Foundations Draft Guide The Gathering

Bonisiwe Shabane

-Nov 18, 2025, 3:56 AM

Chandra, Flameshaper | Illustration by Mark Winters Greetings planeswalkers! We’ve had about a solid two weeks of Foundations drafts so far, and there’s an Arena Open coming this weekend, too. The core question I want to answer here is: How do you play the latest Magic set? Is there anything unexpected about this new Core Set? Or is it mostly just stock MTG?

By the end of this guide, you should be well prepared to battle this weekend. Valkyrie's Call | Illustration by Scott Murphy Foundations is the latest Core Set product that isn’t called a Core Set. It was designed as a solid introduction to the game that would function as Standard‘s backbone, and it's hands down the best MTG set to draft for beginners. Foundations cards will be legal for a full five years, which is more than twice as long as most Standard sets. The set is half new cards and half reprints and focuses on communicating tried and true MTG concepts to new players.

We have a Foundational set! Magic Foundations will be Standard legal for at least the next 5 years, providing a base level magic experience that will underlay anything else coming out in that time. Wizards has given us a Foundation for what Magic should be, how it should feel, and what it’s like to draft. We’re back to basics, but with a modern power level and a lot of interesting things to do. The cards are simpler and there are no tricky mechanics, but the format will still be interesting and skill intensive. There are a lot of cards coming to standard, and only about half of them are draftable.

For reference, here are the draftable Foundations cards. If you want a card-by-card breakdown of every draftable card in the set, here is the full ratings list which I’ll be updating weekly and here is the full card-by-card review where I explain... This article is for the general strategy for each color pair, and useful numbers while you’re drafting. Without further ado, let’s get started with: Here are some useful numbers for context and future reference. Crush your next MTG draft with our Foundations draft guide, including a color tier list, card ratings, set mechanics, and more.

Improve at Draft and Sealed with Draftsmith, Untapped.gg’s draft and deck builder assistant. You may cast a card with flashback from your graveyard. If you do, you pay its flashback cost rather than paying its mana cost. Flashback doesn't change when you can cast the spell, so a sorcery with flashback can still only be cast during your main phase. Also, casting a spell with flashback doesn't change its mana value. Mana value is always based on a spell's mana cost, even if you pay an alternative cost to cast it.

Threshold abilities care about you having seven or more cards in your graveyard. Some threshold abilities are, like the one Crypt Feaster has, a triggered ability. Whenever Crypt Feaster attacks, its ability checks to see if there are seven or more cards in your graveyard. If there are, the ability triggers and goes onto the stack. Players can respond to this ability with instants or activated abilities. Prowess is a triggered ability that gives the creature that has it +1/+1 until end of turn whenever you cast a noncreature spell.

Any spell you cast that isn't a creature will cause prowess to trigger. Remember that lands aren't spells, so playing a land won't cause prowess to trigger. Casting a spell that's a creature and also another type (such as an artifact creature) is still casting a creature spell, so prowess won't trigger in that case either. Welcome to our Foundations Draft Tier List. This article is meant as a companion to our Foundations Draft Guide, which is releasing later this week. (Most likely on Thursday.) While that one focuses on the big picture stuff, in this article you can find grades for every Foundations card, based on how good it is in draft.

Before we start, let’s check what each grade means. For each grade, you’ll also find a couple of examples from the previous draft format, Duskmourn. All grades (except F) can also use a “+” or a “-” symbol. Naturally, C+ is a better grade than C, which is better than C-. So, here are the grades for every card in the Foundations Play boosters. As the name implies, Foundations aims to redefine and reaffirm the “default” gameplay and ideas of Magic.

This modern take on a Core Set definitely seems like a Constructed-first product – understandable, given Standard players will be living in its shadow until 2029! But that also implies that Foundations sealed product will have a long run in stores, and that “basic gameplay” idea also has value as an introductory or refreshing Limited experience. I’m not about to pass up the chance to draft a new format just because it’s got more of a “vanilla” feel than Duskmourn or Bloomburrow. Let’s dig into this Draft Guide and find out what kind of agenda Foundations is setting for Magic’s next five years! First thing to take note of if you’re browsing the cardlist at home – or if you’re trying to quickly search up what instants are available for a certain color mid-match – is that... Hundreds of cards (those with collector numbers after #361) are only printed in the supplemental Starter Collection and Beginner Box products.

But the decision was made to print them with the same set symbol and classify all of them as Foundations, perhaps to avoid confusion about their Standard legality. But it makes things much MORE confusing from a Draft perspective, because if you are looking at cards on Magic Arena (or most card databases), it’s not obvious that say, Tatyova, Benthic Druid is... One of the best ways to play Magic: The Gathering is drafting. It's a format that rewards knowledge of the game without linking the power of your deck to your wallet, but it's also a great way for newer players to experience a new set. Learn how to play the prerelease favourite format, drafting. While many sets focus on new mechanics or interactions, Foundations takes a back-to-basics approach, boiling each color down to the simplest form.

This allows new players to get to know each color, while veteran players can relive the old-school feel of a clearly delineated color wheel. We'll help you choose your pack one pick one with this guide! Flying is a keyword most frequently associated with blue, but white is close behind with dozens of Angels, Spirits, and Birds. Flying creatures cannot be blocked except by other creatures with flying or reach, so your airborne army can assault your opponent virtually unchecked. One of the main things to look for when building a sealed or draft deck is evasion, the ability to get past your opponent's blockers. This archetype leans heavily into that idea, allowing you to focus on other aspects of deckbuilding without worrying too much about having enough evasive creatures to break through the lines.

In this article, we'll discuss the main mechanics, archetypes, and best common and uncommon cards in Foundations, besides its removals and mana fixes! Check out below everything you need to know about these limited formats! The 30th Magic: The Gathering World Championship has just been won by Javier Dominguez, who is now a two-time world champion and the player of the year! But that's not all that happened this past weekend. Namely, the Magic: The Gathering Foundations spoiler season is now near its end, and we also got a truckload of new information at the 2024 MTG World Championship. For instance, Wizards of the Coast announced how the next sets will impact the formats, and changed a critical combat rule, which is incredibly relevant for limited formats.

If you're out of the loop, please check out this excellent article by judge Antonio Carlos. In this article, however, we'll go through this set's mechanics, archetypes, mana bases, and removals, all through the lens of Draft, Sealed, and Pre-release formats. Let's understand how this new MTG set aims to bring a friendlier design and act as a gateway for new players, as well as become Standard's new foundation.

Foundations Draft Guide The Gathering

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