A Rainbow Game – The Quintessential Multiplayer Experience
I want to start by assuring you that while I love the tight play and serious competition of a GP level event, I ALSO love the wild, chaotic, and memorable events that unfold around a multiplayer table.
I have heard it called by many names: Star Magic, 5-Player, Color Wheel, 5-Point Magic, Pentagram… but for the last 25 years we’ve called it a Rainbow Game – and for my money it is by far the best multiplayer variant for Magic, full stop. It is the measure that I compare all other multiplayer experiences against and I will explain why you and 4 of your closest friends (or enemies) should definitely have this format in your rotation.
My history with this variant starts waaaaay back in 1994. Back in those days, when the internet screeched to life through a modem and most of our news came in the form of pieces of woodpulp thrown on our doorstep, I had read about this fantasy-based collectible card game called Magic: The Gathering and knew this was something new and groundbreaking. I wanted to know all I could but, frustratingly, all we had access to was the card-sized revised rulebook. (…and even you, Bilbo, won’t need me to tell you tales of that black sorcerer.)
We were happily building decks and battling away with our Craw Wurms, Nightmares, Shivan Dragons, Serra Angels, and many a Giant Growth. When one day at the local shop I saw a magazine with a mesmerizing cover:
Inside I found an interview with Richard Garfield, as well as one with my favorite artist, Anson Maddox, but the real treasure was an article by Mose Wingert titled “Five Player Magic”. I recently unearthed my original Duelist #1 and re-read Wingert’s article (though it appears to not exist online) and I can confirm that all the variants you can find online these days are missing some key components of the original format as Mose described it.
Here are things that all 5 color / Star/ Rainbow game versions seem to have in common:
- You need 5 magic players – one for each color.
- Each player’s deck contains only spells of their chosen color. All lands and cards in that deck only produce mana of that type or colorless. (This concept has also become a staple of the commander format)
- Players sit in color order (WUBRG) so you have a White, Blue, Black, Red, and Green mage sitting in that order around a table.
- You are allied with your allied colors (the two players on either side of you) and your enemies are the enemy colors (the two players across from you).
- You win when both of your two enemy colors are eliminated from the game.
And here are the two things that I think are required and that help make this version great:
- Turns go in a star pattern.
- After each player’s turn, their enemy to their left takes a turn. White plays first, then black, then green, then blue, and poor red goes last.
- This tension and balance is critical. Two allies are not able to take their turns simultaneously and gang up on an enemy. It also means you have to consider Enemy, Ally, Ally, Enemy as the turn sequence you must survive before you can untap again.
- You can share mana with your Allies, and steal mana from dead allies.
- You can request mana from your allies and if they agree, that mana is moved from their mana pool to yours. This allows big things to happen sooner than normal. I’ve seen 7 mana spells hard cast on turn 4 or even turn 3.
- It requires you to make interesting decisions. Do I spend this extra three mana making another blocker that I dont really need or do I save it for my ally who can then have access to 9 mana on their turn?
- Also, if a player is eliminated, their untapped lands stay in play and can be used by either ally. Since the removed player never gets an untap step this only happens once, but can lead to some interesting betrayals.
As a game designer and student of good gaming, I think this set up allows for some great dynamics to develop naturally.
Distinct Roles
Each player has two allies and two enemies. Everyone has their color identity and that tends to put them in fairly distinct roles and create interesting imbalances. Certain players will have access to different tools. You can see which players have larger creatures, which players have easier access to sweepers, and which players will be using their annoying instants to draw sweet sweet cards and counter spells. When you are playing red, you may have to rely on your green ally to remove enchantments that are hurting you, but you may be the best at taking out problem artifacts.
Of course the larger your card pool, the less restrictive this color limitation can be. If your group can play with just a core set, or just a pauper cardpool, you experience some very interesting deckbuilding restrictions that showcase the color pie and the strengths and weaknesses of each color in lovely and challenging ways.
Clear Heuristics
Your victory condition is clear and creates objectives that drive the game forward. All you have to do is just eliminate those two pesky enemy color players. In a lot of free-for-all multiplayer games players can get bogged down by indecision or information overload. Or worse, there is often a strong incentive to do nothing. Avoid conflict at all costs – if you can just outlast everyone and fly under the radar that is sometimes a solid route to victory but it is also a solid route to a lackluster play experience.
This is why many multiplayer games add “attack left” or the Monarch which encourage interaction and give clear direction on who you should be attacking.
Furious Politics
There is an elegance to the Ally / Enemy structure in a 5 player game. You are enemies with each of your allies’ allies. As the white player you lean over to blue and whisper sweet battle plans in blue’s ear for defeating the chaotic red mage, but your other stalwart ally, the green player is now worried that you are paying too much attention to defeating her Red ally and not enough time focusing on that Black mage.
Now imagine that enemy-ally tension with the ability to share mana. The red mage convinces the green mage to lend her 2 mana that Green probably doesn’t need and she assures Green that this will spell doom for the blue mage. Once the green mana is in her pool though, it allows her to power out a magmaquake for 6 which wipes the board of creatures except for Red’s Skarrgan Hellkite
Side note: I’m not sure if your playgroup has ever played a “share mana” format, but it can create some very over the top begging and horse trading. As youngsters it was serious petitioning and pleading every turn for mana from both sides of you. As we matured as gamers, it became clear that the Catan rule was in effect. Do not share unless you were not going to use that mana and are getting a clear benefit and everyone became very efficient about it. We have a lot more interactions like “Can I have 2?” “No.” “ok.”
Season to Taste
“Variety is also the spice of death.”
Cevraya, Golgari shaman
As with any game variant, you should definitely adjust the parameters to fit the goals of your playgroup. The point of gaming is to enjoy the experience and that means different things for different folks.
- Color Hosing: Some groups like to ban or limit the amount of effects like “Protection from [Color]”, “landwalk”, “Destroy all [Land type]” that are allowed. You can accomplish this by limiting the format (use Standard Legal cards only) or by specifically banning a list of cards. Other groups like to play with all the punching and kicking allowed by the original Dr. Garfield and Pals.
- Victory Conditions: Some groups enjoy the threat of ally betrayal or watching it dissolve into a free-for-all. If that’s your style you can award 1 victory point for killing an ally, 3 victory points for killing an enemy and 5 points if both of your enemies are eliminated from the game while you are still in (no matter who kills them). This keeps the big reward on removing your two enemy colors yourself but adds a betrayal element. If you see an opportunity to take out an ally you have to weight the victory point vs. the help you are giving to an opponent to achieve their aims.
- Additional Layers: While we usually feel the game is just right as described, you can always add in other MTG flavors like Planechase cards, type 4 rules, etc. to enhance or change up the experience.
As always, I’d love to hear your favorite tweaks to this format or if you have an awesome story to share.
Thanks for reading and please remember to follow Mike’s rules of multiplayer:
- Loudly point out how powerful that other player at the table looks compared to your meager position
- Always send your creatures into the redzone with vigor and purpose
- Always game responsibly.
- Be a good friend – bring new people to the table and show them the joy of casting spells and attacking for two.
If players are new to multiplayer magic, I definitely encourage folks to read some of Abe Sargent’s excellent Casual Nation articles. They do a great job establishing concepts that help create a language to discuss and analyze multiplayer formats.
Further reading:
MTG wiki: https://mtg.gamepedia.com/Star
Kelly Diggs ‘09 article: https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/serious-fun/numbers-2009-03-30
Wizards – ‘08 Casual Formats: https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/feature/casual-formats-2008-08-11