WotC Slashes Support for Judge System While Expanding Organized Play

Last updated on September 4, 2024

Owlbear Cub – Illustration by Ernanda Souza

After months of quiet negotiations, WotC ended negotiations with the International Judge Program, providing no official sponsorship or recognition to the IJP. This abrupt end came just a week after WotC announced the new Spotlight Series for 2025, a series of eight Grand Prix-style events with a $50,000 prize pool each.

IJP's Program Lead, Dan Schuster, told Draftsim that the IJP collectively contacted Wizards of the Coast in December 2023 to discuss support for Magic judges' training and certification. 

Schuster said negotiations progressed slowly before ending suddenly.

“Then last month, during a time when we were under the impression that the situation would develop positively, Wizards of the Coast suddenly informed us that they declined our request for sponsorship and recognition,” Schuster said. 

Draftsim reached out for clarity regarding the negotiation process and how the Spotlight Series tournaments will be judged, but Wizards of the Coast declined to comment.

Unintuitively as it may sound, nowadays, an MTG judge is whoever the Tournament Organizer says it is. There's no formal certification or training, and WotC requires none; WotC gives TOs free rein in who they hire for the role and how they ascertain the judge's experience.

“Like almost everything regarding judges, all things that revolve around staffing are outsourced to tournament organizers these days, without involvement from Wizards,” Schuster said.

However, without official guidance, it has become challenging for judges to find motivation or clear directions for improving because every tournament organizer has its own metrics for evaluating judge skill.

“Judges in different parts of the world may be held to different quality standards,” Schuster said. “There is no way for players or tournament organizers to know how good the judges who get staffed at events actually are without trusting them and seeing how things go.”

According to Schuster, there's been an uptick in events without certified judges going badly, like RCQs without a judge where rules are ignored or wrongly interpreted.

“The situation will worsen year after year as senior judges leave the community and newcomers have no formalized way to become judges or improve their skills.”

MTG Judge Program History

Until 10 years ago, WotC oversaw the certification process for judges and supported MTG judges by distributing judge promo foils. Even though TOs ran tournaments like Grand Prix and not WotC themselves, these promo cards were a large part of a judge's compensation: their market price would vary, but some would have hundreds of dollars in resale value.

In 2014, however, Wizards of the Coast changed how Judge Promos worked. Rather than getting a promo from every single GP you judged, you instead only got one if another judge wrote a recommendation through the “Exemplar” program.”

In 2015 and 2016, two different groups of MTG judges sued WotC, seeking unpaid wages and overtime. WotC progressively distanced itself from judge programs, ultimately ending all direct relations in 2019 by transferring the responsibilities to a new organization, Judge Academy. Judge Academy would certify, train, and measure judges worldwide, and WotC would limit itself to providing Judge Academy with promo foils that Judge Academy would distribute.

This arrangement would last until 2023, with WotC and Judge Academy parting ways in October last year.

There are two (major) organizations that took their place: Judge Foundry for judges in the US and Canada and the International Judge Program for everywhere else. But while both organizations claim to represent, train, and certify MTG judges in their respective geographies, neither org is officially supported or overseen by Wizards of the Coast. 

This meant there was no official certification process, performance review, or funding to get those things done. This means judges are being graded differently, don’t have a WotC-based accountability system, and even have to pay their organizations to stay certified. That’s a big series of steps down from the original Judge Program, even with the issues that came with it.

It also seems that neither Judge Foundry nor the International Judge Program is allowed to associate with Magic directly. If you check their “About Us” pages, you won't find a single mention of “Magic” or “MTG,” which suggests that WotC has possibly forbidden both associations to imply they have formal certification power. 

Consequences of a Decentralized Judge System

The lack of sufficiently qualified judges is starting to show. People are describing their negative experiences with the current judging system at all levels of play online.

“Small stores and new stores, especially ones that aren't in a major country, have been struggling badly with getting good judges,” wrote u/cedric1234_ on Reddit. “No certifying body or test means that there really isn't a good way to know if someone knows what they’re doing unless the owner does. The result? Terrible events and significant abuse.”

These are just a few of the odd and poor judging stories in the last year, and they echo the confusion and frustration that the recent Gen Con controversy put in the spotlight.

Magic tournaments are only getting bigger and more frequent. The Pro Tour is back, the World Championship is right around the corner, we have a consistent Regional Championship and qualifier system, and now the Grand Prix system is basically back in the form of the Spotlight Series. 

How will all of these events be judged? Who will certify those judges? Will Wizards of the Coast reject these organizations but still hire their judges for the highest level of play? There are a ton of disconnects that need to be addressed, and Wizards of the Coast's silence only exacerbates the issue and adds to the confusion.

If you want to support the judging environment and the thousands of volunteers holding up this system, please consider contributing to the International Judge Program's GoFundMe. If you're looking to support your local judging communities, you can see what's near you here.