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A couple friends of mine flew out to Grand Prix New Jersey last year to play in "GP Treasure Cruise is still legal". My friend Kyle made a deep run into the tournament, and actually found himself in a win and in for Top 8. The tiebreaker math was a little unclear for the last round, and he thought he was only playing for Top 16, but either way he was playing an important match against an unknown player.
Kyle gravitates towards slower decks, and he and his opponent found themselves pretty far into the round before they started their third game. At this point in time, Kyle and his opponent agreed that they very much did not want to draw, and that one of them should concede if things came down to turns.
Push came to shove, and when turn five rolled around Kyle controlled a Jace, the Mind Sculptor and was clearly ahead of his opponent. I don't recall all of the particulars, but nobody had threats in play but Kyle was obviously ahead with his active Jace and had considerably more cards in hand. He might have had Counter-Top as well, but even just with the Jace he was in a commanding position. At the end of the round Kyle's opponent reneged on his promise, and seeing as Kyle was obviously winning they ended up with a draw.
Now, this scenario is pretty clear cut. Kyle was in commanding position and his opponent made a promise. His opponent obviously should have conceded and he basically stole a Grand Prix Top 8 and a PT invite from Kyle.
Other times, things are not so clear. Just to give another scenario, I was playing at 3-0 with RUG Delver in an SCG Open a couple years ago and I was paired against Miracles. My opponent won a long game one and I won game two without doing much playing. Game two dragged on specifically because my opponent spent a lot of time spinning his Sensei's Divining Top.
In game three I had gotten my opponent down to two life while he set up Counter-Top and killed all of my creatures. Time was called, and on turn five he asked for a concession. At 3-0 in a nine round tournament, a draw was actually worth slightly more than a loss, and I technically had outs in the form of the two Fire // Ice left in my deck coupled with some clever play and some bad draws from my opponent.
More importantly, I have had approximately three unintentional draws in my entire life. I play quickly, and there's no way that I used even half the round time that my opponent did. The draw wasn't terrible for either of us and I didn't see it right to reward my opponent for playing a slow deck slowly, especially when I did have outs. I declined and we drew.
Comically enough, I merely cashed the tournament while my opponent Top 8'd, so it's not like he lost anything.
The question is, under what circumstance do you concede on turn five of extra turns? Does board state matter more, or do you factor in your opponent playing slowly? Perhaps you're in the camp that never concedes, as you believe that players should have to earn all of their wins in a specific fashion. Chime in in the comments on how you handle turn five scenarios.
Maybe his opponent thought he still had outs to just a jace on board? Usually I don’t concede or ask my opponent to concede unless I can say clear cut, look I had you when I did this and there are zero outs you have b/c I have this in my hand.
Stealing a GP T8 seems like harsh words b/c Kyle couldn’t finish the match in reality. It’s what happens when you gravitate towards slower decks honestly. If the opponent was attempting to shave time off to to get to a draw then sure he stole it, but it seems that both players were aware of the time and neither actually wanted a draw. Just as much as that blame can be put on Kyle for not taking any of his turns faster in the previous games (I’m willing to bet he didn’t play faster at the beginning of the match).
You seem to be ignoring the fact that they agreed that somebody should win their match.
I get not conceding if you think you have outs, but not when you agreed somebody should and you are the one who ends up significantly behind in turns. Unfortunately there is no punishment for this behavior, but it’s terrible reputation management.
Both players agreed that they didn’t want to draw and that someone should win the match, but they didn’t say how that would be determined if the game went to turns. Unless the opponent specifically said “I will concede if you have the better board position on turn 5” I don’t see how he was reneging on a promise. By your own logic in your second example, you didn’t concede because you still had outs. The opponent wasn’t dead on board; they probably thought they had outs. He probably expected Kyle to at least consider conceding too, and perhaps it looked like Kyle was going back on his word from that perspective.
As for the legality of deciding a match based on outside factors, I’m not a judge but that is dangerous territory. I’ve seen people disqualified for flipping the top 3 cards of their libraries, deciding how the game would have played out with extra time, and then having someone concede based on that information. Asking someone to concede because “I would eventually have won if the game continued” is pretty close to that.
When I detect that a match I’m playing in may go to time (say, a 20 minute game 1, or opponent going Plains, Top) I get the conversation started early in hopes of avoiding an unintentional draw. “Hey dude, if we go to time, do you want to agree that there will be a winner in our match? We can decide on board state, or something, when the time comes.” This usually gets a positive response. Of course, some decks don’t really have a “board state”, but if everyone’s cool about it, there’s usually a way for me and the opponent to agree.
In addition to being proactive about starting that conversation early, I’ve learned to call the judge early when I see what might become slow play. It’s hard to draw lines with slow play, but we all know it when we see it. I call the judge early so that if I have to call him again (or 4 more times), he is already aware that there might be a problem here. Some opponents will see that as being a jerk, but it doesn’t matter. I’d rather some random dude who likes Miracles think that I’m mean, instead of getting a draw that I could have avoided by speaking to a judge.
I’ve come into a situation where we could not agree on who’s board state was better so that happens sometimes :(.
It’s definitely difficult to evaluate some boards. I definitely wouldn’t say that Kyle’s situation was tough though. Untapping with Jace and being up on cards in hand makes losing very difficult. While you can’t look through players decks while talking about who should concede, you can show hands and Kyle’s opponent was simply under the gun of Jace.
I was playing a Kahns Sealed Game Day event at a local shop. My first round opponent was only there to support her son. We both played slow decks, and with all of her lands gaining her a life, she got up to 36. The game dragged on, and I called the judge over and asked what would happen if time was called on game 2. I was informed that the winner of game 1 would get a match win. My plan became to play quickly, make my opponent draw out and easily win game 1. I had a better board, but repeated attacks would just make the game take longer. My opponent starts suffering from memory loss and begins to check her morphs every turn, makes a suicide attack to take more time and slow plays the heck out of me. When turns are called, I ask her how many cards she has in her library. She says she will draw out on turns. I don’t attack because I have her dead. The next turn, she says, “I do have enough cards in my library to survive extra turns.” I start attacking but it’s not enough. We draw, and it’s like we both lose as packs are awarded at 3 wins. I wasn’t pressing the issue because it was a casual event with a newer player, but I should have. Not completing one game for the round is unacceptable to me.
With players who shuffle excessively slow and take a long time to do nothing on their turn I call the judge over often. I have even started to time peoples shuffling and their turns in front of them (if they start taking a long time). FNM allows you to use cell phone but you can look at a clock at most large events. This mostly applies to standard events but turns shouldn’t last more than 30 seconds unless you have actual interaction during the turn. I also will only give a concession if it is a friend or if the opponent is ahead and didn’t take excessive amounts of time during the game.
Tips for slow players:
Have a plan for the cards in your hand. Don’t just stare at your opponent while they play. Think through their actions.
Practice more. Playing slow against me makes me think you don’t know your deck, your outs, your win-cons.
Resolve your draw spells quickly by setting in a pile all the cards you are going to draw or look at (this allows both players to know you are getting the right number) then pick them up. Don’t dig through time by setting your hand aside and drawing 7 cards slowly. Set your hand down, stack 7 cards, pick them up and decide, then place the rest on bottom. Look at your hand if you need to but you should know what is in it.
/end rant