Level One - Lesson 14

Relaxed Policy Guide

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Hello there, and welcome back to the Judge Program for Star Wars™: Unlimited - Level One certification track lessons.

As always, I’m your host Jonah, and today we’ll be taking our first look at the Relaxed Policy Guide. Unlike with how we handled the Tournament Regulations, you do need to have a complete understanding of this document at level one. Thankfully, this is only a two page document, not close to fifty.

We’ll dive into the Competitive Policy Guide in the Level Two lessons, as the level one certification is aimed at Relaxed events, not Competitive ones.

The Relaxed Policy Guide is broken into four sections. An overview on philosophy of relaxed tier events, common disruptions, notable issues and unacceptable behavior. The last three cover broadly all potential errors and the general expectations and guidelines for remedying errors and issuing penalties as necessary.

In this lesson we’re going to cover every line of this document, and talk briefly about what they mean, expanding on the philosophy and explanations.

Philosophy Overview

This section covers the broad philosophies of the FFG Organized Play team, and the expectations for running events at Relaxed Tier.

“Relaxed tier events for Star Wars: Unlimited are designed to create a welcoming, inclusive, and low-pressure environment where players of all experience levels can enjoy the game. Whether someone is just learning the rules or has played in dozens of events, Relaxed events prioritize fun, community, and fair play over strict penalties.”

The opening paragraph emphasized the priorities of Relaxed tier events, like weekly play and prereleases. The goal is to get players to have fun, as opposed to technically precise play and harsh rulings.

“The emphasis at this level is on education, social interaction, and friendly competition.”

Again, the emphasis is on education over penalization, social interaction over contention and friendly competition over an attitude where victory means everything. That isn’t to say that players shouldn’t come to relaxed tier events with a drive to win - wanting to win is important, but sporting attitudes are key, so that a player who loses should lose with grace and players shouldn’t be trying to angle-shoot their opponents.

“Judges and tournament organizers should foster a positive atmosphere where players feel comfortable asking questions and resolving issues collaboratively. As the game grows, the intricacy of the game grows alongside it, and while we want players to avoid making errors, it is as important that the players feel respected.”

While ideally players feel comfortable asking questions at all levels of play, it’s important that players don’t feel like they’ll be judged for asking what may be potentially obvious questions or for admitting to errors. Listening to how players are feeling and working with them to resolve situations to the mutual satisfaction of both players is paramount.

“Whenever possible, rules misunderstandings or gameplay errors should be treated as learning opportunities. Fix the game state as best as you can, explain the correct process, and encourage players to be mindful going forward. Game Losses or other escalated penalties should only be used if repeated behavior disrupts the event or creates a negative experience for others.”

Again, there’s the emphasis on teaching players. There aren’t warnings issued, and penalties don’t escalate in any sort of regimented fashion. Fix the game, explain how to avoid the issue in the future, and work with the players to resolve the issue. The fixes described in this document are very brief and vague, which means you have a lot of latitude to address issues, and can do things that you should not do at more competitive events, but are fine at more casual events. The consistent experience that’s the focus of relaxed tier events is one of friendly collaboration, not necessarily regimented resolutions to errors.

“The infractions, penalties and remedies included in the Competitive Policy Guide are intended for more intense tournaments, and are not appropriate for Relaxed tier events.”

When you’re assessing a situation at a relaxed tier event, use the policies laid out in the Relaxed Policy Guide, not the Competitive Policy Guide. Those policies emphasize technical play, precise outcomes, and are more concerned with the outcome that the player experience.

“ It’s okay to be lenient with minor mistakes if that helps maintain the pace and tone of the event. Judges should aim to be approachable, fair, and flexible, using their best judgment to keep games moving and spirits high.”

Small errors can be adjusted very easily - just exhaust the necessary resource, add or remove the damage counter, and let the game continue. Resorting to complex fixes such as backups can detract from the experience. While fixing issues, however, be sure to remember that the opponent is a player in the game as well, and while it may feel more fair to be lenient and skip over an error entirely, it’s important to remember the experience of both players, even if one is more passive in the call.

“Judges and players are encouraged to help each other between matches or during deck construction. Encouraging and allowing players to provide advice, helps establish a stronger community and allows players to build each other up.”

This underlines the emphasis on education and community building - during limited events, such as prerelease, at relaxed tier, players are allowed to update their deck between games and rounds - they don’t have to present the same deck at the beginning of each round. This means that players could very easily and fairly get assistance after deck construction is complete and change their deck, but this explicitly allows players to get that guidance during deck construction. This makes for a more enjoyable experience, especially at prerelease and for newer players who may have some confusion. It also allows players to get more excited about exciting pulls.

Players are also encouraged to help each other out between matches - talking strategy during a match to a player is still not allowed - players should still be playing their own games. However, after a match, helping raise the skill level of other competitors is encouraged.

And judges can get in on the fun too - discussing strategy and ideas helps judges become a more active part of the community, rather than being a cold and distant arbiter.

“If your event includes high-value prizes, requires decklists, or experienced players seeking serious competition, you may want to consider upgrading to a Competitive tier event. But for Weekly Play, Store Showdowns, Prereleases, casual tournaments, convention play, or new-player-friendly gatherings, Relaxed events offer a perfect balance of structured play and community enjoyment.”

While some events are required to be at relaxed tier, such as Weekly Play and Prereleases, and others are required to be at competitive tier, such as Planetary Qualifiers, there are unofficial, sanctioned events run by tournament organizers that can be run how the Organizer chooses. As prizes become top-heavy, it becomes more important that infractions are handled with precision and consistency - consequently, for such events, Competitive may be better suited. There aren’t explicit rules about what must be a Competitive event, but if you decide that your event is being run at Competitive tier, it must use the Competitive Policy Guide and not the Relaxed Policy Guide.

“Remember that Relaxed-tier events and in-store play is where the community lives and grows. Above all, Star Wars: Unlimited is about great stories, exciting moments, and shared experiences. Let your event reflect that.”

Like the opening paragraph, this section summarizes the goals of relaxed tier play. It’s not about technically precise play, or perfect understanding of the rules - it’s about enjoying the game for all participants.

Common Disruptions

The Common Disruptions section is the bulk of instructions for handling infractions. It handles, as the title suggests, the most common gameplay and event disruptions.

If you look at how infractions are handled by this document, as compared to the Competitive Policy Guide, it will further highlight the differences between Relaxed-tier events and Competitive-tier events.

“A player sees a card in a deck that they shouldn’t have seen

Shuffle the card into the random portion of the deck. Avoid randomizing the position of any cards that are legally known in the deck.”

This is most often the case because a player began to draw a card that they shouldn’t or dropped cards while shuffling. There may be some investigation required, to determine if the location of any cards in the deck are known (for example, cards put on the bottom due to the resolution of a search effect), but this one is very easy and straightforward.

“A player accidentally has excess cards in their hand or resource zone

If you or the players are able to identify the cards in the incorrect zone and the zone it should have been in, return that card to the correct zone. Otherwise, select the appropriate number of cards at random, and return them to the correct zone. If cards are being returned to the deck in this way put them on top of the deck and do not shuffle the deck.”

This is another straightforward resolution - if a player accidentally draws an extra card or drop cards into their resources, and we are pretty sure which card it was (ie. the rightmost card in the hand or the card on top of the other resources), we can just put the card back. When we’re not certain, we select at random. While this doesn’t wholly mitigate the potential advantage gained, it resolves it frequently, and simply.

“A player commits an in-game error not covered by the above descriptions

If the error is minor, such as a missed trigger or draw, incorrect resources paid for a cost, or putting tokens or counters on a unit, and the effect can be applied now with minimal disruption, resolve the ability or instruct the player to take the missed action now (or to undo excess action). If significant decisions were made based on the game state because of the error, undo each action the players took until the point the error was made. If rewinding the game state in this way would be too disruptive, fix anything currently illegal or incorrect in the game, and let play proceed.”

We get to our third and final gameplay disruption, the vague “everything else”. If you can fix it by just doing whatever didn’t happen now, do it now! If you can go back to the gamestate and resolve it correctly, you can do that. Otherwise, you leave the game as is - no matter how disrupted the game is. At Relaxed-tier, we should never be issuing game losses for gameplay disruptions. Both players are responsible for the game state, even if it’s so far that we can’t repair it. However, beyond these options of “resolve now”, “rewind” and “leave as is”, at Relaxed tier, you have a lot more freedom to do what makes the players satisfied.

Let’s talk about a hypothetical - if a unit should have been defeated due to damage, but has since been healed and given an upgrade so it would survive that damage, simply resolving the damage now doesn’t suffice. Let’s say it’s been two rounds since the damage should have occurred, so rewinding simply isn’t feasible - the players have drawn too many cards, and so much has happened that we can’t rewind. But now this unit is threatening lethal damage, and so the error is deciding the game.

Rather than issuing the game loss, you can consider simply defeating the unit, even though resolving the damage now wouldn’t cause that to happen. You could additionally heal the damage it dealt since the error occurred, and return a unit it defeated to play. You can do what it takes to get as close as you can to reality, without being forced to stay in one lane or another.

However, while you do this, keep in mind the play experience for both players - it can be easy to accidentally create an inequitable or somehow unfair fix when you’re improvising a remedy, which is why more competitive events, with higher stakes, have more precise steps to follow.

Also, and I want to emphasize this - this sort of improvised fix is not appropriate for Competitive-tier events. At competitive tier events, remedies should follow policy, and not be whatever “feels best”.

Beyond those, there’s still one common issue that impacts the event in a broader sense.

“A player has a deck that is not legal for the event or has another player’s cards.

Remove any cards that shouldn’t be in the deck, then add any cards that should. If the player has insufficient cards after this remedy, shuffle cards at random from the player’s sideboard into the deck until they have a deck that meets format size requirements.”

Decklist errors don’t exist at Relaxed-tier events because decklists don’t exist, but deck errors can still occur - this is most frequently failure to desideboard, but you may find a higher frequency of players playing cards they’re not allowed to play - especially banned cards in off-meta brews or cards from a different rotation. Newer and more casual players may not keep up with the news as much, and consequently may miss these changes.

However, the fix is simple - just fix the deck! If you need to add cards to the deck, take them from the sideboard to fill gaps. If a player doesn’t have enough sideboard cards to fill those gaps, at a Relaxed event, you can frankly probably just let them choose some cards to fill in the last few slots - they’re already so far away from what they were intending on playing, that they’ll likely be at a disadvantage anyway, and the focus is on their entertainment and education, not punishing a player because they didn’t keep up with the news.

Notable Issues

Moving on from Common Disruptions, Notable Issues are a little bit more disruptive, but can also be harder to remedy in their own ways.

“Some issues are more disruptive than gameplay errors. These include taking an excessive time to make plays or sideboarding decisions during a match, asking for or providing strategic assistance during an ongoing match or draft, asking for a concession, or randomly determining the outcome of a match.”

Things like slow play, outside assistance, and inappropriately determining a result are all things that are difficult to “fix”. At competitive, we don’t fix them, but we do penalize players who commit them as a disincentive. However, at Relaxed events, the goal isn’t that high level of competition, and so our first response does not include punishment. However, these are still significantly disruptive to an event and consequently need to be addressed.

“Many players may not realize that they are exhibiting these behaviors or are unaware that they are not allowed. Consequently, the focus on these is education, to ensure that players have the opportunity to learn and grow from their actions. If the behavior continues, letting the player know that repeated disruptions of the same type will warrant a game loss can reinforce the lesson. Intentionally taking any of these actions, while knowing they are prohibited, is Unacceptable Behavior, as detailed below.”

The way we address these is the same - explain to them that the behavior is inappropriate, why it’s inappropriate, and that there may be consequences. While a game loss can be issued, it likely shouldn’t be issued until the player has demonstrated a habit of unintentionally causing these issues over the course of multiple events, and have received education multiple times.

Also, note that “Intentionally taking these actions” is a little bit non-specific. Players, even when they’ve been educated on slow play, outside assistance, and improperly determining an result, can commit those infractions unintentionally. A player can very easily lose track of time or not realize that their comment has strategic relevance. However, stalling, intentionally disrupting a match to change the outcome with strategic input, or trying to bribe or collude with their opponent are the more severe versions of these notable issues.

Not everything in Notable Issues is handled this way

“A player who is more than 10 minutes late should be considered absent, issued a match loss, and dropped from the event. If the player returns later in the event, they should be re-added to the tournament.”

There isn’t a game-loss step for absences at Relaxed-tier. This should realistically only occur when a player has left the event without correctly dropping - and so giving the player who isn’t going to have an opponent show up a win and letting them go and dropping the missing player resolves the situation cleanly. Note that if a player is habitually a couple minutes late, it can and should be treated as other Notable Issues - have a conversation with them about the impact their actions are having on the events they’re participating in, and the experience of other players, and if the behavior persists, issuing a gameloss can sometimes be appropriate.

Unacceptable Behavior

That brings us to the final practical section of the Relaxed Policy Guide - Unacceptable Behavior.

“While Relaxed-tier events aim to be inclusive and educational, certain behaviors are never acceptable. Any player engaging in the following must be disqualified from the event, and at the Tournament Organizer’s discretion, may also be asked to leave the venue:

These behaviors line up with the behaviors that result in disqualification at competitive events. Hurting other people, cheating, undermining the integrity of the tournament, and theft are never acceptable actions or behaviors.

The consequence for these behaviors is disqualification, and potentially being removed or banned from the venue. While these are often emotionally difficult scenarios, from a technical standpoint, they’re very straightforward.

“Whenever possible, educate players before disqualifying them - but some actions demand immediate and decisive intervention to protect the event and its community. Let the disqualified player know that your decision is final, but they may contact Organized Play for follow-up.”

You want to take the time to speak to the player, get their side of the story, and investigate these situations properly. Just because you heard of inappropriate behavior from someone else doesn’t mean you should immediately disqualify the player - you should follow best practices of investigation and disqualifications.

Both the judge disqualifying the player and the player who is disqualified should write statements, as well as any relevant witnesses - the opponent of a player who cheated, or a spectator who observed the incident. I strongly recommend reviewing the Disqualifications and Escalations elective.

The final section in the Relaxed Policy Guide is a set of links to resources - contact information for Fantasy Flight Games in case you need to get in touch with the publisher, a link to the Judge Program Discord, so that you can ask for assistance, a link to the home for the other event documents, and a link to Nexus to help tournament organizers find judges for their events.

This is a pretty comprehensive review of the Relaxed Policy Guide - we did cover pretty much every word in the document. However, the RPG is a document intended to be a set of guidelines more than rules - there will be times when it will feel correct to deviate, and Relaxed events are where those deviations should occur. However, becoming comfortable with that level of flexibility and uncertainty takes time, and to do it well, you need to have a mastery of the underlying concepts, which are the goals of Relaxed-tier play. Do keep in mind that this document should not be used at Competitive-tier play. We’ll be back in the Level Two lessons to more comprehensively cover the Competitive Policy Guide.

With this knowledge in our toolbelt, our next lesson is going to be putting this information to use - Taking a Judge Call. As always, if you have any questions, comments, or insights, be sure to join the Judge Community Discord and make your voice heard. Until next time, good luck and have fun!

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