I’m going to be discussing situations at Competitive REL events that may be unintuitive to most players. REL stands for Rules Enforcement Level. The REL of an event dictates how the judges handle fixing situations as well as some other things. The following events are not run at Competitive REL but are instead run at Regular REL: Friday Night Magic, side events, and most of Magic tournaments. A good rule of thumb is that if the event requires you to fill out a decklist, it is Competitive REL.

Most large one-day events follow a similar schedule. The judge call is at 8:30 A.M. Registration starts at 9:00 A.M. The actual event should begin at 10:00 A.M. I recommend arriving at 9:00 A.M. if possible. The first common mistake that players make is filling out their decklists incorrectly. This is the easiest and most common way for a player to receive a game loss. This game loss is normally awarded at the start of Round 2. Filling out your decklist correctly will greatly increase your enjoyment of the event.

I recommend that you check your decklist in the same way that I might deck-check you. Take your deck and flip it so that you can see the cards. Sort the cards out by converted mana cost. Next, look at the cards as they are written out on your decklist. Scoop up those cards and just pile them up in order. At the end, your deck will be sorted exactly how it is written out on your decklist. If your deck and list are in disagreement, you will know. After that, I recommend you count the cards. You can do this by pile shuffling since you’ll need to shuffle your decklist thoroughly anyways. Sort your sideboard the same way. I have informed players of far too many game losses for fourteen-card sideboards. Alternatively, you can exchange decks with a friend to make it more interesting.

The next-easiest way to acquire a game loss is to arrive late to your seat for the round. The head judge will normally announce the tardiness policy in his opening announcements. At most events I’ve judged, there is a zero-minute tardiness policy for a game loss. What this means is that a player arriving at his seat after the clock started will receive a game loss. At other events, I’ve seen a three-minute tardiness policy or a one-minute tardiness policy. Players arriving ten minutes late forfeit their matches and are dropped from the event unless they speak to the head judge or scorekeeper prior to the end of that round.

These penalties probably appear harsh. Forgetting to write down the sixtieth card on your decklist or arriving at your seat a minute and a half after the round started are probably honest mistakes. We are aware of this. The decklist penalty is harsh to prevent potential cheating, and the tardiness penalty is harsh because it both delays the event and makes the event less fun for your opponent.

In short, making sure you show up on time to each round with the correct deck and decklist helps you out.

After an event ends, I sometimes hear a player tell me about some error that occurred that wasn’t fixed because he didn’t want to bother a judge. I probably drove two hours to arrive at 8:30 A.M. and left more than twelve hours later. I greatly enjoy answering your questions. That’s why I became a judge and spent fifteen or so hours of my life to be at this event. We enjoy answering your questions and solving problems.

Sometimes, I hear a player complain that he was deck-checked multiple times. Normally, the judge staff chooses which table to deck-check in a round through a very secretive method. We click the random-player button in Wizards Event Reporter or DCI reporter and deck-check that table. Occasionally, we will flag a player for a deck-check. There are two common reasons—and one less common reason—we might flag a table for deck-checks. If you filled out a list with sixty-one or more cards in it (especially if you write that there are sixty total cards in your main deck), we may want to check to make sure you got it right. Alternatively, someone may have observed that your sleeves looked to be in bad condition. It is relatively rare that cheating concerns are raised, and we need to verify for those purposes.

Penalties

If the player who wrote fifty-nine cards on his decklist only received a warning, it might be advantageous for the player to do this intentionally. A judge would bring the incorrect decklist to the player’s attention at the start of Round 2. At that point, the player will know who his Round 2 opponent is and be able to change that sixtieth care accordingly. At that time, that player’s decklist would be finalized. With the current system, a game loss is sufficient to make the expected value of such actions negative—even if the player could ensure that he wouldn’t be disqualified. The current system greatly discourages trying to take advantage of the system by filling out one’s decklist incorrectly.

Another infraction that may appear unintuitive is called Failure to Maintain Game State. This is a reminder that when your opponent cast his 5-mana spell with 4 mana, you are partially responsible for allowing that to happen. Most judges will never upgrade Failure to Maintain Game State warnings into a game loss. So, if you do receive one of these, I’d like you to think, “Hey, I should be watching what my opponent is doing more carefully,” and nothing more.

Player Question of the Article

While some judges are fairly obvious about whom they are going to deck-check, the goal of a deck-check is to check the deck of players exactly when the decks are presented to their opponents. This is done so that judges have the ability to catch players who are cheating through the use of deck stacking or other methods. If a cheating player knows that he or she is going to be deck-checked, it would be a trivial matter to mash or riffle a few times and erase any obvious signs of that cheating. If judges are discreet, it maintains the appearance that anyone (even you) could be deck-checked any time.

Triggered Abilities and You at Competitive REL Events

You may have heard about “lapsing triggers” as well as something about how you are no longer responsible for your opponents’ missed triggers. The missed trigger rules have changed again. Lapsing triggers no longer exist. The DCI decided that lapsing triggers were confusing and overhauled the missed trigger policy again. What you need to remember is that you need to just announce all of your triggers. It doesn’t matter how obvious it is that you know about your triggered ability—just make it clear that you are aware of it when it triggers. If you control four 1/1 white Spirit creature tokens with flying, cast Craterhoof Behemoth, and turn all your creatures sideways without saying anything, you missed Craterhoof Behemoth’s triggered ability. My advice is to cast your card, poke it with your finger, and say, “Trigger.” It seems like something that will be possible to remember and repeat throughout a day, where not only your mind, but also your luck and stamina, are put to the test.

If you have a question about judging, please ask. I wish you the best of luck to you at your next event.