It’s that time of year again everyone. A heretofore unimaginable cosmic threat imperils the very fabric of the Magic multiverse and the lives of all its inhabitants, requiring desperate resistance from planeswalkers and commonfolk alike. This time it’s Jace!
Yes, one of Magic’s long-time protagonists has finally lost his grip on morality. Heartbroken by the catastrophes he has witnessed, Jace now wishes to replace all reality with his own “director’s cut” version. One where he has personally edited the timeline so that many famous tragedies never occurred; where people he cares about don’t have to bear the pain of loss or failure.
But the blue mage now calling himself “The Theorist” never stopped to ask those people how they felt about it – what does it matter when their lives and memories will soon be overwritten by his Echoverse? Now his (former?) friends and allies in the Gatewatch must defeat their own mirror-selves and the armies of Hexhaven – the warped reflection of Strixhaven – to stop Jace’s selfish plot.
Reality Fracture is the most important and exciting Magic story in years – and you can be a part of it right from day one at your local Prerelease event! Join in with players around the world from September 25th-27th as we experience the Echoverse and its twisted denizens for the first time.
Read on for our Card Kingdom guide on where to find a prerelease, how to join in, and what you get for signing up. Prerelease is all about having fun and trying out new cards – but we’ll also give you a few strategy tips to help you make the most of your games this weekend.
EVERYTHING, EVERYWHERE, ALL AT ONCE
Prerelease weekends are my favorite Magic events because they emphasize the “Gathering” part of the game. Anyone who plays Magic can participate and enjoy them on the same level, regardless of their experience with the game or size of their collection. You don’t even need to own a deck!
You also don’t need to travel far to play a Prerelease. Most specialist game stores that stock Magic will host events for their local communities, so wherever you normally buy cards can also be your Prerelease venue. If you don’t know where your nearest Magic retailer is, Wizards of the Coast have a store locator to help you find one.
Technically that’s all you need to do for preparation: figure out where to go and show up on the weekend ready to play. But if you have a little time and energy to spare, there’s a few things you can do to ensure a relaxed and comfortable experience on the day.
FIRST THING: Pre-register at your venue of choice
A prerelease is actually a schedule of smaller, self-contained events called “flights” which repeat across the weekend, like the schedule of bands at a music festival. When you ask a game store to sign you up for the Prerelease, you’re really registering to play in one or more specific flights.
However, there’s a cap on how many people can participate in each flight, due to limited stock and store space. If your chosen store is particularly busy and you try to walk in and join a popular flight, there’s a chance you might not be able to get a seat.
This is why pre-registering with your Prerelease venue matters, especially if you can only attend during a specific timeslot. Most venues allow you to pre-register quickly and easily by phone, online, or in-person.
There’s no rule against registering for multiple flights at the same store. Theoretically, you could sign up for all of them and spend the whole weekend gaming! But most players are perfectly satisfied playing a single flight each Prerelease, which is usually about a four-hour commitment.
When you’re choosing which flight to register for, you should also check if they’re labeled “2HG” or “Two-Headed Giant”. These flights have special rules where players compete in teams of two – you share one prerelease pack (plus two extra boosters) to build two complementary decks, and then play taking turns at the same time to try and beat down another “two-headed” team in best-of-one matches.
Trying to enter a 2HG flight on your own would be confusing – and the opposite scenario is even more tragic. Make sure you know what you’re signing up for when you go to preregister and you won’t be caught out!
Exactly how much it costs to register for a flight varies by venue – and some stores offer discounts when you sign-up early or for multiple flights at once. But you’re not just paying for entry: you’ll get a bundle of new Reality Fracture cards as part of every flight you play! Each Prerelease Pack contains six Play Boosters, plus an extra random foil rare or mythic rare from the set. The cards in this pack are the only ones you use to actually make your deck for the event (besides basic lands).
For players who are.
SECOND THING: Get your Companion app ready
Official Magic events, including Prereleases, are run using the official Magic Companion app. Having the app installed and an account registered is not a strict requirement for participation in most stores, but it does help smooth over the few sharp corners in the prerelease experience. For starters, you can use it to quickly map out all the venues in your area which are hosting Prerelease events and immediately look up the times and details of their flights!
You can use it to look up the opponents you’re paired against or to report match results to the tournament organizer from the comfort of your seat. The app can track your life total during a match, and a few other small conveniences. Some stores even hand out bonus prizes to players who participate in multiple prerelease flights under the same Companion account.
Companion is a small, free download from the major phone app stores. You log into it using your Wizards account (if you’ve ever played MTG Arena, you can use the same login details here). Note that even if you don’t make an account or use the app, you’ll still be required to put down your email, name and DOB to register for a flight. So, you might as well go through the slight hassle of setting up Companion once and make all your future Magic events a lot easier.
THIRD THING: Pack your bags with necessary supplies!
Like I said earlier, you could theoretically show up to the Prerelease with nothing more than your registration details and a positive attitude. But as a veteran of many such weekends, I can tell you there’s a few key items you can pack that will subtly upgrade your overall experience of the event.
Reality Fracture includes tons of powerful rares and amazing alternate card treatments to collect. Bringing card sleeves from home will protect your nice new cards so they don’t get scuffed in your prerelease games! But they’re also just convenient in a ton of small ways.
It’s much easier to pick up cards and to shuffle them when sleeved, for instance (though brand-new sleeves may be slippery until you play a game and get some microscopic wear on them to increase friction). Unique sleeves make it far harder to accidentally mix up your cards with an opponents at the end of a game, or with other Reality Fracture cards you’re carrying that aren’t technically legal to use in your prerelease flight.
You’ll need ~45 sleeves to play a typical Sealed prerelease flight (or 85, if you’re planning to sleeve your whole prelease pack). If you don’t have the sleeves at home to bring, I would definitely recommend buying them ahead of time; lines to buy things in-store can get very long on Prerelease day. Luckily, Card Kingdom has a wide variety of excellent sleeves you can order right now!
Look for “Standard size” on the packaging to make sure you’re buying sleeves designed for Magic cards (as opposed to Yu-Gi-Oh! Sleeves, which are slightly smaller). Also double check you aren’t buying “inner sleeves”, as those aren’t really meant to be used on their own – they go inside normal sleeves to double-protect very expensive cards. But those are all you have, they’ll be OK for one prerelease.
Another handy thing to pack is a handful of dice – whichever kind you have at home work fine. These are primarily useful for tracking different counters which might be placed on cards, so having different sizes/colors/designs is useful. But they’re also useful for deciding who goes first in your Prerelease matches, or determining the outcome of cards with random effects.
A lot of players also like placing dice next to creature tokens to remember how many of that token they control or track temporary buffs to their stats. I personally like putting a die above cards with “once each turn” abilities to remind me which ones have already been used on the current turn. You can even put your dice on top of your library as a physical reminder to pause before drawing at the start of your turn – which is important when you have upkeep triggers that need to resolve before your draw step!
In general, Magic is a game with lots of numbers in it; you can never have too many dice.
I always bring my own basic land cards to the prerelease, and if you own some basics of each type I recommend you do the same. Basic lands are the only cards you can legally use at the event besides what you open in your Prerelease Pack.
Prerelease decks should include 16-18 lands, but they’re usually at least two colors and you’ll have at least some non-basic lands in that number. So if you’re trying to travel light, you can probably get away with ~10 copies each of your favorite Plains, Mountain, Swamp, Island and Forest.
If you don’t have a supply of each basic land type sitting around, don’t fret – every store hosting events will have a “public land station” where anyone can walk up and borrow the basics they need. But bringing your own from home is even easier and lets you show off any fancy land arts you’ve collected from different sets! You also avoid the chore of de-sleeving borrowed lands from your deck at the end of the event so you can return them to the land station.
Bringing a playmat to the prerelease isn’t as important as those first few recommendations, but it’s a great luxury if you have one to use. Playmats are great for marking out your table space even when you’re sandwiched between other games at the same table. They protect your cards from being scratched up while opening packs, and they make it SO much easier to pick cards up off the table (the soft surface of the mat lets you get a finger under the card even when it’s lying flat).
My last recommendation (at least for helping with the Magic part of your day) is to bring some empty boxes or other containers to hold the new cards you’ll be opening! The box your prerelease kit comes in helps a bit, but in my experience, you always seem to need a little more space than it provides. You might get away with having cards loose in a bag or larger container if they’re all sleeved, but surely it’s better to keep them neat and organized.
WRITE YOUR OWN TALE
I know that for those newer to Magic it can be intimidating to think about playing against more experienced strangers using unfamiliar cards. But the atmosphere of Prerelease is nothing like other, more competitive Magic events. Everyone is new to the set, everyone is playing with the same prerelease packs, and there’s no serious stakes or rules penalties to be nervous about while you play.
If you’re still not sure, I recommend grabbing a friend and trying to find a Two-Headed Giant flight to play together. It might be an obvious thing to say, but getting to do the event with a buddy more or less guarantees everyone will be in a happy, sociable mood. For my money it’s probably the most fun way to play Magic outside of your own specific friend group.
Also remember that prerelease flights are only three or four rounds long. So even in a worst-case scenario where you hate your deck, you’re not stuck with that feeling all day.
Just crack a joke about it with your opponents – or ask them for some deckbuilding tips after the game! Keep an open mind and a friendly attitude, and you’re sure to enjoy your Reality Fracture prerelease.
Tom’s fate was sealed in 7th grade when his friend lent him a pile of commons to play Magic. He quickly picked up Boros and Orzhov decks in Ravnica block and has remained a staunch white magician ever since. A fan of all Constructed formats, he enjoys studying the history of the tournament meta. He specializes in midrange decks, especially Death & Taxes and Martyr Proc. One day, he swears he will win an MCQ with Evershrike. Ask him how at @AWanderingBard, or watch him stream Magic at twitch.tv/TheWanderingBard.