Looking at your cards before shuffling
Asked by Argy 6 years ago
Tonight my Opponent picked up his deck before our first match, with the cards facing towards him, put them in an order he was happy with, them proceeded to shuffle them.
I had a problem with that as the Tournament rules stipulate:
"Ramdomization is defined as bringing the deck to a state where no player can have any information regarding the order or position of cards in any portion of the deck."
I also checked on the Magic Judge Rule Resources site and it says:
"If a player has had the opportunity to see any of the card faces of the deck being shuffled, the deck is no longer considered randomized and must be randomized again."
Am I right to tell him that I don't wish him to do that in future?
The local judge (self appointed) said it was fine.
Epochalyptik says... #2
As long as the shuffling process results in a sufficiently randomized deck (the order of cards being completely unknown to all players), it doesn't matter whether its owner sees the order of those cards beforehand.
Generally, if someone engages in land weaving or some other card rearrangement practice, that player should shuffle his or her deck more thoroughly than someone who began with a deck already in a relatively unknown order. If you feel as though the shuffling has been insufficient, you are free to shuffle the deck yourself (instead of simply cutting it) when it is presented to you.
February 8, 2018 11:46 a.m.
I'd like to see some rules quoted before I mark any answer as acceptable.
February 8, 2018 12:42 p.m.
Rhadamanthus says... Accepted answer #4
You already quoted the relevant rules... This is only a problem if the player doesn't properly shuffle the deck after looking. If the player shuffles properly then the fact that they looked at the cards doesn't matter in the least. Call a Judge if you don't think the player shuffles enough after looking to re-randomize the deck.
February 8, 2018 12:50 p.m.
If I am to understand correctly this means that I can also readjust his deck by looking at all the card faces, as long as I then shuffle enough afterwards to randomise them.
February 8, 2018 4:13 p.m.
Rhadamanthus says... #6
If you look through your opponent's deck before the game starts they're definitely going to call a Judge, and you're going to get a Warning for "Game Play Error - Looking at Extra Cards".
February 8, 2018 5:36 p.m.
This is the type of information I was hoping someone would find.
From the Comprehensive Rules
401.2. Each library must be kept in a single face-down pile. Players cant look at or change the order of cards in a library.
So that's clear to me. You can't look at your cards, unless an effect overrides that rule, and gives you permission eg. Searching after tapping and saccing a fetchland.
When you are shuffling, the cards must be kept as a face down pile, and not looked at, or the order changed.
February 9, 2018 1:33 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #8
A deck only becomes a library once the game starts. You can look at the cards before that point. The only stipulation is that the deck must be sufficiently randomized prior to drawing the initial hand and starting the game.
103.1. At the start of a game, each player shuffles his or her deck so that the cards are in a random order. Each player may then shuffle or cut his or her opponents' decks. The players' decks become their libraries.
I think you may be trying to find justification for not liking the behavior; what your opponent is doing is not against the rules unless he or she doesn't randomize the deck afterward. If you're unsatisfied that the deck has been correctly shuffled, you are fully within your rights to shuffle it further or call a judge.
February 9, 2018 1:43 p.m.
You are projecting your thoughts on to me.
What I am TRYING to do is find a clear answer for whether or not a player is allowed to look at their deck, prior to shuffling it.
This discussion has been taking place on sites other than TappedOut. They have reached a different conclusion to here.
February 9, 2018 1:47 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #10
All of the evidence presented thus far supports the answer we've provided. If you can provide links to those discussions saying otherwise, or at least quote the justification they offer, we can get at the misunderstanding more directly.
Consider it this way: if you build a deck, you know what cards it contains. When you look through it to fill out a tournament deck list form, or when you sideboard, you see the order of its cards. What is it that makes those any different from rearranging cards immediately prior to shuffling?
Once you shuffle a deck such that the order of its cards is completely random and unknown, there is no impact from knowing the order of those cards at any previous point in time. That's why shuffling is required. The rules acknowledge that there are times you may see the order of cards in a library, but they also require that you then sufficiently randomize and conceal that order before returning to play.
February 9, 2018 1:56 p.m.
The issue is this.
If you go through your deck and split up clumps of land, you give yourself an advantage in that, no matter how you then randomise it, you are less likely to end up with land clumps.
Consider how many times you end up with clumps of land, even after you randomise your deck.
The other question, which StuBi asked, is why you would bother changing the order of your cards by looking at them, if it doesn't give you some kind of advantage?
I have enough information from this discussion now, so I'm going to unsubscribe, and leave it there.
February 9, 2018 2:11 p.m.
I know you said you would unsubscribe, but I found the rule you were looking for, and wanted to post it on the off chance you would see this:
Rule 701.16 defines the rules for shuffling. Rule 701.16a actually defines the action of shuffling: "To shuffle a library or a face-down pile of cards, randomize the cards within it so that no player knows their order."
Under a plain reading of the rules, there is no prohibition on rearranging your cards prior to shuffling, so long as you can prove the cards are randomized and their order is unknown post-shuffling.
That said, since I am posting anyway, I figured I'd add my thoughts:
I think this behavior is in poor taste. I do not mind his looking at his cards prior to shuffling (he might be checking to make sure he subbed out his sideboard cards, which is a legitimate purpose), but the rearranging the cards seems a bit uncouth. It might be perfectly legal, but it is not standard practice, and that makes it seem a tad suspicious, and, as you suggested, might give an advantage over players who shuffle normally.
I think you are well within your rights to ask him not to rearrange the cards. Say that you find it both odd and a waste of time.
If he continues the practice, you could always retaliate. Personally, I would ask to cut his deck and, instead of doing the standard 2-3 piles, make 5-6 piles, and place them on top of one another randomly.
February 9, 2018 2:29 p.m. Edited.
Rhadamanthus says... #13
The idea that "If you go through your deck and split up clumps of land, you give yourself an advantage in that, no matter how you then randomise it, you are less likely to end up with land clumps" is only true if the deck isn't being randomized during the shuffle. "Randomized" means you can't reliably predict the order or distribution of the end state based on whatever shuffling method you applied to the initial state (for example, this is why pile-counting alone isn't considered sufficient for shuffling a deck).
Note what you observe yourself in the following comment: "Consider how many times you end up with clumps of land, even after you randomise your deck." If the deck has been properly randomized then any given distribution should be equally as likely as any other, smooth, clumpy, whatever. "Random" doesn't mean "evenly distributed". It means "random".
February 9, 2018 3:10 p.m.
While you are correct in theory, there is a difference between hypothetical and reality.
When shuffling by hand, cards that are grouped together tend to remain grouped together. Picture a slow motion shuffle--ideally, cards from hand 1 will alternate perfectly with those from hand 2. But different hand motions produce different speeds. Humidity might cause cards to fall together. So many other factors might influence the shuffle, keeping some cards from the same pile grouped together. This is made even worse when you use the "mash two piles together, and let the frictionless sleeves push them into a single pile" method.
While you are correct in that it should be completely random, and clumps would be a statistical illusion caused by bad luck, Argy is talking about the reality of the situation--manual shuffling is an imperfect art-form and does not produce complete randomization. Making sure you have removed clumps ahead of time reduces your odds of receiving clumps after a shuffle.
There is a reason casinos do not shuffle decks by hand--it's not actually as random as it should be.
February 9, 2018 3:21 p.m.
Rhadamanthus says... #15
The reason manual shuffling creates randomness is because the average person can't do it perfectly. A skilled magician/cardsharp using a clean deck can perform a series of perfect shuffles to put a card in a specific position, but a regular person will make enough fumbles that at best they could only put a card into a general area if they were really trying (i.e. trying to cheat). If the person is only doing an average job and not trying to influence the shuffle then the distribution of the end state won't really have anything to do with the initial state.
Casinos shuffle by machine to keep games moving faster, to avoid accusations of cheating by a human shuffler, and in the case of multi-deck shufflers and continuous shufflers, to counteract card-counting.
February 9, 2018 3:34 p.m.
I don't know if this helps but I found in the DCI Universal Tournament Rules (UTR 21 Shuffling) that "players are to sufficiently randomize their cards and while doing so, the card faces cant be seen".
This applies to shuffling before the game, as the rules go on to say (UTR 23 Pregame Time Limit) "before each game, competitors have three minutes to shuffle their decks and present them to their opponents for additional shuffling and/or cutting".
So the instruction on not looking at card faces covers the pregame shuffle.
Where people were saying above that it doesn't matter if you look at your cards, so long as you randomize them afterwards, isn't correct.
You can't look at the card faces as part of the randomizing process.
February 11, 2018 11:38 a.m.
Tyrant-Thanatos says... #17
Wait how isn't it correct? Looking at your cards before randomizing them and looking at them during or "as part of" the randomization is not the same thing at all. What's even to stop someone from just doing this before they sit down to play anyhow?
Reverend_Skuch says... #1
Ok so as far as I know he CAN do that. They're his cards after all. But on the other hand YOU also CAN for sure during the cut step reshuffle his deck. I've seen and had it happen at a PPTQ. Granted you should likely do so in a timely fashion.
February 8, 2018 10:07 a.m.