Magic Online Weekly Announcements, April 15, 2025

Posted on Apr 15, 2025

THE LEAD

MTGO is back up after our unscheduled downtime. All Sched Events for the next 24 hours are cancelled, expecting to start again at 2 p.m. PT tomorrow, Wednesday, 4/16. All other events (VC Single-Elim, Leagues, etc) are back up. Nullifications have been processed, and a mass reimbursement will be sent later today, Tuesday, 4/15.

MOCS Open Weekend – Last Chance to Reach the Showcase!

We are down to the final weekend of qualification events for the next MOCS Showcase in May. If you haven’t punched your ticket into that elite 8-player event, your last chances to score an invitation will be in this weekend’s MOCS Showcase Opens!

Featuring Tarkir: Dragonstorm Sealed Deck with a Top 8 Draft, this is your opportunity to spike a tournament for a big payoff! Entry Options are 40 Event Tickets or 400 Play Points and prizes are paid out to the Top 64 with TDM product.

In addition to reaching the Champions Showcase (with its $50,000 prize pool and two invitations to the 2025 World Championship), the winner of each Showcase Open is invited to the Pro Tour Edge of Eternities at Magic Con Atlanta plus the current set of Regional Championships feeding that event. Leaderboard Points are also on the line as players seek one of two At-Large invites at the end of the postseason.

The final batch of Leaderboard Points are up for grabs in the Opens, and when the weekend ends the two highest finishers on the Leaderboard snag At-Large invites to the Showcase.

Our intrepid team of Digital Event Coordinators will also be on hand inside the game during the Opens to lend a hand if something goes awry. To contact a DEC, click the Chat button in the top-right corner of the Home Scene, choose Create/Join New Chat …, then type in #DEC and press Enter to join the room.

For more information on MTGO Premier Play, click the link at the top of the Blog.

Vintage Cube League & 64s Returns Next Week

it's time again for a refresh of the the Magic Online Vintage Cube! Watch MTGO.com this Friday, April 18, for the latest updates to the Cube and spend the weekend strategizing before it goes live next Wednesday, April 23 at 10 a.m. PT (17:00 UTC).

Vintage Cube Free Preview League Next Monday & Tuesday!

Thanks to its popularity, we are bringing back the Free Preview League as a regular feature of Cube League runs! For two days next week, you’ll be able to play single-game matches of the new Cube for free!

Try out some wacky strategies and learn how to find your draft lane – all in preparation for the real League starting next Wednesday.

The Free Vintage Cube Preview League kicks off next Monday, April 21 at 8 a.m. PT (15:00 UTC) and runs until Wednesday, April 23 at 5 a.m. PT (12:00 UTC).

In order to enter the League, you’ll need to get yourself Draft Points. How do you acquire those? Enter the code 2025APRIL into the box in the MTGO Store, just as shown below.

You can only redeem the code once on your account, but you will receive 2 Draft Points. Spend one of them to enter the draft queue, then play up to three single games with your Phantom draft deck. Then repeat this process once.

Win just one of those six total games and you’ll receive this event’s only prize - a special tradeable avatar featuring Scythecat Cub!

We’ll clear out any leftover Draft Points once the League ends. Enjoy the Preview!

MTGO’s Modern Madness Next Week

One of the best lessons we learned from last year’s Creator Season is that our community likes events that are easy to qualify for and have good prizes. Now that we’ve gotten past the technical issues that caused this series to be postponed back in January, it’s time for some Modern Madness!

The fun starts next Monday, April 21 at 7 a.m. PT, the Modern Madness begins! Do one of the following before the start of Sunday’s Finals tournament to earn a Modern Point:

• 5-0 a Modern League course
• 4-0 or 3-1 a Modern Preliminary
• Top 8 a Modern Challenge 32 event
• Top 16 a Modern Challenge 64 event

It all culminates in the Modern Madness Finals on Sunday, April 27^th at 7 a.m. PT. It’ll be like a normal Super Qualifier without Leaderboard Points or RC invitations, except that only players with Modern Points can participate.

Like normal events, you can only play on a single account that you own in any given Scheduled Event (including the Finals), and unused/extra Modern Points will be flushed from the system following the Finals.

Read All About It - Tarkir: Dragonstorm Available Now!

We're back in the land of dragons and clans! Tarkir: Dragonstorm is now available on the digital shelves of the MTGO Store. Click this link to learn more about:

• The Draft Bundle returns - $32 USD for 3 League Drafts and an exclusive avatar!
  • The Tokens are usable for the first three weeks this time – one more than Aetherdrift.
• Each clan has its own Commander Deck - $29.99 USD each.
• The Premium Booster is back as well for $6.99 USD each.
• Our premium card effect for this set, the Dragon Eye lands, will be given away primarily via our Player Rewards grant at the start of May covering April’s paid event play and Store spending!

MTGO BROADCASTS

Mattia Rizzi Wins Another Creator Showdown!

Dozens of your favorite Magic content creators took on the Pioneer format competing for up to $5,000 in cash and prizes in Saturday’s MTGO Creator Showdown!

After five rounds of play, only Mattia Rizzi and El_Gran_Boa emerged unscathed. In the finals – a 75-card Mono-Red Mice mirror match – Rizzi scraped past Boa to take home the top prize of $1,250 USD for the second time in three months!

Lucas Giggs scored his second consecutive money finish on Rakdos Midrange, while Michael Jacob (Boros Transmogrify) and Ben Wheeler (Mono-Blue Rona Combo) also earned cash.

We’ll be back on Saturday, May 10 with the next Creator Showdown!

MTGO Twitch Streams Four Nights a Week

MeatMTG Wednesdays & YungDingo Fridays

Magic Online is pleased to bring you weekly streams from some of our top creators. We’ve teamed up with YungDingo and MeatMTG to show off MTGO at a regular time each week.

MeatMTG is streaming Wednesdays at 5:30 PM PT (00:30 Thursday UTC), while YungDingo takes the reins Friday nights at 6 pm PT (01:00 Saturday UTC) – both at twitch.tv/magiconline.

There will be giveaways galore, including Play Point codes and their own unique in-game avatars!

Visit their streams to earn and collect starting Wednesday and Friday this week

Oblivion Sorrow’s MTGO University How-To Series Tuesdays & Thursdays

We have launched an exciting new How-To series featuring one of our favorite content creators, OblivionSorrow from The Grim Tutors! Join her as she embarks on a journey through Magic: The Gathering Online, guiding both new and returning players through the ins and outs of the game. From streams to YouTube videos, shorts, and more—there’s something for everyone.

Look for streams on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 3 p.m. PT (6 p.m. ET) with YouTube postings of the episodes soon afterward. Be sure to tune in to the stream starting this week to get OblivionSorrow’s exclusive in-game avatar!

Use Code "Oblivion" Today

EVENT UPDATES

Tweaks to Scheduled Events Following Downtime

We always keep a close eye on turnouts for our Scheduled Events to help them fire as often as possible. With that in mind, we have a couple changes to the weekly schedule to announce:

• Starting today, it’ll be a Modern Challenge 32 on Tuesdays at 1 p.m. (formerly a 64).
• Tomorrow’s Pauper Throwdown will move up three hours and begin at 3 p.m. PT (22:00 UTC), replacing Modern Preliminary.
• Thursday’s Pauper Throwdown shifts to 10 a.m. PT (17:00 UTC), scrambling a couple other Prelim times.
• Friday’s Pauper Throwdown will move from 1 a.m. PT to 1 p.m. PT (20:00 UTC), replacing another Modern Preliminary.

The full schedule grid can be found here.

ALTERNATE PLAY

Alternate Play Schedule

Here’s a look at the schedule of events coming up between now and Magic: The Gathering®–FINAL FANTASY™. 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 (17:00 UTC) unless otherwise noted.

• April 8-23 – Tarkir: Dragonstorm Limited is front and center for these two weeks.
• April 23-May 21 – The Vintage Cube will be back with another refresh for a four-week run to support the next MOCS Showcase premiering on May 11. (Phantom)
• May 21-June 5 – We’ve got something very special up our sleeve, but we’re not ready to talk about it just yet.
• June 5-11 – We’re still considering our options for this final week before the year’s first Universes Beyond set.

When Do Vintage Cube Leagues Return?

• April 23-May 21 – Update to support MOCS
• July 2-23 – Summer Refresh

AROUND THE WEB

MTGO’s Web Event Calendar is Now Downloadable!

Magic Online’s Web-based Event Calendar is up and running again! Capture all of the important dates in a weekly or monthly layout and filter down to the types and formats of game play you care about most. Cruicially, all of the start times are listed local to your time zone!

Want to see all of your upcoming chances to play competitive Pauper/Legacy/whatever? The calendar’s got you covered.

Looking for all of the mid-range events to build your experience towards the Premier level? We’ve got a filter for that too!

Those filters will come in handy using our new feature – a downloadable iCalendar format that can be added in to your Google Calendar, Outlook, or just about any other calendar program that accepts the universal .ics format.

A couple tips with this:

• Except for Premier Play, the calendar only displays events that are currently loaded into the MTGO Client. Any events past downtime won’t appear until after downtime.
• If an event time is changed after you download, it will not update on your local version.
• Be very sure to filter to the events you want before downloading and be extra careful when linking to a calendar displaying on your mobile device. Notifications are on by default.

MTGO University – MTGO Fundamentals How-To Short-Form Video Series

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 now on sale in the MTGO Store! Tarkir: Dragonstorm redemptions are planned to begin on Wednesday, May 7.

As a reminder, we announced changes to the Redemption Program starting with Bloomburrow – read all about it in this article.

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 – April 16, 2025

Deckbuilding

• The sideboard pane will again have a card size display slider to adjust cards down from max size.
• Adding basic lands to your Limited deck will no longer undo any manual card sorting in the deck.

Duel Scene

• Sword of the Meek will correctly attach to a token creature when it returns from the graveyard.
• Welcome the Dead will correctly account for cards moved out of the graveyard after being milled or discarded.

NEXT SCHEDULED DOWNTIME – June 4, 9 a.m.-Noon PT

After tomorrow, the next scheduled maintenance is set for Wednesday, June 4 from 9 a.m. to 12 noon PT (16:00-19:00 UTC). This is to support the release of Magic: The Gathering–FINAL FANTASY.