This Week in Magic: Friday, October 25th

Posted on October 25, 2024

Wizards Announces the Commander Format Panel

In the wake of the extensive drama that followed the most recent round of Commander bannings, Wizards revealed that they were taking over the format. This was done in conjunction with the then Commander Rules Committee who determined the format had grown to such a degree that they could no longer manage it on their own. As such, this led to the next announcement that was revealed this week: the Commander Format Panel.

If you're already familiar with the Pauper Format Panel - a group of community members (of whom I'm a part of) and Gavin Verhey work to manage the Pauper format under Wizards - this is largely the same concept. Instead of the mere seven members for a community panel focused on a minor format like Pauper, the Commander Format Panel (or CFP for short) boasts a whopping eighteen members including Gavin himself! Many of these members are former Commander Rules Committee and Commander Advisory Group members, as well as a few additional names from around the world for a more multinational look at the format.

Minor consternations came about due to the apparent non-disparagement clause that was in the contracts, as revealed by former RC member Gavin Duggan. This led to many players worried about what this might mean for the members of the panel, however both Gavin Verhey and other panel members noted that they were still allowed to speak freely. The one caveat is doing so by using "privileged information to disparage WotC," as CFP member Rachel Weeks noted on Twitter.

You can check out all the details on the Commander Format Panel in Wizards' official announcement here.

Secret Lair x Marvel Superdrop Announced

Last Friday at New York Comic Con, Wizards of the Coast showed up to show off the start of their upcoming collaboration with Marvel. To kick things off, we were shown a whole suite of five new Secret Lair releases, all centered around a single all-new card based on a specific Marvel superhero. These five include Captain America, Wolverine, Black Panther, Iron Man, and Storm, and are all going to go on sale on November 4th. You can find all of the details on the release here, and make sure you show up early because there's no doubt these ones are going to go fast.

Additionally, an upcoming release focusing solely on Spider-Man was revealed, though little to no information beyond that was shared. However, various sources - such as in this Polygon article covering the reveal - note that this is going to be a full-sized set release as opposed to something like a Secret Lair. It's clear that this collaboration with Magic is going to be long and that these releases are just the start of a truly massive undertaking within the MTG world.

Leyline of Resonance Banned in Best-of-One on Arena

In my This Week in Magic article from last week, I capped it off by sharing the popular Standard Gruul Aggro deck. At the end of my brief write-up, I noted that the MTG Arena team had revealed they were monitoring the card Leyline of Resonance in best-of-one play because of the warping effect it had on gameplay in that specific environment. Turns out we didn't have to wait very long at all.

This past Tuesday, the MTG Arena team released a Banned and Restricted announcement that banned Leyline of Resonance in best-of-one play. The announcement also revealed that the card was also suspended (a temporary, but possibly forever) ban in best-of-one Alchemy. However, it does note that there may be a rebalance for the card coming down the line eventually that will enable it to be used in Alchemy once again. You can read all the details here and check out the team's reasoning for these updates.

Magic World Championship 30 Starts Today

Today kicks off MagicCon Las Vegas, and with it comes one of the year's biggest competitive Magic tournaments: the Magic World Championship! 113 players are gathering to duke it out for the coveted world champion trophy and a shot at their face on a future MTG card. You can find the meta breakdown above - taken from Frank Karsten's fantastic breakdown of the event's meta. You can also check out the viewer's guide as well for all the details of how to watch the event throughout the weekend. It's sure to be an exciting time!

Decklist of the Week

Azorius Tempo | DSK Standard | Schiaveto, 2nd Place MTGO Standard Challenge

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Those of you who may have been playing Standard for the better part of the last year or so are likely familiar with this list. Previously the deck was dubbed Azorius Mentor and functioned largely off the back of putting copies of Monastery Mentor and Haughty Djinn into your graveyard. From there, you'd get them back utilizing copies of Recommission and Helping Hand to give you powerful creatures for a low cost. The loss of Otherworldly Gaze make it a good bit worse following rotation, but thanks to Duskmourn: House of Horror, it has a creature even better than Mentor! Abhorrent Oculus is a monster of a creature and it even allows you to spawn more creatures that can even flip into another Oculus later. The deck has a fairly sizable showing at Worlds, so expect to see it this weekend!

Paige Smith

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