alt Hacker NewsI used to be deep into the competitive MTG scene. It goes deeper than this. Everyone knew that foils caused warping, which would lead to different theories of the “best way” to foil your deck to get an edge, while also being plausibly deniable that you were essentially marking your deck with foils if someone called a judge on you.
At the high level MTG is as much about rules lawyering as it is about actual skilled play, if you’re curious to learn more about this aspect of the game go learn about the 1997 pro tour with Mike Long, who infamously took the win by mind games and causing his opponent to concede when Long had no path to victory.
I've only played at the lowest possible levels (at local card shops), so my experience is probably not super representative of the competitive scene. Pretty much everyone I played with was more concerned about keeping their cards in good condition than trying to angle-shoot their way to a free win (getting a few more bucks of store credit isn't enough motivation to ruin one's standing in what was essentially a social community).
I'm a bit more familiar with rules lawyering mostly because incidents where people got wins from it are somewhat common topics that people would bring up for fun. Someone might play a Griselbrand deck, and someone else would ask if they knew about the Borborygmos incident that led to the rule where naming a card doesn't require literally knowing the exact name, etc.