Forgetting mandatory effects

Unfortunately there is very little written "officially" about this subject of who is responsible for remembering what. The judges' guidelines (last updated in 2004) don't mention the subject.

Here is the "official" ruling about Leandro from the VEKN site:

The victim Methuselah must choose. There is no default choice. If the players all forget about Leandor's effect until later, the situation must be remedied, but forcing one choice or the other on the victim is not a suitable remedy. [LSJ 10-DEC-2002]

This ruling seems to state, as Jeff (Adonai) said, that it is everyone's responsibility to remember the Leandro effect. There is no punishment to be handed out, just a game state error that must be remedied. By extension, it may also be everyone's responsibility to remember every effect.

I know that in my playgroup I have to watch everyone like a hawk to see if they make mistakes such as accidentally replacing "do not replace" cards. Since they almost never read the full text of their cards out loud, I have to grab every unfamiliar card and read it if I don't want mistakes to be made. (I usually don't make the effort...) It's so, so hard to do that when you're trying to think about your own game, too.

The problem is that the judges' guidelines say that offending players should not gain an advantage from their infractions. So there really needs to be a way to identify who commits each infraction in order to identify who cannot benefit.

I think the judges' guidelines could be updated to talk about this more clearly. A different judge could just as well not given your player that warning.

Aaron wrote:

The problem is that the judges' guidelines say that offending players should not gain an advantage from their infractions. So there really needs to be a way to identify who commits each infraction in order to identify who cannot benefit.

That's not really all that necessary.

Any correction a judge makes should be aiming to put the game into the position it would have been had it all gone smoothly. A gift of pool or taking of pool (for example) should not generally be designed to benefit or harm the recipient but to restore them to their right place, as best as the judge can judge it.

To my mind, the point the guidelines are making is more one of "You, as a judge, are empowered to intervene. You shouldn't just sit on your hands and say 'Too late now' or 'It was your own fault'." It's important that the judge intervenes to restore the state (which itself denies the benefit as much as is feasible), rather than being able to say that it was 70% my fault and 30% your fault.

The question is excellent. I am *also* working on a new judges' Guide, in which this *will* appear.

There will be a philosophy, a penalty, and a correction for each scenario that you guys (anyone feel free to send me / post over here scenarii).

(By the way, after chatting a tad with the MTG guys, it appears they'll penalize the controller of the triggering effect, not the player for whom it triggers)

Pascal wrote:

The question is excellent. I am *also* working on a new judges' Guide, in which this *will* appear.

There will be a philosophy, a penalty, and a correction for each scenario that you guys (anyone feel free to send me / post over here scenarii).

Of course, you mean to say "a penalty (when necessary)" as, fr.ex., the above scenario doesn't rise to the level of being important enough for a penalty.

Perhaps a discussion, private or otherwise, of what errors are "important enough for a penalty" would be useful?

fr.ex. Since we have almost no cheaters in our game, compared to Magic where almost everyone is a cheater, that guideline which was copied from the Magic rules over a decade ago, which states that everyone who draws A SINGLE CARD incorrectly shall be assessed a "warning", is complete and utter shit.

Kevin, that is how the judges' guide is currently organized: philosophy -> penalty -> correction.

According to the Judges' Guide, any error has a penalty. The penalty for small stuff, like replacing a card you are not supposed to, is a "caution".

I think it's great that Pascal is working on an updated judges' guide. I had an on-going discussion several months ago with some of the old-time LA players about judging philosophies, and a lot of what they had to say either did not match the current guide or else had no "official" backing (which means the philosophies were based on things LSJ said, whether recorded or not, but which were never actually incorporated into the rulebook or Judges' Guide).

It's interesting that Kevin, an experienced judge, already says that some errors don't merit penalties, when the Judges' Guide doesn't seem to support that.

Hopefully Pascal is looking for input from judges like Kevin to find out what is actually being done around the world. The guidelines should reflect actual practices or start a discussion towards stronger standardized practices.