Take the dive into one of the world’s most popular card games. From casual games in your local Good Games store, to worldwide pro tournaments, it’s the hobby that brings fun and connection with others.
Magic: The Gathering is a trading card game filled with strategic and entertaining gameplay where your ultimate goal is to reduce your opponent’s life total to zero. The world of Magic is endless, you can build decks for fun based on characters in the Magic Multiverse you love, aim for the stars in competitive play with major prize pools, or simply collect rare cards that sometimes rise in price an insane amount.
In Magic: the Gathering you take the role of a Planeswalker, a powerful multiversal mage, summoning creatures and casting spells against your opponent until they are defeated.
We always advocate that the best way to play is to simply try it! Good Games stores regularly host Magic Learn-to-Play events with staff and volunteers ready to teach, so there’s always a welcoming space for you to take your first steps into Magic.
But, here’s a quick and dirty rundown for those who just can’t wait. Players start with a deck of cards. Both players will draw a hand of seven cards, and one player is chosen at random to take the first turn.
Taking turns; players play a variety of cards from their hand. Each card can represent a spell; like a powerful Lightning Bolt, a creature; like the heroic Serra Angel, or a land; a representation of the resources you have at your disposal.
From there, with a lot of strategy, practice, and a bit of luck, you’ll command your forces to slowly whittle down your opponent’s health.
The game continues until one player’s life total reaches zero. Be on the lookout for other ways to win once you are more familiar with the game.
All you really need is a deck of cards and an opponent. Over the years, Magic has released a whole range of different products. While great for seasoned players, it can be a little daunting for beginners, who may not know what cards can be used in what format.
So, here are the products we recommend you to start with:
Everything you need to play your first game of Magic: The Gathering is right here. Learn the essentials or teach your friends and family with the included Play Guide booklet, then enter the fray with two pre-built 60-card decks
Welcome to the brand spankin’ new frontier plane of Thunder Junction! Everyone’s streaming in from across the Multiverse to be an outlaw here, so better practice your draw if you want to score big.
Once you’ve gotten to grips with the basics of Magic, why not look towards other formats? Traditional Magic comes in Standard, Pioneer, and Modern - which are all one on one, 60 card formats and contain distinct card pools and banlists. Standard, Pioneer, and Modern are more competitive, with a meta-game that varies with every new set release.
Another exciting format that we can’t recommend enough is Commander - Magic’s most popular, and social format. Commander is a four player format, where players start with 40 life and have a deck of 99 unique (except for basic lands) cards, and one legendary creature - your commander. These cards must be within the colour identity of your commander, and your commander can always be cast from a special zone. If you want to know more about Commander, you can read all about it in our article here! Good Games also hosts Commander nights across several stores - you can check out the event schedule here!
