Judge Case Study: Missed Contestation

Hello All, I judged the San Francisco qualifier this weekend, and had a tough call to make in a tricky situation. Here is the setup: Sometime midgame, everyone in the 10-20 pool range. Meth A is playing Assamite big caps bleed/vote. Meth B is playing Brujah princes. Meth C's deck isn't relevant, but he has Dreams of the Sphinx in play. Meth D isn't relevant. Meth E isn't relevant. Meth A's turn, plays Dreams of the Sphinx in his master phase, and no one notices that it contests the one already in play. Meth A taps it immediately to increase hand size, and draws two cards. Meth A plays Khobar: Glory. Meth B tries to block with 2nd Tradition. Meth A plays Lost in Crowds. No other block attempts. Meth A untaps and then bleeds with Govern, replacing the govern and asking for blocks. At that point, someone notices the Dreams is contested, and I'm called over. All players agree with the situation as described above. I take Meth A aside and note that he has drawn 5 cards since the Dreams was used illegally (2 from Dreams, 1 from Khobar: Glory, 1 from Lost in Crowds, 1 from Govern.) I ask him if he is certain of the cards that he drew. He is certain of 4 of the 5 cards. Therefore, my ruling was: Rewind to Meth A's master phase, immediately after Dreams has been played (and contested.) Take the 4 cards that were certainly redrawn plus 1 card at random from Meth A's hand and shuffle them back into Meth A's deck. Put the 2nd Tradition back in Meth B's hand, and shuffle the redrawn card back into Meth B's deck. Meth A now continues with his turn, from the beginning of his minion phase. What would you have done? My ruling was based on the idea that I didn't want Meth A to get any advantage from his mis-play. Cycling 5 extra cards is obviously an advantage, and simply putting the 2 most recently draw cards back in the deck didn't seem sufficient to me. I welcome your insights, and especially any thoughts from LSJ. Thanks, Ira

I think that's plenty fair. You can't completely return the game state to where it was before(people will have knowledge about what other players have if they see them play cards illegally) and you have freedom as the judge to decide exactly what's best for the given situation. Great tournaments, btw! Brandon

I felt it was the right call, since you're right that merely putting back the two cards would still let Meth A know what was coming. A followup to that issue is that as Meth B, I was privy to the knowledge that I was probably going to fail to block Khobar: Glory; am I cleared to decline to play 2nd Trad? Or must I "pretend" that i didn't know better? Just a personal opinion, I believe it is the responsibility of the player who played a Unique card to check the table if there's another copy of it, in addition to announcing it in a way that everyone knows it was played. Of course Meth A played well, and probably the table's was not too focused at that time (I didn't even know he tapped Dreams for two cards, and I was his prey too!). Just one of those things that happen from time to time.

On May 3, 4:59 pm, Gerentt <gerenttc...@gmail.com> wrote: > I felt it was the right call, since you're right that merely putting > back the two cards would still let Meth A know what was coming. > > A followup to that issue is that as Meth B, I was privy to the > knowledge that I was probably going to fail to block Khobar: Glory; am > I cleared to decline to play 2nd Trad? Or must I "pretend" that i > didn't know better? My intention with the ruling was that all Meths were free to play however they wished at that point. Meth A was not obligated to start with the Khobar: Glory, or bleed after that, and Meth B was not obligated to try to block at any point. It's true that Meth A revealed that he had 3 cards in hand (Glory, Govern, Lost in Crowds) and Meth B revealed that he had 1 card in hand (2nd Tradition), but I felt that was the best solution. I'm most curious to know what LSJ would have done in that situation, though I hope many other experienced judges will share their insights so we all can learn and have a more consistent and fair judging experience for all players worldwide. Thanks, Ira

[ quoted text not captured ] I'd say that's a good call. Rewind back as much as possible and continue from there is a good rule of thumb. Beat whinybabies with Stick.

On May 3, 7:47 pm, "ira...@gmail.com" <ira...@gmail.com> wrote: > Hello All, > > I judged the San Francisco qualifier this weekend, and had a tough > call to make in a tricky situation. Here is the setup: > > Sometime midgame, everyone in the 10-20 pool range. > Meth A is playing Assamite big caps bleed/vote. > Meth B is playing Brujah princes. > Meth C's deck isn't relevant, but he has Dreams of the Sphinx in play. > Meth D isn't relevant. > Meth E isn't relevant. ... and no one has any knowledge of the order of any of the cards in A's library. [ quoted text not captured ] I concur. Rewinding, when possible, is the best call, except when knowledge gained poses a large enough problem (which it doesn't seem to in this case). Since you're rewinding (good call), you should also return Khabar: Glory, Lost in Crowds, and Govern to A's hand (less any of these that were among the cards returned to A's library). That is, A's ash heap should be in exactly the same state it was at A's master phase, as part of the rewind.

On May 4, 4:55 am, LSJ <vtes...@white-wolf.com> wrote: > On May 3, 7:47 pm, "ira...@gmail.com" <ira...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > Hello All, > > > I judged the San Francisco qualifier this weekend, and had a tough > > call to make in a tricky situation. Here is the setup: > > > Sometime midgame, everyone in the 10-20 pool range. > > Meth A is playing Assamite big caps bleed/vote. > > Meth B is playing Brujah princes. > > Meth C's deck isn't relevant, but he has Dreams of the Sphinx in play. > > Meth D isn't relevant. > > Meth E isn't relevant. > > ... and no one has any knowledge of the order of any of the cards in > A's library. Yes, good clarification. If people knew the order of cards in A's or B's library, I would have maintained that information when we rewound. [ quoted text not captured ] I'm glad to hear you would have done the same thing. Perhaps you could provide an example where the knowledge gained poses a large problem? Perhaps instead of a bleed, it was a vote, and the acting minion played Awe for 5, and then someone played Delaying Tactics? In that case, what would you have done - just return 2 most recently drawn cards to A's library, shuffle and continue? What if the Awe was one of the 2 most recently drawn cards? > Since you're rewinding (good call), you should also return Khabar: > Glory, Lost in Crowds, and Govern to A's hand (less any of these that > were among the cards returned to A's library). > > That is, A's ash heap should be in exactly the same state it was at > A's master phase, as part of the rewind. Yes, that's exactly what I did. Sorry that was unclear from my description. Thanks, Ira

[ quoted text not captured ] While I (Assamite bleeder) was unhappy with the outcome, I think in the end Ira did do the right thing. And by me being unhappy, I don't refer at all to Ira's decision. Let's take this action one card further... After we unwound, I intentionally contested Dreams, and the sequence of actions, reactions, and modifiers proceeded exactly the same ending with an unblocked bleed of 5 at zero stealth. Then the Brujah Methuselah played Archon Investigation, burning Ur- Shulgi and crippling me. Oh Snap! In fact, if the Dreams contestation error had not been noticed, we had only moments to spare before the AI was played. Now suppose that Ira had been summoned to the table after the AI had been played. What would have been the best judgment call? I'd be curious to first hear Ira's point of view and then LSJ's. Thanks, Jeff

[ quoted text not captured ] Jeff, I'm happy to hear that you don't have any hard feelings about the ruling. I didn't realize that Ur-Shulgi got AI'ed! I think your example is excellent. Obviously it's a much trickier situation. I guess I would acknowledge that "knowledge gained poses a large problem" and therefore we cannot rewind. Your hand size should be 7, but simply putting back the two most recently played cards means you got the benefit of the dreams when you shouldn't. I would probably take 2 random cards from the 9 card hand and put it back in your deck and shuffle. Maybe if you were certain about the 2 most recently played cards, and you had all the played cards in hand before using Dreams, you could just put the 2 most recently played cards back in your deck and shuffle. At that point, I'd probably feel a little pity for you, since Ur-Shulgi just burned. :) I'd love to know what LSJ would do, or any experienced judge. Ira

[ quoted text not captured ] LSJ, any thoughts on this revised case study? What if the AI was already played? Ira

[ quoted text not captured ] Then most likely that would qualify as "too much having passed", precluding a rewind, so another remedy would have to be invented by the judge in accordance with the complete game state.

[ quoted text not captured ] I agree. I'm asking you to imagine yourself in the situation and state what you would probably do if you were the judge. This isn't a ruling; this is a case study with the hopes of teaching judges how to make good judgments in the future in similar situations. I'm trying to learn how to be a better judge, and to help other judges improve as well. I take it as a starting point that you are the best possible judge, so I would like to learn from you. Please enlighten us! If there isn't enough information in the case study I presented, feel free to ask me clarifying questions. Or, even better, invent whatever additional information you need to make a compelling case study that will most effectively illuminate the principles involved. In this case, I'm trying to learn more about: - When should we rewind or not? Guiding principle: if too much information has been revealed or not. - In the case of too much information being revealed, what do we do? What should guide us? From previous case studies, I believe: do not give an advantage to the player who has mis-played. - By way of example, in the particular case study presented (AI played after extra cards cycled from a Dreams that should have been contested), what would you personally do? Of course, other judges could use their judgment and rule differently and be correct, but it's nice to have some collective basis for judgment. Thank you, Ira

[ quoted text not captured ] Hello LSJ, Any chance we could get your take on this trickier situation? I think it would greatly help illuminate similar situations that will surely come up for judges in the future. Thank you, Ira

[ quoted text not captured ] Far too many variables. A possible solution is: identify the extra two cards draw from tapping Dreams. Return them to the library (assuming they are still in hand), remove the counter from Dreams. Flip Dreams over (contested). Continue from there (after the AI). Other solutions are easily possible and perhaps even more suitable, depending on the exact game state.