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MTG Arena Announcements – February 19, 2024

In this edition:

Watch Pro Tour Murders at Karlov Manor This Weekend!

Arena open: murders at karlov manor march 2–3, you can now import deck names, get daily mtg arena updates, event schedule.

The first Pro Tour of 2024 is happening this weekend during MagicCon: Chicago, February 23–25! The Pro Tour Murders at Karlov Manor competition will be streamed live at twitch.tv/magic , and there'll be plenty of social coverage from players, fans, and content creators using the hashtag #PTKarlov .

Coverage begins at 9 a.m. PT each day, Friday and Saturday. Then, Top 8 playoff coverage will begin on Sunday at 8 a.m. PT.

Check out the Pro Tour Murders at Karlov Manor Viewers Guide for all the details on how to watch.

Here's your first opportunity to put your Limited format skills with the latest set to the test! Arena Open: Murders at Karlov Manor happens Saturday and Sunday, March 2–3, and features Sealed and Draft matches.

The Arena Open is also where you can earn an invitation to the April Qualifier Weekend and as much as $2,000!

And everyone who enters receives the Warleaders Call sleeve featuring art by Aldo Dominguez!

Deck names can now be included when importing your deck files!

To use this feature, add an "About" section in your decklist file. Below that, add "Name" followed by the name of your deck. Your imported deck will appear with that name rather than the generic "Imported Deck."

For example, if you want to import your Mono-Red Aggro deck, the start of your decklist file might look like this:

1 About 2 Name Mono-Red Aggro 3 4 Deck 5 24 Mountain 6 4 Shock 7 …

This addition is completely optional, and decklist files without it will continue to successfully import. If you are a content creator that provides decklists designed for import into MTG Arena , please consider adding this section to your output!

Want to keep up with all things MTG Arena ? Follow us on our official Instagram , Facebook , and other social accounts to join in on the community's dreams and memes!

Events open at 8 a.m. PT on their starting dates (excluding Midweek Magic ) and close to entries at 8 a.m. PT (UTC-08:00) on the ending date shown unless otherwise noted.

Midweek Magic

Midweek Magic events open on Tuesdays at 2 p.m. PT and close to new entries on Thursdays at 2 p.m. PT (UTC-08:00).

• February 20–22: On the Edge
• February 27–29: Momir
• March 12–15: Artisan Brawl

Quick Draft

• February 17–27: Murders at Karlov Manor
• February 27–March 12: Wilds of Eldraine

Other Events

• February 27–March 5: Festival: Murders at Karlov Manor Story Decks
• March 8–11: Standard Metagame Challenge
• March 15–18: Historic Metagame Challenge
• March 29–April 1: Explorer Metagame Challenge
• April 5–8: Timeless Metagame Challenge

March Qualifier Events – Alchemy

• March 16: Best-of-One Play-In
• March 22: Best-of-Three Qualifier Play-In
• March 23–24: Qualifier Weekend

Competitive Play Schedule

All times listed are Pacific time (UTC-08:00).

Qualifier Events

Qualifier Play-In events are single-day tournaments in which players compete to earn invitations to that month's Qualifier Weekend events.

Qualifier Weekend events are two-day events in which eligible players compete for invitations to upcoming Arena Championship events.

Qualifier tokens are delivered to your MTG Arena inbox. Remember to claim them before the event starts!

• Qualifier Play-In (Best-of-One) March 16, 6 a.m. PT
• Format: Alchemy
• Qualifier Play-In (Best-of-Three) March 22, 6 a.m. PT–March 23, 3 a.m. PT
• Qualifier Weekend March 23, 6 a.m. PT–March 24, 4 p.m. PT

The Arena Open Day One entry window begins at 6 a.m. PT and closes to new entries the following day at 3 a.m. PT (UTC-08:00). The Day Two entry window is 2 hours only, from 6 a.m. PT until 8 a.m. PT (UTC-08:00).

• March 2: Day One, Murders at Karlov Manor Sealed (Best-of-One and Best-of-Three)
• March 3: Day Two, Murders at Karlov Manor Draft (Best-of-Three)

Arena Championship

The Arena Championship is an invitation-only, two-day virtual event for players who earn invitations through Qualifier Weekend events.

• Arena Championship 5 March 30, 2024 Who has qualified?

February 2024 Ranked Season

The February 2024 Ranked Season begins January 31 at 12:05 p.m. PT and ends February 29 at 12 p.m. PT (UTC-08:00).

• Bronze Reward: 1 Murders at Karlov Manor pack
• Silver Reward: 1 Murders at Karlov Manor pack + 500 gold
• Gold Reward: 2 Murders at Karlov Manor packs + 1,000 gold + Lightning Helix card style
• Platinum Reward: 3 Murders at Karlov Manor packs + 1,000 gold + Lightning Helix card style + Steamcore Scholar card style
• Diamond Reward: 4 Murders at Karlov Manor packs + 1,000 gold + Lightning Helix card style + Steamcore Scholar card style
• Mythic Reward: 5 Murders at Karlov Manor packs + 1,000 gold + Lightning Helix card style + Steamcore Scholar card style

Follow MTG Arena Social

Keep up with the latest MTG Arena news and announcements on:

• Twitter @MTG_Arena
• Facebook @MTGArena
• Instagram @mtgarena
• TikTok @MTGArena
• MTG Arena YouTube channel
• Magic: The Gathering Discord channel
• Threads @mtgarena

Pro Tour Thunder Junction

View as Slideshow | Expand Decks

Format: Standard Date: 2024-04-26 Source: magic.gg

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Magic: The Gathering Hall of Famer Reid Duke wins first Pro Tour, sweeps finals

Reid Duke, Magic Pro Tour Hall of Famer, captured his first Pro Tour victory by sweeping newcomer Benton Madsen in the finals of Pro Tour: Phyrexia.

🎉Congratulations to @ReidDuke , the #PTPhyrexia CHAMPION!🎉 pic.twitter.com/IssK6k02hQ — PlayMTG (@PlayMTG) February 19, 2023

The return of the Pro Tour after the Magic esports experiment also marked the return of tabletop play at the highest levels after nearly three years of absence due to the pandemic. Duke has been a standard-bearer for competitive Magic for over a decade, so the first event of the new system highlighted the crowning of one of Magic ’s best players.

Things went full circle from his crushing second-place defeat in 2013 against two-time world champion Shahar Shenhar. At today’s Pro Tour, Duke was in the position of the experienced veteran battling against the less experienced competitor in Banton. In his first Pro Tour, Banton managed to secure a second-place finish but ultimately struggled to string together the plays needed to take Duke down.

Duke’s list was the tried-and-true Izzet Creativity deck, an interactive combo deck that looks to hit Worldspine Wurm and Xenagos, God of Revels to one-shot the opponent. The list’s ability to suddenly win while stalling the game with the help of strong removal spells and value offered from some of the best cards in the format like Fable of the Mirror-Breaker and Big Score.

Banton stormed through the top eight on the back of his Selesnya Auras deck. The list looks to stack Aura cards onto a creature to create a massive threat that the opponent will struggle to deal with removal or through combat. Gladecover Scout is the primary target for Auras as a one-mana Hexproof creature. Light Paws, Emperor’s Voice and Sram, Senior Edificer are excellent sources of card advantage that help Benton maintain pressure. Skrelv, Defector Mite is a new card in the list that helps further protect key creatures alongside a vast suite of Enchantments.

Game one of the finals was a tight contest between Duke and Benton. After a mulligan to five, Benton managed a strong start, presenting lethal several times against Duke. Relying on chump blocks, Reid was able to survive the pressure applied by Benton, with some help from Benton’s inability to find evasion, long enough to rip his Indomitable Creativity combo kill. It was a back-and-forth game that exemplified what the set would go on to become. Game two was a similar start from Benton with another mulligan to four, a shocking turn of events. The aggressive mulligan strategy had a purpose: to find the critical Gladecover Scout.

The mulligan to four was ineffective in the face of two one-mana removal spells in Duke’s hand. It was an easier victory that time around with Duke nailing the combo and going up 2-0 in the series, leaving Benton with no room for error.

Still, he wasn’t deterred from taking aggressive mulligans, even in a two-game hole. To kick off game three, he again took a mulligan to four. This time, with a turn-one Gladecover Scout and two Ethereal Armors, he put Duke in a tough position early in the game. However, in a seemingly inevitable feat, Duke ripped off his Indomitable Creativity combo again to secure his first Pro Tour championship.

Both Duke and Benton will join the other top eight competitors at this year’s Magic World Championship. Here are the top eight players that earned an invitation.

• Shota Yasooka
• Gabriel Nassif
• Takumi Matsuura
• Benton Madsen
• Chris Ferber
• Derrick Davis

Reigning Magic World Champion Nathan Steuer also made the top eight but already obtained an invitation to this year’s World Championship by winning last year’s event. The top eight stood out because of the diversity of experience levels among the group. The broadcast pointed out that this field included three Hall of Fame players: Yasooka, Nassif, and Duke. It also featured three first-time competitors: Madsen, Ferber, and Davis. 

There were also six Pioneer archetypes represented in the top eight: Izzet Creativity, Lotus Field Combo, Rakdos Midrange, Selesnya Auras, Mono-White Humans, and Enigmatic Fires.

Competitive Magic rolls on with Regional Championships and Qualifiers happening at local game stores. For interested viewers, catch SCG CON Charlotte on March 3 to 5 for more high-level tabletop gameplay and coverage.

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What’s It Like To Be T-Pain Now?

At home in Atlanta and on the Coachella circuit with the Auto-Tune auteur, who embraced his inner geek and found he's more beloved than ever.

By Meaghan Garvey

Meaghan Garvey

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“I’ve been trying to tell people for a decade!” the 39-year-old singer says with a booming laugh, pacing the game room in sweatpants and slippers. “Nobody wanted to listen.” Ten years ago, few would have known that the artist who seemed to write hits in his sleep was regularly hopping on Twitch to play Skyrim with like-minded gamers, or that he’d tricked out his Hit Factory studio in Miami with a full stage for nightly Guitar Hero sessions. (“Any time an artist would come by the studio, I don’t give a f–k what you’re talking about — grab this guitar and meet me in the booth,” he says, pantomiming Pantera-esque riffs.)

Back then, flying his geek flag in plain sight wasn’t compatible with being the voice behind the buoyant, world-conquering records that have soundtracked nearly two decades of bottle service nightclubs, pro sports broadcasts and White House correspondents’ dinners — at least not according to the powers that be. “I never got to show that side of myself because management deemed it uncool. So instead of playing video games, we’d go to the Dolphins game,” T-Pain remembers, his perennially jolly voice tinged with only a hint of regret. “But I thought that the sh-t I wanted to do was the coolest sh-t in the world.”

T-Pain: Photos From the Billboard Cover Shoot

Tooling around on boosted equipment, he used vocal processing software to make himself sound like a choir of horny angels on his first hit, “I’m Sprung,” or an android on a bender on his next smash single, “I’m N Luv (Wit a Stripper),” both of which he wrote and produced as well as sang — and which both cracked the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100 in 2005. Before long, his digitally uplifted melodies, sweet and slightly melancholy, had become the de facto sound of the charts. Between 2007 and 2008, T-Pain landed 13 top 10 Hot 100 hits, including three No. 1s (Flo Rida’s “Low,” Chris Brown’s “Kiss Kiss” and his own “Buy U a Drank”); for two weeks in 2007, he appeared on four top 10 singles at once. A dozen platinum and gold plaques hang throughout his basement, alongside an errant Grammy Award (best rap song for “Good Life” with Kanye West), a few plush toys designed in his likeness and a couple of White Claw empties.

The comment hit close to home. T-Pain had been struggling with alcoholism, mismanaged finances and an overall loss of creative confidence. “I didn’t want to do ‘Freeze,’ I didn’t want to do ‘Buy U a Drank,’ I didn’t want to do most of the songs that are my biggest hits. Because, you know, I’m an artiste ,” he confesses in the basement with a chuckle and a deep sigh. “Back then, when I got done with a song, I was always thinking, ‘People are going to like this,’ and not, ‘I like this.’”

T-Pain says he’d dreamed of recording a curveball like On Top of the Covers while his label and management team compelled him to chase the sound of artists half his age. (After 2017’s Oblivion , his last record for RCA, he signed to Cinematic Music Group, a subsidiary of Universal Music Group whose catalog was sold last year to Interscope Geffen A&M for an undisclosed amount, Billboard reported at the time.) After years of butting up against industry bureaucracy, he decided to go it alone, assembling a tiny team alongside his former project manager Nicolette Carothers to establish Nappy Boy Entertainment as an independent label in January 2020 (Carothers is currently the label’s head of operations). Besides T-Pain himself, it’s home to a small roster of rappers including Young Ca$h, with whom he released a joint eponymous album as The Bluez Brothaz, in March (and with whom he recently threw the Miss Biggest Booty Pageant in Atlanta, which is exactly what it sounds like). That umbrella has since expanded to reflect T-Pain’s truest passions, including Nappy Boy Automotive and Nappy Boy Gaming, both of which sell merchandise and host in-real-life and virtual events — from massive drift-racing competitions to a monthlong music competition on Twitch, which led to the signing of rapper NandoSTL.

Now, the hobbies he was once told to hide to maintain a veneer of cool are branches of his job, which means he’s basically always working. But for the first time in 20 years, he’s doing it his way — which generally means at home in sweatpants with a gaming console in hand. He gave up trying to come off as cool and has never felt cooler. Lit by the glow of five huge gaming monitors, he says with a shrug: “If you stop trying to impress everybody and make everybody think you’re perfect, what can they hate on?”

The day before we meet in early April, T-Pain posts a clip from a recent stream on Twitch, where he regularly broadcasts to a virtual crowd of gamers, fans, haters and random stragglers as he works on new music, plays video games or shoots the sh-t in occasional marathon sessions. (In recent weeks, they’ve ranged from five minutes long to 12 hours.) Previewing a new song, he noticed a string of comments from the same persistent heckler: “straight garbage,” “autotune to mask lack of skill” and so on. “My wife is one of my [moderators], and usually when people start talking sh-t, they get banned immediately,” T-Pain explains. “Then I started seeing the ban appeals: ‘I’m sorry, man. I was going through something that night, I was drinking heavy…’” He decided that rather than block out the hate, he’d figure out where it was coming from.

T-Pain has spent nearly two decades attempting to apply logic to comments like these. “They don’t want their narrative to change, especially if it fits in with everybody else’s: ‘Yeah, we all hate T-Pain. He’s bad at music,’” he says with a wry laugh. “If you’re a metal guy or a country guy, then of course all you’re going to know is the Auto-Tune, the narrative that has been pushed on you. But I’m here to talk through it with you, not to say, ‘F–k you, keep that opinion over there.’ Criticism is always good — but you’re not going to make me dislike my sh-t!” His level-headed breakdown is interrupted by a dramatic entrance from Stewie, the family’s Persian cat, who looks like a haughty, fluffy cloud and proceeds to cough up a series of noisy hairballs (and who is, yes, named for the Family Guy character).

When it comes to metal and country fans, T-Pain speaks from experience. Though the version of “War Pigs” that closes On Top of the Covers received Ozzy Osbourne’s stamp of approval (“Best cover of ‘War Pigs’ ever”), metalheads loudly disagreed. As for Pain’s soulful take on the country standard “Tennessee Whiskey” popularized by Chris Stapleton: “A country music page on Instagram posted my version, and there was only one comment: ‘ Nope ,’” he says, cracking up. It was harder to laugh at the reception of his previous attempts at country crossover. He recalls a red-carpet interview shortly after his “Good Life” Grammy win in 2008. “They asked me who I wanted to work with, and I said Carrie Underwood,” he says. “The country fans were like, ‘She don’t work with j—oos. She has too much class for somebody like you. Why would she ever…’ And I was giving her props!”

But after seeing his share of hateful feedback from gate-keeping country fans, he opted to keep his work private. “Beyoncé is strong enough to keep it going. It’s easier for her to stay in it than me,” he admits. “I’m not up at that level, so I can’t punch through that kind of stuff. So I kept doing it, but I just stopped taking credit.” Maybe those tides are finally turning: Running into Jelly Roll at the iHeartRadio Music Awards in April, the singer fawned over Pain’s “Tennessee Whiskey” cover, declaring, “Country music’s in love with you right now!” (And on April 26, the two released a cover of Keith’s “Should’ve Been a Cowboy” and performed it at Stagecoach together.)

T-Pain tends to refer to his work with a modesty that borders on self-deprecation, brushing off his biggest hits as inside jokes (he wrote “I’m N Luv [Wit a Stripper]” to make fun of a friend’s first strip club experience) or painful memories (the “Good Life” studio sessions dragged on for weeks). His fame still seems to puzzle him. “People will come up to me in the mall and I’m like, ‘My dude, we’re in Hot Topic right now,’” he says with a laugh. “I’m getting ear gauges just like you are, from the same case — actually, can you move? I can’t f–king see my earring.” Being a musician is nowhere near as cool as people make it out to be, he stresses: “Tons of people do way cooler sh-t than I do, and I know that because I look up to them.”

Hertrech “Hert” Eugene Jr. has been co-owner and president of Pain’s auto company, Nappy Boy Automotive, since it launched last year. The Orlando, Fla., native, who Road & Track magazine named the car world’s most important influencer in 2022, remembers his first impression of the singer as remarkably down-to-earth. “Pain wanted to check out what we call the burn yard, where we drift cars around and do burnouts,” he says, referring to a spin move that creates smoke and noise. “It was definitely weird to meet T-Pain, someone who I dressed as for Halloween in 2009 — fast-forward 10 years and he knows who I am.” Showing me a video from the first Nappy Boy-hosted drift event at Atlanta’s Caffeine & Octane raceway, Pain fans out over the various drivers, then points to himself behind the wheel of a souped-up pink race car as it drifts beside its competitors in a kind of chaotic ballet.

His entry into the gaming world was similarly unassuming. Though his former management had warned him not to publicize it, Pain had been active on Twitch since 2014, playing on- and off-stream with friends he’d made on the platform who were mostly chill about the fact that he was, well, T-Pain. One such friend was Mike Brew, who, after years of gaming together, began offering Pain advice about building out his channel into a professional organization; in 2021, that became Nappy Boy Gaming, with Brew as co-founder and president.

Pain and Brew had no connections to the gaming industry or to developers, so establishing the company felt like a scrappy startup, building custom servers and throwing DIY events, gradually earning the respect of the streaming community. “He’s recognized as an actual streamer,” Brew notes. “Not just as a musician trying to find a new revenue stream.” Even so, Matt Galle, one of Pain’s representatives at CAA, believes the singer’s side ventures have bolstered his tours. “When people were stuck inside during COVID, T-Pain was livestreaming daily,” he says. “People got to know him really well as a personality and human being and realized this is someone they believe in.”

Pain’s wisecracking charisma is part of his success on Twitch, but there’s also a decided “nerd recognize nerd” factor. These days he fields regular calls from rapper friends asking him how to get started on the platform. “Nope, I’m not telling you,” he says with a shrug. “I’m not trying to gate-keep, but I know you’re trying to get on there because you think I’m making a ton of money. I am! But still, it’s not like that. You should’ve got on that b-tch a decade ago then.” For all the rappers he names who use Twitch organically (Post Malone, Lupe Fiasco, Tee Grizzley), there are far more who see it as a come-up, though he stresses that the real nerds can sniff out the bullsh-t. “People have all these different ideas of how to make it cool, but it’s not about being cool,” he says. “It’s about gathering with like-minded people, being yourself and not having to conform to anything. The cool sh-t is, you don’t have to be cool.”

Pain’s nerdier passions have now found their way into his songs: For his latest solo single, the anthemic (and un-Auto-Tuned) “Dreaming,” he spent a month learning the 3D graphics software Blender in his spare time to animate the video, complete with exploding volcanoes, a Grand Theft Auto -style street scene and an impressively faithful rendering of himself. The breakneck recording pace of his hit-making prime has significantly slowed since going independent — but that’s because he prefers it that way. “You know the saying, ‘Find something you love and get paid for it’? I think whoever said that didn’t tell everybody, ‘Also, make sure you’re the boss,’” he says, clearly elated at his newfound ability to say no, or to simply do it his way. “That person also left out the part ‘Make sure it’s not your only income.’ Because if it is, you’re going to hate that thing that you loved in the end.”

These days, he uses his “entertainer side” to fund his hobbies, taking a few hours of work (a concert, a club appearance) and turning it into two weeks of fun. He still feels some residual burnout from two grueling decades in the industry, and to those who attribute his latest side projects to having fallen off musically, he has an unbothered reply: “Why stress myself out about doing all these red carpets,” he wonders, “when I could be playing video games in my drawers at home?”

It’s a cloudless 90-degree April day in the Coachella Valley, and T-Pain is dancing like no one is watching. In fact, a few hundred influencers are.

Dressed in their finest Y2K-flavored mesh and leather, the crowd is gathered to witness the singer twirl like a ballerina, hip-thrust like a Magic Mike extra and pop-lock like he has been taking notes from an old Darrin’s Dance Grooves DVD. Pain’s the sole headliner of the invite-only Celsius Cosmic Desert party, next door to the festival grounds on the first Friday of Coachella weekend, where Megan Fox, Halle Bailey and Barry Keoghan pose for pictures clutching dewy energy drink cans. Though the crowd for his 45-minute set skews more Gen Z than millennial, they appear to know every word to anthems like 2007’s “Bartender” or the 2008 Lil Wayne collaboration “Got Money.”

I’d been disabused of any expectations of backstage bacchanalia on the hourlong ride from Pain’s Palm Springs hotel to the windblown festival grounds, during which the singer sat quietly beside Amber, drinking Nesquik, relaxing to the sounds of smooth jazz and extolling the virtues of the new Call of Duty: Warzone mobile game with his bodyguard. It’s Amber’s birthday at midnight; later he’ll take her out for sushi along with the rest of the team, and tomorrow they’ll make a pit stop to grab ice cream before his set at the Revolve Festival in Palm Springs, which he’s headlining alongside Ludacris and a few more 2000s throwbacks (Sean Paul, Ying Yang Twins, Nina Sky). These days, that’s about as wild as it gets for Pain.

As the weekend’s prevailing Y2K aesthetic underlines, it’s a good time to be an icon of the 2000s charts. The period between 2007 and 2008 is generally considered the height of T-Pain’s career, the era when his voice was inescapable. But when he thinks about that time, “I remember forcing happiness,” he told me earlier in his basement. “I remember being drunk a lot. I remember going out to clubs in order to be happy because it wasn’t the studio, it wasn’t work.” He zeroes in on the moment when he found out that his second album, 2007’s Epiphany , had gone platinum. He was on tour at the time, making beats on the bus when someone brought the plaque in. “It was my first platinum album,” he recalls. “And I was like, ‘Let me finish this beat real quick.’ I didn’t really celebrate anything. Everybody else went out to celebrate for me.”

He directed the show top to bottom, from the arrangements to the lighting cues to the instructions for the band and backup singers. Pain banters a bit between songs, countering his bombshell performance with his usual self-effacing wisecracks. (“Tequila hit me a little harder than I thought it was going to. Should’ve ate and took a sh-t before this,” he quips after crushing “War Pigs.”) Eventually, he gets sincere.

“When you get into the music industry, you have this vision of arenas, big f–king crowds,” he tells the audience. “But over the years I’ve realized that we don’t get to connect with people, like, ever. We don’t really get to see in that mass crowd. The real connection is being able to see people. To me, this is superstardom.” He goes on to describe what drew him to musicianship as a kid. “One: When I started rapping in school, I started acquiring friends. People wanted to be around me for some reason. I wasn’t good, so I don’t know where the f–k that came from,” he jokes. “Two: The first song I learned to play on keyboard was ‘Lift Every Voice and Sing.’ That was my dad’s favorite song. I learned it in secret, and when I played it for him, his eyes lit up. I was like, ‘I want to do this all the time now.’”

He’d been searching for that feeling of acceptance all his life, since his days as a self-described “smelly kid” who longed to sit with the cool kids when they were banging on the tables and rapping. “I just wanted people to like me. And I felt like, if you guys just knew how much I know music — if you looked past the Auto-Tune and you just heard me sing — I bet you’d like me.” But he doesn’t feel that way anymore. “It’s five people in this house that I need to like me: my wife, my kids, myself. That’s all I need. That’s all I ever needed. So, you know, suck a butt.”

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Chicago will host LIV Golf's 2024 Individual Championship in September at Bolingbrook Golf Club, the Saudi Arabia-backed circuit announced on Tuesday.

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Anthony Rizzo's walk-off single lifts Yankees past Tigers

Anthony Rizzo hit a walk-off single with nobody out in the ninth inning as the host New York Yankees rallied for a 2-1 victory over the Detroit Tigers on Friday night.

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Pro Tour Murders at Karlov Manor Pioneer Metagame Breakdown

The decklists are in, the data is ready, and the first Pro Tour of 2024 begins tomorrow! It's time for Pro Tour Murders at Karlov Manor , where 258 of the world's best Magic: the Gathering players will compete for $500,000 in prizes, numerous Magic World Championship invites, and a prestigious trophy. The event takes place at MagicCon: Chicago .

While most competitors earned their invitation via Regional Championship performance, the field also includes Magic Hall of Famers, top online players, and high finishers from preceding Pro Tours, Pro Tour Qualifiers, and the World Championship. With World Champion Jean-Emmanuel Depraz and Player of the Year Simon Nielsen in attendance, the Pro Tour is truly one of the highest levels of tabletop Magic competition at a global level.

The formats are Murders at Karlov Manor Booster Draft in the morning of Friday and Saturday, followed by Pioneer for five rounds afterward each of those days. Pioneer is also the Top 8 format on Sunday. To follow all the action, catch the stream at twitch.tv/magic , which begins at 11 a.m. Central Time on Friday and Saturday and at 10 a.m. Central Time on Sunday. Take a look at the viewer's guide for more information.

Pioneer Metagame Breakdown

Pioneer is a non-rotating format based on expansion sets and core sets from Return to Ravnica onward, with the most notable cards on the ban list being the fetch lands. Pioneer will be the designated Constructed format for the next RCQ cycle , heightening its importance for competitive players. With over 10,000 cards to choose from, including the newly added cards from Murders at Karlov Manor , the format features a variety of aggro, midrange, control, and combo strategies. The metagame at the Pro Tour breaks downs as follows.

All Pioneer Constructed decklists for the tournament will be published on the Pro Tour Murders at Karlov Manor event page on Friday February 23 at the beginning of Round 4 gameplay, approximately at 2 p.m. Central Time.

The Pro Tour metagame bears many similarities to the online metagame in January that I analyzed in my format primer , but there are various notable differences. First and foremost, Rakdos Midrange—the most prominent Pioneer deck throughout 2023—has been dethroned. Even though the most-played nonland cards across all Pro Tour decks are still Fable of the Mirror-Breaker, Thoughtseize , and Fatal Push , we now have a new number one deck: Izzet Phoenix!

After gaining Picklock Prankster and Sleight of Hand from Wilds of Eldraine , Izzet Phoenix maintained an upward trajectory throughout the preceding cycle of Regional Championships, and now 17.8% of the Pro Tour field will try to chain Consider , Treasure Cruise , and Lightning Axe in a single turn, aiming to bring back multiple copies of Arclight Phoenix from the graveyard. There's also some innovation, as seven Izzet Phoenix players added main deck Ashiok, Dream Render to fill their graveyard, exile their opponent's, and prevent search effects like Emergent Ultimatum or Chord of Calling .

New Developments and Surprises

Most Izzet Phoenix lists use zero new cards from Murders of Karlov Manor , but the latest set has introduced powerful options for various other archetypes, shaking up the metagame as a result. The most-played new card by far is No More Lies , which is a noticeable upgrade to Make Disappear with additional utility against Arclight Phoenix and Memory Deluge . Let's take a closer look at the importance of No More Lies and other developments.

The Adoption of No More Lies : No More Lies has cemented Azorius Control as a major contender, nearly evenly split between 80-card and 60-card versions. No More Lies also played a major role in the emergence of Jeskai Creativity and Niv to Light, both of which are control decks with a combo finish. The novel Jeskai Creativity builds are reminiscent of the Izzet Creativity deck that Reid Duke used to win last year's Pioneer Pro Tour , with the addition of white for cards like No More Lies and The Wandering Emperor . We might see 2/2 Samurai tokens creatively turning into Atraxa, Grand Unifier . Niv to Light decks are similar to Omnath to Light, but they use at least one copy of Niv-Mizzet Reborn as a tutor target for Bring to Light , usually along with No More Lies to reveal.

The Revamp of Lotus Field Combo: Lotus Field Combo traditionally has a good matchup against Izzet Phoenix, and 23 players—a sizable 8.9% of the field—registered it for the Pro Tour. Out of those 23, an almost-unanimous 22 incorporated Archdruid's Charm , and 16 run the full four copies. The triple-green spell is the first-ever unconditional three-mana effect that can put Lotus Field or Thespian's Stage from your library directly onto the battlefield. Besides increasing the deck's consistency, Archdruid's Charm also answers Damping Sphere after sideboard and can fetch silver-bullet creatures like Dragonlord Dromoka , Fae of Wishes, or even Realm-Cloaked Giant. But the rest of the field came prepared: Lotus Field Combo players will have to contend with Krenko's Buzzcrusher (which gets around hexproof) and Ashiok, Dream Render (which stops Archdruid's Charm ). All of these new changes will refresh the way Lotus Field Combo matches will play out.

The Surprise of Boros Heroic : At 4.7% of the metagame, Boros Heroic is the most-played aggro deck, which is a bit of a surprise. At the preceding cycle of Regional Championships, after Wilds of Eldraine introduced Monstrous Rage , the deck put up solid results, but it lived in the shadow of Boros Convoke. However, Boros Heroic is generally faster, allowing it to race combo decks like Amalia Combo or Lotus Field Combo. Moreover, ten out of twelve Boros Heroic players embraced Fugitive Codebreaker as a new turn-two prowess creature that can be disguised—albeit predictably—to provide staying power in the late game. Supported by an abundance of instants and sorceries, Fugitive Codebreaker shores up the otherwise tough matchup against Rakdos Midrange.

The Verve of Vampires : Cavern of Souls became more valuable after No More Lies was added to the format, and twelve players—4.7% of the field, split between eleven Rakdos and one Mono-Black deck—decided that Vampires was the way to go. Although Sorin, Imperious Bloodlord has been legal in Pioneer for years, the supporting cast of Vampires was always a bit lackluster, but recent sets have changed that. The Lost Caverns of Ixalan added Preacher of the Schism , and Murders at Karlov Manor introduced Vein Ripper . Vein Ripper is difficult to remove, wins damage races, and provides a fast clock when put onto the battlefield on turn three by Sorin. These new Vampire decks pack a punch.

Most-Played Cards from Murders at Karlov Manor

Despite the high bar set by the existing Pioneer card pool, Murders at Karlov Manor had a considerable impact on the format. I've already mentioned standouts like No More Lies and Archdruid's Charm , but the following table provides a complete overview of all new-to-Pioneer cards among decklists submitted for the Pro Tour.

Besides No More Lies , most Azorius Control players also embraced Meticulous Archive and/or Deduce . Meticulous Archive improves the consistency of the mana base, can surveil Memory Deluge into the graveyard for value, and provides a free surveil when your Temporary Lockdown is hit by Boseiju, Who Endures . Deduce is an improved Think Twice ; it was included by slightly less than half of Azorius Control players, and a small number of Creativity players exploit the Clue as a target for Indomitable Creativity as well.

Murders at Karlov Manor was a gold mine for Niv to Light and Omnath to Light. Deadly Cover-Up is a sweet Bring to Light target, as sweeping the board while exiling all opposing copies of Arclight Phoenix or Amalia Benavides Aguirre can provide a big edge in certain matchups. Lightning Helix was an even bigger get, as it's a early-game removal spell for Ledger Shredder , Smuggler's Copter , and Wildgrowth Walker that bridges to your powerful end-game. The iconic burn spell is also found in Jeskai Creativity, Jeskai Control, and Boros Burn.

All Boros Convoke players (and one Azorius Improve player) embraced four copies of Novice Inspector . It's the best one-drop for decks built around Gleeful Demolition and Venerated Loxodon , so the ability to run effectively eight copies of Thraben Inspector adds redundancy and consistency. Boros Convoke players usually shaved Ornithopter to make room. In addition, most Boros Convoke players use a singleton Case of the Gateway Express to bolster their go-wide strategy.

Only four of the eleven Izzet Ensoul players incorporated Gleaming Geardrake and/or Case of the Filched Falcon into their list, shaving Gleeful Demolition and Reckless Bushwhacker , but they are promising options. Both new cards bring along an artifact token, which the deck can suit up with Ensoul Artifact or sacrifice to Shrapnel Blast . And when Darksteel Citadel is animated by Case of the Filched Falcon , an opposing Temporary Lockdown or Get Lost can't even answer it, unlike Ensoul Artifact .

All in all, Murders at Karlov Manor has introduced many novel cards for archetypes both old and new. If you're eager to find out which cards and strategies will come out on top and who will carve their name into competitive Magic history, then don't miss all the live action. Coverage begins Friday, February 23 at twitch.tv/magic !