If you shuffle properly, the position of cards before shuffling does not matter whatsoever as every position will be completely randomized. If there are a lot of clumps without doing the piles, it shows that the way you shuffle isn't sufficient. For reference, taking half your deck and "mash shuffling" it into the other half a total of 7 times will (mathematically) fully randomize the deck, but due to human error you might want to throw in a few variations in there too. Most common error is that the last and/or first cards don't get shuffled enough, so might want to pay attention to how you shuffle.
The way the OP phrased it made it sound more like cheating than it may have been? But yeah, I would have just called a judge to explain things. That said, I've more recently been doing the same as you - breaking up land clumps, then shuffling a ton. I've noticed my issue, and probably a lot of other people's, is that, at the end of the game, I scoop all my cards together. With them already being split between lands and non-lands on the board, that clumps them together. Another thing I try and do, if I can remember, is scooping my board, hand, and graveyard together, shuffling that a bit, *then* shuffling it into my deck.
People have a hard time understanding that "land, spell, land, spell" is just as random a sequence as "land, land, spell, spell". Perfectly shuffling your deck *shouldn't* give you "land, spell, land, spell" 100% throughout. True randomization will give you both clumps, as well as even distribution. A key part of the game is that your deck is fully randomized, which means you sometimes draw five lands in a row. It's rare, but it'll happen, and it doesn't necessarily mean you didn't shuffle enough.
If the goal is to influence the deck in a favourable manner, then it's cheating. Shuffle the deck until it's random, clumps sometimes occur and if you're upset about them shuffle it more!
That Awkward Moment When: A. You are discussing 'Mana Weaving' by the wrong name. Pile shuffling is something entirely different. B. Mana Weaving is fine if you shuffle properly afterward. C. Shuffling 7 times (push shuffle, riffle etc) is actually not great at breaking up pairs/clumps of related cards. You can number your cards 1-99, shuffle any way you please, and will still wind up with obvious patterns in the final shuffled deck. I have personally tested this. As such, mana weaving is actually better at breaking up unnatural lumps (basically it adds mana between combo pairs, increasing the odds that they'll be even further apart when finished shuffling) and is inherently better than not mana weaving, in terms of deterring cheating. Actual Pile shuffling can be better, depending on how badly clumped the deck is, beforehand, though you should still shuffle 'properly/normally' afterward to avoid abuse.
it is my understanding you have to shuffle a deck 10 times to truly shuffle a deck of cards but obviously it is cheating to mana weave in a tournament. The player even admits it is helping him. if you know/suspect someone is mana weaving you can shuffle their deck when they give it to you to cut
Mana weaving your ending cards is not automatically cheating. It's only cheating if you fail to sufficiently shuffle your deck at the start of the next game, at which case, the activity of mana weaving before hand was unnecessary. People who swear by mana weaving are either succumbing to confirmation bias, or cheating without realizing it. If they weave right before they start the game, then they are stacking their deck, and definitely cheating. It's like "I'm going to spend some time stacking my deck, and then undoing the deck stacking later by shuffling." In order to not be considered cheating, at which case, why did you spend the time and effort to stack your deck in the first place?
If you shuffle properly, the position of cards before shuffling does not matter whatsoever as every position will be completely randomized. If there are a lot of clumps without doing the piles, it shows that the way you shuffle isn't sufficient. For reference, taking half your deck and "mash shuffling" it into the other half a total of 7 times will (mathematically) fully randomize the deck, but due to human error you might want to throw in a few variations in there too. Most common error is that the last and/or first cards don't get shuffled enough, so might want to pay attention to how you shuffle.
Worth note that it's closer to 11 for edh-sized decks, but 7 is still in that "good enough" zone (7 being the precise value for 60 card decks)
The way the OP phrased it made it sound more like cheating than it may have been? But yeah, I would have just called a judge to explain things. That said, I've more recently been doing the same as you - breaking up land clumps, then shuffling a ton. I've noticed my issue, and probably a lot of other people's, is that, at the end of the game, I scoop all my cards together. With them already being split between lands and non-lands on the board, that clumps them together. Another thing I try and do, if I can remember, is scooping my board, hand, and graveyard together, shuffling that a bit, *then* shuffling it into my deck.
Shuffling SPECIFIC cards in a SPECIFIC way is cheating. That isn't shuffling, lol.
I love this new segment you've started doing, it's very fun!
People have a hard time understanding that "land, spell, land, spell" is just as random a sequence as "land, land, spell, spell". Perfectly shuffling your deck *shouldn't* give you "land, spell, land, spell" 100% throughout.
True randomization will give you both clumps, as well as even distribution. A key part of the game is that your deck is fully randomized, which means you sometimes draw five lands in a row. It's rare, but it'll happen, and it doesn't necessarily mean you didn't shuffle enough.
Pile shuffling is cheating. You get to pile shuffle once in comp formats to COUNT your cards, then you must actually shuffle afterwards.
If the goal is to influence the deck in a favourable manner, then it's cheating. Shuffle the deck until it's random, clumps sometimes occur and if you're upset about them shuffle it more!
Bro i always end up my game with 30 lands in play (galadriel of lothlorien). I definetly keep shuffling this was. Drawing 10 Lands in a row sux
That Awkward Moment When:
A. You are discussing 'Mana Weaving' by the wrong name. Pile shuffling is something entirely different.
B. Mana Weaving is fine if you shuffle properly afterward.
C. Shuffling 7 times (push shuffle, riffle etc) is actually not great at breaking up pairs/clumps of related cards. You can number your cards 1-99, shuffle any way you please, and will still wind up with obvious patterns in the final shuffled deck. I have personally tested this. As such, mana weaving is actually better at breaking up unnatural lumps (basically it adds mana between combo pairs, increasing the odds that they'll be even further apart when finished shuffling) and is inherently better than not mana weaving, in terms of deterring cheating. Actual Pile shuffling can be better, depending on how badly clumped the deck is, beforehand, though you should still shuffle 'properly/normally' afterward to avoid abuse.
it is my understanding you have to shuffle a deck 10 times to truly shuffle a deck of cards
but obviously it is cheating to mana weave in a tournament. The player even admits it is helping him.
if you know/suspect someone is mana weaving you can shuffle their deck when they give it to you to cut
Mana weaving your ending cards is not automatically cheating. It's only cheating if you fail to sufficiently shuffle your deck at the start of the next game, at which case, the activity of mana weaving before hand was unnecessary. People who swear by mana weaving are either succumbing to confirmation bias, or cheating without realizing it. If they weave right before they start the game, then they are stacking their deck, and definitely cheating. It's like "I'm going to spend some time stacking my deck, and then undoing the deck stacking later by shuffling." In order to not be considered cheating, at which case, why did you spend the time and effort to stack your deck in the first place?
If undoing those clumps helps, you're not shuffling enough and it's cheating. So you might as well skip undoing the clumps and shuffle more.
It’s cheating