Announcements

PHYREXIA: ALL WILL BE ONE ON MTGO STARTS TODAY​

The latest Standard-legal expansion, Phyrexia: All Will Be One, hits MTGO’s digital shelves today at 10 a.m. Pacific time (18:00 UTC). Check out this article for updates on the following that will take effect today:

• Treasure Chests
• MTGO’s Art Bundles, available for a limited time in the Store
• Event schedules and improvements on how they are displayed in the Play Lobby
• Magic Online Player Rewards
• Alternate Play
• The latest suite of Avatars
• Late Change: The Borderless Praetors will appear in booster packs at the same rate as tabletop (originally it was stated they would not appear until later in the year). These cards will not be part of today's Treasure Chest update, but will be included in the next TC Update next month.

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MOCS SHOWCASE CHALLENGE EVENTS THIS WEEKEND​

It’s time once again to get players invited to the next round of Showcase Qualifiers in March and April.

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! Here are the dates and times for the first group:

DATE	TIME (PT)	TIME (UTC)	EVENT	FORMAT
Saturday, February 11, 2023	8:00 a.m.	16:00	Modern Showcase Challenge	Modern
Sunday, February 12, 2023	6:00a.m.	14:00	Pioneer Showcase Challenge	Pioneer

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

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LIMITED CHALLENGE UPDATE​

With the new set upon us, we are reverting the Limited Challenges that begin 12 p.m. Pacific (20:00 UTC) on Saturdays and Sundays to be 64-Player events starting this weekend. This means an extra round and bigger prizes are on the line! We will leave these at 64-Player until we see demand drop enough to go back to 32-Player.

The Limited Challenges at 1 a.m. Pacific (9:00 UTC) remain as 32-Player events.

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ALTERNATE PLAY SCHEDULE​

Here’s a look at the schedule of events coming up between now and March of the Machine. Each description mentions whether or not the Draft is Phantom – cards won’t be added to players’ collections in Phantom events. All event transitions are at 10 a.m. PT.

• Today- February 22 – Phyrexia: All Will Be One Best-of-One League (Keeper) – this has the same entry options and prizes as the previous versions but runs for just two weeks.
• February 15-22 – The Magic 30 Cube returns for the first time with updates! (Phantom) This Cube will recur each time a Magic Con takes place in 2023. (Runs concurrently with Week 2 of the Best-of-1 ONE League)
• February 22-March 1 – Our first trip back to the meeting point of technology and tradition – it’s Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty! (Keeper)
• March 1-8 – An alternate version of Dominaria’s saga returns – Time Spiral Remastered (Keeper)
• March 8-22 – Mid-March = Modern Horizons Madness! We’ll kick it off with the original Modern Horizons (Keeper & Phantom Draft options) for two weeks …
• March 22-April 5 - … then it’s two weeks of Modern Horizons 2! (Keeper & Phantom Draft options)
• April 5-MOM Release – We are still considering our options here.

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REDEMPTION UPDATE​

Redemption Tokens for The Brothers' War and Dominaria United are now on sale in the MTGO Store. The Dominaria United Tokens are getting quite low and The Brothers’ War is about half-gone – when supplies run out, they are gone for good!

Phyrexia: All Will Be One Redemption Tokens are slated to go on-sale on Wednesday, March 8.

For more details on the redemption program, click here.

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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:

• In MOCS Season 1, Pauper and Standard Challenges are never pre-empted.
• 32-Player events require 32 players to fire and give prizes to the Top 32.
  • Pauper, Vintage, and Standard Challenges are always 32-Player tournaments.
• All other events listed require 64 players to fire and give prizes to the Top 64.
• 32-Player Limited Challenge events are 6 rounds with no playoff
• 64-Player Limited Challenge events are 7 rounds with no playoff

TIME (PT)	FRIDAY	SATURDAY	SUNDAY
12:00 a.m.			Vintage Challenge
1:00 a.m.		32-Player Limited Challenge	32-Player Limited Challenge
2:00 a.m.		Pauper Challenge
4:00 a.m.		32-Player Legacy Challenge	Modern Challenge
6:00 a.m.		Standard Challenge	Pioneer Challenge
8:00 a.m.		Modern Challenge	Legacy Challenge
10:00 a.m.		Vintage Challenge	Pauper Challenge
12:00 p.m.		64-Player Limited Challenge	64-Player Limited Challenge
2:00 p.m.		Pioneer Challenge	Standard Challenge
4:00 p.m.	32-Player Limited Challenge
6:00 p.m.	32-Player Modern Challenge	32-Player Modern Challenge

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

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NEXT SCHEDULED DOWNTIME – FEBRUARY 15, 6 A.M. PT​

The next scheduled downtime is planned for Wednesday, February 15 beginning at 6 a.m. PT (14:00 UTC). This is slated to last longer than usual – up to four hours – due to changes needed in our internal infrastructure.

 

The updates to the Treasure Chest are now live!

 

PHYREXIA: ALL WILL BE ONE ON MTGO STARTING NEXT TUESDAY​

The latest Standard-legal expansion, Phyrexia: All Will Be One, hits MTGO’s digital shelves next Tuesday at 10 a.m. Pacific time (18:00 UTC). Check out this article for updates on the following that will take effect at that time:

• MTGO’s Art Bundles, available for a limited time in the Store
• Event schedules and improvements on how they are displayed in the Play Lobby
• Treasure Chests
• Magic Online Player Rewards
• Alternate Play
• The latest suite of Avatars

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DOMINARIA REMASTERED ON MTGO UNTIL NEXT TUESDAY​

For one more week we will be featuring the all-reprint set Dominaria Remastered (DMR). Magic Online will be treating that set as a cross between Cube and Standard – that is:

• Boosters will cost $3.99 USD, the same as a Standard set.
• Both a Draft league and a single-elimination queue will be offered, but they are keeper and cost the same as those of a Standard set (12 and 15 Event Tickets, respectively, plus the normal suite of alternate entry options).
  • The events run only until Phyrexia: All Will Be One events start next Tuesday, February 7 at 10 a.m. PT (18:00 UTC).
• Challenge and Premier events this weekend will award booster and set prizes of Dominaria Remastered. Limited Preliminaries will use DMR for Sealed product – no change in entry options.
• Treasure Chest contents now contain cards from Dominaria Remastered - be sure to look for the usual suite of extended-art and borderless cards!
• Due to some technical limitations, we have removed borderless and retro commons and uncommons from DMR boosters (the slot where those would have appeared will revert to a regular common slot). We are shifting that group of cards to Magic Online Player Rewards – more details are in this article.

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TWO EVENTS FEEDING CYCLE 3 REGIONAL CHAMPS THIS WEEKEND​

Your next opportunities to earn an invitation to tabletop’s Regional Championship Season 3 come up this weekend. First up is the Legacy Qualifier on Saturday, February 4 starting at 7 a.m. PT (15:00 UTC).

The sole entry option is 40 Qualifier Points, and the top 2 finishers earn invitations to the second Regional Championship of 2023 serving their country of residence (held in late spring).

Then on Sunday, February 5 at 7 a.m. PT, it’s the Modern Super Qualifier.

The Super Qualifier’s entry options are 40 Event Tickets, 400 Play Points, or 40 MOCS Season 1 Qualifier Points. The Top 4 finishers earn seats at that same RC round and prizes pay out to the Top 128!

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. 

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REDEMPTION UPDATE​

Redemption Tokens for The Brothers' War and Dominaria United are now on sale in the MTGO Store. The Dominaria United Tokens are getting quite low – when supplies run out, they are gone for good!

Phyrexia: All Will Be One Redemption Tokens are slated to go on-sale on Wednesday, March 8.

For more details on the redemption program, click here.

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NEXT SCHEDULED DOWNTIME – FEBRUARY 15, 6 A.M. PT​

After this Thursday, the next scheduled downtime is planned for Wednesday, February 15 beginning at 6 a.m. PT (14:00 UTC). This is slated to last longer than usual – up to four hours – due to changes needed in our internal infrastructure.

 

We have published a hotfix to address the issue with red borders on non-cards in the Collection scene. This will trigger a client download the next time you open MTGO. Also, we have corrected a legality issue with ONE reprints in Pioneer and Standard - they are now excluded.

 

NEW! Facebook NEW! Instagram

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GET SOCIAL WITH MTGO – NOW ON FACEBOOK & INSTAGRAM!​

Join our communities across the Internet, including our newest ones on Facebook and Instagram that launched last week! Click the links above to get started, including joining over 1400 Magic Online fans on the Discord channel.

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CONGRATULATIONS BART VAN ETTEN, 2022 SEASON 3 MOCS SHOWCASE CHAMPION!​

The Magic Online team congratulates Bart Van Etten, the winner of the 2022 Season 3 MOCS Showcase! Bart took down the Modern pod, then bested Damian Buckley in the final match using Izzet Murktide. Bart takes home $20,000, while Damian walked away with $15,000 – and both of them qualified for World Championship XXIX to be held later this year.

Full coverage of the event can be found at magic.gg

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PHYREXIA: ALL WILL BE ONE ON MTGO – ARTICLE THIS THURSDAY​

Keep an eye on mtgo.com - information on what’s happening with the release of the new Standard set Phyrexia: All Will Be One will be provided in an article going live this Thursday at 8 a.m. PT (16:00 UTC).

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MTGO DOWNTIME THIS THURSDAY – INCLUDES FORUMS & HELP SITE​

MTGO will be down for scheduled maintenance this Thursday, January 26, starting at 9 a.m. Pacific time (17:00 UTC). The downtime is slated to last for up to three hours.

NOTE: Our Customer Support site and our Forums will both also be down for the duration of the downtime. Follow our Twitter and Discord[TM2] channels linked above for live updates.

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DOMINARIA REMASTERED ON MTGO STARTING THURSDAY​

Between that downtime and the start of Phyrexia: All Will Be One, we will be featuring the all-reprint set Dominaria Remastered (DMR). Magic Online will be treating that set as a cross between Cube and Standard – that is:

• Boosters will cost $3.99 USD, the same as a Standard set.
• Both a Draft league and a single-elimination queue will be offered, but they are keeper and cost the same as those of a Standard set (12 and 15 Event Tickets, respectively, plus the normal suite of alternate entry options).
• The events kick off immediately following downtime and run only until ONE events start at 10 a.m. PT (18:00 UTC) on February 7.
• Challenge and Premier events during this 12-day period will award booster and set prizes of Dominaria Remastered. Limited Preliminaries will use DMR for Sealed product – no change in entry options.
• Treasure Chest contents will be updated with Dominaria Remastered included once we come up from downtime - be sure to look for the usual suite of extended-art and borderless cards!
• Due to some technical limitations, we have removed borderless and retro commons and uncommons from DMR boosters (the slot where those would have appeared will revert to a regular common slot). We are shifting that group of cards to Magic Online Player Rewards – more details to come in our ONE article on Thursday morning.
• Finally, rarity downshifts for DMR will apply right after downtime and will affect the Pauper Qualifier event the following Saturday.[TM3][TM4]

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PRELIMINARY-CHALLENGE SCHEDULE UPDATE STARTING JANUARY 27​

We have heard plenty of feedback from players (particularly from the Asia-Pacific region) who want as much top competition as possible around the clock.

To help with this, we are re-arranging the weekly schedule by upgrading two Preliminaries on Friday nights (Pacific time) to small Challenge events, plus adding another on Saturdays, starting this Friday, January 27:

• Modern Challenge 32 - includes Top 8 playoff
• Friday 6 p.m. PT (Saturday at: 02:00 UTC / 11:00 Japan / 13:00 AEDT / 15:00 NZ)
• Saturday 6 p.m. PT (Sunday at: 02:00 UTC / 11:00 Japan / 13:00 AEDT / 15:00 NZ)
• Limited Challenge 32 - 6 Swiss rounds of Sealed, no playoff
• Friday 4 p.m. PT (Saturday at: midnight UTC / 09:00 Japan / 11:00 AEDT / 13:00 NZ)

Additionally, to help Vintage players get more Qualifier Points to get into Showcase Challenges this season, we are adding back two time slots for Vintage Preliminaries starting next Monday, January 30:

• Vintage Preliminary – 4 Swiss rounds
• Monday 5 p.m. PT
• Wednesday 6 p.m. PT

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TWO EVENTS FEEDING CYCLE 3 REGIONAL CHAMPS THIS WEEKEND​

Your next opportunity to earn an invitation to tabletop’s Regional Championship Season 3 come up this weekend. First up is the Pauper Qualifier on Saturday, January 28 starting at 7 a.m. PT (15:00 UTC).

The sole entry option is 40 Qualifier Points, and the top 2 finishers earn invitations to the second Regional Championship of 2023 serving their country of residence (held in late spring).

Then on Sunday, January 29 at 7 a.m. PT, it’s the Vintage Super Qualifier.

The Super Qualifier’s entry options are 40 Event Tickets, 400 Play Points, or 40 MOCS Season 1 Qualifier Points. The Top 4 finishers earn seats at that same RC round and prizes pay out to the Top 128!

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.

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VINTAGE CUBE ENDS AT DOWNTIME​

The five-week run of our most popular format, Vintage Cube, wraps up at downtime on Thursday. Be sure to get your last matches in before the events end. Any unused Vintage Points (good for 1 free entry to the League) will be cleared from accounts during the downtime, so if you or a friend received a Vintage Point last month and have not used it yet, it’s now or never!

Cube design maven Carmen Handy has all of the latest updates in this article – give that a read if you haven’t already! The full card list with changes can be viewed at this page.

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REDEMPTION UPDATE​

Redemption Tokens for The Brothers' War and Dominaria United are now on sale in the MTGO Store. The Dominaria United Tokens are down to about one-sixth of their original stock – when supplies run out, they’re gone for good!

For more details on the redemption program, click here.

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NEXT SCHEDULED DOWNTIME – FEBRUARY 15, 6 A.M. PT​

After this Thursday, the next scheduled downtime is planned for Wednesday, February 15 beginning at 6 a.m. PT (14:00 UTC). This is slated to last longer than usual – up to four hours – due to changes needed in our internal infrastructure.

 

2022 SEASON 3 MOCS SHOWCASE THIS SATURDAY!​

Tune in as eight of Magic Online's best players compete for their share of $70,000 and two invitations to the 2023 World Championship! The broadcast begins this Saturday, January 21, at 10 a.m. Pacific (18:00 UTC) on twitch.tv/magic. Join Cedric Phillips, Carmen Handy, Haiyue Yue, and Mani Davoudi for all the action in Vintage Cube and Modern!

Learn more about the Showcase in this Viewers Guide article.

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DOMINARIA REMASTERED ON MTGO JANUARY 26​

Between next Thursday’s downtime and the start of Phyrexia: All Will Be One, we will be featuring the all-reprint set Dominaria Remastered (DMR). Magic Online will be treating that set as a cross between Cube and Standard – that is:

• Boosters will cost $3.99 USD, the same as a Standard set.
• Both a Draft league and a single-elimination queue will be offered, but they are keeper and cost the same as those of a Standard set.
  • The events kick off immediately following downtime and run only until ONE events start at 10 a.m. PT (18:00 UTC) on February 7.
• Treasure Chest contents will be updated with Dominaria Remastered included once we come up from downtime - be sure to look for the usual suite of extended-art and borderless cards!
• Due to some technical limitations, we have removed borderless and retro commons and uncommons from DMR boosters (the slot where those would have appeared will revert to a regular common slot). We are shifting that group of cards to Magic Online Player Rewards – more details to come in our ONE article on January 26.
• Finally, rarity downshifts for DMR will apply right after downtime and will affect the Pauper Qualifier event the following Saturday.

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PRELIMINARY-CHALLENGE SCHEDULE UPDATE STARTING JANUARY 27​

We have heard plenty of feedback from players (particularly from the Asia-Pacific region) who want as much top competition as possible around the clock.

To help with this, we are re-arranging the weekly schedule by upgrading two Preliminaries on Friday nights (Pacific time) to small Challenge events, plus adding another on Saturdays, starting next weekend (January 27):

• Modern Challenge 32 (includes Top 8 playoff)
  • Friday 6pm PT (Saturday at: 02:00 UTC / 11:00 Japan / 13:00 AEDT / 15:00 NZ)
  • Saturday 6pm PT (Sunday at: 02:00 UTC / 11:00 Japan / 13:00 AEDT / 15:00 NZ)
• Limited Challenge 32 (6 Swiss rounds of Sealed, no playoff)
  • Friday 4pm PT (Saturday at: midnight UTC / 09:00 Japan / 11:00 AEDT / 13:00 NZ)

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TWO SUPER QUALIFIERS FOR CYCLE 3 REGIONAL CHAMPS THIS WEEKEND​

Your first chances to earn an invitation to tabletop’s Regional Championship Season 3 come up this weekend. The Modern Super Qualifier is on Saturday, January 21, then the Limited Super Qualifier follows on Sunday, January 22.

• Start time of 7 a.m. Pacific (15:00 UTC) both days
• The Limited event features The Brothers’ War (Sealed Deck with Top 8 Draft)
• Each event’s entry options are 40 Event Tickets, 400 Play Points, or 40 MOCS Season 1 Qualifier Points.

The Top 4 finishers earn seats to the second Regional Championship of 2023 serving their country of residence (held in late spring), and prizes pay out to the Top 128!

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.

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NEW MTGO.COM FEATURE – DECKLIST FILTERING​

Thanks to some feedback from our Twitter page, our web team has provided an improvement to the Decklists page at MTGO.com - you can now filter the current month’s listings by format and/or event type.

Whether it’s the latest Pauper Challenge, Modern Leagues, or all Showcase events you want to see, the new filters get you there faster – check it out today!

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VINTAGE CUBE CONTINUES – ONE WEEK TO GO​

Our most popular format continues until January 26! As usual we will have a regular Swiss draft league and a single-elimination draft queue. Entry options for both events are 10 Event Tickets, 100 Play Points, or 1 Vintage Point.

Cube design maven Carmen Handy has all of the latest updates in this article – give that a read if you haven’t already! The full card list with changes can be viewed at this page.

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REDEMPTION UPDATE​

Redemption Tokens for The Brothers' War and Dominaria United are now on sale in the MTGO Store. The Dominaria United Tokens are down to about one-fifth of their original stock – when supplies run out, they’re gone for good!

For more details on the redemption program, click here.

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THE BROTHERS’ WAR ON MAGIC ONLINE​

Our latest set, The Brothers’ War, is ongoing. Check out the dedicated article to learn all about everything new with the release:

• The Brothers’ War boosters and Commander decks
• Updates to the MTGO Store
• The latest suite of avatars

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NEXT SCHEDULED DOWNTIME – JANUARY 26​

The next scheduled downtime is planned for Thursday, January 26 beginning at 9 a.m. PT (17:00 UTC). This is for the implementation of Dominaria Remastered and Phyrexia: All Will Be One. Reminder: Events for the latter do not start until February 7.

 

NEW MTGO.COM FEATURE – DECKLIST FILTERING​

Thanks to some feedback from our Twitter page, our web team has provided an improvement to the Decklists page at MTGO.com - you can now filter the current month’s listings by format and/or event type.

Whether it’s the latest Pauper Challenge, Modern Leagues, or all Showcase events you want to see, the new filters get you there faster – check it out today!

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VINTAGE CUBE CONTINUES!​

Our most popular format continues until January 26! As usual we will have a regular Swiss draft league and a single-elimination draft queue. Entry options for both events are 10 Event Tickets, 100 Play Points, or 1 Vintage Point.

Cube design maven Carmen Handy has all of the latest updates in this article – give that a read if you haven’t already! The full card list with changes can be viewed at this page.

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MOCS SHOWCASE CHALLENGE EVENTS THIS WEEKEND​

It’s time once again to get players invited to the next round of Showcase Qualifiers in March.

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! Here are the dates and times for the first group:

DATE	TIME (PT)	TIME (UTC)	EVENT	FORMAT
Saturday, January 14, 2023	10:00 a.m.	18:00	Vintage Showcase Challenge	Vintage
Sunday, January 15, 2023	8:00 a.m.	16:00	Legacy Showcase Challenge	Legacy

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

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ALTERNATE PLAY SCHEDULE​

Here’s a look at the schedule of events coming up between now and Phyrexia: All Will Be One. All of these Alternate Play events are Phantom – cards won’t be added to players’ collections.

• Now-January 26 – Vintage Cube (see above)
• January 26-February 7 – Dominaria Remastered Draft League and single-elimination Queue (both Keeper)

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REDEMPTION UPDATE​

Redemption Tokens for The Brothers' War and Dominaria United are now on sale in the MTGO Store. The Dominaria United Tokens are down to about one-quarter of their original stock – when supplies run out, they’re gone for good.

For more details on the redemption program, click here.

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THE BROTHERS’ WAR ON MAGIC ONLINE​

Our latest set, The Brothers’ War, is ongoing. Check out the dedicated article to learn all about everything new with the release:

• The Brothers’ War boosters and Commander decks
• Updates to the MTGO Store
• The latest suite of avatars

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NEXT SCHEDULED DOWNTIME – JANUARY 26​

The next scheduled downtime is planned for Thursday, January 26 beginning at 9 a.m. PT (17:00 UTC). This is for the implementation of Dominaria Remastered and Phyrexia: All Will Be One. Reminder: Events for the latter do not start until February 7.

 

Have you checked out the decklist page today? We recently implemented the ability to filter by format and event type! Find what you're looking for even faster than before! Go check it out: https://www.mtgo.com/en/mtgo/decklists

 

VINTAGE CUBE CONTINUES!​

Our most popular format continues until January 25! As usual we will have a regular Swiss draft league and a single-elimination draft queue. Entry options for both events are 10 Event Tickets or 100 Play Points. The League also has an entry option of 1 Vintage Point which was granted to each active, fully-functional account (bought an Account Upgrade Kit or can fully trade/chat/play in paid events) as of December 14.

Cube design maven Carmen Handy has all of the latest updates in this article – give that a read if you haven’t already! The full card list with changes can be viewed at this page.

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ALL-ACCESS ENDS TOMORROW​

We hope those of you who took advantage of All-Access the last two weeks have had fun building new decks and exploring formats you otherwise may not have tried.

All-Access and the Mythic Event Tokens will be removed from accounts tomorrow morning at 10 a.m. Pacific time (18:00 UTC). If you are in the middle of a League course with cards you no longer own at that point, you are allowed to complete that course.

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MOCS SHOWCASE CHALLENGE EVENTS THIS WEEKEND​

It’s time once again to get players invited to the next round of Showcase Qualifiers in March.

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! Here are the dates and times for the first group:

DATE	TIME (PT)	TIME (UTC)	EVENT	FORMAT
Saturday, January 7, 2023	8:00 a.m.	16:00	Modern Showcase Qualifier	Modern
Sunday, January 8, 2023	6:00 a.m.	14:00	Pioneer Showcase Qualifier	Pioneer
Saturday, January 14, 2023	10:00 a.m.	18:00	Vintage Showcase Qualifier	Vintage
Sunday, January 15, 2023	8:00 a.m.	16:00	Legacy Showcase Qualifier	Legacy

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

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ALTERNATE PLAY SCHEDULE​

Here’s a look at the schedule of events coming up between now and Phyrexia: All Will Be One. All of these Alternate Play events are Phantom – cards won’t be added to players’ collections.

• Now-January 25 – Vintage Cube (see above)
• January 26-February 6 – Dominaria Remastered Draft League

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REDEMPTION UPDATE​

Redemption Tokens for The Brothers' War and Dominaria United are now on sale in the MTGO Store. The Dominaria United Tokens are down to about one-third of their original stock – when supplies run out, they’re gone for good.

For more details on the redemption program, click here.

---

THE BROTHERS’ WAR ON MAGIC ONLINE​

Our latest set, The Brothers’ War, is ongoing. Check out the dedicated article to learn all about everything new with the release:

• The Brothers’ War boosters and Commander decks
• Updates to the MTGO Store
• The latest suite of avatars

---

NEXT SCHEDULED DOWNTIME – JANUARY 26​

The next scheduled downtime is planned for Thursday, January 26 beginning at 9 a.m. PT (17:00 UTC). This is for the implementation of Dominaria Remastered and Phyrexia: All Will Be One.

 

The MTGO team will be observing Daybreak Games’ winter break between December 23 and January 2. The effects of this for customers during this closure are as follows:

• Redemptions purchased starting Tuesday, December 20 will process as normal in-game but will not be shipped until the first week of January.
• Customer Service will be working at reduced capacity during the break, so there may be longer-than-usual response times to tickets filed at help.mtgo.com – thank you for your patience.
• Forums, Discord, and Twitter will not be as actively monitored.
• No new Blog next week – next one will publish when the team returns on January 3.

 

Howdy, gamers!

Holiday Vintage Cube season’s back, and I’m here for the last time to provide y’all with an update of what to expect this season.

To get things out of the way early, this is going to be my last set cube update for Magic Online. For anyone who hasn’t gotten to read my updates before, my name’s Carmen Handy and I’m a game designer on the Play Design team at Wizards of the Coast. I’ve been updating the set Cubes for a couple of years now and also built the recent 30th Anniversary Cube. After this Cube, I still have a few updates to the 30th Anniversary Cube, but otherwise everything from here will be handled by the wonderful folks at Daybreak Games. Their passion is incredible, and they’ve got folks on their team with the requisite Cube chops to ensure the games stay great and the drafts are as fun as ever.

With that announcement out of the way, I wanted to use my last update to share some lessons I’ve learned while curating the Cubes over the last few years, framed around updates made to this Cube. Let’s hop in!

Lesson #1: Strength Isn’t Everything!​

Not all changes made to Cubes are in the name of making them stronger. In this update to the Cube, for example, I have made the decision to cut Portent for Consider. Which is stronger on raw rate is a bit debatable, but it certainly isn’t a unilateral upgrade – though Consider is certainly more fun to play with over the course of 1000 games.

Sometimes, weaker cards can even enable synergies in Cubes to make archetypes more reliable than they normally would be. In Vintage Cube, for example, having a card that contributes a bit more to graveyard synergies, rather than raw selection, is a huge boon for archetypes like Reanimator, or even some of the Goblin Welder-fueled shenanigans therein.

Other times, it can even mean preserving some of the weaker things going on in Cubes because it’s sweet. At this point it isn’t really a secret that the average Storm deck isn’t particularly strong, but good grief it feels so good whenever you can actually get it to work. The same can be said for the Simic Show and Tell/Eureka decks. There’s nowhere else in Magic you can see that stuff come up, and watching it come together in Vintage Cube is such a treat that it’s worth preserving. Eureka specifically being a great segue into my next point:

Lesson #2: Sacrifice Low-Leverage Spots for Buildarounds​

Early on in my time curating the Vintage Cube, I made the mistake of cutting Niv-Mizzet, Reborn. On paper it didn’t look like it had a high pick rate, and I added something more generically playable in its place. The community rightfully wasn’t happy, and in the time since, it’s been apparent that Niv-Mizzet as the singular 5-color card in the Cube brings a ton of joy, and that single slot can create incentive to build an entirely new deck on its own.

With this Cube update, I made the decision to cut Halana and Alena, Partners for Meria, Scholar of Antiquity. I’ve spoken more than once about the struggles of finding strong Gruul cards that can compete at the Vintage Cube-level, so axing a generic rate card for a sweet build-around is a no-brainer. I’m optimistic about the decks that Meria can enable that otherwise wouldn’t have been built.

Lesson #3: Aggro is Stronger Than You Think​

When in doubt, aggro em out. A lot of changes I’ve made over the course of the Cube have been on the back of aggro being very strong. Lots of people like to play all the sweet 4-mana cards and let MTGO sort out the rest. People who have a 1-2-3-4 curve do a lot of winning. I’ve generally found attacking to be strong in other Cubes I play, but your mileage may vary. If you’re struggling to win in Cube, just focus on your curve and make sure you aren’t stalling out too hard in the early game.

Lesson #4: In a World of Random Decks, Modality is King​

In Cube it’s impossible to know what you’re going to play round to round. That’s doubly true on Magic Online, where the cube size is 540, and in league play, your opponents might even have some of the cards you do! That means that having cards that perform multiple roles in a given matchup are going to have their stock rise. Having as few cards with the “blank cardboard” fail-case in your deck is going to go a long way when building Cubes.

Lesson #5: Know When It’s Time to Give Up on an Idea​

Having spent the better part of a year trying to make some of the more trinket-y sacrifice-synergy stuff work in black, this iteration of Cube sees a lot of the small-ball stuff falling by the wayside. Not all experiments are going to fail (I’d say the Lands archetype from February has been splendid, for example), but sometimes it’s better to find the good pieces of an experiment than it is to try and keep all of it. Goblin Bombardment, for example, is going to stick around as a card that can make people want to build their red decks differently, but I’m not dreaming of a Sedgemoor Witch fueling a bunch of sacrifice stuff anymore.

Lesson #6: Embrace Change​

One of my favorite things to do in game design is try out new things. There’s always something to change, then something to learn, and information to absorb. Working on Cubes has always been an outlet to try and create joy for other people, and trying out cards that nobody has tried before has been a way to do that. Sometimes it’s older stuff (like the Eladamri’s Call in this update) but a lot of times that translates to cards from newer sets that haven’t ever had their shot in Cube before. One of the best feelings when Cubing is being pleasantly surprised by how many roles something like Bloodtithe Harvester can play.

It might look weird sometimes seeing a ton of new cards being added to Vintage Cube, but a lot of times the ones that don’t hack it will be cut sooner, rather than later. The diamonds in the rough that can hang just make the Cube more fun over time. Which brings me to my last point:

Lesson #7: Gameplay over Card List – Always!​

It’s easy to get caught up on pet cards that are always playable when you draft them, but can’t seem to find anyone else who wants to play them. I know I was certainly guilty of this trying to beat the Wheel of Misfortune drum for longer than I should’ve. What’s important is making sure that people are having fun while playing your Cube, and not simply wowed at how cool and obscure all of the cards on the list are.

I appreciate everyone in the community for being patient while I learned all of this and am eternally grateful for all the feedback everyone has given me over the last couple of years. I’m not leaving Wizards – in fact I have some other awesome projects in the pipeline! Hope y’all love this update to the Vintage Cube as much as I’ve loved working on such an integral part of the Magic community.

 

DISCORD IS OPEN​

Join our new MTGO Discord Server! More than 900 players are already on board, and it has quickly become the MTGO social-media destination for the latest MTGO news and information, meeting other players, and real-time chats with your friends, Magic Online team members, and the Magic Online community at large!

We're excited by the response so far--help us continue to build the Discord community and join today! We look forward to getting to know you!

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HOLIDAYS 2022 PROMOTIONS START TOMORROW​

Check out our article describing our Holiday activities taking place over the next five weeks starting tomorrow! The fun includes:

• All-Access back for 2 weeks (tomorrow to January 4) – buy a Mythic Event Token for $25.00 USD
• Vintage Cube back until January 25
• Week of Super Qualifiers December 26-30 (see full calendar below)

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VINTAGE CUBE RETURNS TOMORROW!​

Our most popular format returns for a five-week run starting tomorrow! As usual we will have a regular Swiss draft league and a single-elimination draft queue. Entry options for both events are 10 Event Tickets or 100 Play Points. The League also offers an entry option of 1 Vintage Point, the free draft token that all fully purchased accounts prior to December 14 received last week.

Cube design maven Carmen Handy has all of the latest updates in today’s article – give that a read before you begin playing! The full card list with changes can be viewed at this page.

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WEEK OF SUPER QUALIFIERS & OTHER HOLIDAY PREMIER EVENTS​

A whopping 26 invitations to the next Regional Championship round in February and March are up for grabs over the next two weeks across 7 events:

DATE	TIME (PT)	TIME (UTC)	EVENT	FORMAT
Friday, December 23, 2022	7:00 a.m.	15:00	Limited Super Qualifier	BRO Sealed
Monday, December 26, 2022	7:00 a.m.	15:00	Modern Super Qualifier	Modern
Tuesday, December 27, 2022	7:00 a.m.	15:00	Standard Super Qualifier	Standard
Wednesday, December 28, 2022	7:00 a.m.	15:00	Pioneer Super Qualifier	Pioneer
Thursday, December 29, 2022	7:00 a.m.	15:00	Legacy Super Qualifier	Legacy
Friday, December 30, 2022	7:00 a.m.	15:00	Vintage Super Qualifier	Vintage
Sunday, January 1, 2023	3:00 p.m.	23:00	Limited Qualifier	BRO Sealed

Reminder: The constructed Super Qualifiers on Monday through Friday can also be entered with 2 Mythic Event Tokens.

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MOCS SEASON 3 SHOWCASE FIELD IS SET​

Congratulations to our final field of qualified players who will contest the MOCS Season 3 Showcase next month:

Leandru	Sneakymisato
Demian77	Diem4x
Terribad	Floorscrub
MentalMisstep	mei0024

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ALTERNATE PLAY SCHEDULE​

Here’s a look at the schedule of events coming up between now and Phyrexia: All Will Be One. All of these Alternate Play events are Phantom – cards won’t be added to players’ collections.

• December 21-January 24 – Vintage Cube (see above)
• January 26-February 6 – Dominaria Remastered Draft League

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THE BROTHER’S WAR REDEMPTION ON SALE NOW​

Good news - we had originally stated that redemptions of The Brothers' War would not start until January. Fortunately, our system is ready earlier than expected.

Redemption Tokens for The Brothers' War and Dominaria United are now on sale in the MTGO Store.

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TRANSFORMERS BUNDLE ON SALE NOW – LIMITED TIME ONLY! ​

Your favorite Autobot and Decepticon characters make their debut in a special, unique-to-MTGO Universes Beyond offering – the TRANSFORMERS Bundle! For $24.99, all 15 regular-style, non-foil cards in the set can become part of your Magic Online collection for use in Legacy, Vintage, Commander, and Freeform formats – Optimus Prime, Starscream, Megatron, and more!. 

Each card in the Bundle features two modes between which a TRANSFORMERS character can appear – Bot Mode and Alt Mode. Both sides have powerful abilities, many of which cause the card to convert. The More Than Meets the Eye mechanic permits the card’s controller to have it enter in Alt Mode for an alternate cost.  

Cards in the TRANSFORMERS Bundle will not be made available in Treasure Chests, and the Bundle is only available until January 31 at 9 a.m. PT – be sure you don’t miss out! 

TRANSFORMERS, its Characters (Optimus Prime, Starscream, Megatron, etc.), Autobots, Decepticons, More Than Meets The Eye, and Robots in Disguise are trademarks of Hasbro and © TOMY  [used with permission].  

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THE BROTHER’S WAR ON MAGIC ONLINE​

Our latest set, The Brothers’ War, is ongoing. Check out the dedicated article to learn all about everything new with the release:

• The Brothers’ War boosters and Commander decks
• Updates to the MTGO Store
• The latest suite of avatars

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HOLIDAY BREAK STARTS FRIDAY​

The MTGO team will be observing Daybreak Games’ winter break between December 23 and January 2. The effects of this for customers during this closure are as follows:

• Redemptions purchased starting today will process as normal in-game but will not be shipped until the first week of January.
• Customer Service will be working at reduced capacity during the break, so there may be longer-than-usual response times to tickets filed at help.mtgo.com – thank you for your patience.
• Forums, Discord, and Twitter will not be as actively monitored.
• No new Blog next week – next one will publish when the team returns on January 3.

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NEXT SCHEDULED DOWNTIME - NOW JANUARY 26, 2023​

The next scheduled downtime is now planned for Thursday, January 26 beginning at 9 a.m. PT (17:00 UTC). This is for the implementation of Dominaria Remastered and Phyrexia: All Will Be One. Note that the latter’s events have been pushed back one week – now slated to start February 7.

 

Good news! All active, fully-purchased MTGO accounts as of yesterday will be granted a Vintage Point good for one free Vintage Cube draft (not just those subscribed to emails that already got the Point).

To execute this grant, we will be pausing Leagues, Trade, and Store for about 1 hour starting at 9:45am PT. We will provide further updates.

 

Premier Play Information

Treasure Chest Information – Updated Today!

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ADDITIONAL DOWNTIME TOMORROW​

Magic Online will take an additional downtime tomorrow morning at 9 a.m. Pacific time (17:00 UTC). This game outage should be shorter than a normal version – estimated two hours or less.

Because of this, the Supreme Pioneer Chaos Draft League will close to new entries at 5 a.m. PT (13:00 UTC) and no new matches can begin after 8 a.m. PT

---

WEEKEND WINNERS – ETERNAL WEEKEND & MOCS SHOWCASE QUALIFIERS​

Congratulations to the second pair of players to qualify for next month’s Season 3 Showcase event: Demian77 and Diem4x

Also, our Eternal Weekend champions are mephidro (Legacy, 424 players) and JUJUBEAN__2004 (Vintage, 282 players).

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MOCS SHOWCASE OPENS THIS WEEKEND​

Your final chance to earn a seat at next month’s MOCS Showcase event comes this weekend.

Players don't need to earn points or another qualification to enter, and because these events are Sealed, players don't even need a deck built in advance! Entry options are 40 Event Tickets or 400 Play Points.

The winner of each Showcase Open earns a spot in the final Showcase event in January, where they will battle for their share of $70,000 and compete for two seats at the 2023 Magic World Championship! That Showcase Open winner also gets invited to Pro Tour Minneapolis in May 2023.

The Opens are also the last chance to earn enough Leaderboard points to grab one of two At-Large invites to the Magic Online Champions Showcase.

The schedule for the Showcase Opens are as follows:

DATE	TIME (PT)	TIME (UTC)	EVENT
Saturday, December 17	7:00 a.m.	15:00	MOCS Showcase Open
Sunday, December 18	7:00 a.m.	15:00	MOCS Showcase Open

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

Digital Event Coordinators will be available in the in-game #DEC Chat room during the later rounds of both Open events in case of questions or technical issues.

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FRIENDLY FLASHBACK IXALAN BLOCK DRAFT LEAGUE STARTS TOMORROW​

Welcome back to the jungle! Explore the world where Dinosaurs, Pirates, Vampires, and Merfolk seek the city’s blessing and vie for control of The Immortal Sun.

We’re going to experiment with a different set of entry options and prizes for this one-week League that begins once we are up from downtime tomorrow.

Entry Options: 6 Event Tickets or 60 Play Points
Prizes:

• 3 Wins: 90 Play Points, 2 Treasure Chests, and 1 Friendly Trophy (no QPs)
• 2 Wins: 60 Play Points
• 1 Win: 30 Play Points

---

ALTERNATE PLAY SCHEDULE​

Here’s a look at the schedule of events coming up between now and Phyrexia: All Will Be One. All of these Alternate Play events are Phantom – cards won’t be added to players’ collections.

• December 21-January 24 – Vintage Cube makes its annual holiday return – this time for a full five weeks! As usual, there will be a Draft league and a single-elimination Draft queue. This is one of the formats that will test competitors in the Season 3 MOCS Showcase on January 21.
• January 26-February 6 – Dominaria Remastered Draft League

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HOLIDAYS 2022 ARTICLE TOMORROW​

A sneak preview of our Holidays 2022 activities that start next Wednesday, December 21st, will be live on MTGO.com tomorrow morning.

Also, if you have a fully-functional account (bought an Account Upgrade Kit or can fully trade/chat/play in paid events) and that account is subscribed to our email lists as of yesterday, keep an eye out for a message in the next couple of days with details of a special gift usable during our five weeks of Vintage Cube.

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TREASURE CHEST UPDATE – BRO FAST FOLLOW​

We are updating the Treasure Chest contents during tomorrow’s downtime as promised when The Brother’s War released last month. Due to sufficient distribution being reached, we are closing the TC-Only slot until it’s needed at a future date. A handful of cards there will move to the main Curated slot.

Check out the updated list at the Treasure Chest link at the top of this Blog.

---

THE BROTHER’S WAR REDEMPTION ON SALE NOW​

Good news - we had originally stated that redemptions of The Brothers' War would not start until January. Fortunately, our system is ready earlier than expected.

Redemption Tokens for The Brothers' War and Dominaria United are now on sale in the MTGO Store.

For more details on the redemption program, click here.

---

TRANSFORMERS BUNDLE ON SALE NOW – LIMITED TIME ONLY! ​

Your favorite Autobot and Decepticon characters make their debut in a special, unique-to-MTGO Universes Beyond offering – the TRANSFORMERS Bundle! For $24.99, all 15 regular-style, non-foil cards in the set can become part of your Magic Online collection for use in Legacy, Vintage, Commander, and Freeform formats – Optimus Prime, Starscream, Megatron, and more.

Each card in the Bundle features two modes between which a TRANSFORMERS character can appear – Bot Mode and Alt Mode. Both sides have powerful abilities, many of which cause the card to convert. The More Than Meets the Eye mechanic permits the card’s controller to have it enter in Alt Mode for an alternate cost.

Cards in the TRANSFORMERS Bundle will not be made available in Treasure Chests, and the Bundle is only available until January 31 at 9 a.m. PT – be sure you don’t miss out!

TRANSFORMERS, its Characters (Optimus Prime, Starscream, Megatron, etc.), Autobots, Decepticons, More Than Meets The Eye, and Robots in Disguise are trademarks of Hasbro and © TOMY [used with permission].

---

THE BROTHERS’ WAR ON MAGIC ONLINE​

Our latest set, The Brothers’ War, has its events going live today! Check out the dedicated article to learn all about everything new with the release:

• The Brothers’ War boosters and Commander decks
• Updates to the MTGO Store
• The latest suite of avatars

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PATCH NOTES - DECEMBER 14, 2022​

• Treasure Chest contents have been updated.
• When multiple cards are discarded at once, the game will allow you to select the order those cards are placed in the graveyard.
• Thran Vigil will correctly trigger just once when a single card leaves the graveyard.
• Lands will correctly be unable to be played when a colorless spell is on the stack and Liberator, Urza’s Battlethopter is in play.
• Demolition Field will correctly allow its controller to search for a basic land even if the opponent declines.
• A game reset will no longer occur if you try to cast an instant or sorcery from the graveyard with a Pay X life additional cost.

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NEXT SCHEDULED DOWNTIME - NOW JANUARY 26, 2023​

After tomorrow’s additional downtime, the next scheduled downtime is now planned for Thursday, January 26 beginning at 9 a.m. PT (17:00 UTC). This is for the implementation of Dominaria Remastered and Phyrexia: All Will Be One. Note that the latter’s events have been pushed back one week – now slated to start February 7.

 

ETERNAL WEEKEND RETURNS TO MTGO DECEMBER 10-11​

The great autumnal tradition celebrating Legacy and Vintage formats – Eternal Weekend – returns to Magic Online this weekend!

This year is a bit different: Eternal Weekend events in North America and Asia have returned to tabletop, while the European events will be held here on MTGO.

The Legacy event is Saturday at 1 a.m. PT (9:00 UTC) and the Vintage event is Sunday at 1 a.m. PT (9:00 UTC). The entry option is 20 Event Tickets or 200 Play Points.

All Magic Online accounts are eligible to join these events, not just European residents. Unlike MTGO events in 2020 and 2021, players will need to have the cards in their Collection to participate (no All-Access for these events).

At stake is the life-size art trophy for the winner, plus new this year there will be physical promo cards for the Top 8 finishers in each event.

For more details on the MTGO event, click here. For more details on the in-person event happening in Philadelphia this weekend, visit the tournament's website.

Note: The normal Vintage Challenge scheduled for midnight Sunday PT has been pre-empted this week only by the Vintage Eternal Weekend event.

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SUPREME PIONEER CHAOS DRAFT LEAGUE BEGINS TOMORROW​

It just so happens that The Brother’s War is the 36th Standard-legal, non-Core expansion to be released in the history of the Pioneer format. Because 36 is a magic number for Cube (540-card Cubes are made up of 36 boosters of 15 cards each), we decided to combine all of MTGO’s wackiness into one awesome week of gameplay!

Drafting by yourself, 36 virtual boosters go into a digital bag. You are presented with a booster, draft two cards, then throw the rest of the pack away. Do that with 17 more boosters (which are all different), then build a 40-card deck out of your 36 picks.

High power level, tons of fun, it’s almost … extravagant!

The fun begins tomorrow at 10 a.m. PT (18:00 UTC) and runs for one week only. Entry options are 10 Event Tickets or 100 Play Points, and the event is Phantom – cards won’t be added to players’ collections.

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SEASON 3 SHOWCASE CHALLENGES START SATURDAY​

Players who earned entry into the Showcase Qualifier will be squaring off for an invitation to the 2022 Season 3 Champions Showcase!

Congratulations to our first two qualified players from this weekend: leandru and sneakymisato!

The entry option for Showcase Qualifiers is a format token that matches the Qualifier’s format. As with QPs, after the season's Showcase Qualifiers are finished, all unused Format Tokens will be removed from players' accounts.

Each Showcase Qualifier is a scheduled Swiss-style event with a Top 8 playoff. The winner of each Showcase Qualifier earns a spot in the final Showcase event in January and a chance to earn their share of $70,000 and an invitation to the 2023 Magic World Championship! That winner also gets invited to Pro Tour Minneapolis in May 2023.

Showcase Qualifiers are scheduled as follows:

DATE	TIME (PT)	TIME (UTC)	EVENT
Saturday, December 10	6 a.m.	14:00	Standard Showcase Qualifier
Sunday, December 11	8 a.m.	16:00	Legacy Showcase Qualifier

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

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BRO BEST-OF-ONE & SCARS OF MIRRODIN BLOCK LEAGUES END TOMORROW​

It’s your last call to finish matches in both The Brothers' War Best-of-One League and the Scars of Mirrodin Block Flashback League. Both Leagues close to new entries tomorrow at 10 a.m. PT (18:00 UTC).

---

ALTERNATE PLAY SCHEDULE​

Here’s a look at the schedule of events coming up between now and Phyrexia: All Will Be One. All of these Alternate Play events are Phantom – cards won’t be added to players’ collections.

• December 14-20 – Welcome back to the jungle – it's Rivals of Ixalan-Ixalan Flashback Draft.
• December 21-January 24 – Vintage Cube makes its annual holiday return – this time for a full five weeks! As usual, there will be a Draft league and a single-elimination Draft queue. This is one of the formats that will test competitors in the Season 3 MOCS Showcase on January 21.
• January 25-30 – TBD

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MTGO STORE OUTAGE TODAY​

We will be doing maintenance on MTGO’s payment processor today, December 6, starting at 9 a.m. PT (17:00 UTC). It is scheduled to last for up to two hours. Purchases in the MTGO Store will not be available during this maintenance, but the game will be otherwise unaffected.

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UPDATES TO SUPER QUALIFIER SCHEDULE​

Changes have been applied to the Premier Event schedule in early 2023. The Super Qualifier on February 5th will now be Modern, and the Limited Super Qualifier on February 10th has been pushed back a week to February 17th.

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REDEMPTION UPDATE - THE BROTHERS' WAR REDEMPTION ON SALE FRIDAY​

Thank you for your patience while we are getting our new systems set up. We had originally stated that redemptions of The Brothers' War would not start until January. Fortunately, our system is ready earlier than expected.

You can begin purchasing Redemption Tokens for The Brothers' War in the MTGO Store beginning this Friday, December 9, at 9 a.m. Pacific time (17:00 UTC).

Also, Dominaria United redemption tokens remain available in the Store.

Remember that the policy has changed – redemption sets are only available while supplies last, and a Redemption Token now costs $35.00 USD plus shipping fees and tax. For more details on the redemption program, click here.

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STARTER COMMANDER DECKS ON SALE NOW​

Starter Commander Decks are now available in the MTGO Store. With digital contents identical to those being sold in local game stores, these 5 decks are our ideal product for players wading into Commander. The 5 decks are:

• White-Blue First Flight
• Blue-Black Grave Danger
• Black-Red Chaos Incarnate
• Red-Green Draconic Destruction
• Green-White Token Triumph

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TRANSFORMERS BUNDLE ON SALE NOW – LIMITED TIME ONLY!​

Your favorite Autobot and Decepticon characters make their debut in a special, unique-to-MTGO Universes Beyond offering – the TRANSFORMERS Bundle! For $24.99, all 15 regular-style, non-foil cards in the set can become part of your Magic Online collection for use in Legacy, Vintage, Commander, and Freeform formats – Optimus Prime, Starscream, Megatron, and more.

Each card in the Bundle features two modes between which a TRANSFORMERS character can appear – Bot Mode and Alt Mode. Both sides have powerful abilities, many of which cause the card to convert. The More Than Meets the Eye mechanic permits the card’s controller to have it enter in Alt Mode for an alternate cost.

Cards in the TRANSFORMERS Bundle will not be made available in Treasure Chests, and the Bundle is only available until the release of Phyrexia: All Will Be One in January – be sure you don’t miss out!

TRANSFORMERS, its Characters (Optimus Prime, Starscream, Megatron, etc.), Autobots, Decepticons, More Than Meets The Eye, and Robots in Disguise are trademarks of Hasbro and © TOMY [used with permission].

---

THE BROTHERS’ WAR ON MAGIC ONLINE​

Our latest set, The Brothers’ War, has its events going live today! Check out the dedicated article to learn all about everything new with the release:

• The Brothers’ War boosters and Commander decks
• The TRANSFORMERS Bundle – available for a limited time
• Updates to the MTGO Store
• Updates to Treasure Chests
• The latest suite of avatars
• Alternate Play Schedule

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PATCH NOTES - DECEMBER 7, 2022​

• The Update with Versions in Collection feature will again function correctly
• Cards with prototype will no longer show flavor text as game text
• The retro version of Command Tower will again have correctly-framed art

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NEXT DOWNTIME JANUARY 25, 2023​

The next scheduled downtime is planned for Wednesday, January 25 beginning at 9 a.m. PT (17:00 UTC). This is for the implementation of Dominaria Remastered and Phyrexia: All Will Be One.

 

We begin filling seats in the next MOCS Showcase with the invite-only Showcase Qualifiers this weekend.

Not invited? We have MOCS Opens 2 weeks from now.

Learn more about MTGO Premier Play at https://www.mtgo.com/premier-play-2023.​

 

DISCORD IS OPEN​

Our new MTGO Discord Server is open! Join now and hang out with other MTGO enthusiasts and staff. We look forward to getting to know you all, as we discuss all that is Magic Online!

This is the primary spot for real time chat with friends and more! See you in there.

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BRO BEST-OF-ONE DRAFT LEAGUE - NOW THROUGH DECEMBER 7​

Sometimes you only have time for a quick game or two between classes, during lunch, before you head out, or after the kids are asleep. If this is your style, give this League a try!

Entry options are the same as Best-of-Three – 12 Event Tickets, 120 Play Points, or 3 The Brothers' War boosters + 2 Event Tickets. Each course runs until you reach seven wins or three losses.

Unlike Best-of-Three, this League has a short duration – there’s just one week left to go: the League ends next Wednesday, December 7 at 10 a.m. PT (18:00 UTC).

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SCARS OF MIRRODIN BLOCK FLASHBACK LEAGUE STARTS TOMORROW​

We revisit the prequel to the current Magic story – the first signs of Phyrexian infection and completion. This week’s Flashback format features New Phyrexia, Mirrodin Besieged, and Scars of Mirrodin (in that order). The one-week Draft league begins tomorrow at 10 a.m. PT and ends next Wednesday, December 7.

Entry options are 10 Event Tickets or 100 Play Points, and the event is Phantom – cards won’t be added to players’ collections.

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ALTERNATE PLAY SCHEDULE​

Here’s a look at the schedule of events coming up between now and Phyrexia: All Will Be One. All of these Alternate Play events are Phantom – cards won’t be added to players’ collections.

• November 30-December 6 – A return to where the Phyrexian takeover was first completed, it's Scars of Mirrodin Block Flashback Draft – also featuring Mirrodin Beseiged and New Phyrexia.
• December 7-13 – Four words: Supreme. Pioneer. Chaos. Draft. Things are gonna get weird!
• December 14-20 – Welcome back to the jungle – it's Rivals of Ixalan-Ixalan Flashback Draft.
• December 21-January 24 – Vintage Cube makes its annual holiday return – this time for a full five weeks! As usual, there will be a Draft league and a single-elimination Draft queue. This is one of the formats that will test competitors in the Season 3 MOCS Showcase on January 21.
• January 25-30 – TBD

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MOCS SEASON 3 Last Chance EVENTS ENDING SOON​

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

Since Sunday afternoon Pacific time, all Preliminaries in Modern, Legacy, and Pioneer converted to Last Chance Events. In addition, Standard Showcase Challenges have been sprinkled across the schedule. Finish with a 5-0 record in that event to earn an Entry Token to that format’s Showcase Qualifier next month.

Entry options require both 40 Qualifier Points plus either 30 Event Tickets or 300 Play Points.
Here’s the schedule of remaining Last Chance Events this round:

DAY	TIME (PT)	TIME (UTC)	FORMAT
Tuesday	11 a.m.	19:00	Modern
Tuesday	3 p.m.	23:00	Standard
Tuesday	7 p.m.	3:00*	Legacy
Wednesday	3 a.m.	11:00	Legacy
Wednesday	7 a.m.	15:00	Standard

*indicates next-day

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

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SEASON 3 SHOWCASE CHALLENGES START SATURDAY​

Players who earned entry into the Showcase Qualifier will be squaring off for an invitation to the 2022 Season 3 Champions Showcase!

The entry option for Showcase Qualifiers is a format token that matches the Qualifier’s format. As with QPs, after the season's Showcase Qualifiers are finished, all unused Format Tokens will be removed from players' accounts.

Each Showcase Qualifier is a scheduled Swiss-style event with a Top 8 playoff. The winner of each Showcase Qualifier earns a spot in the final Showcase event in January and a chance to earn their share of $70,000 and an invitation to the 2023 Magic World Championship! That winner also gets invited to Pro Tour Minneapolis in May 2023.

Showcase Qualifiers are scheduled as follows:

DATE	TIME (PT)	TIME (UTC)	EVENT
Saturday, December 3	8 a.m.	16:00	Modern Showcase Qualifier
Sunday, December 4	6 a.m.	14:00	Pioneer Showcase Qualifier
Saturday, December 10	6 a.m.	14:00	Standard Showcase Qualifier
Sunday, December 11	8 a.m.	16:00	Legacy Showcase Qualifier

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

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2023 MOCS SEASON 1 INITIAL INFO & QP CHANGEOVER​

It’s official: we are keeping the same seasonal Showcase system for 2023!

The full Season 1 calendar is now available on the Premier Play information page (click link at top of Blog) or by clicking Calendar at the very top of this page. Leagues and Queues that give away Qualifier Points will start distributing Season 1 QPs around 7:30 a.m. PT (15:30 UTC).

Season 3 Qualifier Points expire tomorrow morning and will be removed from accounts later this week.

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LIMITED SUPER QUALIFIER FRIDAY​

Your next chance for Regional Championship Season 2 is a Limited Super Qualifier. Featuring The Brothers' War Sealed Deck with Top 8 Draft, this tournament kicks off this Friday, December 2nd at a special (for a Friday) start time of 7 a.m. Pacific (15:00 UTC).

Entry options are 40 Event Tickets, 400 Play Points, or 40 Season 1 Qualifier Points (the new ones). The Top 4 finishers earn invitations to the first Regional Championship of 2023 serving their country of residence, and prizes pay out to the Top 128!

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.

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MTGO STORE OUTAGE WEDNESDAY​

We will be doing maintenance on MTGO’s payment processor tomorrow, November 30, starting at 9 a.m. PT (17:00 UTC). It is scheduled to last for up to two hours. Purchases in the MTGO Store will not be available during this maintenance, but the game will be otherwise unaffected.

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DOMINARIA UNITED REDEMPTION ON SALE TODAY​

Thank you for your patience while we are getting our new systems set up. Starting at 9 a.m. today, you can purchase Redemption Tokens for Dominaria United in the MTGO Store.

Remember that the policy has changed – redemption sets are only available while supplies last, and a Redemption Token now costs $35.00 USD plus shipping fees and tax. For more details on the redemption program, click here.

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ETERNAL WEEKEND RETURNS TO MTGO DECEMBER 10-11​

The great autumnal tradition celebrating Legacy and Vintage formats – Eternal Weekend – returns to Magic Online in December!

This year is a bit different: Eternal Weekend events in North America and Asia are returning to tabletop, while the European events will be held here on MTGO.

All Magic Online accounts are eligible to join these events, not just European residents. Unlike MTGO events in 2020 and 2021, players will need to have the cards in their Collection to participate (no All-Access for these events).

At stake is the life-size art trophy for the winner, plus new this year there will be physical promo cards for the Top 8 finishers in each event.

For more details on the MTGO event, click here. For more details on the in-person events in Asia and North America, visit magic.gg.

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The Brothers' War ON MAGIC ONLINE​

Our latest set, The Brothers' War, has its events going live today! Check out the dedicated article to learn all about everything new with the release:

• The Brothers' War boosters and Commander decks
• The TRANSFORMERS Bundle – available for a limited time
• Updates to the MTGO Store
• Updates to Treasure Chests
• The latest suite of avatars
• Alternate Play Schedule

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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 once on Saturdays and once on Sundays for each Constructed format! 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:

• Pauper and Vintage Challenges are never pre-empted.
• Saturday Legacy Challenges require 32 players and give prizes to Top 32.
• Sunday Legacy Challenges require 64 players and give prizes to Top 64.
• 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.

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NEXT DOWNTIME JANUARY 25, 2023​

The next scheduled downtime is planned for Wednesday, January 25, 2023 beginning at 9 a.m. PT (17:00 UTC). This is for the implementation of Phyrexia: All Will Be One.

 

THE BROTHERS' WAR ON MAGIC ONLINE​

Our latest set, The Brothers’ War, has its events going live today! Check out the dedicated article to learn all about everything new with the release:

• The Brothers’ War boosters and Commander decks, plus the TRANSFORMERS Bundle – on-sale at 10 a.m. Pacific time (18:00 UTC) today!
• Updates to the MTGO Store
• Updates to Events
  • BRO Constructed Leagues and Limited Leagues start at 10 a.m. PT today
    • Including a Best-of-One Draft League
  • Adjustments to some Standard, Vintage, and Pauper events
• Updates to Treasure Chests - adding 40 cards from the Commander backlog
  • Treasure Chests update at 10 a.m. PT today!
• The latest suite of avatars
• Alternate Play Schedule

TRANSFORMERS BUNDLE ON SALE TODAY​

Your favorite Autobot and Decepticon characters make their debut in a special, unique-to-MTGO Universes Beyond offering – the TRANSFORMERS Bundle! For $24.99, all 15 regular-style, non-foil cards in the set can become part of your Magic Online collection for use in Legacy, Vintage, Commander, and Freeform formats – Optimus Prime, Starscream, Megatron, and more.

Each card in the Bundle features two modes between which a TRANSFORMERS character can appear – Bot Mode and Alt Mode. Both sides have powerful abilities, many of which cause the card to convert. The More Than Meets the Eye mechanic permits the card’s controller to have it enter in Alt Mode for an alternate cost.

Cards in the TRANSFORMERS Bundle will not be made available in Treasure Chests, and the Bundle is only available until the release of Phyrexia: All Will Be One in January – be sure you don’t miss out!

TRANSFORMERS, its Characters (Optimus Prime, Starscream, Megatron, etc.), Autobots, Decepticons, More Than Meets The Eye, and Robots in Disguise are trademarks of Hasbro and © TOMY [used with permission].

THE BROTHERS' WAR COMMANDER DECKS ON-SALE TODAY​

Designed for Commander players of all abilities, two pre-constructed decks go on-sale in the MTGO Store today at 10 a.m. PT. The choices are:

• Mishra’s Burnished Banner
• Urza’s Iron Alliance

Each deck sells for $29.99 and can be found in the Featured and Commander tabs in the MTGO store once they are live. For full decklists and other details, click here.

MOCS SEASON 3 ENDING SOON​

It is close to that time again – if you have at least 40 Season 3 Qualifier Points, be sure to participate in one of these events in November before those QPs expire.

• This weekend: Modern and Pioneer Showcase Challenges
• Next weekend: Standard and Legacy Showcase Challenges
• November 27-30: Modern, Pioneer, and Legacy Last Chance Events
  • LCEs require 30 Event Tickets or 300 Play Points in addition to 40 QPs
  • Standard LCEs will be added to the schedule – more details next week.

SHOWCASE CHALLENGES ARE BACK THIS WEEKEND​

Qualifying for the next set of MOCS Showcase Qualifier events in December reaches its conclusion over the next two weekends with four more Showcase Challenge events. First up:

• Modern – Saturday, November 19 at 8 a.m. PT (16:00 UTC)
• Pioneer – Sunday, November 20 at 6 a.m. PT (14:00 UTC)

Each Showcase Challenge can be joined with 40 Season 3 Qualifier Points. The Top 8 finishers in each event earn an Entry Token usable for that format’s next Showcase Qualifier.

DOMINARIA UNITED REDEMPTION - EXTENDED DELAY​

Unfortunately, there are still delays in getting product to our facility and to get the process started for selling Dominaria United redemption sets. The estimated date the Tokens will be available in the MTGO Store is now Tuesday, November 29.

Follow us @MagicOnline or in the Forums for any updates to the on-sale date, and for those waiting to order, thank you for your patience.

NEXT DOWNTIME JANUARY 25, 2023​

The next scheduled downtime is planned for Wednesday, January 25, 2023 beginning at 9 a.m. PT (17:00 UTC). This is for the implementation of Phyrexia: All Will Be One.

 

Magic Online has entered scheduled downtime. It is expected to last three hours until 12 noon Pacific (20:00 UTC).

Reminder: Constructed Leagues are extended to Tuesday, and Treasure Chests do no change until Tuesday.

 

THE BROTHERS' WAR ON MAGIC ONLINE​

Our latest set, The Brothers’ War, will be live soon. Check out the dedicated article to learn all about everything new with the release:

• The Brothers’ War boosters and Commander decks, plus the TRANSFORMERS Bundle – on-sale next Tuesday
• Updates to the MTGO Store
• Updates to Events
  • Extension to existing Constructed Leagues to November 15
  • Limited Leagues start next Tuesday (including a Best-of-One Draft League)
  • Adjustments to some Standard, Vintage, and Pauper events
• Updates to Treasure Chests - adding 40 cards from the Commander backlog
• The latest suite of avatars
• Alternate Play Schedule – including Supreme Pioneer Chaos something or other …
• Downtime Tomorrow

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PIONEER CHALLENGER DECKS 2022 ON-SALE TOMORROW​

Designed for players to get their start in the non-rotating Pioneer format, four pre-constructed decks go on-sale in the MTGO Store tomorrow following downtime. The choices are:

• Dimir Control
• Orzhov Humans
• Gruul Stompy
• Izzet Phoenix
  • Due to Expressive Iteration’s ban in Pioneer, the MTGO version of Izzet Phoenix swaps in 1 Pieces of the Puzzle and 1 Fiery Impulse

Each deck sells for $24.99 and can be found in the Featured and For New Players tabs in the MTGO store once downtime is complete.

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THRONE OF ELDRAINE DRAFT LEAGUE STARTS TOMORROW​

Our plane of fairy tales returns to the spotlight – the Throne of Eldraine Draft League starts tomorrow following downtime and lasts until Tuesday, November 15 at 10 a.m. Pacific time (18:00 UTC) - one day shorter than normal.

This is a keep-the-cards League, so it has the usual entry options of 12 Event Tickets, 120 Play Points, or 3 ELD boosters + 2 Event Tickets.

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INNISTRAD FLASHBACK ENDS TOMORROW​

The annual spooky-themed Flashback to the plane of Innistrad is back – even if it’s a tad later than normal. Draft with classic build-arounds of Burning Vengeance and Spider Spawning, or embrace the transformational power of Werewolves.

This 3x Innistrad Phantom Draft League closes tomorrow at downtime, so be sure to get your games in before the League is gone!

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QUALIFIERS THIS WEEKEND​

Ready to earn your spot in the next round of tabletop Regional Championships? Your next chance to do so comes this weekend. Four qualifications are on the line between these two events:

• Pauper Qualifier – Saturday, November 12 at 7 a.m. PT (15:00 UTC)
• Vintage Qualifier – Sunday, November 13 at 7 a.m. PT (15:00 UTC)

Each Super Qualifier can be joined with 40 Season 3 Qualifier Points. The Top 2 finishers in each event earn an invitation to the Regional Championship served by their country of residence early next year.

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DOMINARIA UNITED REDEMPTION - EXTENDED DELAY

Unfortunately, there are still delays in getting product to our facility and to get the process started for selling Dominaria United redemption sets. The estimated date the Tokens will be available in the MTGO Store is now Tuesday, November 29.

Follow us @MagicOnline or in the Forums for any updates to the on-sale date, and for those waiting to order, thank you for your patience.

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PATCH NOTES FOR NOVEMBER 9​

• Bring to Light will correctly cast the exiled card without requiring a mana payment.
• Urza, Lord High Artificer will also correctly not require a mana payment to cast the exiled card (and allows alternative payments).
• In the Account Settings view, billing and shipping addresses will be hidden by default.

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NEXT DOWNTIME TOMORROW​

The next scheduled downtime is planned for Wednesday, November 9 beginning at 9 a.m. PT (17:00 UTC). This is for the implementation of The Brothers’ War – note that events including that set do not begin until November 15. Check out the dedicated article for more.