Mindslaver and opponent's sideboard [O]

[Clariax]

Official word:

Mindslaver does not allow you to look at your opponent's sideboard.


Explanation:

Game effects don't get to interfere with or effect tournament rules.  No game rule allows you to see your sideboard, that's a tournament rule.  Mindslaver's effect can only affect things within the scope of the comp rules/cards.

[Jacob Orlove]

Does that change if you have them cast a Wish during the Mindslaver turn?

[andrewpate]

Yes.  You can look at the sideboard and choose which card to take with a card like Burning Wish or Ring of Ma'Ruf just like before.  This is because, unlike the sideboard rules, those cards are addressed in the Comprehensive Rules explicitly, notably for this case in Rule 507.3.

[Clariax]

It doesn't change for any reason.  If you choose for them to play a wish, you may have them select an appropriate card from the RFG zone.  If it's a Death Wish, you may choose to have them select a card at random from their sideboard.  Regardless of whether a wish is resolving or not, you may not look at your opponent's sideboard while controlling their turn.


Also, please note.  Nothing about sideboards is explicitly (or even implicitly) mentioned in the Comprehensive Rules.  Sideboards are strictly a tournament mechanic.  The Comprehensive Rules don't cover those areas, we have the Magic Floor Rules and Universal Tournament Rules for that.

Does that change if you have them cast a Wish during the Mindslaver turn?

[The Atog Lord]

Aaron, I'm confused. The reminder text on Mindslaver is:

(You see all cards that player could see and make all decisions for the player. He or she doesn't lose life because of mana burn.)

The opponent can see his sideboard when resolving a Wish. I can see all cards that my opponent could see. How am I not, then, able to see his sideboard?

[andrewpate]

I'm with Rich.  My post is how I've always understood 507.3 to work, pursuant to the ruling here (do a Ctrl+F for Cunning Wish).  Can you explain why that one zone is not considered "cards that player can see" as well as when this changed vs. the SCG ruling?

Edit:  fixed link

[Titanium Dragon]

Clariax, you're wrong, and here's why:p

Read Burning Wish. What does it say? Its oracle text, as of right now, is as follows:

You may choose a sorcery card you own from outside the game, reveal that card, and put it into your hand. Remove Burning Wish from the game.

Now, you may choose what card they find with their wish according to rule 507.3. Now, you're thinking "the comp rules don't mention the sideboard", but this is totally irrelevant. The reason is that 507.3 allows you to see ALL cards your opponent owns that aren't in the game to choose from them. The tournament rules state that these cards are all RFGed cards that player owns and the player's sideboard. Therefore, because you can see their cards that are outside the game to choose among them, and those cards are the sideboard in tournament play, you can choose a card from among them and see their sideboard. QED.

Please also note the extremely relevant Mindslaver ruling:

12/1/2004 You can see everything that player can see but you normally could not. This includes that player's hand, face-down creatures, and any cards in his or her library that he or she looks at.

You're wrong, and I'm not sure where you got this idea from. Do you think players themselves cannot look at the cards that aren't in the game?

Official Rulings are precisely that - official. By definition, Clariax can't be wrong, because his post is informing TMD of a new official ruling. Your points could have been made without the inflammatory accusations of "You're wrong". Verbal Warning.
-Godder

[LordHomerCat]

Wow that was a little harsh.  If that is what he says is the official ruling, that's the fact Titanium.  Clariax said he would get us the official rule before Lorwyn comes out and he has.

Now, if you disagree, that's ok, but just saying "you're wrong" is untrue, since you don't get to make the official rulings.

Also, as of right now, if I slaver my opponent and have them cast a Wish, I can look at their board, can't I?  Why would that be changing?

[parallax]

Can I still choose a card from my sideboard when I cast Burning Wish, even though no game rule allows me to see those cards?

[Titanium Dragon]

The reason I was harsh was because the ruling is in needless contradiction with the comprehensive rules of the game and makes Mindslaver - Wish interactions differ between casual play and tournament play. It apparently came down from OP, not R&D or the CRs, and is quite silly.

[andrewpate]

I called Customer Service about this issue and spoke with a representative who agreed that 507.3 should allow a player using Mindslaver to view the opponent's sideboard, especially in the case of a Judgement wish or Ring of Ma'Ruf but probably in general.  He said that specific trumps general and cards trump the Comprehensive Rules, so Mindslaver's ability to view all of the opponent's cards (Rule 507 makes no mention of "zones" or of only seeing cards in zones that player can see) should apply to sideboards.

Furthermore:

507.3. The controller of another player’s turn makes all choices and decisions that player is allowed to make or is told to make during that turn by the rules or by any objects.  This includes choices and decisions about what to play, and choices and decisions called for by spells and abilities.

It is under the Floor Rules, not the Comprehensive Rules, that certain objects (such as Wishes) allow a player to look at his or her sideboard and choose a card.  The Wish allows those players to make those choices, and Mindslaver grants the power to make decisions allowed not only the rules, but by objects as well, a distinction Rule 507.3 is very careful to make.  So the Floor Rules vs. Comprehensive Rules argument does not hold.

HOWEVER, this representative was also very careful to point out (more than once) that his opinions do not have the force of policy.  He had not heard of any new ruling from Organized Play that the sideboard would now be permanently hidden from players controlling opponents' turns, but he said that they are certainly the ones able to make those decisions.  He told me that, for now, I should simply consult with the Head Judge prior to any event on how this question is going to be handled that day.  He also told me that any concerns should be voiced to the Customer Service web form, since the DCI itself has no means of public contact, and that such comments would be shuffled along to the appropriate parties within Wizards from there.

[Clariax]

I apologize in advance for my tone in this post, but clearly the point I'm making is not as widely understood as I'd thought it was, and this is the only way to make it, it seems.








When I post in this forum that something is Official, it's just that, Official.  If you disagree with me, you're wrong.  If you believe some rule contradicts what I said, you're still wrong.  Even if you've contacted someone at Customer Service and they agree with you, you're still wrong.  I have access to the sources who make these Official decisions.  In some cases (not this one, however) I even have a part in making the Official decision.

To cover some of the speciifc points raised:

12/1/2004 You can see everything that player can see but you normally could not. This includes that player's hand, face-down creatures, and any cards in his or her library that he or she looks at.

There's no mention of sideboards here.

Can you explain why that one zone is not considered "cards that player can see"

The sideboard is not a zone.

The Wish allows those players to make those choices, and Mindslaver grants the power to make decisions allowed not only the rules, but by objects as well, a distinction Rule 507.3 is very careful to make.

Mindslaver does allow you to make the decision of what to wish for.  But your decision is limited to the cards you can see.  This works the same as when you have cards removed from the game face down (Memory Jar, for example).  Cunning Wish cannot retrieve a card removed with Memory Jar because you can't look at it to establish it's an instant.  Death Wish allows you to select a random card from a group of cards removed from the game face down.  It is the same with Mindslaver.  You can't choose any sideboard card with Cunning Wish because you can't see it to establish that the card you're choosing is an instant.  You can however choose to take a random sideboard card with Death Wish.




This is how it works now.  How wishes work by themselves is in no way changed.  Any rulings on starcitygames which contradict this are either wrong or out of date.  As for when things changed (assuming there was a change, this is the first I've dealt with the issue), I don't know and don't care.  This is how it works now.

[UR]

Cunning Wish cannot retrieve a card removed with Memory Jar because you can't look at it to establish it's an instant.

Does this also hold true for cards that you know to be an instant? Lets say that I had one card in my hand when I used my Memory Jar that I knew to be an instant (lets say Brainstorm). First, I know it to be an instant and secondly it can be confirmed by matching the other 59 cards in the deck to the decklist that was registered if so desired. So if it can be no other card than an instant, can you get it with the Cunning Wish?

[Clariax]

Cunning Wish cannot retrieve a card removed with Memory Jar

[squeegee]

Ok, first let me say I'm not disputing the ruling made here.  I just have a question, which after lorwyn will basically be irrelevant, but I want to ask anyway.

Until now, a player could not look at his sideboard during a game, correct??  Then how could he look as his sideboard during a wish resolution??  Did they make a special rule for this??

Just curious.

[Clariax]

Ok, first let me say I'm not disputing the ruling made here.  I just have a question, which after lorwyn will basically be irrelevant, but I want to ask anyway.

Until now, a player could not look at his sideboard during a game, correct??  Then how could he look as his sideboard during a wish resolution??  Did they make a special rule for this??

Just curious.

Previously a player could look at his sideboard during the resolution of a wish.  And this is irrelevant already.  The floor rules went into effect today.  You're now able to look at your sideboard during a game.

[MadManiac21]

Edit: Ignore what I wrote, I just re-read the first post.

Why is there the distinction between game rules and tournament rules?

[Yare]

I have access to the sources who make these Official decisions

I feel compelled to ask: how can the common folk get at these general answers if they aren't brought up in the public sphere by an official source?  Is it just "this happened to get asked in a forum so someone answered it" or what? Additionally, how can I, the common player, potentially talk to these people? (Since the Magic Rules list does not seem to be the place to do it).

[Titanium Dragon]

Contents of this post deleted.  Flaming will not be tolerated

  --Clariax

[Ambitious]

This doesn't make any sense to me either.  If you can see everything they can see, then either they can't see their sideboard during a wish resolution or they can.  If they can't, how do they select their card?  If they can, then doesn't mindslaver let you see it too?

If this is an official ruling from Organized Play, it looks like they're trying to contradict the rules of logic here.

[Anusien]

There are a few sources of Official Rulings.  MTGRULES-L, MTGJUDGE-L and #mtgjudge all have Official sources.  These are people appointed by Wizards of the Coast.  MTGRULES-L's O is Gavin Duggan (with Scott Marshall on backup), I don't know about MTGJUDGE-L, and #mtgjudge has Lee Sharpe.  Also, anyone answering from @wizards.com on one of these sources, which will be people like Andy Heckt.  When in doubt, feel free to ask "Is this Official?".

Yare: MTGRULES-L is not a discussion forum.  It's mainly designed for question/answer.  Discussion of these sorts of things is probably best suited by #mtgjudge on Efnet.

Ambitious, Titanium Dragon: Let me preface this by saying "You're wrong."  The answer, Officially by the DCI, is that the way Clariax explained the interaction is the way it works.  Let me try and explain.  Swords to Plowshares removes cards face up.  Everyone can see them.  Jester's Scepter has a static effect (well, the triggered ability has the static ability anyway) that lets you look at the cards removed from the game, even though they are removed face down.  If you Mindslaver someone who controls a Jester's Scepter, you can look at those cards since a game effect lets you look at them.  Mindslaver is different.  No game effect lets you look at cards removed from the game, the same way no game effect lets you look through your library.  The tournament rules were changed to accommodate looking at Wishes, bu t this is a tournament effect.  You cannot use Slaver to look at a sideboard in the same way that you cannot use Mindslaver to force your opponent to concede, fill out the match slip in your favor, take off their clothing or punch themselves in the face.  Much in the same way, you cannot use Mindslaver in a casual game to look at someone's entire collection.  Why not?  Because that's not a part of Magic.

This ruling has been explained poorly in a few places, so I'll break it down to avoid confusion.

* The rules of magic are permissive, not restrictive, by nature: a player may only take an action allowed by the rules (rather than "may take any action not forbidden by the rules").
* The Comp Rules (ie: the rules of the GAME) allow a player to take certain _game actions_, such as drawing a card or playing an activated ability.
* The UTR and MFR (ie: rules of the tournament) allow a player to take certain _tournament actions_, such as conceding or drawing a game, or dropping from the tournament.
* The MFR were recently changed to allow a player to look at his or her sideboard at any time (with the caveat that it must be kept very clear of their hand/library).  This is a tournament action, not a game action.  The game rules make no provisions for the concept of a sideboard, so this action is meaningless within the context of the game rules.
* The CR rules for Mindslaver allow a player to choose what *game* actions his opponent can take.

Result:  Because Mindslaver only allows a player to control the game actions of his or her opponent, it doesn't allow a player to concede or drop for his opponent.  Analogously, it doesn't allow him or her to look at an opponent's sideboard, and the information the opponent has about the contents of his or her sideboard is not in-game information available to the Mindslaver's controller.

> > 1) Can a player controlling his opponent's turn by means of Mindslaver look > > at his opponent's sideboard without playing a wish?
No.

> > 2) What happens if he plays Cunning Wish?
He must choose an RFG'd object he can identify, using information available to him via game rules, as an Instant card .  He can't identify any particular card in the sideboard as an Instant so the wish will do nothing unless there are other cards in the RFG zone that he can identify.. either because they're face up, or because he can exercise a game action to look at them while face down (such as cards the opponent has removed with Gustha's Scepter).

> > 3) What happens if he plays Death Wish?
He must choose an RFG'd object he can identify as a card... including any card in the sideboard (at random).

> > 4) Does the fact of having an Instant or any card removed from the game
> > (say, by having pitched it to Force of Will) affect the answers to 2 and 3?
Yes... if he can choose an Instant removed from the game, he must do so.  Since cards in the sideboard are not legal choices, he must choose the FoW-removed Instant if it is the only choice.

> > how will the public find out about this
Via the normal channels for strange rulings... this list or it's archives, rules columns and posts on websites, event coverage mention if it happens to come up in a feature match, etc.

> > is there any consideration of changing this rule
There was significant consideration given in making the ruling, so it won't be changed in the near future. Some delay in propagation of this information is inevitable, but we can all do our best as local rules authorities to make sure our communities are aware if it's likely to be relevant to them.

You're more than welcome to complain to whoever the appropriate parties are, but this is the way the rule works.

[Godder]

This thread has been posted to inform the TMD community of a new official ruling regarding Mindslaver (a card that sees play in Vintage) and its interactions with the Wishes (cards that also see some play in Vintage) and Sideboards (something else that sees play in Vintage). Discussion on the ruling can be useful to a point, but now that arguments are being repeated by both "sides" (inasmuch as there are sides here), that point has been reached. If people wish to take it further, there are better channels for that than TMD.

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