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By: hamtastic, Erik Friborg
Sep 25 2008 3:38am
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First off, for those who missed it here is the link to the MED2 events: MED2 Release Events

The first thing that jumped out at me was the return of a oft requested event: Championship Events!  But more on that shortly.  Let's break down what's coming with MED2's events, what that means, and finally wrap up with some highlights of the set!

Casual Drafts

On Wednesday September 24, players will be able to play in casual Masters Edition 2 drafts in the newly created "Casual Draft" room. These drafts will charge 0 tix, have 0 k-value, and will not pay prizes. Queues will be set up for 4, 6, and 8 players.

Crack packs with your friends and rare draft, I guess.  People wanted these, and WotC delivered them.  Some question the reason for these.  I don't know why people would use these either, but enough people did to have threads asking for them back and here they are.



Masters Edition 2 Draft Queues

QUEUES BEGIN: Friday, September 26 at 10:00 am PST.

FORMATS: Booster Draft

PRODUCT: 2 10E and 1 Masters Edition 2 Booster and 3 Masters Edition 2 boosters.

ADMISSION: 2 Tix, Product

PRIZE SUPPORT: 4-3-2-2 and 8-4

The winner of each Masters Edition 2 Draft will get an Orcish Squatters avatar.

They've brought back the Core Set + MED mixed drafts for MED2, which is a nice entry point into MED2 for the timid or Standard regular drafters.  I recall a lot of players evolved into the MED1 only drafts after trying out the XXM drafts.  I can see the same happening this time.  For those unitiated to drafting terminology, the above draft information is saying the following:

There will be a draft queue which will require two packs of Xth Edition and one pack of MED and two tickets, or a queue that will require three packs of MED2 and two tickets that will pay out the following.


1st
2nd
3rd
4th
8-4
8
4
0
0
4322
4
3
2
2

Generally, if you don't expect to win you should join the 4-3-2-2 queues so that way even if you win once you get some packs for the effort.

Pros: Booster drafts allow you to pick the cards you want.  You can focus on certain colors or cerrtain card types.  You can largely avoid the mediocre and junk cards you don't want.  They are also fast.  Once your event is over you get your cards to trade/sell/etc.

Cons: They are fast.  If you are hoping to get a lot of playing out of the cards and you're new to drafting you may be in for a sad shock when the event is over in a few mintues.  They are also rather expensive for what you get.  The card selection comes at the price of two tickets.


Masters Edition 2 "Top 8" Premier Events

DURATION: September 26, 10:00 am – October 3, 10:00 am (last starts at 10:00 am). "Top 8" Premier Events start every 4 hours. Each event will have a minimum of 32 players, maximum of 128 players.

PRODUCT: 5 Masters Edition 2 Booster Packs, top 8 booster draft. The booster draft format will be 3 Masters Edition 2 Boosters.

ADMISSION: 4 Tix, Product

PRIZE SUPPORT: Prizes paid as follows:

Place Boosters
1 40
2 30
3-4 15
5-8 10
9-16 5
17-32 3


All who participate in a "Top 8" Premier Event will get an Orcish Squatters avatar. Top 8 will get a Necropotence avatar. In addition, the Top 8 finishers will qualify for the Masters Edition 2 Release Event 4x Championship

This is pretty straight forward, however, for those who are unfamiliar with the term 'Top 8', it means that after the swiss rounds the top 8 players will advance to a booster draft.  This draft will provide its own packs and then the placement for the entire tournament will be based upon where you finish after the draft is done.  The big deal about these events is that the pay out well, AND they qualifiy the best 8 players to play in a really, really big event at the end of the release events.

Pros: Only way to get into the Championship events.  Big payouts.

Cons: You're going to have the top players online going for the big tournament payoff.  The events will likely take a while.  Great fun for a full day though.


Masters Edition 2 Premier Event "Competitive No Top 8" Flights

DURATION: September 26, 11:00 am – October 3, 10:00 am (last starts at 10:00 am). "Competitive No Top 8" flights will have 32 players per flight, and will start as soon as 32 players join the flight. These events will be run "on demand" – as soon as 1 event fills, another will open for sign-up.

LOCATION: These events will take place in the newly created "Sealed Swiss Queues" room

PRODUCT: 5 Masters Edition 2 Booster Packs

ADMISSION: 2 Tix, Product

PRIZE SUPPORT: As there is no top 8, prizes are based on total match points at the end of the tournament. Each match win awards 3 points and each loss awards 0 points.

Points Boosters
15 25
12 11
9 4
0,3, or 6 0


All who participate in a "Competitive No Top 8" Premier Event Flight will get an Orcish Squatters avatar. Players with 12 or more match points and the end of the tournament will get Necropotence avatar.

These are the same as last time, and are similar to the above in that it's a Swiss tournament (you can play all the rounds no matter how you do).  However this one doesn't have a Top 8 draft, it just awards the amount of boosters to the amount of points you've accumulated throughout the tournament.  To win any prizes in this type of tournament you have to win at least three matches out of the five you'll play.

Pros: These will run faster than the Casual flights due to the timing setup.  If you're a good player you should wind up with a bit more product in your virtual pocket.

Cons: If you're not an above average player you may not win anything.   


Masters Edition 2 Premier Event "Casual No Top 8" Flights

Due to the lack of leagues for the Masters Edition 2 Release Events, we will offer these flights for those that desire a more casual release event experience. "Casual No Top 8" flights will differ from regular flights as follows:

 

  • K-Value will be 0
  • Deck build time will be 40 minutes
  • Players will each receive 40 minutes on their play clocks
  • A flatter prize structure

DURATION: September 26, 11:00 am – October 3, 10:00 am (last starts at 10:00 am). "Casual No Top 8" flights will have 32 players per flight and will start as soon as 32 players join the event. These events will be run "on demand" – as soon as 1 event fills, another will open for sign-up.

LOCATION: These events will take place in the newly created "Sealed Swiss Queues" room

PRODUCT: 5 Masters Edition 2 Booster Packs

ADMISSION: 2 Tix, Product

PRIZE SUPPORT: As there is no top 8, prizes are based on total match points at the end of the tournament. Each match win awards 3 points and each loss awards 0 points.

Points Boosters
15 20
12 10
9 4
6 2
0 or 3 0


All who participate in a "Casual No Top 8" Premier Event Flight will get an Orcish Squatters avatar. Players with 12 or more match points and the end of the tournament will get an Necropotence avatar.

Much like the Competitive just above this one, this is a Swiss event.  The main differences are: longer building time, longer play time and prizes for anyone who wins two of their five matches.  I strongly endorse new or timid players to start with these queues if you're going to play a few events.  They're not as casual as leagues were, but they're much nicer than the competitive or top 8 queues if you're just learning the set.  Be prepared for these to go pretty long though, as the whole point is to give players a place to get used to the set.

Pros: Lots of play for your money.  The time structure is very forgiving for new and inexperience players.  The payout is well suited for the new and inexperienced players.  The length of time scares away a lot of 'shark' players.

Cons: These take quite a while to finish. 



Masters Edition Release Event Championship

START TIME: October 4, 8:00 am PST

PRODUCT: 5 Masters Edition 2 Booster Packs, top 8 booster draft. The booster draft format will be 3 Masters Edition 2 Boosters.

ADMISSION: FREE – (No Tix, No Product, Invitation only)

PRIZE SUPPORT: Prizes paid as follows:

Place Boosters
1 72
2 54
3-4 36
5-8 18
9-16 12
17-32 6
33-64 3


The winner of the Championship will also receive a complete set of Magic Online Premium Masters Edition 2 cards.

Second place will receive a complete set of regular Magic Online Masters Edition 2 cards.

Although players may have multiple accounts qualified for the Masters Edition 2 Championship event, players are not permitted to have more than 1 of their accounts entered in the event. Players are not permitted to have secondary accounts played by another person. If a player is discovered to have more than 1 account playing in the Championship before, during, or after the event, appropriate penalties will be applied (including disqualification from the event with no refund of product or event tickets).

And last, but certainly not least is the Master's Edition 2 Championship tournament.

This is a big, big deal.  The winner gets a foil set of MED2 AND 72 (two boxes) of boosters!  That's huge.  The second place player gets a regular set of MED2 and 54 boosters!  That's a huge prize right there as well.  The only way to get into this event is to top 8 a Top 8 Premier Event.  Expect some good competition in the MED2 Top 8 Events.  Also, expect to put in a few events to get to this point.  There will be a lot of people gunning for these big prizes.  Can you beat them all?


Cards to watch out for in MED2 Sealed:

Mostly you want to be on the lookout for your opponent broadcasting removal:
Dry Spell

Dark Banishing
Shrink
Pyrokinesis
Incinerate
Meteor Shower
Lava Burst
Swords to Plowshares
Sacred Boon
Reprisal
Righteous Fury

Some that were surprising to me were Sacred Boon and Reprisal.  What should be an easy combat phase turns into a very one-sided trade.

So there you have it!  A breakdown of what to expect and what you should look for during the release events that are starting this Friday (the 26th of September)!

1 Comments

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