Have you ever caught someone cheating before? I've only caught 1 person, and thankfully they were disqualified from the PTQ they were playing at because of it.
: matched up with a store owner at an FNM a few years ago who missed an early land drop and exasperatedly said, "damn. mana screwed" He suddenly got up from the table pretending to hear a patron asking for help. When he got back I and dropped Thought Erasure on the table, he looked crestfallen. His hand had 8 cards in it, including the Mountain he needed. His shop didn't stay open for long, as you would probably guess.
I caught a person cheating at my LGS draft, and it was super obvious. First, the ol' pile shuffle with no other shuffle--I explain the pile shuffle rule, and ask him to shuffle, he refuses, I call a judge. The other players to me to just shuffle the deck instead of cutting. I went with it. But then, game 2, I caught him turning all his lands upside down and putting them in the deck upside down. He is now banned from every LGS within 50 miles lol. Good riddance.
I've had an opponent try transmuting Tolaria West mid combat before. This could happen to many new players picking up Titan, but this guy has played the deck for a long time. I've only played the guy a few times, but similar things would always happen. Whenever someone noticed he would always just say "oh right" or say that he just went a bit too fast. He would also always be a little erratic and seemed a little nervous so in most cases it could be played off as an accident. However, a year or so ago he was caught stacking his deck at fnm and I haven't seen him playing magic since.
This sounds suspiciously like Alex Bertoncini. The guy is infamous for cheating in damn near every event he was involved in...when he wasn't being watched by a table judge. He has done every cheat under the sun and as far as I know, he has been permabanned from competitive magic.
You could count the number of cards on field, hand, and library, and exile and see if that adds up to the decklist size. If it added up to 39, then thats indication a card is missing, so the mountain would have gone somewhere.
The judge did count to make sure it didn't fall off the table or something, the mountain was accounted for, it was just sitting in play. Only reasonable explanation was most likely through slight of hand
@@SamSerraMTG I agree with you. Him using the slight of hand tactic is the only logical explanation that I can think of on where the 2nd mountain ended up at.
I accidentally played an entire game 3 at an RCQ with 58 cards in my deck and won, I only found out at the beginning of the next round when making sure to de-sideboard. It didn't have an impact on either of us because we were already knocked out, but should I have gone to a judge and explained what happened in case my result impacted tiebreakers of other players? I'm pretty new to competitive magic so I don't know what the correct approach is
Technically you should have told a judge that you played with a 58 card deck, yes. The match was already completed, and you caught the issue, not a judge or another player, so there would be no large penalty like a game or match loss. In general, you should always say something on even yourself, as the penalty for someone else catching it is going to be much worse.
Something odd about MTG is that unlike games like Yugioh or Pokémon there’s no “Zone or Area” for the graveyard. I’ve seen players discard up down left and right from their library.
There are rules regarding where GY are decks and lands etc can be placed, but players really don't care about enforcing them as much as in games like Pokemon
@@SyDikowhat they are saying is that there is no official designation for where you place your graveyard on the table. "Zone" as in "physical zone/area on the table"
Video is solid! Should convert the mic audio to mono though. In stereo with headphones it’s panning your voice to one side or the other based on your position to the mic.
I worked at a comic book store and ran some Magic tournaments in 94-95... It was a nightmare. You really couldn't just look stuff up on the internet for consultation. We had a number to call. During Ice Age release I specifically remember a guy being adamant that his Meteor Shower would deal 6 damage with the 5 mana he paid. I told him it would only do 3 but he just didn't get it. He said "why would they make such a sh!tty card" lol... It was a good question.
My very first match, this guy kept questioning every move one of our opponents were doing to the point they were getting red faced (they never actually made a mistake, btw), and when it was my turn he would loudly fake yawn during my draw step and start talking to his buddy about the weather. He also gave himself an extra 3 that ended up not even mattering. I didn't say anything. Like I said it was my first ever game and I was anxious. I haven't been back to that game store yet, either.
I played against a guy who thought brainstorm was modern legal and he was playing storm while I was on orzhov devotion. I called one of the gamestore staff over and game 1 went to me due to this error. So he replaced the brainstorms with basic lands and we continued the match. He was complaining the entire time since game 2 was taking so long (I had two of my four sideboard cards in my opening hand and kept it). He was adamant about playing it out to teach me a lesson even though I had rest in peace and damping sphere in play. I played phyrexian arena on turn 12 and my following turn I drew two phyrexian obliterators. I played both since I had ten lands and passed. At this point he had not taken and damage due to me only drawing discard spells and removal for most of the game. He didn’t want to concede and we played it out. Turns out being at 20 life against two 5/5s that can’t be damaged is a quick way to lose.
The catch is that his opponent caught him and his story didn't make sense. If he caught it looking through his own graveyard and called the judge over he might have had a chance. At that level of magic you don't accidently slide a land from your graveyard into play. The only way that happens is if it's on purpose.
having attended no small number of these kinds of events, one thing is unfortunately VERY clear. Many, maybe even most competitive judges are basically reddit mods irl. They're combative, rude and above all absolutely certain of their own superiority, with a pathological need for everyone else to know and accept it. I totally understand the need for judges and i respect the truly good and dedicated ones, but as a whole they're a disgusting group of people who would be shunned in most of society.
@@unknown6390 I've been playing MTG for almost 25 years and attending events regularly for 18-19 years. I usually go to 2-3 a year and that's not counting local events. It is not remotely an overgeneralization. In fact it is more towards "the rule" side of the spectrum rather than the "exception" side.
Thats not really true. A overwhelmingly large majority of the top players are great people. You can generally tell who you need to watch out for, just by interacting with them in person for a few minutes.
LSV and Reid Duke never cheated, hell, both guys announce everything they do before doing it and are very precise with their actions. Nassifs luck factor is like a soft cheat at times, but it's not his fault 😂
Have you ever caught someone cheating before? I've only caught 1 person, and thankfully they were disqualified from the PTQ they were playing at because of it.
Yes but it wasn’t at any pro games.
: matched up with a store owner at an FNM a few years ago who missed an early land drop and exasperatedly said, "damn. mana screwed"
He suddenly got up from the table pretending to hear a patron asking for help.
When he got back I and dropped Thought Erasure on the table, he looked crestfallen. His hand had 8 cards in it, including the Mountain he needed.
His shop didn't stay open for long, as you would probably guess.
I caught a person cheating at my LGS draft, and it was super obvious. First, the ol' pile shuffle with no other shuffle--I explain the pile shuffle rule, and ask him to shuffle, he refuses, I call a judge. The other players to me to just shuffle the deck instead of cutting. I went with it. But then, game 2, I caught him turning all his lands upside down and putting them in the deck upside down. He is now banned from every LGS within 50 miles lol. Good riddance.
I've had an opponent try transmuting Tolaria West mid combat before. This could happen to many new players picking up Titan, but this guy has played the deck for a long time.
I've only played the guy a few times, but similar things would always happen. Whenever someone noticed he would always just say "oh right" or say that he just went a bit too fast. He would also always be a little erratic and seemed a little nervous so in most cases it could be played off as an accident.
However, a year or so ago he was caught stacking his deck at fnm and I haven't seen him playing magic since.
Who in their right mind stacks their deck at an FNM?
This sounds suspiciously like Alex Bertoncini. The guy is infamous for cheating in damn near every event he was involved in...when he wasn't being watched by a table judge. He has done every cheat under the sun and as far as I know, he has been permabanned from competitive magic.
Did he take the mountain from his gy and put it back into his hand in order to discard it again ?
He probably did, or he pretended to discard it and put it into play.
You could count the number of cards on field, hand, and library, and exile and see if that adds up to the decklist size.
If it added up to 39, then thats indication a card is missing, so the mountain would have gone somewhere.
The judge did count to make sure it didn't fall off the table or something, the mountain was accounted for, it was just sitting in play. Only reasonable explanation was most likely through slight of hand
The ring tempted him, to put a land into play
@@Virtua.. from the graveyard no less
@@SamSerraMTG I agree with you. Him using the slight of hand tactic is the only logical explanation that I can think of on where the 2nd mountain ended up at.
I accidentally played an entire game 3 at an RCQ with 58 cards in my deck and won, I only found out at the beginning of the next round when making sure to de-sideboard. It didn't have an impact on either of us because we were already knocked out, but should I have gone to a judge and explained what happened in case my result impacted tiebreakers of other players? I'm pretty new to competitive magic so I don't know what the correct approach is
Also looking forward to more green screen content 😁
Technically you should have told a judge that you played with a 58 card deck, yes. The match was already completed, and you caught the issue, not a judge or another player, so there would be no large penalty like a game or match loss.
In general, you should always say something on even yourself, as the penalty for someone else catching it is going to be much worse.
Something odd about MTG is that unlike games like Yugioh or Pokémon there’s no “Zone or Area” for the graveyard. I’ve seen players discard up down left and right from their library.
There are rules regarding where GY are decks and lands etc can be placed, but players really don't care about enforcing them as much as in games like Pokemon
The graveyard IS considered a zone
@@SyDikowhat they are saying is that there is no official designation for where you place your graveyard on the table. "Zone" as in "physical zone/area on the table"
Video is solid! Should convert the mic audio to mono though. In stereo with headphones it’s panning your voice to one side or the other based on your position to the mic.
Thanks for the tip! Thankfully I just got a new rode portable clip-on mic, so it won't be as much of an issue
Thanks for covering this event! I got a grin at how your hat lets the backdrop shine through.
I worked at a comic book store and ran some Magic tournaments in 94-95... It was a nightmare. You really couldn't just look stuff up on the internet for consultation. We had a number to call. During Ice Age release I specifically remember a guy being adamant that his Meteor Shower would deal 6 damage with the 5 mana he paid. I told him it would only do 3 but he just didn't get it. He said "why would they make such a sh!tty card" lol... It was a good question.
My very first match, this guy kept questioning every move one of our opponents were doing to the point they were getting red faced (they never actually made a mistake, btw), and when it was my turn he would loudly fake yawn during my draw step and start talking to his buddy about the weather. He also gave himself an extra 3 that ended up not even mattering. I didn't say anything. Like I said it was my first ever game and I was anxious. I haven't been back to that game store yet, either.
I played against a guy who thought brainstorm was modern legal and he was playing storm while I was on orzhov devotion.
I called one of the gamestore staff over and game 1 went to me due to this error. So he replaced the brainstorms with basic lands and we continued the match. He was complaining the entire time since game 2 was taking so long (I had two of my four sideboard cards in my opening hand and kept it). He was adamant about playing it out to teach me a lesson even though I had rest in peace and damping sphere in play. I played phyrexian arena on turn 12 and my following turn I drew two phyrexian obliterators. I played both since I had ten lands and passed. At this point he had not taken and damage due to me only drawing discard spells and removal for most of the game. He didn’t want to concede and we played it out. Turns out being at 20 life against two 5/5s that can’t be damaged is a quick way to lose.
Guy ended up with a Lonely Mountain.
I especially like how your hat has a green band so we can read the text in your hat strap 😂
This was my first green screen video, cut me some slack 😭😭
Dhauti blocks a rinho
The pro tour Champion cheated
The judges weee there
This pro tour Is ridículous
This was 2023? It looks like it was filmed in 1996
discarded the same mountain twice
If he cheated why would he report himself?
Please don't use the stereo mode!!!!
Should he revert back to 352*240 while he is at it?
Agree lost a match
Not agree Disqualified tournament
Judge need to count a deck some number and check the land
If one number Disqualified him
The catch is that his opponent caught him and his story didn't make sense. If he caught it looking through his own graveyard and called the judge over he might have had a chance.
At that level of magic you don't accidently slide a land from your graveyard into play. The only way that happens is if it's on purpose.
Mistake
Disqualified him tournament
@@ryanbaldrick4311 How do you accidently slide a mountain from your graveyard into play at the pro level? Be honest now?
love the video but the audio being right side dominant is super distracting
aren't the matches recorded?
Only if it's a feature match. They were still during swiss rounds, and not all of those games are recorded, even at the pro tour level.
Suddenly, Mike Meyers from Wayne's World appears!
When you order Paul Rudd from wish.
I need someone to explain to me what the hell this means
having attended no small number of these kinds of events, one thing is unfortunately VERY clear. Many, maybe even most competitive judges are basically reddit mods irl. They're combative, rude and above all absolutely certain of their own superiority, with a pathological need for everyone else to know and accept it. I totally understand the need for judges and i respect the truly good and dedicated ones, but as a whole they're a disgusting group of people who would be shunned in most of society.
Huge overgeneralization
@@unknown6390 I've been playing MTG for almost 25 years and attending events regularly for 18-19 years. I usually go to 2-3 a year and that's not counting local events. It is not remotely an overgeneralization. In fact it is more towards "the rule" side of the spectrum rather than the "exception" side.
There’s no such thing as a “professional” MTG player.
I feel all legends and pros are cheaters after all this controversies
Thats not really true. A overwhelmingly large majority of the top players are great people. You can generally tell who you need to watch out for, just by interacting with them in person for a few minutes.
LSV and Reid Duke never cheated, hell, both guys announce everything they do before doing it and are very precise with their actions. Nassifs luck factor is like a soft cheat at times, but it's not his fault 😂
You just sound like someone who believes everything the shock creators, ie pleasant kenobi, say and roll.with it. The pros are genuinely great people.
@@a_fuckin_spacemarine7514 Oh LSV cheated alright, just not at magic lol.
@a_fuckin_spacemarine7514 LSV might not _cheat_ but he definitely comes across as an entitled prick.