Are you ready for the most radical set release of the year? Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is Magic’s next huge mainstream crossover under the Universes Beyond banner. All the ass-kicking, fun-loving, pizza-munching action of the legendary TMNT comics and cartoons will be reborn as part of the world’s most popular TCG – and you can attend the world premiere at your local prerelease weekend, starting February 27th!
Prerelease events like this one are my favorite part of the Magic calendar. I love the fun and festive atmosphere, and they really bring all different parts of the playerbase together at once.
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! Jaded old heads like me get to enjoy unique, awesome prerelease formats like Two-Headed Giant or Box League.
So, how can you get involved in the upcoming Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles prerelease? The first step is to figure out where it’s all happening.
NINJAS IN YOUR NEIGHBOURHOOD
If you’re a regular attendee at Friday Night Magic and other official events, this should be an easy question to answer. Your local WPN (Wizards Play Network) accredited store will be your hub for the TMNT Prerelease, since only WPN retailers are trusted to handle and distribute boxes of unreleased product with discretion.
If you aren’t familiar with your local WPN locations already, then that’s no problem! You can find out which participating venues are near you and how to contact them using the official Wizards Store Locator page.
Every participating store decides their own unique 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, and check which format of Magic will be played in each flight (more on that later).
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!
CHOOSE YOUR OWN FIGHTING STYLE
I want to back up for a second and discuss those different kinds of “flights” – essentially the different flavors of games which your local venue is holding across the prerelease window. There’s a wide variety to choose from at the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles prerelease.
Most stores still headline their schedules with Sealed flights (the traditional prerelease format) and those are great fun. But if you’re a diehard Commander fan, a relatively new Magic player or just someone who loves to play with friends, I think you’ll appreciate the extra variety!
WPN stores will be allowed to sell the new Turtle Team-Up box set at the prerelease alongside other products. Turtle Team-Up is perfect for groups of friends with mixed levels of Magic experience, or anyone who wants an accessible, TMNT board-game style experience right out of the box.
2-4 players join forces as Heroes in a Half-Shell, with a full pre-built theme deck for each turtle utilising their unique strengths and weaknesses. You’ll be teaming up against an “automated” deck full of TMNT’s rogues gallery: a swarm of Foot Clan ninjas and alien warriors, with the big bads like Shredder appearing as special Boss cards which buff their minions and sabotage the heroes.
Everything you need to play Turtle Team-Up is ready in the box, but you’ll also get some TMNT booster packs you can use to start customizing your Turtle decks! The coolest part of Magic is the chance to put your own spin and style into your gameplay, and that applies to Turtle Team-Up too – these Turtle decks can easily become the basis for a Commander or Standard deck as you collect more TMNT cards.
COWABUNGA INTO COMMANDER LEAGUES!
What about Commander players? The prerelease will be your first chance to buy the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Commander precon that includes all the Turtles and their allies, ready to use against any other Commander deck in Magic’s most popular format.
But what if you and your Commander group all want to try out new TMNT cards at the prerelease? It would be a weird kind of game if you all played the exact same precon against each other. So to make things more exciting, Wizards has introduced the Commander Box League – a short-term deckbuilding and gameplay challenge that gives you a chance to make the TMNT set your own.
Instead of a preconstructed Commander deck, entrants to the Box League will receive a TMNT booster box containing 30 Play Boosters from the new set. The cards in those boosters are the only ones you’re allowed to use when building your Box League deck, so all players are working with the same raw materials. That’s why these leagues are such a cool test of deckbuilding ingenuity!
Boxing League decks follow slightly different rules to normal Commander, to help players build strong decks from their randomized card pools. Firstly, the deck size is only 60 instead of 100 (including your commander). Secondly, you can play multiple copies of the same card – as many as you opened in your booster packs.
Thirdly, color identity is ignored: you can play cards of any color with any commander. You still need to be able to cast them though, so make sure your fixing is good before you go building a five-color Raphael deck!
Once you’ve built your Boxing League deck for TMNT Prerelease, your store will arrange matches against fellow League players so you can test your might. You can keep coming back later in the prerelease and use your same deck in other Boxing League matches, even in the following week. Talk to your local store about their Boxing League schedule and prize structure if you’re interested in this kind of prerelease experience.
LET’S CRACK OPEN THIS PIZZA
It’s great to have more options for players to enjoy Prerelease. But the main way to play on the weekend will still be Sealed, the way it has been for as long as Magic release events have run.
A lot of players only play Sealed when it’s at these prerelease events, so 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 TMNT 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 TMNT cards you have bought or won at the prerelease – cannot be added to your deck during the event.
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 these events run at different times to solo Sealed flights) you will each pay your entry fee and each get a Prerelease Pack. You each build 40 card decks as before, but your decks can use cards from both your Prerelease Packs mixed together.
The actual matches are best-of-one game against the opposing team, with you and your partner playing in unison. You take your turns at the same time (each untapping, drawing, going to combat etc. together), you can both use creatures to block whenever either of you is attacked, and you share a life total.
Other than that, you’re still considered two independent players. Cards your partner plays won’t count as ones “you control”, 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.
Having paired matches and a round timer at Prerelease is really just a way to keep games organized so everyone gets to play a few rounds with different matchups. The stakes 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.
TAP INTO TURTLE POWER!
There’s just no better way to get involved with your local Magic community than to attend a Prerelease. Even in times where I’ve been less invested in the game, I love that I can still dip my toes into a new set when the atmosphere is relaxed and fun, and help keep in touch with what’s going on.
It’s low-commitment, low-barrier-to-entry, low-pressure, and high-fun! So get in touch with your LGS and make sure you pre-register your spot for the TMNT prerelease soon.
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.