Originally Posted by Asthereal
I don't see a results post - or any post, for that matter - this round from Reeplcheep or jhhdk.
I was holding off on putting together my results post because I thought more people would weigh in on the loop issue.
In that regard, I note that the reasons given for the loop rule that's now in the opening post, assume that very loop rule:
"when you need to tap a land eternally to stop something from getting cast," if infinite is not allowed, then zero times
is optimal, "as there is no benefit to the game state in" making extra turns go by before you finally don't tap the land.
If infinite is allowed, then when something would cause you to lose (for example, when you have priority
in a declare blockers step in which your opponent is attacking for lethal in the air), you need to activate
Nomads en-Kor eternally to stop that thing from happening, so there is no optimal number except infinite.
The multiple turns distinction does indeed allow infinite for one and not for the other, but that's just the rule saying so:
It does not validly get derived from optimal play.
Also, as I mentioned earlier, Asthereal vs me is not the only match this round in which the loop issue comes up:
The other one is, against Tylert, can GoblinSmashmaster get draws by recycling the Conjurer’s Baubles eternally?
Lastly, since Thopter Foundry requires sacrificing a nontoken artifact, although I have not run the numbers,
I feel like my matches against Reeplcheep and jddhk and RoosterCocoa should be 6-0 for me.
If those would affect bans for the next round, then please wait at least
10 hours so that tonight I can post an analysis for those 3 matches.
(Although I already had a lot of time, most of that was
me waiting for more replies regarding the loop issue.)
Nope. It loops within a turn. Within a step, even. And it doesn't affect the board state. SO it's the same as a Nomads en-Kor redirecting to itself eternally for no reason at all.
I'll go to sleep in a minute, so you have all my night to analyse if you want.
I'll see what you come up with in the morning.
Fun fact: this entire looping discussion comes after nearly 2.5 years of 4CB where we never had anyone argue about how that would work with our rules.
So yeah, I too was a tad unprepared for the discussion. At first I though there shouldn't be one at all, but the deeper I dug into it, the weirder it got.
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The thopter / sword combo is to sack the sword, which is not a token (and thus infinite life and creature tokens on T1) , so 3-3 is accurate for Phasmoid VS T1 combo (classic of targeted discard vs combo T1).
And Asthereal is right for the 2 MU he presented (luckily for me).
me: Ancient Den, Tidehollow Sculler, Vault of Whispers, Rotting Regisaur
54 points
1. Asthereal (TO): Island, Rishadan Dockhand, Force of Negation, Daze WD 4-1
when I am OTP:
I cast T1 Tidehollow Sculler. You can't counter it,
and a 2/2 beats you even without any abilities.
when I am OTD:
This leads to a loop in which I do nothing and
Aesthereal keeps activating Rishidan Dockhand’s ability.
(See my analysis on page 250.)
2. Reeplcheep: vault of whispers, mox opal, thopter foundry, Sword of the Meek WL 3-3
and
3. jhhdk: Seat of the Synod, Thopter Foundry, Mox Opal, Sword of the Meek WL 3-3
and
6. RoosterCocoa: Vault of Whispers, Welding Jar, Sword of the Meek, Thopter Foundry WL 3-3
When I am OTP, T1 Tidehollow Sculler takes Thopter Foundry and wins.
when I am OTD:
When I was looking at this earlier, I missed the relevant of Sword of the Meek’s return ability.
It lets you go infinite, so you make 20 1/1 flyers and win on T2.
4. Tylert: Ancient den, Energy field, Inkmoth nexus, Leyline of sanctity LL 0-6
Your deck works perfectly against me.
5. PJim: Foil, Island, Nether Spirit, Dryad Arbor DD 2-2
You don't lose since you can Foil whatever I cast first
and then block forever with Nether Spirit.
I cast T1 Tidehollow Sculler, and would take Foil,
so T2 Rotting Regisaur resolves. You can only deal 1 damage to me before my T2
and only 2 damage to me after my T2, so you also can't win.
7. alphastryk: Sand Silos, Misthollow Griffin, Force of Negation, Mu Yanling, Sky Dancer WW 6-0
2+(7+2)+(7+2) = 20 so I goldfish on T4, which is before you can cast anything.
8. Phasmoid: Ancient Den, Tidehollow Sculler, Vault of Whispers, Rotting Regisaur this is me
9. dte: Tarnished citadel, Death's shadow, subtlety, Force of negation WW 6-0
If you cast T1 Death's Shadow, then your creature immediately dies.
I cast T1 Tidehollow Sculler. If it resolves, then it takes
Death's Shadow if you still have it, winning for me.
Thus, you Subtly put it in my library.
2 activations of Tarnished citadel leaves you with at least 14 life, so if
you cast T1 Death's Shadow, then your creature still immediately dies.
On my T2, I draw and re-cast Tidehollow Sculler,
taking Death's Shadow if you still have it.
That wins for me.
10. Wrath of Pie: Darksteel Citadel, Darksteel Citadel, Hangarback Walker, Steel Overseer WW 6-0
if you don’t cast Hangarback Walker before my T1 then:
T1 Tidehollow Sculler takes Hangarback Walker, and I cast T2 Rotting Regisaur.
3 unblocked attacks by Rotting Regisaur would kill you,
so you must do something about that no later than my T5.
Steel Overseer can’t do more than 6 damage to me by then, so it must block.
Steel Overseer will be at most 5/5 by then, so the block is a chump-block, so I win.
In particular, I win when I am OTP.
when I am OTD:
You must cast T1 Hangarback Walker. I cast T1 Tidehollow Sculler and take Steel Overseer.
Hangarback Walker starts your T2 as a 1/1, so it
attacking that turn would leave you with just a 1/1 flyer.
That would be even worse for you than a Steel Overseer,
so Hangarback Walker does not attack on your T2.
Other than your T2, Tidehollow Sculler will never attack and never block.
On one of our T2s, you pump Hangarback Walker to 2/2. On my T2, I cast Rotting Regisaur.
Just like the “you don’t cast Hangarback Walker before my T1” case,
Hangarback Walker must block no later than my T5.
That block does not kill Rotting Regisaur and gives you at most 5 Thopters.
If it gives you 5 Thopters, then you let 2 of my
attacks through and haven’t dealt any damage to me.
In that case, you would need to block each of my subsequent attacks.
Such blocks would cost you 1 Thopter per turn, so you would not be
able to deal more than 5+4+3+2+1 damage to me, so I would win.
You counterattacking on T5 would leave you unable to block,
and any counterattacks before then are for at most 3 damage each.
3<4, so counterattacking with 4 Thopters will deal more damage.
Even that way, you can’t deal more than 4+4+4+3+2+1 = 18 damage to me, so I win.
11. H: Island, Steel Sabotage, Force Spike, Spectral Sailor WL 3-3
When I am OTP, T1 Tidehollow Sculler takes Steel Sabotage,
and then my 2/2 beats your 1/1 flyer.
when I am OTD:
On your T1, you play Island and nothing else.
Steel Sabotage counters Tidehollow Sculler, Force Spike counters Rotting Regisaur,
and you can cast your 1/1 in one of my end steps, after which your 1/1 beats my nothing.
12. maxx!: Seat of the Synod, Genesis Chamber, Shrieking Drake, Burst of Speed WL 3-3
When I am OTP, T1 Tidehollow Sculler takes Shrieking Drake and wins.
When I am OTD, you go off and win on T1.
13. silkster: Ancient Den, Chronomaton, Swords to Plowshares, Duress WW 6-0
Duress doesn’t do anything against me.
I cast T1 Tidehollow Sculler, and it either takes or gets exiled by Swords to Plowshares.
I cast T2 Rotting Regisaur.
3 unblocked attacks by Rotting Regisaur would kill you,
so you must do something about that no later than my T5.
Chronomaton can’t do more than 6 damage to me by then, so it must block.
Chronomaton will be at most 5/5 by then, so the block is a chump-block, so I win.
14. mattamort: Ancient Den, Force of Negation, Stormscape Apprentice, Tidehollow Sculler WL 3-3
Whoever is OTP, that player’s Tidehollow Sculler takes the other player’s Tidehollow Sculler.
when I am OTD:
That leaves you with a 2/2 and a tapper against my 1 creature,
so you win by tapping my creature before combat on my turns.
when I am OTP:
That leaves me with a 2/2 and a bigger creature against your 1/1, so
starting on my T3, you take at least 2 damage on each of my turns.
That kills you before Stormscape Apprentice’s {B} ability could kill me.
15. Serguei: Vault of Whispers;Tidehollow Sculler;Force Of Negation;Essence Flux WL 3-3
When I am OTP, my Tidehollow Sculler takes your Tidehollow Sculler and wins.
When I am OTD, your Tidehollow Sculler takes both of my creatures and wins.
16. GoblinSmashmaster: Mox Opal, Conjurer's Bauble, Conjurer's Bauble, Grapeshot WL 3-3
When I am OTP, Tidehollow Sculler takes Mox Opal and wins.
When I am OTD, you go off and win on T1.
17. FTW: Force of Negation, Subtlety, Darksteel Citadel, Collector Ouphe LL 0-6
You Subtlely put Tidehollow Sculler into my library,
and then Collector Ouphe locks me out and wins for you.
There is still a disagreement between Wrath of Pie and mattamort:
Both have WW for themselves in their results posts
and 6 points for themselves in the spreadsheet.
I agree with mattamort on that match:
T1 Tidehollow Sculler takes 1 of WoP's creatures, WoP can get 1 attack
for 1 damage on T2, and then Stormscape Apprentice shuts down
WoP's remaining creature while Tidehollow Sculler kills WoP.
Again, I found the disagreement by temporarily pasting
my conditional formatting formula to the results grid, so if
I neither find on my own nor am informed of a bug in the conditional formatting formula
and no one opposes this, then I will paste the conditional formatting formula
NON-temporarily starting next round.
The conditional formatting formula is currently applied to a test-grid,
from W22 to Z25 inclusive, so anyone can test it to see if they find a bug.
I guess "argue" means you may be correct anyway, but according to
the response when I asked last round, this at least came up before:
questions regarding the rule for next round:
Do Phyrexian mana symbols count differently from the corresponding normal mana symbols?
For modal double-faced cards, does one also count the back face?
(I would say Yes and Yes.)
I think Wrath may have missed the idea that Sculler is an artifact, which makes a blue mana to cast Apprentice.
I made this same mistake when analysing one of his matches.
Yes and yes. I did not think this round through very well at all.
Should have just gone by "must play at least three colors".
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Looks like we're complete now. Or complete enough to lock in the bannings, otherwise things take too long.
Standings for round 7:
1. dte: 70 - 4,4
1. FTW: 70 - 4,4
3. PJim: 66 - 4,1
4. mattamort: 64 - 4
5. alphastryk: 58 - 3,6
6. Phasmoid: 54 - 3,4
7. Serguei: 53 - 3,3
8. silkster: 51 - 3,2
9. Asthereal (TO): 47 - 2,9
10. Tylert: 41 - 2,6
11. H: 36 - 2,3
12. maxx!: 34 - 2,1
13. Reeplcheep: 31 - 1,9
13. jhhdk: 31 - 1,9
15. GoblinSmashmaster: 30 - 1,9
16. Wrath of Pie: 28 - 1,8
17. RoosterCocoa: 17 - 1,1
Which leads to these bannings:
Collector Ouphe
Darksteel Citadel
Death's shadow
Dryad Arbor
Foil
Force of negation
Nether Spirit
Subtlety
Tarnished citadel
And standings in the round look as follows:
1. Tylert: 27,3
2. Serguei: 26
3. dte: 24,9
4. FTW: 24,8
5. mattamort: 24,5
6. silkster: 23,6
7. GoblinSmashmaster: 22,6
8. PJim: 21,9
9. maxx!: 20,4
10. alphastryk: 19,9
11. Reeplcheep: 16,2
12. RoosterCocoa: 15,9
13. Wrath of Pie: 14,9
14. jhhdk: 12
15. Asthereal (TO): 11,8
16. Phasmoid: 11,3
17. H: 9,7
18. shiftyhomunculus: 3,1
So we see champs FTW and dte moving up in the ranks due to a strong performance.
Also worth mentioning is the steady rise of PJim, who looks to be competing for the top spots before long.
EDIT: Fixed for wrong result in Tylert vs maxx!
Last edited by Asthereal; 07-05-2021 at 05:59 AM.
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I still think Tylert vs maxx! is still wrong, should be 4-1 and not 3-3.
Or how can Tylert win OTP?
The Myr tokens from Chamber don't fly, but of course maxx! can keep the Drake in play by returning (effectively saccing) one of the million tokens he has.
Drake will block and trade with the Nexus, which will also get rid of the Energy Field. So no attacks for Tylert here. I think you're right. Should be 4-1.
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Indeed I did.
ROUND 8 OF SEASON 10: DEVIANT LEGACY BANNATHON has started.
This round we play Cornucopia: Non-land cards in each deck must in total contain at least 3 different colored mana symbols in their mana costs. Hybrid mana symbols count for 1, and so does phyrexian mana. For modal and/or double-faced cards, both side/modes count.
Examples of what's legal and not:
Legal: Abzan Charm, Plains, Swamp, Forest
Legal: City of Brass, Pouncing Jaguar, Lightning Bolt, Fatal Push
Also legal, even though I don't like it: Taiga, Pouncing Jaguar, Tattermunge Maniac, Lightning Bolt (a hybrid mana symbol is counted as different)
Illegal: Crumbling Necropolis, Maze of Ith, Blinkmoth Nexus, The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
So the cards in your deck must in total contain three different colored mana symbols in their casting costs.
How you want to distribute this is up to you, as long as the different color mana symbols are there.
And hybrid and phyrexian count as separate forms.
I have PM'ed myself my deck for round 8, so you can start sending me your decks.
DEADLINE: Wednesday the 7th of July at 11:00AM Central European Time.
(That's my time zone. Pacific Time it'll probably be something like Tuesday night a bit past midnight, so keep that in mind.)
PLEASE NOTE:
The way you send your deck to me matters. Please send it in the way described below, so it doesn't cost me an hour of editing before I can post all the decks.
Please send your deck as follows: Gemstone Mine, City of Brass, Crystalline Sliver, Hibernation Sliver.
So with card tags around each card, and not above eachother, and with your Username and 4CB S10R087 in the topic.
Don't forget to keep an eye on the banned list. You'll find it in the second post of the thread, or in our Google Spreadsheet.
After the deadline has passed, I will post all decks on the forum here, and you can start puzzling out your scores.
If you have any questions, please read the first two posts of this thread first. If you can't find the answer there, drop a message here. We'll answer a.s.a.p.
Happy deck building!
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Asthereal, thanks for the clarification on the round.
Was the wording changed recently? I started brewing over a week ago.
With the original wording it was not clear to me that it was in total across all cards, instead of for any nonland card. I think it also started with different "mana symbols" not different colors. Hybrid and phyrexian are not colors but they are different mana symbols. Woolly Thoctar vs Rhox War Monk seemed boring, so the decks I came up with were 4 lands. At the time it seemed consistent with the rules. Anyway, that's why I had the same questions as Serguei and mattamort. It's clear now.
This discussion came up before on page 220, for the Epic round of Deviant Legacy. (Season 9 Round 12)
I thought we made a decision then: optional infinite loops can result in draws if both players get to take turns (even if one player can't do anything meaningful), but loops must terminate at a finite number if both players don't get turns.
The examples that came up in that discussion were:
1) Infinite Time Warp (Epic ability). This one was debated both ways. We eventually decided since this loop is optional (Time Warp can target opponent), it must terminate. Eventually you must choose to target opponent and pass the turn. If it was Temporal Manipulation then the loop is not optional.
2) Activating Nomads en-Kor infinite times. Everyone agreed spamming the stack and never passing priority is ridiculous. A finite number must be chosen.
3) Crazed Goblin vs Steel Wall. Goblin must attack. The only optional decision is Steel Wall blocking. Opponent could choose not to block to end this infinite loop. However we agreed in 4CB this should be a draw. Opponent should not be forced not to block. This loop is different from the others because both players get turns, even if no progress is made.
4) 3x Oblivion Ring + Darksteel Relic. We agreed the Oblivion Ring loop must terminate and eventually target Darksteel Relic. However without Relic the loop is not optional and draws.
5) Gideon's Lawkeeper vs Blightsteel Colossus. We agreed in 4CB this should be a draw. You should not be forced to stop tapping down Blightsteel and lose.
6) Tap and untap Basalt Monolith forever. We agreed this is also dumb and must terminate after a finite number.
PJim's answer at the time:
"No player is required to make a choice that would end a loop that crosses multiple turns"
According to this rule, loops #2, #4 and #6 must terminate because they occur within just 1 turn. #3 and #5 are allowed because they occur across both players' turns.
Activating Rishadan Dockhand is like #5. We've had Rishadan Port in past rounds too. In our other 4CB rounds you were allowed to tap down opponent forever. I think for 4CB to make sense, tapdown "loops" like Lawkeeper and Rishadan should be draws. Technically any draw is an infinite loop of doing nothing (you could choose to activate mana abilities or make unfavorable combat choices), but these are really stalemates more than loops. The format is supposed to have draws.
Note: PJim's rule is slightly different for #1. It would allow infinite Time Warps because it occurs across multiple turns. For the round we decided infinite Time Warps was not allowed because the loop did not include the other player's turn. I am OK with either version. But we should make a firm decision for the rules.
Yes to everything you said, except I would like to add a thingy to the remark above:
We decided against the eternal Time Warp mostly for that specific round (every sorcery has Epic, which makes Time Warp and friends very dumb indeed).
I don't think we'll need it as a base rule, as eternal Time Warp without help from "deviant" round rules is rather hard to accomplish.
Of course there is Time Vault and Voltaic Key, but Time Vault is banned, and the combo doesn't have a wincon attached to it, and it costs quite some mana.
Doesn't look like a problem to me.
(Then again, I rarely see the problems before they actually hit me in the face.)
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Back in Vintage Bannathon, apple found the better combo of Time Vault + Voltaic Servant for the turn 1 infinite turns + an attacking wincon. But because it had an attacker this is less likely to draw.I don't think we'll need it as a base rule, as eternal Time Warp without help from "deviant" round rules is rather hard to accomplish.
Of course there is Time Vault and Voltaic Key, but Time Vault is banned, and the combo doesn't have a wincon attached to it, and it costs quite some mana.
Doesn't look like a problem to me.
(Then again, I rarely see the problems before they actually hit me in the face.
Because we have rotated through so many different formats, banlists and Deviant rules, it might be helpful to establish this rule in advance. Who knows what interactions will come up later.
The same rule would affect whether Karn Liberated can draw by restarting the game forever or if it's forced to eventually do something else (e.g. vs Invisible Stalker.dec, which Karn cannot kill or steal, and it's too small to kill Karn or opponent before the restart). Karn has been played before.
Edit: Or Isochron Scepter+Final Fortune in past rounds that cancelled "Lose the game" effects.
Karn can surely restart the game forever either way, it's a loop with optional actions going across both players' turns.
For the one player infinite turns loops, I think it's more important that it's established one way or the other, the actual ruling won't come up much. We've got a rule in the OP, so everything should be nice and clear now for future rounds.
This would not need to be "never passing priority".
During the opponent's turn, the Nomads en-Kor player could activate the ability only when the stack is empty,
and let that ability resolve rather than activating it again when there's 1 of it already on the stack.
In the absence of a round rule, for every example of this I can think of, both players would be taking optional actions:
Karn's player is restarting the game, and the other player would be playing something (in your example, casting Invisible Stalker).
Yes, I agree Karn should be allowed to infinitely restart the game as both players are acting across multiple turns.
Since it's a finite number of times the opponent eventually gets to do things, so this could not be used to stall a game to a draw.
Example:
Opponent's upkeep: Activate Nomads once. Pass priority. It resolves. Activate Nomads on empty stack again. etc. This could be repeated over and over. But this can and must be shortcut by a loop. You specify a finite number of times to do this (e.g. 9999), since it's a loop within one turn, then upkeep must end.
Opponent's draw step: Same thing. You can activate whenever the stack is empty but must shortcut this to a finite number of times (you cannot keep putting it on the empty stack an infinite number of times). Activate 9999 times then end draw step.
Opponent's main phase: Same thing.
Opponent's combat step: Same thing.
Opponent's end step: Same thing.
Each loop occurs within a single step/phase and must terminate at a finite number. There are a finite number of phases/steps per turn, so both your turn and opponent's turn pass with a finite number of Nomads activations. The opponent still got a full turn to cast spells and attack. The turns will go back and forth with a finite number of Nomads activations each turn. If opponent has a win condition, it will eventually win.
Note that this is not a multi-turn loop. You can stack together a series of finite loops within each phase, but they cannot be combined to shortcut as a multi-turn loop if the opponent has any action that would progress the game forwards (e.g. Attack for 2 flying with Kor Skyfisher each combat step). Then it is not a multi-turn loop so it is not allowed to be infinite.
If the opponent has no action to progress the game forwards (e.g. no attacker that gets through Nomads), it's irrelevant because it would be a draw either way. I don't see a problem here.
Like I mentioned to Asthereal, this is assuming the relevant part of the rule,
rather than being something from which one can derive that part of the rule.
Your earlier post had
, so I was just bringing up that this example would not require never passing priority:
If the loop rule distinguished based on passes of priority rather than turns,
then it would still stop optional never-passing-priority loops from creating draws,
but would not stop Nomads en-Kor from forcing a draw.
(In fact, I now realize that the "During the opponent's turn,"
part of my description was not necessary.)
I can't think of any way to get an optional never-passing-priority loop under normal rules
- whether for regular MtG or card-blind - but round rules could certainly allow such loops:
For example, if the round rule was
"Whenever a player taps a land for mana, if that player spent mana to
activate that mana ability, that player can't activate mana abilities until
this ability finishes resolving. That player may pay. If that player does,
untap that land and that player adds one mana of any color."
, then 1 other mana plus a corresponding filter land would allow such a loop.
( https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/Filter_land )
Last edited by Phasmoid; 07-06-2021 at 02:16 AM. Reason: fixed hypothetical triggered ability
Technically it's assuming normal Magic rules. Normally in Magic you can't activate Nomads infinitely just to stall.
It just fails to be a case where we would amend the rule for 4CB.
Notice the rule we added said nothing about passing priority.
What you quoted was just an anecdotal example I mentioned. For the example, perhaps I used the wrong words with "pass priority". Should have said "passed turn". Yes, you could technically pass priority but still create an infinite Nomads loop within a single phase (although it shortcuts to the same thing anyway in a game with perfect information, since you know opponent cannot intervene).
The rule was based on turns, not priority. The technical wording is in the quote from PJim. I paraphrased examples that came up in our past discussion, but those don't define the rule.
The simplest way to define whether the loop is allowed to be infinite or not is based on the passing of turns.
If turns keep passing but the game state does not progress by turn n, as n increases to infinity, then the game is a draw. (It's only an infinite loop because infinite turns pass without either player winning)
If the optional loop is only infinite within a turn (i.e. the game is not allowed to reach turn n), then the loop must terminate if possible.
That's the distinction between a stalemate and just trying to freeze the game.
Last edited by FTW; 07-06-2021 at 03:46 AM.
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