Edge of Eternities Prerelease Guide

I’m not sure whether this counts as a hot take, but I think prereleases are by far the best event on the Magic calendar. 

They’re not just hype incubators for new sets like Edge of Eternities:

• Casual Magic players get a low-stress environment where they can connect with (and learn from) veterans of the community. 
• Early adopters can be the first to get their hands on the hot new product!
• It’s also a chance to enjoy unique, awesome prerelease formats like Two-Headed Giant or Box League.

I could go on and on with this kind of praise. But I assume that most of you like prereleases – or at least you’re curious to try one. So let’s discuss how you can get involved and get the most out of the Edge of Eternities prerelease weekend that’s coming up!

YOUR FRIENDLY NEIGHBOURHOOD MAGIC SHOP

Whatever reason you have for attending the Edge of Eternities prerelease, your first step is always going to be the same: look up participating Magic stores in your area. 

Those retailers are the ones trusted to handle and distribute boxes of secret not-yet-released cards with discretion. Even if you’re planning to actually play your prerelease event somewhere else – at home with friends, or at a school club – you’ll still need to organize getting the prerelease packs through one of these venues.

Every participating store decides their own schedule for the weekend, with their own mix of sub-events to enter (called “flights”) and their own prices and prizes. It’s definitely worth looking up all the options in your area before choosing where to register – especially if you know you want to play in a specific kind of flight.

Once you find a venue you like which is running the right flight at the right timeslot, ask them if you can pre-register for it. Not only does this save you some stress and bother later, but it helps the store promote that flight to other players and ensure a good turnout on the day!

A GALAXY OF WAYS TO PLAY

I want to back up for a second and discuss those different kinds of “flights” – essentially the different types of sub-event which your local venue might be running across the prerelease weekend. There’s a wide variety to choose from, including some that are brand-new for Edge of Eternities. 

Most stores still headline their schedules with Sealed flights (the traditional prerelease format) and we’ll discuss those a bit later. But now there are new options for fans of Commander or Draft to play their preferred formats as part of the festivities!

With stores now allowed to sell Edge of Eternities product unrestricted from the start of the prerelease, Draft events can be officially incorporated into the weekend schedule. Instead of needing to buy a whole box of booster packs and recruit an 8-person pod to draft with, you just pay for the three packs you’ll use and sign up with the store. You’ll get to play with and keep a deck of cosmic new EoE cards, and you might even get some special prerelease goodies into the bargain!

What about Commander players? Well for a start, the two new Edge of Eternities precon decks will be available to buy and play as soon as the weekend kicks off. But running an actual flight with everyone on the same two decklists would get dull and repetitive fast. So starting with this Edge of Eternities prelease, a new option has been made available: Box Leagues.

THINK INSIDE THE BOX

Box Leagues provide the prerelease experience of playing with brand new cards, but through the lens of multiplayer Commander. Each player who enters the Box League will start with a single Edge of Eternities booster box (which is 30 individual packs). The cards from that box become your card pool from which to build a new all-EoE Commander deck!

Instead of 100 cards being the deck size, your Box League deck needs to be a total of 60 cards (including the commander). The commander still needs to be a legendary creature (or creature-adjacent), but otherwise you can ignore the normal deckbuilding rules of the format: you can run multiple copies of the same card if they’re in your pool, and you are allowed to use cards of any color or color identity. 

Of course, you can still choose to obey those rules if you feel like it. But for the sake of this unusual event, it’s most important to make sure everyone has a good chance to build a viable 60-card deck!

Once your decks are built, you can get on with playing… some completely normal Commander. There are no special rules or changes to worry about, and the store will help match you into pods of 3-4 Box League-ers for your games.

To ensure you get a chance to play through a good few matches with these decks, Box League play sessions will continue to run in stores for a full week, from the start of prerelease weekend up until the official Edge of Eternities release.

It’s an awesome way to test-fly some new cards in your favorite format and connect with other Commander players in a unique (but even) metagame!

A STELLAR SEALED EXPERIENCE

While these new events are a welcome addition to prerelease schedules, I expect that Sealed flights will still be the most popular way to play for Edge of Eternities. 

Since most players never encounter the Sealed format outside of these prerelease flights, I’ll take a moment to explain exactly how it works and offer some general tips.

What are you signing up for:

Each Sealed flight at a prerelease is its own short round-robin tournament. You play 3-4 matches over as many hours, plus another 40 minutes for deckbuilding. The entry fee buys each player a Prelease Pack of sealed Edge of Eternities cards to use in the matches.

What deck do you play with:

Each player builds a deck using only cards from within their prerelease pack (plus basic lands, which are provided by the store). Other cards – even other Edge of Eternities cards you have bought or won at the prerelease – cannot be added to your deck.

The minimum deck size is 40 cards, and most players recommend using 17 lands (either basics or non-basic lands from your pack).

Can I play with my friends?

Official prerelease events will use seeded pairings, so it’s luck of the draw which opponents you get to play against. However, there is a popular alternate Sealed flight called Two-Headed Giant (2HG) where you and a friend essentially play “doubles” against other paired-up players.

If you enter a 2HG flight (check with the store, as it’s a different event to solo Sealed) you will each pay your entry fee and each get a Prerelease Pack. You each build 40 card decks as before, but you can use cards from both Prerelease Packs mixed together.

The actual matches are best-of-one game against the opposing team, with both you and your partner working together. You take your turns at the same time (each untapping, drawing, going to combat etc. together), you can both block when your opponents attack, and you share a life total.

Other than that, you’re still considered two independent players; “you control” effects don’t count your partner’s cards, and you can’t use your lands to help pay for their spells. But it’s still the best “co-op” Magic experience available, and 2HG is definitely my favorite way to enjoy a prerelease.

Is playing with a new deck and new cards against strangers actually fun?

Magic is a competitive game at heart, but understandably a lot of players just don’t have a desire to play cutthroat 1v1 matches against opponents who may be taking things much more seriously, or have a huge edge in experience.

To those players, I want to reassure you that a prerelease Sealed event is as casual as playing Magic can ever be. 99% of attendees are just there to relax and will happily help you understand the new cards if you’re unsure of rules, plus there are judges in attendance you can ask for impartial help. The “tournament” part is really just to keep games organized so everyone gets to play a few rounds. The prizes are just a couple of booster packs per win, and some stores choose to just hand those out as participation gifts so games are 100% for fun.

IT’S A BIG LONELY UNIVERSE OUT THERE…

So why not take these natural opportunities once per set to really enjoy the best parts of the Magic community? The game moves fast these days, and it can feel difficult to stay engaged if you don’t have time to build meta decks for FNM or keep up with the new cards and mechanics. That’s what makes a one-off, casual, learning-centric event like this so essential!

At times when I’m not entering a lot of competitive tournaments or playing with a regular Commander group, having these prereleases every few months helps me keep in touch with the game and provides a focal point for the hype of each new set. I’m all starry-eyed about the chance to play some Two-Headed Giant with my friends and try out Edge of Eternities. Hopefully by this point you’ve also found some part of the event to get excited about.