Doctor Who

Doctor Who
Set Information
Set symbol
Symbol description	The TARDIS
Design	Gavin Verhey (lead), Chris Mooney, Carmen Klomparens, Trick Jarrett, Elizabeth Rice, Jess Dunks
Release date	October 13, 2023
Themes and mechanics	Planechase cards
Keywords/​ability words	Cascade, Doctor's Companion, Historic, Paradox, Saga, Suspend, Time travel, Time counter, Vanishing, Villainous choice
Set size	4 decks of 100 cards (189 new cards)
Expansion code	WHO[1]
Universes Beyond
The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-Earth Doctor Who Jurassic World
Magic: The Gathering Chronology
Alchemy: Eldraine Doctor Who Lord of the Rings Holiday Release

Doctor Who (initially referred to as the "Doctor Who Commander Product"^[2]) is a product in the Magic: The Gathering Universes Beyond series released by Wizards of the Coast. Doctor Who was released on October 13, 2023.^[3][4][5]

Set details[ | ]

This is a cross-over product based on the British BBC science-fiction television series Doctor Who.^[6]

Storyline[ | ]

This article or section discusses story elements that are not canonical. The story discussed here is based on another IP than Magic: The Gathering. It has no bearing on Magic continuity.

"The Doctor" is a traveler of space and time who journeys in the TARDIS (Time and Relative Dimensions in Space), a time-travel machine that travels by materializing in and out of the Time Vortex and is bigger on the inside. Due to a malfunction, the outer appearance of the Doctor's TARDIS remains fixed as a blue British police box. Although the Doctor has occasional stints of solo travels, they much prefer the company of at least one companion, if not more, on these adventures; these companions are most often humans contemporary to the period in which the series is currently airing, owing to the Doctor's fascination with the planet Earth. However, a few have been aliens or native to past and future eras.

The Doctor's exact origins are subject to timelines being overwritten, so while their origins are often consistent in that they are a renegade Time Lord who stole the TARDIS from Gallifrey, this is certainly not their only origin. In the timelines in which the Doctor is of Gallifreyan biology, they are millennia old given their ability to regenerate into a new incarnation when mortally injured, a process that variably changes their appearance, gender, and even personality traits. The Doctor's various incarnations have gained numerous recurring enemies during their travels, including the Daleks and their generally accepted creator Davros; the Cybermen, a form of cybernetically "upgraded" humans who have been stripped of their humanity; and their fellow renegade Time Lord "The Master", the Moriarty to the Doctor's Sherlock Holmes. The Doctor's real name is generally accepted to be unknown to the audience; there have been a select few times where it has potentially been revealed, however oft disregarded even by the Doctor themselves.

Marketing[ | ]

Magic meets the TARDIS with four Commander decks, special card treatments, Collector Boosters, and Secret Lairs.^[7] This collaboration has flavor and fun for fans of every Doctor from across 60 years of Doctor Who stories.^[5] The four 100-card decks contain 189 new cards in total.^[8] The Display commanders are #192-195. All reprints feature new Doctor Who themed art (#196-331).

Doctor Who was the first Commander deck release to include Collector Boosters. The boosters feature all alternate art showcase versions of the cards in the decks (no new cards). Extended art cards are #332-534. Thirty cards have a TARDIS-inspired card frame and comic book art style, and are numbered #535-564.^[9] The Collector Boosters also feature surge foil versions of the described treatments (#606-1165). These were not printed in French and German language versions.^[10] The release card is #565.

To represent the space- and time-traveling nature of the Doctor, each Commander deck also features 10 new Planechase cards.^[5][8] The planar cards are numbered #566-605.

Two Doctor Who themed Secret Lairs were released on October 2, 2023. A third drop will be released later.

Serialized Doctors[ | ]

Serialized versions of the Doctors may appear in Collector Boosters. The serialized total ranges from 501 to 513 matching each specific Doctor.^[9]

Events[ | ]

• Launch Party: October 13 – 15, 2023

Promotional cards[ | ]

• Release card: foil Past in Flames

Tokens and markers[ | ]

Doctor Who has 31 tokens and one overlay card.^[11][12][13]

1. Copy, for Caught in a Parallel Universe; City of Death; Fractured Identity; Human-Time Lord Meta-Crisis; Hunted by The Family; Quantum Misalignment; Romana II; The Eleventh Hour; The Master, Gallifrey's End; The Sixth Doctor and Wedding Ring.
2. 2/2 Alien creature for Adipose Offspring; New New York and North Pole Research Base.
3. 4/4 Alien Rhino creature for Fugitive of the Judoon.
4. 2/2 Horse creature with "Doctors you control have horsemanship" for The Girl in the Fireplace.
5. 1/1 Human creature with "Doctor spells you cast cost less to cast." for The Eleventh Hour.
6. 1/1 Human creature with ward for Fugitive of the Judoon.
7. 1/1 Human Noble creature with vanishing 3 and "Prevent all damage that would be dealt to this creature." for The Girl in the Fireplace.
8. 1/1 Soldier creature for Alistair, the Brigadier; Kate Stewart and UNIT Headquarters.
9. 1/1 Warrior creature for The Cave of Skulls and The War Games.
10. 1/1 Fish creature for Frost Fair Lure Fish.
11. 2/2 Alien Angel artifact creature with first strike, vigilance and "Whenever an opponent cast a creature spell, this permanent isn't a creature until end of turn." for Aplan Mortarium and Blink.
12. 3/3 Dalek artifact creature with menace for City of the Daleks; Cult of Skaro; Dalek Intensive Care; Davros, Dalek Creator; Doomsday Confluence; Gardens of Tranquil Repose; Genesis of the Daleks and The Dalek Emperor.
13. 2/2 Human Rogue creature for Spectrox Mines.
14. 2/2 Alien Warrior creature for Iraxxa, Empress of Mars.
15. Mark of the Rani, an Aura enchantment with "Enchant creature" and "Enchanted creature gets +2/+2 and is goaded." for The Rani.
16. 2/2 Alien Salamander creature with islandwalk for The Sea Devils.
17. 3/3 Beast creature for Beast Within.
18. 3/3 Mutant creature with deathtouch for The Curse of Fenric.
19. 1/1 Alien Insect creature with flying for Vrestin, Menoptra Leader.
20. 2/2 Dinosaur creature with flying and haste for Dinosaurs on a Spaceship.
21. Clue artifact (Krynoid pod) for Antarctic Research Base; Duggan, Private Detective; Sarah Jane Smith; The Seventh Doctor and The Third Doctor.
22. Clue artifact (Hypercube) for Martha Jones; Rory Williams and Sally Sparrow.
23. Clue artifact (Biodata module) for Blink; Fugitive of the Judoon; Heaven Sent; Madame Vastra; Osgood, Operation Double; The Dining Car; The Fugitive Doctor; The Rani and Thijarian Witness.
24. 2/2 Cyberman artifact creature overlay card for Cyber Conversion; Cybership; Death in Heaven; Missy; Mondassian Colony Ship; The Cyber-Controller and The Moonbase.
25. Food artifact (Jelly Babies) for Spectrox Mines; The Fourth Doctor and The Third Doctor.
26. Food artifact (Fish fingers and custard) for Astrid Peth and The Eleventh Hour.
27. Food artifact (Cheese and pickle sandwich) for Graham O'Brien; Madame Vastra and The Dining Car.
28. Treasure artifact (Romana) for City of Death; Spectrox Mines and The Third Doctor.
29. Treasure artifact (Firestone) for New New York and RMS Titanic.
30. Treasure artifact (TARDIS key) for Frost Fair Lure Fish; Kerblam! Warehouse and North Pole Research Base.
31. Treasure artifact (The Master's ring) for The Matrix of Time.
32. Osgood, Operation Double, a 2/2 Human Alien Shapeshifter creature with ": Add . Spend this mana only to cast an artifact spell or activate an ability of an artifact.", "Paradox - Whenever you cast a spell from anywhere other than your hand, investigate." and "(This token's mana cost is .)", for Osgood, Operation Double.

Themes and mechanics[ | ]

Doctor's Companion is a Partner variant which allows you to have two Commanders if one of them is the Doctor.^[8][14]

The Timey-Wimey deck is built around time counters. To this end, it features three core mechanics: Suspend and Vanishing, two returning mechanics that utilize time counters, and Time travel, a new mechanic that allows one to manipulate the time counters on their cards.^[11][15]

The Paradox Power deck focuses on the new Paradox ability word, which provides an effect whenever you cast a spell from anywhere but your hand.

The Masters of Evil deck introduces Villainous choice, a new mechanic which offers a modal effect targeted at the player's opponents. Both options offer unfortunate outcomes, but they get to choose which one befalls them. This deck also features an artifact creature subtheme.

The Blast from the Past deck is structured around artifact tokens (particularly Food, Clue, and Treasure tokens) and the returning Historic mechanic.

Sagas play a significant role, as each of the 15 Doctors (the first 13 main Doctors followed by the TV series plus the War Doctor and the Fugitive Doctor) and 4 villain cards have an associated saga representing an iconic episode of their run.^[8]

Since all four of these preconstructed decks include additional Planechase decks, the Planechase-exclusive mechanics Planeswalk and Chaos ensues also make a return. They also appear as an added bonus on regular cards.^[16]

The set also sees the return of Afflict, Affinity (for Daleks), Battalion, Battle cry, Basic landcycling, Boast, Cascade, Casualty, Conspire, Convoke, Emerge, Escape, Exert, Explore, Flashback, Foretell, Goad, Horsemanship, Imprint, Investigate, Islandwalk, Jump-start, Mentor, Morbid, Myriad, Partner with, Read ahead, Rebound, Retrace, Secret council, Shadow, Skulk, Soulbond, Storm, and Vote. Replicate is featured with the specific cost of tapping a Dalek.

The set makes extensive use of Flavor words.

Card types[ | ]

This set introduces the Doctor creature type, used for cards that depict the many versions of "The Doctor". Every Doctor is two-color, while every Doctor's Companion is mono-color.^[17] Companions usually have the Human type. The Doctor always additionally has the creature type Time Lord (which uniquely consists of two words without a hyphen). The Doctor's core color identity is blue and most Doctor cards are a combination of blue and a second color, aside from the two 'anomalous' Doctors (the War Doctor and the Fugitive Doctor), who are each a combination of two non-blue colors.

The set also introduces the Dalek and Cyberman creature types for the Doctor's main antagonists. Creatures in the graveyard may be returned as face down 2/2 Cyberman artifact creature (i.e. similar to a morphed creature) . To indicate this, a Cyberman overlay card is provided. Furthermore, the set adds the Detective creature type.

After formally being introduced in Unfinity, the Alien type is also featured in this set, and the formerly acorn Scientist creature type becomes eternal.

Counter types[ | ]

Doctor Who introduces Shadow counters, which grant creatures Shadow, Eruption counters, and Takeover counters. The Time travel mechanic makes use of Time counters.

Plane types[ | ]

Doctor Who introduces the following non-canon Plane types:^[11]

Cycles[ | ]

Pairs[ | ]

Mirrored pair		Description
Alistair, the Brigadier ()	Kate Stewart ()	Two rare Legendary creatures that cost four mana of three colors, have an ability that creates 1/1 Soldier creature tokens, and an attack trigger that costs and cares about a theme of their respective decks (Historic and Time counters). They represent the leaders of the militaristic UNIT organization, Alistair Lethbridge-Stewart and later his daughter Kate Stewart.
Sonic Screwdriver	Laser Screwdriver	Two artifacts that cost and have four abilities — one that produces mana and three that cost , , and respectively. They represent the iconic tool of The Doctor and the tool of his/her antithesis The Master.

Preconstructed decks[ | ]

These immersive Commander decks feature Doctors, companions, villains, and locations from the series.^[3] These decks are so full of references, you'd think they are bigger on the inside.

Theme deck name	Color Identity					Commander
Blast from the Past	W	U			G	The Fourth Doctor & Sarah Jane Smith
Timey-Wimey	W	U		R		The Tenth Doctor & Rose Tyler
Masters of Evil		U	B	R		Davros, Dalek Creator
Paradox Power		U		R	G	The Thirteenth Doctor & Yasmin Khan

Trivia[ | ]

• Blink is the first Saga to have its chapters progress in a non-linear order. I and III both use the Saga's first ability while II and IV use the second. This represents the fact that the episode "Blink"'s protagonist Sally Sparrow meets the Doctor out of chronological order.
• The Night of the Doctor is the first Saga to only have 2 chapters. This is because it represents a mini-episode.
• The use of creature types for characters from alien species externally identical to humans is inconsistent. Nyssa of Traken, Adric, Mathematical Genius and Astrid Peth are typed as Humans, while Vislor Turlough lacks a species-related type and Davros, Dalek Creator (whose grotesque appearance is the result of his war injuries, not his Kaled species) is typed as an Alien.
• The card Karvanista, Loyal Lupari has an error in its name, as "Lupari" is the plural of "Lupar".
• The tokens created by The Sea Devils are Alien Salamanders although Sea Devils are native to the planet Earth and closely related to Silurians such as Madame Vastra, who does not have the Alien type.
• The surge foil Osgood, Operation Double is the only surge foil to feature alternate art from its original. However, it shares its art with the Osgood token.

External links[ | ]

• Doctor Who wiki
• Official product page.
• WPN product page.
• The BIG Doctor Who Commander Reveal! New Cards, Art, Deck Themes, & More! (Video). Good Morning Magic. YouTube (July 21, 2023).
• Jubilee Finnegan (July 21, 2023). "Catch Up with the Magic: The Gathering - Doctor Who San Diego Comic-Con Reveals". magicthegathering.com. Wizards of the Coast.
• Jubilee Finnegan (July 28, 2023). "A First Look at Magic: The Gathering - Doctor Who". magicthegathering.com. Wizards of the Coast.
• Tom Marks (October 2, 2023). "Exclusive: See Doctor Who's Iconic Blink Episode and More as Magic: The Gathering Cards". IGN.com.
• CompleteIndie's Every Reference In Magic's Doctor Who Cards.

References[ | ]