Well, it never came up today, thankfully, because I'm sure if it had, the "judge" (and I'll us that term loosely, for the moment) probably would have told me I was full of it, or blowing hot air anyway. I think he hates to be proven wrong or something like that.
Something did come up today though, that made me furious, and I don't get angry, but this was enough even for me. My friend had to borrow one of my decks to play today, since he had to rush down and couldn't get his own deck, and the only extra deck I had on me was my Insect Deck, and it contained two Millenium Scorpions in it. It was even winning, until the "judge" walked by and told him he couldn't play with those, they aren't legal yet. He proceeded to tell him what I told him, that new sets were legal in all UDE sponsored tournaments (which I don't know what this even is, there's never any Tournament pack-type prizes or anything like that, but then again I don't know the whole deal with how that works anyway for sure), but he said they weren't. I told him about the post on the Judge's List about it, and he said he never got that.... he's also said he's never gotten half of the things I mentioned to him. The store owner/TO is also supposedly on the list, but never got that post, or even any of the rules changes from the past two days, so he said.
We went to check out the policy documents on UDE, and they said TLM would be legal July 1, and he's supposed to go by what those policy documents say, according to UDE.
I went and showed them both the judge's list archive, on his computer, to the direct post that Kevin had made to the list, they read it, and he said "well now Upper Deck is contradicting themselves, what's a person supposed to do?"
By this time, I was getting frustrated, because my friend spent $10 in gas just to get there today, and then another $5 for the entry fee, so I mentioned, "Isn't it supposed to be a judge's job, or even an organizer's job, to keep up with all the rules and stuff, for the sake of the players?" Needless to say, the arguments didn't get anywhere, he still wouldn't allow my friend to play, but at least he did give him his entrance fee back.
I wish I had somewhere else to play, though, because that "judge" is off his rocker. I'm not sure how he ever passed his lvl1 test, because a few weeks ago, he ruled that
Vampire Genesis could be summoned by the effects of
Call of the Mummy in another person's game. If I had been taking a drink at that moment, I'm sure I would've done a spit-take, hearing that. I just rolled my eyes and groaned, I couldn't believe that one. I have great respect for judges, expecially pretty much everybody here, you've helped me iron out a few strategies that sometimes I wasn't sure would work, but I have very little respect for stupid people, especially someone who's supposed to be a "judge", that doesn't know half of the things that he should. It's either ignorance, or laziness, and I don't feel that we players should suffer for something like that, where if he's actually going to judge, he should really know the game, at least all of the important stuff.
So not only did my friend waste $10 gas money, I pretty much wasted $10 in gas and $10 in entrance fees for myself and my brother, and was so annoyed after that, I just decided to throw the game to a young kid that played me last time, so he could feel good about beating me, the same kid my friend WAS winning against, until the judge stopped him. We all just left after that, there was no reason to stay, the day had been ruined, and I wasn't having any fun anymore, I have enough mental problems as it is. It's a good thing my brother and I werent playing with decks that had new cards in them though, or the same thing would've happened to us, and I know my 14 year old brother would've been highly upset if that was the case.
Basically, I'd like to know, is the judge's mailing list that unreliable, that messages don't go through to people a lot of the time? It'd been almost a month since that announcement, and neither of them had even remotely heard of it.
I know Kevin, etc. are busy with all the new rulings and everything, but if the policy documents are supposed to say things like these, is it that difficult to go update them and add in a couple of sentences?
I wish there was somewhere else I could go to play, honestly, but I have to travel 80 miles just to get to the place, which is the closest place that holds a tournament. I play the game to have fun, but I do also play to win, and it really isn't everything. The only time I even get annoyed at losing, is when some cookie-cutter deck just goes through, wanting to win, and having very little fun and originality at all. When you travel 80 miles one direction to have fun, only to get annoyed and in an arguement, that tends to ruin everything. The only redeeming quality was one of the players, whom I respect a lot (even if he does often abuse time by looking at graveyards way too much, though he's gotten better at that,) almost always tells me he loves my ideas, and I must just sit at home a lot of times thinking of deck designs and things like that. He also said if he ever held any kind of tournament, he'd want me there to judge. I've showed him so many little tricks, I can't help but feel good about that. It's just a shame that some things like this have to happen, and when you try to help out everybody, as quite a few people had TLM cards from what I saw, just not in their decks, that all it ends up doing is upsetting you.
Just one last question, if anyone knows... is there /any/ projected date for the lvl1 judge's test to be put online to take? I've been looking for months now, still nothing. If not, the next major event I'll be going to is the CRV pre-release, as there's no regionals before then, as far as I know. Do you think it would be possible to take the test at that, or would they not even have it available?
I also apologize that this turned into a mini-rant, I'm just failing to see how some things like that can go unnoticed. I've even tried telling the "judge" about RONIN before, and how useful it is, but he just says everything he needs to know is in a little PDA he carries. Talk about someone that just doesn't seem to even have the slightest bit of enthusiasm.
