This November, it's time to engage your warp drive and head on over to your friendly local game shop for our Magic Universes Beyond: Star Trek prerelease weekend. With sixty years of history to pull from, this set boasts something for fans of every series, from the original to the next generation, Discovery, Deep Space Nine, and beyond. So head forth and boldly go where Magic has never gone before!

Magic Presents Star Trek Prerelease Information

Never played at a prerelease before? No problem! We'll be hosting six different prerelease events during our Star Trek prerelease weekend of November 6 - 8. If you need more information, just keep reading this blog post. We've got a quick rundown of how our prerelease events work, some helpful tips and reminders for you below, and links to all of our events and preorder information to boot.

Sealed Prerelease Events

** - Please note that the limited pool for our 2-Headed Giant events will continue to be 1 Prerelease Kit per player, for a total of 12 packs per team.

Each event will consist of a sealed event of some variety (regular or 2-Headed Giant), and last 3-4 rounds of play. More on that just a bit further down. If you’d rather draft a prerelease, we have you covered the Tuesday after!

Bonus Draft Prerelease Event!

Flight 7 - Tuesday, November 10 at 6:30 PM (this link will go live Wednesday, November 4 at 11 AM)

As soon as we open on Friday, September 25, we'll have the entire product suite available for you! And that’s not all - we’ll also be able to sell individual packs, including play and collector boosters.

Preparing for a Prerelease at Phoenix

Once you've preregistered for your event(s) of choice, there's a small checklist of things to do before prerelease weekend rolls along. If you're planning to play at one of the in-person events, here's what you'll need to be aware of:

Food and Non-alcoholic drinks are allowed inside, so consider bringing a snack and water bottle in case you get hungry between rounds (we will also have sodas and snacks available for purchase).
Optional, but highly recommended: Download the Magic Companion app to your phone or tablet.
Optional, but highly recommended: Make sure you have a login setup with the MTG Companion App (if you play Arena, these login credentials are the same for both game and app). Bonus - players who sign in to the event through the app will receive bonus boosters and content for their arena account just for participating in the prerelease!

What to do during Prerelease Weekend

If you're playing in one of our in-person events, just make sure you arrive at the store before the event's start time. We recommend aiming for about 30-45 minutes prior to the event to make sure you can get checked in, find a seat, and get comfortable in the space. You can do some trading, or pick up some sleeves or what have you, and it's way easier if you do that ahead of start time rather than during deck construction.

The Prerelease "How to"

All of our Star Trek prerelease events will be a sealed (or limited) format events. That means you'll be given 6 play boosters of Star Trek and a foil bonus rare inside of your prerelease kit. We'll give you about 45 minutes to open those packs, sort them, and build deck out of the contents inside. Here are all the deck building requirements:

Minimum Deck Size is 40 cards
You may use the contents of your prerelease booster packs (plus the bonus rare) to build your deck.
Aside from basic land, you may only use whatever is in your prerelease kit to build with. (No trading with other players or combining multiple pools, please).
There's no cap on the number of cards of the same name you can have in the deck (ex: if you open 5 of the same card, you can use all 5 if you want).
You may adjust your deck between games or matches. If you're just not doing well with what you built, maybe try a different combination of colors!

Once you've got your deck built, set the rest of your card pool aside until the end of the event. Don't trade anything away yet, cause those leftover cards will be your sideboard.

Prerelease Prize Support

All of our prerelease events are run with an eye towards having the best possible time, learning, and trying out new ideas and strategies that come from every new set. So with that in mind, we stick to a simple pack-per-win prize structure that looks a little like this:

4 Wins - 4 Packs
3 Wins - 3 Packs
2 Wins - 2 Packs
0 / 1 Win - 1 Pack

With the exception of the Friday at 3 PM event, each event will have a maximum of 4 rounds. All prizes will be awarded to players in the form of Star Trek play boosters once they've finished with the event. Only play 2 rounds and need to drop? No problem! Just let us know you're leaving and we'll give you whatever prizes are owed at that point.

Because the 3 PM Friday event will be constrained to 3 rounds in order to make sure that the 7:30 PM event can start on time, it will have a similar prize structure to the one listed above, but adjusted slightly. In order to accommodate the missing round, the final round of the event will count for 2 boosters (so you can still win as many as four packs if you 3-0 the Friday event).

Magic Presents: Star Trek Mechanics

One of the best ways to prepare yourself for prerelease is to get familiar with the mechanics of the set. Star Trek boldly introduces FIVE new mechanics into the game. Joining these new mechanics are some fan favorite returning ones to give this set a theme that is truly out of this world.

Beam Me Up

The transporter. One of the most beloved and iconic pieces of technology in the Star Trek Universe is now an ability on a Magic card. Beam me up lets you cast a spell from the graveyard by paying a mana cost listed on the card as well as returning a creature you control to its owner's hand. Clever use of this ability lets you recycle some powerful enter the battlefield effects in this set, so make sure your engineering crew keep your transporters functional!

Dilemmas

Dilemmas and moral quandaries are the meat and potatoes of any good Star Trek episode. The choices our fearless space explorers make in crucial moments help to define them for good or ill. And what better way to represent that on a magic card then by offering a choice. You're considered to be facing a dilemma anytime you have multiple options to choose from while casting a spell or activating an ability. So tell me - will you set your phasers to stun? or Kill?

Federation

Like its heroic namesake - the federation ability draws its strength from the number of non-born creature types among all the creatures you control. So anytime you see that keyword start counting your creature types, for in diversity they find strength. And with Federation, you will too.

Strange New Worlds

Star Trek is all about exploration, and in this set seeking out strange new worlds comes with all sorts of rewards. This ability cares about the number of differently named lands you control. So branch out from basic lands and put that Risa, Vulcan, and Ferenginar in your deck. You never know what the next world might bring.

Assimilate

One of the scariest antagonists in all of Star Trek, the borg are known for their ability to assimilate individuals. By turning your opponent's into fellow borg and adding them to the collective, you can borrow any number of effects for interesting results. Just beware - when you assimilate a creature while it does get a +1/+1 counter it loses any individuality - all of its previous creature types are lost, and it becomes an artifact creature.

Magic Presents: Star Trek Prerelease FAQ

Here's a few commonly asked questions about prerelease events and in-store play events. If your question isn't on this list, please don't hesitate to reach out to us at the store! We're happy to answer any questions you might have.

Q: How well do I have to know Magic to play at a prerelease?

A: Not that well really! We ask that you have a working knowledge of the game (i.e., you know how to play, and no one's going to need to explain turn order or any of the basics), but beyond that we'll do our best to accommodate any and all skill levels. Prerelease events are a fun and casual environment, and if you're having a tough time with something we'll have a judge or tournament organizer available to help you through it.

Q: What should I bring with me to the event?

A: Here's a short checklist of items that are either required or good to have:

Optional but recommended: A well fitted mask to wear while at the tables.
A water bottle and energy bar or dry-snack (it's a good idea to have something if you're hungry and a round goes long).
Sleeves ( Strongly recommended for this event!) and a deck box (you also can buy these at the shop if you forget them)

Q: Should I preregister for the event?

A: If you're able to, yes absolutely! Preregistration locks in your spot at the event. The last thing you need or want is to show up on the day of and find out we sold out the night before (which is a thing that has happened in the past).

Q: If I preregister and can't make the event, what happens?

A: That depends on you! In the event you aren't able to make it to the event, please contact us to request a refund as early as possible. Refunds requested more than 48 hours in advance of the event can just be cancelled and refunded back to the card they were purchased with. Refunds requested inside the 48 hour window will be refunded back to store credit.

Q: Oops! I registered and forgot to show. What happens now?

A: That's okay! Your registration fee will just get refunded back to you in the form of store credit. We typically do this around the week following the prerelease weekend.

Q: What if I need to swap from one event to the other, can I do that?

A: Sure! As long as there's still a spot at the event you want to swap to, yes definitely. Please email us (or contact us through the contact page of our website) and we'll get right on it. Please don't call - we need an email or contact form so that we have a record of when the request was made.

Q: I've never built a deck for limited before. Any pointers?

A: We've got a few! Here's a short list of handy tips when building a limited / sealed deck:

Stick to 40 cards! That's roughly 23 spells and creatures + 17 land. Those numbers will shift a little bit depending on what you open, but broadly that's where you should aim to be.
Play the colors that let you play your best cards.
Don't be afraid to experiment! You can switch your deck around between rounds and between games. Every card you're not actively using in your deck is part of your sideboard, so if one color combo just isn't working for you, maybe wait until the match is over and try swapping it around.
It's okay to ask for help from other players. This is a prerelease; we're here to have fun and enjoy the new set. You'll often find that we've got several players at each prerelease that enjoy helping and mentoring newer players through the deck building process.

Q: Any other advice on getting ready for a prerelease?

A: Yup! If you can, try to familiarize yourself with the set ahead of time. Keep an eye out for spoilers! By the time you're reading this, spoiler season will already have started and you can bet that there's a few really cool looking cards and mechanics out there that need reading up on.

Q: Where's the best place to park for a prerelease event?

A: If you're not familiar with Capitol Hill, you should know that parking is at a premium. If you're planning to drive to us for one of our events, we recommend either parking at the paid lot at Harvard & Pine, or parking at one of the park & rides along the light rail route and taking the light rail into the Capitol Hill stop. We're just across the street.

Having said all of that - if you're in a hurry and need to find parking right away, our neighbor, Dick's Drive-In, has now allocated a small number of parking spaces along the wall of our building as paid parking. You'll need to download the pay-by-phone app to get started, and instructions are available next to each paid parking space.

Q: Can I preorder product from you and pick it up during prerelease?

A: Yes! Any preorders that you'd like to put in alongside your preregistration tickets will be available for pickup starting when we open on Friday, November 6th at 11 AM. (Please note: Commander Decks are currently potentially delayed and may not be available until after release.)

Q: If I preorder something and the price later changes, what happens?

A: When you preorder an item you lock in the price paid for it. We don't offer refunds for the difference if the price goes down later, but we also don't force you to pay more if the price goes up later. Please bear this in mind when making your purchasing decisions!

And that's it for our Star Trek Prerelease Guide! We hope you found this informative and helpful, and we hope to see you at one of our many prerelease events!

Star Trek Prerelease Info