Question on a Stage Selection Ruling

[goateeguy]

I recently ran a regional in Arizona, and an issue came up during a PM singles match which I'm interested in hearing other opinions on.

It's a best of 3 set. Player A wins game 1, then Player B wins game 2, and makes his strikes. After some consideration, Player A silently moves the cursor up to the top row and selects a banned stage. Player B says nothing and they play game 3 in its entirety on this banned stage. Some people in the audience object and raise the issue after Player A wins game 3 on a stage which, they argue, clearly gives him an advantage.

There were 2 major arguments. One says that game 3 does not count since it was played on a banned stage, and that it needs to be replayed. The other says that Player B is responsible for knowing the stage list, and that continuing to play the match instead of objecting to the stage choice protects Player A's choice of stage.

These two sides argued for a minute before a compromise was reached whereby game 3 counted in Player A's favor, but the set was extended to a best of 5 which still gave Player B a chance to come back. This was a good compromise because the players both agreed to it, but I have my own personal reservations which I'll withhold for now in order not to bias discussion. What would you have done in my place?

 

[NickRiddle]

If no objections are raised, the Gentleman's clause goes into effect. Both players may agree to play on any stage. Not contesting the stage is essentially agreeing.

 

[Shadow the Past]

If the player does not argue against the other player's choice, it's automatically Gentleman's clause. Even if Player B plead ignorance to a tournament rule (not knowing what stages are banned), it still applies, since he could double check with a TO on what stages are banned.

Replaying a match is the last option you want to take when deciding the outcome of such a match. The only forseeable reason a match should ever be replayed is if in-game rules change the outcome of a match (i.e. timer shortened, different number of stocks, team attack off, etc.) rather than out-game rules (i.e. legal stages, character switching issues, etc.)

 

[goateeguy]

Playing devil's advocate: shouldn't the gentleman's clause only apply in cases where both players specifically acknowledge that the stage is banned and that they agree to play on it anyway? As someone argued, "gentlemen shake hands". It's not very gentlemanly if someone gets away with breaking the rules unbeknownst to their opponent.

 

[Shadow the Past]

A player is responsible for knowing the rules of the tournament.

This obviously isn't the first time this has happened. The most popular case of this happening was with M2K vs Unknown (pretty sure that's his name). This was a big Melee tournament where Dave's Stupid Rule (DSR) was in effect (no going back to a stage you've already won on), even though other tournaments at the time didn't have DSR. So in the match the players are about to begin game 5, and M2K counterpicks to FD, even though he'd already won on that stage during that set. Both players unaware of the DSR rule play out the match and M2K wins. After the match, Unknown goes and talks to a TO and discovers that DSR was actually a rule this tournament, and the TO asks them to replay game 5. M2K is obviously not happy about this, and underperforms on this match and thus loses, which led to a bit of a ****storm afterwards with people complaining about it. (May have gotten some details wrong.)

Basically, player's can't plead ignorance and expect the rules to change for them because of their ignorance (i.e. replaying a match, extending the set, etc).

 

[goateeguy]

A player is responsible for knowing the rules of the tournament.

This obviously isn't the first time this has happened. The most popular case of this happening was with M2K vs Unknown (pretty sure that's his name). This was a big Melee tournament where Dave's Stupid Rule (DSR) was in effect (no going back to a stage you've already won on), even though other tournaments at the time didn't have DSR. So in the match the players are about to begin game 5, and M2K counterpicks to FD, even though he'd already won on that stage during that set. Both players unaware of the DSR rule play out the match and M2K wins. After the match, Unknown goes and talks to a TO and discovers that DSR was actually a rule this tournament, and the TO asks them to replay game 5. M2K is obviously not happy about this, and underperforms on this match and thus loses, which led to a bit of a ****storm afterwards with people complaining about it. (May have gotten some details wrong.)

Basically, player's can't plead ignorance and expect the rules to change for them because of their ignorance (i.e. replaying a match, extending the set, etc).

Thanks, that clarifies that argument for me.

 

[pidgezero_one]

i see this from the other perspective, it's not player b's job to make sure player a is abiding by the to's ruleset. knowingly choosing a banned stage and unknowingly not contesting a banned stage are not equivalent, and being consciously at fault deserves more culpability than being unconsciously at fault

 

[Shadow the Past]

i see this from the other perspective, it's not player b's job to make sure player a is abiding by the to's ruleset. knowingly choosing a banned stage and unknowingly not contesting a banned stage are not equivalent, and being consciously at fault deserves more culpability than being unconsciously at fault

Actually, it is Player B's job to make sure Player A abides by the rules. It's no different than playing a game of Chess with a friend, or a board game. If Player A moves a piece in an illegal way, you need to call them out on it or they're going to keep doing it. There's not going to be a ref sitting there making sure Player A's being a good boy for the entire day.

As I said, Player B is responsible for knowing the rules at a tournament. If they have absolutely no clue what stages are legal, they can have Player A wait while Player B goes up and asks the TO what stages are legal. Hell, most tournaments these days print out sheets of paper with the rulesets on them and leave them at every setup for quick reference. It's no different than knowing how many stocks you should have, what the timer should be set to, etc.

Last week I was having a money match and the game went to time and we both had the same percent, so we had to do a 1 stock 3 minute match. The person I was money matching (who's a friend of mine) said that the timer should be set to 5 minutes. I went and double checked with a TO and he said it was 3 minutes, and so my friend digressed and we played the match. It was my responsibility to know what the rulesets were, and since there was a disagreement on what each of us thought the rule was, we consulted a TO. If I hadn't known the 3 minute rule and we instead played the match with a 5 minute timer, it would've been my fault, not the other player's fault.

Player's don't get to plead ignorance to get around rules, and that applies to both player's who try to be manipulative (Player A) and those who are actually ignorant (Player B).