Hello Planeswalkers,
2025 saw an insane number of product releases for Magic: the Gathering, with 7 Standard-legal sets being released per year now. This is in part due to the push for Universes Beyond products taking up a larger lion's share of the releases in a given year. We went from 1-2 Universes Beyond sets a year, to 3 sets in 2025, to a staggering 4 Universes Beyond sets planned for release in 2026. More than half of all Magic releases in 2026 are going to be Universes Beyond products, and whether that's seen as good news or bad news will vary from player to player.
It's not much of a secret that Universes Beyond sets tend to fare poorly compared to in-universe sets. Tarkir: Dragonstorm, Edge of Eternities, and Lorwyn Eclipsed have all out-performed every Universes Beyond release in 2025, save for the obvious outlier that is Final Fantasy. I'm not even talking about sales here; the turn-out for our events are far and away much greater for in-universe sets than for cross-over sets.
Lorwyn Eclipsed's first FNM oversold due to the sheer demand to play the set. That's the kind of passion and excitement we like to see at our events! It's been fun to listen in on people's conversations about what exciting pulls they may have come across during the draft or the interesting commander decks they plan to build with all the new legendary creatures.
All of this points to a general lack of interest for a large portion of the community to come out for FNM events that feature Universes Beyond sets. We've seen that quite clearly with low turnouts for both Spider-man and Avatar: the Last Airbender drafts, though certainly the higher cost of Universes Beyond drafts plays a role here. We would like those who aren't fans of Universes Beyond to still be able to come out and draft once in a while even if the current set isn't their jam.
Beginning with the release of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and continuing through all future Universes Beyond sets, we will be alternating between the current Universes Beyond set and a Flashback Draft to a previous set, such as Tarkir: Dragonstorm, or Bloomburrow. There's no set schedule or list of sets we're going to draft just yet, though I'd advise keeping an eye on our Event Calendar come late February/early March, as we'll make clear which days will be Flashback Drafts.
This change serves two purposes:
- Players who are uninterested in Universes Beyond properties will be able to come out every second week for an in-universe flashback draft. They won't feel like they have to "sit out" for an entire season of drafts.
- It is likely to lower the cost of entry for Friday Night Magic, as Universes Beyond boosters are generally more expensive than in-universe sets. This should help keep FNM accessible for everyone.
When it comes to in-universe sets, like Secrets of Strixhaven or the upcoming Reality Fracture, we will return to our regular draft schedule.
We're hoping that the community will like these changes to the draft schedule, and we are open to hearing any feedback you may have! If there's any questions or concerns, you can always email us at tcg@gameknight.ca or you can reach us on our public discord server.
Cheers!
Boregard & the GameKnight TCG Team
