WotC: Future Universes Beyond Sets Will Be Legal in ALL Formats

Last updated on October 25, 2024

Etched Cornfield | Illustration by Randy Gallegos

2:25 p.m. PST Update: Wizards has confirmed that Final Fantasy and Marvel UB sets have been designed with this change in mind.

WotC has just announced at Magic Con: Las Vegas that, going forward, in an attempt to clarify legality, new Universes Beyond sets will be legal in all formats.

Final Fantasy's UB set is the next release, coming in 2025, and will be the first out-of-universe set to be legal in all formats. That includes Standard, Pioneer, Modern, and any other official format. The same goes for Marvel, which has a highly-anticipated Secret Lair coming out next year.

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This marks a significant change for the non-canon products. Up until this point, these were only legal in formats that included all Magic cards: Commander and Vintage. Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-Earth was an exception to that rule, with cards being Modern-Legal in addition to Commander and Vintage.

On top of that, the number of normal set releases, called multiversal sets, will be equal to the number of Universes Beyond sets in 2025. So while these sets took on the role of an additional, for-fun set between main sets, they will become much more a part of the core Magic experience as well.

Balance Implications Galore

Orcish Bowmasters | Illustration by Maxim Kostin

Universes Beyond cards that have been put into formats like Modern, such as The One Ring or Orcish Bowmasters have absolutely dominated the metagame, and still do! One issue with cards being put into tons of sets is that Wizards won't have the ability to properly test and balance these cards.

This wasn't an issue until now. If a card is only legal in Commander and Vintage, where nearly every set is legal, minimal balancing concerns need to be addressed. However, cross-balancing for Pioneer, Standard, Modern, and Legacy will lead to either exceptionally weak cards or the inevitable broken format-warping card.

The haymakers from LTR still dominate and warp Modern's gameplay, and with how WotC is ramping up products of these collaboration sets, it's likely we'll see repeats of these incredibly powerful cards.

Looking Ahead

This change in legality comes at an interesting time. MTG Foundations, a 5-year core set meant to bring balance and stability to Standard and even Pioneer, now has to reckon with a swath of new out-of-universe cards. It was suspected that Foundations might stabilize these formats, maybe even slow them down.

But these new cards need to be exciting and more than just an iconic character on cardboard. People won't buy cards they think suck, and so WotC may be backing themselves into a corner where they need to balance power, desirability, and theme across many different formats.

Universes Beyond sets are usually smaller Secret Lair releases. There isn't any bulk, which means that each card needs to bring some value and power to the table to be worth the often $40 price tag. And that's not even considering any Commander products that may spill into the other formats.