Nicole Tipple's first Regional Championship was a lonely one.
"I didn't know anyone at the Regional Championship, I didn't even know the people who played competitively locally, so I didn't have anyone there with me to share what was going on," she recalled of her first Regional Championship that nonetheless set her on the path to becoming a Pro Tour regular. "When I qualified for the Pro Tour, I didn't have anyone there to celebrate with.
"Then Noor [Singh], who is lovely, reached out and asked me to join a testing team. I asked, 'What's that?'"
That team turned out to be Team Sanctum of All, the Magic team known for many things. First and foremost is their focus on inclusivity and extending open invitations to players of marginalized genders. Their other claims to fame have come from some of the huge successes the squad has put up over the last several years. From wild cftsoc creations like
Sanctum is one of a handful of notable teams all eyeing success at next week's Pro Tour Magic: The Gathering®—FINAL FANTASY™ at MagicCon: Las Vegas. While there will of course be teams of grizzled veterans with Hall of Fame resumes longer than the textbox on
But none of that was yet a thing when Tipple first dipped her toes into competitive Magic several years back, after watching local Reid Duke win Pro Tour Phyrexia in legendary fashion. That sparked the fire in Nicole Tipple, and the breakthrough at the Regional Championship came before she had learned the ropes. It wasn't long ago in Magic that Tipple would have then been more or less stuck: qualified for the Pro Tour but with no idea just how much she didn't know.
"I didn't know that people worked with teams and things like that," Tipple explained, "and I was really nervous, but I joined; Sanctum felt like the right place."
It was—Tipple would go on to string together strong Pro Tour performances since. And in that time, she's grown into not just a member or standout competitor on Sanctum, but into someone taking on a leadership role in addition to, you know, the usual fare of trying to win the Pro Tour.
POV: You are an underslime — I love Sanctum #PTThunder pic.twitter.com/jyfJ91kfAM
— Nicole Tipple (@NicoleTipple) April 27, 2024
It all goes back to that message from Singh, and the best part about Tipple's backstory here is that it's not unique—Singh (and Sanctum at large) have been proactive about not just being available but making themselves available to up-and-coming competitors like Tipple who face a number of challenges once reaching the very top tier of competition.
It goes beyond the outreach. Mindful of her own fears when joining, Tipple and others make sure that input from new qualifiers isn't just accepted but encouraged. The team's collaboration goes beyond just jamming games on opposite sides of a table, and even the smallest of notes from anyone on the team can unlock more success for everyone.
Above all else, the team makes sure that being welcoming means more than just a spot on the roster. That means a commitment to each other, and Tipple learned what this meant in real time. Before long, she wasn't worried about sharing her screen for fear of being ridiculed or dismissed as not good enough.
"Anxiety is one of the biggest things that will hold you back," she said. "One of the things we work on is helping new players be comfortable sharing opinions. The idea is that we're all growing together. Ryan Condon does a good job of this, pushing people to share their opinions even if it sounds crazy. That environment created at Sanctum helps everyone feel comfortable."
Like most Magic testing teams, Sanctum utilizes a structured Discord server to coordinate Limited and Constructed testing across international time zones. But unlike most teams, Sanctum's goes beyond the usual keep or mulligan or Pack 1, Pick 1 or Standard decklist channels.
"We have a channel in the Discord that's just called 'General Expectations,'" Tipple explained. "For a number of people on the team, it's their first Pro Tour. We want to develop a team that's beneficial for everyone."
And here's the thing about all of that commitment to contentment—it pays off when table meets Twitch.
We had 12 out of our 21 teammates qualify for day 2 of the PT! Toni Portolan is 7-1, currently 5th in standings, will be in the featured pod tomorrow! Etienne Eggenschwiler, @rcondon_, Gray Payne, and @NoJusticeMTG are all 6-2! (1/2)
— Sanctum of All (@SanctumOfAll) February 22, 2025
Like all of Sanctum's leadership, Tipple's hard work is being felt.
Toni Portolan spoke highly of the team's work. "Sanctum consists of several senior players who have gone through the process of preparing for the Pro Tour a couple of times, but we're also welcoming new players to the Pro Tour or players who are new to testing teams, like me. People go out of their way to include everyone when sharing findings and conclusions, and knowledge and silliness flow freely!" they explained , who joined Sanctum ahead of their first Pro Tour and is coming off a Top 16 finish at Pro Tour Aetherdrift earlier this year as well as an appearance at Arena Championship 7. "I also had the barrier of joining from a European time zone, but there was no immense pressure on me as an individual, rather just to advance the team's understanding of the metagame and decks. Jason Ye checked up on me a couple of times to see how I was feeling or where it could support me.
"Every voice and opinion is taken into account, it's a very supportive and relaxed environment. Regarding testing, it's great to be back in the heat of it. The atmosphere is welcoming and buzzing with ideas, trying hard to break the format open."
Sanctum isn't the only team bringing together new faces for this event. Flexslot Diamond is working together officially for the first time, but this roster has familiar faces like Corey Burkhart and Mark Jacobson, the ringleaders of the squad, along with relative newcomers like Adam Brace, who posted a strong finish at Pro Tour Aetherdrift as part of Team SystemMagic but, like more than a dozen other players, flocked to the new team he heard Burkhart was putting together when he found himself looking for a group.
Brace has been through the ringer when it comes to Pro Tour logistics in his previous experiences. His first Pro Tour appearance in 2024 was derailed by a major illness the week before the event, and much of those last all-important days of testing were spent on their own. While it only takes one person to fire up a game on MTG Arena and start battling, the sheer amount of data that Pro Tour teams have available to them in 2025 can't be matched by a single player (unless your name is Shota Yasooka).
"That first Pro Tour was a cluster of bad experiences, but working with SystemMagic at the last one was a world of difference, and it completely changed my perspective of how to be on the Pro Tour; it was all a very eye-opening experience," Brace recalled. "It's really cool to see the differences between how people who have been doing this for a long time do it versus those who are new, down to how they organize and manage their Discord servers."
While SystemMagic didn't come together for Las Vegas, fortunately for Brace, Flexslot Diamond was open to taking on newcomers and was headed by a pair of savvy Magic vets who know how to run a team. Burkhart, who won Pro Tour Phoenix in 2020, is an affable competitor with a knack for fostering good communication amongst teammates. Jacobson, who has been working for several years to return to the Pro Tour after a long run of success in the 2010s that included a victory at Grand Prix Mexico City in 2018. He finally did requalify after several near misses over the last two years, including a trio of missed win-and-ins at a Regional Championship. From there, he found the opportunity to help guide the process with Flexslot Diamond too appealing to pass up.
"I wanted to mesh the best chance to succeed in the tournament with an enjoyable process and vibe with the other people on the team," Jacobson explained. "Having played competitive Magic before, there are a lot of interesting personalities. You want to be with people you can get down with to the fullest extent. When Jacob Milchman reached out and said Corey was putting together a testing a team, I knew I was interested, having worked with Corey in the past. As someone who is extremely interested in the process side of things, I asked Corey a bunch of questions about how the process would work. Instead of answering, he just sent me an invite to the Discord server.
"I accepted it."
It's been over five years since playing a Pro Tour and I couldn't be more excited to be back in action with past testing partners and new friends! https://t.co/I8fygXt4ui
— Mark Jacobson (@markjmtg) June 4, 2025
With that, Flexslot Diamond was off and running. Burkhart and Jacobson brought the process knowledge; Brace and the rest of the zoomers—as Burkhart put it—brought the enthusiasm and the dedication. The team has been hard at work for weeks already as the latest set's previews rolled in, with the structure Jacobson has helped provide guiding things along.
"When I realized I could put my thumb on the scale and influence the testing process, that was really big for me," Jacobson explained. "I've had a lot of success with team leadership in the past and knew if I could get people to buy into my testing ideas that I knew worked, while incorporating everyone's ideas about how things have changed. Being given the keys to help lead helped me feel comfortable that we would have a good process."
For Flexslot Diamond, a big part of that process started with communication. Especially for a new team bringing together so many unique voices, it's a truism that you can't win the tournament in the testing house, but you can lose it; poor team chemistry has sunk more than one Pro Tour hopeful's dreams in the past.
"We spent a lot of time on guidelines and expectations, not just on how we are going to test or handle meetings, but also how to communicate effectively, eliminate hyperbole, and handle issues that arise. It's difficult to deal with a week and a half before the Pro Tour when you have an issue with how people are connecting with each other or how the testing is going when you're in crunch time and don't have any options. We've mapped everything out ahead of time so that, when we reach crunch, it's just execution."
Early reviews are that the team is off to a strong start. Burkhart is feeling confident with where their testing has brought them. As we near the end of the testing period, there's nothing but praise for the zoomers like Brace or Lee Webb (two Top 8 players from Magic Spotlight: Dragons earlier this year) or Ian Robb (fresh off the Top 8 of Pro Tour Aetherdrift) from the team's veterans.
"One huge thing we've seen is enthusiasm and open-mindedness from the newcomers," Jacobson elaborated. "Even if you don't know the ropes, if you show up and put in honest effort and are open to guidance, it will be helpful to the dynamic—everyone's input is valuable.
"I think it's important to your overall success that you have good communication. It's a snowball effect. When you have people who are vibing, you push each other in healthy ways. Having good vibes helps drive everyone to the next level."
Thus far, the vibes are immaculate. As Burkhart alluded, the zoomers are alright.
"Overall, it's gone significantly better than I would have expected—if you had asked me from the onset how it would work, I would have expected the teenagers and 20-somethings to be exceptionally hyperbolic and have to rein them in on the cool catchphrases of the day. But it's been super chill and effective. They've come in and hit the ground running. They're asking the right questions, talking about the key cards in each matchup, and how can we exploit interactions. They ask the right questions; that's not a skillset those of playing back in 2012 had. I don't know if gaming culture is much more engrained or what, but players are so much more prepared now; the worst player in the room would have been a Top 100 player at my first Pro Tour."
That's the highest of praise coming from a Pro Tour champ, and as both Sanctum of All and Flexslot Diamond head to Las Vegas over the next few days to dig in for a week of intense, in-house testing, one thing is clear: we are watching the future of the Pro Tour develop in front of our eyes.
