Magic: The Gathering Archives

This apology arises amid a plethora of tweets and complaints by the LGBTQ+ players of Magic: The Gathering, who were absolutely outraged that a contracted writer would write out such an important part of a pivotal character's persona in as dismissive of a way as he did. Source: Wizards of the Coast However briefly, the Wizards Creative[...]

Welcome (or in many cases, welcome back) to our Magic: The Gathering deck tech analyses of the Amonkheti gods and the grim, grisly fates that took four out of the five of them (or is that the eight of them? The verdict is out) Currently, we are covering the fate of poor Rhonas, the "indomitable" snake-headed god of[...]

Hello faithful readers of Bleeding Cool's coverage of Magic: The Gathering news! Today, I continue my analysis of the Gods of Amonkhet and their very sad, rather untimely fates This has been done through various deck techs, and today will be no exception. We honestly did not get nearly enough of Rhonas the Indomitable in the Amonkhet short[...]

There are a few (more) mysteries afoot at Wizards of the Coast! Following (rather closely) in the footsteps of the Magic: The Gathering Mystery Boosters and their appearance at conventions such as MagicFest Richmond, Wizards has revealed a product via Twitter to be fully publicized this coming Monday, November 25th. Source: Wizards of the Coast Now, despite a[...]

Hello friends! This brisk evening of November 19th, we are going to follow up on the previous Magic: The Gathering deck tech I posted earlier today Hazoret the Fervent never made her way to Ravnica during the War of the Spark storyline arc, so of course in the spirit of cycle completion, Wizards of the[...]

Despite the bleakest moments in the Magic: The Gathering storyline as of late (namely the fates of the gods of Amonkhet), there's always some amount of solace that escapes, like light from a crack in a door frame While the Amonkheti gods Oketra, Kefnet, Bontu, and Rhonas have become Eternalized and reformed into undead monstrosities in[...]

Let's talk for a second about Pioneer in the context of Magic: The Gathering formats that have come before it In this article, I'm inclined to discuss what older formats have had banned from them from the get-go, and how this early in the life of Pioneer, the relative lack of bans is preposterous. The starting legality[...]

StarCityGames, a tabletop gaming store in Roanoke, Virginia, has a circuit of Magic: The Gathering tournaments all across the eastern coast of the United States, and even a few in the midwest One of their biggest events each year is called SCGCON, which is a three-day event where Magic players from all across the world congregate to[...]

Today (November 18th), Wizards of the Coast has announced a smattering of additions to their Banned and Restricted List for Magic: The Gathering The additions are as follows: Standard: Oko, Thief of Crowns is banned. Once Upon a Time is banned. Veil of Summer is banned. Brawl: Oko, Thief of Crowns is banned. Legacy: Wrenn and Six is banned. Vintage: Narset, Parter of Veils is restricted. A grim day for Oko[...]

Welcome! I have a second Magic: The Gathering deck tech article for you all today Not too long ago, we at Bleeding Cool wrote up a Commander deck tech revolving around Bontu, the Glorified, the black-aligned god of Amonkhet This article will focus on the eternalized version of Bontu, the aptly-named God-Eternal Bontu. Source: Wizards of[...]

Hello friends! It's time again for another set of Commander deck techs styled after the best and worst of each color in Magic: The Gathering Today, we will be looking over black, a color which may be even harder to find compliments for than blue (and hey, don't hate me for saying so – blue[...]

Hey all! Today, I would like to continue my ongoing monthly segment where I check in on how Magic: The Gathering: Arena is from a player perspective. Javier Dominguez, triumphant after Mythic Championship V Source: Wizards of the Coast Before I do that, however, I was given a few confirmed clarifications to my last article, directly from[...]

On November 14th, Wizards of the Coast sent out an email blast to users of Magic: The Gathering Online and Magic: The Gathering: Arena, stating that users' data had been compromised in a security breach. Source: Wizards of the Coast According to this email, while much data was breached (including first and last names of users, users' email addresses,[...]

(Or, "Get In Nerds: The Party Bus Cometh!")

Well, this is one Magic: The Gathering article I didn't want to write, but I totally expected it would come up It was an inevitability as early as this past Friday evening (November 8th), and now we at Bleeding Cool are here to make sense of the wreckage Here we go. Source: Twitter After nonbinary Magic professional player Autumn Burchett's cards[...]

A recent book covering the latest plots in the storyline of Magic: The Gathering entitled "War of the Spark: Forsaken" has come under scrutiny by gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and queer Magic players (among many others) for its content Greg Weisman, the author, seems to have done a lot of people in the community dirty, according[...]

In news which may absolutely floor a ton of Magic: The Gathering players while being completely predictable to a good many others, Commander may be the most played Magic format. Source: Wizards of the Coast According to Magic: The Gathering Head Designer Mark Rosewater in an answer to a question posed on his Tumblr blog Blogatog, data suggests that[...]

Of all of the innovations in Magic: The Gathering, there is none so insidious as the ones which force other players to sit and do nothing while you get to play and win These sorts of cards are tough to deal with and frustrate many a player on a regular basis The very worst offenders among[...]

Hello friends! It's time again for another set of two Magic: The Gathering Commander deck techs Sometimes, I find it's best to step away from the battlefield when writing up techs for my readers and take a moment to be mindful of things like burnout, writer's block, and other similar worries But then I think[...]

As we covered on the site on Saturday, Autumn Burchett, a Magic: The Gathering pro player who openly identifies as nonbinary, had been instructed by a Wizards of the Coast official to remove the basic land cards from their deck before playing in the main event in MagicFest Richmond. I was instructed by tournament officials to remove[...]

I attended a Commander-format Magic: The Gathering tournament benefitting the ExtraLife charity on Saturday, November 9th The event, while fun as it could be, raises some concerns about what exactly constitutes a competitive Commander deck and what doesn't quite cut it. I had gone with using my Chainer, Dementia Master deck in this tournament – the very[...]

Last night (Friday night, November 8th) at MagicFest Richmond, professional Magic: The Gathering player Autumn Burchett purportedly was instructed to remove two cards from their deck after the cards were found to have potentially divisive messages written on them The messages included "No TERFs[…]" and "Trans Rights are Human Rights", which, while to some are[...]

I wrote an article around this time a year ago about how Chainer, Dementia Master, is among the best of the best when it comes to reanimator commanders within Magic: The Gathering This was written on a website called "Commander Fight Club", where players could make content about the Commander format (the website has yet to[...]

In continuation of our pair of white Magic: The Gathering deck techs for today (having kicked it off with Oketra the True), I now present the second Commander deck tech We are preparing for the arrival of Theros, Beyond Death through these techs, and as such we are giving special focus to the Gods in Magic. White is[...]

Today, we at Bleeding Cool have a special set of two Commander Magic: The Gathering deck tech articles for you! This is the first of them. But first,  before I reveal which Commander I'll be writing for you, a bit of background information Theros: Beyond Death, Magic: The Gathering's 83rd expansion set, is coming out in January[...]

Nearly a month ago, Wizards of the Coast unveiled plans to release a "Mystery Booster" product for Magic: The Gathering The details – any and all of them, save for the packaging and its existence at MagicFest Richmond onwards – were completely hidden from anyone Today, MagicFest Richmond's high point occurred when the mysterious booster pack[...]

Among them, coloring books, Matchbox cars, and – as the title of my article suggests – Magic: The Gathering. Source: Strong Museum of Play Head of Tabletop Gaming for Magic, Bill Rose, spoke a bit about how the game has never been better, and how as Magic enters its 27th year in 2020, the game is only going to improve[...]

One could say that the Merlin trope is quintessential to any good fantasy story, even those that are told through the medium of trading cards. Today for my Magic: The Gathering Commander deck tech, I want to cover a commander who embodies the Merlin trope to a T: Gadwick, the Wizened. Wizards, indeed Source: Wizards of the[...]

Magic: The Gathering is full of characters each with different story arcs Often times, we as players and consumers of the Magic storyline will see characters with multiple different cards meant to represent their continuing character development It's quite a sight to see someone petulant like Chandra Nalaar become responsible and focused on her goals and[...]

So to that end, I saw all of the love for this day on Bleeding Cool's queue and thought, "I should do something to celebrate!" So here we are, with me crafting a Magic: The Gathering Oathbreaker deck to commemorate this day Oathbreaker, for those who are just tuning into my articles on it today, is a format[...]