As we found out last year, Magic: The Gathering is getting a crossover with the classic British sci-fi show Doctor Who. Featuring characters and creatures from across the TV show’s 60-year history, MTG Doctor Who packs in tons of references to both classic and NuWho, giving a whole lot of famous faces and alien races the Magic card treatment.
This is the second major MTG Universes Beyond crossover release of the year, with the even larger MTG Lord of the Rings set released a season before. But MTG Doctor Who is actually more akin to the MTG Warhammer 40k deck releases that came out last year, with Commander decks and Secret Lairs, but no standalone set accompanying them.
We don’t need time travel to see MTG Doctor Who spoilers – they’re currently underway, so be sure to check back regularly.
MTG Doctor Who release date
We now know just when in time and space the MTG Doctor Who decks will be arriving. MTG Doctor Who is confirmed to release on October 13. It’s therefore scheduled to release a little before The Lost Caverns of Ixalan, the final MTG set of the year.
The release is also quite timely, as it comes just a little before Russell T Davies’ Doctor Who specials, which air November 2023.
MTG Doctor Who decks
A mixture of reprints with a Doctor Who theme and brand new Doctor Who cards are expected for the MTG Doctor Who crossover. Wizards has four Commander decks planned, and promises to fill them with “doctors, companions, villains, locations and more” from the show’s entire history. There’ll also be collector boosters, containing special treatment versions of these cards, and MTG Secret Lairs too.
We had a suspicion that there might be multiple decks representing the heroes, and that the Doctor Who villains (who don’t typically play nice) might be bunded up in one deck. For the last big crossover, it was fairly straightforward, there was one deck each for four of the Warhammer 40k factions – but many of Doctor Who’s most famous baddies are standalone.
What do you know, it seems we were exactly right, as the four MTG Doctor Who decks are as follows:
| Name | Color | Features | Commander | Theme |
| Blast From the Past | Green, White, Blue | First 8 Doctors | 4th Doctor and Sarah Jane Smith | Historic/Tokens |
| Timey Wimey | Red, White, Blue | Doctors 9, 10, 11 | 10th Doctor and Rose | Time Counters |
| Masters of Evil | Red, Blue, Black | Monsters and Villains | Davros | Villainous Choices |
| Paradox Power | Red, Blue, Green | Doctors 12, and 13 | 13th Doctor and Yaz | Playing from Exile |
These decks will feature a new mechanic, Doctor’s Companion. A derivative of Partner, this lets you have a second commander, provided one is a Doctor, and the other is a Doctor’s Companion. For instance, in Timey Wimey, the Doctor is red/blue, and Rose is white. This will allow for lots of fun combinations.
MTG Doctor Who cards
On the first day of MTG Doctor Who spoiler seasons, Wizards of the Coast gave to us, a pair of cards themed around the infamous Blink episode, that had all of us afraid to take our eyes off the screen in 2007. There’s Blink, which removes creatures for clues, and makes angel tokens, and Don’t Blink, a hate card for creatures entering the battlefield from exile (i.e. blink strategies!).
The actual Weeping Angel monster was previewed a while ago. It’s a sneaky fella, a first striker with worse than deathtouch – it shuffles creatures it hits back into their library. It’s not so good on the defence though, becoming an inanimate statue if a creature was played that turn.
We’ve now seen every MTG Doctor card, as well as a load of companions. We’d already glimpsed a fair few Doctor Who cards already, including every face MTG Doctor Who commander. From Rose Tyler, to River Song, you can find the full range of spoiler cards from Barcelona MagicCon below:
Before this latest batch of Doctor Who spoilers, we were shown the Dalek’s iconic Exterminate spell, The Tenth Doctor, and the Tardis. We also got to see saga card, The Parting of the Ways. This is one example of the many sagas in the set, each one representing an iconic episode. Apparently each Doctor gets one, and there are 16 in total (one per Doctor, plus the Fugitive and War Doctors).
Planechase is making another return to EDH, to represent the Doctor and companions’ journey through time and space. Planechase cards include the Tomb of the Doctor, and Bad Wolf Bay. The four below are each from different decks:
We’ve also seen a cycle of MTG land cards featuring the TARDIS. A reprint of the blue-white card Fractured Identity featuring the fourth doctor has also been revealed.
As for new cards, along with Davros, we’ve seen artwork for cards named Gallifrey Stands, The Fugitive Doctor, and The Eleventh Doctor. That’s a lot of time lord content – as you’d expect given the large number of Doctor decks.
Finally there’s The Lux Foundation Library for Planechase. Fans of this EDH feature are spoiled for choice this year, since March of the Machine also featured the fun but chaotic Planechase game mode.
For more Magic: The Gathering news don’t miss our MTG 2023 release schedule for the few remaining sets of 2023, or check out next year’s MTG release schedule, for all the 2024 news and dates currently released. Perhaps you plan to jump to a particular release day in your TARDIS.
Source: Wargamer
