MTG

Hi Mark,

From one Marvel fan to another, what does the chance of getting access to the otherwise mechanically unique Secret Lair Marvel cards in a later product look like now after the feedback was passed on? Still low? Impossible?

All the unique mechanical cards from the Marvel Secret Lair will appear later in the same mechanical form, possibly with the same name, in some product.

Cube legend and an amazing person, unbelievably sad 😞. He streamed as Teamjbro on Twitch and dominated Vintage Cube every season, even organizing and running CubeCon every year.

Here’s the GoFundMe for his family if anyone is interested.

Part of the Magic Academy promos in Foundations includes an Ajani lapel pin for the most friendly and helpful players and staff who help teach new players.

Size comparison with a Sol Ring Buy-A-Box promo.

Here are some of the biggest brained, 300 IQ Magic plays ever caught on camera!

Some great plays, some of these are more like "tricks" but all of them are really impressive and fun to watch.

I personally use cockatrice, there's almost always a game available

MTGO and MTGA are the official clients (MTGA only has brawl. MTGO has commander but is also not particularly budget friendly). There are also unofficial ones like cockatrice, untap.in, xmage, forge (with some of these, you might be able to play commander, with others not). Many also play commander via webcam using https://spelltable.wizards.com/

source

I've been playing some Magic recently on Forge and considering rejoining my local game store (LGS). However, it seems like the company is pushing Commander a lot, and the most recommended way to play it is through Cockatrice. Nevermind, I'll keep playing on Forge, and maybe I'll try Cockatrice. I'm just not excited about playing a format where "Bobsponge" is a thing. It makes me wonder, what are they even doing with this game?

From his Facebook:

This is the part of artist relations Wizards of the Coast is NOT going to like to talk about in public. This is why laid-off employees need to sign Non Disclosure Agreements (NDAs) to receive severance packages. Corporations do not like public facts. Since I will likely never work for Wizards again, and have already stopped accepting new commissions from them for over a year now, I feel the need to share all of this factual, public information to drive the conversation regarding compensation into the light and force Wizards to engage in change for those artists, digital and traditional, who still rely upon them as an income source.

Let’s start at the beginning.

The fee for my very first Magic:The Gathering card back in 1996 was $1000.

That was modestly good pay for small, work-for-hire spot illustration artwork where the artist had a large creative control in the process. Over the years I continued to work with new commissions from Wizards even as the art management of the content grew with heavily directly style guides and the basic fee stayed the same. I did my best to deliver exceptional high quality oil paintings at those fees, including illustrations like Cartographer, Mirari, the 7th Edition Shivan Dragon, and the suite of characters for Ravnica - Razia, Tolsimir, Szadek, Agrus, and the Sisters.

Stepping forward two decades, the fee for one of my artworks in a recent set from Magic, Murders at Karlov Manor, commissioned in 2023 was also $1000… 27 years and not a cent raised from my base rate. Or, when accounting for inflation, the fee is actually far lower, at $516 in relative dollar value comparison ( in acknowledgement Wizards has raised their base rate to a whopping $1250 in 2024. Thanks Wizards). Why would someone work for a client who did not raise their pay after 27 years?

I have asked that question of myself many times. Mostly it was that I did not depend upon Wizards as a primary client, taking just a card commission here and there as desired. The connection to the game and fans was part of the deal to accept low pay.

I actually stopped working for Wizards back in 2010 over these exploitatively low fee issues. I concentrated my energies on many other professional projects. But I returned to accept new commissions from Wizards in 2017.

Why?

First, two of my artist friends and mentorees had moved into positions at Wizards as art directors. They reached out to me, and I wanted to help them create great art for the game of Magic. We are all part of an artistic community.

Secondly, I enjoy making high quality, labor intensive oil paintings for my projects, and the art directors knew the growing secondary aftermarket for Magic art was a way I could get ‘paid’ for my quality work, even if the initial commission fee did not justify the labor.

I returned not to work for Wizards’ low fees, but to stay connected to the community and aftermarket associated with Magic - convention appearances, sales of original art, signing artist proofs, cards, and playmats to fans, players, art collectors, and other artists all connected to Magic. I am a fan of this genre.

The private, secondary original art market for Magic: The Gathering card illustration has seen tremendous growth over the past two decades - from practically ‘giving away’ Magic art back in the late 1990’s for a couple hundred dollars, full color finished card art can now sell from $2000 to $10,000 and up, sketches sell for $300 to $800 and more.

The only way for me, and many other artists, to bring an exceptionally high degree of craft to the art at the pay scale Wizards offered was to recapture that invested labor in the secondary aftermarket connected to private collectors and fans. It is this aftermarket which allows Magic artists to make a modest living, knowing that financial recoupment existed beyond Wizards of the Coast’s meager initial fees. The secondary aftermarket has helped fuel the creative energies of artists and allowed them to invest tremendous labor and quality in an extremely low paid commission. Until it didn’t.

Recent Magic:The Gathering set releases in their Universes Beyond themed expansions appears to prohibit the sale and creation of ANY physical art and removes ALL secondary aftermarket sales - no original art, no artist proofs, no prints, no playmats, no repainted interpretations, no convention/event sketches of ANY kind for ALL of the commissioned images. All commissioned art was to be expressly and purely digitally executed, the initial low work-for-hire fee was the ONLY compensation. Using a conservative estimate, Wizards removed secondary aftermarket sales of $3+ million from artists working upon the Universes Beyond, The Lord of the Rings set. Thank you for supporting your artists Wizards.

This digital only art requirement is in no way an industry standard for commercially commissioned artists. Wizards has introduced a new level of contractual obligations which specifically targets to destroy the private, artist based secondary aftermarket sales which was directly benefiting the Magic artist, fan, and collector community.

Why? I have no reasonable assessments.

The aftermarket has zero impact on the initial sales of the game and product to the millions of players worldwide in ten languages. In fact the aftermarket greatly benefits the game through player interactions with artists at events, the collecting and signing of cards, the public display and excitement of original art in game shops around the world, and the use of original art by Wizard’s itself as prizes to players.

More importantly, the aftermarket provided a broad incentive for artists to vest labor and quality into the products they were creating for Magic. This removal of incentive means that Wizards has guaranteed that the quality of art they will receive for these sets will diminish, likely impacting sales negatively. Recently Wizards has seemingly thrown traditional artists a scrap from the table with the new Marvel set, allowing them to sell a painting from their commission into the secondary market, but treating digital artists differently with no such offering it appears.

How do you feel digital artists? Excited to work on that next Universes Beyond set knowing Wizards contractually thinks less of you as artists?

Although these new contractual obligations are only occurring with the Universes Beyond sets, it is not too hard to see them implemented on standard Magic contracts in the future. Hasbro has stepped up the Universes Beyond to be nearly half of their set releases in the future. Sadly looking forward to even more exploitative digital only contracts reducing the secondary aftermarket even further.

To add gasoline to this fire, Hasbro’s current CEO is quoted as welcomingly embracing A.I. art creation and it’s use on Magic and D&D products. It is not hard to see the leap of a digital only artist contract being replaced with digital only A.I. art now that the CEO has openly stated such a direction. Thank you for supporting, respecting, and valuing your artists Hasbro.

To all the artists working, and hoping to work on Magic, I am sure Wizards will raise the base rate again in 27 years to properly compensate the prompted A.I. robots.

In frustration and sadness for my peers,

Donato Giancola November 2, 2024

Do permanents that are also a 4/4 creature because of [[Bello, Bard of the Brambles]] trigger creature ETB effects from things like [[Warstorm Surge]]?

The Professor gives us his thoughts on the recent Universes Beyond announcements.

[[Estrid's Invocation]] enters as a copy of another enchantment you control. At your upkeep, you may re-enter it, allowing you to choose a different target.

Note that casting it without an eligible target will void the second part. It will just stay and sit there, not triggering on upkeep.

I tried to build a deck around this card with lots of non-legendary enchantments. And found out, Sagas are particularly interesting. The crazy interaction is that Estrid's re-enter triggers before Sagas tick up.

An example match start:

• turn 2: [[Omen of the Sea]] (1U, flash, scry 2, then draw 1)
• turn 3: [[Estrid's Invocation]] (2U), gaining another scry 2 + draw 1
• turn 4: [[Binding the old Gods]] (2BG, destroy nonland), Estrid re-entered before on the Omen to get a 3rd scry2+d1
• turn 5: Estrid re-enters as the Binding, which immediately lets you destroy a second nonland. Next but still in your upkeep, both Sagas tick up, letting you fetch two ~~basic~~ forests.
• turn 6: Estrid re-enters as the Binding before it's saga counter can tick up, letting you destroy a 3rd nonland, and fetching a 3rd forest, before the original Binding finally expires.

If you managed to get a 2nd Estrid out by that point, you can have both Estrid Sagas copy each other infinitely, without ever expiring.

Also nice: [[Elspeth conquers Death]] (3WW, exile mana 3+) and [[The Eldest Reborn]] (4B, sac creature, discard, return creature/PW from any GY)

Other non-saga enchantments which I found useful:

• [[Omen of the Hunt]] (2G, flash, fetch basic land)
• [[Wingbright Thief]] (more on that later)
• [[Smothering Tithe]] (3W, opponent chooses wether they have less mana or you gain more)
• [[Revenge of Ravens]] (3B, drain 1 life for each creature attacking you)
• and of course [[Triumphant Getaway]] (1UBR, flash, heist twice, drain 2 on casting heisted cards)

Some are useful because of their on-enter effects, some are useful to stack up a beneficial ability. A Smothering Tithe times 2 makes a significant difference in speed, no matter wether they choose to have less mana for themselves or give you more treasures.

[[Wingbright Thief]] (1WU, creature, on enter reveals opponents nonland hand cards, choose one which perpetually gains "opponent draws 1 and gains 3 life" when you cast this) ... is the only enchantment creature I found worthwhile (maybe aside from [[Overlord of the Hauntwoods]]). But it's a crazy good target for Estrid! Not only does it give you intel on their hand each round for free, you can also burden their most valuable spells with an advantage for you.

For some spells, like untargeted discard, this outright renders it useless. Sure, you can cast it and make me discard a card, but before that happens, I get to draw one and gain 3 life. Similarly, red face damage can be neutralized by this.

For most other spells, the question becomes "how many stacks of Wingbright Thief can this card endure, before casting it becomes more beneficial to your opponent than to you?", which is quite an interesting game mechanic if you ask me. Both sides have to weigh options and estimate value.

Some spells remain useful regardless of how many stacks they have. When a [[Haze of Pollen]] (1G prevent all combat damage) would prevent you from dying, it's still worth casting, even if your opponent draws 10 cards and gains 30 life.

Another poweful aspect of Estrid's Invocation is the flexibility it provides. On each upkeep, you can re-spec your toolkit, choosing wether you want more creatures, more sagas, or more passive abilities this turn.

Sometimes I even use it on [[Utopia Sprawl]] (G, forest makes extra mana) to have 1 more mana this round of a missing color, or on [[Valgavoth's Lair]] (a hexproof land of any color) to have more mana next round, and to flee an expected nonland destroy.

The more I play with it (Magic Arena Historic), the more I wonder why I see it so rarely. Have you played with or against it already? What are your thoughts?

The announcement of this rule change with examples are at the bottom of the article. To summarize:

In the current rules, if you attack with a creature and it gets multi-blocked, once your opponent locks in their blocks, you choose the order of blockers immediately. During the combat damage step, you must assign enough (big asterisk on "enough") damage on the first creature before you can assign damage on the next.

Starting with Foundations, you don't choose an order for the blockers. During the combat damage step, you will just distribute damage however you want.

This weakens multi-blocking as a defensive option.

We will one day speak of blocker order like we do damage on the stack.

Now an update for @MTG_Arena! Pioneer Masters is coming December 10th 2024! Pioneer Masters brings many cards to MTG Arena for the first time as we work towards our goal of parity with competitive Pioneer in tabletop.

Chris Cocks confirms Spider-Man set will be first of multiple major sets WotC collaborates with Marvel on in coming years.