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Magic: The Gathering — Final Fantasy is here, which means it’s time for the Final Fantasy Prerelease! Prerelease is a casual sealed tournament that lets you get your hands on cards a week before they’re officially released, and have a fun day of limited battling against your friends and opponents with 40-card decks, built from the six packs that you open.
But if you’re just delving into the world of Magic: The Gathering, or even if you just need a refresher on the set and what to expect, it’s best to go in prepared. After all, it can be incredibly overwhelming to see a bunch of new cards and not know what to do with them, so making sure you’ve got a plan of action going in will help you have the best time.
This guide is here to help you with exactly that! We’ll go over some of the Prerelease basics, and then take a deeper look at what you need to know to make sure that you can take the crown at your own Final Fantasy Prerelease!
The Basics of Final Fantasy Prerelease
Prerelease is a casual sealed tournament that occurs a week before the official Tabletop release of a set. This means that everyone will be on the same playing field — it’ll be the first time anyone gets their hands on the cards, and so the best thing you can do is prepare yourself with information beforehand.
But there are a few basics of Sealed that you’ll need to know to be able to build the best deck possible. We’ll go over all of them, so you know everything you need to, so you can go in with all of the knowledge you’ll need.
Deck Construction
There are a few fundamentals to be aware of when it comes to building a limited deck in any format, and not just Final Fantasy Prerelease.
Here are the basics:
- 40 Cards: A limited (sealed or draft) deck is a minimum of 40 cards, but you shouldn’t go over 40. There is a school of thought that 41 cards — also known as the ‘41 card special’ — is practically the same as 40 when it comes to mathematics, but it’s generally recommended to stick to that 40 number.
- 23 Nonlands, 17 Lands…: You’ll generally want 23 nonland cards and 17 land cards in your deck, to be able to make sure that you draw a good distribution of lands and nonlands. This creates an approximate 2:1 ratio of nonland and land cards, meaning you’ll generally draw two nonland cards for every land card.
- … Unless You’re Aggro: If your deck is aggressive and has low mana costs throughout, then you can sometimes cut down to 16 lands for more of an aggressive ratio. But, don’t do this unless you really feel like you need to, and feel confident that you’ve got a low enough mana curve to be able to.
- Stick to One or Two Colours: Your colour distribution is generally going to be either one or two colours for every sealed event, unless the format is built around three colours. You’ll know whether it is due to the archetypes provided and the cards within the set (such as a lack of mana-fixing lands), but for Final Fantasy, stick to two colours.
- Creatures: In limited, Creatures are generally your path to victory, rather than spells. Making sure that your deck has a majority of creatures accented by noncreatures to support your game plan is going to be important, as limited is generally a combat-oriented format.
The Mana Curve
Your deck’s mana curve is vital for making sure that you can cast the cards in your hand, at a good enough distribution, while still making sure you have those powerful and high-costed cards at the top end of your deck.
Too many low-cost cards and your deck generally won’t have enough power to close out games (unless you’ve carefully crafted your deck that way), but too many high-cost cards, and by the time you’ve got the lands to cast them, you’ll be at zero life.
This is the general mana curve recommended for most Sealed decks:
- Mana Value 1: 2 Cards
- Mana Value 2: 7 Cards
- Mana Value 3: 6 Cards
- Mana Value 4: 4 Cards
- Mana Value 5: 3 Cards
- Mana Value 6+: 1 Card
You can adjust this slightly, especially if you want to adjust it for a more aggressive deck. But your distribution should follow a curve, as shown above, to ensure that you balance costs and power.
Final Fantasy Prerelease Mechanics
There are a few new keywords and set mechanics in Final Fantasy that you should be aware of going into Prerelease, as well as some returning mechanics — some of which bring a new and exciting twist.
Job Select
When this Equipment enters, create a 1/1 colorless Hero creature token, then attach this to it.
Job Select isn’t a new design, but is a keyworded version of a mechanic that has existed traditionally (both keyworded, with Living Weapon, and unkeyworded). If you play an Equipment with Job Select, it’ll create a 1/1 creature token when it enters and attach itself to it.
When deckbuilding, an Equipment with Job Select is essentially a creature, so make sure to account for that in your deckbuilding. However, if that creature is removed, the Equipment will stick around, creating additional value.
Tiered
Choose one additional cost.
Tiered is a keyword that lets you increase a spell’s effect by paying more. It’s a pretty simple mechanic, in that if you pay more, you get the corresponding effect, but it makes spells more useful throughout the game.
In your mana curve, make sure to account for these, as if you only want to cast the highest cost, you’ll need to account for it. However, if you’re using it as a flexible tool, you can integrate it based on its main cost.
Saga Creatures
As this Saga enters and after your draw step, add a lore counter. Sacrifice after III.
The beloved Saga mechanic returns, but this time with a new twist. There are now Saga creatures that you can attack with for as long as they stick around. But, like traditional Sagas, they sacrifice themselves after their last chapter.
These are otherwise the same as normal creatures with abilities, though. They have summoning sickness, and so can only attack for a single turn, and can block (and die during combat).
Transforming Double-Faced Cards
Transform this card.
Transform and Double-Faced Cards (TDFCs) are back. Pretty simply, these cards have an effect that, when that effect triggers, you turn the card around to its other side. Importantly, these are not Modal Double-Faced Cards (MDFCs), and you can only cast these as their front side.
Once you’ve transformed a TDFC, it is the card on the back for as long as it remains on the battlefield. But when it leaves the battlefield, it’s the card on the front again. So, make sure to remember to flip that card back over when it’s destroyed. Also, the transformed card retains the mana value of its front side, which can sometimes be important.
Adventures
[Once the adventure is played], exile this card. You may play this card later from exile.
Adventures are a type of ‘dual’ card, in that you can play both halves of them. One half will be an Instant or Sorcery with the subtype Adventure, and the other will be a permanent of some kind. If you opt to play the Adventure, you exile the card and can play it from exile at any point onwards.
You don’t have to play it from exile, though. The only Adventures in the set — the land Adventures, such as Jidoor, Artistocratic Capital — are made to be played as lands earlier on, and so don’t feel like you have to cast both sides. You can also include these as lands in your mana curve.
Landcycling
Discard this card: Search your library for a [Land Type] card, reveal it, put it into your hand, then shuffle.
Landcycling is a classic mechanic that helps with mana fixing and gives you the flexibility to turn late-game threats into lands if you’re running low. Importantly, these are not the lands themselves, and they shouldn’t be included in your deck as part of your land counts, unlike the Modern Horizons 3 land cyclers, which cost one mana to cycle.
Final Fantasy Prerelease Archetypes
Final Fantasy has an archetype for every two-colour combination, and these are important to knowing what kind of things to look out for.
UW Artifacts
In this set, the combination of Blue and White is themed around artifacts, with the key UW ‘signpost’ cards in the set — Cid, Timeless Artificer and Tidus, Blitzball Star — both caring massively about playing them.
There are a ton of great artifacts in the set, including the Equipment cards with Job Select, and there are also a few different cards that care about artifacts like Rook Turret and Gaelicat, both of which are at common rarity.
UB Control
Blue and Black in Final Fantasy is all about control, which means pairing efficient removal and card selection with high-quality bombs to close out games. The two signpost cards — Locke Cole and Ultimecia, Time Sorceress — are both traditional UB value engines, and look to draw you cards.
The Black removal in Final Fantasy is few and far between, so making sure that you have enough of it is important, and making sure that you have a good enough game-ender is going to be the key to winning games. Otherwise, look out for defensively-statted creatures to draw the game to a longer one, and ways to be able to find your key cards through card draw and scrying.
BR “Black Mage Aggro”
“Black Mage Aggro” is essentially code for Black and Red Prowess. You’re not playing a full-on burn deck, but the deck is quite aggressively positioned, with a lot of buffs and tokens that ping damage at your opponents.
The key to this deck is prioritising aggressive creatures while playing as much flexible burn/removal as possible, to help your creatures hit as well as being able to send damage to their face if relevant. In the meantime, your ‘black mage’ tokens will be slowly building up damage as the game goes along.
GR Landfall Aggro
Green and Red’s Landfall archetype is a pretty simple theme. Play lands, and get aggressive value from your creatures for playing them. This is also the Chocobo archetype, as they have Landfall built in, so stock up on cards that create Chocobos, and cards that interact with your lands.
Otherwise, this is an aggressive archetype that looks to go all-in on killing your opponent as fast as possible. You want a critical mass of lands-matter cards, and then to accent those cards with general aggression and burn.
GW Go Wide
The Green and White archetype is all in the name here — you want to go wide with a bunch of creatures. You’re looking for cards that create tokens and help you amass a massive boardstate, as well as cards that can boost your boardstate massively.
Outside of the two key signpost uncommons, cards like Auron’s Inspiration are vital for boosting your board’s damage, making each creature hit for more damage than it would otherwise.
WB Artifact & Creature Sacrifice
The Black and White archetype, more commonly known as ‘aristocrats’ in the Magic-sphere, is a midrange/value deck that aims to sacrifice creatures and tokens for value, usually for extra damage. This can either be through direct pings or, like on Judge Magister Gabranth, a massive creature with a ton of +1/+1 counters.
Here, we want a good number of payoffs with on-death triggers as well as sacrifice outlets like Ahriman, or else the deck just won’t function as intended. If you have too many of one without the other, you’re just playing a mid-tier Midrange deck that doesn’t do much, so make sure to consider that while deckbuilding.
UR Big Noncreatures
As expected for Blue and Red, you want to cast noncreature spells to boost your creatures. However, the twist here is that you want to cast noncreature spells with mana value 4 or more, which will give you payoffs on cards like Shantotto, Tactician Magician.
The gameplan here is to try to play through your opponents’ threats, either with cheap and efficient removal or bounce spells, or by going all-in and comboing past them to victory. In this, you have to play as a tempo deck, but with a bit less of a ‘Protect the Queen’ strategy and a bit more of a pummeling endgame.
BG Graveyard Value
As expected for Black and Green, the archetype cares about using your graveyard to generate midrange value. This is the quintessential Midrange deck, which is all about utilising removal and efficient creatures to create space and value for your board in the long term, while also keeping your graveyard full for those effects.
Interestingly, BG has a Meld pair in Vanille, Cheerful I’Cie, and Fang, Fearless I’Cie, both of whom combine into Ragnarok, Divine Deliverance. Both of these cards are great on their own, but when combined provide an insanely potent midrange threat with an on-death 3 for 1, in case your opponent tries to remove it.
RW Equipment Aggro
Red and White is another Aggro archetype that wants to combine the aggressive nature of Red with the large number of Equipment in the set. Cards like Giott, King of the Dwarves massively care about Equipment, and are great payoffs for running a bunch of them in your deck.
Job Select is huge here, as it allows you to run a load of Equipment in your deck without giving up creature density. And, if those creatures don’t survive in the long run, you can eventually use the Equipment cards (that stick around) to close out the game.
UG Town Ramp
In Blue and Green, you’re looking to ramp up on both lands and card draw, to be able to keep generating value to find huge bombs that will eventually generate more value than your opponents can handle.
This archetype is quite defensive otherwise, so you’ll want to make sure to balance value pieces with defensively statted cards like Scorpion Sentinel and PuPu UFO to help hold down some of the more aggressive decks in the format.
Closing Time
Magic: The Gathering - Final Fantasy Prelease is going to be an exciting time for both seasoned Magic players and newcomers to the game. With this guide, you can take down your prerelease and take the crown at your Local Game Store.
If you’re looking for more great Magic content from great authors, including yours truly, check out the rest of our content! We’ve got guides on Limited, Constructed, and Commander to help you take your Magic strategy to the next level.
Otherwise, in any case, thank you for reading, and I’ll see you next time!
