What happens in the final of a tournament when no maesters are left on both sides and there is no chance to get one back intoplay and of course both players have chains on their agenda left?

I don't know, but my guess is that it would be a draw.

And therefore a rematch I suppose. You can't break the trophy in two parts…

Effectively, you are stuck playing the game to time limit, then the player with the most power gets a modified win.

The tournament rules differentiate between your "victory condition," which includes all requirements and limitations necessary to win, and your "victory total," which is your total power needed as part of the victory condition (as modified by card effects like CS-Melisandre and The North agendas, and so forth). The limitation of "can't win" from Maester's Path is part of the victory condition, but does not affect the victory total (since it in no way affects your power or how you count it).

The tournament rules also say that in order to get a "full" win, a player must reach his victory condition before time is up in the round. However, once time is up, the tournament rules award a modified win based only on the victory total.

So, if you reach a point in the game where no one will be able to reach their victory condition, it does not actually end the tournament game or result in an automatic draw. The game isn't over. In the scenario you describe, the game will not have an official end until the time limit is called, at which point, you determine who gets a modified win (if any).

It may sound complicated and tedious, in that you really are continuing to play for a partial win without any hope of a full win, but that's the way the rules would shake out. ~That's the risk you take when playing The Maester's Path without enough Maesters.

mischraum.de said:

The original post was straight from our final in the Munich Regional. Helmut had like 30 power on his house card and totally dominated the board. Matt however played Targ Maester and I was affraid he would burn Helmut's last maester as soon as he hit the board. Since our main judge was Helmut the decision would have been mine to make and I was getting very nervous. If Matt wouldn't have given the win to Helmut in that case I guess I would have granted him a rematch.

Thankfully Helmut's maester survived long enough to grab his chains.

ktom said:

In the end this sounds to me like the TO can do whatever he wants because he must improvise now. I will send this to Damon…

The imposed time limit sounds like it is the most fair way to go. Either that or count the power collected at the time it is known that no one has anymore Maester's that can be put into play. The problem with that is that it is not meant to be known information I suppose.

At the last tournament I had this situation with two Maesters decks, one of them with something like 25 powers.

And I was wondering what would happen if the other guy reached 15 by the time limit.

Strictly speaking, the guy with 15 powers is closer to the victory total than the guy with 25 powers. I would still give, I think, the modified win to the player with the more power, but I just thought his opponent might argue differently - and not be really wrong.

Bolzano said:

ktom said:

Which is really the whole issue, isn't it?

Boy, am I glad I've never had to deal with a situation like this.

From the core rules:

"The game is immediately over when one player
has claimed 15 or more total power between
his or her House and/or characters in play. That
player wins the game.

If two or more players reach the victory condition
simultaneously, the first player chooses
which of these players wins the game."

Technically, it would be a draw if they both had 15(or if it is modified by house attachments) or more power and still have chains attached to TMP, right? A player with 30 power is just as far from victory as the player with 17 power in this case.

I know this topic is considered for the Final Game only(or game where you advance because of winning), but power is really the only unit of measurement on victory. If you are using the absolute number of the difference between the power counter victory condition and the current total power you have, having more power than 15(for examples sake), technically puts you in a far worse situation. If I have 25 power and the opponent has 6 power, based on what I just said would make the opponent with 6 power closer to the victory condition. This is what makes me think that you should use most power in a stalemate match like this…. or start the match over?

Bomb said:

And I think most people would agree with you.

Unfortunately, we have no official backing for that point of view, as of yet.

Bomb said:

Bomb said:

I think we're making mountains out of molehills here. On the off, off, off chance that this happens (the two or three people who have said "I was getting nervous because it looked like this might happen" also said "luckily, it didn't"), the TO has complete discretion. I don't have a problem with that.

Yeah, luckily it did not happen.

And even if it did, what are the chances that the player with less power claims the modified win? Very low indeed.

Plus, if we asked to FFG, it is very likely they woulld say that the player with the more power get the modified win.

In any case, this ruling is not going to impact on Maesters decks building.

After days of being lazy I will post Damon's answer on the matter. As of now there is no official way to handle this but in the next tournament I am definitely going for answer number four because Maesters suck and people should be punished for running them! I am not sure if number two is really satisfying in a final but it might be the answer for a semifinal.

Damon:

Well as TO it is completely up to you how to solve this problem. There are 3 simple options that I would look at as a TO, and one that is crazy:

1. Neither player can win the final game, therefore a rematch is required.
The game is played over entirely.
2. Neither player can win the final game, therefore sudden death goes into effect.
The TO announces a set amount of turns to be played (I would recommend 3) from
the start and whomever has the most power, regardless of chains on the House
card wins the game.
3. Neither player can win in the final game, so it is declared a draw. Prizes are split equally,
with first choice going to the person with the fewest chains on his House card
4. Neither player can win in the final game, so the third place winner is now the tournament
champion.

That's not much of an answer really…