to see the issue and call a judge, it would result in
a Warning. If that opponent never had the chance, it is a GL. If the chance
existed for the opponent to call a judge, a did not, that does not change
the penalty to a GL. This would result in all sorts of nefarious options
for a devious opponent.

So guys who would like to issue a GL here. Can you please explain to me why you're deviating from a very clear and textbook case that is specifically covered by the IPG?

Adam: Even though E. Tutor is an instant and it was cast EoT, I would believe that there was enough time for Adam to notice Nolan's mistake because it doesn't mention Nolan failing to shuffle. That means the card sat out for a while, the deck was presented, the card was placed on top incorrectly, Nolan untapped, moved through his upkeep and into his draw, drew his card and was somewhere later in his turn before the error was realized. Having moved through several phases, I would say that it's unlikely that there was not enough time for Adam to recognize the mistake. If there were a reason to believe that there was not enough time, then yes, I would avoid giving the FTMGS.

Joshua: Is there an official definition of “uniquely identifiable”? Because as Adam points out, most cards spend some time being “uniquely identifiable”, if you really want to push the definition. Even in your examples, at some point, the card is out of the library and not yet in the hand. During that time, it's uniquely identifiable. When it's in the hand, if it hasn't been shuffled around, you could argue that it's uniquely identifiable (although I can't see anyone ever ruling this way in a tournament, but it's pretty common at the kitchen table for fixing extra draws or situations like this one - the players both know which card was supposed to be revealed and the player reveals that card). Is a card in play, separated from other cards, uniquely identifiable? Because that would be any instance of a morph card not being revealed before being shuffled in. Where do you draw that line? The extra information in the description of GRV gives examples of what constitutes “uniquely identifiable”, top of library, only card in hand, but it doesn't define it.

Given the exact wording of the IPG, I would agree with your interpretation. It says “was”. However, my understanding was that FtR was not removed because of a change in philosophy but because it did not come up often enough to warrant its own section and was therefore folded into GRV. You say that the intention behind the rules is unimportant but I disagree. Each listing in the IPG comes with a section on the philosophy behind the rule. That is because the philosophy guides us in how to apply the rules.

I seem to remember reading that the policy change on failure to reveal was that we felt that the punishment (GL) was very harsh for FtR. Yes, there is a significant potential for advantage to be gained, which is why the penalty was a GL in the first place. However, in cases like this one where players are forgetting to reveal and the card was once uniquely identifiable, there becomes an opportunity for the opponent to wait until the card is no longer uniquely identifiable to call a judge (which has an even greater potential for abuse and advantage to be gained in my opinion). This is why the penalty is now a GRV (which FtR really is anyways) and the default penalty is a warning as opposed to a GL. The cases where FtR was a GL came up less often than a downgrade which had to be run past the HJ, this means that the HJ has to be involved in the ruling in significantly more cases.

I don't disagree that on the surface this is a very clear cut case from the IPG. I also wouldn't disagree that even underneath the surface that this is probably still a very clear cut case from the IPG. However, given that this is a Knowledge Pool Scenario, I feel its our goal to dissect and analyze this from every possible angle. I don't claim at all that my perspective is right and reading to the letter of the law is wrong. I'm just looking to inspire some debate.

Mike; of course, you're right. The MIPG doesn't define “uniquely identifiable”. In any other circumstance, we could deliberate over what constitutes uniquely identifiable.

HOWEVER. In this situation, we're dealing with a card that was, unarguably, uniquely identifiable. The card was searched and placed on top of the library. The MIPG says that searching and placing a card on top of a library constitutes “uniquely identifiable”. That's why it's irrelevant; the card Nolan tutored was uniquely identifiable because the MIPG explicitly says that cards in its exact situation are also uniquely identifiable. Arguing over what “uniquely identifiable” means and proposing outlandish examples is pointless; again, we know the card in this situation counts as uniquely identifiable because there's a line in the document we have to rule from saying that it is.

Edited Josh Andrews (Dec. 6, 2012 10:47:36 AM)

The question to ask is why does that clause exist in the IPG?

“If the information needed to verify the legality was ever in a uniquely identifiable position (such as on top of the library or as the only card in hand) after the infraction was committed, do not upgrade the penalty”

Lets look at it a different way, Adam tutors and puts the card on the top of his library.
His opponent sits there and thinks, “hmm - I can make him reveal it now, or I can wait until he draws it and get him a GL”

To allow players to game the penalty system like that is most definitely not healthy for the game. That is why the IPG has that clause. The opponent had a chance to get the information revealed and missed it.

Sorry, that means it is just a warning and an FTGMS.

The IPG states that it should be a warning, but the HJ could upgrade to a game loss. Further investigation would be needed to determine if the opponent was trying to “trap” his opponent into a GL, if this was a mistake (as always, magic is not a game of dexterity). If he was illegally tutoring and trying to cheat, then fraud.

Edited Toma Graves (Dec. 6, 2012 12:36:55 PM)

I had not remembered the section in the definition of GRV about upgrading to a GL for situations that would've previously fallen under the FtR. So had it come up in tournament, I'd have gotten it right, but for the wrong reason. I chalk that up to being a bad judge. Once that was pointed out in earlier posts, here's how I looked at it:

If I go to draw an extra card, but instead of putting it into my hand, I put it face down on the table, then I realize that I shouldn't be drawing that card and put it back, there's no penalty. Since I didn't look at extra cards or draw extra cards, nothing has happened from an infraction standpoint. The same would hold true for multiple cards. If I laid out 3 cards, realized my error and put them back, there is no infraction. If, however, I lay out 3 cards, proceed to play 3 card monte with them, then put them back, now we have an issue. It is not clear to both players what the original order of those cards is.

To me, this means that there is clearly a time, while a card is traveling from one zone to another, during which it is uniquely identifiable. If, however, this is the case, then there is never an instance in which a card does not qualify as “previously (”was“) uniquely identifiable”. So the upgrade requirement on a FtR-style GRV, as written, would therefore never apply. It clearly is not the intent of the rules team to create senseless rules, so the conclusion that I drew was that it was simply poorly written. I know that there is potential for abuse in FtR-style GRVs; the old section on FtR went so far as to state as much in the philosophy section to explain why the GL penalty applies. The most logical conclusion was to assume that “was” should generally be read as “is”. With that interpretation, I could still see corner cases where a card would not be in a uniquely identifiable *position* but still be identifiable (I use a Mirage tutor, you Extirpate me. We both know what that card on top was, but it has now been shuffled into my library. Upgrading here would not make sense, since there was no potential for gain). So “was” could still be correct in these corner cases, but not applicable to most cases.

Reading Mackenzie's post on the philosophy and Nicholas' post on how he defines uniquely identifiable has given me a clearer picture of why this would not be upgraded.

Seems that I was mistaken about the uniquely identifiable clause of this rule. That's what I get for answering while I am at work. I guess I personally don't feel very good about this change in the rule, but in the end, policy is clear that this was identifiable at one point (on top of the library) and was not caught by the opponent, so this is a Warning, and not a GL for GPE-GRV with a Failure to Maintain Warning for the opponent.

I would be giving either two warnings (GRV and FTMGS) or just a game loss
upgrading the GRV.

In the later case the opportunity for the opponent to notice wasn't given
and the player rushed through resolving the spell, untapping and drawing
really quickly. If I don't think he had an opportunity to respond to the
GRV earlier I also don't think he had an opportunity to game the system and
the card didn't exist in a uniquely identifiable position in any useful or
material way.


On Fri, Dec 7, 2012 at 8:44 AM, Arthur Edson <
forum-2137@apps.magicjudges.org> wrote:

> Seems that I was mistaken about the uniquely identifiable clause of this
> rule. That's what I get for answering while I am at work. I guess I
> personally don't feel very good about this change in the rule, but in the
> end, policy is clear that this was identifiable at one point (on top of the
> library) and was not caught by the opponent, so this is a Warning, and not
> a GL for GPE-GRV with a Failure to Maintain Warning for the opponent.
>
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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”

Gareth, I don't get anywhere from the original scenario that the NAP rushed through the EOT resolution of Enlightened Tutor, nor that he rushed through his upkeep (although I wouldn't necessarily be surprised if he did the latter). More to the point, I don't see that as being relevant here. Nowhere in the GPE-GRV section does the opponent's ability to stop a violation involving hidden information come into play. The relevant circumstance in which upgrading such a penalty is not appropriate is when the “information needed to verify the legality was ever in a uniquely identifiable position” and nothing else.

This seems to me to be an absolutely textbook example of a downgrade for reasons many have already stated. I see no reason to deviate from the IPG and would issue a Warning as recommended for GPE - GRV.

-Justin Miyashiro
L1 Fort Collins CO

I don't either. I was just stating the most likely reason to go with the
Game Loss some are suggesting.


On Fri, Dec 7, 2012 at 11:03 AM, Justin Miyashiro <
forum-2137@apps.magicjudges.org> wrote:

> Gareth, I don't get anywhere from the original scenario that the NAP
> rushed through the EOT resolution of Enlightened Tutor, nor that he rushed
> through his upkeep (although I wouldn't necessarily be surprised if he did
> the latter). More to the point, I don't see that as being relevant here.
> Nowhere in the GPE-GRV section does the opponent's ability to stop a
> violation involving hidden information come into play. The relevant
> circumstance in which upgrading such a penalty is not appropriate is when
> the “information needed to verify the legality was ever in a uniquely
> identifiable position” and nothing else.
>
> This seems to me to be an absolutely textbook example of a downgrade for
> reasons many have already stated. I see no reason to deviate from the IPG
> and would issue a Warning as recommended for GPE - GRV.
>
> -Justin Miyashiro
> L1 Fort Collins CO
>
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“Dear God, I would like to file a bug report”