As Short As Possible (Not As Short As Planned) Unabridged Beginner’s Guide to MTG Arena
Appendix D. Timeline
As of 30 August 2021, the guide has moved to MTG Arena Zone. Further updates are expected there rather than here.
As of 30 August 2021, the guide has moved to MTG Arena Zone. Further updates are expected there rather than here.
August 24, 2021
An important patch with a large-scale change to backend systems was applied (moved forward from 10th of August). Ranked season ended early, and servers were down for several hours.
The next iteration of dual-colored starter decks were be distributed to old players (new players were getting them since AFR release).
Following the patch, in two days Jumpstart: Historic Horizons (J21) set/event is added to Arena, containing 782 cards legal in Historic.
It will reuse some existing Arena cards, add some cards from Modern Horizons and Modern Horizons 2, and new-to-Magic cards.
New cards are purely digital and employ some mechanics that could not efficiently work in paper.
May 27, 2021
Historic Anthology 5 added.
March 25, 2021
Arena mobile now available for iOS and tablets.
March 11, 2021
Historic Anthology 4 added.
February 12, 2021
The first offer of Traditional (best-of-three) Sealed, followed by February Arena Open and the March qualifier in the Sealed format.
January 28, 2021
Arena mobile “early access”, powerful Android phones only.
December 12, 2020
The first offer of Traditional (best-of-three) Cube (it was even extended due to the popularity), with another one announced for January.
November 12, 2020
Kaladesh Remastered released on Arena, legal for Historic. Combines parts of Kaladesh and Aether Revolt into a 286-card set (plus basic lands) plus Sculpting Steel as a “box topper”.
August 13, 2020
Amonkhet Remastered released on Arena, legal for Historic. Combines most of Amonkhet and Hour of Devastation plus some other reprints into a 303-card set (plus basic lands).
Next iteration of starter decks released and distributed to existing players.
July 16, 2020
Jumpstart released on Arena, legal for Historic (with 20 replacements compared to the paper version).
June 25, 2020
MacOS version released via Epic Games Store.
A sort of duplicate protection introduced for same-art Rare and Mythic reprints.
Completely free Brawl queue announced starting July 1st.
June 12, 2020
Cube draft event first introduced.
May 21, 2020
Historic Anthology III and permanent Historic Ranked queue added.
April 16, 2020
Player drafts introduced, Traditional draft (best-of-three) structure changed to 3 Swiss rounds.
Card visualization changes implemented.
March 12, 2020
Direct messaging for friends added.
Historic Anthology II added.
New Player Experience reworked, introducing Color Challenges.
January 16, 2020
Epic Games Store release.
Permanent Historic Constructed events added.
December 12, 2019
Monthly paid-entry permanently available Brawl queue added, now known as Brawler's Guildhall.
Suspensions introduced for Historic.
November 21, 2019
Basic “Friend List” feature added.
Historic Anthology I and temporary Historic Ranked queue added.
October 18, 2019
Free Brawl queue open on Wednesdays.
Set Mastery experience added for 10 daily wins.
September 26, 2019
Official release. Historic unranked queue added.
July 2, 2019
Set Mastery introduced, featuring Mastery Passes and replacing weekly packs reward.
March 27, 2019
Cosmetics added: card styles and sleeves.
February 14, 2019
Deck builder improvements, including adding unowned cards, format filters and advanced search.
January 31, 2019
Best-of-three Ranked Constructed added.
Limited MMR removed from Ranked (Quick) draft matchmaking, Win/Loss Record put ahead of rank.
January 17, 2019
Duplicate protection for 5th copies of Rares and Mythics added: replacement or Gems.
Constructed events rewards nerfed to account for Duplicate protection bonuses.
December 13, 2018
Ranked system with seasonal rewards added. Draft bots got “personalities”.
November 15, 2018
“Direct Challenge” feature added.
September 27, 2018
Open beta launch.
The last collection wipe. Only sets from Ixalan onwards left in the game.
v. 1.32, 12/08/2021: Various corrections and additions.
v. 1.31, 08/07/2021: A few correction and additions reflecting the current game state. Changed the mastery pass information to AFR.
v. 1.30, 12/04/2021: Appendix E on advanced search options added. A lot of small updates and corrections, including information on Strixhaven mastery pass.
v. 1.21, 30/01/2021: A small but important correction on Kaldheim mastery pass contents.
v. 1.20, 28/01/2021: A number of corrections, updates and rewrites across the guide. Refreshed the mastery pass info for Kaldheim.
v. 1.19, 13/11/2020: A couple of fixes and updates.
v. 1.18, 12/10/2020: Refreshed information about bans and starter deck lists according to the post-ban changes, other amendments.
v. 1.17, 25/09/2020: Several minor updates, including unannounced change for AKR Mythics from 1:5 to 1:6 (turned to be a rounding issue).
v. 1.16, 18/09/2020: Several updates across various pages, mainly concerning Zendikar Rising mastery pass.
v. 1.15, 15/08/2020: Changes tied to AKR release and new starter decks (now keeping all the starter deck lists), plus various adjustments.
v. 1.14, 26/07/2020: A link to Appendix C fixed; a link to Historic ban list added; formatting corrections.
v. 1.13, 25/07/2020: Minor addition to the interactions section in Deeper Dive.
v. 1.12, 22/07/2020: Expanded the section on Arena Gameplay settings. Other minor changes and additions.
v. 1.11, 18/07/2020: Added a mention of Arena open to the events section. Renewed the link to the event schedule, which seems to be up-to-date.
v. 1.10, 16/07/2020: On the top questions overview page, provided links to specific sections of the guide. A number of additions (especially Jumpstart-related) and corrections.
v. 1.02, 24/06/2020: Added Appendix D: Arena changes timeline. Made corrections and additions according to changes happened and announced with Core Set 2021 release.
v. 1.01, 23/05/2020: Several corrections and updates according to changes made with the last patch.
v. 1.00, 05/05/2020: Completed the “Dealing with variance” section-article in “Deeper dive”. This makes the guide Unabridged and pushes it to 1.00.
v. 0.99: Minor updates and corrections.
v. 0.98: Minor updates. The guide is now Unyielding, I just can’t get to that last pending section :/
v. 0.97: The guide should be up-to-date for Ikoria release patch. Please tell me if not.
v. 0.96: Minor updates on various pages. Added a warning that the guide is not up-to-date for Ikoria.
v. 0.95: Minor updates on various pages. Added an unplanned page with summarized info on the most asked beginner questions: since the guide turned out to be not as short as planned, it became too large to be consumed when you’re eager to start playing. Hope this page solves that.
v. 0.93: Small update on NPE info. Removing the traces of Account Mastery.
v. 0.92: Renewed information on the NPE, some other corrections and additions.
v. 0.91: A typo fix, more links in Appendix C.3.4.
v. 0.9: A number of corrections, additions, and fixes. Appendix C added. The guide is now Unfinished.
v. 0.86: Typo fixes, minor additions and rewrites.
v. 0.85: A number of corrections and additions as per first reader comments. Reworked the section on expanding collection and split it in two to have a separate link for the “drafting to complete collection” part.
v. 0.84: Various sections adjusted and updated, once again thanks to early reviewers (and Microsoft Word). Added a few images to starting sections.
v. 0.83: Corrected the section on the Set mastery given THB mastery pass details.
v. 0.82: Polished and corrected some points thanks to early reviewer feedback. Added section on bans. Expanded section on the in-match interface. Added links to cards in the Slang section.
18/01/2020. Gave the guide an arbitrary version number and published the site.
Renamed the guide, “(N)ASAP Wittingly Unexpurgated Beginner’s and Rookie’s Guide (WUBRG)” was too adorned. Now it is Unadorned. If you think there could be a better epithet, please contact me.
Completed all sections except two WIP ones planned for a later date.