Variant rules used at GenCon 2001

The remaining portion of this page summarizes the rules used at the first Peasant Magic tourney, played at GenCon 2001. Rules that were suggested after the first tourney but which were not used are preceded by an asterisk (*).

Deck construction / Tournament play

Deck construction

Decks may consist of at least sixty cards, containing:

• Cards from any published Magic set wherein cards were assigned a rarity value by WotC. This includes Unglued, Starter, and Portal, but does not include promotional cards or cards from pre-built sets like Vangaurd.
• No more than five (5) uncommon cards.
• No (zero, 0, nada, zilch, empty-set) rare cards.
• At least 55 common cards.
• There may be no more than four (4) copies of any single card except basic land.
  * Snow-covered land counts as a basic land.
• In the event that a deck contained cards that must be physically destroyed to be used (re: Chaos Confetti from Unglued), players were allowed to replace the destroyed card after each game in which they destroyed a copy of the card.
  * If a player runs out of copies of a card, then they must fill their deck with basic land(s) of their choice.

Card Rarity

Rarity lists:
Card rarities are listed on the Wizards of the Coast website, in text files for each expansion. Additionally, there are now Word DOC and Acrobat PDF files on this website that list all of the cards from those text files. If a card does not have a listed rarity, then it is not allowed in Peasant Magic Tournaments. In general, all cardsets listed under Starter Sets, Limited-edition Expansion Sets, and Basic Sets on that page are allowed. From Special sets, only Unglued and Chronicles/Renaissance are allowed. World Championship decks are not allowed.

Card issued with different rarity ratings:
If a card is listed with two different rarities in two different editions, use the most common rating for calculating rarity. For example, Wyluli Wolf is Rare in Fifth Edition, but Common in Arabian Nights. For Peasant Master tourneys, Wyluli Wolf is Common.

Restricted / Banned cards

Cards that are restricted or banned in Type I and Type II tournament play are allowed, with up to four (4) copies permitted in a deck. Cards that are on the Extended lists are allowed as well.
* In a Limited Peasant tourney, players may not have more than two (2) copies of each banned or restricted cards in their deck.
* In a Sanctioned Peasant tourney, players must abide by the restrictions of Type I decks (as described by the DCI), including limiting or eliminating the use of restricted or banned cards. In such a tournament, Unglued, Starter, and Portal would not be allowed supplements. All other deck construction limitations would remain in place.

* Sideboards

In a Guildmaster tourney, the players may have a sideboard of 15 common cards.

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Tournament Play

Peasant Magic tourneys may use any standard means determined by the judge to reduce the playing field, including round-robin and single- or double-elimination. At GenCon 2001, the Master of Peasant Magic tourney used a modified double-elimination method, with the following rules.

Time limits:
Each round before the semifinals had a one hour time limit. During that hour, players were expected to play a best of three set. If games were unfinished at the end of that time period, the judge ruled a winner for the game in progress based on the following formula:

1. The player with the highest (life total) + (number of controlled permanents) won.
2. If tied, the player that had the most land won.
3. If still tied, the player that had the most cards in hand won.
4. If still tied, both players lost. If this resulted in an overall tie for the set, both players were judged to have lost the round.

Rare cards:
If a player is caught attempting to play a rare card, or if they are discovered with a rare card in place, they lose the current game. They will then be allowed to remove all rare cards from their deck and replace them with basic land(s) of their choice.

First player draws:
Players may choose whether they will allow the first player that goes to draw or not. Players must play the whole round using the same mechanism as the first game.
* If the players disagree as to what means will be used, then the first player will NOT draw a card on his or her first turn.

First turn mulligan:
The only first turn mulligan allowed is the all land/no land mulligan. In this case, if a player has all land or no land in his starting hand, he or she may reshuffle and redeal, but must keep the result of the second deal.
* If a player's opponent takes a mulligan, then they may do so as well, however, they must also keep the hand resulting from the second deal.

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