Greetings judges! Welcome back after an awesome Modern Masters Weekend. This week's scenario is Silver, so L2+ judges please wait until Friday before sharing your knowledge.

The blog post for this scenario is here: http://blogs.magicjudges.org/knowledgepool/?p=1414

You are a floor judge of a Regional Pro Tour Qualifier. It's round 5 and the EOR leader has asked you to gather as many entry slips as possible before time in the round. While you walk around, you see a match that ends, approach to the table and kindly ask them to fill and sign their result entry slip. Angus takes the slip while Charley is scooping his cards, records his loss 2-0 and both sign it.

Before leaving the table you ask to confirm, “So, Brad wins 2-0?” Charley quickly answers, “No! Charley wins 2-0.” You give them the result entry slip to fix it and find out that Charley is playing at the wrong table. Next to them Brad is still playing at the wrong table against Dan.

What do you do?

(I'm assuming that the correct matchups are Angus-Brad, and Charley-Dan)

Unfortunately for Brad and Charlie, both of them have committed Tournament Error - Tardiness. Angus and Dan are both sitting at their correct, assigned tables, while Brad and Charlie aren't, and this is a IPG given example of Tardiness.

Since it's near the end of the round, we're well past the ‘Match Loss’ cutoff. Brad receives a Match Loss, for being tardy to the Angus-Brad game, and Charley receives a Match Loss, for being tardy to the Charley-Dan game. In this case, it isn't necessary to drop either of them from the tournament, as they're both still clearly present and attempting to participate.

This is a pretty steep penalty for Brad and Charley, however, it's necessary for the efficient running of the tournament as a whole. Brad and Charley will not be happy with these results, so it's important to handle the situation diplomatically. I'm interested to hear how people would explain their rulings, here.

Edited Talin Salway (June 11, 2015 07:47:40 AM)

Ruling: Tardiness
Penalty: Match Loss for Brad and Charley

As awful as it's going to feel for them, both Brad and Charley committed TE: Tardiness as shown from one of the examples in the IPG.

D. A player sits at an incorrect table and plays the wrong opponent.

It is a player's responsibility to make sure that they are in the right place at the right time during a tournament, and both of these players have made the error of sitting at the wrong table. It's unfortunate that this was not noticed earlier, but since we are nearing the end of the round there is no remedy that will allow them to play a full match with their correct opponent without holding up the tournament. That is why we will follow the additional remedy given in the IPG.

A player not in his or her seat 10 minutes into the round will receive a Match Loss and be dropped from the tournament unless he or she reports to the Head Judge or Scorekeeper before the end of the round.

There is some temptation here to use the match results as they were played, but we don't have any good reason to change the pairings as they were assigned so this is not a real option.

As for how we handle this, we will need to stop the match between Brad and Dan since that is also an incorrect matchup. I would explain to both groups that Brad and Charley sat in the wrong seats so the matches that have been played will not be reported. This counts as Tardiness by the tournament rules. I'll follow up with that since it is more than 10 minutes into the round, the penalty associated is a match loss. I will record the slips 2-0 in favor of Angus and Dan due to No Shows, but I will ask Brad and Charley if they want to drop or continue on so that they don't have to make a separate trip to the scorekeeper to un-drop from the tournament.

This is one of the listed examples for Tournament Error - Tardiness in the IPG. “A player sits at an incorrect table and plays the wrong opponent.” We should adhere to the tardiness policy that was announced at the start of the tournament in the head judge announcement, usually 0/10 for the penalties of match loss/game loss. If a tardiness policy wasn't announced, then 0/10 is the default. The fact that Angus and Charley finished 2 games means that it is almost definitely more than 10 minutes into the round. If that is the case, Brad and Charley are each going to get a match loss because they were the players who sat at the wrong table.

If either of them is upset about the penalty, I would remind them that it's their responsibility as players to make sure they are at the right table each round. It's always best to check the match slip ASAP and verify that both players at the table match the names on the slip.

Thank you all for participating in this week's scenario. Everyone clearly identified that Charley and Brad have commited Tournament Error - Tardiness because they sat at an incorrect table and played the wrong opponent. This is one of the 4 examples for this infraction we can find in IPG.

D. A player sits at an incorrect table and plays the wrong opponent.

For the penalty, we must look at the Additional Remedy section of the infraction to find the appropiate.

A player not in his or her seat 10 minutes into the round will receive a Match Loss and be dropped from the tournament unless he or she reports to the Head Judge or Scorekeeper before the end of the round.

According to this both Charley and Brad will receive a Match Loss. We must be very careful when explaining the penalty because Brad and, specially, Charley will be disgusted for the consequences of their error. Although the Additional Remedy states that they will be dropped from the tournament unless they report to the Head Judge or Scorekeeper before the end of the round, it is not necessary to apply this clause unless any of them really wants to drop.

As Matthew has stated, fixing the matches so that they match how Charley and Brad sat is not a good idea since it's not supported by policy.

Finally, write down the correct match results and the infractions.

Thanks again and see you soon!