Hartford, Conneticut
Friday May 16th, 2025 - Sunday May 18th, 2025


Friday - Regular REL Side Events

Create-A-Card
One of the chronic issues with Mystery Booster is that there are a number of cards that create other cards. One of the most egregious being Pinchy McStingbutt. This being the second event where I simply wished WotC had included tokens of conjured cards in booster packs caused me to make a PDF of all the cards that can be conjured during Mystery Booster events. You can view that here for easy printing.

Build-A-Bear
AP controls Built Bear and chooses two one-point upgrades, how much mana will it cost? It will cost 2G. Additionally AP can change the attributes chosen in between matches in tournaments with continuous construction. (gatherer rulings)

Ethereal Players
When dealing with no shows during the build portion of the sealed event, an interesting piece of advice my TL gave was to call out the name of the missing player just in case one of the "no shows" was actually present, but sat in the vacant seat of an actual no show. Adding players after build in a sealed event has historically caused issues with Eventlink.

Spike's Gambit
What happens if NAP concedes while Snap Judgement is on the stack? The spell won't resolve, and AP won't win the match. (CR 104.3a) However as an aside, this card is also just incredibly strategically interesting card. When is the best time to cast it? If AP only casts it when they're assured to win, then NAP will just concede with it on the stack. But if AP just blasts it at the beginning of the game, NAP might get some good draws, and then the card would highly benefit them. It's also worthless to cast in game two if AP has already won game one, and always bad to cast in game three.

Gunky Game-State
AP controls Fludge, Gunk Guardian, Peregrine Drake and Archaeomancer. They cast Ghostly Flicker on the Drake and the Archaeomancer until they have infinite mana. Then afterwards they want to cast Ghostly Flicker on the Fludge and the Archaeomancer infinite times to put so many gunk in NAP's deck that they can't play anymore, what happens? This is certainly a loop, AP can specify a number of iterations but actually executing those iterations is physically challenging. (MTR 4.4) I went to the sides lead and they told me since the effect involved a shuffle and AP wouldn't be able to specify exactly where the gunk were in NAP's library, so it was non-deterministic, and that AP would be allowed to complete two iterations of the loop before they needed to meaningfully change the game state. In retrospect I think this would've been much better handled by having AP specify how many gunk would be in NAP's library, and then figuring out how many real cards were in there, and using a random number generator to determine whether NAP drew a gunk or a real card, each time they drew a card.

Activate Only if You Are the Beatdown
AP controls Toofer, Keeper of the Full Grip, and I learned why R&D doesn't like to put esoteric concepts on cards. Having to explain how card advantage works and what it means to gain it to someone who's never even thought about it before was incredibly difficult. Mystery Booster is in a weird place because it's advertised as a "super fun wacky casual time" but is also incredibly complex and rules-intensive. I suppose it's geared towards veteran players who aren't super competitive. Which strangely enough has a lot of overlap with the judge community.

Curious Trades
AP cast Deadpool, Trading Card and swaps text boxes with Enduring Curiosity. What happens when it dies? It will return as an enchantment but will be able to swap text boxes with another card as it enters. It will still be an enchantment. Deadpool's ability doesn't interact with the type-changing effect applied by the resolution of Deadpool/Enduring Curiosity's triggered ability. When Deadpool returns to the battlefield it has no memory of previously having swapped text with Enduring Curiosity, which is what enables it to swap text with something else. (CR 400.7) however, becoming an enchantment is part of the resolution of the ability that returns it to the battlefield, so that ability will apply.

Sprouting Libraries
AP casts Plant a Sapling, transforms it and shuffles it into their library. Can it be tutored by Worldly Tutor? The rules specify that in all zones other than the stack or battlefield, double-faced cards only have the characteristics of the front face. (CR 712.8a) However while there isn't a ruling on Plant a Sapling that contests this, we also normally aren't able to cast the back face of transforming double-faced cards. I felt like the intention here is that it would be a creature card in the library. I mentioned, however, that if it died on the battlefield, it would go back to the front face if it went into AP's graveyard. The text on Plant a Sapling supersedes the requirement to shuffle it into the library on its front face, but there's no card text that says it stays on the back face forever.

Saturday - Regional Championship EOR Support & Pairings Team Lead

Ghastly Code
The "EOR Support" team was a little confusing for me, and while I spoke a lot with the EOR lead before the event, when the actual event rolled around, my team had almost nothing to do with EOR. One of the contributions I did make was to add some additional coding for single and double no shows, since at my previous event there were some issues with the no show slips making it up to the stage. We were having judges mark ghosts as +99, double no shows as +77 and single no shows as +88. This is a bit much, and it was confusing remembering which thing meant which other thing, I think in the future it would be nice if purple fox just had an integrated way to mark tables as ghosts.

An Open Door
AP has a Blast Zone with three counters on it and NAP unlocks Ritual Chamber, can AP activate Blast Zone in response to the unlock ability? No, unlocking a room is a special action that doesn't use the stack. (CR 116.2m) Oftentimes unlocking a room can cause triggered abilities to go onto the stack, but by that time the mana value of Unholy Annex//Ritual Chamber is 8. (CR 709.4b)

Another interesting interaction is what happens if the room is flickered? Both sides enter locked. (CR 709.5d)

Bounds and Bursts
AP casts a kicked Burst Lightning kicked on Beza, the Bounding Spring. Both players think it dies and NAP puts it into their graveyard. This is a great example of where a partial fix applies, we can easily just put the Beza back onto the battlefield. (IPG 2.5) More interestingly was whether the enter the battlefield trigger would go onto the stack again. Common sense dictates that it shouldn't, but the documents don't actually specify this.

Bound Steel
AP controls a Cori-Steel Cutter that's currently equipped to a monk token. They cast their second spell for the turn and puts Cori-Steel Cutter's triggered ability onto the stack. NAP counters it with Tishana's Tidebinder, will it remain equipped to the monk it's currently on? Yes. It's still an equipment and the monk is still a creature. Losing its equip ability doesn't prevent it from being attached to anything. (CR 301.5)

Inside Notes
Can AP look at NAP's decklist while sideboarding? Yes. This isn't specified super clearly anywhere, but in events that use open decklists, players are allowed to reference those decklists before their first game, and during sideboarding, but not during the game.

Card In, Card Out
On turn two AP has an extra card in their hand. NAP asked AP how many cards were in their hand, and that's when the error was noticed. Both players had only played two lands this game and nothing else. AP had mulled to 6 and put a card on the bottom, I verified that the card they'd said was the one that was on the bottom. Either AP drew two while drawing for turn, or drew 8 and put one on the bottom. I felt this was a little odd but the HJ ruled no DQ. The justification is that if AP drew 8 while mulliganing, then put one on the bottom, they're still looking at 7 cards, which is a normal number of cards. If they forgot they mulled then it's possible this was an honest mistake. The penalty ended up being Hidden Card Error with one card being chosen by NAP to be shuffled into the random portion of AP's library. (IPG 2.3)

Sleightly Optortunistic
AP cast Opt but resolved Sleight of Hand, meaning they looked at the top two cards of their library, then put one in their hand and one on the bottom of their library. I ruled Hidden Card Error, and had AP reveal their hand, NAP selected one card to be the "chosen card", then we took the bottom card of the library and had NAP select one to shuffle into AP's library. The remaining card would be put on top of AP's library, and AP would then resolve Opt correctly. (IPG 2.3)

Dicey Trigger
AP is keeping track of prowess triggers with dice, each time they cast a spell they tick a die up. What happens if they forget to tick a die up? I think this is missed trigger, and is synonymous with AP declaring the power of the creature (and thus demonstrably missing a trigger). (IPG 2.1)

IPG Breaker
AP casts Momentum Breaker and forgets to tick up their speed. Several turns later it's noticed. Is this CPV or GRV? Speed is defined as status information (MTR 4.1) so technically AP is supposed to announce or represent it as soon as it changes, however if NAP hasn't taken any actions based on AP not having speed, then it's not a communication policy violation. Generally we assume that the actions players take are legal, if they can be interpreted that way. So we can assume AP was at one speed the whole time and just missed a lot of triggered abilities.

Authoritative Lockdown
AP controls a Temporary Lockdown, which is currently exiling AP's Authority of the Consuls and NAP's Storm Crow. What happens if the Temporary Lockdown is destroyed? Storm Crow will enter the battlefield untapped and AP will gain a life. This is because replacement effects need to exist before the event they're modifying. As Authority and Storm Crow are entering the battlefield, neither is currently on the battlefield, so Authority's replacement effect doesn't exist, which means Storm Crow enters untapped. (CR 614.4) However triggered abilities check the game state after an event occurs to see if any abilities triggered. In this case, after everything has entered, Authority is on the battlefield, and its ability can trigger. (CR 603.10)

Blockers Beware
Something I guess I never internalized after the recent rules change about declaring blockers, is that you no longer have to deal lethal damage to any particular blocker before dealing damage to other blockers. If AP attacks with a 4/4 Rhino and NAP blocks with four Storm Crows, AP is allowed to deal one damage to each Crow and then cast Blazing Volley to finish everything off. (CR 510.1)

Cut to the Chase
AP controls Cori-Steel Cutter and casts a kicked Burst Lightning as their second spell for the turn. NAP is at six life and immediately says "resolves", and then AP says "Cori-Steel Cutter trigger" and points to the card. NAP then says "Oh, in that case I'd like to Spell Pierce the Burst Lightning". Is NAP allowed to do this? It's debatable. In the MTR under tournament shortcuts there's a clause about if a player makes a decision not normally made until resolution (like naming a card for Pithing Needle) that they have to adhere to the decision unless their opponent does something before the spell resolves. (MTR 4.2) This is notably not that, but it feels quite similar, NAP declared no intent to counter, and then AP demonstrated that they hadn't missed their trigger, at which point NAP wanted to change their mind. I think this trigger as described isn't missed, AP drew attention to it almost as soon as they could. NAP isn't allowed to "force resolve" AP's spell to get them to miss their trigger. I also think NAP is allowed to counter the spell. After the Cori-Steel trigger resolves NAP gets priority again before the spell resolves, and at that point has the opportunity to counter the spell.

Sunday - Regional Championship EOR Floor Judge

Rage-Inducing Bluff
NAP is swinging with their creatures and AP says "If you have Monstrous Rage, it's lethal." NAP reveals Monstrous Rage, but doesn't tap a land, and vaguely points in the direction of their eligible creatures. NAP then says "I'll destroy the creature you target with Monstrous Rage" at which point AP is like "I don't think I technically cast this". This one was very odd, since it's more of a communication mishap than anything. NAP didn't wait until AP had finished casting the spell before revealing that they actually weren't dead. It's awkward because it's one of those 'implied casts'. AP believed the game was over, and didn't go through the motions of actually casting the spell. After much deliberation, the HJ determined that AP hadn't yet cast the card because they hadn't succinctly declared a target, nor had they tapped a land.

Timing is Everything
If NAP activates Gix, Yawgmoth Praetor, can they play lands during AP's turn? No. While both casting the spells and playing the lands occurs during the resolution of Gix's ability, usually card text overrides CR entries (as evidenced by Gix allowing NAP to play sorceries durings its resolution, when the stack is markedly not empty) However there is a special rule for playing lands that allows you to only play them during your turn that specifically states that it overrides any card text. (CR 305.3)

It's All Mapped Out
AP activated their Map token, and revealed the top card of their library, at which point NAP said "you haven't picked a target". I ruled Game Rule Violation and shuffled the revealed card back into AP's library, and had them pick a target. This certainly is awkward, since it gives AP a reroll on the Map activation. (IPG 2.5) It would be interesting if we allowed NAP to make the choice as to whether to shuffle it back or not, I think this would fully negate advantage. However this is a deviation and while it can be a fun thought experiment to figure out the "best fix" doing this would corrode consistency.

Preach It!
AP attacks with Preacher of the Schism and creates a 1/1 Vampire token instead of losing a life and drawing a card. It isn't noticed until NAP's precombat main phase. What is the infraction, penalty and fix? It's more complex than you think. My immediate reaction was GRV and missed beneficial trigger, however this is awkward because we'd be rewinding to the incorrect trigger resolving, at which point AP could easily remember the other trigger, so ruling missed trigger wouldn't actually do a whole lot here anyways. I think the correct fix is just game rule violation, you resolved your trigger wrong, even though on the card it's two separate triggers. (IPG 2.5)

Plains at Noon
AP casts High Noon, passes, NAP casts Stock Up and passes the turn. AP casts Loran of the Third Path destroying AP's Stormchaser's Talent when they realize that their Bleachbone Verges don't tap for White and never have. This was a little odd. My most likely "cheating" scenario was that AP saw the verges in their hand, but didn't realize that they didn't tap for white, and kept a bad hand because of it. Then later realized the issue and didn't call attention to it. Things that are incongruous with this are the fact that AP called it on themselves now, as well as the fact that they had a different play they could make on their turn other than Loran that drew cards. If their goal was to intentionally feign ignorance, it would've been best to hope the opponent would never even notice (which is what happened here). We rewound the Loran, but didn't backup further than that, and issued game rule violation and failure to maintain game state. (IPG 2.5, 2.6)

...In Conclusion
I had a really good time at Hartford, I got to take a lot of judge calls, got to find a ton of interesting rules and policy questions. A few events ago I asked someone what I should do to work on being an appeals judge, and their advice for me was to work on being a good team lead first. Kind of like learning to take care of a goldfish before getting a dog. So I'm glad I got the chance to team lead and work on that.