Magic Online Weekly Announcements, January 21, 2025
Posted on Jan 21, 2025
Treasure Chest Information -Changelist Available Now, Updates After Downtime Tomorrow
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THE LEAD
Read All About It – Hover-Zoom & Card Image Improvements Live Tomorrow
Creative Director Ryan Spain is back with the low down on the latest updates to the look and feel of cards in Magic Online. Following tomorrow’s downtime, hovering your mouse over a card for a short time will let the image zoom to a more readable size. It’s a rollover feature, so you can quickly move from one card to the next, all without interfering with your ability to click to take game actions.
Another change is to re-frame how most cards look in the game, from fonts to art image clarity, making cards look closer to their tabletop versions. Check out this article for details and look for the changes to go live alongside tomorrow’s downtime!
Innistrad Remastered Available Following Downtime Tomorrow!
The first Magic offering of 2025 is a return to one of the game’s most beloved planes – Innistrad! Think of Innistrad Remastered (set code INR) as a collectible version of Innistrad Cube – your Gothic and cosmic horror favorites all under one banner.
Magic Online will be the exclusive digital home of Innistrad Remastered! The set will debut when we come up from downtime tomorrow, January 22.
Boosters
An Innistrad Remastered Play Booster featuring 14 cards with 1-4 rare/mythics and 1-2 foils will cost $3.99 USD in the MTGO Store, the same as a Standard set. Its contents will mirror their cardboard cousins – a rare/mythic, a wild card, a foil wild card, a regular or foil land, plus a retro-frame card in every pack!
The INR Premium Booster, a MTGO Store exclusive, features 4 rare/mythics, 6 foils, and 7 alternate-border cards among the 10 cards in the pack and will cost $5.99 USD. Here’s the breakdown:
- 1 foil uncommon
- 1 foil common
- 1 foil retro basic land
- 1 regular Booster Fun common
- 1 regular Booster fun uncommon
- 1 foil Booster Fun common/uncommon
- Booster Fun commons/uncommons include Showcase, Retro, and Borderless frames
- 1 foil rare/mythic (regular frame)
- 2 regular Booster Fun rare/mythics
- 1 foil Booster Fun rare/mythics
- Booster Fun rare/mythics include Showcase, Borderless, Retro, and Movie Poster frames (including headliner Edgar Markov!)
Events
Innistrad Remastered events kick off immediately following downtime and run only until Aetherdrift events start at 10 a.m. PT (18:00 UTC) on February 11.
- Both a Draft league and a single-elimination Draft queue will be offered, but they are keep-the-cards events that cost the same as those of a Standard set (12 and 15 Event Tickets, respectively, plus the normal suite of alternate entry options).
- Preliminary, Challenge, and Premier events utilizing Sealed Deck during this period will use INR for their product and award booster & set prizes of Innistrad Remastered instead of Foundations.
- There is a Limited Qualifier on Friday, January 31 that will use INR for product and prizes.
- Constructed Challenge and Premier events will switch to award Innistrad Remastered set prizes following downtime.
Odds & Ends
- Treasure Chest contents will be updated with Innistrad Remastered included once we come up from downtime - be sure to look for the suite of retro-frame and Movie Poster cards! Check out the Treasure Chest Update item below.
- INR is not eligible for redemption and there are no Prestige Avatars.
- Finally, rarity downshifts for INR will apply right after downtime.
TREASURE CHEST UPDATE
Foundations Jumpstart, Mystery Booster 2, INR, and More in TCs Tomorrow
We’re restocking the Treasure Chest with Innistrad Remastered cards immediately following tomorrow’s downtime. Also, after a bit of a delay, Magic Online’s Treasure Chest will feature select cards from Foundations Jumpstart (set code J25) and Mystery Booster 2 (MB2) starting tomorrow as well.
Specifically, we’re including the following:
- J25 – Anime Art cards (both new and reprints), and all new rare/mythics from the Main Set
- MB2 – Future Sight frame rare/mythics (some foil) and foil white-bordered rare/mythics
- A set of 14 commons & uncommons in these treatments will also appear
- INR – Retro rare/mythics, plus the headliner Edgar Markov and the borderless Sorin Markov – all in foil.
For those who are curious, common and uncommon versions of the J25 and MB2 treatments will feature in the next Magic Online Player Rewards grant on February 3 covering January event play and Store spending.
On top of all of that, we discovered a handful of cards that had been created but were never released. Here’s that list (*indicates original edition of a card released in a later Commander set):
Additions to Treasure Chest |
|
Catti-Brie of Mithral Hall (AFC) |
Klauth, Unrivaled Ancient (AFC) |
Extract Brain (AFC)* |
Lorcan, Warlock Collector (AFC) |
Holy Avenger (AFC) |
Minn, Wily Illusionist (AFC) |
We will be updating Treasure Chests again on February 11 when Aetherdrift debuts, so be sure to crack them open if you love the look of these cards before they get hard to get!
For full details on Treasure Chest composition, click the Treasure Chest Information link at the top of the Blog.
PREMIER PLAY & EVENT NEWS
Congratulations Charalampos Kikidis, 2024 MOCS Season 3 Showcase Champion!
Eight of Magic Online’s top competitors gathered this weekend to earn their share of $50,000 and two invitations to the 2025 World Championship. In the end, Charalampos Kikidis ruled the day!
The day began with Vintage Cube with MOCS rookie Matthew Wright having the hot hand. The American player ran a Gruul strategy that featured Orcish Lumberjack and friends. Matthew defeated fellow American Andrei Klepatch, who played a 4-color good stuff build, in the pod finals to lock up a seat in the Championship round.
In the Modern rounds, the two Boros Energy decks in the field met in the pod finals. Greece’s Charalampos Kikidis took the mirror match from Klepatch.
Then in the Championship round, Kikidis topped Wright’s Dimir Oculus strategy in two games.
Charalampos took home $13,000 as Champion, while Matthew earned $11,000. Both players will appear at the 2025 Magic World Championship later this year!
The MTGO game team thanks all 8 Showcase competitors, our talented team of casters, and the exceptional behind-the-scenes production team for a great event!
You can watch all of the action on MTGO’s YouTube channel and get decklists and standings on the event page on Magic.gg.
If you want to be part of the next Showcase in May, click the Premier Play Information link at the top to learn more.
It's Showcase Challenge Weekend
A new MOCS season is underway, so it’s time to qualify the first players for the next round of Showcase Qualifiers in 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 round of events:
DATE |
TIME (PT) |
TIME (UTC) |
EVENT |
Saturday, January 25 |
8:00 a.m. |
16:00 |
Modern Showcase Challenge |
Sunday, January 26 |
8:00 a.m. |
16:00 |
Standard Showcase Challenge |
Saturday, February 1 |
10:00 a.m. |
18:00 |
Vintage Showcase Challenge |
Sunday, February 2 |
8:00 a.m. |
16:00 |
Legacy Showcase Challenge |
For more information on these events, click the Premier Play Information link at the top of the Blog.
ALTERNATE PLAY
Last Call to Use Vintage Cube Draft Tokens
If you are still holding onto a Vintage Cube Draft Token, you have only until tomorrow’s downtime to use it. We will be removing all unused Tokens from accounts during downtime with no refunds – please make sure you use them up!
Pioneer Chaos Draft Start Next Week
We’re gathering up Phantom boosters of every non-Core set in Pioneer (yes, Foundations, you’re in) and tossing them in the grab bag – chaos will ensue ...
Check out the Pioneer Chaos Draft League starting next Wednesday, January 29. It’ll run for about two weeks until the start of Aetherdrift, so don’t miss out!
When Does Vintage Cube Return?
With the current Holiday round of Vintage Cube ending at tomorrow’s downtime, here’s the plan for the next round of Vintage Cube:
- March – exact dates TBD – Spring Refresh
- May – exact dates TBD – Update to support MOCS
AROUND THE WEB
MTGO University – MTGO Fundamentals How-To Series Live
We’ve introduced a brand-new landing spot for everything related to getting your new-to-MTGO friends up to speed on playing our game – MTGO University! Whether you’re new to a specific format, new to Magic Online, or are just curious about what this version of MTG is all about, check out MTGO University.
New to MTGO University – the MTGO Fundamentals playlist: short-form videos showing off a bunch of tips and tricks. Check it out on YouTube today!
WEEKLY UPDATES
Redemption Corner
We’ve updated our Redemption page with new quantity percentages.
Bloomburrow sets redeemed with regular digital cards are now out of stock. BLB sets redeemed with foil digital cards remain in stock in low quantities. As a reminder, we announced changes to the Redemption Program starting with Bloomburrow – read all about it in this article.
Duskmourn: House of Horror redemption tokens are also now available in the Store. A limited number of Outlaws of Thunder Junction sets still remain available.
Finally, Magic: The Gathering Foundations is not a redeemable set – redemptions will resume with Aetherdrift.
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.
PATCH NOTES – January 22, 2025
Quality-of-Life Improvements
- Zooming on cards has been updated to occur whenever you hover on a card image.
- Art images on many cards have improved clarity and font adjustments.
- In Collection and Deckbuilding scenes, the minimum and maximum size of cards are expressed as a percentage of pixels available on your monitor. This should improve the experience for players with large monitors.
General Updates
- Certain Scheduled Events will no longer allow to entry players from restricted regions. Restriction regions are found in the Legal Information on this page.
Card Fixes – Holiday Bug Bash!!
- Enchantments from the Amonkhet Invocations set will display correct card frames.
- Amped Raptor will not trigger if it’s cast from any zone other than hand.
- Damage-dealing abilities of creatures that have left the battlefield since triggering will correctly evaluate the last-known information of its source.
- Dusk Mangler will again cause opponents to discard.
- Florian, Voldaren Scion will no longer cause opponents to shuffle away cards revealed by previous effects.
- Futureshifted cards from Future Sight will no longer cause client crashes when Windows scaling is increased.
- Glarb, Calamity’s Augur will correctly cast X spells from atop your library if their mana value is 4 or more.
- Liliana, Waker of the Dead will correctly make opponents who can’t discard lose 3 life.
- Borderless versions of Memnite will feature correct card art.
- Nowhere to Run will correctly keep ward abilities from triggering.
- Plaguecrafter will correctly force an opponent to discard if they can’t sacrifice a creature or planeswalker.
- Terravore and Sutured Ghoul will play nicely together, having their */* power and toughness apply across all zones.
- The First Tyrannic War’s first chapter ability will apply correctly to creature with X in their mana cost.
- Timothar, Baron of Bats will correctly allow stolen Vampires to be exiled with its ability.
NEXT SCHEDULED DOWNTIME – February 5, 9 a.m.-Noon PT
After tomorrow, the next scheduled maintenance is set for Wednesday, February 5 from 9 a.m. to 12 noon PT (17:00-20:00 UTC). This is to support the release of Aetherdrift.