Subject: Defrauding the DCI
Date: Sun, 28 Jun 1998 22:34:24 EDT
From: Crnicoloff@aol.com

(With special thanks to Manuel Bevand, who inspired me to write about this
topic, and to my two anonymous informants who tipped me off to the scams I
listed.)

I don't think I had ever heard of the DCI until around the time of the US
Southeast Regionals, 1996.  I got my number for free for attending the
regional tournament, soon after the DCI decided every competitor needed one.

I was so happy to have a number that I promptly played several single-
elimination sealed deck tournaments to celebrate.  My Limited rating reflects
my impulsiveness to this day.  Go ahead and look, if you're curious.  My DCI
number is 134277.  It *just* went back up over 1600.

Sometimes I wonder if my ratings are legitimate.  I guess I could always
request a report of all my data, but that's a service I have to pay for.  The
DCI makes mistakes, but the players have to pay to discover them.  Most
players won't.

I remember being startled a couple years ago when another player asked me to
confirm that I was not at  tournament on a certain date.  He said the DCI
had recorded a match loss for him versus me at a tournament I wasn't within
2,000 miles of.  He had to appeal it, because he was hoping to get invited to
a tournament based on his ranking.

Until then, I never really thought that there could be wins or losses for me
that never happened, artifically tampering with my rating in the DCI database.
I almost called them and purchased a report.  Until I remembered it cost
money.

The DCI is quite a mess.  A few months ago, a friend of mine in Europe
casually declared that some of his friends were *still* waiting for their
tournament matches to be entered into the DCI computer.  They had been waiting
for months.  He related this to me in such a bland manner that I pressed him
for details.  He told me it was always this way.  He didn't seem upset.
Just... resigned.  It made me wonder what happened to the reports.  Are they
sitting in a low-priority pile?  Were they lost in the mail?  Were they mailed
at all?

So, ladies and gentlemen, this all brings me to the point of my discussion.

When the DCI was even more of a mess and less strict about new players, a lot
of well-known players with good rankings carried multiple DCI numbers.  In my
local area, players were handed a blank tournament match record to fill out at
the beginning of the tournament.  If these players did poorly, they would
switch DCI numbers before turning in their scorecards, thus preserving their
rating.  This sort of unethical tampering led many otherwise undeserving
players to the ranks of permanently qualified Pro Tour players - at the
expense of players with legitimate rankings.  Thankfully, the widespread use
of computers by tournament organizers has mostly nullified such abuses.

Unethical things of this sort are bound to occur.  After all, there are
thousands of unsupervised tournaments run under DCI sanctioning, with only the
competence and honesty of the players and organizers standing in the way of
corruption.

Sounds romantic, right?  Honest players and organizers, crusading in their
quests to provide a fun and fair playing environment for all.  I would be a
lot more dazzled by the image if I didn't have to contend with the far more
dismal reality.

Organizers are conspiring with players to tamper with the fairness of DCI
ratings.

Not all organizers, mind you.  Probably not more than a handful.  Just a few
crooks spoil the whole thing, though.

How's your DCI rating, by the way?  Is it poor?  Want to help it?  Here's what
you do.

1) Collect a bunch of DCI numbers and the names to go with them.  I gave you
mine right at the top of this article.

2) Optional - Get together a few friends who also want to improve their DCI
ratings.  If you're the kind of person who does this, you probably don't have
friends.

3) Grab a qualified "judge", create an event, get it sanctioned.

4) Take all your collected DCI numbers and run your "tournament".  You and
your friends go mostly undefeated.  Record your triumphant win.

5) Repeat.

Note - this works best if you use numbers that won't generate suspicion.  For
example, try not to steal numbers from high-ranked people who might appeal
their rating.  Also, try not to steal numbers from people who don't live near
you.

Are you a bit squeamish about all these details?  Want to delegate the more
slimy activities to someone else?  Try this.

1) Find a corrupt organizer.  Become good friends.  (Note - this sometimes
works the other way around.  If you're the sort of person who has good friends
in high places, you might be able to "corrupt" one.)

2) Let your organizer friend know that you want to attend the next Pro
Tour/Nationals/Worlds/whatever.  Don't actually mention your lack of skills
necessary to qualify legitimately.  That will become obvious later.

3) Your organizer friend should then sanction a boatload of tournaments for
you to compete in.  If you're really good friends, you might get to compete
for free.

4) Attend your tournaments, and do your best.  Don't worry, your organizer
friend has you covered.

5) Your organizer friend will then promptly proceed to "lose" all the reports
from tournaments you did poorly in.  His ass is covered, since he can blame it
on the DCI.  Alternately, he might merely make unfortunate "errors" in his
final report.  Still, the DCI is a good scapegoat for this sort of thing.

6) Optional - get some friends in on it.  Form a "team".  Qualify with
stunning regularity to Pro Tours.  Fall flat on your asses each time.

You think this is funny?  You think it's a big joke?  This stuff actually
happens.

There's an interesting article on the "Issues" page of the Dojo by D. Diggler.
It's written under a pseudonym to protect his identity.  Read it.  It's along
these lines, and best of all, it's a true account.

I think these sorts of things happen much more often than the DCI would like
to admit.  If anyone has information on such, please send it to the Dojo as a
followup to this article.  The Magic playing world needs to see it.

As the DCI continues to grow and unsupervised tournaments sprout around the
globe, such abuses of the system will continue.  I consider the entire ranking
list a fraud, full of so many internal errors and unethical tamperings as to
be representative of exactly nothing.

My solution is in two parts.

1) No more sanctioning for tournaments that have no physical DCI presence.
Exempt Qualifiers and Pre-releases since they are arranged by WotC under
specific guidelines and contain tons of ratings-conscious witnesses.

2) Set everybody back to 1600 in all formats.  Don't use the lists for
invitations until the first person hits 1800.

Without the innumerable small tournaments for the DCI to track, they will have
more manpower to get the big ones right and keep them right.  As a bonus,
players who live in areas without large pools of players will have mostly
equal opportunities to travel to the same Grand Prix, PTQs and Pre-releases
that everyone else attends, provided WotC doles them out in a reasonable
fashion.

Let's start over and do it rightunities to travel to the same Grand Prix, PTQs and Pre-releases
that everyone else attends, provided WotC doles them out in a reasonable
fashion.

Let's start over and do it right this time.

- Cathy

(Hi, Mom!)