[The comments thread for this article can be found here -Seamus]

This month we're going to take a brief look at something I found in my library. By "library," I mean my collection of books, not a pile of cards—I could tell you about this Darien, King of Kjeldor deck that I've been playing in the Casual room, but there's not much to say about that. My library, which contains such timeless classics as The Lord of the Rings, Pride and Prejudice, The Kalevala, my husband's black sock, and Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, also contains a Magical book from the game's early days: Baxter on Magic:A Guide to Proper Playing Techniques for Magic: the Gathering, by George Baxter. I bought this book a few years ago after finding it in the "things that will never sell" box at work. In the spirit of Time Spiral, I'm going to talk about the old days of Magic.

Here is a picture of the book for easy identification. The photo was taken on my crappy Ikea coffee table. The Magic card is there for scale; Agent Mulder is there because he likes to be in pictures; and the coins are there because they are stuck on the table and I can't remove them without destroying the whole thing.

Like the title of the book says, it is a guide to proper playing technique. Most of the book is devoted to Type 2 deck archetypes (from around 1996, it seems), with sample decklists, sideboards, and instructions on how to play or beat these decks. If you published such a book today, it would be almost worthless—the world spins much faster and a two week old metagame article can be completely irrelevant. Apparently, ten years ago it was a different world. The deck section might be valuable as a historical document..

The book contains about 40 pages worth of general advice on "proper playing techniques." George Baxter was a Pro Tour player, and his advice must reflect what was then acceptable and expected on the Tour and in tournaments in general. In the introduction to the book, Baxter promises that "after you have read Baxter on Magic you will have learned what most players regard as proper playing skill". The back cover proclaims these theories "timeless," because that's what back covers do. Some of the advice is still relevant and acceptable after many rules changes and policy adjustments (it's still a good idea to be aware of the game state, to shuffle your hand, to avoid overextending, etc), but some of it is stuff that I'd like the Magic community to forget [Which is why we present it here, for your forgetting benefit -Seamus].

Oh yes, some things have changed a bit. On page two, Baxter suggests that it's a good idea to put your Stasis on top of your library so you won't forget to pay for the upkeep. "This can be done with any number of cards, including Binding Grasp, Land Tax and Sylvan Library," says Mr. Baxter. Many players come up with this idea, but for as long as I can remember, it's been forbidden by the Universal Tournament Rules. You cannot put anything on top of the library—not permanents, not tokens, not your pen or your special upkeep reminder counter. However, it seems that back in 1996 it was okay.

Okay, that is not a very shocking difference. Well, how about this one: in Chapter 1 ("Habits to Form"), Baxter reminds us that it is illegal to rearrange your graveyard, and "this can often lead to game forfeiture depending on the judge at hand." Think about that one: game loss for rearranging your graveyard. It sounds very unreasonable indeed, until you remember that back then, there were cards that cared about graveyard order. In trying to recreate this exciting feature, Research & Development gave us the Recover mechanic, which is partly responsible for the most controversial judging policy issue of recent times. The second part is also interesting: "depending on the judge at hand." Consistency in rulings is very important to the judge program these days, and although we probably shouldn't read too much into this single comment, it does make me wonder what else used to depend on the judge at hand.

Chapter 3 is devoted to bluffing. Baxter provides a list of "various bluffs you can perform to outwit your opponent." These cunning tricks have nice names: "The Count," "The Inquiry," "The Fidget," "The Adjustment," "The Pseudo Bluff," "The Reactive Bluff," "The Active Bluff," and the one that makes a judge jump out of his/her seat, "The Stall.". The font reminds me of my GURPS books and makes me want to buy skill ranks in "The Fidget." I can probably afford it if I take the "Minority Group" Disadvantage. The Stall is not as bad as it sounds; it merely refers to pausing and pretending to think about playing one of the cards in your hand when you really have nothing to play. I don't really have a problem with this as long as it's not used excessively to run out the clock.

Compared to current Magic writers, I find Baxter's style to be a bit stiff. He has these names for his bluffing techniques, he uses phrases such as "conducting The Adjustment," and the sample games in the deck section are free of anything I'd recognize as Magic jargon. On the other hand, he has dramatic chapter headings such as "Chapter 6: Destroying Your Opponent's Will to Fight". This chapter contains some "mental tactics" that will totally demoralize your opponent. I will not repeat them here because just reading them destroyed my will to fight. I'd like to rename this chapter to "How to Be As Annoying As Possible".

The most interesting chapter of the book is chapter 4, "Using the Rules to Your Advantage". Baxter presents several "very simple yet game winning technicalities" that you can use to cheese your opponent out of a victory. The first of these is the "Talking Too Fast Rule." Here's how it goes: you do something, get a response from the opponent, and then make him take it back because it he was "talking too fast." For example, you can attack, and when the opponent blocks, you say that he was talking too fast and that you wanted to play a spell or ability—I'm sorry, I mean "cast a fast effect"—before blockers—and then you can use the extra information to your advantage. Now, of course players sometimes play too fast, without making sure that their opponent really has passed priority. But Baxter is not presenting this merely as something to be aware of, but as something you should set up and take advantage of actively. Today, this is considered both unsporting and illegal.

Next, Baxter covers some specific timing issues of the combat phase. Most of this is very outdated information from the dark pre-6th Edition ages. For example, after you declared your "intent to attack," your opponent was allowed to play spells and abilities. If he did, your attack was canceled, you'd go back to your main phase and would be able to play your Ball Lightning.

In this book, the rules of the game are something to be used against the opponent. If your opponent plays sloppily and makes a technical mistake, you are to take advantage of it. Even though this book is clearly intended for potential tournament players, Baxter rarely mentions judges, and when he does, they are handing out game losses. He doesn't tell you that judges are there to answer your rules questions, settle disputes, and clean up any messy situations caused by slow play.

I used the Wayback Machine (http://web.archive.org) to find old versions of the DCI tournament rules. The earliest document I could find was a letter to DCI members from September 1996. This letter explains several changes to the tournament rules (the rules have been constantly changing): the rules are now a single document, cheating and unsporting behaviour is more clearly defined, the shuffling rules are clarified, cards are now interpreted according to the latest printed version, and there are now guidelines for adjudicating difficult situations such as "when a competitor forgets about the upkeep phase," and when two players wish to take an intentional draw (they may not take a draw if it would put one of the players out of contention [?! -S]).

There are several interesting things in the rules document itself. For example, there used to be a rule that the Head Judge can terminate any "excessively long" match before its actual conclusion. However, he must give the players at least 30 minutes warning before he actually gets to do this. After the 30 minutes are up, the active player gets to finish his turn, and then the match ends. This rule doesn't actually explain what to do with the match once it has been terminated. The document says nothing about matches that are not finished when time is called. Why did this rule exist, and when was it used? I'm too new to know this.

A well-known and often-mentioned rule from the old days concerns sleeves. It used to be that you could force your opponent to remove his sleeves for any reason. Just wanting to annoy your opponent was apparently reason enough. A judge may remove the sleeves if he or she thinks that they are too worn, marked or otherwise unacceptable, but the opponent doesn't need a reason. Nothing is said about markings on the cards themselves. Newsgroup discussions from this time period reveal that people were concerned about shuffling (a sleeved deck was considered more difficult to riffle shuffle properly, and easier to stack), and counterfeits (harder to spot with sleeves on). However, many people were pointing out the obvious benefits of sleeve use, and eventually the DCI removed this rule.

Many veterans of the game might remember that penalties used to be much harsher in the old days. The penalty for an illegal main deck used to be disqualification, and this rules document repeats the phrase "Violation of this rule may result in disqualification from current competition at the discretion of the Head Judge, and possibly from future competition at the discretion of the DCI." is repeated many times. Getting suspended for playing two copies of a restricted card, that must have been fun.

DCI officials and judges are not perfect, but it's nice to see that as an organization, we have learned and evolved. We don't expect technically perfect play, we don't punish players for minor technical mistakes, and we don't let players abuse the rules. Although our policy documents still don't cover absolutely everything a judge (or a player) should know, every update brings improvements.

I hope you enjoyed this look into Magic's past. Remember the past as you open your Time Spiral packs next week at the prerelease, and have fun.

Next week: we interrupt the normal Feature Friday rotation to bring you an article from one of my favourite judges ever, the great Matt Tabak. Next month: I'm done with travelling for a while, so I'll report on some of my local events.

Johanna
Level 3 Judge, Finland
flame (at) bore.org
flame- on Efnet's #mtgjudge