VIENNAGEDDON 2025
VIENNAGEDDON 2025
Austria’s Biggest Old School and Premodern Tournament
May 2025
Last weekend, from May 16 to May 18, 2025, the Lions of Austria organized their annual Old School tournament, the VIENNAGEDDON! This time, with a “little” twist:
Instead of only going Old School, the Lions included a Premodern tournament, and not only that! They included the biggest Premodern tournament in all of Austria, with a total of over 70 spots available! The same goes, of course, for the Old School tournament.
What is the VIENNAGEDDON?
This has been the sixth time the VIENNAGEDDON took place, and it seems like this event is growing and growing every year. It’s hard to put a concrete number on it, but there were around 110 and 120 individual players present over the weekend, that’s more than double or even triple the people than last year! To be fair, this was mainly due to the inclusion and popularity of Premodern, as well as Side Events.
So, what was the plan with this year’s VIENNAGEDDON?
Three days of retro frame card action, of course!
Two main tournaments were planned: Old School (Ravenna) on Saturday and Premodern on Sunday, which was promptly named AUSTRIAN PREMODERN CHAMPIONSHIP. On top of that, the Lions decided to add side events: Premodern on Saturday and Old School (Atlantic) on Sunday. That means, if you wanted, you could play Premodern on both days or Old School on both days.
But wait a second, what’s with Friday? Well, on Friday, we played Retro Limited Events! Fallen Empires, Ice Age, Masques, Onslaught and Odyssey were on the menu, but more about that later!
THE SCHEDULE
Friday, 16th May 2025 – Community Event with Retro Limited Events
Saturday, 17th May 2025 – Old School Main Tournament (Ravenna) and Premodern Side Event
Sunday, 18th May 2025 – Austrian Premodern Championship + Old School Side Event (Atlantic)
Friday – Community Get-Together
On Friday, May 16th 2025, we met at the Three for One Trading store for the warm-up, community event and get-together! The general the idea was:
Get to know each other, drink some beers, meet Jeff Laubenstein, play some games of whatever you want and have fun
Now, that doesn’t mean we didn’t have some cool stuff lined up for you guys: Awesome retro limited tournaments were waiting for anyone that wanted to join, even if you didn’t register for the VIENNAGEDDON itself! The following Limited Events were available once enough people wanted to join:
Drafts
Fallen Empires (6 Packs) – €50
Ice Age Block (IA, ALL, CSP) – €90
Masques Block (MMQ, NEM, PRY) – €110
Onslaught Block (ONS, LEG, SCG) – €90
Sealed
Odyssey Block (Starter ODY, Booster Torment, Booster Judgment) – €120
WCD Battles – €10
In addition to all that sealed action, people played Premodern as well as Premodern EDH (regulars at 341 might already know that some of us cought that Retro EDH virus!) and we even had an Old School EDH game organized and recorded by Timmy the Sorcerer! That means some of the OG Elder Dragon Legends competed against each other in an epic battle for glory and… nostalgia: Chromium vs. Arcades Sabboth vs. Nicol Bolas vs. Vaevictis Asmadi!
There’s even a live stream of that, check it out here:
“We meet at Vinzirast, don’t be late!”
“Hey, wait a minute, isn’t the location at the Three for One Trading store?“
You are both right, sorry for the confusion!
On Friday, we met at our store for the Community Event. That meant casual games of Old School and Premodern, funky limited tournaments, beer, talks, meeting THE artist and getting to know each other. More about that further down the blog road!
On Saturday and Sunday, we met at Vinzirast Mittendrin, for the main tournaments. The location was picked after long talks, discussions, brainstorming, scouting and visitations by the Lions of Austria. At some point, Rolf (the Head of Lion) said:
“Wait a minute guys, my wonderful wife Kathy works at this awesome restaurant, they have tons of space and super tasty food, let’s just meet there”
Et voilà! And that, kids, is how we met at …
VINZIRAST MITTENDRIN
Vinzirast Mittendrin was a really great location for the event, because they had soooo much space! We could meet at the rooftop terrace which had a covered area for around 70-80 people, which was perfect for the main event. Then there was the first floor, which could seat around 30 people. This is where we could hold our side events as well as set up THE artist and our 341 booth!
That’s not all, though! Since the Head of Lions and Head of Vinzi are “emotionally engaged and more”, the Lions could arrange a special beer price for the event of €4 a bottle. On top of that, Kathy created the perfect “Magic Menu” for us (Editor’s Note: Big thanks for the vegan and non-alcoholic options)! We had a 30 minutes lunch break and some of us thought it would be impossible to order food and eat in that timeframe, but the team from Vinzirast Mittendrin was faster than a Lightning Bolt. Literally a wait time of 0.5 seconds until food was in your hands (and depending on the person, also 0.5 seconds until food was eaten).
We are not going to stop talking about Vinzirast Mittendrin just yet! This restaurant was not only the perfect location for our VIENNAGEDDON, but it is also an awesome social project. We are paraphrasing/copying this info from their own website, but just be assured, this place got a big heart:
Vinzirast Mittendrin is an innovative social housing project that opened in May 2013. It is a place where formerly homeless people and students live, work and learn together here. Some of the residents find employment in the kitchen or in service, an opportunity to re-enter working life. Here they work together with full-time and volunteer colleagues.
Special Guests and Others
Every single person that visited the VIENNAGEDDON 2025 with us is special. But then there are always some people that are a little bit more special. Sorry, we are not making the rules of the social construct, some people are royalty and some are not. And we are super happy that some of that royalty was present at this year’s VIENNAGEDDON!
The famous artist and wonderful person Jeff Laubenstein visited us for the whole weekend! You know, the guy behind the artwork of Recurring Nightmare, Show and Tell, Martyr’s Cause, Dauthi Horror and the funky Apes of Rath!
You could get your cards signed by Jeff, altered by Jeff, take pictures with Jeff, drink some beer with Jeff and talk about God with Jeff! He also brought a lot of cool playmats, beautiful prints, A LOT of custom tokens and even some really cool looking fabric tubes for your playmats!
Mister Laubenstein was the star of the party, and we are so happy he agreed to join the VIENNAGEDDON. He not only showed up, but he was a big part of the event, and we were very thankful to have him there!
Next up on the red carpet, Old School royalty and friend:
Thomas already visited us last year for the VIENNAGEDDON 2024 to help us stream the event, and we also met at MagicCon Amsterdam 2024! Now he was back in Vienna again, to stream and kick ass, because Thomas and his brother Joep also joined the Old School tournament this year.
And you only need to look at the Top 8 to see that both, Thomas and Joep, not only know how to make commentary, but also know how to play Old School!
While we are looking forward to the edited content of the stream, you can rewatch the raw version on Timmy’s Youtube channel and here:
No Play, Only Work
While the MtG pop stars were drinking champagne and looking at beautiful retro cards, there were some people present that did all the heavy lifting! Most notably the two judges that agreed to participate in the famously well-organized and timely VIENNAGEDDON (that sounds like a joke, but we were actually pretty punctual and good organized this time).
Christian Gawrilowicz did a fantastic job at staying cool while handling drunk Old School players and Christian Marx managed to be a perfect Premodern judge, although he previously was one of the already mentioned OS players ;) Thanks a lot guys, this would have been a lot harder without you!
Need Cards? No Problem!
Our very own Lukas (yes, that’s the team lead of our buying department) accompanied us during the whole event, so anybody that needed to buy cards or wanted to get rid of cards could do so! We had a little 341 booth present with all staples needed for Premodern as well as some Old School cards that people might need!
As expected, Lukas did a great job at doing his job! Well-structured, organized and calm, he managed the card booth both days on Saturday and Sunday.
If you missed buying any cards you wanted during the event, you can still do so here!
Best Photographer/EDH Player in Town
Next up in our line-up of awesome people: Mario Pernkopf from Mario Pampel Productions photography. Almost all the pictures you see on this blog (except for the deck pictures and, well… card pictures) are from Mario! He was there the WHOLE TIME from start to finish on Friday, Saturday and Sunday doing all in his power to cover the VIENNAGEDDON to its fullest.
And dare we say it? Mario did an awesome job, again!
Again? Well yes, Mario has covered a lot of events for us so far from smaller tournaments at our store, to international events like the MagicCon Amsterdam to bigger local tournaments in Vienna! Although you could see it was energy draining work, Mario pulled through and created a lot of beautiful photos.
Thanks a lot for those awesome impressions, Mario!
Prizes, Prizes, Prizes
The VIENNAGEDDON 2025 has been PACKED with prizes! Now we all know the real prize is the friendships you make along the way, but it’s also really cool to win something! A little appreciation for the good plays you made, so to speak.
As last year, the Old School prize pool consisted of three different categories:
- 1st Place: Unlimited Armageddon (signed by all) + Trophy
- 2nd Place: Signed Triskelion
- 3rd to 4th Place: Berserk
- 5th to 8th Place: Land Tax
- Best Performing Unpowered Deck: Revised Plateau
- Most Creative Deck: Dan Frazier Signed Mox Sapphire Playmat
- Participation Promo: Swedish Legal Cards with Logo Stamp
The Premodern prize pool reflected a bit the more competitive nature of the format, but we believe nobody complained about that:
- 1st Place: Mox Diamond + Meidling Mage Playmat (signed by all)
- 2nd Place: City of Traitors
- 3rd to 4th Place: Survival of the Fittest
- 5th to 8th Place: Intuition
- 9th to 16th Place: Wasteland + sponsored vouchers (€18) for Cardmarket by Cardmarket
- Raffle prizes: Cardmarket Deck Boxes and Sleeves sponsored by Cardmarket
Saturday – Main Old School Tournament
On Saturday, May 17th 2025, we officially started the VIENNAGEDDON with our first main event: THE OLD SCHOOL TOURNAMENT! For a lot of people, this was the origin of the VIENNAGEDDON and therefore the “real” main event of the weekend.
After a very short timely delay (as is tradition), we started with the tournament. A total of 47 players made it through the registration and to their tables! It only took 6 rounds to arrive at the Top 8, which included a lot of well-known characters!
Viennageddon 2025: Main Old School Tournament – Impressions
What is Art? What is Creativity?
Some of you already asked, “How do you determine what the most creative deck is?” and the answer is “Quick and dirty!“
There have been a lot of creative decks this weekend, and most of them deserved the title “Most Creative Deck”. In the end, there can only be one (or two) winner, and we decided that this year, the award goes to a deck with many original and janky cards that you wouldn’t directly expect at a big Old School tournament as well as a deck with a very unique deck building challenge.
So THE WINNERS OF THE MOST CREATIVE DECK are…
CHRISO AND MATTHIAS
We had to decide on a player to give the prize playmat to, so we decided for Chriso because although Matthias deck was super unique, it seemed to us that the deck played at the “wrong tournament”. Big thanks to Matthias for being a great sport regarding this decision!
In retrospect, a lot of decks would have deserved the “Most Creative Deck” title, so we want to feature all the decks that we believe are worthy of it! If you are disappointed that your deck didn’t win, please be assured we’ll sharpen our creative decision-making brains for the VIENNAGEDDON 2026 and will try to be prepared a little bit better (or maybe just do a raffle among the funkiest decks?).
Now please look at all the awesome decks and be happy about all the cool stuff the community comes up with!
(Jonathan Wais is the undisputed deck picture winner, fight me on this!)
Who Needs Unlimited Power If You Got UNLIMITED DAMAGE?
It’s far easier to determine the best unpowered deck than the most creative deck: Just check standings and look up the deck pictures. What could go wrong?! There were exactly 12 out of 47 Old School decks that played without Power Nine. There were many different reasons why people did it, but we all know that the main reason was swag!
And the WINNER FOR BEST UNPOWERED DECK is…
MARC FOURNIER
He didn’t get into the finals, but he sure made some Power Nine players pretty anxious: Congratulations, Marc!
If you are curious what the unpowered decks looked like, here are all of them:
Viennageddon 2025: Main Old School Tournament – Top 8
Oliver Polak-Rottmann – Atog Control
Stefano Rossi – Multi Burn
Andreas Aji – BWu Moat
Thomas Meddens – Timmy’s Spellbook
Joep Meddens – GWu Control
Nicholas Boltuć – BURN
Mathias Diernaes – Robot Control
Peter Vermeulen – UWb Control
Oliver Polak-Rottmann – Atog Control
Stefano Rossi – Multi Burn
Andreas Aji – BWu Moat
Nicholas Boltuć – BURN
Joep Meddens – GWu Control
Thomas Meddens – Timmy’s Spellbook
Mathias Diernaes – Robot Control
Peter Vermeulen – UWb Control
Main Old School Tournament – Winner
And VIENNAGEDDON 2025 OLD SCHOOL WINNER is…
OLIVER POLAK-ROTTMANN
After an exciting finale against Stefano Rossi, the winner was decided: Congratulations, Oli!
Although some might argue with you if your Atog Control deck was really that different from a regular Atog deck, you once again showed us how to play Old School Magic on a different level. This is the second time in a row Oli has won the VIENNAGEDDON, which means we all need to step up our game, guys! We’ll push him from the throne in 2026, maybe… probably… eventually?!
Saturday – Premodern Side Event
On Saturday, May 17th 2025, after the Main Old School Tournament started, we continued with the second event of the day: THE PREMODERN SIDE EVENT
Premodern hardcore fans and those that couldn’t make it on Sunday registered for this event, which resulted in a total of 27 players coming together to share their love for retro cards and competitive gameplay!
Viennageddon 2025: Premodern Side Event – Impressions
Viennageddon 2025: Premodern Side Event – Top 8
Benjamin Rozhon – Mono Blue Control
Adam Koska – BG Gamekeeper Oath
Christian Lobnig – Deadguy Ale
Gary Campbell – Oath
Joep Lenglet – Deadguy Ale
Patrick Arthofer – Stiflenought
Sebastian Hillenga – Ponza Oath
Valerio Sorichetti – White Weenie
Premodern Side Event – Winner
And THE PREMODERN SIDE EVENT WINNER is…
BENJAMIN ROZHON
In the finale, Beni had the upper hand against Adam Koska: Congratulations Benjamin!
Now, Beni wouldn’t have won this tournament if it hadn’t been for all the people that reminded him to register for the tournament in time ;) To be fair, those who played against Beni might have realized that he is no newcomer to the competitive Magic scene and knew how to keep those two blue mana open! Jokes aside, it’s great to see that both winners from day one are through and through Three for One Trading boys, REPRESENT!
Sunday – Austrian Premodern Championship
On Sunday, May 18th 2025, we continued the Viennageddon with our second main event: THE AUSTRIAN PREMODERN CHAMPIONSHIP
After a tiny technical hiccup and a small wave of deregistrations, the 61 players that were left started the heated battle to become Austrian Premodern Champion!
Viennageddon 2025: Austrian Premodern Championship – Impressions
Viennageddon 2025: Austrian Premodern Championship – Top 8
Adam Koska – BG Gamekeeper Oath
Ariel Trapp – Red Ponza
Benjamin Vollmann – Parallax Replenish
Florian Wild – BRG Zoo
Ondrej Kedrovič – Devourer Combo
Patrick Arthofer – Stiflenought
Tobias Dombek – Parallax Replenish
Uwe Tertinek – Devourer Combo
Austrian Premodern Championship – Winner
And THE AUSTRIAN PREMODERN CHAMPION is…
ADAM KOSKA
After Adam lost his first finale, to at least win the finale of the Austrian Premodern Championship against Florian Wild: Congratulations Adam!
It shows great knowledge of the game to become a finalist twice in a row, and we are happy to give Adam the title of Austrian Premodern Champion. Well deserved! He also won a Mox Diamond, but wait a minute… he only plays 3 copies in his deck? Did he become even stronger now?!
Sunday – Old School Side Event
While the main event on Sunday, May 18th 2025, was the Austrian Premodern Championship, the side event was something else: OLD SCHOOL TOURNAMENT (with Atlantic Rules)
Only a small group of 9 players was strong enough to endure another day full of Old School Magic and alcoholic beverages! And all of this with Atlantic rules, which basically means:
Falles Empires exists and so does Mana Burn! On top of that, the following cards were not restricted:
Viennageddon 2025: Old School Side Event – Impressions
Old School Side Event – Winner
And OLD SCHOOL SIDE EVENT WINNER is…
WOLFGANG JANCAR
After luck during the big Old School Ravenna tournament was not on Wolfgang’s side, it sure was during the Atlantic tournament: Congratulations Wolfi!
Now the big question is, will you keep the magazine sealed or crack it and learn some valuable lessons from the old days?
BIG THANKS TO ALL OF YOU
For making this an unforgettable and awesome weekend.
Hope we will see you all again next year!
(P.S.: A participant from the US, the wonderful Neil Troy who I unfortunately didn’t get a chance to talk to, wrote his own blog post about the VIENNAGEDDON 2025. You can find it HERE! Thanks for the visit and the coverage Troy, maybe your work schedule aligns with our tournament again in 2026?!)
