A history of Magic: the Gathering penalty guidelines<\/strong><\/p>\n This document provides a list of important changes<\/span><\/i> to the <\/span><\/i>Magic Infraction Procedure Guide (IPG)<\/span> and its predecessor documents, in text form and in diagram form. I also provide personal commentary and historical context on both individual changes and on trends. (10,000 words)<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n (A Google Docs version is also available, but it lacks errata.<\/a>)<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Here\u2019s some interesting stuff before we begin with the nitty-gritty:<\/span><\/p>\n The first part is a list of important changes in each version of the IPG (and its predecessor documents, I will refer to them collectively as the IPG), in text form. I omit changes that don\u2019t actually affect policy, such as clarifications, and I omit many details of implementation, especially when a large change completely rewrites a section of the document. I also comment some of these changes.<\/span><\/p>\n The second part is better viewed in a separate browser tab, as a full-size image. It\u2019s a diagram that shows how individual infractions were created, removed, merged or split over time, and how the penalties for these infractions changed. Some of these changes are explained in the first part as well, but many aren\u2019t.<\/span><\/p>\n The third part is my personal commentary on trends and major changes in the document. It is written as a readable essay so if you don\u2019t like technical history, then, a) why are you here? ^^ and b) this is the part you want to read after looking at the diagram in the second part.<\/span><\/p>\n You can download most of the documents that I discuss here on my personal website. <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n For each version of the IPG or a predecessor document, from 2000 up to January 2018, I give the list of changes in that document.<\/span><\/p>\n Let us begin!<\/span><\/p>\n The rules in this period were covered by the „Official DCI Penalty Guidelines“. It is very hard to obtain these documents online. There were few judges, and the guidelines were printed and distributed on paper. The web was in its infancy. <\/span><\/p>\n One version is available at the Wizards website<\/span><\/a> but I have no idea from which year it is. More versions of the document from this era may still be somewhere. A combination of browsing the Wizards archive, the Wayback Machine and powerful Google skills may be enough to find more versions of the document.<\/span><\/p>\n Some articles from the era are accessible (<\/span>Elaine Chase<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>Ken Horton<\/span><\/a>).<\/span><\/p>\n The document was very different from the IPG of today.<\/span><\/p>\n The following penalties existed:<\/span><\/p>\n The following RELs existed:<\/span><\/p>\n At different RELs, the same infraction may receive different penalties. This is a concept that will survive until the introduction of the <\/span>Regular Rules Enforcement Level Guide to Fixing Common Errors <\/span><\/i>in June 2010 when differences between Competitive and Professional REL get erased. Formal penalties were eliminated from Regular REL tournaments with <\/span>Judging at Regular REL<\/span><\/i> in 2011. <\/span><\/p>\n Tournaments with a higher K-Value affected ELO DCI ratings more and required a higher REL and a judge of higher level. It was more important in those tournaments that the integrity of games is protected and that players don\u2019t gain advantage through either incorrect play or uncaught cheating. This will persist until the three RELs are collapsed into three in 2007.<\/span><\/p>\n The document had infractions such as „Failure to Agree on Reality“, „Failure to Keep Cards Elevated above the Table“ and „Failure to Provide a Method to Track Life Total“. In most cases, infractions were more strict and gave more severe penalties than the infractions of today. A guiding philosophy was „prevent players from gaining advantage from breaking the rules“. Duel loss eliminates most forms of advantage so it was the go-to penalty of choice. Today, <\/span>we are more lenient and often err on the side of assuming the player didn\u2019t cheat, if we can\u2019t prove it.<\/span><\/p>\n Comment:<\/span><\/i> Here we see the origin of the term <\/span>rules enforcement level<\/span><\/i>. It may be „very lenient“, „lenient“, „standard“, „strict“ or „very strict“. These adjectives modify the phrase „rules enforcement level“ directly and cannot be used to describe a tournament — we can\u2019t talk about a „strict tournament“ in the same way we talk about a „Professional tournament“.<\/span><\/p>\nPrelude<\/span><\/h2>\n
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Table of contents<\/span><\/h2>\n
Part 1: List of changes to the IPG in text form<\/span><\/h2>\n
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1994 – 2000: Ancient times<\/strong><\/h5>\n
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\n<\/span>„Unintentional rules violations at this enforcement level should be treated with a high degree of tolerance. Particularly at this level, judges should focus on educating the player about the rule he or she violated so the error can be avoided in future tournaments.“<\/span><\/i><\/li>\n
\n<\/span>„This level of rules enforcement is designed for the highest level of competition. Players are expected to have a thorough knowledge of all tournament rules and procedures, so judges should issue penalties for unintentional rules violations that reflect this expected amount of rules knowledge.“<\/span><\/i><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n