Magic Online Weekly Announcements, August 13, 2024

Posted on Aug 13, 2024

THE LEAD

Vintage Cube LIVE Rolls on with Week 3

One of the biggest events in Magic Online history continues this week. Win your way to Las Vegas to draft Vintage Cube – LIVE at MagicCon: Las Vegas, thanks to our friends at Ultimate Guard – and take everything you draft home with you!

For the latest updates to the series announced last week, check out this article. The Bloomburrow update of the Cube will be in play for Weeks 3-8 of Vintage Cube LIVE digital events.

To get to Vegas, you must run a gauntlet of three different tournaments undefeated:

Step 1 – The Feeder League

The entry point for the series - 6 Event Tickets or 80 Play Points per course

Your next scheduled chance to play in the Feeder League will come this Saturday, August 17.

You’ll need to win FOUR matches without losing in a single course to collect a Limited Championship Entry Token. There are now prizes for 2 wins and 3 wins in a course.

IMPORTANT: It is possible that the Feeder League could be only open for 24 hours or less depending on demand. Once we approach an internal target of entries that yield a Week’s worth of Entry Tokens, we will provide a 1-hour warning prior to the League closing to new entries. Players who’ve already drafted after the League closes will have 24 hours to complete their matches.

Step 2 – The 64-Player Drafts

Use that Entry Token to battle through two straight single-elimination Cube Drafts. Six match wins in a single event advances you to the last step.

Week 3’s 64-Player Drafts for this week have been posted in the MTGO client.

NEW! Scheduled Events that are full will continue to be displayed in the client until their start time! This means that if someone drops from the event, that change will reflect right away instead of requiring you to restart MTGO.

Reminder: If a regular-scheduled 64 doesn’t fire for some reason, the replacement will be scheduled for 3 hours later and will be posted for entries as soon as possible following the cancellation.

Week 4’s 64-Player Drafts will post in the MTGO client Monday, August 19 at 10 a.m. PT (for Tuesday/Thursday/Friday events) and 5 p.m. PT (for Wednesday events).

Limited Championship Entry Tokens are usable as entry for all 8 Weeks of Vintage Cube LIVE.

Step 3 – The Vegas Qualifier

The eight winners of a single Week’s 64-Player Drafts meet in one final showdown. The one player who’s left standing at the end punches their ticket to Las Vegas, while the other participants receive digital set prizes and an exclusive avatar.

Week 3’s Vegas Qualifier will be held on Saturday, August 17 at 9:30 a.m. PT (16:30 UTC).

The Winner’s Circle

We have two players qualified for the Ultimate Guard Finals at MagicCon so far – MunsonJenkins and foolishpuppy. Who will join them this week?

You can get full details on the entire series on this page, including the Official Rules. The link to the announcement article is found here.

Vintage Cube Bloomburrow Update – Normal League Starts Tomorrow

Our Vintage Cube Curation Team is back with an update to incorporate new cards and swap in archetypes. Check out this article for more details. This will be the Cube for the following events:

• Vintage Cube LIVE – the remainder of digital qualifying through September 28
• MOCS Season 2 Showcase – broadcast now slated for Sunday, September 15
• Vintage Cube Elimination Queues – runs until September 24
• The normal Vintage Cube League – starts tomorrow & runs until downtime on September 18, normal entry options (10 Event Tickets / 100 Play Points) and prizes apply

Next Beta Round August 20-26

We have exciting new updates to the look and feel of cards (including our foils) to test in our Beta environment very soon! This will be a longer Beta period than usual – a full week from August 20-26 – so we can iterate based on customer suggestions.

If you’d like a sneak peek and an opportunity to give feedback, you can join the Beta program by submitting a ticket at help.mtgo.com (your login there is the same as MTGO).

Two-Factor Authentication Is Now Live – Protect Your Account Today!

If you haven’t heard, a long-requested security feature is now part Magic Online – check out Ryan Spain’s article to learn the why, what, and how to put Two-Factor Authentication into effect to help protect your account today!

MTGO BROADCASTS 

MTGO Masters Season 2 – Every Wednesday at 1 p.m. PT

Sixteen online Magic luminaries are gathering for a new season of competition slinging spells in Modern on Magic Online – but with a heavy dose of Modern Horizons 3 added. It’s the return of MTGO Masters!

Continuing tomorrow at 1 p.m. PT (20:00 UTC), this 12-week series features a four-player faceoff with spots in the next round at stake. It all leads to a two-week Top 8 finale in mid-September. Until then, the format is Win 2 Before You Lose 2 – both for matches in a week and also weekly pods prior to Top 8.

Anuraag Das and Will Hall return as hosts for the stream broadcast on the main MTGO Twitch channel – twitch.tv/magiconline – as well as Anuraag’s channel twitch.tv/anzidmtg. We will also be featuring co-streaming partners throughout the season.

Last week, Caleb Durward swept the pod, while Nathan Steuer also made the Top 8 with a 2-1 finish. Alex Hayne and Andreas Petersen fared worse and will have work to do in the Last Chance Pod later this season.

It’s time to start trimming the field – we will send two players each week until we reach our Top 8 show on September 11^th. With elimination on the line, it’s simply Modern in all its glory – no more Theme Weeks or gimmicks until a champion is crowned!

The first group of four looking to remain in the competition are:

• Jim Davis
• Kanister
• Rebell Lily
• YungDingo

Each contestant will bring two decks to the table. Check out what our celebrities conjure up tomorrow and every Wednesday all season long!

Creator Showdown Summary

Dozens of your favorite Magic content creators were in action competing for cash and prizes in the MTGO Creator Showdown

The format of choice this month was Bloomburrow Sealed Deck. In the end, regining Player of the Year Simon Nielsen neatly dispatched all six of his opponents to take down the maximum prize of $1,250. In the finals, Simon defeated Santiago Bigatti – who got the consolation prize of $750.

Three others also finished with a $600 prize – DarkestMage, PrediMTG, and El_Gran_Boa. Congratulations to all five players.

Mark your calendar for the next Creator Showdown on Saturday, September 7 when the group explores Standard!

PREMIER PLAY

It's Showcase Challenge Weekend 

It’s time to get the first batch of players qualified for MOCS Season 3’s Showcase Qualifiers in November & December.  

You’ll need 40 Season 3 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

Battle of the Planes Starts Tomorrow!

The Olympic spirit of representing your home gets its digital translation in Magic Online for one week only – it’s the return of Battle of the Planes!

Choose your favorite home plane and enter with the normal entry options – 10 Event Tickets or 100 Play Points. You’ll get 8 Phantom booster packs with which to build a 40-card deck. With the advent of Remastered sets, we’ve re-jiggered the mix of packs for each plane. Here’s the full menu:

Dominaria – 2 each: Dominaria United, The Brothers’ War, March of the Machine, Dominaria Remastered

Innistrad – 2 each: Innistrad, Midnight Hunt; 1 each: Dark Ascension, Shadows over Innistrad, Eldritch Moon, Crimson Vow

Mirrodin – 2 each: Scars of Mirrodin, Phyrexia: All Will Be One; 1 each: Mirrodin, Darksteel, Mirrodin Besieged, New Phyrexia

Ravnica – 6 Ravnica Remastered; 2 War of the Spark

Zendikar – 2 each: Zendikar, Battle for Zendikar, Zendikar Rising; 1 each: Worldwake, Oath of the Gatewatch

Normal prizes for a Cube/Flashback apply. Have an extravagant time!

Alternate Play Schedule

Here’s a look at the schedule of events coming up between now and Duskmourn: House of Horror. All these offerings are Phantom – cards won’t be added to players’ collections in Phantom events. All transitions take place at 10:00 a.m. PT unless otherwise noted.

• Tomorrow-August 21 – It’s once again time for the Battle of the Planes – the same five locations as last year will do battle, but there are a couple twists in store. (Phantom)
• Tomorrow-September 18 – Vintage Cube returns to support the next MOCS Showcase on September 14 – this is the same set of cards that will be used in Vintage Cube Live starting August 9. (Phantom. Ends at downtime)
• September 18-24 – As promised when we had to end its run early in May, we are running back Modern Horizons 2 Flashback (Phantom only)

When Is Vintage Cube League Back?

A regular feature of the Blog, this item points out when the next scheduled run of our most popular event will take place:

• August Refresh to Support MOCS & Vintage Cube Live
  • New Cube in Feeder Leagues/64s/Vegas Qualifiers Now!
  • New Cube in Single Elimination Queues Now!
  • Normal Cube Leagues run Tomorrow-September 18

AROUND THE WEB

Content Creator Applications Open - Round 2

Yes, you are reading this correctly we are reopening our Creator Program applications for MTGO. If you missed out last time, this is your time to shine. Read about it in this article. Be part of something special and help us shape the future of MTGO. Think you have what it takes to be an MTGO Creator? 

Tell Your Friends! New Learn-to-Play Channel – MTGO University

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.

The first content on this page is all seasons of Magic Discovery Zone. This includes learn-to-play videos on all five of the decks included in the New Account Starter Kit. And keep an eye out for additional new-player videos coming very soon!

WEEKLY UPDATES 

Bloomburrow Now Available!

It's time to gather the communities of the Valley together in an epic fight against the Calamity Beasts – Bloomburrow is on sale now in the MTGO Store! Check out this article now to learn all about what MTGO has on offer with this new set:

• Play Boosters, Premium Boosters, and Commander Decks
  • Gilded frames return on the Anime cards
• Treasure Chest Update
• Commander Backlog progress, plus the usual pile of updates from around MTGO

Duel Commander Now Available on Magic Online

One of the most popular ways to play competitive Commander is now available on Magic Online. Duel Commander is a 1v1, 20-life format utilizing the 99 in new ways never done digitally before. With thousands of fans worldwide, its distinct metagame and banned lists, and both a Tournament Practice room and a League, the time is ripe to take this game mode for a spin!

Check out this article now to learn all about the format, its origins, and get ready to play on MTGO.

Note: There is one Known Issues and one Known Exploit for Duel Commander:

• Known Issue – You can’t submit a deck that has multiple creatures with Companion, even if all but one are in the main deck.
• Exploit - It’s possible to swap into a card banned as a Commander during sideboarding.

Although we are trying to get fixes for these as soon as possible, if the Exploit is seen in a League match, it should be reported at help.mtgo.com.

Redemption Corner

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

Outlaws of Thunder Junction are going fast – so get those sets completed and redeemed today!

Redemption Changes

As a reminder, we announced changes to the Redemption Program starting with Bloomburrow – read all about it in this article. Bloomburrow redemption sets go on sale on September 4.

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 – August 7, 2024

Quality of Life Improvements

• Events that are at maximum capacity will remain viewable in-client until their start time.
• In Duel Commander, the sideboard area will be locked so cards dragged there can’t disappear.

Card Fixes

• Gossip’s Talent will properly indicate which creature is affected by its Level 3 ability.
• Brainstealer Dragon will correctly only apply when your opponents’ permanent enter on your side of the battlefield.
• Trespasser’s Curse will correctly make the enchanted player lose life.

NEXT SCHEDULED DOWNTIME – September 18, 9 a.m.-Noon PT

The next scheduled maintenance is set for Wednesday, September 18 from 9 a.m. to 12 noon PT (16:00-19:00 UTC). This is to support the release of Duskmourn: House of Horror.