State of the Program for November 4th 2016

In the News

Peregrine Drake BANNED in Pauper: Wizards has issued an unscheduled change to the Pauper B&R list. Effective November 16th, the current Pauper league will end November 15th . A new league will begin the next day, sans the Drake. Expect commentary (and rejoicing) from our regular Pauper experts. Wizards has issued an unscheduled change to the Pauper B&R list. Effective November 16 Peregrine Drake will be banned in Pauper. Wizards explained their reasoning here . Important note – because of the banning,. A new league will begin the next day, sans the Drake. Expect commentary (and rejoicing) from our regular Pauper experts.

Original Modern Masters Phantom Drafts Back for One Week: Wizards is bringing back the original Modern Masters draft queue for one week, beginning November 9th. The event will be run as a league, and cost either 10 TIX or 1000 play points. Prizes will be play points.

Kaladesh Championship Events Beginning: The Kaladesh Limited Championship will be tomorrow. The Standard KLD Championship prelims and the Championship itself will be taking place next week. Details The Kaladesh Limited Championship will be tomorrow. The Standard KLD Championship prelims and the Championship itself will be taking place next week. Details here

World Magic Cup Coming: The World Magic Cup will be played November 18-20. Coverage will be on Twitch.tv/magic.

SCG Reduces Legacy Support: StarCity Games has modified their Open series, and drastically cut the number of Legacy events. Instead of a Legacy Classic on Sunday at every open, SCG will now only do a couple of Legacy Classics per year. Wizards will still offer a couple Legacy GPs each year, but it is not clear what will happen to the format from here. Note that Legacy will continue online, of course.

The Timeline

This is a list of things we have been promised, or we just want to see coming back. Another good source for dates and times is the weekly blog, while the best source for known bugs is the Known Issues List . For quick reference, here are some major upcoming events. In addition, there are either one or two online PTQs each weekend, with qualifiers running the three days prior to the PTQ.

Recurring Events Timing Power Nine Challenge Last Saturday of the month, at 11am Pacific Legacy Challenge Second Saturday of the month, at 11am Pacific No Downtime November 9th, 23rd and 30th and December 14th Extended Downtime November 16th Current Leagues End January

Upcoming and Ongoing Events Begins Ends From the Vault: Lore On sale now January 4, 2017 PAUPER LEAGUE ENDING EARLY DUE TO BANNING Now active November 15th Kaladesh Limited Championship November 5th Details here Kaladesh Standard Championship November 13th Details here Kaladesh Sealed MOCS events October 29th, December 4th, 11th, 18th and 30th. Details here Standard MOCS events November 6th &25th Details here Modern MOCS events January 7th & 21st Details here Amonkhet Spring, 2017 release Aether Revolt prerelease January 27th January30th Modern Masters 2017 Edition MTGO release March 23rd

Flashback Schedule:

Flashback drafts cost 10Tix or 100 Play Points or 2 Tix plus product. They are you-keep-the- cards, not Phantom. These are single elimination events that pay out in play points: 200 for first, 100 for second, and 50 for third and fourth place.

Format Begins Ends Dark Ascension, 2 Innistrad November 2 November 9 Triple Magic 2012 November 9 November 16 Triple Avacyn Restored November 16 November 23 Triple Magic 2013 November 23 November 30 Triple Return to Ravnica: November 30 December 7 Triple Gatecrash December 7 December 14 Dragon’s Maze, Gatecrash, Return to Ravnica December 14 December 21

Opinion Section: Bribery, Part II

Last weekend, I preached about Bribery, and how there were no “magic words” that would let you get across the idea that you were bribing someone without actually getting penalized for bribery. The responses I got, in comments and elsewhere, were interesting. One group of comments seemed to say that this wasn’t really that big of an issue, because pro players knew how to “get around the rule so easily.”

First off, Bribery is a big thing, because it has a real impact on other players. The outcome of a given match does not just affect the two players in that match, it affects the tiebreakers of every player either of the players involved in the bribery had played at any time during the event. The first tiebreaker, after your own match wins, is opponent match wins. If one of your opponents accepts a bribe and loses a game that they would have won, that player’s match win percentage – your first tie-breaker – is significantly lower than it would have been. That can easily be the difference between 8th and 9th place. And that sort of thing does not just affect the Top 8.



The difference between 32nd and 33rd place finish at a Grand Prix is $250. At GP Atlanta, Rob Pisano (32nd) finished ahead of Michael Segal (33rd) by 0.0004%. Had even one opponent of either flipped their result in any match in the event, Mr. Segal would be $250 richer. At GP Providence, it was the gap between 16th ($1,000) and 17th ($500) that was razor thin.

Bribery for match wins affects the integrity of the entire tournament, which is why it is a disqualification offense. It is why Wizards must oppose it, and must try to prevent it.

In one of the announcements of a Bribery DQ, Wizards commented that some pros do not appear to know that Wizards does not condone bribery, collusion or even IDs, since they all affect the tiebreakers – and tournament results – of other players. ID’s are a different discussion, but the point about pros not knowing why bribery and collusion are problems is well taken. Pros should understand the impact their actions can have.

Commenters also said that “if a rule is difficult to enforce, it is a bad rule.” I strongly disagree. The fact that something is difficult to enforce does not make it a bad rule or law. It is difficult to catch or prosecute all shoplifters, or catch every vandal, but that does not mean that society should make theft or destruction of other people’s property legal.

It is hard to prevent collusion between players, since judges cannot be everywhere. If players discuss and agree to collusive behavior before they arrive at the event, or have an understanding that, if a player cheats (and throwing a match in expectation of a payment is cheating, both under the rules and morally) with an unspoken expectation that the other player will make it up to them later, that can be very hard to prove. Note that I did not say detect, I said prove. Players can have a legitimate reason to concede a match and it is not possible to get inside a player’s brain to determine why the player conceded a match. Sometimes friends concede to each other. Sometimes players need to leave an event early. And sometimes players concede because they expect to be paid later. As a judge, it is our job to figure out which reason applies, and DQ if it is the later. If we are convinced it is the later, we DQ. If we are unsure, we may have to give players the benefit of the doubt.

Again, policing bribery is hard, but that does not mean that we should allow it. Too many other players are harmed every time a bribe affects the outcome of the match.

One additional thought – we judges know that bribery exists, and that pro players often concede to each other with the unspoken expectation of getting something later on. We also know that most of the time we cannot prove it. As a result, when we do catch someone offering and/or accepting a bribe, we have very little sympathy. Bribery is illegal. The head judge generally makes an announcement to that effect at every event, and even without the announcement, people should know that corruption is wrong. That means that when we catch someone offering a bribe, they are highly unlikely to get off with a warning. Just saying.

Cutting Edge Tech

Standard: We had two more GPs last weekend. Coverage for GP Warsaw is : We had two more GPs last weekend. Coverage for GP Warsaw is here , and coverage for GP Santiago is here . Once again, the format was dominated by GB Delirium and UW Flash. I’ve covered those, so I will grab two of the few non-GB, non-UW decks in the Top 8 to feature.



Legacy: Eternal Weekend was last weekend. 410 players converged to play the format, somewhat offsetting SCGs announcement that it will greatly reduce its support for Legacy. Coverage is

Eternal Weekend was last weekend. 410 players converged to play the format, somewhat offsetting SCGs announcement that it will greatly reduce its support for Legacy. Coverage is here . The SCG announcement is here . The winning deck was one I had not seen much of – a green based Dark Depths combo deck.

Vintage: I am having trouble getting to the eternal weekend coverage page, so I’m pulling my deck from the European eternal weekend event. Instead, a reminder that the next season of the Vintage Super League will begin in early January.

Card Prices

Note: all my prices come from the fine folks at MTGOTraders.com . These are retail prices, and generally the price of the lowest priced, actively traded version. (Prices for some rare promo versions are not updated when not in stock, so I skip those.) You can get these cards at MTGOTraders.com web store, or from their bots: MTGOTradersBot(#) (they have bots 1-10), CardCaddy and CardWareHouse, or sell cards to MTGOTradersBuyBot(#) (they have buybots 1-4). I have bought cards from MTGOTraders for over a decade now, and have never been overcharged or disappointed.

Standard staples: Standard prices are doing about churning a bit. These changes reflect the metagame changes – the price drops from lots of KLD being opened have ended.

Modern staples: Modern prices have bounced around a bit this week. I wonder if the big losses on Liliana and other staples are a result of treasure chests being opened.

Legacy and Vintage: Legacy and Vintage are up just a touch overall. A lot of cards have shown very small price increases, but almost all no losses. Misdirection is down, but Misdirection is rarely more than a one-of in Vintage (Stephen Menendian aside), so a small number of Treasure Chests might well cause the drop despite the overall up trend.

Set Redemption: You can redeem complete sets on MTGO. You need to purchase a redemption voucher from the store for $25. During the next downtime, Wizards removes a complete set from your account and sends you the same set in paper.

Complete Set Price Last Week Change % Change Battle for Zendikar $68.58 $68.90 ($0.32) 0% Eldritch Moon $128.46 $116.75 $11.71 10% Kaladesh $87.75 $86.92 $0.83 1% Oath of the Gatewatch $94.88 $95.27 ($0.39) 0% Shadows over Innistrad $63.99 $60.18 $3.81 6%

The Good Stuff

The following is a list of all the non-promo, non-foil cards on MTGO that retail for more than $25 per card. These are the big ticket items in the world of MTGO. The list is back over 50 cards again this week.

Name Set Rarity Price Rishadan Port MM Rare $ 246.74 Black Lotus VMA Bonus $ 109.87 Liliana of the Veil ISD Mythic Rare $ 72.61 Misdirection MM Rare $ 68.99 Tangle Wire NE Rare $ 53.99 Show and Tell UZ Rare $ 52.84 Food Chain MM Rare $ 48.20 Exploration UZ Rare $ 45.55 Tarmogoyf MM2 Mythic Rare $ 44.47 Tarmogoyf FUT Rare $ 43.90 Tarmogoyf MMA Mythic Rare $ 43.89 Mox Sapphire VMA Bonus $ 41.22 Wasteland TE Uncommon $ 38.45 Wasteland TPR Rare $ 38.04 Gaea's Cradle UZ Rare $ 37.13 Engineered Explosives MMA Rare $ 36.99 Engineered Explosives 5DN Rare $ 36.81 Wasteland EMA Rare $ 36.49 Liliana, the Last Hope EMN Mythic Rare $ 36.14 Ensnaring Bridge ST Rare $ 36.03 Infernal Tutor DIS Rare $ 35.77 Blood Moon MMA Rare $ 35.15 Back to Basics UZ Rare $ 35.11 Blood Moon 8ED Rare $ 34.69 Blood Moon 9ED Rare $ 34.48 Ensnaring Bridge 8ED Rare $ 32.33 Wasteland EXP Mythic Rare $ 32.26 Cavern of Souls AVR Rare $ 32.17 Unmask MM Rare $ 32.12 Moat MED Rare $ 30.87 Force of Will MED Rare $ 30.42 Ensnaring Bridge 7E Rare $ 30.10 Lion's Eye Diamond MI Rare $ 29.89 True-Name Nemesis PZ1 Mythic Rare $ 29.82 Ancestral Recall VMA Bonus $ 29.73 Golgari Grave-Troll DDJ Rare $ 29.38 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet OGW Mythic Rare $ 29.33 Golgari Grave-Troll RAV Rare $ 28.89 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar BFZ Mythic Rare $ 28.69 Containment Priest PZ1 Rare $ 28.57 Doomsday WL Rare $ 27.35 Inkmoth Nexus MBS Rare $ 27.13 Containment Priest C14 Rare $ 26.65 Voice of Resurgence DGM Mythic Rare $ 26.45 Volcanic Island ME3 Rare $ 26.36 Mox Jet VMA Bonus $ 26.22 Undiscovered Paradise VI Rare $ 26.09 Grove of the Burnwillows FUT Rare $ 26.03 Mox Opal SOM Mythic Rare $ 25.83 Force of Will EMA Mythic Rare $ 25.43 Mox Opal MM2 Mythic Rare $ 25.08

The big number is the retail price of a playset (4 copies) of every card available on MTGO. Assuming you bought the least expensive versions available, the cost of owning a playset of every card on MTGO is $ 22,340. That is up about $75 from last week.

Weekly Highlights

Not a ton of Magic again this week. Family obligations plus work meant I never even got to load the program. I also did not get a chance to watch the Warsaw coverage, but apparently the Internet connection was giving Wizards problems, so I guess I didn’t miss anything.

PRJ

“One Million Words” and “3MWords” on MTGO

This series is an ongoing tribute to Erik “Hamtastic” Friborg.