Grand Contests are where the realm gathers. Players who have built communities at their local stores, who have contested Cornerstone Champions, or have felt the pull of something larger. This is where they converge.

Where Cornerstone Championships celebrate the communities that build them, Grand Contests widen the circle further. These regional gatherings bring players together from across multiple communities, where the creativity, mastery, and wonder that began at local tables meet on a larger stage.


The journey that started with a few players at a local store, which grew through Store Kit events and culminated in a Cornerstone Championship, does not end there. At Grand Contests, players who have never shared a table before find themselves contesting the realm together, recognising in each other the same passion that built their own communities back home.

A champion will be crowned, but the players who travel to a Grand Contest carry something back with them beyond a result. New stories, new friends, and a sense of just how wide this community has grown.

promotional card for top finishers, featuring art by Marta Molina

 promotional card for judges, with art by Alan Pollack

promotional cards for community champions, illustrated by Drew Tucker

for event participants, featuring the art of Caio Calazans

These kits are designed to scale with your event. Additional kits can be added so that every community is set up for a great experience.

Marta Molina, Alan Pollack, Drew Tucker, Caio Calazans. These cards speak for themselves. Every promo features hand-painted art, a window into the realm you can hold in your hands. Artist Caio Calazans shares a peek into his process with a time-lapse of Croaking Swamp. Watch it come to life and find your copy at a Grand Contest near you.

Grand Contests are a new tier in Sorcery Organized Play for 2026, replacing Crossroads. They are designed to bring players together from across a wider region, typically spanning several countries or states, for a celebration of Sorcery at a scale beyond the local.

These are curated events. Grand Contest status is extended by invitation to select groups with a proven track record of community support.

In the United States, every SCG CON this year will be a Grand Contest event, beginning with 

, on May 29th. Our partners at SCG CON are known for bringing together passionate players, and we could not be more excited to continue to bring Sorcery into that experience at scale. 

In Europe, we are excited to announce that 

 (July 3–5) will be a Grand Contest, bringing together players from across the continent for what promises to be a landmark event.

 And SorceryFest is just the start. The team at White Rabbit, as well as Aquila Games and the Sorcerers at the Core, have been building some of Europe's strongest Sorcery communities, and we are looking forward to what is coming from that part of the realm.

The realm is wider than any one region. We are working to bring Grand Contests to Asia-Pacific as well, and more announcements are coming. 

This is a global program, and it is just getting started!

That brings us to the final circle for 2026: the Avatar of the Realm.

2026 Grand Contests: Where the Realm Gathers

 bring new players together, local Sorcery communities begin to take shape. Rivalries form, new decks appear, stories are shared, and the circle of players grows stronger with each gathering. The kind of community that deserves a moment of recognition. A chance to celebrate the creativity, wonder, and mastery that have taken root at that store.

Cornerstone Championships recognize stores that have built a thriving Sorcery scene and invite their players to come together for a special local championship, where bold ideas, practiced skill, and unforgettable moments all take the spotlight.

If Store Kits connect circles of players to their Local Game Store, Cornerstone Championships celebrate and strengthen the communities they have built.

While Cornerstone Championships are competitive events, with prizes for top placement, in Sorcery competition is always in service of something larger. A champion is crowned, but what endures is another year of games shared, skills tested, and new players drawn into the fold. Your circle of play has widened, and that is what Cornerstones celebrate.

Each Cornerstone Kit supports 8 players. Stores will receive a number of kits based on expected player counts, informed by Sorcery Play Network attendance at local events and Cornerstone participation in 2025.

prize card for the champion (single-kit events) or top finishers (multi-kit events)

promotional cards for participants, featuring the art of Caio Calazans.

promotional card to reward the event judge, with art by Alan Pollack.

promotional card to recognise a community champion, illustrated by Drew Tucker.

The 2026 Cornerstone Kit will be available for a limited time until Q3 2026.

Cornerstone Championships are something you build toward. Stores that have been supporting regular play through the Sorcery Play Network and hosting events with the Gothic Store Kit work toward earning a Cornerstone Kit, and with it, the chance to host something special.

Once your kit arrives, your store selects a date. These are annual celebrations of your local community, but they are also an open invitation to neighbouring communities to join in. Choose your date with that in mind, and list your event on the Sorcery Play Network so that players nearby can search, make their plans, and find their way to your tables.

While a Constructed tournament is a natural fit for many communities, Cornerstone Championships are open to any format you choose. Start with a simple question: what does your community most want to do to celebrate a year of Sorcery together?

Every Sorcery community is different, and we encourage you to make your Cornerstone your own: Cosplay, community awards, local artists, trading, open gaming alongside the main event. The choice is yours. The only requirement is that it feels worthy of the community that has built it.

As Sorcery communities grow and reach new milestones, so too must the Dust system grow with them. Guided by player feedback and a renewed focus on Organized Play, we’ve redistributed Dust rewards for achievement-based earnings and raised the monthly participation cap from 100 to 250, ensuring that every gathering, every game, and every contribution helps the realm flourish. Cornerstone Championships will follow the 2026 Dust structure. Learn more about Dust 

Behind every great contest are those who ensure it is fair, clear, and worthy of the realm. Our judges offer their time and expertise so that every player can focus on what matters: playing Sorcery! As a token of our gratitude, volunteer judges at Cornerstone events will receive the exclusive foil alternative art 

. Recognition of the care and commitment judges bring to every game. You can learn more about our Judge program 

if you ran a Cornerstone event through the Sorcery Play Network in 2025, you can confirm your involvement in the 2026 Sorcery OP program 

, or respond to the email invitation we have already sent you.

 if you have not hosted a Cornerstone event yet but want to bring Sorcery Organized Play to your community in 2026, we would be delighted to welcome you and your players to the Realm. You can register your interest for Sorcery Organized Play 

, and once you have a few events under your belt, we will send you a Cornerstone Kit to celebrate the Sorcery community you’ve helped to build.

to find a Cornerstone Championship near you and come celebrate the journey your local community has been on together.

For many players, a Cornerstone Championship is where the horizon widens. The chance to meet Sorcerers from neighboring communities, to share in new stories, and to feel the pull of something larger. However, the journey does not stop here. The Grand Contest awaits, where communities from across the region come together, and the circle grows wider still.

Where Communities Are Celebrated: 2026 Cornerstone Championships

Every journey into Sorcery begins the same way: a table, a few players, and the simple decision to contest the realm. But before long, the desire to widen the circle begins to stir. To meet new Sorcerers, test new deck ideas, and share the game beyond your own table.

help connect those circles. They bring Sorcery into local game stores, where separate playgroups can meet, merge, and grow into something larger. A couple of friends become a few more players, familiar games become challenges to unravel, and new stories emerge from both sides of the table.


The Gothic Store Kit is built to support regular in-store play, the backbone of local Sorcery communities across the realm. Each kit includes alternate-art promotional cards and playmats to reward players for their participation, their contribution to the community, and their achievement at the table.

2 One-Player alternate-art Flaming Skull playmats,

 promotional cards for event participants

 to recognize community champions, featuring the art of Drew Tucker

highlighting the incredible hand-painted art of Sorcery.

Each Store Kit is designed to support eight players across a season of in-store play. If your community is larger, add more kits to ensure every player at your table is covered.

There is no fixed schedule. Every community gathers at its own pace, some weekly, some monthly. What matters is that players have a consistent place to meet, experiment, and share their love of the game. Every meet-up is a chance to test new ideas, discover something new about the realm, and come back to the table a little sharper than before.

Store Kits are also your connection to Sorcery's larger 

. Hosting Store Kit events and participating in the Sorcery Play Network help us stay connected to your community and support it as it grows. In addition to rewarding players with Dust, hosting events at your store on the Sorcery Play Network will help to qualify you for a 2026 Cornerstone Kit; your store’s annual celebration of the Sorcery community you’ve been building together.

For existing Cornerstone stores: If you hosted a Cornerstone event through the Sorcery Play Network in 2025, your invitation to join Sorcery Organized Play 2026 has already been sent, and you’ll be sent an initial allocation of Store Kits soon.

For new stores, if your store hasn’t hosted a Cornerstone event yet but you’d like to bring Sorcery Organized Play to your community in 2026, we’d be delighted to welcome you to the realm!

Please note: Store Kits are limited and subject to restrictions and qualifying criteria.

Every great community starts somewhere, and the Store Kit is how you can build yours. Next up? The 2026 Cornerstone Kit, your store's way to annually celebrate your Sorcery players and the community you've built together.

Where Communities Take Root: The Gothic Store Kit

In 2025, we bolstered the Sorcery social play experience with Sorcery Organized Play. More than 1,800 players gathered across 150 Cornerstone events at local game stores around the world, sharing in those Sorcery moments together.

Now, in 2026, we’re writing the next chapter. Today, we’re introducing 

, a program designed to help stores build thriving communities, connect players across regions, and celebrate the creativity and imagination that make Sorcery unique.

But before we talk about the Gothic Store Kit, Cornerstone events, Grand Contests, or the Avatar of the Realm, we need to talk about something simpler.

Sorcery begins at the table. Maybe it’s a kitchen table, a folding table at the back of a game store, or the top table at a Grand Contest. While the spirit of the realm is familiar wherever you sit down, every table has its own stories, its own players, and its own moments.

Sorcery Organized Play is what happens when those tables connect.

It would be easy to build a ladder and focus on a system where the only story that matters is who finished first. But Sorcery was built around a different vision.

Sorcery Organized Play 2026 isn’t a climb, it’s an expanding circle. The goal isn’t to filter players through increasingly narrow levels of competition; the goal is to draw a bigger circle around the table, so that more players, more stores, and more communities can share in the experience of Sorcery together.

Organized Play is how your table finds others, and how the moments that make Sorcery worth returning to keep growing.

Every level of Sorcery OP 2026 is built around three guiding throughlines: Creativity, Mastery, and Wonder. These aren’t slogans, so much as they are things we want to continue to create space for at Sorcery tables around the world.

We believe that creativity should always have room at the table, after all, Sorcery is at its best when you feel free to experiment! You feel it when that creeping ‘what if?’ starts forming as you browse cards on 

, and that creative exploration is what opens the door to wonder.

We believe games should contain moments of wonder. These are the moments you remember long after you forget the number of games you won or lost in a season. You feel it when the perfect card appears at exactly the right moment. A Rolling Boulder returning from an unexpected approach. An Erik’s Curiosa ripped apart at a climactic moment. These are the moments you’ll retell later, at the counter of a game store, on the drive home, or around the table next week. They’re the moments that turn a match into a story.

We believe the pursuit of mastery never ends. Sorcery rewards players who keep learning, who discover interactions, and come back each week a little sharper than before. You feel it when you face a skillful opponent, or when a match pushes you to think about the realm in a new way. Competition helps bring that mastery into focus, and at its best, makes every moment of creativity and wonder hit harder.

These ideas shape the way we approach play in Sorcery, and are the values we bring with us as our circles grow with Organized Play.

Organized Play builds outward from the same place Sorcery always begins: the table. Each level of Organized Play is designed to be a widening of the circle from the one before it, helping local communities grow while creating opportunities for players to connect and celebrate the realm together.

Over the coming weeks, we’ll share deeper looks at each part of the program. For now, here’s the shape of the season:

Where communities gather, where new players sit down, and where experimentation feels natural and welcome. Store Kits support regular play at local game stores and help new Sorcery tables come to life.

A store’s annual celebration of Sorcery and their community. A chance to gather together and celebrate the moments that defined their time in the realm.

Regional gatherings that expand the field of play, where familiar faces meet with new friends across regions and where mastery can be showcased and further refined across communities.

The global culmination of the year, a shared spectacle of imagination, artistry, and play that brings together players from across the entire realm.

In the weeks ahead, we’ll be sharing deeper looks at each part of the program: The Gothic Store Kit, Cornerstone Championships, Grand Contests, and the Avatar of the Realm.

Organized Play

Judges

2026 Grand Contests: Where the Realm Gathers

Where Communities Are Celebrated: 2026 Cornerstone Championships

Where Communities Take Root: The Gothic Store Kit

Where Tables Connect: Sorcery Organized Play 2026