Hello Canadian Judges! Our second judge spotlight is a former Regional Advocate, and current member of the Judge Foundry board of directors. She’s also one of the most recognizable Judges in Canada and at larger events across North America!

Name: Tobias Vyseri

Level: Four

Location: Barrier BC ( It’s close to Kamloops)

Judge start date:  February 2014

Occupation:  Graphic Designer and Illustrator. 

Favourite card: Delver of Secrets because it’s super cool, and it was one of the first cards that I started playing with.

How did you feel about it getting a sequel? There’ve been some Delvers afterwards. Those have all been worse. I’m happy that they exist, and I did like Docent of Perfection. That one is actually very good. It’s kind of neat, the update on what Delver’s been up to from one set to the next. 

Least favorite card: It’s also Delver of Secrets, because sometimes I just need it to flip once in nine turns and I win the game, and it never does and then I lose. 

Favourite format: Modern

Commander General: Sakashima the Impostor

What Single Colour, Two Colour Guild and Three Colour faction do you identify with personally? Blue, (I like puzzles). Izzet(I think I lack patience sometimes. I find myself trying to solve a problem by thinking about it, and then when that takes too long, I just try some stuff and see if it works.) Jeskai, (white is the community colour, and I really care about the judge community.)

Favourite non-Magic Game:  I don’t have like a forever favorite game. But I have a favourite game of right now. That would probably be Slay the Spire. It’s pretty strategic and I like how I can play it on a plane.

Best tournament result: I won a PPTQ and got to go to the RPTQ.

Random fact about yourself: I have an African gray parrot named Ada, and she is the goodest girl.

Smart pets can sometimes be trouble. Is she always good? Yes, that’s because she’s the goodest. She’s always good. (Editor’s Note: As a Cat owner, I can’t imagine what it’s like not to have at least one pet be a domestic terrorist.)

Why do you judge? Many reasons, but the most important reason is that I like magic and I like players, and being a judge lets me interact with both of these things quite a bit.

Tell us your favourite Judge story.
This was quite a few years ago (It was in one of my tournament reports). I walked by the On-Demand Events section at some large event, saw a bunch of money on the table and some players looking at it, and I thought, “Okay, well, I need to figure out if this is a problem or not.” So I walk over and ask the players, “What’s going on?” And the players are just like, “oh yeah, I pulled this money out of my bag, and it’s wet.” I just kinda look at him, and he feels the money. “I don’t think it’s water.” I was just kind of standing there, trying to figure out how to respond, when the player smelled the money. He says, “I think it might be olive oil”.  So I just look at this player and ask, “Why would you think that? That’s very specific.” The player was just like, “Oh, I just had a bottle of olive oil in my bag” and at this point I was like, “Well, this isn’t bribery. This is just weird, but not a violation of tournament rules. So I’m just going to leave.” And then a few hours later in the same event, that player found me, he’s like, “hey, judge, guess what? It was a banana! My money had banana on it!” 

What are some tips you have for other Judges?
If you’re a newer judge and just starting out travelling, please try to communicate with other judges about travelling arrangements and stuff. It gets so much easier and cheaper when you room with other judges. But the problem is that a lot of these judges are too scared to talk to other judges, and so everybody just gets a room on their own, and it sucks, and everybody has less fun. So, I think just making sure that you’re communicating and trying to connect with your peers and stuff is really helpful when you’re starting out.

Who have been some of your biggest mentors in the Judge Program, and what did they teach you? I’ve had many mentors throughout the judge program. Right now, I think one of my biggest mentors/peers is Mike Hill. He’s like super helpful. I’ve learned about logistics and stuff. He’s very charismatic, where I’m not charismatic, so it helps to see what he’s doing, and then try and do that. Isaac King is fairly helpful with rules; he can just explain any interaction very clearly and very cleanly, and that’s helped me a great deal.

What positive aspects has the Judge Program contributed to your everyday life?
I think being part of the program has given me a lot of self-confidence and a lot of experience with different social situations. My other job, being a graphic designer and an artist, doesn’t really have me interacting with people and dealing with contentious situations a lot. So I feel like I’ve learned a lot about conflict management and team management from the program. 

What’s the best part about your local Magic community?
The best part about my local magic community is that it’s located in the tournament Capital of Canada.

What is your favourite non-Magic hobby?
Drawing and playing video games. (not at the same time)

How did you get involved in Magic in the first place?
My old roommate used to play. It was a summer evening, and all the computers in the house were like, reformatting for various reasons, so we were just sitting around, kind of bored and kind of warm. So I asked “Don’t you have a bunch of boxes of those magic cards? Can you like teach me this game?” He had just gotten a bunch of free boxes of Ravnica commons and uncommons from some game store. So we built some dopey decks and it went from there. 

If you were a Planeswalker, what would be your ultimate?
It would be an emblem that has a triggered ability that says, “Whenever you draw a card, draw a card.” I like how it ends the game one way or the other.

Where would you go if you could take an omenpath vacation on any magic plane?
I would go to Bloomburrow and be a bird person. 

Okay, so you’re a bird person. What kind of bird are you? And would you be disappointed if you came through and you realized “oh no, I’m a raccoon”?
I probably wouldn’t be super sad if I were a different critter. I would want to be a Magpie. They  are so cool and they’re super cute, but like any bird would be pretty great. Except for like a really stupid non-flying bird, like an ostrich or something. 

If you could have any magic character as your head judge, who would it be?
Nicol Bolas, because I think his pre-event planning would be very, very good.

His employees often don’t make it to the finish line. Is that a concern?
Well, I mean, we’re judges, we’re servants of the players, right? So, if we don’t make it through the event, that’s just an occupational hazard.

Proudest moment of your Judge life?
I’ve had a player to thank me after I’ve DQ’d them. And I’ve had a couple of players be very chill about being DQed. I feel like DQing players is one of the hardest things we do, so when it goes smoothly I feel pretty proud of myself. 

What character in Magic (real or fictional) represents you the best, and why?
Tamiyo, she’s very creative, we’re both story keepers of a sort. And big into travelling for work as well. 

Two Truths and a Lie:
1. I have over 100 Beanie Babies that are birds.
2. Last year, I worked for 10 different large Tournament Organizers.
3. I’ve judged an event on five different continents.

Last episodes answer:
I’m sad to report the unfortunately Michael Hill does not have a pet Iguana named Nicol Bolas 🙁