In September, Wizards of the Coast indicated that a Friends List would finally be added to Magic: The Gathering Arena in October. WotC stated that this Magic: The Gathering Arena Friends List would "provide an easier way for [players] to see whether [their] friends are online," and indeed this is something that many fans have been requesting for quite some time. However, it seems that these players will need to wait a bit longer for this feature, as implementation of the MTGA Friends List has now been delayed.
Revealed in the Magic: The Gathering Arena State of the Beta from October 18, the developer suggests that its current priority is "focusing on performance improvements and client health," and the addition of a Friends List to Magic: The Gathering Arena has been put on hold as a result. Wizards has not provided a new ETA for the launch of the Magic: The Gathering Arena Friends List, but the company has assured players that all of the new social features that have been announced previously remain on the roadmap.
These MTGA social features include not only the Friends List, but in-game messaging and the ability to share Magic: The Gathering decks as well. Furthermore, Wizards states that its goal is to go even further with social features, adding things like eight-person drafts, spectating, four-player formats, and more in the future. However, with the announcement of the delayed Friends List, players should expect the arrival of these additional features to be a ways off.
With respect to the Magic: The Gathering Arena performances improvements that Wizards of the Coast cites as the reason for the delay, there are a number of issues that are receiving the developer's attention. These issues include gameplay crashes, reconnection issues, FPS drops, and memory leaks, and it is said that addressing these problems will be WotC's "primary focus" for the next few months.
While some fans will be disappointed by the delayed Friends List in MTGA, many players will be happy to hear that addressing performance concerns has become Wizards' "highest priority." Indeed, the problems that some players are currently experiencing with the Magic: The Gathering Arena client is a frequent point of discussion in the community, and it seems that WotC is now committed to resolving some these problems prior to the release of the next MTG sets.
Magic: The Gathering Arena is available now on PC.
Source: Wizards of the Coast