A few weeks ago, Wizards of the Coast announced that they’d be providing an update to something very important to Magic: the Gathering, Organized Play. When the MPL was announced to be dissolved, it left the state of organized play up in the air. Players were curious what the fate of things like the Pro Tour and high level play would be, and today we have that update!
Path to the Pros
With William “Huey” Jensen recently put at the helm of Play Programs at WotC, there was a bit of hope that he’d be able to bring the player perspective to bare and deliver some welcomed changes. Well, Spoiler Alert, this announcement is FANTASTIC! Let’s take a look at it.
The long and short of everything here is that the Pro Tour is back! No longer are we calling it “Players Tours”, and gone is convoluted ways to qualify for these events. Here’s the graphic for the path to the Pro Tour for paper play.
It starts with the Regional Championship Qualifiers (RCQs). Across the world, various outlets have partnered with Wizards to be the official holders of RCQ’s. Here’s the list of those outlets.
- USA – Dreamhack
- Canada – Face to Face Games
- Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) – Legacy
- Australia/New Zealand – Good Games
- China – Kadou
- Japan/Korea – Big Magic
- Southeast Asia – Oracle Events
- Chinese Taipei – Game Square
- Brazil – City Class Games
- Mexico/Central America/Caribbean – Yellow Rabbit
- South America – Magicsur
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From here, if you do well enough in RCQ’s and you make it to the Regional Championships. If you do well enough there, you make it to the Pro Tour. If you WIN the RC, then you land yourself a spot at Worlds! Not much other specific details were given outside of this, so be sure to check in with the RCQ organizers for more details about their events.
There are Promos for these events as well, which is awesome to see return!
For the Regional Championships, there is 1 promo available.
Non-foil Teferi, Hero of Dominaria is for participants in the Regional Qualifiers, and Foil is for top finishers in those events.
Now let’s talk about Pro Tours!
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It’s Back!
Pro Tours are back! There will be 3 of them each year, where some of the best players will compete for bragging rights, a seat at the World Championships, and a sweet $500,000 prize pool. Qualifications for the Pro Tour will come from Regional Championships, getting 10 wins in a previous Pro Tour, or through Wizards‘s new Adjusted Match Point system. This system allows players who have had a series of strong, but not quite qualifying performances to still make their way to the tour.
It appears that WotC is targeting early 2023 as their first Pro Tour, with more details to be announced. This lines up with Brother’s War as the set for that tour most likely.
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Worlds
Worlds is where it all culminates. 128 Players will qualify for this event and will be playing for a $1,000,000 prize pool, and the title of World Champion. This first iteration of Worlds will be held in late 2023, and it doesn’t seem like much else is changing here other than how to qualify for it.
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Digital Paths
With all of this focus on Paper, WotC does recognize that there is a digital audience that is still here as well. While the “Organized Play: Digital Edition” announcements are to come in late April, they were able to offer up some details. The digital experience will eventually feed into the paper OP stack, ending at Worlds. Here’s the details that Wizards offered up.
- Events on both platforms will feed tabletop events at nearly every level, including the World Championship.
- Magic: The Gathering Arena Qualifier Weekends will continue, with some exciting twists.
- Magic: The Gathering Online Showcase events will continue and will feed the World Championship directly!
- MTG Arena will include new ways to qualify for Qualifier Weekends besides ladder play.
- The updated MTG Arena qualification path will start with April ladder play and May qualification events! There will be some differences between how that first month plugs into the tabletop path and later months, but we’ll cover those details separately.
- The digital path will have different eligibility requirements that we’ll outline in April.
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There’s a LOT of amazing information here, and I highly recommend you go through and read the announcement article, and check out the Twitch Stream later today at 2:30 PM PST. There Huey Jensen will be sitting down with Blake Rasmussen to talk more about this announcement.
