Upper Deck Entertainment Forums

I was asked to pose this question in this forum, originally posted in the WoW Rules forum.

Basically, the question is, what happens when there is a match that might never end? OK, so here's the scenario. I played a deck this weekend that used Footsteps of Illidan and Xi'ri to combo out and kill the opponent. It used Concentration Aura to make the abilities instant and Antonidas Aegis to make them untargetable.
The deck had no way to deal damage to the opponent, other than a Xi'ri attacking, which is an almost impossible scenario in the mirror. I am curious what would have happened if I had played the mirror match, someone playing the same deck (there were at least 2 of us playing the exact same list).
95% of those games will end up a draw. If either player tries to combo off and get Xi'ri into play, then the other player will play Footsteps on your hero, and at the end of the turn both heros will be destroyed simultaneously.
Both players could refuse to put Xi'ri into play, but eventually one player will get near decking out, and will be forced to play his Xi'ri and get a draw rather than lose to decking.
One player COULD win, but only in rare scenarios.

So, what happens if this matchup occurs in a tournament? The round could literally last upwards of 4 hours before a player won. I asked a few judges. None seemed to know, but one thing they told me for sure is that it is illegal for players to use a randomization device (i.e. die roll) to determine a winner.

So, what can be done? From a tournament management standpoint, you can't let the round go for hours over time. The only possible entries for Mantis are one player winning or a double-loss. However, a double-loss seems awkward as no player has done anything violating any rules. Also, neither player is deserving of a penalty because this deck was not intended to make draws, it is just an anomoly that occurs while having a mirror match. So, what can be done?

If I'm remembering correctly from the "Self-Destruct Button" topics from Yu-Gi-Oh it was decided that there's nothing illegal about playing the deck or using a deck mechanic to stall the game. I don't judge WOW so I don't know if match results are allowed to end in draws, I'm assuming not. Either way, I believe the call was something along the lines of eventually giving the players a time limit and award penalties after that time is up to end the match. I can't for the life of me recall the exact procedure or penalties though.

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Go Player ~ 22 Kyu

Twanbon:

So, what happens if this matchup occurs in a tournament? The round could literally last upwards of 4 hours before a player won. I asked a few judges. None seemed to know, but one thing they told me for sure is that it is illegal for players to use a randomization device (i.e. die roll) to determine a winner.

So, what can be done?

Hello,

Judges were correct, it is illegal to use a random method to decide the outcome for a game. It is unlikely that this match could go for 4 hours after time is called.

It's acceptable for a game to end in a draw in both players kill each other simultaneously. A match, however can not end in a draw.

If Xi'ri is in play, and both heroes are demons, this would result in both heroes being destroyed at the same time. If the match would result in a draw due to this, another game would be played.

If time is called on this match, please review the End of Match procedures found in Appendix C: WoW TCG Policies found here: http://entertainment.upperdeck.com/community/files/28/english/category1039.aspx

Appendix C: WoW TCG Policies:

•    If both players have an equal number of game wins, the player whose hero has the most damage is the loser of the match. If damage on the heroes is tied, play continues. When there is a change in damage totals, the player whose hero has the most damage is the loser of the match. This is a pre-priority check.

•    If both players have an equal number of game wins and are between games, the next game will start. Players may use their side decks. The match winner will be determined by checking the damage on the heroes after four turns. If damage on the heroes is tied, play continues. When there is a change in damage totals, the player whose hero has the most damage is the loser of the match. This is a pre-priority check.

Please note that only one player can win a match, and the double-loss is reserved for only specific situations. As long as both players are continuing the game at an appropriate pace neither would receive a 'slow play' loss.

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Ry Schueller
Organized Play Representative
Upper Deck Entertainment

Ry, I apologize if I am misreading your statement, but I believe you misunderstand the situation.

I fully understand that a game can end in a draw. HOWEVER, the issue is that NEARLY EVERY GAME in this particular matchup will end in a draw. Neither player can deal the other any damage, and whenever one player tries to kill the other with Xi'ri, the other player will ALMOST ALWAYS have the cards in hand to make it a draw.

Therefore, the round could go indefinitely long without a winner, ESPECIALLY since neither play will be comboing off until late in each game. It is VERY possible for the match to take 7, 8, or more games before one player can beat the other.  

So, what will happen if the match proceeds FAR beyond the time limit with no winner being decided? That is the question.

747828:

Ry, I apologize if I am misreading your statement, but I believe you misunderstand the situation.

I fully understand that a game can end in a draw. HOWEVER, the issue is that NEARLY EVERY GAME in this particular matchup will end in a draw. Neither player can deal the other any damage, and whenever one player tries to kill the other with Xi'ri, the other player will ALMOST ALWAYS have the cards in hand to make it a draw.

Therefore, the round could go indefinitely long without a winner, ESPECIALLY since neither play will be comboing off until late in each game. It is VERY possible for the match to take 7, 8, or more games before one player can beat the other.  

So, what will happen if the match proceeds FAR beyond the time limit with no winner being decided? That is the question.

I think the reality is that while there is nothing wrong with the question per se, you're asking about a practical impossibility. Statistically, both players consistantly having the exact cards need to always draw the game, is unlikely, and sooner or later someone will win a game. Either someone's going to have to deck out, or they're going to have to play. Either they're going to play and draw or play and someone loses.

Now lets say, in your example, every game, the combo is played, and every game ends in a draw. Then I believe the judge is allowed to issue a slow play warning and time limit to each player.

P406 Slow play
This infraction occurs when a player unintentionally causes a delay of the game. This can happen through non-action by the player, or through repetitive action that does not progress the game.
Players are responsible for playing at an efficient pace regardless of the complexity of the game or the number of decisions that have to be made. Failure to do so slows down the whole tournament. In addition to assessing a penalty for this infraction, the judge must also give players two extra turns, one for each player, (or two ticks in the case of WoW Minis) to be taken as part of end of match procedures.

This would be assuming that this happens unintentionally. Now. If I understand it correctly. In order for the game to draw, you opponent has to respond to the first card in the combo. It is possible that after this has occurred a number of times, the judge might be able to issue a warning to both players that they're both aware that playing said combo will always draw the game and that they can not allow the tournament to continue to be delayed. As such, it's possible they might state that any more intentional playing of that combo will be seen as a method to intentionally delay the tournament and would then fall under,

P704 Stalling
This infraction occurs when a player intentionally plays slow during a game to gain an advantage.
Players that intentionally play slow to gain an advantage from end of match procedures create an unfair game environment, and unnecessarily delay the tournament.
The penalty for Stalling is a Disqualification for both Rules Levels.

I do not know however, if this is something we are allowed to do. I would imagine that sooner or later we would have to step in and do something. However, I think in practice, such delays are only going to last maybe 10, 15 minutes tops. Like I said, I don't know if this is proper interpretation or not. I'm just throwing it out there, but I have a feeling that this isn't correct.

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Go Player ~ 22 Kyu

If I understand this correctly, then not reacting and comboing off would essentially mean giving up for the player.
We can't force a player to give up a game, no matter what the situation is.
The problem with slow play is this. Slow Play is a delay of the game by non-action or repeated action without purpose. In this case however, there is a case of repeated action with a very important and specific purpose, which is not losing the game and match. This is no case of Slow Play.

Same goes with Stalling. Per definition, Stalling is the act of playing slowly in order to gain an advantage from end of match procedures. However, in this situation, the players simply don't want to lose, they gain nothing from end-of-match procedures (actually, they don't care about them at all).


The problem in this case is that the deck effectively has no win condition in the mirror match, because as soon as you try to win, your opponent will likely get the game to draw. The only real way to end this is one player getting off his combo without his opponent being able to draw the game (or someone getting damage onto his opponent's hero by some means).

How about asking the players to side the parts that cause the game to be a draw out of their decks? Then, in the worse case, one player should lose from being decked at the end of their game. Since you are considering a mirror match, both players should remove the same cards, the judge getting them to agree on which card they should remove. I guess that refusing to accept such a suggestion would fall in a minor unsporting conduct, so one player would be allowed to try once more to try the match without changing the deck, but the second time he would get a game loss, thus allowing the tournament to continue. If both players refuse to come to this agreement, the penalty should slowly be increased up to disqualification with reward (then you would be able to continue the tournament without worrying about it anymore).

The goal of this suggestion would be to propose a solution for the players, without giving any advantage to any of them. Even though you can't order them to do so, failure to search or accept a way to shorten the game while remaining fair for both players would fall under an unsporting conduct, thus giving you a way to end it.

I suppose I just don't see the problem with allowing the players to agree to randomly determine a winner in this situation. As a player, I don't want to sit around for 3 hours playing a match that is basically going to be randomly determined anyway (whoever gets very unlucky first loses). Why not let players randomly determine if they agree upon it?

1733232:

I think the reality is that while there is nothing wrong with the question per se, you're asking about a practical impossibility. Statistically, both players consistantly having the exact cards need to always draw the game, is unlikely, and sooner or later someone will win a game. Either someone's going to have to deck out, or they're going to have to play. Either they're going to play and draw or play and someone loses.

Its actually very statistically UNLIKELY that the game will result in a winner. This deck doesn't combo off until the player has drawn over half of its deck. At the time Player A tries to combo off, in order to win, the following must occur:
1) Player B needs to have NOT drawn one particular card in his deck yet (Footsteps of Illidan)
AND
2) Player B needs to have not drawn ability destruction yet (Sacred Purification) OR Player A has to have drawn Antonidas' Aegis
AND
3) Player B needs to have not drawn his Arcane Torrent yet UNLESS Player A has Concentration Aura or Antonidas' Aegis

ALL of that needs to occur for Player A to win the game, after both players have likely seen over half of their deck.
On top of that, there is a staring contest going on here, because the person to tries to combo off first is actually at a disadvantage, so both players are likely waiting for the other to combo off, so they can counter it, and then combo off themselves while the other player is out of resources. So, while both players are waiting for the other to combo off, they get further into their decks, making it more and more likely that each player has the cards needed to make the game a draw instead of a win.

Hope that explained a bit further.

Two points,

1. The policy documents do NOT allow random determination of the game results. Doing so would be violation the UDE policy and would result in severe penalties.

2. After time is called, the players each get 2 turns, if neither has dealt ANY damage in that time, then the game goes into "sudden death". At that point, the FIRST life point change will end the game. I have a hard time believing that there is NO way to deal ANY damage until turn 13.

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WoW RK2
VS RK2
PM LV2
Specialist LV2 (formerly demo team)
TO LV1

284102:

1. The policy documents do NOT allow random determination of the game results. Doing so would be violation the UDE policy and would result in severe penalties.

And I am suggesting that perhaps this is a scenario that warrants a re-thinking of that policy, solely in the case where the match is far exceeding the time limit, but neither player is violating the slow play rules.

284102:

2. After time is called, the players each get 2 turns, if neither has dealt ANY damage in that time, then the game goes into "sudden death". At that point, the FIRST life point change will end the game. I have a hard time believing that there is NO way to deal ANY damage until turn 13.

I apologize if I come off as arrogant here, but I know what I'm talking about. There is NO WAY for this deck to deal ANY DAMAGE in the mirror match. The entire premise of the deck is to Armor up, protect your hand and abilities, draw cards, and combo off. Since everyone seems to have a hard time believing that, here is a complete list of all the cards you will find between main and side deck.

Valterus's Flip Power - to make your hero or Xi'ri untargetable
Footsteps of Illidan - to turn your opponent into a demon
Xi'ri - to destroy all demons
Blastenheimer 5000 ultra cannon - to sneak Xi'ri into play early
Concentration Aura - to make your abilities instant and uninterruptable
Antonidas Aegis - to make your abilities untargetable
4 types of Armor - none of which deal damage
Blessing of Salvation - makes you untargetable
Arcant Torrent - Interrupts things
Hammer of Justice - to slow things down
Blessing of Wisdom - to draw cards
Holy Strike - to kill allies (can't hit heroes)
Penance - to kill allies (can't hit heroes)
Sacred Purification - to kill abilities
Defensive Breach - to kill equipment
Quests and Darkmoon Faire - for card draw

That is the totality of the cards found between main and side deck. This is a very viable deck, that took me to day 2 of NACC, and almost took another player as well. However, the deck CANNOT deal damage. The end of match procedures DO NOT WORK in the scenario where this deck meets its mirror match, which very well could have happened at NACC. The match COULD take hours and hours to finish. Niether player will try to combo off until they have not only the combo pieces, but also have the necessary protections for them, and will not try to win until they can play all of that at once, which will likely be around turn 15 or 16. To try and combo off before then would be suicide for that player.

To Illustrate - the earliest this deck can win is turn 8. On turn 7, you play Blastenheimer Cannon, and on turn 8, you use the Cannon to shoot out Xi'ri and then play Footsteps on your opponent's hero. However, since your opponent's hero is Valterus, you need 2 copies of Footsteps to start with. Now, this uses up all of your resources. If you opponent simply has Concentration Aura and Footsteps, he has forced the draw. If he has the above two cards AND Sacred Purification, you just lost the game.
So, you will not want to try to combo off until a much later turn, when you've assembled copies of Arcane Torrent, Sacred Purification, Multiple copies of Footsteps, Antonidas's Aegis, etc. And even then, it is in your best interest to wait for your opponent to try to combo off, because the person who tries to combo off is at a disadvantage when the flurry of instants start flying. So the game can, and likely will, become a staring contest until one player feels like they have the exact hand they want to try and go off. And by then, both players will have drawn so many cards that they almost definitely both have the effects and counter-cards to end up in a draw.

TLDR version: PLEASE trust me, I'm not exaggerating, this is a match will likely take hours to resolve. The end-of-match procedures do not resolve this match in a timely fashion. It could hold the tournament up for hours. Please address this issue.

Alright, even if it possible this can happen, What are the actual odds of 2 random players, not only playing the exact same deck card for card, and getting paired together. Can it happen? Sure, however, unless this is a top match, I highly doubt the players are going to have the patience to sit there for hours on end. Second off, the venue owner and the TO are highly unlikely to allow this to continue. I honestly believe either one of the players is going to forfeit, do damage, or the HJ is going to have to end up giving some sort of penalty.

Players are expected to understand that the whole reason we have time limits is to avoid having matches take several hours to complete and to finish the event in a reasonable amount of time. I still think that after the HJ has reminded the players that the match needs to be finished because the tournament needs to move onward, that the players from that point on are intentionally delaying the event which would, at least in my opinion fall under unsporting conduct and probably result in either a match loss or DQ for both.

Just because the decks not illegal, just because they're not stalling or slow playing doesn't mean it's acceptable to allow them to drag out the rest of the event. Sooner or later, we have to step in and do something, whether it falls directly in the penalty guidelines or not.

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Go Player ~ 22 Kyu

I looked over the deck and you are correct. That means this is something that UDE is going to have to explore and determine how to handle it. The chance of them getting paired in a swiss may be slim (depending on how many players), but if they both happen to make top 8, then it becomes a much greater likelyhood. If they are playing properly there is no justification for a penalty, nor would there be a fair way to decide who would recieve the penalty.

Until UDE does come up with a solution, I would suggest to deal with the mirror match that you add a 1 drop ally to your side deck  or change one of the '4 types of armors' to be an armor that can deal damage (such as Master Cannoneer Boots or Helm of Fire).

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WoW RK2
VS RK2
PM LV2
Specialist LV2 (formerly demo team)
TO LV1

Hello all,

For a situation as stated above, the game may have to go to End-of-Match procedures. If there is truly no way for either player to win regardless of how many additional turns they play, this borderlines a variety of penalties already outlined in our documents (slow play, or unsporting conduct depending on how the situation is being handled).

In this situation, a judge may wish to assign a double match loss to order to advance the event. I would also suggest adding a few damage dealing cards to your side board if this is an issue you anticipate seeing at future events.

I will also see if this issue can be clarified in future versions of our policy documents.

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Ry Schueller
Organized Play Representative
Upper Deck Entertainment

284102:

I looked over the deck and you are correct. That means this is something that UDE is going to have to explore and determine how to handle it. The chance of them getting paired in a swiss may be slim (depending on how many players), but if they both happen to make top 8, then it becomes a much greater likelyhood. If they are playing properly there is no justification for a penalty, nor would there be a fair way to decide who would recieve the penalty.

Until UDE does come up with a solution, I would suggest to deal with the mirror match that you add a 1 drop ally to your side deck  or change one of the '4 types of armors' to be an armor that can deal damage (such as Master Cannoneer Boots or Helm of Fire).

Thank you both for understanding my issue. Unfortunately there's not a ton that can be done here, because even if you ran a few damage-dealing cards, it would have to be enough to get through the opponent's armor and ally/equip/abil kill. And like it has been said, it may have been unlikely to be paired up at NACC, but if the same 4 of us brought the deck to a local Qualifier event, which might have 20 players, we would obviously have a much bigger problem.
If some change is to be made, I would suggest the following:
If the match is going exceedingly long, with neither player warranting personal slow play penalties (that is, both are playing at an efficient pace), then the players should be offered the option to randomly determine a winner. If both players agree, then a random winner may be decided. If either player refuses, then slow play penalties will be given.