2 Lands in hand higher REL...

[LotusHead]

151.   Cheating — Stalling
Definition
A player intentionally plays slowly in order to take advantage of the time limit. If the slow play is not intentional, please refer to Tournament Error — Slow Play instead.
Example
A.   A player in a Magic tournament has two lands in his hand, no options available to significantly affect the game, and spends time "thinking" about what to do to eat up time on the clock.
B.   A player in a Dreamblade tournament is ahead in turns and significantly slows down their pace of play so the opponent has little chance to catch up.
C.   A player playing slowly appeals a warning in an attempt to gain advantage by having more time to make a decision.
Philosophy
If it is clear that a player is stalling, the integrity of the match is compromised and he or she should face a serious penalty.
Penalty
All Levels
Disqualification without prize

This is from the Penalty Guidlines. I am taking steps to become a Judge.

The Bolded Stuff:

I have held two lands in hand, to deliberatly let my opponent think I had more options than I really had.  I don't consider this cheating, or "penalty worthy", but as part of the game, bluffing, and strategic play.

What do you think about "eating up the clock:" as opposed to "bluffing", assuming no Duress was played during the previous turn... (Duress, Pwn a card, untap draw a random card happens all the time. What about this situation?)

[Godder]

This is very difficult to answer straight-up, because there's much opinion on the subject. However, note the following part:

A player intentionally plays slowly in order to take advantage of the time limit. If the slow play is not intentional, please refer to Tournament Error — Slow Play instead.

Intent is everything (bluffing is not stalling), which is why policing this rule is so hard.

[Apollyon]

That's an example that works best in Limited. If a player plays a combat trick to keep a big guy alive, but the rest of the board gets killed off, leaving a 2 turn clock, that situation can and does happen.

If the player that's about to lose draws a card, waits, waits, waits, that's probably a sign of slow play. In general, slow play is when you look at the match and go "What is this guy doing? I'm getting bored sitting here. I wish that they'd do something. Who's turn is this, anyways? I just walked over and neither of them has played cards."

That situation can be stalling if, for example, it's game 2 and the player won game 1. Or if it's game 3 and the guy wants to get out of there with a draw. Both of those are cases where there is the possibility of advantage to be gained by slow play.

[LotusHead]

I guess the bolded quote from the Penalty Guides mentions "spending time thinking" which is what caught me off guard.

Would 15 seconds to say, one full minute be good enough to not be stalling? (assuming the 2 land hand bluff senario where a misplay by the other player could turn the tide of the game).

[Apollyon]

A full minute is a long time. I'd call that stalling at a minute. And most likely before that. Stalling doesn't have to be "Draw card, go to the bathroom, head outside to smoke, and then play Freebird."

[Clariax]

There's no set exact amount of time where it crosses the line from "OK" to stalling.  Stalling could be a single 1-2 minute "bluff," or it could be a series of many actions each a few seconds longer than necessary

Any specific situation cannot be properly evaluated without ALL of the details (even with all the details it's not always so easy).  And I do mean ALL of them, so don't try to just give more details here expecting to suddenly recieve a definite answer, it just can't be done in a chat forum/theoretical discussion.

Whether or not it's stalling is all about the intent.  If you're doing it to bluff, you're not stalling.  (It may be slow play, but that's a seperate infraction.)  If you're doing it to waste time to take advantage of the time limit, then it's stalling.  And, of course, it's up to the judge to determine which it is.

Would 15 seconds to say, one full minute be good enough to not be stalling? (assuming the 2 land hand bluff senario where a misplay by the other player could turn the tide of the game).

[LotusHead]

Whether or not it's stalling is all about the intent.  If you're doing it to bluff, you're not stalling.  (It may be slow play, but that's a seperate infraction.)  If you're doing it to waste time to take advantage of the time limit, then it's stalling.  And, of course, it's up to the judge to determine which it is.

Thanks for the Clarifaxiation.  I hoped it would be like you say, I just got scared by the wording in the Pen. Guide.