As far as I know, that's not true. Pyreheart Wolf has a triggered ability that prevents you from blocking with only one creature. He doesn't have to announce anything and purposefully trying to block with one creature is cheating. He can't even let you do it because it isn't a beenficial trigger in the closed list. You might mean beneficial triggers such as Ajani's Mantra 's. It's a closed list and it's recent. Hardly what I'd call upon to interpret the rest of the rules.
This, in fact, WAS changed recently for Competative REL tournaments.
Haven't read many responses in the past 2 pages, but to recap my own thoughts (though admittedly, while a qualified lv 1 judge I haven't actually judged too many events, and haven't had anything dodgy like this come up):
If the player hadn't tapped their lands and had just revealed the card, and tried to trick their opponent into conceding that way, I wouldn't consider it cheating. If I considered the event something low level (pretty much anything regular REL), I'd probably tell them about how that level of event is mostly social and for fun, so they shouldn't be so ultra competitive as to be underhanded like that as they'll alienate themselves from the community.
If they had tapped their lands and the rest of the scenario was the same, and someone brought it to my attention, I'd probably consider it cheating. Of course, they are always case by case decisions and I'd need to hear what people had to say before making a decision, but I wouldn't be surprised if I decided it was cheating for intentionally trying to illegally cast a spell. Tapping lands and showing a card is something I'd consider an allowable representation of a spell cast (after all, a normal instant/sorcery cast in Magic usually involves tapping lands and putting the card on the table - so this isn't far off at all), so I'd consider it trying to trick the opponent into letting you cast the spell illegally, rather than trying to trick the opponent into conceding.
As a side note, Inaction Injunction does nothing to a creature that's already attacking or blocking (well, except from stopping it from being declared as an attacker or blocker from that point on, or activating abilities). If your opponent double blocked you and you then detained one of the two blockers, the detained creature would still be blocking and would still deal damage.
I'm all about super-control in MTG. If you're able to stop my shenanigans, then there aren't enough shenanigans.
Crap. My rules version is out of date. Thanks for the correction.
Mr. Physics : Revealing a card in hand in the hopes of making your opponent believe you could cast it is cheating. A judge wouldn't try to know it the way it was done suggested casting at all.
The definition of Fraud is :
A person intentionally and knowingly violates or misrepresents rules, procedures, personal information, or any other relevant tournament information.
Did you intentionnaly and knowingly misrepresented relevant tournament information? Yes you did. End of the line. That you didn't technically say anything that semantically was false does not mean you didn't intentionnally misrepresent the game state, as your only objective in doing so is to lead your opponent into believing something false.
Let's say you have a friend who just got a haircut. God is it ridiculous on him. He asks "Who do you like my haircut?" and you answer "I've always liked that haircut". This is technically true, but you still just lied to your friend, since you said something you knew he would understand as the exact opposite of waht you thought. This is the same situation.
If you reveal it in your turn when you're about to concede and say "I had that in hand" and he scoops, we wouldn't be on the same boat, of course. That would be totally random and you wouldn't have the intention the infraction requires. It could happen. You reveal it with a sad face and you say "That was a good game, I just needed..." and he takes his things and go, probably in frustration, and quits the venue. Could you be disqualified (let's say if a bystander would call a judge)? Of course not!
Yeah... Until next game, where it'll be right back.
Seriously, there's no way to deal with Rancor in any format. It should be banned, except Gleemax is a lobbyist for the Rancor party, so that'll never happen.
You can't ban rancor, it just returns to your deck.
You might want to actually talk to the Flavor & Storyline Board people... since, you know, our whole reason for playing Magic is the flavor. I'm willing to bet you'll get a lot more interest there than in General.
Indeed, both posters down there would be thrilled.
When talks about banning Jace first started, I was thinking that I would see him banned come June 20th. But as I think more about it, I don't really think that Jace is the problem anymore. Sure his power level leaves very little to the imagination (opening Jace is like opening a refrigerator box with a naked girl on the inside), and sure his price does have a strong impact on what players choose to play (playing Jace is like being intimate with a woman and she doesn't charge you in the morning), but it is not the source of all the problems in Standard.
How do people think saving room to print more abilities on cards is dumbing down the game?
Do you really think, say, Akroma would ever be printed if she said, "Akroma can block by creatures with this ability and cannot be blocked by creatures without this ability. If a creature without this ability would deal combat damage by Akroma would be destroyed, prevent all combat damage that creature would deal to Akroma this combat. Attacking does not cause Akroma to tap. If Akroma is blocked and deals lethal damage, it deals the remainder of its damage to the defending player. Akroma may attack and use abilities that require tapping in the casting cost the turn it enters the battlefield. Akroma cannot be damaged, enchanted, equipped, blocked or targeted by black or red sources" rather than her "dumbed down" wording she has? No freaking way. Keywording and shorthand allows them to make complicated cards easy to play with, allowing them to be printed in the first place.
1. cast frankie peanuts 2. ask opponent "will you concede the game this turn"? if they say yes, you win; if they say no, play a staying power 3. subsequently ask "will you attack this turn"? and "will you cast a spell this turn"? (using a Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir for the second question if necessary) to ensure they can't disrupt the combo 4. donate them a platinum angel 5. play a mox lotus and braingeyser them for every card in their library. play an opalescence and donate them a glorious anthem and a blacker lotus , then play enchanted evening . play and activate a mindslaver and then donate them a fastbond and the mox lotus (returning one of the donates to your hand with eternal witness or whatever) 6. during their turn, play every permanent in their hand (playing lands with fastbond) then (as yourself) cast mirrorweave on the blacker lotus, so every permanent becomes a copy of it. proceed to tear up every card they control, and hopefully do it before they notice that they aren't bound by staying power's ability anymore and can concede
Dark Ritual being overpowered is determined more by what is done with it than the card itself.
True, but the fact that it enables so many ridiculous things is pretty telling. It's like, sure I can use a shotgun as a bludgeoning instrument, but that doesn't make it not a shotgun.
Shortly before Serra died, she transferred her spark into an angel whose full name was Asha Avacyn Bolas. Her dragon father groomed her for her positions in Alara and Innistrad, and she's also been getting help from her uncle Ugin in the form of Urza, who was resurrected as Marit Lage to be the avatar as which she projects herself into material realms. Grieslbrand is a split personality who sometimes wanders the planes disguised as a human woman named Liliana Vess.
Everyone's life would be easier if players would, instead of coming to the 'net for help with a deck, just netdeck and be done with it. And I'm not talking about some Top 8 lists, for the Casualists, too, can benefit from netdecking. I've netdecked plenty of decks from the Casual Play forums from users such as Mown, Raedien, Floopfoot, and a few others. I snatched straight the heck out of my web browser. Yes, people, your original idea fell victim to a savage netdecker. You have been assimiliated.
Suppose I wanted a Zombie deck. Why on earth would I spend time searching Gatherer for a decent list of Zombie cards when Raedien already did it for me? Taking time to be creative or waiting on people on the forums to tell you why your deck sucks or 'go to Casual forums' is a disasterous waste of time (to me).
That being said, Magic was ruined back in Alpha when they added all that rules and cards [Debutantes avert your eyes]. My friends and I still like playing it the "pure" way (Basically we go into the woods and hit eachother with wiffle bats while shouting made up obscenities. You know, the way Garfield wanted it to be played).
Don't worry about it. I've come up with a list of changes to fix EDH.
-First off, there's no commander. -The minimum deck size is 60 cards, and each deck can have up to four of each card, save basic lands and relentless rats. Also decks have no color identity. -Starting life total is 20.
Here's a clever play you can try yourself: -Convince friend to run relentless rats.dec in legacy tournament -Get a deck with lots of mill, yixlid jailer, and humility -Drop humility and jailer, wait for him to dump his hand, mill him out -All his rats now have no abilities. Call a judge because he's playing an illegal deck with more than 4 of a single card. -Get him/her banned from competitive magic play
L, is for the leather gloves you weaaaar. O, is for the organs that guy could spaaaare. V, is very very, extraordinay. E, is for every vagrant i butchered in a wine cellar befooooore.
The outer layer of the Magic: the Gathering box, the carton, or crust, is fairly thin and light, and contains largely aluminosilcates.
Within that lies the middle layer, consisting of the familiar booster pack. Although solid, the booster packs' high temperatures allow them to acutally move around within the booster box. This flow, sometimes called convection, is cited by frustrated box mappers as one of WOTC's most genious uses of thermodynamics since the Ravnica block.
No one knows what lies at the core of the booster box, but scientists theorize that it must be especially dense in order to make up for the large amount of fluff distributed amongst the booster packs.
I imagine [Ajani 3's] second ability involves him hurling the creature at your opponent Brion Stoutarm style, then the guy is just like "Okay, that may have worked, but don't- GOD DAMN IT!" as he does it again because cats don't give a **** :33.
Its like that one time Elves broke out in a field of Jund. Elves became a resurgent hit, then died off again once Jund adapted to the rest of the field of G/W that it required mass removal that inherently pooped on Elves too.
Submit to the menace. Delver can, and will blot out the sun.
"I remember my days as a youth at Tolarian Academy ." "Wow, small multiverse, I actually went there too." "WAIT, DON'T- Well ****, there's $200,000 in student loans well spent."
And flavor goes out the window when you cast a second copy of a planeswalker right after the first one dies, so...
"Hey Nissa, I need a favor." "You just asked me for a 'favor' like thirty seconds ago, and it turned out to be having Sarkhan Transmogrify my only follower into a dragon like 5 times -which dickery aside also violates some laws of causality - and then you let me get beaten over the head by that hedron crab." "...I'll give you " "...Well all right then."
GM, I don't think Dill is better than you. I KNOW it. Even if he wakes up every morning, clubs a baby seal, steals all the TV remotes from within a block's radius of his house and then robs hungry orphans of their food he'd be better than you, for the simple reason that he learns from his mistakes.
What would they have to fight about? Like, all I can think of now is Gideon going "Hey, long-ears! I'm gathering a group of 'Walkers together to fight some tentacle monsters.....you want in?" and Tamiyo going "Ew! Hentai no bakka Gideon-desu desu!" and flying away.
I open 4 packs just to be on the safe side. Not only do I get more cards than everyone else, but I also get to spend the rest of the night off. Win Win.
MaRo has a thing for people opening boosters with bad cards. But since he can only get so many bad cards printed in each set, he has found a devious way of getting more bad cards into circulation: He makes entire print sheets with just bad rares, then puts them onto the assembly line. He proceeds to wring his hands and twirl his evil mustache that he grew for twirling purposes as a lightning bolt strikes in the background. Afterwards, he goes to make sure that the good cards are only opened by everyone's friends, and that we all only get to open bad cards. He does this by memorising each booster, than switching them around accordingly. Whenever someone complains about a card, he immediately jumps out from behind a chair to yell "WELL, IT'S NOT FOR YOU!" before merging back into the shadows in order to devise new ways in which he can screw over players, then claim that he has valid reasons for doing so.
Mark Rosewater is sitting in a seemingly innocuous cable TV van, outside of Bankaimastery's house. Sitting nearby are two hardened criminal hackers, fresh out of prison, and filled with resentment at their lack of physical fitness. "Have you managed to hack his brainwaves yet? The set deadline's coming up fast." "We're almost through. It should be coming up on the screen any second." The hacker presses a button, and Kevin's thoughts flash onto the screen. Mark and the hackers stare in amazement at the sheer beauty, the elegance, and the raw truth of what they see. It's like the ending to 2001: A Space Odyssey. Brilliant light shines across the screen, the truth of existence is made clear to them, and they despair at their own foolishness, their own ignorance, their own inadequacy. And then they steal his ideas. As they return back to R&D, Mark sneers at a haggard old man chained to a cast-iron sphere. The man looks up from his laborious task of breaking rocks in the dungeon of Wizards of the Coast headquarters, and asks a question: "Kevin, my greatest student. He - he's all right, isn't he? You didn't hurt him?" Mark deals him a weighty blow with his boot. "Know your place, Richard. Get back to work."
I'm only opposed to it because it bears so little relation to how people actually play the game. The example of Miracles is actually a much better one then the Clone example I was trying to use.
From the game's perspective, the card can move instantly from face down in the library to revealed in the hand and that's fine for the rules. But in real life, we can't actually do that, so the card spends a good bit of time in locations that are neither where that player's library is nor where that player's hand is. And that's fine for real life. What I don't want is the disconnect to be explicitly codified. Along the lines of
183664.697 A game of Magic as laid out by these rules exists only as a pure Platonic ideal, utterly unrealizable by fallible mortals limited by the confines of physicality and the ravages of evil and sin.
183664.698 The cake is a lie, too.
I know it's true, but I don't want the rules to actually straight-up tell me that.
Pfft this cant be serious can it? If it is please delete your account OP. Its not even close to ban worthy, considering what JTMS and stoneforge had to accomplish to get banned i see the WotC selling magic to aquire Pokemon before that ever happens.
I'm trying to imagine sorin markov as a gym leader in one of those pokemon games which you have to beat him to get his badge... somehow I imagine that he would stab you in the chest with his sword before giving you the badge, even if you beat his pokemon....
Personally, I'd be fine with tea time but then I'm not gonna waste the mana summoning Emrakul, the Aeons Torn . He always takes all the sugar, drinks the whole pot of Earl Grey and doesn't even say thank you. SO. RUDE.
Break the Card is a regular thread in the Cards and Combo Forum. Quite simply, the participants are given a Johnnystatic card (e.g. Xenograft ) and are asked to build a deck around it. The winner and honorable mentions are sigged below. Get brewing!
This week's Break the Card was based around Xenograft . Thread : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/27681049/Break_the_card_:_Xenograft?pg=1
Winner : Axterix with his Vampdrazi deck. Finalist : Vektor480 with his Ally/Golem/Plant deck. Honorable mentions : Zammm for the Turntimber Ranger combo and TinGorilla for suggesting Sarkhan the Mad .
Here's the link to the Mindlock Orb contest : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/27697565/Break_the_Card_:_Mindlock_Orb?sdb=1&pg=last#497536269
Here's the link to Break the Card : Bludgeon Brawl : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/27715169/Break_the_Card_:_Bludgeon_Brawl?sdb=1&pg=last#498208797
Winner : Vektor and his Grab the World deck. Finalist : Crandor with his Awesome Aliteration deck. Honorable mentions : RP Jesus with his Wat deck and Zix200 with his Signet Renewal deck.
This week was Followed Footsteps : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/27748677/Break_the_Card_:_Followed_Footsteps?pg=1
Winner : Tevish_Szat with his Exponential Growth deck. Honorable mentions : Zix with his Carbon Copies deck and Escef with his Fungus of Speed and Time deck.
This week's card was Jace's Archivist : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/28063377/Break_the_Card_:_Jaces_Archivist.
Finalists : Jentaru with his "Consecration of the Draw" deck and HereticSmitty with his "ADHD: The deck" deck. Winner : JaxsonBateman with his "The Archives Are Endless!" deck.
Thanks for the reply JaxsonBateman. I completely agree that tapping lands and revealing a card is a representation of a spell cast if nothing else is said. I was wondering if you explicitly used the word 'reveal' it would change things but the general consensus appears to be that no, it doesnt. Thats cool, I look forward to not doing this and avoiding unfavorable judging experiences in my future ; )
I agree that the REL definitely matters, even in the case of just revealing the card. In general using technicalities to win casual events is something to be avoided. That said, in the top 8 of an FNM vs someone I know has played on the pro tour, Ill be less lenient that some kid in his first FNM top 8.
I once pointed out to someone that isperia, supreme judge has a *may* trigger, and that to draw cards after taking damage is too late. They got pretty upset and I felt badly, so I learned my lesson there. Tried to find the guy to let him know his opponent had changed his mind and conceded, but apparently he had already left. In this case, if he had drawn, say, a dramatic rescue he gains very valuable info, say that he can save rescue on a blocker rather than use it on an incoming attacker. Of course, it seemed true that he hadnt actually thought of that and wasn't trying to do that ;/ In retrospect I should have just told him to be more careful next time, which is what I usually do when someone makes a mistake at FNM.
On your sidenote: In the example with sunspire griffins and archons, if I have injunction and fire, it makes sense to hold the injunction until after combat, as you certainly want to detain the archon, but you actually want it to block as if it does you can kill it, so in this case it makes sense to save it for post blockers. If he double blocks skywatch and chumps imp like he did, you can then fire one of the griffins blocking skywatch so that he loses all 3 griffins, then injunction archon and hope to draw into impact or bounce if they are in your deck (they were in my deck).
Edit: D_L you make it seem like flashing fury with the intent of causing your opponent to concede without tapping mana is illegal, and misrepresenting the game state. I don't believe this to be the case, and on this point others have agreed with me. Your example seems to imply that in order for the concession to work, you must not have revealed the card with that intent. Tricking you opponent into a concession is not illegal, although you may have some moral opposition it is part of how the game works as far as I can tell. Tricking your opponent into thinking you are casting a spell when you are not is cheating. Basically, what has been argued here is that tricking your opponent into thinking you *could* cast a spell you arent casting, regardless of the verbiage, is cheating, as the line between 'could cast' and 'casting' is too thin. Basically if I am tapping mana, their is some kind of understood contract that I am casting a spell, which is not present in the gavony township example.
Let me be clear. If you reveal a card during the course of a game, in the manner you are discribing you are attempting (by your own admission) to be attempting to muddy the game state. You can't cast the card, YOU know this, showing the card and using the mannerisms described is attempting to to distort the game state. A judge CAN punish you for this as it would be quite obvious to most players that you're trying to persuade an opponent to resign under false pretenses.
There is a lot of leeway for judges to make rulings about this sort of under-handed tactic.
If someone tried this against me I would immediately call the judge over and tell him what was going on, at the very least they would probably have a record on your DCI about this type of play.
You also mentioned casting spells which you don't have the legal mana to cast and that you WOULD try this WILLINGLY against an unwitting opponent. There is NO grey area on this sort of cheating and I really regret your mindset on playing Magic. The fact that you've spend so much time thinking about these senarios that you think might be ambiguous enough to get away with.
In your world it might be fine to sneak a fifth Thragtusk into your standard deck, knowing that for any one game you probably wont get caught.
bulletd Guidelines:
5.0: I will take this card no matter what. Creature 1 or playable 1 or hate 1.Domri Rade 4.5: Bomb and splashable. Creature 1-2, playable 1-2, removal 1. Obzedat, Ghost Council 4.0: Excellent first pick first pack, will sway me into same colors. Creatures 1-4, removal 1. Rubblehulk 3.5: Excellent first pack pick two, will confirm colors or possibly sway into second color. Ground Assault 3.0: Good in-color addition, or splashable removal/creature. Creatures 3-9, removal 1-3. Kingpin's Pet 2.5: Solid pick in-color; creatures 5-12, removal 3-5. Mugging 2.0: Creatures 10-16; removal 6-7. Act of Treason 1.5: My 23rd or 22nd card, depending on removal. Gutter Skulk 1.0: 23rd card if I don't maindeck an additional land. Mental Vapors 0.5: This card will sometimes be sideboarded in. Shattering Blow 0.0: I will shred this card for counters. Frenzied tilling
Let me be clear. If you reveal a card during the course of a game, in the manner you are discribing you are attempting (by your own admission) to be attempting to muddy the game state. You can't cast the card, YOU know this, showing the card and using the mannerisms described is attempting to to distort the game state. A judge CAN punish you for this as it would be quite obvious to most players that you're trying to persuade an opponent to resign under false pretenses.
There is a lot of leeway for judges to make rulings about this sort of under-handed tactic.
If someone tried this against me I would immediately call the judge over and tell him what was going on, at the very least they would probably have a record on your DCI about this type of play.
You also mentioned casting spells which you don't have the legal mana to cast and that you WOULD try this WILLINGLY against an unwitting opponent. There is NO grey area on this sort of cheating and I really regret your mindset on playing Magic. The fact that you've spend so much time thinking about these senarios that you think might be ambiguous enough to get away with.
In your world it might be fine to sneak a fifth Thragtusk into your standard deck, knowing that for any one game you probably wont get caught.
I feel like this could be considered a personal attack, and is inconsistent with what else I have written in this thread. Knowingly putting in a 5th thragtusk is the same as rules lawyering someone on something you think is a legal play? Winning on rules technicalities is a part of how competitive magic works. Doing straight up illegal plays is not.
To bring up two recent high profile players involved in this type of play (trying to get wins off technicalities): Jackie Lee and Owen Turtenwald.
Owen single blocked after he got attacked with a pyreheart wolf . Pyrehearts ability is a *must* and I am sure owen knows this. I am sure Owen knew his opponent knew this when he attacked. Owen also knew his opponent had not explicitly mentioned the trigger in any way, so under the new rules at the grand prix level he could single block. As soon as the block happened, obviously his opponent protested. Head judge's ruling: Owen can single block. When I first read this I thought "what the malarky is this madness". It just seemed slimy to me. It was always pretty clear to all players what pyreheart does... who puts a 3 mana 1/1 undying in their red deck wins deck? At first this play made me think less of Owen as a player, but it also got me thinking long and hard about the rules at competitive REL. Eventually I realized, I was misguided in taking out this negative impression on Owen, but rather on the trigger rules which allow seemingly illegal board states. I would like the trigger rules changed back to where you can't have *mandatory* triggers not trigger, or at least have some new rule to ensure the pyreheart situation doesnt occur. However, even though I don't like the spirit of the rules in this case, I will still make the single block as Owen did as long as the play is legal. I think of competitive REL as much more similar to a sporting event than just a game. There was a huge furor in golf about something called a *belly putter*. Now, I dont really know much about golf, but I do know that a bunch of the people calling for belly putters to be banned *used belly putters*!! at the same time. I do not view these people as in any way being hypocritical. They are using every currently legal aspect of the rules of their sporting event to win.
In the Jackie Lee example, as I understand it, something roughly along the lines of the following occured: Her opponent had a stab wounded guy and during his upkeep he did not in any way mention verbally or otherwise acknowledge the trigger. Her opponent then went to write down a loss of 2 life during his upkeep (which he did not verbally announce, and he should have). According to Jackie, she though she didn't have to mention the trigger, because he had missed this. Result, Jackie Lee is DQ'ed for cheating-fraud. You might say 'of course!' but its a LOT of people appear to misunderstand the rules justification for this. The loss of 2 life was *not* considered an acknowledgement of the trigger. I mean, why else would you lose two life, clearly the opponent was remembering the trigger and hence marking down the two life lost, but thats *NOT* how the rules are interpreted at competitive REL. She was DQ'ed for a *failure to note a discrepency in life total* which is cheating-fraud. I feel like if I brought this question to these boards everyone would be arguing with me that taking 2 is an acknowledgement of the trigger, but as far a I currently understand the rules *they would be wrong*. To me, the DQ here is 100% correct she clearly was committing fraud by allowing a life total discrepency to knowlingly continue, but I can definitely see her side to the story, which came about with her getting confused about her obligation under the new trigger rules.
I said I WOULD try this WILLINGLY against an unwitting opponent *if I confirmed the play was legal*. I wasnt sure it was legal, which is why I asked. If Jackie Lee had really thought about her play ahead of time, she would have realized it was illegal and Im sure she would *not* have attempted it.
I was arguing for a long time because I felt a bunch of people were arguing based on emotion just as much as logic. Some of them made statements contradictory to my understanding of how actual rulings would happen. Others used arguments that I feel simply wouldnt be supported by high level judge rulings.
I am not trying to muddy the game state. I am trying to make my opponent see floating mana and a revealed card and say *ahhhh the writing is on the wall, time to concede*. I wasnt trying to misrepresent the amount of mana I am tapping or that I can cast the spell. Sure, I am hoping he will mistakenly believe I can cast it, just as I might reveal it without tapping and hope he thinks I can cast it. I am taking a legal action, floating mana, and explicitly saying I am floating mana. The ambiguity comes in because since magic is such a complex game, people tend to use shortcuts rather than follow the rules to the letter, even at high level tournaments. You might say there is *no* ambiguity about an opponent taking 2 during their upkeep from their stab wound trigger, and I think you would be 100% right at FNM. At a GP, you are expected to specifically mention that its do to stab wound. As far as I can tell, if Jackie had honestly not seen him mark his life total, it could have been her opponent getting DQ'ed for the same reason *failure to acknowledge changes in life total*. I have also specifically mentioned that in my example, if your opponent says "I'm dead" you MUST correct them.
Jaxson Bateman came here and explained exactly how he would handle the ruling as a judge, and my response was 'okay, I can see your point, I wont do it". This is because he focused on the fact that tapping and *revealing* could reasonably be considered a shortcut, even though when you cast you place the card on the table (a fact he touched upon). Ikegami pointed out a difference in how shortcuts work in magic and how I thought they worked, and I basically said "yah you are probably right".
I fail to see how going to the *rules* boards and trying to seek clarification of how something would be ruled so I can know if it doesnt work the way I think is underhanded. Its not that I cant see the other side, I can see people who think that Owen's play was underhanded. I don't think it was. Neither did the head judge of a grand prix.
I feel like you're coming around to the right way to think about things and seeing everyone's point of view so I can respect that.
The reason we got a bit put off is because you actually talking about playing cards you didn't have the mana to cast to slip by and your lava axe inquiry is also in my mind quite questionable and I wouldn't respect you as a player for trying it, I think there are judges who would REALLY have a problem with it the way you ORIGINALLY explained it.
But at least you're learning the rules!
bulletd Guidelines:
5.0: I will take this card no matter what. Creature 1 or playable 1 or hate 1.Domri Rade 4.5: Bomb and splashable. Creature 1-2, playable 1-2, removal 1. Obzedat, Ghost Council 4.0: Excellent first pick first pack, will sway me into same colors. Creatures 1-4, removal 1. Rubblehulk 3.5: Excellent first pack pick two, will confirm colors or possibly sway into second color. Ground Assault 3.0: Good in-color addition, or splashable removal/creature. Creatures 3-9, removal 1-3. Kingpin's Pet 2.5: Solid pick in-color; creatures 5-12, removal 3-5. Mugging 2.0: Creatures 10-16; removal 6-7. Act of Treason 1.5: My 23rd or 22nd card, depending on removal. Gutter Skulk 1.0: 23rd card if I don't maindeck an additional land. Mental Vapors 0.5: This card will sometimes be sideboarded in. Shattering Blow 0.0: I will shred this card for counters. Frenzied tilling
I feel like you're coming around to the right way to think about things and seeing everyone's point of view so I can respect that.
The reason we got a bit put off is because you actually talking about playing cards you didn't have the mana to cast to slip by and your lava axe inquiry is also in my mind quite questionable and I wouldn't respect you as a player for trying it, I think there are judges who would REALLY have a problem with it the way you ORIGINALLY explained it.
But at least you're learning the rules!
Yah, I agree the way I first explained it is probably illegal, and in an attempt to figure out exactly what was going wrong I changed the wording several times throughout the thread to try to pin down exactly what was going wrong, but its a bit of a massive thread so I dont expect everyone commenting to have read every post.
I am glad to see people think I am not beyong reason ; ). If I cant admit I might be wrong, then I am basically no better than a troll. While I am still a bit confused (I posted my question with more updated wording to a level 2 judge ask a judge forum) I can certainly see where the "it might not be illegal, but a lot of judge's would reasonably DQ you anyways" is coming from. If everyone can agree that you cant do it, then that is how the game is played and I have no problem with it. Likewise if people agreed I can do it I would have no problems with it.
I am trying to better learn the rules in case I decide to take my game to the next level, and appreciate the help.
In the Jackie Lee example, she was looking at her opponent writing her loss of life and thought that since he never announced it verbally, she could just say nothing and that would be a missed trigger. However, since you're required to point out discrepancies in life totals and she didn't, she was DQ'ed. This is only an example of trying to use the rules to your advantage and not knowing other rules that come in. I don't see how it relates to the present discussion, though.
You have to understand that even if you attempt something that is technically legal, you can't try to screw up your opponent with such tactics. Cheating in the IPG has rarely anything to do with illegal actions, but more with your actual intent. The objective is to create a favorable gaming environment that is fun to play within. While it may be interesting once in a while to rules-lawyer your way out of a defeat, you have to understand that if we let all technically correct play slide, then we have a game where you're constantly double-checking what you're opponent is doing or announcing and trying to bluff the moves of the game.
Trying to bluff about what's in your hand is interesting. Trying to bluff about what you're actually doing is much less interesting for the players. That's the reasoning behind such calls.
Of course, for such calls, it all depends on the judge! It's a close call, with arguments either way, as this thread showed.
Yeah... Until next game, where it'll be right back.
Seriously, there's no way to deal with Rancor in any format. It should be banned, except Gleemax is a lobbyist for the Rancor party, so that'll never happen.
You can't ban rancor, it just returns to your deck.
You might want to actually talk to the Flavor & Storyline Board people... since, you know, our whole reason for playing Magic is the flavor. I'm willing to bet you'll get a lot more interest there than in General.
Indeed, both posters down there would be thrilled.
When talks about banning Jace first started, I was thinking that I would see him banned come June 20th. But as I think more about it, I don't really think that Jace is the problem anymore. Sure his power level leaves very little to the imagination (opening Jace is like opening a refrigerator box with a naked girl on the inside), and sure his price does have a strong impact on what players choose to play (playing Jace is like being intimate with a woman and she doesn't charge you in the morning), but it is not the source of all the problems in Standard.
How do people think saving room to print more abilities on cards is dumbing down the game?
Do you really think, say, Akroma would ever be printed if she said, "Akroma can block by creatures with this ability and cannot be blocked by creatures without this ability. If a creature without this ability would deal combat damage by Akroma would be destroyed, prevent all combat damage that creature would deal to Akroma this combat. Attacking does not cause Akroma to tap. If Akroma is blocked and deals lethal damage, it deals the remainder of its damage to the defending player. Akroma may attack and use abilities that require tapping in the casting cost the turn it enters the battlefield. Akroma cannot be damaged, enchanted, equipped, blocked or targeted by black or red sources" rather than her "dumbed down" wording she has? No freaking way. Keywording and shorthand allows them to make complicated cards easy to play with, allowing them to be printed in the first place.
1. cast frankie peanuts 2. ask opponent "will you concede the game this turn"? if they say yes, you win; if they say no, play a staying power 3. subsequently ask "will you attack this turn"? and "will you cast a spell this turn"? (using a Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir for the second question if necessary) to ensure they can't disrupt the combo 4. donate them a platinum angel 5. play a mox lotus and braingeyser them for every card in their library. play an opalescence and donate them a glorious anthem and a blacker lotus , then play enchanted evening . play and activate a mindslaver and then donate them a fastbond and the mox lotus (returning one of the donates to your hand with eternal witness or whatever) 6. during their turn, play every permanent in their hand (playing lands with fastbond) then (as yourself) cast mirrorweave on the blacker lotus, so every permanent becomes a copy of it. proceed to tear up every card they control, and hopefully do it before they notice that they aren't bound by staying power's ability anymore and can concede
Dark Ritual being overpowered is determined more by what is done with it than the card itself.
True, but the fact that it enables so many ridiculous things is pretty telling. It's like, sure I can use a shotgun as a bludgeoning instrument, but that doesn't make it not a shotgun.
Shortly before Serra died, she transferred her spark into an angel whose full name was Asha Avacyn Bolas. Her dragon father groomed her for her positions in Alara and Innistrad, and she's also been getting help from her uncle Ugin in the form of Urza, who was resurrected as Marit Lage to be the avatar as which she projects herself into material realms. Grieslbrand is a split personality who sometimes wanders the planes disguised as a human woman named Liliana Vess.
Everyone's life would be easier if players would, instead of coming to the 'net for help with a deck, just netdeck and be done with it. And I'm not talking about some Top 8 lists, for the Casualists, too, can benefit from netdecking. I've netdecked plenty of decks from the Casual Play forums from users such as Mown, Raedien, Floopfoot, and a few others. I snatched straight the heck out of my web browser. Yes, people, your original idea fell victim to a savage netdecker. You have been assimiliated.
Suppose I wanted a Zombie deck. Why on earth would I spend time searching Gatherer for a decent list of Zombie cards when Raedien already did it for me? Taking time to be creative or waiting on people on the forums to tell you why your deck sucks or 'go to Casual forums' is a disasterous waste of time (to me).
That being said, Magic was ruined back in Alpha when they added all that rules and cards [Debutantes avert your eyes]. My friends and I still like playing it the "pure" way (Basically we go into the woods and hit eachother with wiffle bats while shouting made up obscenities. You know, the way Garfield wanted it to be played).
Don't worry about it. I've come up with a list of changes to fix EDH.
-First off, there's no commander. -The minimum deck size is 60 cards, and each deck can have up to four of each card, save basic lands and relentless rats. Also decks have no color identity. -Starting life total is 20.
Here's a clever play you can try yourself: -Convince friend to run relentless rats.dec in legacy tournament -Get a deck with lots of mill, yixlid jailer, and humility -Drop humility and jailer, wait for him to dump his hand, mill him out -All his rats now have no abilities. Call a judge because he's playing an illegal deck with more than 4 of a single card. -Get him/her banned from competitive magic play
L, is for the leather gloves you weaaaar. O, is for the organs that guy could spaaaare. V, is very very, extraordinay. E, is for every vagrant i butchered in a wine cellar befooooore.
The outer layer of the Magic: the Gathering box, the carton, or crust, is fairly thin and light, and contains largely aluminosilcates.
Within that lies the middle layer, consisting of the familiar booster pack. Although solid, the booster packs' high temperatures allow them to acutally move around within the booster box. This flow, sometimes called convection, is cited by frustrated box mappers as one of WOTC's most genious uses of thermodynamics since the Ravnica block.
No one knows what lies at the core of the booster box, but scientists theorize that it must be especially dense in order to make up for the large amount of fluff distributed amongst the booster packs.
I imagine [Ajani 3's] second ability involves him hurling the creature at your opponent Brion Stoutarm style, then the guy is just like "Okay, that may have worked, but don't- GOD DAMN IT!" as he does it again because cats don't give a **** :33.
Its like that one time Elves broke out in a field of Jund. Elves became a resurgent hit, then died off again once Jund adapted to the rest of the field of G/W that it required mass removal that inherently pooped on Elves too.
Submit to the menace. Delver can, and will blot out the sun.
"I remember my days as a youth at Tolarian Academy ." "Wow, small multiverse, I actually went there too." "WAIT, DON'T- Well ****, there's $200,000 in student loans well spent."
And flavor goes out the window when you cast a second copy of a planeswalker right after the first one dies, so...
"Hey Nissa, I need a favor." "You just asked me for a 'favor' like thirty seconds ago, and it turned out to be having Sarkhan Transmogrify my only follower into a dragon like 5 times -which dickery aside also violates some laws of causality - and then you let me get beaten over the head by that hedron crab." "...I'll give you " "...Well all right then."
GM, I don't think Dill is better than you. I KNOW it. Even if he wakes up every morning, clubs a baby seal, steals all the TV remotes from within a block's radius of his house and then robs hungry orphans of their food he'd be better than you, for the simple reason that he learns from his mistakes.
What would they have to fight about? Like, all I can think of now is Gideon going "Hey, long-ears! I'm gathering a group of 'Walkers together to fight some tentacle monsters.....you want in?" and Tamiyo going "Ew! Hentai no bakka Gideon-desu desu!" and flying away.
I open 4 packs just to be on the safe side. Not only do I get more cards than everyone else, but I also get to spend the rest of the night off. Win Win.
MaRo has a thing for people opening boosters with bad cards. But since he can only get so many bad cards printed in each set, he has found a devious way of getting more bad cards into circulation: He makes entire print sheets with just bad rares, then puts them onto the assembly line. He proceeds to wring his hands and twirl his evil mustache that he grew for twirling purposes as a lightning bolt strikes in the background. Afterwards, he goes to make sure that the good cards are only opened by everyone's friends, and that we all only get to open bad cards. He does this by memorising each booster, than switching them around accordingly. Whenever someone complains about a card, he immediately jumps out from behind a chair to yell "WELL, IT'S NOT FOR YOU!" before merging back into the shadows in order to devise new ways in which he can screw over players, then claim that he has valid reasons for doing so.
Mark Rosewater is sitting in a seemingly innocuous cable TV van, outside of Bankaimastery's house. Sitting nearby are two hardened criminal hackers, fresh out of prison, and filled with resentment at their lack of physical fitness. "Have you managed to hack his brainwaves yet? The set deadline's coming up fast." "We're almost through. It should be coming up on the screen any second." The hacker presses a button, and Kevin's thoughts flash onto the screen. Mark and the hackers stare in amazement at the sheer beauty, the elegance, and the raw truth of what they see. It's like the ending to 2001: A Space Odyssey. Brilliant light shines across the screen, the truth of existence is made clear to them, and they despair at their own foolishness, their own ignorance, their own inadequacy. And then they steal his ideas. As they return back to R&D, Mark sneers at a haggard old man chained to a cast-iron sphere. The man looks up from his laborious task of breaking rocks in the dungeon of Wizards of the Coast headquarters, and asks a question: "Kevin, my greatest student. He - he's all right, isn't he? You didn't hurt him?" Mark deals him a weighty blow with his boot. "Know your place, Richard. Get back to work."
I'm only opposed to it because it bears so little relation to how people actually play the game. The example of Miracles is actually a much better one then the Clone example I was trying to use.
From the game's perspective, the card can move instantly from face down in the library to revealed in the hand and that's fine for the rules. But in real life, we can't actually do that, so the card spends a good bit of time in locations that are neither where that player's library is nor where that player's hand is. And that's fine for real life. What I don't want is the disconnect to be explicitly codified. Along the lines of
183664.697 A game of Magic as laid out by these rules exists only as a pure Platonic ideal, utterly unrealizable by fallible mortals limited by the confines of physicality and the ravages of evil and sin.
183664.698 The cake is a lie, too.
I know it's true, but I don't want the rules to actually straight-up tell me that.
Pfft this cant be serious can it? If it is please delete your account OP. Its not even close to ban worthy, considering what JTMS and stoneforge had to accomplish to get banned i see the WotC selling magic to aquire Pokemon before that ever happens.
I'm trying to imagine sorin markov as a gym leader in one of those pokemon games which you have to beat him to get his badge... somehow I imagine that he would stab you in the chest with his sword before giving you the badge, even if you beat his pokemon....
Personally, I'd be fine with tea time but then I'm not gonna waste the mana summoning Emrakul, the Aeons Torn . He always takes all the sugar, drinks the whole pot of Earl Grey and doesn't even say thank you. SO. RUDE.
Break the Card is a regular thread in the Cards and Combo Forum. Quite simply, the participants are given a Johnnystatic card (e.g. Xenograft ) and are asked to build a deck around it. The winner and honorable mentions are sigged below. Get brewing!
This week's Break the Card was based around Xenograft . Thread : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/27681049/Break_the_card_:_Xenograft?pg=1
Winner : Axterix with his Vampdrazi deck. Finalist : Vektor480 with his Ally/Golem/Plant deck. Honorable mentions : Zammm for the Turntimber Ranger combo and TinGorilla for suggesting Sarkhan the Mad .
Here's the link to the Mindlock Orb contest : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/27697565/Break_the_Card_:_Mindlock_Orb?sdb=1&pg=last#497536269
Here's the link to Break the Card : Bludgeon Brawl : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/27715169/Break_the_Card_:_Bludgeon_Brawl?sdb=1&pg=last#498208797
Winner : Vektor and his Grab the World deck. Finalist : Crandor with his Awesome Aliteration deck. Honorable mentions : RP Jesus with his Wat deck and Zix200 with his Signet Renewal deck.
This week was Followed Footsteps : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/27748677/Break_the_Card_:_Followed_Footsteps?pg=1
Winner : Tevish_Szat with his Exponential Growth deck. Honorable mentions : Zix with his Carbon Copies deck and Escef with his Fungus of Speed and Time deck.
This week's card was Jace's Archivist : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/28063377/Break_the_Card_:_Jaces_Archivist.
Finalists : Jentaru with his "Consecration of the Draw" deck and HereticSmitty with his "ADHD: The deck" deck. Winner : JaxsonBateman with his "The Archives Are Endless!" deck.
I have one piece of advice for you: don't try this. Ever. Because when (not if) your opponent--or a player at the next table, or a spectator--realizes what's going on and calls me over, you and I are going to have a nice long talk that's almost certain to end with you being disqualified. You're attempting to tightrope walk on a thread two feet over a lava pit here--even if you don't quite fall you're still going to get badly burned.
Generally speaking, any time a player is trying to explain to me how what they were doing wasn't actually cheating because technically they didn't do X, or because they made sure to do Y, I'm going to be extremely skeptical to the point of outright disbelief. Those explanations being made at all means the player knows very well they're doing something shady--either they're cheating and they know it but they're trying to cover their ass after the fact, or they're still cheating but have managed to rationalize their behavior so as to convince themselves it's not really cheating. And I have a very low tolerance for rationalization.
You thought that this was shady enough to warrant making this thread and asking about it before trying it in a real event. The very fact that you felt you had to do that should give you your answer: it's shady, and quite possibly cheating. You shouldn't do it. So don't.
And so people say to me, "How do I know if a word is real?" You know, anyone who's read a children's book knows that love makes things real. If you love a word, use it! That makes it real. Being in the dictionary is an artificial distinction; it doesn't make the word any more real than any other word. If you love a word, it becomes real. --Erin McKean, Redefining the Dictionary
: Regenerate.
It's a close call, with arguments either way, as this thread showed.
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