The time has come for the first Magic Online Champions Showcase of the year, a multiformat event that pits the best digital players against each other for their share of the $70,000 prize pool.
The season three MOCS kicks off its third tournament at 12pm CT on Jan. 21 on the Magic Twitch channel. Throughout the day, eight players will battle in a six-round Swiss bracket split between Vintage Cube Draft followed by Modern. The top-performing players from each format will play in a best-of-three Modern final.
Like past MOCS events, if a player goes undefeated in each format, they will automatically win the event without having to play in a final match. Reigning world champion Nathan Steuer accomplished this feat last year.
The winner of the MOCS earns $20,000 and an invitation to the 2023 Magic World Championship, which will be held at MagicCon: Las Vegas. This will be the first World Championship under the new Pro Tour system, marking the return of tabletop play to the competitive landscape.
Here are the eight players invited to the MOCS and what events they qualified from.
- Shun Asano – Leaderboard
- Damian Buckley – Standard
- Cain Rianhard – Pioneer
- Karl Sarap – Open No. 1
- Stefan Schutz – Leaderboard
- Gieciano Souza – Modern
- Bart Van Etten – Legacy
- Chistopher Westerlund – Open No. 2
Whoever comes out with the victory will be a first-time MOCS winner. Sarap is coming off a top-four finish at the 2022 Magic World Championship. Additionally, the field is loaded with experienced Magic Online grinders like Rianhard and Van Etten.
The event is also a chance to check in on Modern, a format that is rarely featured on the calendar of digital Magic competitions because it’s exclusively on Magic Online. As a Draft format, Vintage Cube is a treat to watch. It’s a curated set filled with some of the most powerful cards in Magic’s history. Games hinge on tight interactions and play more like high-level Constructed rather than the typical Draft.
