Magic Online Weekly Announcements, February 11, 2025

Posted on Feb 11, 2025

THE LEAD

Read All About It – Aetherdrift on MTGO Today

The need for (max) speed and the thrill of the open (interplanar) road take center stage in the newest expansion to arrive on Magic Online! Aetherdrift debuts today at 10 a.m. PT (18:00 UTC). Check out this article now for details on this shiny new set:

• Draft Bundles join the MTGO Store for Standard-legal sets - $32 USD for 3 Draft Entry Tokens plus a Bundle-exclusive avatar!
  • Tokens are for the regular Draft League and are good only for the first two weeks of DFT play
• The Golden Booster, with its GOLD First-Place Foils, awaits winners of Scheduled Events during DFT season plus it appears in 1 of 20 Treasure Chests.
• The 10-card Premium Booster returns with a tinge of GOLD – a First-Place Foil in every one – for only $6.99 USD.
• Beyond the Golden Booster, the Booster Fun in this set is stunning! Check out our favorites in the article.

MTGO BROADCASTS

Creator Showdown This Weekend – Standard for up to $5,000!

Dozens of your favorite Magic content creators will be in action competing for up to $5,000 in cash and prizes in the next MTGO Creator Showdown this Saturday, February 15!

The rotating format of battle this month is Standard and all participants will be streaming simultaneously in this six-round, double-elimination event starting at 9 a.m. PT (17:00 UTC).

Once the field is whittled down to 16 undefeated players, the official MTGO Twitch channel will fire up a broadcast hosted new host Admirable (aka Natham Zamora) and featuring a rotating cast of commentators – this month it’s Corey Baumeister!

We’ll whip around from stream to stream catching every turn of the cards until one player emerges with a 6-0 record and scores the top prize of $1,250!

There will be giveaways galore on the MTGO channel’s broadcast, so be sure to tune in and follow the action!

PREMIER PLAY & EVENT NEWS

Three Shots at the Regional Championship This Weekend

Your next chance to reach the Regional Championship arrives this long weekend with tournaments on Friday, Sunday, and Monday (a U.S. holiday). You’ll want to rack up a bunch of Qualifier Points in advance to get in on all the action.

First up is a Pioneer Qualifier on Valentine’s Day – this Friday, February 14 at 7 a.m. PT (15:00 UTC).

After that are two chances to show off your brand-new skills with Aetherdrift. Sunday features a Limited Super Qualifier and Monday is the day for the Limited Qualifier. Both events feature the new set’s Sealed Deck format with Top 8 Draft starting at 7 a.m. PT.

It takes 40 Season 1 QPs to enter a Qualifier. The Top 2 finishers earn an invitation to the April-May round of tabletop RCs, while prizes go to the Top 64!

Sunday’s Super Q accepts 40 Event Tickets, 400 Play Points, or 40 Season 1 Qualifier Points. The Top 4 are invited to the RC and prizes go down as far as 128^th place.

For more information on these events, click the Premier Play Information link at the top of the Blog.

Modern Showcase Challenge This Saturday

A new MOCS season is underway, so it’s time to qualify the first players for the next round of Showcase Qualifiers in April. 

Here are the revised dates and times for this first round of events: 

It takes 40 Season 1 Qualifier Points to enter a Showcase Challenge. The Top 8 finishers in each event earn a Championship Entry Token for the event’s format plus earn Leaderboard Points toward an At-Large berth in the next Showcase!

For more information on these events, click the Premier Play Information link at the top of the Blog.

ALTERNATE PLAY

Alternate Play Schedule
Here’s a look at the schedule of events coming up between now and Tarkir: Dragonstorm. Each description mentions if the Draft is Phantom – cards won’t be added to players’ collections in Phantom events. All transitions take place at 10:00 a.m. PT (18:00 UTC until March 8, 17:00 UTC after) unless otherwise noted.

• February 11-26 – Aetherdrift Limited is center stage for these two weeks.
• February 26-March 5 – Time for a couple Flashback drafts … first up Modern Horizons 3 Phantom Draft.
• March 5-12 – For the first time, The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth® (Phantom)
• March 12-April 2 – The Vintage Cube will be back with another refresh for a single 3-week run. (Phantom)
• April 2-8 – Before leaving Avishkar and Aetherdrift behind, we’ll make a return trip to the plane’s original format – Triple Kaladesh (Phantom)

When Does Vintage Cube Return?

• March 12-April 2 – Spring Refresh
• Late April into May – exact dates TBD – Update to support MOCS

AROUND THE WEB

MTGO University – MTGO Fundamentals How-To Series Live

We’ve introduced a brand-new landing spot for everything related to getting your new-to-MTGO friends up to speed on playing our game – MTGO University! Whether you’re new to a specific format, new to Magic Online, or are just curious about what this version of MTG is all about, check out MTGO University.

New to MTGO University – the MTGO Fundamentals playlist: short-form videos showing off a bunch of tips and tricks. Check it out on YouTube today!

WEEKLY UPDATES

Redemption Corner

We’ve updated our Redemption page with new quantity percentages.

Aetherdrift redemptions are currently planned to go on sale Wednesday, March 12.

Bloomburrow & Duskmourn sets redeemed with regular digital cards are now out of stock. BLB and DSK sets redeemed with foil digital cards remain in stock in low quantities. As a reminder, we announced changes to the Redemption Program starting with Bloomburrow – read all about it in this article.

A limited number of Outlaws of Thunder Junction foil sets still remain available.

Magic Online Format Challenges Every Weekend

Format Challenges are the first step toward qualifying for Premier Play through your favorite Magic formats and provide excellent prizes for those looking to test their mettle in their favorite formats. Learn more about Premier Play qualification to get started today.

Magic Online's Format Challenges run as shown on the schedule on this page.

TOMORROW’S PATCH NOTES – February 11, 2025

Card Fixes

• Gornog, the Red Reaper will correctly select opponent’s creatures to become Cowards.
• The Replicate, Conspire, and Offspring abilities again function correctly.
• Dress Down will correctly not affect +1/+1 or -1/-1 counters

Duel Scene

• Cards that sacrifice themselves as part of the cost will correctly be unable to simultaneously be sacrificed a different way for mana (example: activating Scrap Compactor and then also feeding it to Krark-Clan Ironworks).
• Phased-out permanents won't get +1/+1 counters from abilities that had targeted them before the phase-out.

NEXT SCHEDULED DOWNTIME – April 2, 9 a.m.-Noon PT

The next scheduled maintenance is set for Wednesday, April 2 from 9 a.m. to 12 noon PT (16:00-19:00 UTC). This is to support the release of Tarkir: Dragonstorm.