I have been intrigued by the Heavy Play line-up of products ever since I saw a video on The Professor's YouTube channel featuring them. As someone who tends to travel with multiple Commander and Pioneer decks, whether it's to a card show or my local game store, for the longest time I've simply shoved individual deck boxes into the bowels of a backpack, hoping to Christ they don't get banged around too badly in there. Back at MagicCon Vegas I thought I solved this issue by buying one of Ultimate Guard's Superhive 550+ deck box carriers, but even then it was bulky, didn't quite fit into my backpack, and was something of a hassle to carry around at shows.
I wasn't really planning on buying any more deckboxes after the Superhive, though, despite how bulky it was to carry around. It did the job just fine, and I had a convenient way to carry my Tom Bombadil playmat, some dice, and at least four of my main decks since I was already embedded in the Ultimate Guard system with their Xenoskin deck boxes for my favorite decks.
Yet, after seeing a Heavy Play playmat in person during a game of Magic: The Gathering with other games journalists during PAX West, I once again found myself interested in their products. So I was happy to see that they had a booth at PAX West, where I picked up their Counterspell art Playmat and a matching Blue deckbox as an entry point into the ecosystem.
Heavy Play has since provided us with a range of their products for the purposes of reviewing them, including their RFG Deckbox, the RFG Deckbox Carrier, two sets of their rounded corner sleeves, a set of their standard and hard inner sleeves, the RNG Dicebox, the ETB Playmat tube, and more.
Heavy Play First Thoughts
One of the major design aspects of the Heavy Play products is down to how they are all designed to function together in some way, thanks to the inclusion of magnets in the product. Called Heavy Play's EquipMAG system, everything from the playmat to the dice box is meant to snap together using these magnets, unifying them all in one package. This means if you need to just bring your mat, a deck, and a dice box to a tournament, you can simply snap the two boxes to the mat and carry it in that way. Or, if you're like me, and you tend to travel with multiple decks, the RFG Carrier holds quite a few deck boxes, while I can snap the playmat on one side, a deckbox or dice box on the other side and carry it all with just the strap on the carrier itself.
It's a really cool ecosystem that works really well together, though it does require some buy-in on multiple products to get the most use out of it. But I can say in practice it feels less like a gimmick, which surprised me after spending some time with the product, and more like an integral piece to my cardboard puzzle.
It helps too that everything feels extremely well-built. This isn't your standard chipboard or cheap plastic deck box or carrier. Each deckbox, from the cheaper RFG Deckbox to the RFG Max, is built from high-quality polycarbonate, with the latter also featuring vegan leather accents, a microfiber interior, and a fiberglass window to showcase your deck's Commander. The playmat isn't simply a polyester that every playmat on the market is built from. Instead, it's layers of polyester, EVA foam, polycarbonate, fiberglass, and an anti-slip PU all put together in one package, giving the playmat a premium, sturdy feel to the touch.
Each of the Heavy Play products, even down to the cheaper RFG Deckbox, which evokes the same style as the Ultimate Guard Boulder, feels premium, and that is by design. Heavy Play's founder, Randy Chiang, comes from an industrial design background, working in the mobile accessory space, and he took those design aesthetics and philosophies he learned from working on products like PopSockets. That attention to detail and design really shine through in each of the products I've used.
The pricing here reflects this quality, as well. Heavy Play's products skew towards the higher side of the pricing spectrum, with their cheapest deckbox setting you back $30, while the RFG Deckbox Carrier runs you $120. Speaking with Randy in an interview earlier this month, he explains that there was a seeming disconnect between players putting $1000 decks into $5 polypropylene deck boxes, and he sought to give those enthusiasts a better option.
"In terms of overall benchmarking and positioning versus our competitors, again coming from the mobile space, it's the way people think about protection as sort of an investment, [which] I think also applies here. So people are happy to spend, you know, $40, $50 on a phone case to protect a $1000-plus phone. Then, if you look at our gaming communities, people are spending a lot on cardboard. So it's not uncoming to find, you , $1000, $2000 deck and its sort of a shame to go and put those into cheap $5 polypropylene deck boxes. So I think there was room in the market for players that are enfranchised enthusiasts that were looking for more and they just didn't have a better option.
"The other thing is when it comes to premium in this category, I'd say historically what you were looking at was like bespoke, handmade wooden, hand-carved, Etsy brass buckle - like that whole high fantasy vibe, and that's not my personal style. I love the fantasy aspect of Magic, but more important I like the gameplay, and so wanting to have something that felt high-end and clean and techie and gadgety, so premium in that sort of manner, also landed at this price point. We recognize we have a high price point, but it's a very high-cost product. So pretty much every penny is going into the product itself."
Heavy Play Playmat
This was the product that first caught my attention when I saw The Professor's video which featured the Heavy Play products. So it's no surprise to me that the playmat is what drew me to the booth at PAX when I saw the Heavy Play signage in the Summit hall. I love my standard Tom Bombadil playmat, especially as a massive Lord of the Rings fanatic, and I usually carry that around everywhere, but the tube doesn't exactly fit snugly into my backpack (and I don't have a backpack designed for carrying cards and cardboard accessories, so yea), so oftentimes I would simply roll the mat up, throw it into the main compartment of my backpack and hope that this isn't the time the anti-slip coating finally starts to crack from wear.
So the idea of throwing a flat playmat into a laptop sleeve in my backpack was incredibly compelling. My biggest concern, though, was whether it would still feel great to play on. One thing I love about standard playmats is that they have a little squish to them, making it easier to pick up cards on them. My biggest fear with the Heavy Play playmat was that it would feel far too firm to the touch, especially with the inclusion of the polycarbonate and fiberglass layers in the mat itself. Thankfully, this didn't come to pass. Yes, it's a little firmer than a standard mat, just as a result of the sheer volume of layers underneath providing that stable support, but the top layer is built with the same standard material that all playmat surfaces are made from, making it feel familiar to the touch. The inclusion of that EVA foam underneath provides sufficient squish that makes me forget at times I'm using the Heavy Play playmat.
This is the one area where I feel the EquipMAG doesn't feel nearly as seamless, however. Sure, I can snap deckboxes, diceboxes and more to the side of the playmat when it's folded, and when just carrying a few items its fine. But snapping this to the side of the deckbox carrier feels a little awkward as the platmat simply juts out of the side of the carrier box. It's a nitpick, but it's one that makes me incredibly happy that the playmat itself fits perfectly in the myriad laptop sleeves in my AER City Pack Pro backpack.
The Heavy Play Playmat is also the first product in the Heavy Play line to feature art inspired by Magic: The Gathering's history of incredible artwork. While it doesn't feature card art like some of Heavy Play's competitors (Randy states that it's "In the works," but couldn't comment further), it still features some incredible art - such as the Counterspell Art Masters mat that all but forced me to pull the trigger and buy it at the show. Heavy Play also leans into the collectibility aspect of TCGs by having some playmats serialized, creating "chase mat" style scenarios, which I think is pretty cool.
The ETB Playmat tube is, well, it's a magnetized tube you can slap to the side of your deckbox or deckbox carrier, and it fits a rolled up playmat perfectly. It gives Heavy Play users the ability to keep using their favorite sleeve while traveling with everything in one EquipMAG'd form factor. I will say, even though I have this tube, I still find myself leaving the house with the Counterspell playmat in my backpack - it just feels more convenient than having to keep track of a mat and a tube separately. But it's nice to have the option if I ever want to break out Bombadil or my Anime-inspired Narset, Parter of Veils at an LGS table.
Heavy Play Deck and Dice Boxes
It's here I should say that I absolutely adore my Xenoskin deckboxes from Ultimate Guard. But I have always been worried that if drop the box that it's going to split along one of its seams, or the Xenoskin textured fabric they have over the chipboard interior would easily rip if something were to happen in my backpack. It's one of the major reasons why I wanted a deckbox carrier - to make carrying my decks easier while also protecting my deck boxes themselves.
So, when I saw the RFG Max Deckboxes at the Heavy Play booth, I had to buy one. The sturdier material really sold me, especially as someone walking around with a $1500+ Commander deck inside a $35 chipboard case all the time. The sturdier polycarbonate really drew me in at first glance, while the vegan leather panels and fliptop gave it a premium feel that rivaled the feel of the Xenoskin UG boxes I used. I also adore the window showcasing my Commander on the front of the box. Before, I color-coded my deckboxes to know what deck was in there. While I'm still doing that with the Heavy Play boxes, I can also, at a glance, just look into the deckbox and see the Commander itself. This isn't anything new or revolutionary - we've seen other deckboxes, especially in the Etsy-deckbox space - do this. But it's such a nice touch, especially when you've never used a box with that feature before.
I have a concern about the durability of the vegan leather flap, particularly at the point where you lift the tab to open the box. Getting my fingertip underneath the lip of the flap makes me wonder if I'm going to mangle that edge each time, and while it's not shown any sign of wear right now, I do worry about the longevity there. The deckboxes themselves come in two major styles: the standard RFG Deckbox and the RFG Deckbox Max (which, in its turn, comes in a 100+ and 133+ variant). The 100+ will fit up to 100 double-sleeved cards, while the 133+ will fit up to 100+ double-sleeved cards with hard inners. So whichever you need is basically down to your preference.
The standard RFG Deckbox is the entry-level offering from Heavy Play, and this is reminiscent of the UG Boulder deckbox. It features two polycarbonate shells that snap together in the middle, the top shell being translucent to feature that same window-style look into the deckbox as the RFG Max offers. What I really like about this deckbox is how you can basically use the magnets on the back of the box to snap the top shell to the bottom shell and use it to hold dice or tokens while you're playing your game, keeping everything within arms reach.
I will say, the snap between the two halves doesn't feel as secure as I was expecting (though, it should be said, I've not had any issues with it just coming open or the lid falling off when holding it upside down), but that said it still feels overall well built.
What does have a satisfying snap is the dicebox. Seriously, sliding the dice box tray in and out is so, so satisfying that I have found myself using it as a fidget during games. This is because the magnets on the tray and dicebox exterior literally snap it back into place when you slide the tray inwards that it just feels...right? I don't know how else to describe it. However, this might be the one product where I'm not necessarily a fan of the price - $30 for a standard dice tray that, while it has some satisfying magnets, is just a dice tray at the end of the day, feels a bit much. I only have the standard dicetray to review, but you can get the upgraded Dicebox Max for $60, which is roomier, the tray itself snaps to the top of the box itself, and is lined with vegan leather for a more premium feel, but again, that's quite a bit of money for what is, in essence, a dicebox.
Being able to just snap the dicebox to the back of my deck box when traveling with just one deck, or even slap it to the side of my Carrier when traveling with everything, however, is really convenient. I usually carry a bulky dice bag full of loads of D6s and D20 spindowns, but I have found I can usually just leave that at home now if I have the dicebox with me.
Speaking of the Carrier, this is probably my favorite box of the bunch. It looks like an RFG Deckbox Max on steroids, complete with the polycarbonate shell, vegan leather panels, and flip-top, as well as magnetized sides to attach even more Heavy Play products to it to carry it all in one hand. What I especially adore about this product is that it works with standard-sized deckboxes from any manufacturer. My aforementioned Xenoskin boxes from Ultimate Guard fit just fine in here. While I can fit fewer decks in the carrier in third-party boxes, I do appreciate that the size is standard enough that it doesn't require immediate buy-in of the whole Heavy Play ecosystem to use. Now I have a mix of the RFG deckboxes and a single UG box in there, alongside my dry-erase tokens and marker, which no longer find themselves just stuffed into a pocket of my backpack, ready to get lost.
There are some improvements I would make to the RFG Carrier for model 2.0, such as a carrying strap to throw over my shoulder like the Quiver, or a more comfortable feeling material used for the carrying strap, but the tube-shaped design and the EquipMAG features made it super convenient to carry around the final day of PAX West as well as to my LGS the last few weeks. It's also got a smaller footprint in my house, making storage of the Carrier when I'm not using it so much better than the larger, boxier competition.
The deckboxes all feature the same visual aesthetic - deep colors with brighter accent colors, giving each this attractive two-tone look I really like. The team is also working on new colors to bring to the products (with MagicCon Atlanta being the first place you get your hands on them), including a dark toned pink the company calls Scout Pink, and a brighter shade called Sorcerer Pink (this will also be coming to the playmats in the future).
Heavy Play Sleeves
One of the more intriguing product in the Heavy Play line up have to be the sleeves. Their defining feature are rounded corners on the bottom of each sleeve, which serves a dual purpose: it is meant to help with a smoother shuffle, while also acting as a clear indication which direction your deck is facing, as you'll always know what the bottom of the sleeve is at a glance. The CURV sleeves' rounded corners also mean there are no more sharp sleeve corners diging into your hand when clutching a full grip of cards. Or at least, that's the marketing speak.
I honestly can't remember the last time the corner of a sleeve caused me some discomfort - but you can also make the argument that I'm just so used to it after thousands of games of Magic that I simply don't notice anymore. What I do notice, however, are the scratches left on the front of some of my cheaper sleeved decks that the corners from shuffling too much creates. The last thing I want is to play Spongebob Squarepants only to see a giant gouge on the affable hero's face because a sharp corner was a little too aggressively shuffled. This is honestly why I love sleeves like the Katana line or the Eclipses. These are high-quality, durable sleeves that also feel incredible when shuffling, especially larger commander decks.
When I first sleeved up a deck using the CURV sleeves and inners, I actually thought I was doing something wrong, as there was so much air trapped in the sleeves that my decks felt almost buoyant. I had to press down constantly as I stacked cards on top of each other, compressing the air out of the sleeves, only for it to bounce back right away. This is, apparently, normal, I learned after speaking with Doc at PAX West and then Randy on our call. The sleeves need to settle in over time, which I'm happy to say that they have after a few weeks in the purple CURV Sleeves and standard inner sleeves (I don't have a deckbox large enough for the double-sleeved hard inners right now).
I will say, too, I miss the sharp corner at the bottom of the sleeve, especially when shuffling Commander decks. I would oftentimes use that corner to index where the cards were when shuffling, making it easier to shuffle without looking. I don't have that feeling anymore when shuffling with the CURV sleeves, and while the overall feel once the cards are sliding against each other is fantastic, that initial motion getting the sleeves to index properly just feels like I'm mashing plastic against each other. This leaves questions of durability over long stretches as well, especially since it doesn't take a whole lot of pressure to split the sleeves at their seam. I honestly cannot remember the last time I've had a Katana sleeve split, as much as I dislike the feel of Dragon Shields, the same can be said with their thicker variety of card sleeve. After a few weeks of using the CURV sleeves, I haven't noticed any scratches on the front of the cards, but I have already started to notice wear on the sides, especially around the curved bottoms, where I have trouble indexing the deck halves together while shuffling.
Out of all the products I've tested in the Heavy Play lineup, the sleeves might be the weakest of the bunch, especially for $20 for a box. It's a hard sell, especially when so many of the competition have sleeves that have held up under heavy play over the years. I am definitely eager to see how Heavy Play improves and iterates on this product over time, but unless you really want rounded corners, it's a hard sell for me to recommend these right now over less expensive options like the Katana or Eclipses.
Heavy Play Ecosystem As A Whole
One overarching theme of the Heavy Play products is interoperability, thanks to the EquipMAG system built into every major product in the lineup. From the cheapest deck and dice boxes to the most expensive product in the line, the Carrier, this ability to simply snap everything together for easy carrying, storage, use and more is one of the most compelling reasons to give this product a look. It's a premium product; Heavy Play doesn't try to obscure this fact, but I feel like the pricing is, with few exceptions, largely justified. The Deckbox Carrier and Playmat are both instantly my go-to products when going to my LGS and any convention where I'll need a few Magic decks. I went back to the booth the next day at PAX and bought a second RFG Deckbox Max (though after realizing I needed the larger 133+ size for the hard double inners, I wish I had bought that one instead). I really like the premium feel nearly every product exudes, even down to the lowliest Dicebox. The magnets bring so much to the table here without feeling like just a gimmick to draw players in.
While I'm not the biggest fan of the sleeves overall, everything else in the lineup that I've tried has made me a convert. Since switching to the Deckbox Carrier, I've mainly used my old Superhive box to store extra bulk cards and half-built decks. I already want another RFG Deckbox Max so I can double sleeve my Azorious Salt deck in the hard inners (which feel incredible when double sleeved, I'll say). The Counterspell playmat is utterly gorgeous, and I'm excited to see what other art the Art Masters series showcases down the road - and I'm looking forward to seeing that art migrate to sleeves, deckboxes, and more.
It's not cheap - and Heavy Playy knows this. But it's not so egregiously priced overall, especially considering the value of the cardboard we're oftentimes carrying around with us, that it's worth a look, whether on the Heavy Play website or at your local game store. If you're on the fence and will be at MagicCon Atlanta next weekend, it's also worth just going to the booth and talking with the team there. That's what I did, and the combination of customer service and product quality, once I got my hands on them, has turned me into a convert. It's hard to go back to my Xenoskin deckboxes, despite how much I like them. And while I think $30 might be a bit much for a dicebox regardless of how satisfying the tray is to pop in and out, I have found myself carrying it and not my bulky Gondorian leather bag to and from the card shop nowadays.
At the end of the day, the Heavy Play products are, by and large, an easy recommendation. I'm really looking forward to seeing what else they offer in the future, especially as the product matures more and the team expands its lineup of colors, designs, and improves upon its initial offerings here.
Full disclosure: The product described was provided by the manufacturer for the purposes of this evaluation. We, however, did purchase the playmat and two of the RFG Deckbox Max deckboxes ourselves outside the evaluation product.
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