So i was playing a game earlier.
A guy Had Chance encounter and Frenetic Efreet At end of his opponents turn he activated Efreet 1000000 times in order to win with Chance encounter. One guy was stubborn and told him to flip the coins even though in 1000000 flips you are VERY likely to get at least 10 heads. Is there a way to shortcut this? (Luckily all of us scooped and agreed the coin flip guy won even though he scooped as well because he was not gonna actually flip a coin 1000000 times.
No. Due to the random element, you cannot determine the exact game state at the end of the shortcut, which includes the exact number of counters on Chance Encounter, so the shortcut cannot be taken. You must be able to deterministically describe the game state at the end of the shortcut and all decisions made during it in advance (so no conditionals either).
You cannot shortcut the coin flips because you have to put a luck counter on Chance Encounter for each win. This marks 1000001 different outcomes, winning all, none, or some of the flips.
You can only shortcut if you can pick an end state and specify step-by-step how to get there. The end state must include -all- factors, so you need to know how many luck counters there are.
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The reason why shortcutting one million coin flips is not allowed:
C.R. 720.2a: A declared shortcut must have a sequence of choices with "predictable results"; moreover, the shortcut "can't include conditional actions".
M.T.R. 4.4: In a sanctioned tournament, "[n]on-deterministic loops ([including] loops that rely on ... probability ...) may not be shortcut".
so in short, activating efreet 1000000 times is just a jerk move, and the guy who wanted him to play it out was also a jerk. (He obviously doe snot understand that a coin flip takes about 5 seconds. and 1000000 seconds will reach a little over 11.5 days, at five seconds a flip we are looking at almost 58 days of non stop flipping.
there has to be some sort of ruling in conditions like this.
I'm curious how this would be handled at an event. Say the Chance Encounter player says some large number of Efreet activations like 10^100000000000, and the opponent does not concede. Obviously it would take all day to flip that many coins, you'd go to time in the round, and go to turns but the game is still on turn 0. It doesn't appear to be slow play to my understanding since counters are being placed on Chance Encounter thus advancing the game. It's a little bit of a Hans's Platnium Angel scenario since any reasonable person would concede, but is there anything to prevent two players from holding a tournament hostage this way?
I'm curious how this would be handled at an event. Say the Chance Encounter player says some large number of Efreet activations like 10^100000000000, and the opponent does not concede. Obviously it would take all day to flip that many coins, you'd go to time in the round, and go to turns but the game is still on turn 0. It doesn't appear to be slow play to my understanding since counters are being placed on Chance Encounter thus advancing the game. It's a little bit of a Hans's Platnium Angel scenario since any reasonable person would concede, but is there anything to prevent two players from holding a tournament hostage this way?
That was funny.
But i do agree, there has to be some ruling in this situation. Be it just acknowledge the defeat given that the win condition has been met (10 won flips) Or show that you can stop this before his upkeep. Regardless of how many flips he wins after the initial 10, it will not change the effect of Chance encounter. If you do not have an instant speed removal spell (Or ability you can activate or a sorcery that (removes enchantments) you can play at instant speed) you may as well just concede. No one wants to sit around for two months flipping coins just to determine a winner. If you cannot remove the enchantment after the initial 10 won flips, regardless of if he loses or wins every other flip, he still has the win con active.
Well, reviewing the IPG, this seems to fall under Tournament Error - Slow Play
3.3. Tournament Error — Slow Play
Definition
A player takes longer than is reasonably required to complete game actions. If a judge believes a player is intentionally playing slowly to take advantage of a time limit, the infraction is Unsporting Conduct — Stalling.
It is also slow play if a player continues to execute a loop without being able to provide an exact number of iterations and the expected resulting game state.
I know he can't use a shortcut through the entire resolution, but once chance encounter has (however many counters he feels is sufficient to protect his win condition) on it, there should be no relevant game information unknown. The frenetic efreet is no longer accessible to any of the still stacked abilities. Would it not be possible to shortcut through the remainder?
I know he can't use a shortcut through the entire resolution, but once chance encounter has (however many counters he feels is sufficient to protect his win condition) on it, there should be no relevant game information unknown. The frenetic efreet is no longer accessible to any of the still stacked abilities. Would it not be possible to shortcut through the remainder?
Though it's possible to activate Frenetic Efreet's activated ability an arbitrary number of times without letting them resolve (C.R. 116.3b, 116.1b, 605.1a, 720.2a; for sanctioned tournaments, see M.T.R. 4.4), the resulting resolutions can't be shortcut since the actions rely on probability (C.R. 720.2a; for sanctioned tournaments, see M.T.R. 4.4). This is true even if, as a result, Chance Encounter turns out to have ten or more luck counters on it. This can be relevant if, for example, Thief of Blood is entering the battlefield — since doing so relies on the exact number of counters on all permanents.
So question, if your opponent is going to pass priority until all Frenetic Efreet triggers resolve, and there is nothing on the battlefield that triggers off of coin flips (other than Chance Encounter, and nothing that triggers off of Chance Encounter triggering, is there any particular reason why you couldn't activate the ability say, 51 times, resolve the first one on it's own (as it determines whether the Efreet phases out or is sacrificed), and then roll 5 groups of 10d6 where 1-3 is tails and 4-6 is heads? If nothing in the game state is changing between the resolution of each ability other than the number of counters on Chance Encounter, could you not speed up the determination of the final game state in the manner I illustrated?
So question, if your opponent is going to pass priority until all Frenetic Efreet triggers resolve, and there is nothing on the battlefield that triggers off of coin flips (other than Chance Encounter, and nothing that triggers off of Chance Encounter triggering, is there any particular reason why you couldn't activate the ability say, 51 times, resolve the first one on it's own (as it determines whether the Efreet phases out or is sacrificed), and then roll 5 groups of 10d6 where 1-3 is tails and 4-6 is heads? If nothing in the game state is changing between the resolution of each ability other than the number of counters on Chance Encounter, could you not speed up the determination of the final game state in the manner I illustrated?
You can roll fair dice in a way that substitutes for the coin flips, as long as "all players agree to the substitution" (C.R. 705.3). More generally, the players can agree to any "metho[d] of randomization" that achieves the same purpose of flipping multiple coins, as long as "there are two possible outcomes of equal likelihood" for each coin flip modeled this way (C.R. 705.3).
A guy Had Chance encounter and Frenetic Efreet At end of his opponents turn he activated Efreet 1000000 times in order to win with Chance encounter. One guy was stubborn and told him to flip the coins even though in 1000000 flips you are VERY likely to get at least 10 heads. Is there a way to shortcut this? (Luckily all of us scooped and agreed the coin flip guy won even though he scooped as well because he was not gonna actually flip a coin 1000000 times.
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You can only shortcut if you can pick an end state and specify step-by-step how to get there. The end state must include -all- factors, so you need to know how many luck counters there are.
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C.R. 720.2a: A declared shortcut must have a sequence of choices with "predictable results"; moreover, the shortcut "can't include conditional actions".
M.T.R. 4.4: In a sanctioned tournament, "[n]on-deterministic loops ([including] loops that rely on ... probability ...) may not be shortcut".
there has to be some sort of ruling in conditions like this.
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That was funny.
But i do agree, there has to be some ruling in this situation. Be it just acknowledge the defeat given that the win condition has been met (10 won flips) Or show that you can stop this before his upkeep. Regardless of how many flips he wins after the initial 10, it will not change the effect of Chance encounter. If you do not have an instant speed removal spell (Or ability you can activate or a sorcery that (removes enchantments) you can play at instant speed) you may as well just concede. No one wants to sit around for two months flipping coins just to determine a winner. If you cannot remove the enchantment after the initial 10 won flips, regardless of if he loses or wins every other flip, he still has the win con active.
UB Vela the Night-Clad BUDecklist
WBG Ghave, Guru of Spores GBW
WUBRGThe Ur-DragonWUBRGDecklist
Former Rules Advisor
"Everything's better with pirates." - Lodge
(The Gamers: Dorkness Rising)
"Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science."
(Girl Genius - Fairy Tale Theater Break - Cinderella, end of volume 8)
Awesome avatar provided by Krashbot @ [Epic Graphics].