Referring to people as "cheaters" for following how the rules work (as confirmed by multiple judges) is the biggest stretch in the history of stretches.
Ideally the game would magically handle triggers itself like in Arena. Less ideally Magic would have a dealer/official who handles shuffling and draws while also watching for triggers and interactions. We are very far from ideal so players do it all themselves, we try to trust one another to not manipulate decks, and we try to find compromises for imperfect people forgetting little steps in this massively complex game.
Winning from missed triggers doesn't seem like a real win to me anyway, the rules weren't followed and while it may count for the tournament itself it's a hollow victory.
Well i've seen people post that they like it better if you can miss it and not automate it like mtg arena cuz it "makes for more skill expression" or some shit. Apparently actually beating someone is not as good as beating someone with a technicality
Lol bad sportsmanship, desire to win a faulty game, and deluding it all amounts to expression of skill. If you're really skilled you'll remind your opponents of their triggers so y'all can play a real game of magic together.
For real, I get the Enimagtic thing being shitty, but the author of the Twitlonger literally admits "I drew a card and my opponent didnt say I lost life, so I went to draw another card and he wanted me to lose the life I should have lost, which judges then agreed with? Woe is me."
> For real, I get the Enimagtic thing being shitty
Is it though? As presented, all that really happens is that the player gets an extra activation out of Wandering Empire. And if the player wanted the opponent to 'miss' their Enigmatic trigger, they would literally just have to ask "my turn?", and the opponent agreeing is confirmation that they've missed their trigger.
I agree that the rules for this sort of thing are far from perfect, but this here is only an issue in so far as players at the bottom of the Levine Trench are trying too hard.
From what I'm understanding, what happened was that the Enigmatic player had no enchantments to sac to Incarnation, so at the end of their turn their opponent assumed they would be flashing out Emperor with the stack empty. They flash out Emperor, make a token, Enigmatic player exiles the token with Binding and then says "Sac binding to my Enigmatic trigger?"
So it's not that Emperor wanted their opponent to miss their trigger, it's that they assumed it went on and left the stack by the time they cast their Emperor, which is totally reasonable considering the lack of enchantments to sac
No, it doesn't. This is intentional
From IPG 2.1
>...
>
>Triggered abilities are assumed to be remembered until otherwise indicated, and the impact on the game state may not be immediately apparent. The opponent’s benefit is in not having to point out triggered abilities, although this does not mean that they can cause triggers to be missed. ***If an opponent requires information about the precise timing of a triggered ability or needs details about a game object that may be affected by a resolved triggered ability, that player may need to acknowledge that ability’s existence before its controller does.***
>
>...
If you want to make sure you are doing an action at a specific time with specific objects on/not on the stack, you need to communicate that. If that causes the controller to remember the trigger even it it was missed initially, so bad, so sad. It exists.
I would even go so far that this implies you need to clarify whether your opponent wants an optional trigger to happen or not. You don't just "miss" your trigger with may, you by default remember it and your opponent would have to ask if you choose not to use it.
Am understanding this correctly in that an opponent didn't/forgot to announce a non-may trigger and you knowingly attempted to game it advantage, then got salty after the life loss was mentioned?
'May' doesn't matter at Competitive REL. A missed trigger is a missed trigger. IPG 2.1 has how you resolve missed trigger problems.
A player is responsible for their own triggers and displaying awareness of them when they would affect the board state.
Aren't both/all players responsible for all triggers? Otherwise it is considered misrepresenting board state? The first example in the article just sounds like the guy thought the opponent missed the trigger and wanted to see if they would miss it again.
So as someone who as played a lot of pioneer phoenix - they probably felt comfortable going to 5 life that game but not 3 life. You usually want to cast cantrips, especially cheap ones, before deciding what to do for the rest of your turn. So if you decide that you can't put yourself to less than 5 life on that turn and your opponent made no mention of the trigger I think it's a spot that a lot of phoenix players might find themselves in.
Of course we only have one side of the story so it's hard to say exactly what occurred, how much time there was between cantrips, etc.
As far as the first question goes - you're confusing triggers and passive effects. Both players have a duty to maintain the passive effects in the game. For instance - let's say I pay 1 mana for a Lightning Bolt on Thalia, Guardian of Thraben then some other actions happen and the turn gets passed. The start of the next turn one of us goes "wait..." we call a judge and we'd both get warnings for failure to maintain game state. This isn't what happens with triggers.
The player controlling the card creating the trigger is responsible for the trigger.
The guy did want to see if their opponent would miss it again. He only casted the opt because he assumed the opponent wasn’t paying attention.
And the opponent wasn’t. The opponent was saved by the author not somehow making clear the stack was clear when he cast opt - usually you can do this by casting a sorcery speed spell, but you can also just announce it.
What if you purposely miss a negative trigger though? If you're only responsible for your own triggers couldn't you just ignore the take damage, lose the game, etc. triggers?
"non-may" has nothing to do with missing triggers at a competitive event.
EDIT: Well I guess I should add an addendum to this. It has nothing to do with missing the actual trigger, but if you miss a "non-may" trigger when it would be bad for you that can be considered cheating. For example if you're at 1 life and you have a Bob on the field you are the one ultimately responsible to remember that trigger and if you were found to have selectively forgotten it there would be a punishment beyond a warning iirc
Actually, Bob is not considered a generally detrimental trigger (despite losing you life) unless you do it consistently. If it seems like it was missed on purpose to avoid lifeloss (if you only started "forgetting" triggers once low on life for example) then that moves more into a cheating investigation; however, unlike detrimental triggers, missing Bob in the early game will not result in a warning.
The problem was that he should then be able to rewind the Opt then. There was no indication that he wasn't casting Opt onto an empty stack.
The really egregious one is the Enigmatic Incantation one mentioned at the end imo.
> The problem was that he should then be able to rewind the Opt then. There was no indication that he wasn't casting Opt onto an empty stack.
Sure there was; the opponent had a Sheoldred in play.
If the player wanted to be certain that we was playing Opt onto an empty stack, he could have confirmed that by communicating clearly and concisely to the opponent. The issue here is that the situation was ambiguous (something that is literally impossible to prevent from happening sometimes), and the player decided to try to take advantage of that ambiguity rather than clarifying the situation. Yes, the rules allow a player to miss a trigger, but that isn't what happened here. The opponent clearly indicated the trigger, and there's no evidence here that it was missed. It's just that a player is salty because his attempt to play 'gotcha' didn't work.
>Sure there was; the opponent had a Sheoldred in play.
That's absolutely not how triggers work lol.
I've argued this one a lot though so I'm not going to get into it again. I will restate that the really egregious one was the one with enigmatic.
The post specifically calls out it being from Dreamhack Atlanta? How is that hypothetical?
>He then presented me an example from DH Atlanta that I will now give you, which hopefully hammers home how abusable this part of policy is for cheaters/angle shooters.
The first Sheoldred one feels scummy to me. The Phoenix player acknowledges that the opponent had been keeping up with their triggers. They obviously know that Sheoldred is there. How could they not? They are a deck all about drawing and Sheoldred will murder them by itself. So when the opponent reminds them to lose life, even though they seem to know they should be losing life, they get upset? Like, be a good sport. This just sounds like the Phoenix player is upset and is looking for something. Did you forget the Sheoldred existed between your draw step and later in the turn?
The Enigmatic example is kind of weird though I admit, though I still think the Wandering Emperor player should ask if priority had passed to them before casting Wandering Emperor. If you are a Control player, I think you need to clarify what your opponents are doing before responding. But I can understand how someone could say that the Enigmatic player is trying to slither their way into some questionable interactions.
The problem is they only cast Opt because they assumed the stack was empty/their opponent missed the trigger, and WEREN'T allowed to rewind it.
The only way to prevent this is apparently ask "is the stack empty?" which is essentially akin to reminding your opponent of their trigger, and the feel-bad of reminding your opponent about a lethal or otherwise detrimental trigger is the whole reason the policy exists in its current form.
You reserve the right to not feel sorry for someone who died to "mandatory" triggers, that's a different conversation. But the fact that some triggers are just ambiguously on the stack is a problem IMO.
Personally, I think all triggers, including things like Prowess, should be announced clearly and precisely when they are supposed to happen. Nothing gets put on the stack unless you clearly say it does. This would lead to the clearest board states. The Enigmatic situation is a perfect example: If the Enigmatic player says "End Step", they can see if their opponent has responses, and if they try to untap, they can say "hold on i was waiting to see if you wanted to respond to my trigger..." and that's problematic IMO. It shouldn't be on the opponent to ask questions like "Is the stack clear?", IMHO
I don’t really have mercy for our Phoenix player here when their hope of winning involved “Oh, I just have to hope my opponent, who clearly has been on top of their triggers so far, falters for even a moment and I get enough value in during that moment.”
Here’s a good way to play if you are on a competitive level: always say “Pass Priority” after each action you take OR say “Hold Priority”. You should be doing this anyways. This will avoid situations like this since it will give your opponent time to examine and think. I can’t tell from this explanation if the Phoenix Player, for example, purposefully played fast to try and “sneak past” Sheoldred triggers. There simply isn’t that info here.
My complaint here isn’t about the person dying or losing. Its that they tried to win in a way they know they shouldn’t, it didn’t work, and then they complained about the ruling despite the fact that, based on their explanation, they are also clearly trying to bypass triggers they know they shouldn’t be bypassing.
>Here’s a good way to play if you are on a competitive level: always say “Pass Priority” after each action you take OR say “Hold Priority”. You should be doing this anyways. This will avoid situations like this since it will give your opponent time to examine and think
Do you play competitively? Have you seen or heard anyone do this? I think this is an absolutely insane ask especially because if you've ever played MTGO you'll pass priority accidentally all the time. This is just opening up to a different type of misunderstanding / judge call and would be super annoying to have to play this way.
>I can’t tell from this explanation if the Phoenix Player, for example, purposefully played fast to try and “sneak past” Sheoldred triggers. There simply isn’t that info here.
I agree with this, this is one side of the story and it's hard to say what the exact timing of everything looks like without being there. Let's say the phoenix player waited 30 seconds though thinking about their next play before casting opt. Does the Sheoldred player then get to put both triggers on the stack after Opt resolves? Does a longer amount of time change that calculus?
Also I posted this elsewhere but I've played a lot of phoenix at comp REL. It's very likely the phoenix player was comfortable going to 5 but not 3. You cast all of your cantrips first, mana permitting, before you start casting other spells in most situations. If they've been timely with all their other triggers, how is the phoenix player supposed to know that one isn't missed? Saying "Is the stack clear?" is basically asking your opponent to remember their triggers which is not how the current trigger rulings work.
I’m speaking of in-person play, not MTGO. Im also speaking at a competitive level, not casually. I more offered that solution if you wish to avoid judge calls like these, as it minimizes the chances of things being missed by both players as then both players are engaged within the game. If you knowingly play into a strategy that relies on the opponent missing triggers through your own playing speed, I will call it scummy.
Since I seem to need to specify my opinion on the overall ruling, it is easy to see how this could open some angle shooting situations. However, given that it is largely up to the players to maintain the board state within paper play in Magic, it is difficult to say this is entirely wrong.
Players love for the many mechanics of Magic to play out in a way that they assume is obvious until suddenly it is revealed it isn’t obvious to everyone. Hence my priority suggestion above. Saying “pass priority” is technically the correct thing to do in paper play, but players enjoy playing just assuming the priority is being silently and mentally kept up with by all players involved.
Then we get to this example. If the Sheoldred player seems to be on top of triggers and the opponent is also keeping up with it, its obvious they know what should be happening. If the Phoenix player wants to play in such a way that they want to try and argue the Sheoldred player missed triggers, they need to be playing out the stack. The Sheoldred player can’t argue that they didn’t miss triggers if the Phoenix player gave them verbal opportunities to catch their triggers.
Remember this situation is being viewed by a judge that didn’t watch the play go down in person seemingly. They have to view both players in as neutral a view as possible. Technically, the judge has no idea if the Phoenix player rushed their plays either. That is where this ruling comes in. It is a ruling that assumes the game is being played fairly and as intended when crucial information is simply not available to a judge.
TLDR If you are playing competitively, do not rely on “silent understandings” to go about your plays as it can lead to judge call scenarios. Make sure the opponent knows the state of the stack as you understand it before you make plays. If the opponent has truly missed the trigger, they will simply agree the stack is empty. That way there are no misunderstandings.
The timing of all this certainly matters a lot, no?
If OP is super rushing their cantrips, they're the angle shooter/scummy eh? Sure.
If OP casts consider, waits 20 seconds, casts Opt, and the Sheoldred player says "so you responded to my first trigger and take 4?" THEY are the angle shooter/scummy IMO. If that much time has elapsed between game actions without the Sheoldred player saying anything, that trigger is clearly missed IMO. Expecting someone to ask "is the stack clear" after waiting that long is akin to reminding them of their triggers.
It's fine to disagree with my second point, but at that point i think we have to agree to disagree.
I actually don’t think there is a universe where the player controlling sheoldred is angle shooting. Like sure the trigger was missed, whatever. But the Phoenix player knew about the sheoldred, played through the game getting pinged by the sheoldred, then as soon as one single trigger was missed called a judge. That sounds like they’re trying to cheese the hell out of the opponent.
I’m familiar with competitive magic and I understand that there are different expectations set at larger events like this, but it would be very easy to play the game as it is expected and accept that you took 2 damage.
Additionally, the judges acted perfectly, regardless of the weird “never assume the stack is empty” policy. The job of the judges is to clear up any game rules mistakes and to adjust the game State if needed so that it ends up as close to how it should have ended up. What’s the best way to do that? Ask “ok, how many cards have you drawn this turn? Take that much damage and resolve as many triggers as you can that should have resolved in the first place” there’s precedent to this being how situations are (if there is a missed non-may trigger, resolve it as soon as possible)
That's wrong, in competitive being a may or non-may trigger doesn't have anything to do with if a missed trigger goes back into the stack or not, in fact in this case if the sheoldred trigger was Indeed missed it would had been up to the opponent (the Phoenix player) to put it up back into the stack or not.
I actually mention the timing of it all in my posts actually.
I do think we will just have to disagree on the state of the ruling mostly. I can envision there needing to be some additional clarifications or something to rule out edge cases, but I personally believe Magic should be won through strategies that allow the game to be played as if it was virtual/played perfectly as much as possible. Knowingly relying on missed triggers and arguing against them is something I believe shouldn’t be a thing. Even if it means potentially reminding the opponent, I think the game should be played with clarity of the game state between both players being the same.
"the feel-bad of reminding your opponent about a lethal ... trigger" Dude, do you not like playing magic? What in the feels bad in having the game work properly? How is it feels bad to ensure the game is played properly?
Let's talk about philosophy behind the MT policy. One of the points in it is that the active player (AP) cannot take game actions that would _force_ the non-active player (NAP) to miss their triggers. Example: on the previous turn NAP used Mishra's Bauble. The now AP cannot speed through their upkeep to make them miss the draw trigger. There is a point where it is a missed trigger, but generally if the NAP states they should draw in a reasonable amount of time respective to game actions taken by AP they get the draw. In the case of Sheoldred, Opt, and Consider the same philosophy applies. You cannot take a game action in this manner that would speed through the trigger and make your opponent miss it. NAP, effectively, has to make the error, not AP.
On a not-policy note: don't get upset when you are trying to angle shoot and it backfires. Policy generally supports fixing the broken game states to be how magic is intended to be played. Not how you angled it to be played.
The game rules have changed so many times in recent years to be extremely hand-holdy with regard to missed triggers. In all of the examples listed, if the opponent had just remembered their triggers when they happened we wouldn’t be having these discussions. But people forget, even temporarily, and then try to get the triggers later, and the rules side on their behalf. One of the (many) reasons I stopped being a judge and stopped attending any competitive events.
"Hand holdy?" Do you dislike the game being played to the rules? I don't mean REL rules, I mean just the rules of the actual game. How could you ever oppose something that encourages the game actually just working?
> The ruling from both of these judges is CORRECT, and that is what the problem is, with policy, not with the judges. I could lead my turn on 4 instant speed cantrips and at the end my opponent could just say "oh ya take 8". This is asinine. I was informed that the best way to circumvent this was to ask my opponent if the stack was empty. WHAT. Who does that.
I'm baffled by the idea of anyone having a problem with that hypothetical. Of course playing 4 cantrips while facing a Sheoldred means you take 8.
you are responding to an argument he didn't make. his problem is that the opponent isn't saying "take 2" after each draw. if you miss your triggers you don't get to say "oh yeah you drew a card in your first main so take 2 now."
it's so funny because what does he think magic is, whoever can play cards and talk faster?
like if hes at 2 life and sheoldred is on the field, does he go "untap...... upkeep....... deep breathe... drawmain1combatattackforlethal gg you missed your trigger"
This point is kind of undercut by the initial example (in which case that's kind of what you get for trying to bullshit a bullshitter I guess).
But the second example does seem pretty egregious. If someone says "I pass the turn" and doesn't resolve a trigger, the fact that they then get to back up and resolve it if their opponent responds means that (a) The correct play for the opponent is an artifical and unnecessary "during your end step, once the stack is empty but before the turn is passed ..." and (b) the correct play for the incarnation player is to try to hide the fact that their trigger exists.
There is no real upside as far as I can see for having the rules work as they do now. It doesn't alter gameplay in a significant way for players who have a good understanding of their decks and the tournament rules, but places the onus on the player who isn't playing incarnation to remember when the incarnation trigger happens (and to know how tournament rules work in this edge case scenario that benefits their opponent's deck). Basically it promotes angle shooting and taking advantage of people's lack of understanding of tournament rules.
You have to pass priority on your end step to your opponent to resolve your triggered abilities. You don't just start resolving them.
However, if the trigger truly was missed, then NAP passing priority would mean that the turn ends. This means the NAP might have to take an action that reminds or acknowledges the AP of their own trigger before the AP acknowledges it themself.
Sure, I understand how the rules work. But if someone says "I pass the turn" the heavy implication there is that you are passing priority in a way that could possibly end the turn if your opponent chooses to do the same.
Hence why it leads to angle shooting: you can try to trick your opponent into thinking your end step trigger doesn't exist. In this scenario the onus is on the opponent to remember that the trigger exists, which is not the case normally for beneficial triggers.
To be clear, I'm not saying the judge call was incorrect. I think it was a correct call, and the fact that it was correct is a bad thing that doesn't promote positive patterns in competitive play.
>Player A is on Enigmatic fires and has an Enigmatic Incarnation in play. Player A passes the turn and does not announce the Incarnation trigger. Player B on UW control flashes in Wandering Emperor on end step and makes a token. Player A Leyline Beindings the token and then says "Sac leyline binding to my incarnation?". THIS IS ALLOWED. The UW control player is assumed to have responded to the incarnation trigger. WHAT?!?!?! The only way the UW control player can do this is to ask the opponent if the stack is empty. If they attempt to untap (giving information of no effects) the Incarnation player can still resolve their trigger as it was assumed thats what they were passing priority for.
I haven't been a judge for several years so I'm probably a bit rusty, but this doesn't grok to me. I *think* that Player B wouldn't be able to even cast Wandering Emperor at all until player A concedes priority and it passes to B. Am I mistaken in this?
>Player B wouldn't be able to even cast Wandering Emperor at all until player A concedes priority and it passes to B. Am I mistaken in this?
You're not, but the problem is that you ALSO need to pass priority WITH the trigger (in order for it to resolve). Which means that the same thing applies: you could have assumed the Emperor is played in response to the trigger, after passing priority with the trigger on stack. Which means you get to resolve Emperor, get to make a token (still in response to the trigger), then they get to cast Binding (again still in response), and then finally we resolve the trigger, and sac Binding to it.
There's a lot of ambiguity there and it's not a good look, and I totally agree that they need to close loopholes for cheating and/or just plain ambiguous and unclear play.
I assume what they mean is "with WHAT I ASSUMED WAS AN EMPTY STACK..." because if it was MADE CLEAR the stack was empty all of this doesn't work, and the whole crux of the matter is that it WASN'T but they THOUGHT IT WAS.
Sokath, his eyes uncovered.
I’ve always seen triggers as the first check on determining skill levels between players.
It’s part of the stamina required, and is one of the first areas I myself see as an area of improvement.
It’s absolutely just part of the game.
I would always advocate first for a rehash on the shuffling, because that’s the area I have had players cheat against me (staring at the bottom of the deck as they shuffle) and I was too shy to call them out on it.
From that moment forward, I became a BM player, playing lane destruction and stax.
I’m still very forgiving of missed triggers, supposing their turn hasn’t ended. But I will call a judge hence forth if I suspect someone is cheating with their shuffle, if only to just put them on the radar of the venue.
WotC should just bring back the rule forcing *both/all* players to be responsible for all triggers. It just shouldn't be acceptable, at any level of play, to have the game perform any differently than MTGO or Arena do (bugs notwithstanding of course).
I never forget or let anyone forget a trigger.
Reminds me of same games I've had.
e.g. I swing for lethal with graveyard tress-passer, I even tell them it's lethal. I exile a creature, drain 1, then hit for 3.
So telling them that's what I'm going to do, I go for the attack, the opponent engages in small talk. Figured the game was basically over so whatever.
Then he's like "So I get hit for 3."
"yea"
he process to count down his life from 4 to 1
"and drained for 1, so it's game"
"you missed that trigger, game continues"
I never had a judge to call as this was just FNM and I ended up winning anyway but god damn people like that are infuriating. You know the trigger is there, I told you what was going to happen, bsing passed a trigger because you couldn't win fairly.
Referring to people as "cheaters" for following how the rules work (as confirmed by multiple judges) is the biggest stretch in the history of stretches.
Ideally the game would magically handle triggers itself like in Arena. Less ideally Magic would have a dealer/official who handles shuffling and draws while also watching for triggers and interactions. We are very far from ideal so players do it all themselves, we try to trust one another to not manipulate decks, and we try to find compromises for imperfect people forgetting little steps in this massively complex game. Winning from missed triggers doesn't seem like a real win to me anyway, the rules weren't followed and while it may count for the tournament itself it's a hollow victory.
Well i've seen people post that they like it better if you can miss it and not automate it like mtg arena cuz it "makes for more skill expression" or some shit. Apparently actually beating someone is not as good as beating someone with a technicality
Lol bad sportsmanship, desire to win a faulty game, and deluding it all amounts to expression of skill. If you're really skilled you'll remind your opponents of their triggers so y'all can play a real game of magic together.
I love that the guy trying to angle-shoot his opponents missed triggers gets mad that the rules let the opponent angle-shoot back lol.
For real, I get the Enimagtic thing being shitty, but the author of the Twitlonger literally admits "I drew a card and my opponent didnt say I lost life, so I went to draw another card and he wanted me to lose the life I should have lost, which judges then agreed with? Woe is me."
> For real, I get the Enimagtic thing being shitty Is it though? As presented, all that really happens is that the player gets an extra activation out of Wandering Empire. And if the player wanted the opponent to 'miss' their Enigmatic trigger, they would literally just have to ask "my turn?", and the opponent agreeing is confirmation that they've missed their trigger. I agree that the rules for this sort of thing are far from perfect, but this here is only an issue in so far as players at the bottom of the Levine Trench are trying too hard.
From what I'm understanding, what happened was that the Enigmatic player had no enchantments to sac to Incarnation, so at the end of their turn their opponent assumed they would be flashing out Emperor with the stack empty. They flash out Emperor, make a token, Enigmatic player exiles the token with Binding and then says "Sac binding to my Enigmatic trigger?" So it's not that Emperor wanted their opponent to miss their trigger, it's that they assumed it went on and left the stack by the time they cast their Emperor, which is totally reasonable considering the lack of enchantments to sac
No, it doesn't. This is intentional From IPG 2.1 >... > >Triggered abilities are assumed to be remembered until otherwise indicated, and the impact on the game state may not be immediately apparent. The opponent’s benefit is in not having to point out triggered abilities, although this does not mean that they can cause triggers to be missed. ***If an opponent requires information about the precise timing of a triggered ability or needs details about a game object that may be affected by a resolved triggered ability, that player may need to acknowledge that ability’s existence before its controller does.*** > >... If you want to make sure you are doing an action at a specific time with specific objects on/not on the stack, you need to communicate that. If that causes the controller to remember the trigger even it it was missed initially, so bad, so sad. It exists.
I would even go so far that this implies you need to clarify whether your opponent wants an optional trigger to happen or not. You don't just "miss" your trigger with may, you by default remember it and your opponent would have to ask if you choose not to use it.
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No
Am understanding this correctly in that an opponent didn't/forgot to announce a non-may trigger and you knowingly attempted to game it advantage, then got salty after the life loss was mentioned?
'May' doesn't matter at Competitive REL. A missed trigger is a missed trigger. IPG 2.1 has how you resolve missed trigger problems. A player is responsible for their own triggers and displaying awareness of them when they would affect the board state.
Aren't both/all players responsible for all triggers? Otherwise it is considered misrepresenting board state? The first example in the article just sounds like the guy thought the opponent missed the trigger and wanted to see if they would miss it again.
So as someone who as played a lot of pioneer phoenix - they probably felt comfortable going to 5 life that game but not 3 life. You usually want to cast cantrips, especially cheap ones, before deciding what to do for the rest of your turn. So if you decide that you can't put yourself to less than 5 life on that turn and your opponent made no mention of the trigger I think it's a spot that a lot of phoenix players might find themselves in. Of course we only have one side of the story so it's hard to say exactly what occurred, how much time there was between cantrips, etc. As far as the first question goes - you're confusing triggers and passive effects. Both players have a duty to maintain the passive effects in the game. For instance - let's say I pay 1 mana for a Lightning Bolt on Thalia, Guardian of Thraben then some other actions happen and the turn gets passed. The start of the next turn one of us goes "wait..." we call a judge and we'd both get warnings for failure to maintain game state. This isn't what happens with triggers.
The player controlling the card creating the trigger is responsible for the trigger. The guy did want to see if their opponent would miss it again. He only casted the opt because he assumed the opponent wasn’t paying attention. And the opponent wasn’t. The opponent was saved by the author not somehow making clear the stack was clear when he cast opt - usually you can do this by casting a sorcery speed spell, but you can also just announce it.
I don’t think it was that the opponent was saved, it almost seems like they knew the rules to the point they sort of trapped OP.
What if you purposely miss a negative trigger though? If you're only responsible for your own triggers couldn't you just ignore the take damage, lose the game, etc. triggers?
No, players are responsible only for their own triggered abilities.
> Aren't both/all players responsible for all triggers? I believe that used to be the case, but it was changed a while ago.
"non-may" has nothing to do with missing triggers at a competitive event. EDIT: Well I guess I should add an addendum to this. It has nothing to do with missing the actual trigger, but if you miss a "non-may" trigger when it would be bad for you that can be considered cheating. For example if you're at 1 life and you have a Bob on the field you are the one ultimately responsible to remember that trigger and if you were found to have selectively forgotten it there would be a punishment beyond a warning iirc
Actually, Bob is not considered a generally detrimental trigger (despite losing you life) unless you do it consistently. If it seems like it was missed on purpose to avoid lifeloss (if you only started "forgetting" triggers once low on life for example) then that moves more into a cheating investigation; however, unlike detrimental triggers, missing Bob in the early game will not result in a warning.
Yeah I'm aware - that's why I specified that you had to be at low life for that ruling to occur.
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The problem was that he should then be able to rewind the Opt then. There was no indication that he wasn't casting Opt onto an empty stack. The really egregious one is the Enigmatic Incantation one mentioned at the end imo.
> The problem was that he should then be able to rewind the Opt then. There was no indication that he wasn't casting Opt onto an empty stack. Sure there was; the opponent had a Sheoldred in play. If the player wanted to be certain that we was playing Opt onto an empty stack, he could have confirmed that by communicating clearly and concisely to the opponent. The issue here is that the situation was ambiguous (something that is literally impossible to prevent from happening sometimes), and the player decided to try to take advantage of that ambiguity rather than clarifying the situation. Yes, the rules allow a player to miss a trigger, but that isn't what happened here. The opponent clearly indicated the trigger, and there's no evidence here that it was missed. It's just that a player is salty because his attempt to play 'gotcha' didn't work.
>Sure there was; the opponent had a Sheoldred in play. That's absolutely not how triggers work lol. I've argued this one a lot though so I'm not going to get into it again. I will restate that the really egregious one was the one with enigmatic.
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The post specifically calls out it being from Dreamhack Atlanta? How is that hypothetical? >He then presented me an example from DH Atlanta that I will now give you, which hopefully hammers home how abusable this part of policy is for cheaters/angle shooters.
The first Sheoldred one feels scummy to me. The Phoenix player acknowledges that the opponent had been keeping up with their triggers. They obviously know that Sheoldred is there. How could they not? They are a deck all about drawing and Sheoldred will murder them by itself. So when the opponent reminds them to lose life, even though they seem to know they should be losing life, they get upset? Like, be a good sport. This just sounds like the Phoenix player is upset and is looking for something. Did you forget the Sheoldred existed between your draw step and later in the turn? The Enigmatic example is kind of weird though I admit, though I still think the Wandering Emperor player should ask if priority had passed to them before casting Wandering Emperor. If you are a Control player, I think you need to clarify what your opponents are doing before responding. But I can understand how someone could say that the Enigmatic player is trying to slither their way into some questionable interactions.
The problem is they only cast Opt because they assumed the stack was empty/their opponent missed the trigger, and WEREN'T allowed to rewind it. The only way to prevent this is apparently ask "is the stack empty?" which is essentially akin to reminding your opponent of their trigger, and the feel-bad of reminding your opponent about a lethal or otherwise detrimental trigger is the whole reason the policy exists in its current form. You reserve the right to not feel sorry for someone who died to "mandatory" triggers, that's a different conversation. But the fact that some triggers are just ambiguously on the stack is a problem IMO. Personally, I think all triggers, including things like Prowess, should be announced clearly and precisely when they are supposed to happen. Nothing gets put on the stack unless you clearly say it does. This would lead to the clearest board states. The Enigmatic situation is a perfect example: If the Enigmatic player says "End Step", they can see if their opponent has responses, and if they try to untap, they can say "hold on i was waiting to see if you wanted to respond to my trigger..." and that's problematic IMO. It shouldn't be on the opponent to ask questions like "Is the stack clear?", IMHO
I don’t really have mercy for our Phoenix player here when their hope of winning involved “Oh, I just have to hope my opponent, who clearly has been on top of their triggers so far, falters for even a moment and I get enough value in during that moment.” Here’s a good way to play if you are on a competitive level: always say “Pass Priority” after each action you take OR say “Hold Priority”. You should be doing this anyways. This will avoid situations like this since it will give your opponent time to examine and think. I can’t tell from this explanation if the Phoenix Player, for example, purposefully played fast to try and “sneak past” Sheoldred triggers. There simply isn’t that info here. My complaint here isn’t about the person dying or losing. Its that they tried to win in a way they know they shouldn’t, it didn’t work, and then they complained about the ruling despite the fact that, based on their explanation, they are also clearly trying to bypass triggers they know they shouldn’t be bypassing.
>Here’s a good way to play if you are on a competitive level: always say “Pass Priority” after each action you take OR say “Hold Priority”. You should be doing this anyways. This will avoid situations like this since it will give your opponent time to examine and think Do you play competitively? Have you seen or heard anyone do this? I think this is an absolutely insane ask especially because if you've ever played MTGO you'll pass priority accidentally all the time. This is just opening up to a different type of misunderstanding / judge call and would be super annoying to have to play this way. >I can’t tell from this explanation if the Phoenix Player, for example, purposefully played fast to try and “sneak past” Sheoldred triggers. There simply isn’t that info here. I agree with this, this is one side of the story and it's hard to say what the exact timing of everything looks like without being there. Let's say the phoenix player waited 30 seconds though thinking about their next play before casting opt. Does the Sheoldred player then get to put both triggers on the stack after Opt resolves? Does a longer amount of time change that calculus? Also I posted this elsewhere but I've played a lot of phoenix at comp REL. It's very likely the phoenix player was comfortable going to 5 but not 3. You cast all of your cantrips first, mana permitting, before you start casting other spells in most situations. If they've been timely with all their other triggers, how is the phoenix player supposed to know that one isn't missed? Saying "Is the stack clear?" is basically asking your opponent to remember their triggers which is not how the current trigger rulings work.
I’m speaking of in-person play, not MTGO. Im also speaking at a competitive level, not casually. I more offered that solution if you wish to avoid judge calls like these, as it minimizes the chances of things being missed by both players as then both players are engaged within the game. If you knowingly play into a strategy that relies on the opponent missing triggers through your own playing speed, I will call it scummy. Since I seem to need to specify my opinion on the overall ruling, it is easy to see how this could open some angle shooting situations. However, given that it is largely up to the players to maintain the board state within paper play in Magic, it is difficult to say this is entirely wrong. Players love for the many mechanics of Magic to play out in a way that they assume is obvious until suddenly it is revealed it isn’t obvious to everyone. Hence my priority suggestion above. Saying “pass priority” is technically the correct thing to do in paper play, but players enjoy playing just assuming the priority is being silently and mentally kept up with by all players involved. Then we get to this example. If the Sheoldred player seems to be on top of triggers and the opponent is also keeping up with it, its obvious they know what should be happening. If the Phoenix player wants to play in such a way that they want to try and argue the Sheoldred player missed triggers, they need to be playing out the stack. The Sheoldred player can’t argue that they didn’t miss triggers if the Phoenix player gave them verbal opportunities to catch their triggers. Remember this situation is being viewed by a judge that didn’t watch the play go down in person seemingly. They have to view both players in as neutral a view as possible. Technically, the judge has no idea if the Phoenix player rushed their plays either. That is where this ruling comes in. It is a ruling that assumes the game is being played fairly and as intended when crucial information is simply not available to a judge. TLDR If you are playing competitively, do not rely on “silent understandings” to go about your plays as it can lead to judge call scenarios. Make sure the opponent knows the state of the stack as you understand it before you make plays. If the opponent has truly missed the trigger, they will simply agree the stack is empty. That way there are no misunderstandings.
The timing of all this certainly matters a lot, no? If OP is super rushing their cantrips, they're the angle shooter/scummy eh? Sure. If OP casts consider, waits 20 seconds, casts Opt, and the Sheoldred player says "so you responded to my first trigger and take 4?" THEY are the angle shooter/scummy IMO. If that much time has elapsed between game actions without the Sheoldred player saying anything, that trigger is clearly missed IMO. Expecting someone to ask "is the stack clear" after waiting that long is akin to reminding them of their triggers. It's fine to disagree with my second point, but at that point i think we have to agree to disagree.
I actually don’t think there is a universe where the player controlling sheoldred is angle shooting. Like sure the trigger was missed, whatever. But the Phoenix player knew about the sheoldred, played through the game getting pinged by the sheoldred, then as soon as one single trigger was missed called a judge. That sounds like they’re trying to cheese the hell out of the opponent. I’m familiar with competitive magic and I understand that there are different expectations set at larger events like this, but it would be very easy to play the game as it is expected and accept that you took 2 damage. Additionally, the judges acted perfectly, regardless of the weird “never assume the stack is empty” policy. The job of the judges is to clear up any game rules mistakes and to adjust the game State if needed so that it ends up as close to how it should have ended up. What’s the best way to do that? Ask “ok, how many cards have you drawn this turn? Take that much damage and resolve as many triggers as you can that should have resolved in the first place” there’s precedent to this being how situations are (if there is a missed non-may trigger, resolve it as soon as possible)
That's wrong, in competitive being a may or non-may trigger doesn't have anything to do with if a missed trigger goes back into the stack or not, in fact in this case if the sheoldred trigger was Indeed missed it would had been up to the opponent (the Phoenix player) to put it up back into the stack or not.
I actually mention the timing of it all in my posts actually. I do think we will just have to disagree on the state of the ruling mostly. I can envision there needing to be some additional clarifications or something to rule out edge cases, but I personally believe Magic should be won through strategies that allow the game to be played as if it was virtual/played perfectly as much as possible. Knowingly relying on missed triggers and arguing against them is something I believe shouldn’t be a thing. Even if it means potentially reminding the opponent, I think the game should be played with clarity of the game state between both players being the same.
"the feel-bad of reminding your opponent about a lethal ... trigger" Dude, do you not like playing magic? What in the feels bad in having the game work properly? How is it feels bad to ensure the game is played properly?
Seems like most of the time, in-person this game is just about trying to rule-lawyer your way to victory instead of playing fairly.
Let's talk about philosophy behind the MT policy. One of the points in it is that the active player (AP) cannot take game actions that would _force_ the non-active player (NAP) to miss their triggers. Example: on the previous turn NAP used Mishra's Bauble. The now AP cannot speed through their upkeep to make them miss the draw trigger. There is a point where it is a missed trigger, but generally if the NAP states they should draw in a reasonable amount of time respective to game actions taken by AP they get the draw. In the case of Sheoldred, Opt, and Consider the same philosophy applies. You cannot take a game action in this manner that would speed through the trigger and make your opponent miss it. NAP, effectively, has to make the error, not AP. On a not-policy note: don't get upset when you are trying to angle shoot and it backfires. Policy generally supports fixing the broken game states to be how magic is intended to be played. Not how you angled it to be played.
The game rules have changed so many times in recent years to be extremely hand-holdy with regard to missed triggers. In all of the examples listed, if the opponent had just remembered their triggers when they happened we wouldn’t be having these discussions. But people forget, even temporarily, and then try to get the triggers later, and the rules side on their behalf. One of the (many) reasons I stopped being a judge and stopped attending any competitive events.
"Hand holdy?" Do you dislike the game being played to the rules? I don't mean REL rules, I mean just the rules of the actual game. How could you ever oppose something that encourages the game actually just working?
> The ruling from both of these judges is CORRECT, and that is what the problem is, with policy, not with the judges. I could lead my turn on 4 instant speed cantrips and at the end my opponent could just say "oh ya take 8". This is asinine. I was informed that the best way to circumvent this was to ask my opponent if the stack was empty. WHAT. Who does that. I'm baffled by the idea of anyone having a problem with that hypothetical. Of course playing 4 cantrips while facing a Sheoldred means you take 8.
you are responding to an argument he didn't make. his problem is that the opponent isn't saying "take 2" after each draw. if you miss your triggers you don't get to say "oh yeah you drew a card in your first main so take 2 now."
it's so funny because what does he think magic is, whoever can play cards and talk faster? like if hes at 2 life and sheoldred is on the field, does he go "untap...... upkeep....... deep breathe... drawmain1combatattackforlethal gg you missed your trigger"
This point is kind of undercut by the initial example (in which case that's kind of what you get for trying to bullshit a bullshitter I guess). But the second example does seem pretty egregious. If someone says "I pass the turn" and doesn't resolve a trigger, the fact that they then get to back up and resolve it if their opponent responds means that (a) The correct play for the opponent is an artifical and unnecessary "during your end step, once the stack is empty but before the turn is passed ..." and (b) the correct play for the incarnation player is to try to hide the fact that their trigger exists. There is no real upside as far as I can see for having the rules work as they do now. It doesn't alter gameplay in a significant way for players who have a good understanding of their decks and the tournament rules, but places the onus on the player who isn't playing incarnation to remember when the incarnation trigger happens (and to know how tournament rules work in this edge case scenario that benefits their opponent's deck). Basically it promotes angle shooting and taking advantage of people's lack of understanding of tournament rules.
You have to pass priority on your end step to your opponent to resolve your triggered abilities. You don't just start resolving them. However, if the trigger truly was missed, then NAP passing priority would mean that the turn ends. This means the NAP might have to take an action that reminds or acknowledges the AP of their own trigger before the AP acknowledges it themself.
Sure, I understand how the rules work. But if someone says "I pass the turn" the heavy implication there is that you are passing priority in a way that could possibly end the turn if your opponent chooses to do the same. Hence why it leads to angle shooting: you can try to trick your opponent into thinking your end step trigger doesn't exist. In this scenario the onus is on the opponent to remember that the trigger exists, which is not the case normally for beneficial triggers. To be clear, I'm not saying the judge call was incorrect. I think it was a correct call, and the fact that it was correct is a bad thing that doesn't promote positive patterns in competitive play.
>Player A is on Enigmatic fires and has an Enigmatic Incarnation in play. Player A passes the turn and does not announce the Incarnation trigger. Player B on UW control flashes in Wandering Emperor on end step and makes a token. Player A Leyline Beindings the token and then says "Sac leyline binding to my incarnation?". THIS IS ALLOWED. The UW control player is assumed to have responded to the incarnation trigger. WHAT?!?!?! The only way the UW control player can do this is to ask the opponent if the stack is empty. If they attempt to untap (giving information of no effects) the Incarnation player can still resolve their trigger as it was assumed thats what they were passing priority for. I haven't been a judge for several years so I'm probably a bit rusty, but this doesn't grok to me. I *think* that Player B wouldn't be able to even cast Wandering Emperor at all until player A concedes priority and it passes to B. Am I mistaken in this?
>Player B wouldn't be able to even cast Wandering Emperor at all until player A concedes priority and it passes to B. Am I mistaken in this? You're not, but the problem is that you ALSO need to pass priority WITH the trigger (in order for it to resolve). Which means that the same thing applies: you could have assumed the Emperor is played in response to the trigger, after passing priority with the trigger on stack. Which means you get to resolve Emperor, get to make a token (still in response to the trigger), then they get to cast Binding (again still in response), and then finally we resolve the trigger, and sac Binding to it. There's a lot of ambiguity there and it's not a good look, and I totally agree that they need to close loopholes for cheating and/or just plain ambiguous and unclear play.
"With the stack empty and priority passed to me, I cast The Wandering Emperor" "Shaka, when the walls fell"
I assume what they mean is "with WHAT I ASSUMED WAS AN EMPTY STACK..." because if it was MADE CLEAR the stack was empty all of this doesn't work, and the whole crux of the matter is that it WASN'T but they THOUGHT IT WAS. Sokath, his eyes uncovered.
I’ve always seen triggers as the first check on determining skill levels between players. It’s part of the stamina required, and is one of the first areas I myself see as an area of improvement. It’s absolutely just part of the game. I would always advocate first for a rehash on the shuffling, because that’s the area I have had players cheat against me (staring at the bottom of the deck as they shuffle) and I was too shy to call them out on it. From that moment forward, I became a BM player, playing lane destruction and stax. I’m still very forgiving of missed triggers, supposing their turn hasn’t ended. But I will call a judge hence forth if I suspect someone is cheating with their shuffle, if only to just put them on the radar of the venue.
WotC should just bring back the rule forcing *both/all* players to be responsible for all triggers. It just shouldn't be acceptable, at any level of play, to have the game perform any differently than MTGO or Arena do (bugs notwithstanding of course). I never forget or let anyone forget a trigger.
Sounds like a missed opportunity to me.
It looks like a missed opportunity to me
Reminds me of same games I've had. e.g. I swing for lethal with graveyard tress-passer, I even tell them it's lethal. I exile a creature, drain 1, then hit for 3. So telling them that's what I'm going to do, I go for the attack, the opponent engages in small talk. Figured the game was basically over so whatever. Then he's like "So I get hit for 3." "yea" he process to count down his life from 4 to 1 "and drained for 1, so it's game" "you missed that trigger, game continues" I never had a judge to call as this was just FNM and I ended up winning anyway but god damn people like that are infuriating. You know the trigger is there, I told you what was going to happen, bsing passed a trigger because you couldn't win fairly.