mike

One of my favorite channels on YouTube, Distraction Makers, discuss proxying cards in MtG.

Some more info on the TCGPlayer situation

11 new cards added to Arena as well

This card made me fall in love with the game. I remember building a Golgari deck trying to use Urborg Panther, Feral Shadow, and Breathstealer to get Spirit of the Night out into play.

Some pictures of a recent leak of the FF starter kit:

Rosa, Steadfast White Mage - 3W - Legendary Creature : Noble Human Cleric - Reach; At the beginning of combat on your turn, put a +1/+1 counter on target creature you control. It gains lifelink until end of turn. (2/3).

Beatrix, Loyal General - 4WW - Legendary Creature : Human Soldier - Vigilance; At the beginning of combat on your turn, attach any number of equipment to target creature you control. (4/4).

Lightning, Security Sergeant - 2R - Legendary Creature : Human Soldier - Menace; Whenever Lightning deals combat damage to a player, exile the top card of your library. You may cast that card as long as you control Lightning. (2/3).

Rays of Judgement - 3R - Instant - Rays of Judgment deals 5 damage to target creature and X damage to it's controller, where X is the number of equipment you control.

Ultima Weapon - 7 - Legendary Artifact : Equipment - Equip 7; Whenever equipped creature attacks, destroy target creature. Equipped creature gets +7/+7.

Adalbert Steiner - 1W - Legendary Creature : Human Knight - Lifelink; Adalbert Steiner gets +1/+1 for each equipment you control. (2/1)

Cloud Moogle - 3WW - Creature : Moogle - Flying; Whenever this creature enters, put a +1/+1 counter on target creature. Plainscycling 2. (2/3).

Coeurl - 1W - Creature : Cat Beast - 1W + Tap -> Tap target non-enchantment creature. (2/2)

Dwarven Castle Guard - 1W - Creature : Dwarf Soldier - When this creature dies, create a colorless 1/1 hero token. (2/1)

Sun-Cryst's Fate - 4W - Instant - This spell costs 2 less to cast if it targets a tapped creature. Dstroy target nonland permanent.

Blade of Light - 1W - Instant - Blade of Light deals damage equal to the number of creatures and equipment you control to target creature.

White Auracite - 2WW - Artifact - When this artifact enters, exile target non-land permanent an opponent controls until this artifact leaves the battlefield. Tap -> Add W.

White Mage's Rod - 1W - Artifact : Equipment - Choose A Job (When this equipment enters create a colorless 1/1 hero token and attach this to it). Equip 3; The equipped creature gets +1/+1, gains "Whenever this creature attacks you gain 1 life," and is a Cleric in addition to its other types.

The Chosen of the Crystal - 5WW - Sorcery - Create 4 1/1 colorless hero tokens. Put a +1/+1 counter on each creature you control.

Dragonspear - 1W - Artifact : Equipment - Choose A Job (When this equipment enters create a colorless 1/1 hero token and attach this to it). Equip 4; Equipped creature gets +1/+0 and is a Knight in addition to it's other types. During your turn equipped creature gets flying.

G'raha Tia - 4W - Legendary Creature : Cat Archer - Reach; Whenever one or more creatures or artifacts you control are put into the graveyard from the battlefield, draw a card. This ability only triggers once per turn. (3/5).

Item Merchant - 1R - Creature : Human Citizen - Whenever you attack, target attacking equipped creature gets menace until the end of the turn. (2/2)

Warrior's Blade - 3R - Artifact : Equipment - Choose A Job (When this equipment enters create a colorless 1/1 hero token and attach this to it). Equip 5; Equipped creature gets +3/+2 and is a Warrior in addition to it's other types.

Suplex - 1R - Sorcery - Choose one: 1) Suplex deals 3 damage to target creature. If that creature would die this turn, exile it instead; 2) Exile target artifact.

Freija Crescent - R - Legendary Creature : Rat Knight - During your turn this creature has flying; Tap -> Add R. Only use this mana to cast equipment or activae abilties of equipment. (1/1)

Samurai Katana - 2R - Artifact : Equipment - Choose A Job (When this equipment enters create a colorless 1/1 hero token and attach this to it). Equip 5; Equipped creature gets +2/+2, has trample and haste, and is a Samurai in addition to it's other types.

Barret Wallace - 3R - Legendary Creature : Human Rebel - Reach; Whenever Barret Wallace attacks, he deals damage equal to the number of equipped creatures you control to defending player. (4/4)

Rabanastre, City of the Kingdom - Land : City - This land enters tapped. Tap -> Add W or R

Ultimecia, Menace of Time - 4UU - Legendary Creature : Human Warlock - Whenever this creature enters, tap all creatures your opponents control. Whenever a creature you control deals combat damage to an opponent, draw a card. (4/4)

Seymour Flux - 4B - Legendary Creature : Spirit Avatar - At the beginning of your upkeep you may pay 1 life. If you do, draw a card and put a +1/+1 counter on Seymour Beta. (5/5)

Deadly Embrace - 3BB - Sorcery - Destroy target creature an opponent controls. Then draw a card for each creature that died this turn.

Xande, Dark Mage - 2UB - Legendary Creature : Human Sorcerer - Menace; Xande gets +1+1 for each non-creature, non-land card in your graveyard. (3/3)

Magitek Scythe - 4 - Artifact : Equipment - When this equipment enters, you may attach it to target creature you control. If you do, that creature gains first strike until end of turn and must be blocked thus turn if able. Equip 2; Equipped creature gets +2/+1.

Sahagin - 1U - Creature : Merfolk Warrior - Whenever you cast a non-creature spell, if at least 4 mana was spent to cast it, put a +1/+1 counter on this creature and it can't be blocked this turn. (1/3)

Fairy of Il Mheg - 1U - Creature : Fairy - Flying; Whenever this creature attacks surveil 1. (2/1)

Go for the Esper - 3U - Sorcery - Create a 3/3 blue Robot artifact creature token. If this spell was cast from a graveyard, put a +1/+1 counter on that token. Flashback 5U.

Laguna's Dreams - 1U - Instant - Scry 1 and then draw a card. Flashback 3U.

Relm Drawings - 2UU - Sorcery - Create a token that is a copy of target artifact, creature, or land.

Aqueduct Rat - 1B - Creature : Rat - When this creature dies, create a treasure token. (2/2)

Shinra Reinforcements - 2B - Creature : Human Soldier - When this creature enters, mill 3 cards and gain 3 life. (2/3)

Sephiroth's Intervention - 3B - Instant - Destroy target creature. You gain 2 life.

Walking Cie'th - 2B - Mutant Horror - This creature enters tapped. Whenever you cast a non-creature spell, you may pay B. If you do, return this creature from your graveyard to your hand. (?/?)

Albhed Rescuers - 2B - Creature : Human Artificer Warrior - Whenever this creatue or another creature or artifact you control is put into your graveyard from the battlefield, target opponent loses 1 life and you gain 1 life. (2/3)

Extermination - 2B - Instant - Target creature gets -0/-9999 until end of turn.

The Return of Evil - 4B - Sorcery - Return target creature card from your graveyard to the battlefield with 2 +1/+1 counters on it.

Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/MTGRumors/comments/1jt1xyj/ff_starterkit/

Announcement Date: March 31, 2025

Standard:

No changes

Pioneer:

No changes

Modern:

Underworld Breach is banned.

Legacy:

Sowing Mycospawn is banned.
Troll of Khazad-dûm is banned.

Vintage:

No changes

Pauper:

Basking Broodscale is banned.
Kuldotha Rebirth is banned.
Deadly Dispute is banned.

Prophetic Prisim is unbanned.
High Tide is unbanned.

Alchemy:

No changes

Explorer:

No changes

Historic:

No changes

Timeless:

No changes

Brawl:

No changes

Effective Date: March 31, 2025

Just saw these yesterday, what do you all think? Seems like a fun take on basic lands, but it also sort of makes me question what a basic land even is at this point 😝

Is an individual final fantasy play booster intended to be the same price as aetherdrift? Sorry for the basic question, but it's hard to find clear info online.

No, Universes Beyond boosters normally have a higher MSRP.

Richard Garfield blogs about the differences between a ranked ladder and tournaments for competitive play.

Recently I started playing a digital game. There was a tournament announced for the top players. Although I wasn’t a top player – the game was new enough and there was enough luck in the play that I thought maybe I could qualify, and so I started paying attention to my ranking.

Quickly I noticed that I was having less fun because I was no longer experimenting and trying new things – I was focusing on what I knew worked. I began to lean more heavily on what other people said was correct rather than finding my own way. Losses were setbacks rather than learning experiences. When I rose to a level that corresponded to my actual skill, I stalled. Then the games became more samey, with the players mostly playing similar styles. I noticed that I felt like a mediocre player even though I was in the top 10%.

The experience brought into focus and made personal some of the misgivings I have had about extensive player rankings in games. [...]

tylerja-blog asked:

"That’s the nature of Magic. It adapts to the needs of the collective whole. It used to upset me, but I came to realize it is one of the game’s greatest strengths. It becomes the game its players need/want it to be." Is to me, a market-friendly way to say "sloughs emotionally invested players in pursuit of the unremarkable, but widely palatable middle"

Many players like to assume the core of the people making the changes aren’t enfranchised players, but it’s exactly the opposite. Why, for example, is Universes Beyond so popular? Because the people who play the most Magic really adore it.

We’re not ignoring the hard-core Magic players, we’re doing what they say they most want through their actions and in market research.

Magic is a business. Ignoring our core customers would just be bad business.

We make changes because Magic players, and especially our hard-core enfranchised players, want it. Maybe in this particular case it’s not you in particular (or maybe it is, I don’t know), but it’s not us ignoring “emotionally invested players”.

izzipurrito asked:

I know this is a big ask, but...

Please no more direct to Modern sets.

If you guys must, at least make it so that it is Standard legal so it is Standard level in power.

Some distributors have posted their Aetherdrift order pages and revealed that starting with Aetherdrift, the booster boxes will have 30 packs instead of 36.

I believe it's been stated that the per pack MSRP will not change, meaning the overall box price will just go down accordingly by 1/6th.

A Duskmourn Play booster box is $138 on TCGPlayer, or $3.83 per pack. They are $4.25 when bought individually.

The new MSRP for Aetherdrift $5.50 per pack. If they keep the same price of $140 per box, that would work out to about $4.66 per pack when buying a box. And if they left it at 36 packs it would cost about $168 per box which I think everyone in the world realizes is just far too expensive to buy.