The MtG:Arena Player's Club Tavern... of Doom....!

In the presumably short and small - that's what sh-... no... - absence of a dedicated section for MtG Arena players and lovers in here, I am creating this thread as the go to place (for now) for your MtG needs.

If you want to grab a game against me and one of my half-baked, god-awful nooby decks, then feel free to see if I'm around and send me a challenge.
my Username is: 

Scorpyon#47528

At the moment I am attempting to build some sort of weird and janky Amass based Black / White deck, and another silly discard Win-With-Jace blue deck. :-P

Come join me here and there. ;-)

As someone who has played irl MTG I'd love to get into MtG: Arena, but I do most of my gaming on console and my computer is a Mac. If anyone has a good recommendation for a program that would allow me to run MtG on my Mac I'd appreciate it.

Quote From RevenantSC

As someone who has played irl MTG I'd love to get into MtG: Arena, but I do most of my gaming on console and my computer is a Mac. If anyone has a good recommendation for a program that would allow me to run MtG on my Mac I'd appreciate it.

On UNIX system there isn't wine? I use it on Ubuntu, but there should be something like that for mac.

Quote From Synesthesy

Quote From RevenantSC

As someone who has played irl MTG I'd love to get into MtG: Arena, but I do most of my gaming on console and my computer is a Mac. If anyone has a good recommendation for a program that would allow me to run MtG on my Mac I'd appreciate it.

On UNIX system there isn't wine? I use it on Ubuntu, but there should be something like that for mac.

I've already checked Wine, but after checking their search tool it doesn't look like it supports MTG, unless I missed something

Quote From Fluxflashor

Quote From Demonxz95

As someone who isn't a BIG MTG player, but does play it occasionally and is interested in getting into it more, I have actually considered getting MTG: Arena. It looks really cool and faithful to the original game and it would probably help me learn more about it.

I must ask though, how is the F2P experience for you guys? I've heard both ends of the spectrum before.

I'm definitely not free to play in MTGA, but from what I can tell, the experience is better than Hearthstone.

I did a sponsored stream with Wizards back when they created their new "character progression" system and the unlock pace felt good, the decks performed decently on the ladder (I'm certain can be modified a bit to get even better), and in the end you get quite a few cards. From just the new player perspective, there should be hours of enjoyment without spending a dime.

It also feels more rewarding to go through your daily wins and quest progression. Getting random cards after you get past a certain number of wins is also super cool. I don't know if there is a certain pool they can come from but free cards is always great.

I'm not sure about the whole card crafting system though. It feels better than Hearthstone since you accumulate "wild cards" to turn into whatever card you desire but on paper it may be worse. There is no disenchanting so you have to keep all the cards you will never end up playing with which I know for some F2P players in Hearthstone, that could be an issue.

I definitely recommend giving it a shot though when you're feeling bored and not interested in Hearthstone.

I can confirm that the New Player progression in MtG:A is definitely very good. You feel rewarded for every game you play and you can build up a nice little starter collection quite easily. It takes a good few hours worth of game time to complete the progression path and as you go along the game drip-feeds you new cards and decks to try out.

I found for me personally that the best thing to do was not to buy any packs (or do any drafts) with the in game gold until getting all the starter decks and cards first. THat way you don't end up duping anything and you can find a deck style that interests you.

The thing I have always liked the most about MtG (at least from a nonranked game perspective) is that there are so many different decks to come up against and two games rarely feel the same. 
I've never had two people playing the same deck in a row in any games I've played over the last few weeks - you wouldn't believe how refreshing that is after Hearthstone Ladder! Haha! :-)

I've just started playing MTGA this week, and have no MTG experience at all but I'm really enjoying it so far :)

Does anyone have any recommendations for beginner resources? Particularly for drafting and also upgrading decks - I'd like to upgrade a starter deck as I did when I first started hearthstone but I have no idea where to begin as I'm so unfamiliar with the cards and mechanics.

Any youtube channels/websites with up-to-date content for complete MTG noobs would be really appreciated!

I know that both Day9 and Savjz do streams for Arena now - though I don't know how beginner-friendly they are; but I found Day9's videos on Youtube provide good entertainment and you start to pick up bits as he plays and talks... and talks... and talks... lol

In terms of beginner packs, etc - what I was told by the Arena community in general, was to complete the new player experience first before buying anything - you get a load of packs and cards and decks that way to start you off.

And after that, if you're wanting to focus on building a collection that is usable for the most time, to get packs from the latest 3 expacs (Ravnica Guild, Allegiance and War of the Spark).
Apparently the Shock lands in the Allegiance (I think it is? Please double check that) are really important. And the War of the Spark is pretty much loads of Planeswalkers, which are very powerful.

I started playing MTG 2 weeks ago. The new player progression is great honestly. Feels a lot better than the hearthstone experience for sure. I am not F2P in Hearthstone ( I was for 1 year and it was extremely limiting.) In MTG I just got the $5 bundle and finished the progression. So far I have played around 50 hours of MTG for $5 and had a lot of fun. I made a few decks with the cards provided and used the lists provided. I only played unranked and the planeswalker event which was super confusing until I played about 6 rounds.

I love hearthstone but at the moment I do enjoy playing it, even with a full collection. (i am more than likely just burned from it.)

Current goals in MTG is to craft Mono-Red-Aggro and learn to play it. By the time i am done with that deck I should have farmed enough gold/gems to craft esper control.

Did you use to free codes to get the 9 packs?

• PlayAllegiance: Redeems for three Ravnica Allegiance packs.  (Expires July 1, 2020)
• PlayRavnica: Redeems for three Guilds of Ravnica packs. (Expires July 1, 2020)
• PlayWarSpark: Redeems for three War of the Spark packs. (Expires July 1, 2020)

I've been playing arena for a long time now. Still F2P, but I have multiple meta decks, and I am having a blast. You should definitely give it a try. As someone who's played MtG for probably six years now, it feels really good. It gives me some practice for FNM. :)

However, the game is still relatively new, and needs some features. (Friends, anyone?)

But overall, I would highly recommend getting into it. 

As for resources, I'd say just find some beginner articles on  how to play and understand the game, and then just play it yourself. The best way to learn and get better is experience. Don't craft anything until you're sure you want to play it. Wild cards are precious. (Think, dust in Hearthstone)

And that's kinda it. If they do ever come out with a friend list, add me! I'll add my tag later when I get home. I'd be down to play with anyone also with the direct challange thing too.

Just played my first draft and I went 0-3 :) on my second draft and now 1:1. So much information its crazy, so fun and so fresh.

Thanks for the advice all - I agree that the new player setup is great, just with the starter decks I've been having some success on ranked :)

It's been a fun change while I wait for the hs buffs to come in, definitely going to keep playing casually.  I think what I'm liking the most at the moment is that I can really see where I went wrong in games I lose and why I lost, and when I win i actually feel like I'm improving.

Quote From Beth9202

Thanks for the advice all - I agree that the new player setup is great, just with the starter decks I've been having some success on ranked :)

It's been a fun change while I wait for the hs buffs to come in, definitely going to keep playing casually.  I think what I'm liking the most at the moment is that I can really see where I went wrong in games I lose and why I lost, and when I win i actually feel like I'm improving.

Very much this! ^^
In Hearthstone, when you lose, it often just feels like it was RnG screwing you over and hard to see anything you could have done differently.

But in MtG, there's so many choices you could have made differently and attacks you could have made / not made, etc.
Of course, there is the very rare occurence that you get screwed over by mana screw / flood, but that is often a good indicator of a poorly created deck, so even in that case there is something you could have done differently.

I've slowly been playing more MTGA and less HS for many reasons.  Relatively speaking, you could say I'm new to MTG (although that's not entire true, as I played a long time ago when I was a kid, but there have been a lot of new mechanics introduced since then).  Are there any guides for new players, specifically on how to maximize my experience in MTGA and on basic strategy?  I often find myself topdecking as early as turns 5 and 6 - since mana comes from cards in your hand, this seems really easy to run out of resources early in the game, am I better off not playing creatures??

(edit - I've played through and unlocked all the starter decks, have not yet used those codes for additional free packs)

Also, I opened up an Ugin, the Ineffable last night - it seems like a pretty powerful card but maybe I'm just seeing all the flash and none of the practicality.  How good is this?

I am really curios how will they handle standard rotation. It will be a large hit for F2P players and unlike hearthstone there are no option to DE wild cards (either all or useless ones)

I am pretty new to Arena (and hardly played Magic before). I just switched over from Hearthstone (which I still play and enjoy, too). The are still so many new effects and combos I encounter and keep wondering how to deal with them.

As there is no "Classic" Set in Magic, it would be helpful to replenish the card base when a Core Set rotates out with either:

a) Give away the new Core Set for free ... [^_^] ... yes, I know ...

b) Or at least hand out a dozen free booster packs for the new core set (or somewhat similar).

Otherwise, the loss of cards with each rotation would be truly substantial. Or not?

If I had to guess, I'd say that they'll probably give players some new decks with new cards. They'll have to update beginner's decks anyway and may give existing players part of what next newbies will get.

But I doubt they'll go as far as giving 10 full new decks to existing players.

BTW, I think it is likely that they'll change stuff new players get before rotation and together with the release of 2020 because in paper magic core sets are usually focused at newer players.

I’m in love with MTGA. It looks more generous at first but when you try to go competitive you see how expensive most decks are. Even mono-red aggro is not cheap, and needs a lot of rares (HS equivalent of Epics). Anyway it feels great to farm dailies and slowly build your collection towards your dream decks. I completely dropped HS these last days..

Gruul midrange is a cool deck and pretty expensive too, but the control ones (Esper etc... Forget about it.

How competitive is competitive?  For instance, with Hearthstone you could learn the basics and pilot almost any deck from the lowest rankings to say Rank 10, before you really needed to start thinking about investing in cards.  Is this at all true of MTGA?  

Quote From Louise

I am pretty new to Arena (and hardly played Magic before). I just switched over from Hearthstone (which I still play and enjoy, too). The are still so many new effects and combos I encounter and keep wondering how to deal with them.

As there is no "Classic" Set in Magic, it would be helpful to replenish the card base when a Core Set rotates out with either:

a) Give away the new Core Set for free ... [^_^] ... yes, I know ...

b) Or at least hand out a dozen free booster packs for the new core set (or somewhat similar).

Otherwise, the loss of cards with each rotation would be truly substantial. Or not?

 

The "New Player" experience essentially sets you up with a load of core and initial cards for the season you are in.
I don't know how they handle new seasons for new players, but it's possible that it may include a "Starter" set of some sort.

Hey, they are giving three free random Mythic rare cards via MYTHICMAGIC code (will work only till July 2). Got Oketra, Spawn of Mayhem and Skargan Hellkite. Didn't get anything I really wanted like Lilliana or Gideon but happy to dodge those mythical rare useless cards

I've been trying to win some ladder games with a BW Vampires deck. I can't win everything, but it feels good when I do. I'm getting to slowly climb it, though I'm still at gold 4.

When I finish getting some wins though I enjoy playing a BG undergrowth deck. That one feels satisfying to win with :D

Quote From kaladin

How competitive is competitive?  For instance, with Hearthstone you could learn the basics and pilot almost any deck from the lowest rankings to say Rank 10, before you really needed to start thinking about investing in cards.  Is this at all true of MTGA?  

It really depends. You'll see a lot of mono red aggro decks in ladder, but if you have even a somewhat amateurish white weenie deck that blocks some creatures and gains life, they give up.

Likely the "safe" bet to climbing ladder would be an Esper control, but even they get hosed by Mana flood or getting Mana screwed. If your deck can be consistent, you can climb.