State of the Program for May 27th 2016

In the News:

Eternal Masters Previews Starting: Wizards has officially launched Eternal Masters. Mark Rosewater’s article introducing the set is Wizards has officially launched Eternal Masters. Mark Rosewater’s article introducing the set is here . The Developing EM article is here . The Card Image Gallery is here . Previews are scattered around the Interwebs. The set looks pretty good – lots of solid, needed cards.

Standard PTQ on Monday, and RED PTQ Tokens Expire: It is a double PTQ weekend. Important note: this is the last PTQ for PT Eldritch Moon. That means these two PTQs are the last chance to use any RED PTQ Tokens you may have earned. After next downtime, any unused tokens will be removed from your collection.

Software Issues at GP Charlotte: This is not directly MTGO related, but it is relevant. The software that Wizards uses to run large events, nicknamed Walter, ran into a very rare, very strange circumstance, and it created errors in the round pairing algorithm. This caused delays and one round of random pairings. Star City Games, the tournament organizer, responded well. They kept everyone informed, and threw tens of thousands of dollars in free packs and events to the players affected. Wizards accepted full responsibility, and has said that it will cover at least some of what SCG spent on compensation. This particular issue should not reoccur. More information just what happened, and more of my thoughts on this, in the opinion section.

Rosewater on Magic: Mark Rosewater gave a speech entitled Magic the Gathering: Twenty Years, Twenty Lessons at GDC 16. If you like knowing more about how Magic is made, check it out Mark Rosewater gave a speech entitled Magic the Gathering: Twenty Years, Twenty Lessons at GDC 16. If you like knowing more about how Magic is made, check it out here

Power Nine Challenge this Weekend: Saturday. Go for it. GL all.

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 MTGO calendar and 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.

Item: date and notes

· Power Nine Challenge: Last Saturday of the month, at 11am Pacific. Next one May 28th. That’s tomorrow!

· Legacy Challenge: Second Saturday of the month, at 11am Pacific. Next one June 11th.

· No Downtime on: June 8 and June 22

· League End Dates: all current leagues end July 27, 2016

· Legacy Gauntlet: June 8 through 16

· Eternal Masters: June 16 through July 6. Details : June 16 through July 6. Details here

· Legacy Championship Qualifiers: July 6 through July 20

· Legacy Championship: July 24

· Eldritch Moon Prerelease: July 29-August 1. Details : July 29-August 1. Details here

· Kaladesh Prerelease: October 7-10, on sale October 10th. Product code KLD.

· From the Vault Lore: releases online October 10, 2016.

· Aether Revolt: January 2017 release

Flashback Schedule:

Flashback drafts are 10Tix / 100 Play Points / 2 Tix plus product, not Phantom, single elim and pay out in play points: 200 for first, 100 for second, 50 for third and fourth.

· Triple Tenth Edition: May 25, 2016 to June 1, 2016

· Triple Lorwyn: June 1 to June 8

· 2 Lorwyn, Morningtide: June 8 to June 15

· Triple Shadowmoor: June 15 to June 22

· 2 Shadowmoor, Eventide: June 22 to June 29

· Triple Shards of Alara: June 29 to July 6

· 2 Shards, Conflux: July 6 to July 13

· Shards, Conflux, Alara Reborn: July 13 to July 20

· Triple Magic 2010: July 20 to July 27

· Triple Zendikar: August 17 to August 24

· 2 Zendikar, Worldwake: August 24 to August 31

· Triple Rise of the Eldrazi: August 31 to September 7

· Triple Magic 2011: September 7 to September 14

· Triple Scars of Mirrodin: September 14 to September 21

· Mirrodin Besieged, 2 Scars of Mirrodin: September 21 to September 28

· New Phyrexia, Mirrodin Besieged, Scars of Mirrodin: September 28 to October 5

· Triple Innistrad: October 26 to November 2

· Dark Ascension, 2 Innistrad: November 2 to November 9

· Triple Magic 2012: November 9 to November 16

· Triple Avacyn Restored: November 16 to November 23

· Triple Magic 2013: November 23 to November 30

· Triple Return to Ravnica: November 30 to December 7

· Triple Gatecrash: December 7 to December 14

· Dragon’s Maze, Gatecrash, Return to Ravnica: December 14 to December 21

Flashback This Week: Flashback drafts are back. We have Tenth Edition until next downtime, followed by Triple Lorwyn. Lorwyn’s money cards include Thoughtseize, Flashback drafts are back. We have Tenth Edition until next downtime, followed by Triple Lorwyn. Lorwyn’s money cards include Wanderwine Hub Cryptic Command , Garruk and Thorn of Amethyst

Opinion Section: Software Problems at GP Charlotte and GP Minneapolis

I’ll start by going into more depth on the software issues at GP Charlotte. This is not MTGO related, but it is worth discussing. Second caveat: I don’t want to going down “Wizards can’t do software” rabbit hole. That’s also not relevant. This was a fairly rare event, and created a new and strange bug. The scorekeepers, include the amazing Nick Fang, were able to identify the issue, find a fix that worked, and get the tournament back online in a couple hours. Painful, but it could have been so much worse. Let’s get into the details.

Wizards has developed new software, WLTR (nicknamed Walter), to run very large events. It has been in development for years, and has been running events for about a year. It works. It works better than Wizards Event Reporter (the software stores use) for large events. It is also a lot better than DCI-R, the software it was used to run large events until late last year. If these were cars, then WER would be a Smart car – fine for commuting and basic driving, but limited in what it could do. Walter is a Formula One car – very good on the race track, highly adjustable, but not user friendly and not what grandma would take to the store. DCI-R is a 1960s Volkswagen Beetle: not actually all that good at anything and it breaks down a lot, but its owners know how to fix stuff when it breaks and most fixes are easy.

It is still not clear exactly what happened. I have read Wizards’ statement, here , this article and listened to the interview with HJ Scott Marshall on the Monday Night Magic podcast. What is clear that, in round four, player’s match points were not being calculated correctly. Players should get one match point for a draw, and three for a win. However, match points resulting from rounds two and three were not being entered into player match point totals. Pairings, which are based on players’ match points, were based only on round one results. While that is not exactly random, it is a mess.

The rules for Swiss pairings are, basically, you get paired against opponents with the same match points, with the caveats that you cannot play someone you have not already played, and if there are an odd number of players with a given number of points, someone will get paired down. All this matters because opponent match wins and opponent game wins are important tiebreakers, and you generally need good tiebreakers to make Top 8. Under Swiss pairings, if you are at 7-0, you should be playing against another player at 7-0, or 6-1 or 6-0-1 if you get paired down. That means your round 7 opponent should help your tiebreakers. If you get paired randomly, then you could get paired against someone at 0-7, which would absolutely destroy your tiebreakers.

Swiss pairings are a big deal in large events, because tiebreakers really do matter.

We don’t know what happened, but here’s a theory from one of the head scorekeepers: A preregistered player was not assigned the correct number of byes. When he arrived at the right round, a scorekeeper had to reenter him and fix his results from previous rounds. When this happened, WLTR crashed, but this is not uncommon. Almost always, scorekeepers just restart WLTR and everything is good. WLTR restarted as usual, but something had broken in the crash – something that would not become apparent until much later, when round four was paired.

When round four was paired, the virtual “player cards” that track match points were right, but the pairings algorithm was not using those numbers. The scorekeepers tried all the usual tricks, including restoring the end of round three from backup and repairing round four. That didn’t work. In theory, the scorekeepers could have restored round one from backup, then recreated each round from the match result slips and re-entered results from those slips, but recreating several rounds from paper, for an event with over 2k players, takes hours and hours. Not a solution.

During all this, the scorekeepers were on the phone with Wizards, and had emailed the tournament files to Renton for analysis. After discussions and delay while the Wizards techs looked at the problem, Wizards eventually told SCG to pair round four randomly. It was a trade-off – tiebreakers go to pieces, but at least the round could start.

During round four, Wizards and the scorekeepers thought they had a solution. It seemed to work, but when they paired round five for real, the problem was back. By round seven they had a fix that actually worked. (As I understand it, at least in part it involved enrolling Wizards Organized Play Manager Scott Larabee in the event, pairing him against this player, then dropping him again. Scott Larabee is a gifted and highly experienced scorekeeper himself, so maybe that’s what it takes.) Whatever, and for whatever reason, the pairings algorithm started working correctly again.

I would expect the WLTR team is giving the pairing algorithm a hard look this week.

Start City Games was the tournament organizer for this event. They run good events: they have a lot of well-trained people, hire good judges and scorekeepers, and know how to keep an event on track. However, they cannot write their own tournament software. As Wizards stated , this problem was not on SCG, but SCG still handled it like champs.

When it looked like semi-random pairings might continue, Star City Games offered all active players a chance to drop from the main event. In return, anyone who dropped would get a badge which grants free entry into many scheduled side events (not drafts) for the entire weekend. SCG also announced that it was adding additional free-with-badge events, including a sealed event which would be starting shortly. In other words, if you dropped, you got at least 6 packs immediately, and a chance to win more and play in more events. Over 700 players dropped immediately. SCG then tweeted something like “Given the number of players dropping, the next round will start … in a while.” I’m not a pro, but I scorekeep a reasonable number of tournaments. I can drop a player in 30 seconds or so. Player walk up, I ask for DCI number, player gives it, I enter it, database spins, I verify name, click drop, database spins, then drops player and we move on. Professional scorekeepers can type and click faster, but players still talk at the same speed, and the Wizards servers still respond at speeds that are actually quite exceptional for a Wang VS system. It would take me hours and hours to drop 800 players. SCG threw every available computer and scorekeeper at the job and plowed through it much faster – but that still took time. Getting them badges took even longer, since SCG brought enough badge printers for normal volumes – not 700 players all at once.

Many hundreds of players joined the free sealed event for their free packs. That is making it right on a grand scale – but it comes at a cost. Assuming that 500 players joined for the packs, that gesture probably meant SCG burned through some 4,000 extra packs, for no revenue, for that sealed event alone. Add to that the costs of the other free events those 800 players played in for the rest of the weekend, and you are talking real money. Wizards has said that they will reimburse SCG for some of those costs, as they should. Kudos to SCG for giving players something back, and to Wizards for accepting the responsibility and reimbursing SCG.

Some reddit folks have said this same thing has happened at other events. If by same thing you mean a software glitch, yes, it has. If you mean this bug due to a late entering players with byes; that has not happened before. And it almost certainly won’t be a problem again (if for no other reason, because the scorekeepers now know the workaround.) However, WLTR is a complex piece of software that ties to a very large, secure database. I have little doubt that other bugs will surface over time.

I’m going to attend GP Minneapolis. I may or may not play in the event. Usually Ingrid and I are pretty good at planning for events. This time, I either misunderstood, or forgot, or something, and I never applied for the event. Ingrid is on staff, and will be judging. I’m not. I get to tag along and enjoy the weekend, but I don’t have to work it.

The question is, should I play?

Spring is busy, with lots of real-life time sinks. As a result, I have played very little Standard. I have been winning more than I lose, even when picking up one new deck after another, but I have not come close to mastering the format. I suspect that I am good enough to have a decent chance of making Day Two, but I have almost no chance of making the top 64, which is what it takes to win any money. If you don’t money, you don’t get anything. That’s how a GP works.

GP Minneapolis costs $70. Seventy dollars, for a constructed event! However, $70 is the new price point for constructed events: GP Charlotte and GP LA were both constructed, and both charged the same amount. Had I registered months ago, it would have cost less – but had I known I was going months ago, I might have applied to judge the event.

I will get a promo card if I join the event, but I already have a playset of Stoneforge Mystics. I will also get a playmat, but Ingrid and I have dozens, if not hundreds, of playmats at home. Besides, she will get one for judging this event. The playmat does not motivate me.

Maybe I am not part of the target audience for a GP. Or I’m too jaded, or too cynical, or whatever, but I am having trouble justifying paying $8 per match to play Standard. Not even if it drops to $5 per match, the price point if I make day two. I do consider playing Magic a hobby, and the cost of entry akin to the cost of buying a movie ticket, but these are some really expensive movie tickets.

But maybe this is just me. GP attendance is way up, to the extent that most GPs announce caps on players, and the caps are in the thousands. Maybe the cards and playmats do motivate people, or maybe the other players have better pay skills, or assume their odds of moneying are higher than mine. Whatever Magic Wizards is using to get people to play in GPs, I wish they could apply that to MTGO.

Judge Question of the Week:

I have been training new judges for many years, and part of that training involves setting out scenarios and problems that teach various parts of the rules. They start simple – i.e. a creature with trample is blocked by a creature with protection – and get harder as they go. The goal is to determine what areas of the rules I need to teach, and what my candidate already knows. And to have some fun. Here we go.

I am facing Affinity. During my end step, I flash back the Ancient Grudge in my graveyard targeting my opponent’s Arcbound Ravager. In response, my opponent sacrifices the Ravage to put a counter on his Ornithopter. All this is pretty routine – but it’s about to get interesting. I then cast Ertai’s Meddling targeting my own Ancient Grudge, which was being flashed back, with X = 1.

During my next upkeep, can I smash his Ornithopter with the Ancient Grudge? If so, can I flash it back again to kill something else? Am I, as Marshall Sutcliffe would say, “going off.”

As always, there are no relevant cards not mentioned. For example, you do not have an Isochron Scepter to allow you to recast Ertai’s Meddling over and over again, because that might be next week’s question.

Cutting Edge Tech:

Standard: The MTGO Champs is over. The GPs last weekend were Modern. However, I have to choose a deck for GP Minneapolis. Here’s my likely choice – well, one of my likely choices – at the moment. Maybe. I am doing well with it in Leagues, but I also want Tireless Tracker.

Modern: We had two Modern GPs last weekend. Coverage of GP LA is We had two Modern GPs last weekend. Coverage of GP LA is here . Coverage of GP Charlotte is here . Overall, the format looks pretty good.

Legacy: With SCG running a GP last weekend, they did not run any Legacy events. This list comes from the Wizards website.

Vintage: The VSL qualifying event has wrapped up. The VSL decklists are : The VSL qualifying event has wrapped up. The VSL decklists are here . Kai Budde won the last chance qualifier when David Williams accidentally cast a Mox into his own Standstill.

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 is volatile again this week. We are still seeing the reaction to recent Standard GPs. Last week I asked if CoCo could pass Jace and noted that Kalitas and Nahiri were making runs. Both of those were sprinting, and have fallen back.

Modern staples: Modern is a bit more reasonable this week. The lands opened in recent flashbacks took some hits, but that won’t last.

Legacy and Vintage: Legacy and Vintage are mixed this week. Eternal Masters previews are starting. Daze has been spoiled, as a common. I am compiling these tables early Wednesday – expect more changes as more spoilers appear.

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 $72.05 $76.48 ($4.43) -6% Dragons of Tarkir $129.94 $131.55 ($1.61) -1% Magic Origins $122.20 $135.18 ($12.98) -10% Oath of the Gatewatch $122.88 $121.76 $1.12 1% Shadows over Innistrad $97.71 $100.07 ($2.36) -2%

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. Worth promised to up the supply of some needed cards seems to be happening, Eternal Masters is looking good. That said, the list grew by a half dozen cards this week. Name Set Rarity Price Rishadan Port MM Rare $ 156.72 Black Lotus VMA Bonus $ 135.64 Liliana of the Veil ISD Mythic Rare $ 98.07 Misdirection MM Rare $ 88.82 Mox Sapphire VMA Bonus $ 60.43 Tarmogoyf MM2 Mythic Rare $ 54.07 Tarmogoyf MMA Mythic Rare $ 53.23 Tangle Wire NE Rare $ 52.94 Wasteland TE Uncommon $ 49.08 Ancestral Recall VMA Bonus $ 47.84 Wasteland TPR Rare $ 47.82 Tarmogoyf FUT Rare $ 46.52 City of Traitors EX Rare $ 43.28 City of Traitors TPR Rare $ 41.73 Mox Jet VMA Bonus $ 40.34 Gaea's Cradle UZ Rare $ 40.20 Show and Tell UZ Rare $ 40.15 Voice of Resurgence DGM Mythic Rare $ 38.04 Celestial Colonnade WWK Rare $ 37.85 Scalding Tarn ZEN Rare $ 36.75 Scapeshift MOR Rare $ 36.54 Underground Sea ME2 Rare $ 36.35 Food Chain MM Rare $ 36.17 Time Walk VMA Bonus $ 35.83 Mox Opal MM2 Mythic Rare $ 35.62 Jace, Vryn's Prodigy ORI Mythic Rare $ 34.28 Mox Emerald VMA Bonus $ 34.02 Infernal Tutor DIS Rare $ 33.38 Exploration UZ Rare $ 33.34 Lion's Eye Diamond MI Rare $ 33.27 Batterskull NPH Mythic Rare $ 33.26 Mox Opal SOM Mythic Rare $ 33.26 Mox Ruby VMA Bonus $ 31.95 Containment Priest C14 Rare $ 31.94 Mox Pearl VMA Bonus $ 31.68 Containment Priest PZ1 Rare $ 31.09 Grove of the Burnwillows FUT Rare $ 30.71 Griselbrand AVR Mythic Rare $ 30.00 Underground Sea ME4 Rare $ 29.54 Ensnaring Bridge 7E Rare $ 29.41 Collected Company DTK Rare $ 29.01 Ensnaring Bridge ST Rare $ 28.68 Ensnaring Bridge 8ED Rare $ 28.54 Horizon Canopy FUT Rare $ 28.46 Blood Moon MMA Rare $ 28.44 Volcanic Island VMA Rare $ 28.20 Verdant Catacombs ZEN Rare $ 28.13 Cavern of Souls AVR Rare $ 28.12 Volcanic Island ME4 Rare $ 27.62 Volcanic Island ME3 Rare $ 27.37 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar BFZ Mythic Rare $ 27.11 Underground Sea VMA Rare $ 26.96 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet OGW Mythic Rare $ 26.40 Crucible of Worlds 5DN Rare $ 26.12 Crucible of Worlds 10E Rare $ 25.85 Blood Moon 9ED Rare $ 25.42 Blood Moon 8ED Rare $ 25.37 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 $ 26,760. That’s down about $80 from last week’s number.

Weekly Highlights:

I am going to be headed for GP Minneapolis. I'll play Magic in some sort of tourney or tourneys. Wish me luck.

PRJ

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

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

HammyBot Super Sale: HammyBot was set up to sell off Erik Friborg’s collection, with all proceeds going to his wife and son. So far, HammyBot has raised over $8,000, but there are a lot of cards left in the collection. Those cards are being sold at MTGOTrader’s Buy Price.

Answer to the Judge Question of the Week:

I am facing Affinity. During my end step, I flash back the Ancient Grudge in my graveyard targeting my opponent’s Arcbound Ravager. In response, my opponent sacrifices the Ravage to put a counter on his Ornithopter. All this is pretty routine – but it’s about to get interesting. I then cast Ertai’s Meddling targeting my own Ancient Grudge, which was being flashed back, with X = 1.

During my next upkeep, can I smash his Ornithopter with the Ancient Grudge? If so, can I flash it back again to kill something else?

First, you can counter a flashback spell with Ertai’s Meddling, and it will come back when the delay counters run out. Flashback has a replacement effect that says “when this spell resolves, if it would go anywhere else, exile it instead.” However, since Ertai’s Meddling exiles the spell, the flashback replacement effect does not apply. However, when Ancient Grudge comes back, it goes onto the stack “as a copy of the original spell.” It does not say “you can choose new targets for the spell.” This means the Ancient Grudge returns targeting the (dead) Arcbound Ravager, and is then countered because its target is illegal. Worse yet, Ancient Grudge “remembers” that it was flashed back, so it is exiled.

As for whether Marshall might describe this as “going off” or “doing it” -- he might say something like that if this worked in any way. Since it does not, probably not.