When Fallen Empires was released in my first year of Magic playing, I set up a rainbow match with four of my friends. We each chose a color (I greedily grabbed green; the one stuck with red complained rightfully) spent a while building our decks then sat in our respective places (see the back of any card for an illustration). Each player was teammates with their two neighbors and opponents with the two sitting across. If any two teammates died, their shared opponent would walk out of the game a winner.
I was super interested to see how the politics would play out. Who would die first? Who would be the first winner?
Instead the black and white players executed a planned partnership and quickly took out the other three players. The Star format---specifically the rule of not-being-able-to-attack-teammates---didn't exist yet. Sadly another game was not to be had. It wasn't until 2002 that I tried another set-specific rainbow game with some college friends and a box of Onslaught.
Here's a list of alternate formats I've been a part of. Some are limited-specific, others constructed. Some I've tried only once or twice, while others I've played tons of times. Many of them are combinable; feel free to mash together as many as you like!
No doubt I'll forget some and have to add to this list. If you know of formats I really should try, please let me know!
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Emperor (best as a Draft): This is my favorite 6-person limited format. I recommend giving everyone the same "target range" of either 1 or 2. If the emperors can start off targeting the lieutenants, but they can't target the emperor back, it can become a little frustrating for the lieutenants. I think I've had the most success using a range of 2, because otherwise the emperors are mostly limited picking up spells that pump and protect their lieutenants creatures. Ranges of 2 make the drafting a bit less predictable. In the past, I've always played the game with 6 separate turns per round, but I would really like to try team turns in the past. Once in 2005, I managed to gather 11 other people (Donny G saved us by being that last person) for a four-team emperor draft tournament. It was awesome! If you have 6 people about to draft, see if you can convince them to do this instead.
Group Game Draft: I just tried this over the summer with three friends from Boston University. It was awesome! Great for 4-6 people if you want to draft a fourth pack and have aggressive matches.
Winston Draft: This is the best way to draft for two people, and also works great for three. I don't know if I've done this with more, but I would probably add more piles.
Cutthroat: The best way to play a game with three people. Normal 3-player games can suffer from extra politics and drag on longer than desired. Kevin Chudyk explained this format to me: when you attack, all creatures attack both opponents instead of just one apiece. Those players assign blockers together, and any damage that gets through (unblocked or by trampling, etc) is dealt to both defending players. There are some additional effects I'm not sure how to handle, but I raised the point in this reddit.com post. (For example, what happens when Thieving Magpie deals combat damage to both opponents? What happens if one of your opponents has Teferi's Moat out?)
Rainbow-Star: A five-player format based on colors. Each player chooses a color and builds a deck with spells of only that color, then sit around the table arranged as on the back of a magic card. Each player has two teammates (those sitting next to them) and two opponents (those sitting across from them). You may not attack your teammates. You win if you kill both your opponents (at that point you leave the game as a winner. This is fun to do if you open a box of a set with little or no multi-colored cards and divide them amongst five players. Best when combined with Cutthroat as described below.
Star: A five-player format not tied to specific colors. As above, but players can run whichever cards they like. Drafting to play this format is fun! Best when combined with Cutthroat as described below.
Cutthroat Star: A combination of Cutthroat and Star (both above). When a player attacks, they attack both opponents, just as in cutthroat. Also just as with 3-players, cutthroat speeds the game up and keeps some adverse effects of politics low.
Deckmaster: An intense format that can be combined with 1-pack sealed or draft. In deckmaster, there is little need to shuffle your deck. At the beginning of the game, you choose whatever 7-card hand you like. Then, whenever you have priority, you may rearrange the order of cards in your deck. This format was taught to me by Ben "JC" Allen. I haven't found the web resource he learned it from, but it's an extremely intense format. Even with only 15 spells, games take a long time. As JC put it, this format will improve your magic playing.
Archenemy Draft: A one-versus-all draft format. Choose one person to be the Archenemy, then draft as normal. When playing, the Archenemy uses a deck of scheme cards (we just shuffled all of the schemes together into one massive deck), then play as normal. I've only done this once: 3 versus 1, and it went pretty well: 2-1 for the archenemy.
Anaconda Draft: Ever wanted to change drafting strategy mid-pack? Stuff back some cards you took already to get more choices! Compatible with any other draft format.
Back Draft: Ever wanted to play a format where everyone has a terrible limited deck? Note: DO NOT combine this with a Winston draft!
Two-Headed Giant: How have you not played this yet? My favorite part about prereleases is playing with people you know. The shoft-lived team-sealed didn't cut it because you weren't supposed to be talking to your team. How is that fun?
Wacky Draft: Want to see how cards interact across blocks in limited? Bring whatever three packs you want to a wacky draft and open them in any order. Note: for packs with less than 12 cards, you'll need to open two of them instead of one. Compatible with any draft format.
Progressive Draft: One-on-one tournament drafting for many people. Each round you shuffle your and your new opponents' card pool from the previous round, then draft with those 90 cards (build random 15-card packs or, probably better, Winston Draft them). After that match, take your new card pool to the next round and draft them again.
Ironman Magic: In this format you get to tear up cards. We did this once with Unhinged; it was very satisfying!
Zombie Horde Magic: Need a co-operative adventure? (I still need ~30 zombie tokens to complete my deck...)
Danger Room Magic: Help teach new magickers to play by using the same exciting deck.
OneCC: Which casting cost is the best? This is a constructed format where each deck uses non-basic-land cards that all have the exact same casting cost. I've seen some awesome decks with costs R, B, 2GG, and... um... no cost. Important: this enforces exactly casting cost not converted casting cost. That means Tundra Wolves and Boros Recruit cannot be in the same deck. The same is true of Memnite and Pendelhaven. I most recently ran a Modern tournament that luckily banned Hypergenesis. Still, R was incredibly good and probably deserves a ban... assuming anyone was playing this format.
Pauper: A constructed format that allows commons only.
Peasant: Similar to Pauper, but you are allowed five uncommons.
Choose-Your-Own-Standard: Which standard deck was the best? A constructed format where each player picks two successive blocks and a core set that was legal with both of them to build their deck from. Adhere to block bannings (otherwise you'll see lots of Raffinity).
Build-Your-Own-Standard: Which blocks should have been legal together? Just like Choose-Your-Own-Standard, except that you can use whichever two blocks you like, as well as any core set. Usually we restrict this to sets since Sixth edition.
Mental Magic: Play whatever card of the same casting cost you want. Your brain will hurt. Have fun! Excellent if there is an unwanted stack of commons left over from a draft.
Bounties: Want to coerce other players to destroy permanents or people? Whenever you have priority, you can pay X life to put a bounty of X on a permanent or player. When that permanent or player is removed from play, whomever controlled that effect gains that X life, so long as it wasn't the same person that declared the bounty. Start with 30 life apiece and enjoy games that drag out way longer than they should. I played a lot of this between 1995 and 1997.
Mercenary: We never got these rules nailed down, but we were young enough that it didn't matter. There were two "Lords" who were trying to kill each other and everyone else were mercenaries, fighting amongst themselves. Lords were not adjacent to each other and had to "march" creatures through mercenaries' territories. It was loads of fun, but not well-defined.
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Here are some formats I've never played (but want to). If you have any other suggestions, please let me know!
Grand Melee Magic.
Tag-Team: I really want to give this a try!
Rooster Draft.
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