Filling your calendar with engaging Magic events is paramount to building your in-store play community. As you get to know your player base, consider recommending events that align with their interests or experience level. The better your recommendations are, the more trust you build with your consumers. Plus, if you suggest the right events to your players and they have a great time, they're all the more likely to return for more.

Today we'll cover what events align with new Magic players, intermediate Magic players, and competitively focused players.

New-to-Magic Players

New player events are a great way to welcome new-to-Magic players into your community. These players may have never played before, be returning to the game after a long hiatus, or might have played their only games at their kitchen table. In-store events may seem daunting to them, but they are also eager to learn and engage. Keeping the stakes low and the fun high is a great way to help them feel welcome.

There are some great events designed to help you do just that:

• Learn-to-Play Magic Events


• Traditional Prerelease


• Jumpstart Prerelease


• Jumpstart 2022 Launch Party

Prerelease is a great opportunity to introduce someone to Magic—traditional Prerelease uses Prerelease Packs, which include Draft Boosters, a year-stamped promo, and instructions that explain how to build their deck. Jumpstart Prerelease offers an alternative way to play that doesn't require players to build a deck at all: they only need to grab two set Jumpstart Boosters, shuffle them together, and they have their 40-card deck ready to go, including lands.

You may host Learn-to-Play events for any format, from teaching players how to Draft to walking them through their first Commander game. You might also consider pairing events with relevant new player product releases to encourage new players to give Magic a try at your store.

Using flat prize structures helps players feel rewarded no matter how well they played. For new-to-Magic fans, every prize they open may still feel as fresh and rewarding as the last as they get a taste for the wide breadth of what each set has to explore.

Use your Welcome Boosters to introduce your new players to the game, and be sure to host the following events to keep them coming back to your store:

Engaged Magic Players

An engaged Magic player knows their way around the rules and may even be willing to teach a new player the basics if given the opportunity. To keep an engaged player interested in your event rotation, you'll want to schedule events that provide a challenge, or tailor to their unique interests. This may vary greatly depending on your community, but you can try any of the following to capture the interest of your engaged players:

• Traditional Prerelease


• Booster Draft Events


• Commander Nights


• Commander Party (WPN Premium only)

Engaged fans may be eager to introduce Magic to their friends, and you might incentivize them to sign up for events with the promise of the Bring-a-Friend promo (this season's is Thought Vessel).

Depending on your players' interests, you may even direct players toward products like Pioneer Challenger Decks so they can get started in a competitive space.

Competitive Magic Players

Magic players who enjoy competitive play usually enjoy showcasing their abilities , and a top-heavy prize structure serves to make the experience all the more enticing. If your community has a strong competitive presence, be sure to point players to the right events to support their needs.

Some events you may run with a competitive focus include the following:

• Store Championship


• Standard, Pioneer, or Modern Tournaments


• Regional Championship Qualifiers

Each of these events give these players space to show off and hone their skills to prepare for larger-scale competitive events, such as Worlds or the Pro Tour. Regional Championship Qualifiers feed your players into the Pro Tour; to learn more about how your store can get involved, check out our full announcement article.

As you plan your season of events, use Wizards EventLink to schedule—it is a great go-to Magic calendar, and you'll find many events have templates for you to use to make adding new events a breeze.

Events you schedule in EventLink show up in the Store & Event Locator, allowing players to discover your store's events from miles away as they search for where to play the latest set.

Don't hold off on scheduling: the sooner your events are on the calendar, the sooner players can start signing up. Schedule the events that suit your community's needs and continue building up your in-store play.