Magic: The Gathering's Most Popular Draft Format Finally Makes Its Debut on MTG Arena

The Vintage Cube stands as one of the highly popular cubes on the original digital platform, the premier digital platform for playing MTG before Arena came into existence. Now, Arena enthusiasts will get the opportunity to encounter immense strength when the Powered Cube limited event debuts on October 28. As per the official description, "This thrilling occasion is unlike anything else on Arena and will feature some of the most powerful cards from throughout Magic's history, featuring the Power Nine."

What Is the Vintage Cube?

As experienced Limited players know, a cube is a unique form of draft format that does not pull cards from particular expansions, but rather from a pre-selected collection. The Classic Cube has long been a enjoyable and widely-used way for MTG players to experience the thrills of using some of the most powerful cards in the history of the game without having to pay the significant money required for tabletop Vintage. Arena previously offered a comparable option with its Timeless format, but it excluded cards such as the iconic Power Nine — MTG's legendary high-power cards, including Black Lotus, the Mox gem series, Time Walk card, Timetwister, and Ancestral Recall.

Features of the Arena Powered Cube

The Powered Cube will incorporate 100 new MTG Arena card versions, but some of these will be collectible at the launch of the event. This allows for the addition of a larger card pool, as some of these massively overpowered cards could create imbalance issues in Constructed formats. According to the official news, this also made the release of the new cube faster. Online community members are already speculating that this move was a response to the poor reception of the Omenpaths set — the Arena version of Marvel's Spider-Man and the least-played Arena set to date, according to some reports.

How It Works and Participation Information

Launching a iteration of one of the most popular cubes ever will certainly increase engagement in MTG Arena, but there is an key point to note. The Arena Powered Cube will adopt a reward system and access cost similar to the Premier Draft events, thus being more expensive to play than earlier cube events. The format details will be the following:

• Begins On: October 28, 8 a.m. PT (3 p.m. UTC)
• Signup Close: November 18, 8 a.m. PT (15:00 UTC)
• Participation Cost: 10k gold, or 1,500 gems, or 1 Player Draft token
• Game Style: Powered Cube Phantom Player Draft (Players do not keep the event cards)
• Best-of-One: Seven wins or three losses; with ranking
• Best-of-Three: 3 matches; unranked

Prizes and Additional Details

The Cube Prize Packs awarded during the event can include nearly all cards permitted in the Timeless format, along with cards from a unique bonus card list. For more details on the rewards and the cards present in the Powered Cube, interested players can review the official announcement. Also, on Oct. 22, MTG pro players Luis Scott-Vargas and Paul Cheon, long-time Vintage Cube aficionados, will provide more updates on their video platforms.