Pokémon TCG: Sword and Shield—Brilliant Stars

Ways to Stall

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SteveP

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I've always found it interesting what some players consider stalling. So, I'm starting this topic to see what you think about ways to drag out the final few minutes if a match.

Let's first talk about illegitimate, and perhaps funny ways:

1. shuffle your discard pile, hand, or prizes
2. get a drink or snack
3. call your girl/boy friend on the cell phone
4. rip a card sleeve so you have to de-sleeve everything
5. infinate damage swap or energy transfer

OKAY, we can ALL usually tell when someone is illegally stalling. But, here's some tactics I've let players use at our tournaments to drag out the last couple minutes:

1. Take up to 3 minutes to setup for the next game in a multigame match. I usually always give players a 6-7 minute warning so that a loosing player can choose to concede if it's obvious he's going to loose anyway. That way, he can get that 2nd or 3rd game going.

2. Use as many search/shuffle cards as they can during their turn (in a timely fashion), so long as those plays continue to provide an effect. For example, playing multiple Fast Balls so long as each play produces an evolution card, even though you might not have ANY Pokemon in play that can evolve.

3. Of course, players can inflict special conditions (ie., sleep, paralyses) to try to drag out the last couple minutes.

SO, can you think of other legal ways to draw out the last few minutes if needed?
 
Nothing wrong with 3 steve. 2 is mostly okay but 1 could be a problem.

I take a chess clock view of stalling: I believe that both players should be allowed approximately half of the round time each.

So in your particular example if the loosing player has got set up quickly, and to the satisfaction of the winning player, then it is unreasonable to expect that the loosing player should be kept waiting.

Other ways of burning time :

4) calling a Judge!
 
Play Lanettes Net Search.

...looking through my deck one card at a time..."hmm, not this one, hmm, well this is a trainer so I guess I can't get it with this card...hmm...oh hey, another basic energy card, ha ha....hmm..."...goes back to look at the trainer again..."did you know that this trainer can...."
 
Repeatedly ask for relatively game-obvious questions -
How much time is left in the round?
How many cards in your hand?
Can I see your discard pile?
What's that attack on your Pokemon say again?
Didn't your Pokemon have 4 damage counters instead of 3?

Ask to use the restroom.
Flipping the coin-flip off of the table, repeatedly.
 
How long should your turns last before they become considered stalling? At the City Championship I attended, this guy that was like 47 years old took over 1 and a half minutes simply doing what anyone else could do in like 20 seconds. It made me pretty mad, and I'm sure it wasn't intentional on his part, but a turn was like:

"ok, i'm done, ur turn"
...

....

he draws a card... looks at his hand... looks some more.... looks... attaches energy.... looks at his hand... looks some more... plays an oak's reserach or something. Shuffles. Shuffles. Drawwwwwws his 5 slooowly. etc. You see what I'm getting at. This happened every single turn, allowing me no chance to come off a bad start =\ Like I said, i'm sure this wasn't inentional, but you could easily do this if you get a good start to their bad start and screw your opponent over pretty bad...
 
I agree NOT necessarily stalling. Might be 'unsporting' though. If you think you are being unfairly disadvantaged by your opponent then politely explain what they are doing and if nothing improves call a judge.

I'm not exactly the fastest player on the block either so I have a degree of empathy with your oponent NikePK. That said I do believe that roughly half of the round time belongs to my opponent and I should endevour to ensure that I do not unfairly use my opponents share of the time available to play. However if my opponent is very quick on their turns I don't believe that I am compelled to play equally quickly. Which is, I believe, why PokePop said "not stalling" in his reply.
 
Yeah, I like the dice/coin flip... could pull it off 1-2 times every turn, if you are consistantly rolling off the table anyways, it owuldnt look like stalling....

Kinda reminds me of a (I appologize in advance) a YGO card, jirai gumo, it says toss a coin. I wanted to build a deck with them, tossing my coin at my opponet, rather than just flip it... then when they get mad, I will show them the card doesnt say flip, but toss... its too funny.. just have to figure out what angle to toss it, so it hits them, and lands on table for legit call...
 
always shuffle your deck and ask them to cut then sometimes while playing "acidently" shuffle your deck after they cut it and make it look like your kinda cheating and say "oops i shuffled it do you want to cut it?" and they will probly do this like every other time you shuffle your deck
 
This really is a judgement call (with a few exceptions)

I must admit that I am almost 40 and I play slow. Very slow. I just dont play often enough, (I am usually running an event. ) so when I do play it is very methodical.

At a recent City though I had a player accuse another of stalling. I watched my watch and gave them a pre determined legnth of time per turn. I asked "anything else?" that question was ansswered with a no. I said next turn. and so on. You also need to let a player think. Sometimes they are really thinking of all the options in their hand.
 
I've played people like that nikePK.

The rules say,
Slow Play

Players should attempt to complete their match in the allotted time. It is important for the players to avoid the appearance of cheating or unsportsmanlike conduct, especially when it comes to playing slowly. If the head judge determines that a player is intentionally attempting to stall out a match, it will be considered cheating, and subject to the appropriate penalties.
So it does have to be intentional to be cheating. But how can anyone judge someone's intent?

The old DCI rules were a little stricter,
Slow Play
Players must take their turns in a timely fashion regardless of the complexity of the play situation. Playing too slowly or stalling for time is not acceptable. If a judge determines that a player is playing excessively slowly at any point during the tournament, the responsible player will be subject to the appropriate provisions of the DCI Penalty Guidelines.

I think that, whether intentional or not, if a player is playing too slowly to finish the game in the allotted time then the judge should step in. Or maybe we could get those timers like they use in chess and allow each player half the alloted time to make all of his or her plays? If time runs out, you lose.
 
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I would love to see a chess stile play clock. That way either player can take as much time as they want, but if they run out time before their opponet they lose. It's perfect. The only question is the purchessing of the clocks. If its the players responsibilty that's just more money we have to spend there by discouraging people from comming to the game. To's won't want to spend the money. Maybe considering the recent anouncement of the prize support for Worlds (very cool BTW) Nintendo could handle it?
 
dld4a said:
I would love to see a chess stile play clock. That way either player can take as much time as they want, but if they run out time before their opponet they lose.

There are some serious problems because the opponent may have to do things during your turn (Shaman, Focus Band, Slowking, ....) and there is no good way of transferring the clock during a turn.
 
I was kind of kidding about the clocks but, you could just hit the clock during your turn if your opponent needs to do something.
 
lol... one of the Exp E-cards has a dot code for the chess style clock, it uses L/R buttons for each player to hit, and end their turn....

Another one is a straight stop watch, and isnt as fun, but still....
 
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