MTG Universes Beyond: Doctor Who best cards

With 200 new card designs, from Doctors to Davros, MTG Universes Beyond: Doctor Who is packed with powerful new choices for your Commander decks.

Doctor Who and Magic: The Gathering are proving to be an exceptional match. Each of the four Universes Beyond: Doctor Who Commander Decks has been constructed with a designer’s deft touch and a fan’s love of the material.

With half of each deck being given over to completely new card designs, there are many contenders for the set’s absolute best. We’ll run through our picks for the best cards to be found throughout these hotly-anticipated Commander decks

Best Cards in MTG Universes Beyond: Doctor Who

Flesh Duplicate

An exceptionally cheap creature that can copy a wide range of targets, Flesh Duplicate is gunning for the design space occupied by Phyrexian Metamorph. While Flesh Duplicate doesn’t share that card’s flexible Phyrexian mana, it is ultimately cheaper overall. With the prevalence of blue in each of the Doctor Who Commander decks you’ll rarely struggle to get this one out.

The only real drawback to Flesh Duplicate is its Vanishing 3 ability. But for a 2-drop, 3 turns is plenty of time to hit the field and have a significant impact.

Everybody lives

A powerful and flavorful table-wide protection spell. Everybody Lives effectively guarantees that the board state will remain just the way it is.

Whether protecting a fellow player or setting up a big play free of interference, Everybody Lives can have a huge impact for just a little cost. It is very likely to be added to a whole host of white decks in the near future.

RMS Titanic

Treasure is widely considered to be MTG’s best Artifact token type, fueling some of the speediest and most mana-intensive strategies in equal measure.

The RMS Titanic is an excellent new treasure generator that can provide a huge stockpile in a flash. With multiple evasion keywords, the RMS Titanic is almost guaranteed to get some damage in that can be converted into treasure. And with careful timing, the card can be boosted and swing without being blocked, netting you a giant hoard of Treasure to facilitate your most impactful plays.

The Ninth Doctor

Many Doctors in Universes Beyond: Doctor Who have weird and wonderful abilities. But the Ninth Doctor’s is perhaps the most offbeat.

Many powerful cards and effects, from Mechanised Production to Sanctum of All, trigger during the upkeep, and the Ninth Doctor allows you to double up on those triggers and speed your way to the endgame. With a low initial casting cost and Izzet colors, the Ninth Doctor will greatly benefit a number of new upkeep-focused strategies.

The Sixth Doctor

Historic spells are a particularly strong subtype within Magic: The Gathering. Legendary creatures have immensely powerful associated Commanders like Jodah the Unifier, and Sagas are finally picking up steam with back-to-back inclusions in Tales from Middle Earth, Wilds of Eldraine, and Universes Beyond: Doctor Who. But it’s Artifacts that are the cream of the crop when it comes to historic. Endlessly versatile and useful, Artifacts are among MTG’s most loved card types, and the Sixth Doctor copying them for free and ignoring the Legend Rule opens up a number of new Artifact strategies.
Green is not traditionally an artifact-supporting color, but there are more than enough Artifacts in Blue for the Sixth Doctor to boost alone, making him an incredibly potent new commander.

The Twelfth Doctor

The Twelfth Doctor breathes new life into an underused mechanic originating in Strixhaven. Demonstrate allows you to copy a spell when casting it, provided you also allow an opponent to copy the spell.

Demonstrate is an ability with a huge number of potential applications, and by granting it every turn, the Twelfth Doctor will quickly facilitate a very busy board, growing more powerful with counters all the while.

Doomsday Confluence

X-cost spells, while potent in the late-game, can often be underwhelming inclusions at any other point of play. As a result, their eventual payoff needs to be potent enough to justify that early lackluster performance. And Doomsday Confluence absolutely delivers in this regard.

With multiple potential effects to choose from, with enough black mana Doomsday Confluence can build up your board, destroy your opponents’ board presence, and send their hands right to the grave, effectively locking them out of the game in one fell swoop.

Nanogene Conversion

Echoing Doctor Who’s fan-favorite Empty Child episode, Nanogene Conversion temporarily has your creatures all become copies of a single creature of your choice. Whether that’s simply the biggest on your field or a creature with the most impactful ability is entirely up to you.

At four mana, Nanogene Conversion is both cheaper and potentially more powerful than similar spells like Masterful Replication. While that spell allowed for explosive, high-value artifact turns, Nanogene conversion instead foregrounds creature combos and powerful, game-ending swings.

Flatline

While MTG has many exceptional evasion effects to maximize the chances of dealing damage, sometimes your opponents’ creatures are simply too powerful. You could certainly play a boardwipe, but that can set back your game plan as much as theirs.

With Flatline, you don’t have to both with table-wide removal to get past your opponents’ biggest blockers. By reducing their power to 0 and their toughness to 1 for the turn, you can feel free to make a big swing without fear of trading off and losing your best attackers in the process.

River Song’s Diary

While the random casting factor may be enough to put off some players, the fact remains that River Song’s Diary is an exceptional value-builder.

Keeping your opponents from recurring their instants and sorceries is good enough on its own. But in a game with plenty of spellslinging, River Song’s Diary will be giving you a free spell every turn for very little initial investment.