honest mistake or unfair advantage or cheating?

[TrEkIeV]

you can see it here at the 38:00 as the player on the left declumps his deck before game 3.
is it an honest mistake or unfair advantage or cheating?

http://www.twitch.tv/onthebubble/b/420733475

 

[G landers]

Honest mistake a lot of people declump which is alright as long as they shuffle sufficiently after, the gray area is when a deck is fully randomized.

 

[Plebeian]

Before a game, and when I search through the deck I generally declump. I also thoroughly shuffle afterwards. I'm anti-cheat, too. Spirit of the game!

 

[Pikabruce]

Honest mistake a lot of people declump which is alright as long as they shuffle sufficiently after, the gray area is when a deck is fully randomized.

Before a game, and when I search through the deck I generally declump. I also thoroughly shuffle afterwards. I'm anti-cheat, too. Spirit of the game!

Did you guys even watch the video? :nonono:

This is what I see: After spending a minute on shuffling, he spends about 45 seconds looking at his cards and moving cards around. He then does what looks like one mash shuffle and then 5 sideways Japanese shuffles. (A Japanese shuffle like this is little more than a cut, and does not move the bottom cards of the deck.)

As seen on the video, it looks very bad to me.

 

[Proxied]

That is shuffling to your likings and defies the whole purpose of randomizing.

 

[Bilbo Baggins]

you can see it here at the 38:00 as the player on the left declumps his deck before game 3.
is it an honest mistake or unfair advantage or cheating?

http://www.twitch.tv/onthebubble/b/420733475

I was watching the left player and he did nothing wrong.
.
.
.
The RIGHT player on the other hand declumps after already doing the 6 pile, barely does any shuffling, and then asks for a cut.

I say it's an unfair advantage (which essentially is cheating). Declumping before 6 pile, and then 6 piling will get cards to clump anyway, and 6 piling never 100% declumps. What he did was essentially declumps (could be easily putting cards where he wants too), and then barely shuffles knowing where these cards are. He could easily shuffle to his benefit if he wanted (or even did).

 

[Proxied]

Finally, an authority that clearly sees that these actions are considered wrong.

 

[Pandemonium]

Honest mistake a lot of people declump which is alright as long as they shuffle sufficiently after, the gray area is when a deck is fully randomized.

Before a game, and when I search through the deck I generally declump. I also thoroughly shuffle afterwards. I'm anti-cheat, too. Spirit of the game!

Did you guys even watch the video? :nonono:

This is what I see: After spending a minute on shuffling, he spends about 45 seconds looking at his cards and moving cards around. He then does what looks like one mash shuffle and then 5 sideways Japanese shuffles. (A Japanese shuffle like this is little more than a cut, and does not move the bottom cards of the deck.)

As seen on the video, it looks very bad to me.

No they didn't, as it seems most people didn't on this thread.

The player on the LEFT of the video did NOTHING wrong. However, the player on the RIGHT side of the video (Zach Lesage) clearly did. He declumped his deck, did a pseudo-shuffle and asked for a cut. What he did wasn't even a shuffle. He literally moved the cards up and down, appearing to look like a shuffle then asked for a cut. He MAY have pulled the back half of the deck to the front a couple of times, but it looked like he was just picking the deck up and shuffling it. Hope they do something about this. Spirit of the game is a huge pet peeve. You're just kidding yourself if you think that was an honest mistake sadly.

 

[Swordfish1989]

I just watched it for the first time and that was not ok. Not only should you not be allowed to look through your deck mid-shuffle, but you should also be required to shuffle decently after doing such a declumping. Otherwise, you're inherently stacking the deck in your favor.

 

[Kayle]

I'm not sure how declumping is supposed to be an honest mistake in any situation.

"What are you doing? Are you declumping?"
"Oh, wow, I didn't even notice. Whoops. Thanks judge, sorry about that."

 

[ShuckleLVX]

Declumping before a thorough shuffling is not an issue.

What the player on the right did is not declumping before shuffling, and not an honest mistake by any stretch. This is one of the most painful things I have watched in a long time.

He spends about two minutes doing some decent shuffling, but then looks at this deck. That alone would negate all the shuffling her did. He then proceeds to rearrange cards in his deck, after which he barely even pretends to shuffle (no one could ever consider that a 'thorough shuffling' or 'sufficiently randomized') and presents his deck to the opponent.

If I saw a player present that deck for a cut, I'd have strong issue with it.

 

[The Gorn]

Shuffling a deck does not require LOOKING AT a deck. Cards that direct you to look at your deck say things like "Search your deck." Cards that say "shuffle your hand into you deck" do not include the words "Search your deck" or "Look at your deck."

 

[JandPDS]

Last year I saw a player in T8 of a State championship 6 pile his deck face up infront of his opponent and pick and choose what cards go where. I asked the head judge if this was leagal and as long as it is shuffled afterwards is legal to so arrange your deck before the shuffle.

What is not legal is to shuffle your deck and look through it to reorder the cards afterwards.

 

[NoPoke]

Players think that they know what is or is not an acceptable shuffle. Players are too quick to declare xyz as cheating. The problem is that players and staff very obviously do not know what is acceptable given posts in this thread, previous threads and the videos that have appeared in recent months.

All POP say on the subject is that the deck should be sufficiently randomised. (edit: the penalty guidelines sensibly require "sufficient", POP go further in the rules document and ask for "fully" )

Right now there is a lot of insufficient shuffling taking place out there which should be receiving prize card penalties but is not. There is also some poor shuffling that should be picking up the Unsporting conduct penalty as it is so poor that advantage cannot be avoided. (example: order deck as pokemon - trainers - energy then double nickle followed by minimal shuffling.) There is also some deliberate cheating where part of the deck is controlled.

 

[Bilbo Baggins]

I'm fine with that, as long as the deck is shuffled sufficiently after. The shuffling before hand is wiped out, so all he did in terms of shuffling was very minimal if at all shuffle and then presented the deck.


I know during games, the time limit for shuffling / quick play makes people tend to shuffle like he did, but in between matches the shuffling should be much more adequate than mid game shuffle.

However, the opposing player does have the right to shuffle the deck if he thinks anything is out of ordinary, or even have a judge shuffle. It's encouraged even during high stakes games.

 

[RyuAmph]

I am so glad that there are many "leagel" ways to shuffle a deck!

 

[Pikabruce]

...All POP say on the subject is that the deck should be sufficiently randomised....

They say a lot more than that:

Each player’s deck is expected to be fully randomized ["fully", not "sufficiently"] at the start of each game and during the game, as card effects require. In order to achieve randomness, players are allowed to riffle, pile, or otherwise shuffle their decks until they are satisfied that the deck is random. Randomization must be done in the presence of the player’s opponent and must be done in a reasonable amount of time. Care should be taken to assure that the cards in the deck are not harmed or revealed during the shuffle...

I would interpret the rule to mean that no "declumping" should done after the shuffle begins (since declumping involves revealing the cards to the shuffler, in violation of the rules).

Part of the problem is that the "game tempo" allows 2 minutes for a player to do the initial shuffle and set-up, whereas if you shuffle your opponent's deck you are supposed to be "brief". So if your opponent wastes his set-up time by shuffling for a minute, then declumping for 45 seconds, then doing a quick inadequate shuffle, you have very little time to fully randomize that opponent's deck with a "brief" shuffle.

 

[PokePop]

They say a lot more than that:


I would interpret the rule to mean that no "declumping" should done after the shuffle begins (since declumping involves revealing the cards to the shuffler, in violation of the rules).

Part of the problem is that the "game tempo" allows 2 minutes for a player to do the initial shuffle and set-up, whereas if you shuffle your opponent's deck you are supposed to be "brief". So if your opponent wastes his set-up time by shuffling for a minute, then declumping for 45 seconds, then doing a quick inadequate shuffle, you have very little time to fully randomize that opponent's deck with a "brief" shuffle.

There is also a key phrase in there:

Care should be taken to assure that the cards in the deck are not harmed or revealed during the shuffle

Once cards have been revealed (and reordered!), you have left the shuffle and have to start all over again.

 

[NoPoke]

"fully randomised" is an unfortunate choice of words. My computer is unable to fully randomise cards in the simulations that I occasionally run so I don't know how players can be expected to manage fully randomised.

 

[Otaku]

What does your computer consider fully randomized, NoPoke?

I may or may not know where you are going, but right now I worry your comment will be misconstrued as "no clumps = fully randomized"... when a fully randomized decks may have clumps, may have card X begin and end in the same position, etc.