About blocking D-actions, Eagle Sight and blocking window

AaronC wrote:

Thanks for that reference from LSJ, because, again, there is a player who sometimes plays the game of picking up his pool as if taking a bleed, and then, nope, oops, he never put it down, and oh, there, the bleed is bounced.

Break that guy's fingers. One solution for both picking up the pool and bouncing the bleed
More serious: I think asking 'any blocks' in a loud enough and clear voice should do the trick. If people running eagle's sight should just be more attentive of things to block, so that when the question comes they can react as needed.

AaronC wrote:

That doesn't fully answer the question. It seems as though you are saying that any indication that a player declines to block is sufficient.

It is.

AaronC wrote:

However, that doesn't answer whether every player who legally can block must decline to block before the action can continue. That is my understanding, but you claim that it "is very much wrong".

And that's what the other LSJ ruling addresses. (Yes, you are still "very much wrong".) Don't kill the game with tedium. Do your bit to help the game flow.

Just as we don't announce every single possible timing phase for every possible play of every possible effect and, somehow, we still manage to play cards, it is also possible to handle the question of blocking without entering into a staring contest with every player on the table, followed by the signing of a contract corroborated by two uninvolved witnesses, in red ink on vellum.

If you can cope with the situation where I play Govern the Unaligned and we work on the principle that no-one is DI-ing it when I've gone on, at a leisurely pace, to draw a replacement, then play Seduction, then draw a replacement, then tapped Brigitte Gebauer (Wraith) to get an extra +1 bleed in the "as announced" window, you can cope with any other similar situation. Including:

- calling for blocks
- handling polling in a referendum
- allowing a player to play Nosferatu Putrescence
- a cross-table play of Rotschreck, by neither of the combatants
- bidding during Malkavian Time Auction when one player attempts to bid out of turn

AaronC wrote:

Thanks for that reference from LSJ, because, again, there is a player who sometimes plays the game of picking up his pool as if taking a bleed, and then, nope, oops, he never put it down, and oh, there, the bleed is bounced.

Picking up your pool and making the mechanical motions for taking the bleed can reasonably indicate no blocks. The impulse goes back to the acting Methuselah who can then change the bleed, such as increasing it, or whatever else. If that happens, it's perfectly reasonable for the player to bounce the bleed. (Moving the pool to the blood bank can't rush by that timing window.) If nothing happens, the player deciding to bounce instead of taking the bleed is reasonable, if a little weird. Possibly the player thinks picking up the pool will lull the acting Methuselah into thinking they don't have a bounce and so draw out the Conditioning - but if "no block" has been communicated, it's still no block.

jamesatzephyr wrote:

AaronC wrote:

However, that doesn't answer whether every player who legally can block must decline to block before the action can continue. That is my understanding, but you claim that it "is very much wrong".

And that's what the other LSJ ruling addresses. (Yes, you are still "very much wrong".) Don't kill the game with tedium. Do your bit to help the game flow.

I read the entire post by LSJ ([LSJ 20060822]), and it is very interesting. However, it addresses the responsibilities of the acting player, and I am interested in the responsibility of the reacting players. Are all players who can apparently legally block required to communicate block or no block?

By the way, I really appreciate your knowledge and research, but I don't appreciate your occasionally bitchy tone. If you are going to hold yourself up as an expert and also use a disparaging tone on this forum, I would appreciate knowing your actual name, location, and what tournaments you have judged. Curious to see your TWDs for example.

AaronC wrote:

I read the entire post by LSJ ([LSJ 20060822]), and it is very interesting. However, it addresses the responsibilities of the acting player, and I am interested in the responsibility of the reacting players.

No, it addresses the responsibilities of everyone to not kill the game with tedium and to do their bit to help game flow. The same issues found in (mis-)announcing an action apply to pretty much all effect announcements.

AaronC wrote:

Are all players who can apparently legally block required to communicate block or no block?

Clearly, you need to determine whether the action is being blocked or not. This does not allow a player to say "Lalala, I'm not listening to anything going on on the table, you have to PUNCH ME IN THE FACE before I'll answer."

AaronC wrote:

By the way, I really appreciate your knowledge and research, but I don't appreciate your occasionally bitchy tone. If you are going to hold yourself up as an expert and also use a disparaging tone on this forum, I would appreciate knowing your actual name, location, and what tournaments you have judged. Curious to see your TWDs for example.

By posting links to actual, verifiable rulings, I don't have to hold myself up as an expert. That's the point. Since you are, repeatedly, arguing "Well, I understand it works like this" without providing any backing for your point of view, it is you who's arguing as though you are an authority. When the rulings are provided and they don't support you and you still continue to assert your wrongness, perhaps you should be less surprised that the reactions you provoke are somewhat brusker than you apparently desire. (For example, arguing from a point of view that players ignoring, you know, questions about the game is a tenable state of affairs is not at all reasonable.)

However, I've judged (single judge and multi-judge) a large number of UK tournaments over the years - local things, nationals, Continental Qualifiers, whatever. (I haven't had much access to real world V:TES for a while, as a consequence of a slightly weird job choice meaning I have relatively little free time many evenings, and my weekends are then taken up with the things I'd do at other times.)

AaronC wrote:

I read the entire post by LSJ ([LSJ 20060822]), and it is very interesting. However, it addresses the responsibilities of the acting player, and I am interested in the responsibility of the reacting players. Are all players who can apparently legally block required to communicate block or no block?

The responsibility of reacting players is to answer the question asked - "Are there any other block attempts?"

On "announcing any oddball timing phases":

Its helpful to imterject with"not done!" During the part of another players minion phase when you can use cog or madness network.

Its helpful to ask "any DI?" On a really heinous action thats unblocked, like sense dep, or maybe amaranth.

Ive been asked "AI?" When being bled for 4.

Hell, i (jokingly 90% or the time) ask "any foul blood?" After hunting, before adding a bead.

I know weve all backtracked by a discard action, adding or removing a bead, playing freak drive, etc.

If you are worried, ask "any eagles sight/falcons eye/annekke block?" Before playing your bleed pump.

Otherwise, deal with getting blocked after the normal block options are denied.

Small mistakes happen, ive ousted with Marcellous playing aire of elation, and nobody noticed somethimg wrong until a minute laterwhen i bled with someone else(luckily, no decks were shuffled yet....)

You CAN play like an ass, and eagle sight after the target declines if the acting methuselah doesnt ask.

You always bounce after pump, its common to act like you wont, amd ask "how much?" So, if it could cost a turn sooner vp, assume someone will screw you, and ask.

Especially ir im playing

Pascal, interpretation?