The discussion on tournament rule knowledge that I mentioned in my tournament primer continues over at David's PT San Diego article. One common thread that appears in the conversation is the idea that it is strictly the responsibility of players to know all the tournament rules when they show up for an event.
Commenter Delha said this:
It’s the player’s responsibility to learn the rules of the competition. This is true of any sport/game/etc. People are just being too lazy to do their homework, then whining when it comes back to bite them later.
For any critical penalty you see in professional sports, players have probably lost hundreds of games across their collective pasts in this exact manner. We just don’t hear about those games as much becuase they generally happen before them became pros.
Anyone serious competitor (in practically any field) ought to know that hard lessons are just a part of the journey (Demigod of Revenge, anyone?). Grit your teeth, grumble a bit if you need, but at the end of the day, take the lesson to heart and move on.
This was my response, and I wanted to reprint it here because I think it conveys what I believe is important about how we operate at PTQs, GPs, and public events:
The problem is that if only serious players turn up, we don’t have 2,000-person GPs in Paris. Seriously, the vast majority of all GP and PTQ attendees are “dead money” the moment round one starts, but they come because they (1) think they have a chance and (2) want to game. When they lose to tournament rules they weren’t briefed on, that sours them, and they go home. If they go home, then the GP no longer serves its purpose as a promotional tool for the game, and it goes away.
Professional sports isn’t a good analogy here, as that only really maps well onto the Pro Tour itself. For an actual PT, I expect all the players to know the tournament rules thoroughly, and it’s their own fault if they screw that up. But for a public event held in parallel with the PT, or a PTQ, or a GP, it’s unhealthy for the game if people can be ambushed by tournament rules.
Honestly, I’m already careful at GPs and PTQs to explain to my opponent that it’s not a big deal when I call a judge on them, because I don’t want them to think I’m trying to game the system. Check out some of the comments on my column about GP Oakland, where some readers thought I was fishing for a win by counting out my opponent’s deck (when in reality, I just wanted to make sure he didn’t present an illegal deck AGAIN, and I count out the deck each time it is presented as a matter of policy).
There’s a big difference between not understanding how the Demigod trigger works and not knowing that suggesting a prize split for a concession is a DQ offense. The first one is a bit of a “WTF?” moment you can share with your friends later, and take home as a valuable learning lesson to your kitchen table or FNM game. The second one is a bitter loss of your day and your $30 entry fee that happened just because you made a casual suggestion that you thought was okay.
It’s good for the game if you learn that there are pros who are “end bosses” in terms of their superior skills. It’s bad for the game if you learn that there are bastards who are going to screw you out of wins with tournament rule tricks.
What I'd like to see
So, that's what I wrote. What I'd like to see at PTQs and GPs are things like one-page, bullet-point summaries of how the tournament rules work (like a shorter version of this). At GP Oakland, they gave us free Magic score pads and FNM pens. The top sheet of each score pad could easily be a little explanation of key tournament rules to avoid stupid game losses and disqualifications. At a PTQ, the rules could be posted at the venue or distributed on the back of the buy sheets (our PTQs always have at least one dealer with a buy sheet that's being spammed across the venue).
I agree with commenter "The E" who said this:
You can say “Players should educate THEMSELVES” or “If a player comes to a tournament not having read the floor rules beforehand then they’re an idiot”…etc…etc. But I feel, you’re being ignorant then. I don’t care IF players SHOULD do that. I care that THEY DO do that. There’s a big difference between what someone should do and then what actually happens.
In the health sciences, there's a concept known as "harm reduction." The core idea behind harm reduction is that you're going to develop methods that are based on how people actually behave, with the intent of minimizing bad outcomes.
Sure, Nancy Reagan can tell all the kids to "just say no." Realistically, we all know that some kids will use drugs, so why not develop healthcare practices that prevent transmission of diseases by, say, offering them free rehab or needle exchange?
Similarly, we can say that it's the responsibility of each player to review the tournament rules before entering a DCI event. But we know that many won't -- heck, we know that many players aren't even aware that there are separate tournament rules. I mean, they've never read the actual Magic rules, right?
It's much better for us as a community, and a community that wants people to keep coming to these big, spectacle-scale tournaments, to proactively educate newer players so that their first premier event isn't their last.