David works on the Magic community team as a content specialist. He spends his days writing about Magic Online and trying to play too many colors at once in Limited.

What Is the Magic Online Weekly Announcements Blog?

Every Tuesday, we round up all of the biggest Magic Online news for the Weekly Announcements Blog.

Check in weekly for the latest updates!

Quick Links

Don't Forget to Watch Vintage Super League Tonight!

The Vintage Super League kicks off tonight at 6:00 p.m. Pacific (UTC-8) on twitch.tv/magic! Check out Randy Buehler's preview article for a look at what's coming up in tonight's episode.

Check in tomorrow on MTGO.com to get a complete list of all decklists being used by Vintage Super League competitors.

Changes to Pro Tour Challenge Invitees

The Magic Online Pro Tour Challenge is an additional event held during Pro Tour especially for players who qualified for the Pro Tour through Magic Online. Previously, the only way to earn an invite to the Pro Tour Challenge was by qualifying through a Pro Tour Qualifier Event on Magic Online. Now, beginning with the Season 3 Finals, players who earn an invitation to the Pro Tour via a Magic Online Championship Series (MOCS) season final, Player of the Year Championship, or Last Chance Qualifier will also be eligible to participate in the Pro Tour Challenge!

Check out the table below for a list of fabulous prizes players can win in the Pro Tour Challenge.

Match Wins Prize 4 Wins $1,500 + 54 Magic Online boosters 3 Wins $1,500 + 45 Magic Online boosters 2 Wins $1,500 + 36 Magic Online boosters 1 Win $1,500 + 27 Magic Online boosters 0 Wins $1,500 + 18 Magic Online boosters

Please note that players who have qualified for the Pro Tour via a MOCS Season Final will no longer be eligible for either face-to-face or Magic Online PTQ events that qualify for the same Pro Tour.

Refer to the MOCS page for the full details.

Ugin's Fate on Magic Online

Want to get your hands on cards from the Ugin’s Fate booster packs on Magic Online? Players will be getting their chance during the Magic Online Fate Reforged Prerelease and Release Events!

Fate Reforged Streaming Events

To give players a sneak-peek at what's coming with Fate Reforged, Magic Online will be hosting a Fate Reforged Preview Draft. To show off the new set, we've invited popular streamers from far and wide to put it through its paces. We'll be holding two events, one on Wednesday, January 28, at 6:00 p.m. Pacific (UTC-8), and the second on Thursday, January 29, at 1:00 p.m. Pacific. Competition will be fierce—a booster pack of Fate Reforged is on the line for each match win, awarded with the start of Prerelease on Friday, January 30. For information about which streamers are playing which days, as well as links to their Twitch channels, check out the table below.

Fate Reforged Phantom Preview Draft

START TIMES Wednesday, January 28, 6:00 p.m.

and

Thursday, January 29, 1:00 p.m.

All times are Pacific (for UTC, add 8 hours) LOCATION Scheduled Events ENTRY OPTIONS Option 1 Invite Only PRODUCT Magic Online will provide 1 Phantom Fate Reforged booster pack and 2 Phantom Khans of Tarkir booster packs SIZE 8 players PLAY STYLE Swiss FORMAT Draft DURATION 10 minutes deck-building time. Three rounds, each round up to 50 minutes.

MOCS and PTQ Prelim and Final Event Prize Changes

Beginning January 30, booster prizes for all MOCS and PTQ Prelim and Final Events will award two-thirds Khans of Tarkir booster packs and one-third Fate Reforged booster pack.

Learn more about the MOCS and PTQ programs.

Extended Downtime for January 28, 2015

All tournaments will close Wednesday, January 28, at 12:00 a.m. Pacific (8:00 UTC)

Store and trade activity will be suspended at approximately 2:45 a.m. Pacific(10:45 UTC)

The system will be down from 3:00 a.m. Pacific (11:00 UTC) until 1:00 p.m. Pacific (21:00 UTC)

Build Notes

Magic Online Gameplay

The Banned and Restricted lists have been updated as described in the January 19, 2015 announcement. In addition, the 100-Card Singleton list has been updated to match the Banned list currently enforced in Magic Online.

Delve has been updated with better prompt box text, updated highlighting for indicating which cards are available to be exiled, updated workflow to move all cards from the graveyard to exile simultaneously, and updated log text.

You can now select opponent’s creatures while casting Duneblast even if you don’t control a creature.

Fixed an issue that caused cards that have multiple targets to select, such as Arc Lightning or Inferno Titan, have the 'OK' improperly grayed out preventing users from being able to proceed.

Fixed an issue that caused choices such as shuffling with Ponder to incorrectly register the incorrect response from the player.

Fixed a crash that was caused when tokens in older frames gained blue text. For example, casting Hive Stirrings when any ability granting Sliver was on the battlefield.

Fixed a crash that was caused when Fade Away was cast while there were multiple creatures on the battlefield.

Deepcavern Imp no longer forces the player to pay Echo.

The window that opens when a Delayed Trigger Ability goes on the stack has been updated to better reflect that the ability is a Delayed Trigger.

The temporary window previously named “Exiled (Can be Cast)” has been updated to “Exile Zone (Can be Played)”.

Living weapon, Cycling, Reinforce, Scry, Champion, Extort, Suspend, Undying, and Annihilator have had their reminder text, prompt box text and/or trigger text updated for clarity.

Creatures that can choose to deal damage to a player as though it wasn’t blocked, such as Tornado Elemental, that have had their prompt box text updated for clarity.

Modal Triggered Abilities, such as Orzhov Pontiff, now better reflect the choice that has been made on the stack and in the game log.

Magic Online Look and Feel

The summoning sickness animation has been updated for an improved look and feel. We have also made huge performance upgrades compared to how the old animation impacted client performance.

For Fate Reforged, the premium version of new choose Khans or Dragons cards will have different animations prior to and after the choice depending on the choice that the player makes.

The context menu when right-clicking has been updated in styling and font. We have also removed small amounts of dead space that would cause a selection to not register. Context menus for modal cards have also been updated.

For some newer Planeswalker cards, the art will now break the frame to match the look and feel of physical cards. The remaining newer, Magic 2015 and more recent, Planeswalker cards will break the frame on 2/18/2015.

Magic Online General

Fixed a crash that was caused by deck names ending in a number.

We have disabled player chat on the Free Server.

We have redone the prompt that player’s receive after a game ends to accurately reflect who has won the game and/or match.

Awarded January MOCS card Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite. For each 15 Season 2 (January) QPs a user had, they will receive 1 card. Full information about the Magic Online Championship program can be found here.

Awarded January Store Activity card (Rattleclaw Mystic) and Event Participation card (Kiora’s Follower). Full information about the Magic Online Player Rewards program can be found here.

Magic Online Account Sign-Up

Improved the workflow for users who have cookies and/or JavaScript disabled.

Improved password requirement workflow to better enforce the need for both uppercase and lowercase letters in passwords.

Updated the links to the Privacy Policy and ESRB information.

Updated the minimum system requirements from Windows XP to Windows Vista to match what the current standards are.

Known Issues

If a manifested creature has been granted a keyword ability that the face up creature naturally has, it will not properly display blue text to the controller indicating that the manifested creature also has that ability. For example, if you have a face-down manifested Flying Men then Lightform will not give blue rules text indicating 'Flying' on a the face-down side of the card. Even lacking the blue text, the creature will have flying properly.

Face-down manifested cards that change controllers have incorrect art assets when viewed by the new controller.

The cycle of two-colored common lands’ textbox backgrounds only display one color.

Upcoming Events

January 14-January 28—Legacy Cube and Odyssey Flashback Draft Queues

January 28-January 29—Khans of Tarkir Sealed Pro Tour Qualifier Preliminaries

January 30-January 31—Khans of Tarkir/Fate Reforged Sealed Pro Tour Qualifier Preliminaries

February 1—Khans of Tarkir/Fate Reforged Sealed Pro Tour Qualifier Finals 7:00 a.m. Pacific (15:00 UTC)

January 30-February 2—Fate Reforged Prerelease Events

February 2-February 18—Fate Reforged Release Events

February 11-February 13—Season 2 Magic Online Championship Series Preliminaries

February 14—Season 2 Magic Online Championship Series Finals 7:00 a.m. Pacific (15:00 UTC)