Magic’s Universes Beyond Fallout Commander decks have been fully previewed, and in two weeks we’ll be able to get our hands on the decks or buy singles from the release. Today, I’m bringing you a set review for the new cards, though there are some excellent reprints too. I’ll offer my opinion on the Top 3 cards in each color and a few Honorable Mentions, as well as my favorite reprint. I’ll also rate the color based on the quality of the cards and the density of very good ones. Unfortunately, I’m not at all familiar with the Fallout video games, so I can’t judge these on flavor, but I do love me some awesome cards for my Commander decks. Buckle up, let’s roll!
White
Honorable Mentions
Favorite Reprint
Top 3
I’m loving Fallout bringing the return of energy cards in a big way, and Brotherhood Scribe does a lot of work in the 99 of any deck that cares about energy. It’s just two mana, the metalcraft condition should be easy to meet, and it also pumps your team if you need it for an alpha strike, or even on defense if you have an instant-speed way to add energy – which Brotherhood Scribe can do.
I really like how this card rewards aggressive lines of play, and how The Nuka-Cola Challenge’s trigger encourages diversifying your attacks on multiple opponents. You could have a small evasive creature attacking each of your opponents each combat to really rack up the quest counters and Food tokens, and then cash in the Food tokens for a huge smashing attack later on.
There are tons of Commander decks that focus on Auras or Equipment, and Codsworth, Handy Helper is an easy inclusion in the 99 of any of them that play white. It provides you mana to cast Auras or Equipment spells if you need it, or you can use it to move an Aura or Equipment between creatures you control. This is great to use post-combat to move the enhancement to a blocker after your attacker got to take advantage of it.
If that were all that Codsworth offers in addition to its awesome name, I’d still be loving it, but it even gives commanders you control ward 2! I expect to see a lot of this card.
Grade: B – White’s offerings are pretty deep, with some really fun and powerful cards.
Blue
Honorable Mentions
Favorite Reprint
Top 3
3. Curie, Emergent Intelligence
Curie’s activated ability is really neat, but keep in mind it’s basically a one-shot (unless of course Curie is your commander and ends up back in the command zone). I imagine you’d want to have something with indestructible you can copy, like Darksteel Juggernaut, to protect against non-exile removal. But even without ever using that ability, this is like a two-mana Scroll Thief, but instead of drawing just one card, it draws cards equal to its power. If Curie is your commander, then Blackblade Reforged is a must, but all sorts of Equipment will be awesome in this deck.
Vigilance is an excellent ability to have in a sizeable creature that will constantly grow in the right deck. Not only that, it also draws you a card each time one or more nonland cards are milled once per turn, no matter which player does the milling. The rad counters can trigger the milling, but you’re obviously going to want to include a lot of other ways to mill in your deck. If you’re leaning into a lot of radiation counters, proliferate can help keep that going.
1. Nerd Rage
First, what a great name, and this will be super-fun to say every time you cast it. But I really love the mini-quest built into this card, trying to have ten or more cards in hand when you attack with the creature this Aura enchants. Magic players love few things better than drawing cards, but often drawing cards doesn’t really help end the game; Nerd Rage helps you with that!
Grade: C – Blue’s range of noteworthy cards is thin, though there are a handful that look quite fun.
Black
Honorable Mentions
Favorite Reprint
Top 3
3. V.A.T.S.
I’m stoked at the return of split second in Fallout, and both of the spells have a strong reason for the mechanic. V.A.T.S. offers up an uncounterable removal spell that can also sometimes kill off multiple threats and is particularly well suited to clean up a huge army of token creatures.
This will be an awesome high-end card for any radiation decks, generating a decent number of 2/2 black Zombie Mutant tokens from Chapter II, and then growing your Zombie or Mutant creatures by two +1/+1 counters from Chapter III. If you’ve got a way to proliferate the same turn you cast this, you can maximize your token production!
Another awesome card for radiation decks, the Scorchbeast gets the nod for first place since you can take advantage of the rad counter mill during the next player’s precombat main phase, hopefully generating at least one 2/2 Zombie Mutant token. Oh, and it also is a 5/5 beater with flying and menace. Altar of Dementia would be some big game in this deck.
Grade: B – Black’s cards are a bit narrow overall, but I think they’re pretty cool.
Red
Honorable Mentions
Favorite Reprint
Top 3
I’m a huge fan of extra attack steps, and I really like how this effect is attached to an Aura that you will generally cast after your initial attack. The morbid discount is quite nice too, since odds are pretty good that a creature will have died in combat. Keep in mind that you untap all your creatures when it enters the battlefield, not just what attacked, so any creatures with activated abilities can get extra activations. Fans of Ghen, Arcanum Weaver are bound to be stoked by Grim Reaper’s Sprint!
Every time I look at this card, my brain tells me it’s called “Megatron’s Fate.” I love this card’s flexibility, and each effect is solid for the six-mana investment – either you destroy the biggest artifact threat on the table and get two-thirds of the mana you invested back in Treasure tokens, or you very likely kill all creatures on the battlefield (outside of Brash Taunter, at least) and each player gets four rad counters, which may or may not be of interest to your deck.
This card is high on the fun scale, especially if the instant or sorcery cards that are exiled represent a vast difference in power and game effect. Maybe you get to draw cards from a Harmonize, or maybe you sweep the battlefield with a Wrath of God, or maybe you get to spin the Wheel of Misfortune. This is the sort of card that will lead to memorable games, and I’m here for it.
Grade: C – Red’s card quality seems a bit shallow and narrow, but there are a handful that I really like.
Green
Honorable Mentions
Favorite Reprint
Top 3
3. Strong Back
A powerful card for Voltron strategies. It’ll be pretty easy to cast Strong Back and then equip the creature with a bunch of Equipment all in one fell swoop. The flavor is hilarious too; even though I don’t know anything about the Fallout game specifically, I do know RPGs where characters often end up carrying a lot more than they should realistically be able to.
I’m looking forward to slotting Bighorner Rancher right into my Grothama, All-Devouring deck because tapping this for ten green mana sounds amazing! But really, just about any green deck will have big creatures, so this card will be an excellent source of extra mana, and since it has vigilance, you can even attack with it first if you need to. And in the face of a battlefield sweeper, you can sacrifice Bighorner Rancher to gain some life.
1. Strong, the Brutish Thespian
Any Commander card that makes me think of an old, forgotten card like Cyclone is A+ in my book! Wizards of the Coast (WotC) has been pushing a lot of excellent “bite” cards lately, such as Archdruid’s Charm and Ram Through, but Strong wants you to get back to basics with spells that fight, such as Tail Swipe and Primal Might. Strong will grow quickly, but it needs some evasion to push damage through; thankfully, green has a ton of ways to gain trample such as Rancor.
Oh, and if you’re playing a radiation strategy, Strong turns that life loss into lifegain as a bonus!
Grade: A – Green has a bunch of cool new cards for Commander, and quite a few could have easily made the Top 3 list. And the reprints are fantastic!
Multicolor
Honorable Mentions
Favorite Reprint
Top 3
Another cool card you can use your energy for, Rex, Cyber-Hound gives me vibes from one of my all-time favorite cards: Necrotic Ooze! I love the idea of building a strange combination of activated abilities depending on what your opponents are playing with, along with your own creatures that might end up in the graveyard.
I love value attached to a creature, and when it’s attached to a 6/6 with menace and trample, I love it even more. You get the trigger when it enters the battlefield, and with black, there will be many ways to bring it back from the graveyard when it dies to do it all over again, even if you don’t make it monstrous. Note that this destroys any permanent, so if you need to get rid of that Gaea’s Cradle your opponent has been abusing, Alpha Deathclaw has your back.
Battlefield sweepers are often needed to reset the game in the face of one player exploding onto the battlefield, but they can be a bit of a bummer when everyone needs to rebuild. That’s why I love The Nipton Lottery, which staples a fun mini-game onto the effect. “Choose a creature at random that survives, and you get to attack with it” is a wild effect that will lead to some amazing and memorable plays.
Grade: A – Tons and tons of fantastic cards for your Commander decks make for an excellent grade.
Artifact, Land, Colorless
Honorable Mentions
Favorite Reprint
Top 3
Behemoth of Vault 0 is an excellent artifact creature of an impressive size that plays awesomely with energy strategies, but even if you don’t have any other energy cards in the deck, this can still give you value when it dies. I’m just thinking of this with Goblin Welder!
2. HELIOS One
HELIOS One can slot into any energy deck and plays particularly well when you’ve got ways to recur your lands. Space lasers go boom!
1. Pip-Boy 3000
You know I’m a sucker for inexpensive Equipment cards, and Pip-Boy 3000 is incredibly flexible with all three modes being excellent. It’s awesome that it’s an attack trigger so that you don’t have to deal combat damage to an opponent to get the benefit. You can choose to loot a card, grow the equipped creature with a +1/+1 counter, or untap two lands (which basically pays for the equip cost). If you get multiple attacks, you get even more triggers!
Grade: B – A lot of fun cards, plus some excellent reprints, gives this a solid grade.
Another excellent Universes Beyond offering for Commander fans, Fallout Commander provides fun themed decks or tons of singles for your existing decks, including a lot of much-needed reprints. Which cards would be in your own Top 3 lists?
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And lastly, I just want to say: let us love each other and stay healthy and happy.
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