The mana weaving thread (Fabrizio Anteri edition)

By now, I wonder if there are any Magic "Pros" that AREN'T cheating scumbags. We've reached the point where cyclists look more upstanding than MtG players.

At least he's admitting he fucked up instead of going full damage control, I have to respect that.

This is either full-on damage control, or he's plain retarded.
If you don't have a lot of time, don't fucking prioritize mana weaving over properly shuffling.

I manaweave when assembling decks and postgame if I got more than 70% of my lands on the board

You can say muh randomization all you like, but losing a game due to shuffle RNG isn't what this game is about.

>opponent mana weaves and doesn't shuffle properly afterwards
>instead of saying anything, take his deck and shuffle it in a way that ensures he's got huge clumps of land and spells

You mulligan to 5? How unfortunate.

I mana weave the first time I need to organize a deck. I think it's very reasonable to do so, particularly in drafts or sealed sets. After manaweaving, I manashuffle twice, then usually manashuffle a third time in front of my opponent before letting them cut. I want everything to be as fair as possible, both for myself and my opponent, which means transparency. I even tell them and will let them shuffle any way they'd like once I've done my thing.

Hope you like your dq, you should have called a judge when your opponent presented.

>manashuffle
What new memery is this?

If you shuffle properly, Mana Weaving is unnecessary.

Riffle 7 to 9 times and it'll be as fair and random as it ever gets.

Just teaching FNM scrubs a lesson.

>Hope you like your dq
What for? You can re-shuffle opponents deck before play. It might only be issue when stalling, but one round of 3 pile shuffle takes under minute easily (assuming 60 cards deck).

I don't think it's new memery? You shuffle your deck the same way anyone would, then divide your deck into piles. In EDH I make 9 piles of 10 and one pile of 9, and in drafts/limited I make 8 piles of 5, by laying out cards from the top of deck individually face down on each stack. Then once the piles are organized, I grab them in a random order, then casually shuffle before asking someone to cut. I think the principle is by dividing the cards evenly into piles, you should theoretically have an even mana distribution among the piles. I'm pretty sure I do it because I have OCD more than anything.

How do you shuffle properly? I tend to struggle a lot, so I try to divide things into piles and randomize them as much as I can without doing fancy card tricks.

As usual, OP pic sums it up.

If you manaweave you're either wasting time or cheating.

There is such a thing as mutual cheating, just because your opponent cheats doesn't give you the right to counter-cheat to nullify his original cheat, it just makes you both guilty.

I can't find it in the current version, but an older version of the infraction procedure guide listed that specific scenario as an example under Unsporting Conduct - Cheating. Maybe things have changed since then but I'd still call a judge if I thought my opponent wasn't sufficiently randomizing their deck, knowingly or not.

Riffle Shuffle. It's really not that hard, just practice it a few times and you are golden. It's also incredibly quick, making it easy to achieve a very randomized deck in less than a minute by just doing it a few times.

Fags will tell you that it'll damage your cards, but any kind of shuffling will do that, especially if you don't do it properly. You don't have to bend your cards that heavily, just enough to riffle them.
Using sleeves and just riffling the empty sides further decreases the chance of damage.

Personally, when I'm not pressed for time, I usually do this
>1 Riffle
>1 Pile Shuffle by randomly distributing the cards on a random number of piles
>7 to 9 Riffles
>Mash until the game starts

The Riffles should be more than enough, but if I have the time I just do it for fun.

I'm absolutely shit at riffling (a shuffled deck, especially 60 card one) and can't seem to pick that skill up. My bridge playing buddies obviously handle it like pros.

My usual pre-game procedure:
Pile the deck once face down to count the cards and check the sleeves. (Pile, not pile shuffle, because a shuffle it is not.)
Give the deck a dozen good mashes or so.
Present.

At FNM level I just cut the opponent deck, unless I felt they were shuffling too little. Elsewhere half a dozen good mashes will do.

>Riffle Shuffle
Fuck I had to google what the heck you were talking about. I see people doing that all the time and I can never seem to do it properly without spraying cards all over the place like some kind of sperg. I'll just buy a cheap deck of cards and practice until I'm good at it.

Also, is it socially acceptable to corgi shuffle?

>Also known as the Chemmy, Irish, scramble, beginner shuffle, or washing the cards, this involves simply spreading the cards out face down, and sliding them around and over each other with one's hands. Then the cards are moved into one pile so that they begin to intertwine and are then arranged back into a stack.

Pile shuffling still has a legitimate purpose, but it's to count your cards and make sure you're presenting what you think you're presenting rather than actual shuffling.

Never participated in any real card game tournament. How are cards shuffled before games? Standard riffle-shuffle doesn't exactly give a really random distribution, so I would assume it's not enough.

I think the issue is that if you're playing with sleeves I'm pretty certain a card edge will stick to a sleeve opening somewhere.

>There is such a thing as mutual cheating,
Except 3 pile shuffle is not a cheating. It is not sufficient shuffle on its own, but as a re-shuffle of already randomized deck it should be acceptable.
And I can't counter-cheat if I'm oblivious to original cheating. I think it's called "plausible deniability".

I haven't slept yet, so my brain is moving a little slowly, but are you suggesting that I should go unsleeved, or by virtue of being sleeved it's reasonable to assume someone will fuck up by accident?

As long as your opponent is given the opportunity to cut, your technique is irrelevant.

Of course, yeah.

It can still happen in theory that he just never ran into anyone that would call him out of it or even do the three-pile reverse stack meme on him.

They should have gone "what the fuck do you think you are you doing" on him the first time he tried that and then upon explaining give him auto-loss or something and let him go on in the tourney. Not check videos from his last four rounds and go "uhhhhhhh you are systematically cheating that's a DQ".

They seem pretty convinced and call it investigation though, so idk. It's within accepptable measures, he didn't get a lifeban or anyhting.

>Except 3 pile shuffle is not a cheating.

An older version of the infraction procedure guide had pile shuffling to undo a weave instead of calling a judge listed as an example under Unsporting Conduct - Cheating. So in this case, it is. As for your plausible deniability, that's up to the judge to decide. Why would you even take the risk when you could just get your opponent disqualified?

Dunno if it cou ts as properly mana weaving. But after a game usually take my cards used in the game and interleave through my undrawn deck before shuffling.
Probably just superstition but i feel like possibly getting the same groups of cards again the next game would be boring.

Suspension can still come. They're dealt out later by DCI after reports from the judges and the player.

>what is mana weaving
Your opponent is actually given the opportunity to shuffle, though, which should make your cheat properly irrelevant in theory, but you'd underestimate people's good will if you thought they will shuffle it seven times like they are suppossed to every time.

>And I can't counter-cheat if I'm oblivious to original cheating. I think it's called "plausible deniability".
That's just an excuse, and you might even be able to sneak it by a judge if you're called on it if you're very lucky, but the idea that you "just so happened" to pile-shuffle their deck into an unplayable mess is extremely suspicious and most judges will error on the side of it being intentional. Remember this isn't a court of law, the judge at a Magic tournament doesn't have to convict you before a jury of your peers before he can issue you a penalty.

Bravo for owning up to your mistakes. This is the only reason I can believe it's a mistake.

OCD is a mentally debilitating disease user. I'm not saying he has it. I'm just saying I have it and I know what can happen.

You see a whole lot of diffent ways to shuffle. Riffle, mash, hindu, overhand, what have you.

Magic Tournament Rules are somewhat subjective about it. Only clear thing said there is that pile shuffle alone is not sufficient for randomization. "Mathematical random" is not a requirement, you just need to bring the deck to state where reasonably you do not know positions of any cards.

Hmm. Good point, I need to check the latest ruling on this. In my experience judge dq doesn't happen very frequently, they usually just handwave it as a warning. But maybe that's just our local judges.

>implying it's possible to "wholly randomize" your deck by doing a cursory shuffling
>implying the only thing with mana weaving isn't the difference in amount of chance that can fuck people who do or don't do it
>implying this wouldn't be avoided if game mechanics allowed discretionary choice whether to draw from spell deck or mana deck

Based on research by mathematician Persi Diaconis, you only need to shuffle a deck of 52 cards 7 times to fully randomize it. Based on his description, 60 cards is also 7 times since 7 is actually overflow at the 52 level.

Meaning as long as you don't waste ALL your shuffle time on mana weaving it's fine. Suggestion: just pull it all out into one pile and mash that in then start shuffling your 7 times. Should take 30 seconds with practice and won't disrupt the game.

For anyone wondering, Persi Diaconis has stated that casino shuffling is objectively and measurably the best method of randomization. This involves:
-Riffle (or "mash" when you have sleeves) once
-Then overhand (also called "stripping the deck) once
Together they are "1 shuffle" and you repeat this process. Overhand by itself is one of the worst possible shuffle methods. Combined with a riffle, it will neuter accidental perfect riffle shuffles and keep the deck random. Always do these two steps seven times and welcome to the average.

>>implying this wouldn't be avoided if game mechanics allowed discretionary choice whether to draw from spell deck or mana deck
Absolutely disgusting, you degenerate.

They don't cheat, they just cast two explores.

The only real requirement is that you randomize it enough that neither player can reasonably know the position of any specific card, or any particular pattern of cards. This should only take a minute or two at most unless you've got such fat sweaty nerd hands that you can't even mash shuffle properly.

>the idea that you "just so happened" to pile-shuffle their deck into an unplayable mess is extremely suspicious
the assumed course of action is that they draw shit hand and mulligan, the overall composition of the deck never comes in question

>I need to check the latest ruling on this

Pile shuffling to turn a mana weaved deck into an unplayable mess is no longer listed as an example under Unsporting Conduct - Cheating, but it still seems pretty clear cut to me.

>Unsporting Conduct—Cheating
>Disqualification
>Definition
>A person breaks a rule defined by the tournament documents, lies to a tournament official, or notices an offense committed in his or her (or a teammate’s) match and does not call attention to it.
>Additionally, the offense must meet the following criteria for it to be considered cheating:
>The player must be attempting to gain advantage from his or her action.
>The player must be aware that he or she is doing something illegal.

You might be able to feign ignorance and get away with some lesser violation if you don't have a history of cheating, but don't expect a judge to give you the benefit of the doubt.

Wouldn't the obvious solution be to have judges come by and shuffle both players decks before a match before handing them back? This would also let them inspect for card marking.

>This should only take a minute or two at most unless you've got such fat sweaty nerd hands that you can't even mash shuffle properly.
Hey, just because I have fat sweaty nerd hands mangled by years of basketball doesn't mean you should make fun of me for it. I just have stubby fingers bent at all sorts of wacky angles from repeated sprains/breaks.

>pile shuffle alone is not sufficient for randomization

Well, mathematically it's the best shuffle is you use plenty of piles and and least attempt to place your cards in random piles, but I guess that at tournament level you cannot put faith in people.

For that you would either need a lot more judges per player or much slower tournaments.

Realistically unfeasible for general tournament play, and at the finals tables I'm pretty sure you've got judges watching like hawks at all stages anyway.

You can never assume people won't cheat, that's general human nature. In any situation where winning matters someone will eventually cheat if they think they can get away with it, that's true for any competitive activity on the planet.

>OCD is a mentally debilitating disease user.
I know, but being sick is no excuse to violate the rules at a tournament. Get your shit together, or get out.

This should be standard practice at high-stakes tournaments anyway, but at lower levels it's just not feasible.

This, i'm a super ethics fag but I recognize when it comes to cheating you have two competing instincts/adaptations - Reciprocation and Opportunism. Both are survival tactics ingrained into our species.

Yes, because you have to riffle and cut like 50 times to randomize a deck after it's been sorted out. I usually collect my cards after a game in a way that puts all of my lands in a row, all of my creatures in a row, etc. I've taken to piling everything together and then weaving in the lands before shuffling. Getting a pile of creatures or enchantments isn't ideal, but as long as it comes with lands I'll play it and not waste time with a Mulligan.

Claiming that he just didn't know IS damage control. He has a potential suspension looming; he literally only has two options. He can admit he was cheating, or he can claim to be a retard. He deserves absolutely zero respect for trying to cover his ass.

Riffle shuffle 7-9 times for a 40 card deck, 9-11 times with a 60 card deck. Magic cards are playing cards. They are made specifically to bend and warp, then going back to the origianl shape. Thats why the bend test works. Real magic cards will bend back. And shuffling like that is even easier with sleeves ( I pefer dragon sheild matte, with KMC perfect fit), just shuffle them together at the corner.

It always bothered me how badass the genie is when doing gag magic, but how hilariously incompetent and helpless he becomes when shit comes down.

>You can say muh randomization all you like, but losing a game due to shuffle RNG isn't what this game is about.

How to sum up the Spike mentality in a sentence.

Sure, getting mana screwed or flooded isn't fun but, it happens. This is the risk you agree to accept when you deal with the RNG element of card draw. If Wizards wanted everyone to draw the exact card they needed at every turn they'd print more tutors.

You can say that Magic (or any game with a random element involved) is about managing and reducing the effects of randomness of which mana weaving (read: cheating) is an extreme expression but, the bottom line is if you feel the need to cheat then you're not confident enough in your own ability and you have no business playing at that point.

there is a small sub-branch of math dedicated to deck shuffling, OF COURSE all the people at the top tables are cheating.
mana weaving, making sure you'll draw at least 1 or 2 sideboard cards, it's all maths. it's part of how magicians do card tricks (but without the sleight of hand).

Yes.

>Yes, because you have to riffle and cut like 50 times to randomize a deck after it's been sorted out.

You really don't, not for a game of magic at least.

>Like 50 times
More like nine. And even if that were the case, you can riffle fifty times no problem in the time it takes to Mana Weave.

This "whirlpool shuffle" as I've always heard it called is usually too slow to be used in tournament play. I do use it, but only to mix up a pre-sorted deck (ie writing down my decklist) before round 1 starts. Doing it during a match is right out.

Not if you've got sleeved cards, sleeved cards are very prone to perfectly interleave one card over another meaning there's no effect on the randomness of your deck

Whatever happened to that guy? did he quit or get banned?

Suspended. Big names can't be banned, that's reserved for nobodies.

This game is a fucking joke.

This is not true at all and you have to be a manaweaving retard to believe it.

Nope. I have sleeves so I just cut the deck, shove the two together, repeat as necessary.

The British always cheat at games.

I don't understand, why is this cheating?

Your opponent gets to shuffle your deck after you are done...

>That ancient British name Fabrizio Anteri

Look at that name m8, just look at it. Dude's a Venezuelan-Italian apparently.

He's passing it off as him forgetting to shuffle though. He's a pro player. Is that likely? How often do you forget to shuffle?

He's a British citizen.

...

Except for the whole "cheating" part, that's almost correct.

How is obtaining better randomness through weaving cheating?

Because you yourself are required to set the deck into an unknown state.

Then why let your opponent shuffle? Isn't that just pointlessly allowing them to cheat like all the pro's who put your lands to your deck bottom?

According to his MTGSalvation page he's not got British citizenship. in fact he's specifically listed as 'currently living in London' which suggests his residence is temporary.

MTGSalvation are not the most stringent source but then again Mario Huehue isn't important enough to be on a real wiki.

To counter the original point though, everyone cheats at games at a high enough level. Honestly the length casinos have to go to to stop cheaters is unreal and I don't think there's been a fair race run in over two decades.

Because if you shuffle the way you are supposed to, the starting state of the deck is irrelevant. If you shuffle properly, it doesn't fucking matter wether you mana weave, or the lands are neatly separated from the other cards.

Because, unless you are mana weaving like a retard, it's pretty fucking hard to put all the lands to the bottom, especially when somebody is starting at you while you are doing it.

Just a reminder: There is no requirement that a deck be "totally randomized" or even "randomized as much as possible" for REL Magic (or any TCG). The requirement is only that a deck be "sufficiently randomized" meaning that no person should be able to determine which cards or which type of cards may be located in any discrete portion of the deck after the shuffle is completed.

By this definition mana weaving is absolutely allowed even though it provides an advantage. Because you cannot determine exactly where the lands are (or even how many lands are in any discrete portion of the deck) beyond "probably somewhat uniform" the deck is "sufficiently shuffled" and you are fine.

If you ever suspect that your opponent is stacking their deck in such a way that provides them advantage you are always allowed to either shuffle or cut their deck and as a general rule I always cut my opponent's deck. If on the other hand you are booty bothered by your opponent having high probabilities of silky smooth land drops more often than you perhaps you should consider mana-weaving as it is perfectly legal.

Mana weaving reduces randomness. You're organizing the pattern of the deck.

no person should be able to determine which cards or which type of cards may be located in any discrete portion of the deck
>which type of cards may be located in any discrete portion of the deck

Except mana weaving does exactly that. It let's you know which type of cards (lands) are where in the deck (evenly dispersed)

The whole game should be played with a land deck and a normal deck, you get to choose which deck to draw from at the beginning of your turn.

>By this definition mana weaving is absolutely allowed even though it provides an advantage.

Tell that to a judge and see what happens.

Build better decks or play a different game.

But that's not the rules, user.

>Decks must be randomized at the start of every game and whenever an instruction requires it. Randomization is defined as bringing the deck to a state where no player can have any information regarding the order or position of cards in any portion of the deck. Pile shuffling alone is not sufficiently random.

>Randomization is defined as bringing the deck to a state where no player can have any information regarding the order or position of cards in any portion of the deck.

>ANY

Also, you 100% can and should call a judge.
>If the opponent does not believe the player made a reasonable effort to randomize his or her deck, the opponent must notify a judge.

>MUST

Why no just let the opponent shuffle your deck?

Everybody gets manascrewed from time to time. It never really bothers me, but it might cut out some of the whining to do it with two decks.

The entire game is built around this mechanic. If you ensure that you get lands 100% when you need them, it'd make for a completely different and way more greedy game.

Realistically if you're building a deck properly mana screw should be extremely minimal, you're more likely to get flooded. Also, use your mulligans properly, so many people keep crap hands because they don't want to mulligan but then complain about mana screw.

"Evenly dispersed" is a horse shit claim. You might as well try to get your opponent banned for having lands "somewhere" in their deck.

Most people never learn how to Mulligan properly, even though it's an incredibly important part of the game.

Go whine at a judge and get laughed out of the room. Mana Weaving is illegal by definition and that's the end of it.