Magic Online Weekly Announcements, June 27, 2023

Posted on Jun 27, 2023

Premier Play Information

Treasure Chest Information

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THE LEAD

The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth™ on MTGO

Check out this article for the scoop on everything on offer:

• Art Bundles and other items
• Event updates, including special prize structures
  • NEW: Prizes have been increased since initial publication in several LTR Leagues
• Jumpstart’s return as a New Player experience
• Treasure Chest updated
• Alternate Play, including Supreme Draft and Commander Legends in a whole new format

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

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!

PREMIER PLAY

MOCS Season 2 Ending Soon & MOCS Season 3 First Look

The current season’s Qualifier Points expire next week. These are the remaining events that accept Season 2 QPs:

• The LTR Limited Qualifier this Friday, June 30
• The last round of Showcase Challenges
  • Pauper/Legacy this weekend: July 1-2
• The Last Chance events July 2-5
  • Additional events will be created for Pauper Last Chance (see Last Chance item below)

Also, we've updated the Premier Play Calendar (link at top of Blog) with dates through August for the first part of Season 3. The first event is a Modern Super Qualifier on Sunday, July 30 (the day of Pro Tour Barcelona’s Top 8).

LTR Limited Qualifier Friday

Your next chance to earn a seat at this fall’s round of Regional Championships comes up this weekend. The name of the game this weekend is The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth™ Sealed Deck with Top 8 Draft.

The Limited Qualifier begins at 7 a.m. PT (14:00 UTC) this Friday, June 30.

Each Qualifier’s entry option is 40 MOCS Season 2 Qualifier Points. The Top 2 finishers in this tournament earn seats at the RC round that starts in late September, and prizes pay out to the Top 64!

Click the Premier Play Information link at the top of this Blog for full details. For more details on tabletop Regional Championships, visit magic.gg.

Final MOCS Showcase Challenge Events of Season 2 This Weekend

We're into the final stretch of MOCS Season 2, so it’s time for the last round of Showcase Challenges feeding the next Showcase Qualifiers in July. 

It takes 40 Season 2 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!

Here are the dates and times for this weekend’s events: 

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

MOCS Last Chance Events Start Saturday

Did you fall just short of a Top 8 Showcase Challenge finish? Did you scrape together that 39^th and 40^th Qualifier Point at the last second? If so, your ticket to the upcoming Showcase Qualifiers could be earned in a Last Chance Event!

Starting Saturday afternoon Pacific time (changed from Sunday in previous seasons), all Preliminaries in Modern, Legacy, and Pioneer convert to Last Chance Events. In addition, Pauper Last Chance Events will be sprinkled across the schedule. Finish with a 5-0 record in that event to earn an Entry Token to that format’s Showcase Qualifier later in July.

Entry options require both 40 Qualifier Points plus either 30 Event Tickets or 300 Play Points.

Here’s the schedule of Last Chance Events this round:

*indicates next-day

Last Chance Events pre-empt Preliminaries of the same format normally scheduled at those times.

Click the Premier Play Information link at the top of this Blog for full Last Chance Event details.

ALTERNATE PLAY

Upcoming Schedule

Here is the lineup of other play formats that will be available between The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth™ and the release of Commander Masters on August 3rd:

• Now-July 5 – As usual, we will provide a Best-of-One Draft league with the newest set.
• July 5-12 – It's time for Supreme Draft – Gold Edition: 18 multicolor sets enter, all but 36 cards leave. (Phantom)
• July 12-19 – Commander Legends makes its return to digital draft tables in a very different form! Each League course will consist of a 4-player draft pod, followed by a single game of play. Prizes are still awarded by votes with the game’s winner receiving an extra vote. (Keeper and Phantom)
• July 19-26 – We return to the plane of innovation and energy – for the first time (somehow), it's Aether Revolt-Kaladesh Flashback Draft! (Phantom)
• July 26-August 3 – Magic 30 Cube returns for its penultimate run. The Cube’s designer, Carmen Handy, has some extra special surprises in store for this edition.

WEEKLY UPDATES

Store Outage Wednesday Morning

Redemption Corner

Redemption Tokens for March of the Machine are now on sale in the MTGO Store.

IMPORTANT: As of May 23, all new orders of Redemption Tokens are non-refundable! We’ve updated our Redemption page with that information.

Tokens for Phyrexia: All Will Be One and The Brothers' War remain available.

For more details on the redemption program, click here.

Pauper League Update Reversed

The idea of reducing the entry option for Pauper League from 10 Event Tickets to 6 Event Tickets starting July 5 is being dropped. The current League has been extended to end at the same time as other Constructed Leagues on September 5. 

We appreciate the constructive conversations held regarding this change. This was intended to be an experiment within the broader attempt to flatten new players’ learning curve for playing events.  

However, between feedback from Pauper players and the concern internally that this won't get us where we want to be with event onboarding anyway, we won't make any changes while we rethink event onboarding for MTGO. 

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 below.

On weekends featuring Showcase Challenge events, the Format Challenge that starts at either 6 a.m., 8 a.m., or 10 a.m. Pacific time is pre-empted by the Showcase Challenge; Format Challenges scheduled at other times remain in place.

NOTES:
CONSTRUCTED

• In MOCS Season 2, Vintage and Standard Challenges are never pre-empted.
• 32-Player events require 32 players to fire and give prizes to the Top 32.
  • Pauper and Vintage Challenges are always 32-Player tournaments.
• All other events listed require 64 players to fire and give prizes to the Top 64.
  
  

LIMITED

• 32-Player Limited Challenge events are 6 rounds with no playoff
• 64-Player Limited Challenge events are 7 rounds with no playoff

Check out the Magic Online Format Challenges page for further event details.

PATCH NOTES – June 22, 2023 Hotfix

• Shire Shirriff and Invasion of New Capenna now can’t select opponents’ tokens/creatures to sacrifice (even though the sacrifice was impossible).
• If Sauron, the Necromancer was the ring-bearer and was removed from the battlefield, its end step trigger will correctly exile the created token.
• The Add Lands button in LTR Limited has reverted to use the normal frame basic lands.
• Outdated descriptions of the contents of Jumpstart boosters have been corrected.

PATCH NOTES – June 28, 2023

• In Collection, searching for specific words within quotes will return only cards matching all words.
  • Searches not using quotes still works as a Boolean OR command – returning all cards containing any of the words.
• Coalition Relic’s trigger will correctly only add mana if a charge counter is removed.
• Cards with Fading will correctly be sacrificed to the upkeep trigger if no counters remain.

NEXT SCHEDULED DOWNTIME – July 12, 9 a.m. to Noon PT

The next scheduled maintenance is now set for Wednesday, July 12, from 9 a.m. to noon PT (16:00-19:00 UTC).

Also on that day, to assist with company-wide infrastructure needs, the MTGO Store will not be available for purchases starting at 6 a.m. PT (13:00 UTC). The rest of the game will function as expected – trade, play, opening packs, etc until downtime. Everything will work as expected once downtime concludes.