Fallout Commander precon decks and singles are out there in the wild now, so what are you looking to build decks with? Checking out EDHREC for the new commanders from the set – a whopping 52! – we’ve got Mr. House, President and CEO at #1 for new decks running away, with The Wise Mothman at #2 with just over half as many decks. I totally understand it – I’ve got a stack of cards set aside for my own Mr. House deck, since I absolutely love rolling dice in my games.
You’ve got to go all the way to #7 to get to the deck I want to dive into today: Three Dog, Galaxy News DJ!
As I mentioned before, I’m not at all familiar with the video game series Fallout, so I don’t know the character this card represents, but being an old man, I can’t help to think about the awesome classic rock band Three Dog Night. You’ve probably heard their songs “Joy to the World” and “Black and White.” I’m especially partial to “Eli’s Coming” and “Out in the Country.”
The band’s name comes from their interpretation of an Aboriginal Australian expression where cold nights were measured by degrees depending on how many of your outback dogs you needed to sleep with for warmth, so a “three dog night” is really, really cold. I suppose the band thought that expression was hilarious and ran with it (though the fact the band had three lead singers might have been part of it too).
Anyway, I think the card Three Dog is really neat, a cool spin on Auras matter themes that have been quite popular in Commander in recent years. Let’s walk through what the card does.
Breaking Down Three Dog
Three Dog has a trigger when you attack, rather than when Three Dog attacks, so you can potentially use it the same turn as you cast Three Dog, assuming you’ve also been able to enchant Three Dog with an Aura you can sacrifice. The trigger costs just two mana and you need to sacrifice an Aura attached to Three Dog; when you do, for each other attacking creature you control, you create a token that’s a copy of that Aura attached to that creature.
The effectiveness of the ability scales with the number of creatures you’re attacking with besides your commander, so you don’t necessarily want to cast Three Dog early on. Instead, you’ll want to build your battlefield presence with creatures you want to attack with; either aggressive, hard-to-block creature cards, or a bunch of otherwise disposable creature tokens. Since Three Dog is creating token Auras, and white has some nice token support cards, I’d likely lean heavily on going wide with token creatures.
I’d also lean heavily on Auras that let you draw a card when they enter the battlefield, which will translate into a lot of extra cards when you sacrifice one to Three Dog and copy it for each other attacking creature. “Enchantress”-style cards that care about enchantments entering the battlefield will obviously get turbocharged by Three Dog’s trigger.
All right, let’s take a look at the jams that the Galaxy News DJ might spin up for his deck!
Buff Auras
Copying All That Glitters for your attackers, and then the next turn copying Daybreak Coronet will smash life totals brutally. I like Cartouche of Solidarity due to the token creature it makes when it enters the battlefield.
The Role Auras from cards like Witch’s Mark and Spellbook Vendor are nifty. You can put one on Three Dog and then copy it onto your other attackers. Just remember that a creature can only have one Role at a time.
Definitely don’t sleep on Griffin Guide, which provides a sizeable buff to your creature and gives it flying, and if enchanted creature dies, you get a 2/2 Griffin creature token with flying to keep the party going.
Utility Auras
I’ve got a lot of card-drawing Auras in this batch and will fill out most of my Aura stable with these solid gold hits, with Sage’s Reverie at the top of the charts. The Auras with umbra armor, like Felidar Umbra, do double-duty by protecting Three Dog from destroy effects before you get a chance to sacrifice one when you attack. Similarly, Shielded by Faith can make Three Dog indestructible long enough to sacrifice it to make all your other attackers indestructible; if Three Dog dies and you cast it again, you can move one of those copies onto Three Dog to keep up the protection.
Spell-Like Auras
Grim Reaper’s Sprint does a nice impression of Relentless Assault in Aura form, while Chains of Custody and Faith Unbroken give you some temporary control over nonland permanents or creatures. Galvanic Arc has new Oracle wording that makes it a true Lightning Bolt — three damage to any target.
Gift of Immortality can help protect Three Dog from destroy effects, but once you sacrifice it to make copies for your other attackers, the copies obviously will not return from the graveyard if one of the other creatures dies, but will still save it from immediate death.
Auras That Come Back
I thought having a couple of Auras that come back from the graveyard would be excellent to sacrifice to Three Dog; you’ll make copies, and you get the original back to recast. Spirit Loop in particular is a nice one for this—note that it doesn’t grant lifelink, it just has an ability that functions a lot like lifelink, but multiple copies can stack.
Auras Matter
There’s a ton of Aura support out there these days, particularly in white, and I’ve pulled the best of them here. Codsworth, Handy Helper is a sweet new card from Fallout that can move a copy Aura back on Three Dog to do “the thing” over again. Also, how sweet is Inventory Management, also from Fallout, capable of moving your Auras (and Equipment) around at instant speed? With split second, opponents can’t mess with your plans until the spell resolves.
I’m excited to have a fun home for Liberated Livestock, an excellent way to buffer against battlefield sweepers by making three token creatures and getting back three Auras from your graveyard or your hand.
Enchantments Matter
White has a bunch of support cards for enchantments more broadly that we can certainly fill out our decklist with, especially ones that create token creatures like Archon of Sun’s Grace and Sigil of the Empty Throne. Starfield Mystic often doesn’t make the cut when brewing other enchantment decks, but the fact that Three Dog sacrifices an Aura to the trigger means I can expect those +1/+1 counters to start adding up.
Since the Aura copies are both tokens and enchantments, it might be worth taking a look at bargain cards like Realm-Scorcher Hellkite. Getting back four of the six mana to used to cast it can be quite useful, even if it’s just dealing one damage to any target twice.
Tokens Matter
Three Dog’s ability makes copy tokens of Auras, and you want to play token creatures to go wide, so Mondrak, Glory Dominus and Anointed Procession are excellent inclusions if you have them. Bennie Bracks, Zoologist also rewards you by drawing a card once per turn when you create a token; Bennie was recently reprinted in Murders at Karlov Manor Commander, and the price for that is considerably cheaper than the New Capenna Commander first printing. If you need one, now is an excellent time to snag it!
Graveyard Recursion
Inevitably there’ll be a battlefield sweeper that destroys all of your creatures, and that will include all your lovely Auras, so I’d want ways to recoup that loss. Mantle of the Ancients is ideal because it itself is an Aura that lets you bring back all of the Auras in the graveyard, which is incredible for just five mana. I’m also thinking Gerrard’s Hourglass Pendant might be an interesting card to consider as a way to bring your stuff back for five total mana at instant speed.
Go Wide
There are many options for making token creatures, and I’d definitely find room for a fair number of these. I’ve been looking for a place to run Rabble Rousing, and this seems perfect. Grand Crescendo is awesome as an instant-speed way to create token creatures and also give your team indestructible for the turn.
Protect Three Dog
Once Three Dog gets cooking, your opponents will want to put a stop to the shenanigans, so having a few ways to protect the DJ is likely a good idea. I’m a huge fan of Boromir, Warden of the Tower and would definitely find a home for it here, especially since it hoses all sorts of powerful effects that cast spells for no mana while it’s on the battlefield.
Eldrazi Monument is a classic, and if you’re planning on running a bunch of ways to make tokens, it’s easy to pay the upkeep cost while also giving your attacking creatures flying. I also like to have a couple of instant-speed ways to interact to keep people honest, like Boros Charm or Loran’s Escape.
What tunes are you looking to spin with Three Dog, Galaxy News DJ that I might have overlooked? Which new legend from Fallout do you find the coolest?
Talk to Me
Do me a solid and follow me on Twitter! I run polls and start conversations about Commander all the time, so get in on the fun! You can also find my LinkTree on my profile page there with links to all my content.
I’d also love it if you followed my Twitch channel TheCompleteCommander, where I do Commander, Brawl, and sometimes other Magic-related streams when I can. If you can’t join me live, the videos are available on demand for a few weeks on Twitch, but I also upload them to my YouTube channel. You can also find the lists for my paper decks over on Archidekt if you want to dig into how I put together my own decks and brews.
And lastly, I just want to say: let us love each other and stay healthy and happy.
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