Head Judge Tournament Report – Norwegian Nationals 2017

Warning: This post is more of an insight to my journey through the Norwegian Nationals, rather than a shorter and on-point tournament report. If you are only interested in the tournament itself, please skip ahead to Part 3 to save some minutes of your life. 🙂

Part 1 – Collected Company

Cue me, two months ago. I had been an L2 for 9 months. I had never judged a GP (well, still haven’t). The largest tournament I had Head Judged was 50 players. I definitely still felt wet behind the ears (still do!). Then I get asked if I would like to Head Judge the Norwegian Nationals? Yes, absolutely!

I started by defining some goals for myself and the tournament:

1) The judge team shall consist of both experienced and less experienced judges. The judges shall preferably come from different regions of Norway.
2) Before the event begins, I am going to delegate tasks and responsibilities so everyone knows exactly what is expected of them, and what their tasks are.
3) I will do my best to prepare myself and my scorekeeper for potential pitfalls (cough, WER, cough).
4) During the event, my main focus will be to be available for my team, to supply my judges with everything they need to do their part optimally, and to help out where it is needed. (Those who know me might know that I think engaging with players and taking judge calls are by far the best part of judging, so this was actually a big one for me).
5) The players are going to have a good experience.

My very first task was putting together the team of judges for the event. The expected number of players at this point was about 140. I decided to ask for a full time deck check team, so I could ensure that two deck checks were performed every round without impacting the floor coverage. I also asked for a team of two floor judges.

Now, a total of six judges (HJ + SC + 2 DC + 2 FJ) is definitely one more than I could expect, but the TO (Outland, Oslo) was very committed to making the event a success, and basically offered me as many judges as I thought I would need. They also proposed that we should have a standby judge in case the event was larger than anticipated.

I wanted my judge team to be a mix of L2s and L1s. I decided to make one member on each team the “team lead” (for the huge teams of two judges). This meant I could delegate tasks and responsibilities to the team leads rather than either:

  1. a) micromanaging every single judge in the event, or
  2. b) delegate tasks to the teams and saying “you figure it out amongst yourselves”.

It also made the judge selection process a bit easier, as I could pair an experienced judge with a less experienced judge, and could trust the team leads that their tasks were split between the two in a reasonable way.

In hindsight, I’m very happy I made this decision. It made the delegation process easier, and it made communications easier during the event. I also authorized the floor lead to perform backups, and also to handle appeals in situations where I could not (for instance if I was handling another appeal), which I believe lead to a smoother player experience.

The judge team ended up like this:

Head Judge – HÃ¥kon Gulbrandsen

Scorekeeper – HaiWei Shen (L1). I was really happy to have HaiWei on the team. He is probably the most experienced scorekeeper in Norway, and has a lot of routine.

Floor Judges – Even Hansen (lead, L2) and Roy-Arne De Wilde (L1). I was very happy to have Even as the floor lead, as I knew that I could trust him blindly with regards to performing backups (and maybe more importantly, when not to). I had not worked an event with Roy-Arne before, but had heard a lot of positive things.

Deck Check team – Lars Harald Nordli (lead, L2) and Eirik Armann Grytøyr (L1). Lars Harald was possibly the one judge I wanted the most on the judge team, because his skill set is the complete opposite of mine! While my main strengths are rules and policy, Lars Harald’s systematical approach, tidiness and keen eye for potential problems is impressive. Like Roy-Arne, I had not judged an event with Eirik, but had heard positive things.

Part 2 – Strategic Planning

Conveniently for me, the Norwegian Nationals was planned for the last of the three Nationals weekends. This meant I could gather information from judges from other Nationals (shoutout to Danish Head Judge Jonas Breindahl) with regards to what the major bottlenecks and WER hickups were throughout the day. I thoroughly read up on the WER walkthrough provided by WotC, and wrote a list of all the mishaps that I could expect to encounter. The main ones not mentioned in the walkthrough were:

1) WER included all the inactive players in the pods when it was time to make draft pods. These needs to be removed manually, cascading players up through the pods.

2) Unless you’ve got a multiple of 8 players, WER will create pods with non-8 numbers starting from pod 1. We obviously wanted to have all pods (except the last one) be 8 players. This is fixed manually, simultaneously as 1.

3) WER might have a problem with printing the draft pods after repairing them. Be prepared to screenshot the pairings and print as pictures if needed.

The TO made sure that decklists could be handed in electronically, through a system that ported all the information (name, dci, date, decklist, deck archetype, etc) into a regular decklist form, and stored the finished file as a PDF. The files were stored as “[Lastname][Firstname]_[DCI].pdf”, and had a batch download function, which combined to let you print all the submitted decklists in alphabetical order by pushing about three buttons. The TO also made sure that online pairings would be available during the tournament. These additions were fantastic!

The one problem that came back to haunt us while the planning of the event was the layout of the venue, roughly illustrated below.

To get a feel for the size of the venue: the outer walls are about 45×20 metres, and the venue seats roughly 200 players. The tables are positioned along the outer walls. Access to a microphone and loudspeakers was unfortunately not available, which posed three main problems:

1) The Head Judge announcements.

If enough players showed up, we would not be able to have the players seated during the announcements. If this happened, the backup plan was to seat players in half the venue, and have the remaining standing during the announcements. The other option would be to have two sets of announcements, with another judge announcing for the other half of the room. I did not like this alternative.

2) Calling time in the round so the entire venue hears it simultaneously.

Relatively easily solved by having the floor judges synchronize their watches, and having good floor coverage.

3) Calling time for the draft.

This was the big one for me. The venue layout made sure that there was no chance whatsoever that a single judge could call the time for all of the draft pods. I settled (after a lot of thought and discussions) on using the venue for what it was worth, and to take advantage of how poorly the venue carried announcements. Pods 1-8 were seated in one end of the venue, and the remaining pods were seated in the other. I’m quite happy with this solution. The players would not be confused about which draft instructions to follow, as you could barely hear the judge calling the draft on the opposite side. See the draft description in Part 3 for more details.

Three to four days before the event, I wrote down all the information I had about what to expect, tasks at hand, and responsibilities for each of the teams (and scorekeeper). This included:

– A walkthrough of the game plan.
– How the TO’s online deck registration worked.
– Where we were going to set up the deck check station.
– How to handle end of round procedures.
– Which judges (team leads) had which permissions.
– A thorough walkthrough of the draft procedure and the following pool/deck registration.

At this point I felt really good about the preparations. We knew the pitfalls, and We knew the workarounds.

Part 3 – Start Your Engines

On Saturday morning, I gathered the judge team and went through the layout of the day. We made sure everyone knew who’s in charge of what, and that they would tell me if they had too much or too little to do throughout the day. I also checked in with deck check lead Lars Harald to hear the details of the decklist system. He showed me a ring binder with alphabetical binder dividers. I have never been happier to see one of those, and I knew the deck check station was in excellent hands.

In the weeks before the event, the estimated amount of players sank lower and lower. On Friday, the estimated number of players was down to 90, and I was at least hoping to beat the venue record of 105 players that showed up for the Ixalan prerelease three weeks prior. As the registration ended, WER told us that we had 106 players. Got there! More important, though, was the fact that less than 118 players meant we could fit everyone in one half on the venue, and thus partially solving the anticipated issues with announcements and calling time in the round!

After giving the Head Judge announcements (including informing the players that they may store the Inkmoth Nexus promo in the deckbox, but conveniently forgetting information about where the toilet was), we collected deck lists and got ready for round 1.

Rounds 1-4: Standard

Pairings for round 1 were posted, and after the round was started, everything was quiet. I sat down for a couple of minutes by the scorekeeper to make sure everything was in order, and enjoyed watching the deck check team gathering decks for a check, and the floor judges taking calls.

Tables 20-45 during round 1. Photo: Gunnar Olai Sivertsen.

The part I learned the most from was handling the End of Round procedures. It was a bit disorganized for the first couple of rounds, but I’m very happy with my (and the team’s) execution from round 4 and out. HaiWei’s previous experience with end of round procedures and input from round to round made the learning curve steep, but enjoyable. We did approximately this:

  • 6 minutes (left in round): Get all the remaining table numbers from the scorekeeper. Cross-check with the time extension sheet to find the tables with extensions. All match slips goes through me from this point and onwards.
  • 4 minutes: All judges come to me. I assign table numbers (or multiple, if close to each other), prioritizing that tables with short extensions have judges on them. Spread the rest of the judges to maximize floor coverage.
  • 0 minutes: Floor judges call time in the round. Judges stationed at matches with time extensions call time in those matches individually. Whenever a match slip is delivered, the judge receives a new table number. Repeat until all match slips are in.

I noticed with the repetitions that I wanted to start the end of round procedure earlier and earlier in the round. I think starting closer to the 10 minute mark would lead to a bit more structure than I managed during this event.

Some notable calls and incidents from the standard rounds:

– During round 1, the floor judges (and some players) commented on how it was almost impossible to access some of the tables by the windows. We decided to remove a row of tables before round 2 to free up some space, while still making sure to keep the players in one half of the venue. Several players  thanked us throughout rounds 2 and 3, so there is no doubt in my mind that it was a necessary change. My experience is that most Magic players keep feedback to themselves (both positive or negative, but especially the latter) unless it’s something they really care about.

– During round 2, a player realized while searching their library that they had a copy of Sunken Hollow in their deck in place of a Fetid Pool. The card had not been seen during round 1. The player received a warning for TE – Deck Problem, and the Sunken Hollow was substituted with a quickly obtained Fetid Pool. We thanked him for calling a judge, and the players resumed the game.

– A player asked the following: “My Hostage Taker was stolen by my opponent’s Confiscation Coup. Who may cast the exiled card?” (For the record, the answer is the player who controlled Hostage Taker’s triggered ability).

– During round 2, a player calls a judge because they are worried about seeing cards in their opponents deck while shuffling their deck. There was a decently sized mirror on the wall a few metres to the left of the player. We thanked him, and elegantly covered the mirror with a tablecloth and duct tape.

– A floor judge gets called to a match where two Glorybringers are facing each other. The active player had attacked and exerted his Glorybringer, attempted to target the opponent’s dragon. Their opponent reminded them that Glorybringer was not a legal target for the ability, and there were no other legal targets. The active player received a warning for GPE – Game Rule Violation, and the game was backed up to right before attackers were declared. (I believe the more correct solution is not backing up, as exerting the dragon in itself is a legal play. However, both players were happy with the solution, and the ruling was not appealed).

– During the beginning of round 3, five tables did not hear the beginning of round announcement. They all received a two minutes time extension (time since start of round), and I made a mental note to turn up the volume of announcements a bit.

– In round 4, the Sunken Hollow/Fetid Pool player from earlier received a game loss for TE – Decklist Problem for having a card from Oath of the Gatewatch in their sideboard. There are apparently multiple reasons as to why should spend more than 20 minutes building your deck! 🙂

Rounds 5-7: Ixalan Draft

For the draft procedure itself, we followed this article by Kevin Desprez. We had eight pods in one end of the venue, and the remaining five in the other. Even and Lars Harald called the two drafts, and the both of them did a great job. The players drafted, switched places with players from other pods, registered a pool, and returned to their own pool, before they received new seats for building and registering their decks. Players in seat 1 built their decks in pod 1, seat 2 in pod 2, and onwards. The two halves of the venue were synced up before the players were allowed to start building and registering their decks.

Pods 2-7 getting their draft game on. Photo: HÃ¥kon Gulbrandsen.

The registration process was a bit time consuming, especially because we chose to only move eight players at the same time in order to have eyes on everyone. Before the event, the most frequently asked question I received from players was “what measures are being taken to prevent cheating (by bringing in external cards) to the draft pools?”. I wanted the players to know and feel that this was important to me as well, and had decided that being a little bit too cautious was better than risking the opposite.

In retrospect, I believe we could have moved 16 players at once, and still maintain full control, thus saving a couple of minutes of time where absolutely nothing happened for the players. When the event is over, the players don’t remember how pairings for round 4 were posted exactly 50 minutes after round 3 had started (it was quite nice, though!). They do, however, remember the five minutes they spent sitting on a chair doing nothing at all, waiting to build their draft deck. Not all minutes are equal!

Pods 1-3 during the draft. Photo: HÃ¥kon Gulbrandsen.

Near the end of the deck registration period, one of the judges took me aside. A player had, disappointed by an answer from the judge, told the judge that “you are the worst judge I know of”. After getting the details of the situation (which will not be disclosed here due to privacy reasons for the involved parties), I had a quick discussion with another judge. We agreed that as long as there were no further curveballs to the story, this is unsporting conduct aimed towards an individual, and therefore UC – Major.

I took the player aside at the beginning of the round to hear their side of the story, and their side of the story was identical to the judge’s. They agreed that what they said was not acceptable, but that they had felt disrespected by the judge prior to the incident. For the record, the answer given by the judge was perfectly reasonable, and the judge and player apparently have a history of disagreements. After talking with the player for almost 20 minutes (deescalating the situation, then guiding him to the proper ways to give feedback to judges).

After pairings were posted for round 5, there was an issue among the top tables. One of the side-event matches had, for some reason, sat down to play at table 4, and were in the middle of a huge board stall. I looked at the board, then at the two main event players supposed to play there, and improvised a solution I am quite happy with: “Do you want to play on camera for the feature match?”. We had initially settled on another feature match, but this was also a relevant match for coverage. Other than moving the players to a random table in the venue, I believe this is the only solution that does not delay the tournament several minutes. In addition, the side event players were quite happy to not have to move mid-game.

All in all, day 1 lasted ten hours from round 1 was paired until non-top8 prizes were given out. That was about an hour more than I would have expected, but still within reason. The feedback we’ve received from players have almost been all positive (although this should be taken with a grain of salt as less positive experiences unfortunately often stays among the players, and doesn’t reach the judge(s) who could need the feedback). The one piece of constructive feedback I received was that there were some periods of time where the players received little information about what was happening. We used a projector to display remaining time in the round, but we could have used it to update the players. For instance “Awaiting final match results”/”X matches remaining” after the round had gone to time.

Day 2 – Top8

The top8 was very uneventful from a judge standpoint, as they often are. All the players except one (who had to go earlier) had received decklists for all the competitors after the top8 announcement on Saturday. We therefore decided to delay the affected quarterfinal for 30 minutes to give the remaining player time to read through the opponents’ decklists, while the three other matches started playing. The players were experienced, played without many technical errors, and made sure that the judges could watch some excellent Magic without interfering too much. The event ended with two great players (Simen Skrede Reigstad and Thomas Madland) claiming first and second place to round off the Norwegian team for the World Magic Cup in December. Congratulations, and good luck to them!

The finalist and Norwegian Champion 2017. Photo: HÃ¥kon Gulbrandsen.

Looking back at the event, it did really go smoother than anticipated. There were no major hickups, and apart from some minutes we could have saved here and there, I am very happy. With regards to the goals I had set for the event, there is one obvious thing that I should have done, namely to drink more water and eat some more throughout the event. Keep yourselves hydrated, friends!

I really want to give credit to the judge team for the job they did. They truly made the event a memorable one! Well done, and thank you to Lars Harald, Eirik, Even, Roy-Arne, and HaiWei!

 

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