Starting February 6, Wizards team members and family members will be able to interact more closely with the community by being eligible to participate in some Magic organized play events as well as some events on Magic Online.

This policy change comes after considering the way the Magic community is able to interact with our team members and identifying that giving team members more opportunities to play in some Magic events will encourage a deeper connection between Wizards and the Magic community. This change will better enable Wizards to craft the best experiences for the Magic community, while at the same time provide more opportunities for the Wizards team to do what they love—play more Magic!

Under the revised policy, Wizards team members will be eligible to participate in Magic organized play events in the community with the following exceptions:

During a blackout period in which Standard or Limited (Sealed Deck and Draft) events allow a new booster set release, until the week after that set's release date. For example: Fate Reforged's release date was Friday, January 23, 2015, so had the policy been in effect this week, associates would have been allowed to participate in sanctioned Limited and Standard events starting Friday, January 30, 2015.

Events which are part of, or lead to, our Premier Magic Programs. Currently these events include: Preliminary Pro Tour Qualifiers, Pro Tour Qualifiers, Regional Pro Tour Qualifiers, Pro Tour, Grand Prix, Grand Prix Trials, World Magic Cup Qualifiers, World Magic Cup, the Magic World Championship, and Magic Online Championship Series Preliminaries and Finals.

Third party premier play-like events (e.g., StarCityGames.com Open Series, TCGplayer.com MaxPoint Series, etc.).

Any events where any prize exceeds $250.00 USD.

Wizards team members are required to introduce themselves to the tournament organizers before signing-up for an event, and tournament organizers have the right to deny admittance to Wizards team members for any reason.

In Magic Online, Wizards team members are eligible to play in queues, Leagues, and open play, but not scheduled events and you will always know you are playing against a Wizards team member by their username

We love our communities and look forward to having a great time with everyone!

UPDATE 8/31/2015: With the release of Magic Online Leagues, we’ve updated this policy so that Wizards employees will be able to participate in Magic Online League play. For more details on Leagues, refer to this article.