At States this year, I witnessed the following…
Two players are duking it out in a control mirror. The first player – let’s call him, say, Batman – is up a game against, say, The Riddler.
Being the tricksy type, Riddler is in the process of decking Batman by recurring Jester’s Cap, having long since removed all of the caped crusader’s win conditions. On the last of the extra turns, the Cap removes Batman’s last three cards and the Riddler breathes a sigh of relief. "Close one, he says."
"Yeah," replies Batman. "That’s a drawn game. So close!"
The Riddler is puzzled. "A drawn game? But I won this one – I decked you!"
"My library’s empty," replies the Bat, "but you just took the fifth extra turn. The game’s over; I don’t get another draw step."
To add insult to injury, the Riddler was down a game and was playing for the draw, meaning he got slapped with an 0-1-1 match loss after all his painstaking work removing Batman’s library from the game.
Why did Riddler lose?
Any time you lose a game of Magic, you should always ask yourself this question. In this particular case, the first thing that probably came to the Riddler’s mind was, "I lost because I ran out of time."
Well, why did you run out of time?
"The game went on too long."
Ah, yes. The game’s fault. Nothing we can do when the game makes us lose, eh?
I started watching after the (untimed) extra turns had started, but after watching Riddler activate his Jester’s Cap by picking up his Island and turning it sideways, and then picking up his Plains and turning it sideways, and then on Batman’s end step activating Academy Ruins by picking up his Island and turning it sideways, and then picking up his Plains and turning it sideways, and then picking up his Academy Ruins and turning it sideways… and with one of the players – I don’t recall which – repeating the ever-irritating snap-snap-snap-SNAP, snap-snap-snap-SNAP maneuver with the cards in his hand… I really started to wonder how much of this draw was the game’s fault after all.
Riddler needed seconds to win that game. All it took was one less riffle shuffle, one player saying "go" just a wee bit earlier, or even just one fewer double-checking of the life totals to have Riddler be the active player when time was called, thus giving Batman the last turn of the game and the lethal draw step that came with it.
Some games come down to seconds on the clock, like this, but far more come down to just minutes. The players are feverishly battling it out, when suddenly the one who is behind looks up at the clock and realizes he’s only got a few minutes left to turn this game around. Suddenly his play style changes dramatically. First, he starts throwing his cards onto the table as soon as he figures out his play, attacking, and saying "go" before he even finishes recording the life totals. Then he starts cutting into his decision-making time, running the "F*** it, let’s just attack with the team" play without pausing to consider the consequences as he would have in the first five minutes of the match.
Then he makes a mistake. Then he loses.
If you attacked wrong because you "didn’t have time to think," and if you could have altered your play style earlier in the match (without the use of cheating or unsportsmanlike conduct, of course) to give yourself enough time to think later on, I’ve got news for you: you messed up.
Sometimes people sideboard wrong and lose the match. Who’s to blame?
Them. Because they sideboarded wrong.
Sometimes people alpha strike into Brine Elemental and lose the Pro Tour. Who’s to blame?
Them. Because they attacked wrong.
Sometimes people don’t finish a game they had in the bag and lose the match. Who’s to blame?
Them. Because snap-snap-snap-SNAP.
Now I’m not suggesting you take all the fun out of your play, or that you race through each turn at breakneck speeds in order to conserve precious milliseconds of clock time. Nor am I condemning the players who like to add a little flair to their game by, say, whipping their cards from their libraries into their hands each time they draw a card. After all, who doesn’t enjoy the satisfying smack of sleeved cardboard-on-sleeved cardboard? No real harm in that, clock-wise or otherwise.
No, I’m talking about the ones who sit, brows furrowed, eyes on the table, snapping the cards in their hands together over and over again like some ridiculous army general attempting to make an important decision while blowing big, pink bubbles with his bubblegum. The snap-snap-snap-SNAP is a pleasant diversion that lets you split your attention between the game state and something else – because, let’s face it: that smack gives you much more immediate pleasure than grinding through a complicated board position.
Meanwhile, the clock ticks on.
Before you know it, time is called. Five turns later, the win you worked for, practiced for, playtested for, worked for from the start… that win that you were only a turn or two away from collecting is merely a draw instead.
And it was so easy to avoid!
If this is your draw step:
1) Tap the card off the top of your library, onto the table.
2) Sliiiiiiiiiiiide the card over to your hand.
3) Turn it sideways.
4) Look at it sideways.
5) Put it in your hand.
… and the game was a draw, are you honestly going to look me in the eye and say "The game went on too long?"
People do these things without thinking, as if "there’s no downside." It’s correct play and deckbuilding that determines victory in Magic, right? That and luck, right?
If only it were so simple. What good is playing well, bringing a deck that puts you ahead, and so on and so forth, if you don’t even give yourself enough time to turn these advantages into a win?
"Aha!" says a clever reader. "But what if you’re Batman instead of the Riddler? Then the slow pace of the game actually worked out in your favor! If it makes sense to speed things along when you’re way ahead, then it makes even more sense to slow them down when you’re hopelessly behind, amiright?" Actually, this is something you’d like to catch your opponent doing, as it’s an alternate win condition for players whose "Judge!" arm is in working order. (For details, see Max Bracht.)
If snapping your cards around in your hand is your catharsis, then go for it. If it fills your heart with glee to pause for the drumroll between beginning to draw a card and ending that action, then keep it up. If you’re afraid that taking the "slow" out of your game will cause you to drop cards or commit procedural errors, then practice until you’ve got the dexterity to divert that time to decision-making instead.
But if your play is slower than it ought to be because of bad habits alone, then fix it! It’s not something that’s difficult to change once you notice you’re doing it, and putting in the effort to improve your play style is so much more rewarding than getting knocked out of a tournament because you ran out of time, of all things.
I hope this discussion will be of value to those of you who are heading into the Extended PTQ season. There are several decks in this environment that involve repeated actions (Scepter-Chant with its "Go, upkeep, Chant with Kicker") or repeated long turns (CAL and Aggro Loam, with their constant cycling, dredging, and Loaming). If you’re piloting one of these decks, or playing against one, make sure you’re not letting those little time-wasters add up. Otherwise you may find yourself in the draw bracket, and mad as hell that you were robbed of victory by nothing more than wasted time.
See you next week.
Richard Feldman
Team Check Minus
[email protected]