Judging the LOF Northridge Planetary Qualifier at Fire & Dice Games
2025/08/23: Floor judge 1 from 10AM-end of Swiss.
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For people who prefer the video format.
Table of Contents
Thanks to FAD for letting me record gameplays and this timelapse footage.
2025/08/23 - Fire & Dice Games (and Photo Dump)
Huamin’s perspective PQ post and context with the CBG jersey joke on ecomode games Substack (ecomodegames.substack.com/p/the-los-angeles-lotf-pq):
Format: Bo3, 7 Swiss rounds, 113 players, Top Cut to 8 players;
https://melee.gg/Tournament/View/342882
Alyssa went 4-3, placing 25th.
This is the same store as the previous PQ that I judged at:
Side Note of the Event Itself
This PQ event experience was overall great and went pretty smoothly.
The Good Stuff:
Compared to the last time, the place is a lot more furnished.
There was a full prizing breakdown in the listing!
The restroom was pretty clean.
The table play space surface area was good and the seats were cushioned.
There were so many monitors for the timer.
The time in between rounds was very minimal.
The Not-So-Good Stuff:
[Minor/Resolved] I got one feedback with confusion over the timer when they were using some of the monitors for the side events. The player and their opponent had referred to the wrong timer when checking the time for their Swiss match. I brought this up with the HJ and a staff and they rectified it.
Judging Staff
Head Judge (HJ): Georges (the one in the FAD jersey)
Floor Judge 1 [FJ1]: Me (GC shirt, the SWU Judge shirts has been OOS since it’s been sold out back in October 2024)
Floor Judge 2 [FJ2]: Francisco (the one in the SWU Judge shirt)
There were other FAD employees there (that can help with the timers and Melee stuff), we were the ones answering the judge calls.
Some of the Judge Calls
Simple/straightforward:
Player A asked if they can choose not to ambush when playing 4-LOM off of Sneak Attack, so that it enters ready.
Answer: Yes.
Player asked if Krayt Dragon still does 1 damage if opponent plays Force Lightning on it.
Resolution: Yes.
Game state: Opponent has a stolen player's Tranquility.
Player asked if they can Timely Intervention + Tranquility, trigger the ambush first to defeat the opponent's controlled Tranquility and then trigger the when played to return one of two Tranquilitys back to hand.
Resolution: Yes.
Start of game: Player passed. Opponent claimed.
Player thought there has to be two passes before proceeding to the regroup phase.
Resolution: Proceed to the next phase.
Player had a damaged unit get Traitorous'd.
Player asked if the damage counters comes off or not.
Resolution: No.
More Complicated:
Player A wanted to buff another unit via Sith Holocron's on-attack by damaging that particular unit, instead of buffing the unit the Sith Holocron is attached to.
Player was adamant and said that this was how it was ruled at GC. A judge asked in the Judge Discord to confirm.
https://discord.com/channels/1265343874105081856/1269053260766117908/1408886129033216212
Resolution: Only the unit with the Sith Holocron upgrade gets the buff, regardless where the damage is allocated (this involved all three judges).
Player accidentally resourced an extra card.
Resolution: Opponent gets to see the resource row and pick one to return back to hand (this call involved another judge).
Double Ma Klounkee usage, but only one was in the discard pile. Player accidentally returned it back to hand after the first usage (two action phases ago) and it wasn't until the start of a new turn when the opponent was checking the player's discard pile where the discrepancy was discovered.
Resolution: Ignore the 2nd usage of the Ma Klounkee (where it was used to kill a Ki-Adi Mundi (LOF) toward the end of the previous turn).
(I answered this call, my initial thought/gut reaction was that it's an irreparable game state after hearing the initial situation, but called for a second opinion).
Player A forgot to replace their Cassian Andor (SHD) after smuggling it out. Discovered during the regroup phase, when the player had already drawn two cards and combined it with their hand.
Resolution: Opponent sees entire hand and pick one to replace the smuggled Cassian Andor. Player draws one more card (this call involved another judge).
Player forgot to replace their resource after smuggling Entrenched out via Tech. Discovered during the regroup phase, when the player had already drawn two cards and combined it with their hand.
Resolution: Opponent sees entire hand and pick one to replace the smuggled card. Player draws one more card.
Games I Was Watching:
At least two missed Adi Gallia's triggers.
Player played No Glory, Only Results on opponent's Yoda (SOR), and the opponent drew a card (it was also the last card in their deck, but luckily it was the action phase, so them knowing what it was didn't really matter). I called it out that it was the player's choice given that it was No Glory, Only Results.
Player not correctly applying Fennec Shand unit (SHD) on-attack effect. The on-attack damage was enough to defeat the defending unit, so Fennec Shand should take no damage in return, but the player had still put damage counters on it. I confirmed with them and they removed the damage counters.
Player not having paid the Millenium Falcon (SOR) upkeep cost after an action has already taken place during the action phase, so it got returned back to hand.
During the first turn: Kylo (LOF) player didn't draw a card after discarding an upgrade via the leader's ability. I noticed their card count (hand + resource + discard) didn't match and confirmed that they still only had an even number of cards during the regroup phase when they should have had an odd number of cards. I had the Kylo player draw an extra card.
Miscellaneous Judge Stuff
In the second round, we passed out the promo card and an OP pack (LOF).
There were random deck checks that happened throughout the Swiss rounds, though I didn’t participate in any of those deck checks.
Mid-match (in between games), a player wanted to use the restroom. I started a timer and gave them a time extension as such.
A player's deck pod had a signed card (Porg) in the sliding card case. I recommended them to put that away just to be on the safe side in case of a deck check.
There were at least two players who were using non-SWU Star Wars card (Destiny?), which was fine. One was using it as a Force token, and the other seemed to be using it as a hand placeholder.
Multiple no-shows/late-shows (Round 1 and Round 7), so I explained the 5 minute (game win) and the 10 minute (match win) increment rules to the players who were waiting.
The two different timers (PQ and the side events) were confusing. A player brought this up to me and how that they referred to the wrong timer. The player asked if the timers can be different colored or something.
I helped in deck checking the Top Cut decks. No issues found.
Conclusion
I personally had fewer judge calls vs FAD's JTL PQ (12), but that can come down to if I was closer to the judge call or not than another judge. This is somewhat expected as LOF didn't introduce any game "breaking" mechanics, such as pilots. I also only got one Krayt Dragon related question, as opposed to multiple in the prior PQ.
Basically, a copy paste of my previous PQ judging Substack post:
Overall, I appreciate given the privilege of judging a PQ and the store allowing me to record both the gameplays as well as the 360° footage. Similar to last time, I got asked a few times why I was judging instead of playing and if I already got a PQ win (Lol, I wish haha).
It was quite tiring on my feet (as expected).
Answering the card ruling questions is the easy part, but questions regarding policies is a bit harder.
Anyways, pretty fun experience, I learned a lot, would do it again.