One of Magic: the Gathering’s biggest strengths is its ability not to take itself too seriously. While it’s taken too far at times, as we saw with last year’s bevy of “Hat Sets,” this capacity for memes and inside jokes is a huge part of the game’s appeal. Among these memes, Yargle is up there with the best of them. Despite being a mere 9/3 vanilla creature for five, Yargle has amassed a considerable fanbase over the years, to the point that MTG Arena hosts an annual Yargle Day in his honor.
The 2025 version of this event kicked off earlier today, and it’s taken a bit of a different approach to past versions. Now there are Yargle-related achievements, and associated titles, up for grabs. While this sounds exciting, players are reporting that the event is marred by technical and difficulty issues so far. It hasn’t stopped people from coming together and getting involved, but it is an unfortunate blemish on a usually fun event in the Magic calendar.
It’s Yargle Day On MTG Arena!
Since 2019, Yargle Day has been a regular event on MTG Arena. It lands on the 9th of September each year, 9/3, as a tribute to Yargle’s legendary 9/3 statline. It’s typically been a free-to-play event with a different preconstructed format each time. 2019 was Yargle Pauper, for example, while 2020 was Brawl. This year, however, Wizards opted to introduce five new Yargle-themed temporary achievements instead.
These achievements range from the simple, like controlling creatures with total power nine at the end of your turn, to the complex, like dealing 93 total damage with Yargle attacks. Completing any three of them will earn you the “Gnshhagghkkapphribbit” emote. Completing all five will get you the title of “The Bargler,” which Wizards assures us is a coveted thing indeed.
This all sounds great, but unfortunately there are some flies in the ointment. Across social media, players have had a lot of complaints about the event so far. Chief among these have been problems regarding the difficulty of the achievements. Having Yargle stick around to attack is tough enough, but getting in for damage nine separate times is something else. Others, like winning a Commander game with Yargle in the command zone after getting every land out of your deck, are similarly tricky. As ToxicCommodore put it on r/MagicArena: “This Yargle day stuff feels impossible.”
This problem is made worse by the relatively tight time limit on these achievements. While they’re, thankfully, not restricted to a single day, you can only earn these achievements until September 10th. With how inconsistent some of them are, that’s not a lot of time at all.
Bugs Galore
If the above were the only issues with the MTG Arena Yargle Day for 2025, then it wouldn’t be a major deal. Difficult limited-time achievements create meaningful rewards, after all, so there’s definitely a place for them. Where things get a bit thornier is with the technical issues the event seems to be having so far.
Players are reporting all sorts of problems with the way Arena tracks progress for these achievements. Many are finding it impossible to progress with the ’93 Yargle damage’ achievement, despite fulfilling the requirements in multiple games. Similar issues are cropping up around the ‘run 25 nonland Dominaria cards in your deck’ achievement, too. Basically, the trackers for these achievements aren’t building up, despite players doing everything they should.
Some players are pretty angry about these problems. In a comment on r/MagicArena, HangBodohHa added “This might just be the most poorly designed AND worst executed event in the history of events.” While this is fairly dramatic, it’s indicative of the general disappointment around the event right now. Yargle Day is supposed to be a celebration for the MTG Arena community, and these bugs have turned it into a frustrating, hopeless grind.
Fortunately, Wizards does appear to be aware of these issues. In a post on X yesterday, it acknowledged that the ‘Death by Vanilla’ achievement was bugged. The post notes that a hotfix should be arriving soon, along with a time extension to give players long enough to earn the achievement. This is a nice gesture, though it may well need to be extended to the other achievements in the set based on community sentiment right now.
Community Spirit
These problems are very unfortunate, but they haven’t ruined Yargle Day for everyone. On Reddit, the event has still managed to inspire some spirited deckbuilding discussions, and even a surprising sense of community.
To combat the sluggish nature of the achievement grind, players like SirTimelordTech have shared their finely-tuned lists. These have mostly been in pursuit of getting around the ’25 nonland Dominaria cards’ achievement, which is giving a lot of players trouble. Others, like Tayrog77, have put together full-on combo decks, in order to get that ‘no lands left in the deck’ Commander achievement. Turns out you don’t need to drag things out forever when you have Doomsday Excruciator to clear your deck for you.
This sharing of strategies is exactly what Yargle Day should be about. The requirements here are ridiculous, yes, but they also bring players together to find good solutions. You can also see this community spirit in the sharing of ‘rules’ for Yargle day. Since a lot of players are trying to get the achievements right now, unusual actions like letting Yargles through unblocked and not conceding to deny achievements are being encouraged. Again, this is a great example of the Arena community coming together.
That players are still willing to engage with Yargle Day, and even work around its problems, is hugely encouraging. Wizards absolutely needs to fix the issues here, that much is certain. In the meantime, however, players are still finding the fun here where they can. This is another great reminder, if one were needed, that “The Gathering” is what makes Magic the game that it is.
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