The Third Doctor & Sarah Jane Smith

Commanders

The Third Doctor Sarah Jane Smith

This is a Bant historic token-tempo deck.

Sarah Jane Smith turns the first historic spell cast each turn into a Clue. The Third Doctor converts every noncreature token into +1/+1 and already creates a Clue, Food or Treasure when he enters.

The deck therefore turns the same resource into three different advantages:

1. Clues provide card advantage.
2. Food stabilises races.
3. Treasures accelerate important turns.
4. Every one of those tokens increases the Third Doctor's power.

This is not a generic historic deck with a small token package. Creating and preserving noncreature tokens is the central plan.

Why This Commander Pair?

The Fourteenth Doctor and Sarah Jane Smith offer a high ceiling, but require four colours and a substantial number of expensive Doctors to make the Fourteenth Doctor reliable. That creates both mana and card-quality costs.

The Fourth Doctor and Sarah Jane Smith are the closest alternative. That pairing is excellent at grinding through the top of the library, but it does not convert its resources into immediate pressure.

The Third Doctor is better suited to 21-life 1v1 games:

• He always generates a token when he resolves.
• He naturally has trample.
• Sarah supplies a repeatable stream of Clues.
• Recasting him creates another token rather than producing no immediate value.
• The opponent cannot safely ignore him for several turns.
• The deck can threaten both 20 normal damage and 21 commander damage.

The Fourth Doctor remains in the deck as a secondary historic and Food engine.

Deck Structure

The 100 cards contain:

• 2 commanders
• 36 lands
• 18 creatures, including the commanders
• 15 artifacts
• 9 enchantments
• 10 instants
• 12 sorceries
• 39 historic cards, including the commanders
• 37 historic cards in the 98-card library

Every nonland package serves at least one of four purposes:

1. Create or copy noncreature tokens.
2. Trigger Sarah Jane Smith.
3. protect or enable the Third Doctor.
4. Disrupt the opponent efficiently.

Primary Game Plan

The preferred development is:

• Turn one: Ponder, Preordain or suspend Search for Tomorrow.
• Turn two: Sarah Jane Smith or a mana artifact.
• Turn three: a historic spell, preferably one that also creates a token.
• Turn four: The Third Doctor with protection or an evasion plan available.

The best turn-three plays after Sarah are:

• Astrid Peth: Sarah creates a Clue and Astrid creates a Food.
• Martha Jones: Sarah and Martha each create a Clue.
• Rory Williams: Sarah investigates and Rory investigates before suspending himself.
• City of Death: Sarah creates a Clue and the first chapter creates a Treasure.
• The First Doctor: Sarah creates a Clue and the Doctor finds TARDIS.
• A cheap artifact followed by another development spell.

A particularly strong sequence is:

1. Turn two Sarah Jane Smith.
2. Turn three City of Death, producing a Clue and a Treasure.
3. City of Death copies one of those tokens on turn four.
4. Cast the Third Doctor, producing another Clue from Sarah and another token from his own ability.

The Third Doctor enters as a 7/7 with trample before any equipment or anthem effect.

Managing the Tokens

Clues are not merely cards waiting to be drawn. While the Third Doctor is present, every Clue is also +1/+1.

Do not sacrifice Clues automatically. Keep them when:

• the Third Doctor is threatening lethal damage;
• City of Death or Romana II can copy one;
• Five Hundred Year Diary can convert them into mana;
• Martha Jones may need one to provide unblockable;
• Astrid Peth can benefit from the sacrifice;
• Nyssa of Traken may convert several into cards and tapped blockers.

Sacrifice them when finding interaction or another land is more important than preserving the Third Doctor's current power.

The default token from the Third Doctor is normally a Clue. Choose:

• Treasure when the extra mana creates an immediate tempo advantage;
• Food when racing an aggressive opponent;
• Clue in neutral or attritional positions.

Token Engines

Sarah Jane Smith

Sarah is the most reliable engine because she begins in the command zone. The deck contains enough inexpensive historic cards to trigger her without filling the list with weak legendary creatures.

Her ability triggers only once each turn. When two sequencing options are otherwise equal, save a historic spell for the following turn rather than spending several after Sarah has already triggered.

Astrid Peth

Astrid creates Food when she enters and attacks. Sacrificing Clues or Food also allows her to explore, converting expendable resources into selection and permanent growth.

Martha Jones

Martha creates a Clue immediately. Sacrificing a Clue makes Martha and another creature unblockable, normally the Third Doctor.

Rory Williams

Casting Rory from the hand while Sarah is in play produces two Clues: one from Sarah and one from Rory. Rory later returns as a first strike, lifelink threat.

Duggan, Private Detective

Duggan investigates on entry and attack. His activated ability also gives the deck creature removal without requiring another spell.

The Fourth Doctor

The Fourth Doctor creates Food when a historic card is played from the top of the library and supplies a sustained source of card advantage.

City of Death

The first chapter creates a Treasure. The remaining chapters repeatedly copy a non-Saga token.

The usual targets are:

1. Clue
2. Treasure
3. Food
4. A valuable token created by Fractured Identity

Copying a Clue increases the Third Doctor's power immediately while preserving future card advantage.

Romana II

Romana copies a token that entered during the current turn. Sarah's Clue trigger provides a reliable target, although Romana can also copy Food, Treasure or a more valuable token.

Five Hundred Year Diary

The Diary turns a collection of Clues into a large amount of blue mana. This pays for Clue activations, commander tax, Traverse Eternity or multiple spells in one turn.

It enters tapped, so it should not be treated as immediate acceleration.

Commander Damage

The Third Doctor has trample, but the deck also contains several ways to bypass blockers completely:

• K-9, Mark I
• Martha Jones
• Bessie, the Doctor's Roadster
• Psychic Paper
• Sonic Screwdriver
• The Girl in the Fireplace
• Reverse the Polarity

The main power increases are:

• The Third Doctor's own token ability
• Sarah Jane Smith's Clues
• Hero's Blade
• Ace's Baseball Bat
• Day of Destiny
• Sublime Archangel
• Tegan Jovanka

Hero's Blade is especially efficient because it can attach to the Third Doctor automatically when he enters.

Sublime Archangel is not included as a generic large creature. It is a dedicated commander-damage finisher. When the Third Doctor attacks alone, every creature grants an additional exalted trigger.

Tegan Jovanka gives an attacking historic creature +1/+1 and indestructible, allowing the Third Doctor to attack into removal or a larger blocker.

Protection

The deck does not rely solely on recasting the Third Doctor.

• Lightning Greaves protects him and grants haste.
• K-9 gives other legendary creatures ward while untapped.
• Psychic Paper provides ward and unblockable.
• Heroic Intervention protects the entire board.
• Everybody Lives! stops damage, life loss, losing the game and most removal for the turn.
• Time Lord Regeneration converts the Doctor's death into another Time Lord.
• Tegan Jovanka gives indestructible during combat.
• Restoration Angel can blink the Third Doctor in response to removal while creating another token when he returns.
• Time Wipe returns the Third Doctor to hand before destroying the remaining creatures, avoiding commander tax.

Be careful with Everybody Lives!: its effects are symmetrical. It protects the opponent and prevents the opponent from losing during that turn.

Interaction

Cheap removal

• Swords to Plowshares
• Path to Exile
• Cyber Conversion
• Beast Within

These should normally be reserved for commanders, must-answer engines or creatures that prevent the Third Doctor from attacking profitably.

Permanent removal

• Grasp of Fate
• Banish to Another Universe
• Fractured Identity
• Angel of the Ruins

Fractured Identity is particularly strong in 1v1. Exiling an opposing nonland permanent gives this deck the token copy. If the copied permanent is not a creature, that token also increases the Third Doctor's power.

Angel of the Ruins is not merely seven-mana top-end. Plainscycling fixes the early mana, while the creature provides a historic threat and two-for-one removal in longer games.

The Pandorica

The Pandorica phases out an opposing nonland permanent and can remain tapped to keep it phased out.

This is especially effective against commanders because phasing does not change zones. The opponent cannot move the phased-out commander back to the command zone.

Trial of a Time Lord

In a two-player game, the final vote will normally be tied if the opponent votes for innocent. Treat Trial primarily as a tempo card that removes creatures for several turns, not as guaranteed permanent removal.

Against an opposing commander, its controller can move that commander to the command zone when the exile effect occurs, forcing an additional commander tax.

Sweepers and combat control

• Out of Time
• Flatline
• Time Wipe

Flatline can function as a one-sided combat trick or allow the Third Doctor to trample through an otherwise superior board.

Time Wipe is the preferred conventional sweeper because it can return the Third Doctor to hand first.

Other Important Synergies

Adric, Mathematical Genius

Adric can copy:

• Sarah Jane Smith's investigate trigger;
• the Third Doctor's token trigger;
• Astrid Peth's Food trigger;
• Martha Jones's investigate trigger;
• Duggan's investigate trigger;
• a City of Death chapter;
• an important activated ability.

Copying Sarah's trigger creates an additional Clue even though Sarah normally triggers only once each turn.

Adric can also sacrifice himself to counter a decisive activated or triggered ability.

Restoration Angel

The primary blink targets are:

• The Third Doctor
• Astrid Peth
• Martha Jones
• Duggan, Private Detective
• The First Doctor

Blinking the Third Doctor protects him and creates another noncreature token.

Flesh Duplicate

Flesh Duplicate is a two-mana answer to the best creature on the battlefield. It can also copy Astrid, Martha or Duggan to obtain another token-producing enters-the-battlefield ability.

It normally should not copy the Third Doctor because the legend rule would require one of them to be put into the graveyard, although doing so can occasionally be worthwhile simply to obtain another entry trigger.

An Unearthly Child

Each chapter finds a Doctor, a card with Doctor's companion or a Vehicle. The deck contains enough eligible cards for this to function as a three-card advantage engine rather than a narrow tribal card.

The First Doctor and TARDIS

The First Doctor searches for TARDIS from the library or graveyard. Both cards are historic and therefore produce Clues with Sarah.

TARDIS provides an evasive attacker and gives the next spell cascade after it attacks while a Time Lord is controlled.

The Eleventh Hour

The first chapter finds the First or Fourth Doctor. The second produces Food and a creature that helps cast Doctors. The final chapter copies the most useful creature on the battlefield.

Clockwork Droid

Clockwork Droid is included because the deck needs inexpensive historic plays. It triggers Sarah on curve, attacks as a 3/1 and can exert to become unblockable while improving the next draw with scry.

It is not present merely to increase the artifact count.

Mulligan Guide

A normal keep should contain:

• two or three lands;
• access to white for Sarah;
• access to blue and green by turn four;
• a cantrip, ramp spell or inexpensive historic card;
• preferably one piece of interaction.

Strong keeps include:

• turn-one cantrip into turn-two Sarah;
• Search for Tomorrow into Sarah or a turn-three Third Doctor;
• Sarah plus City of Death;
• Sarah plus Astrid, Martha or Rory;
• two lands plus a two-mana mana artifact and a functional follow-up.

Mulligan:

• one-land hands without Sol Ring and a credible sequence;
• hands containing only conditional or tapped lands;
• hands without white access;
• hands containing several four-to-seven-mana cards and no acceleration;
• hands with equipment but no development;
• reactive hands that cannot establish Sarah or another engine.

The deck should not keep a slow hand merely because it contains both commanders. They are already available from the command zone.

Mana Base

The deck uses 36 lands and only three colours.

The direct land sources provide approximately:

• 16 white sources
• 17 blue sources
• 15 green sources

Those figures do not include the additional access provided by:

• Skycloud Expanse
• Sungrass Prairie
• Ash Barrens
• Evolving Wilds
• Exotic Orchard
• Gallifrey Council Chamber

White is required early for Sarah and the efficient removal. Blue supports selection, card advantage and most of the evasion. Green supplies the Third Doctor and the land acceleration.

The deck deliberately does not use red or black. Neither colour contributes enough to this specific plan to justify making the first four turns less reliable.

Acceleration consists of:

• Sol Ring
• Arcane Signet
• Mind Stone
• Talisman of Curiosity
• Talisman of Progress
• Talisman of Unity
• Sonic Screwdriver
• Susan Foreman
• Search for Tomorrow
• Farseek
• Three Visits
• Growth Spiral
• Explore

The Clue activations and commander tax provide ample uses for excess mana, so 36 lands do not create the same flooding risk as they would in a deck without mana sinks.

Cards Deliberately Excluded

The Fourteenth Doctor package

The deck does not contain a large collection of expensive Doctors solely to improve a probabilistic commander trigger. The mana and card-quality costs are too high for this plan.

Displaced Dinosaurs

Displaced Dinosaurs turns historic permanents, including newly created Clue, Food and Treasure tokens, into creatures. Those tokens then stop counting as noncreature tokens for the Third Doctor.

It is individually powerful but pulls the deck toward a different strategy.

Gallifrey Stands and The Five Doctors

The list is not Doctor tribal. These cards require a larger, slower Doctor package and do not advance the primary token-tempo plan efficiently.

The Sixth Doctor

Copying historic spells has an excellent ceiling, but six mana without immediate protection is too slow for the baseline 1v1 list.

The Seventh Doctor

The Seventh Doctor cares about artifacts, but costs five mana and must attack before generating value. The Third Doctor applies pressure sooner and does not require winning a guessing game.

Alistair, the Brigadier

Alistair rewards creature tokens, while this deck is built around noncreature tokens. His activated ability is also too expensive for competitive 1v1.

Farewell

Farewell was considered but excluded. Six mana is slow, and exiling the deck's own artifacts, Clues and graveyard destroys too much of the engine.

Sally Sparrow

Sally is synergistic, but the four-mana slot is already crowded. She also requires other creatures to leave the battlefield before producing a Clue. The selected four-mana cards either generate resources immediately or threaten to end the game.

Weaknesses

Early aggression

The mana base contains several lands that may enter tapped, and the primary commander costs four. Cheap removal and Food should be prioritised against fast aggressive decks.

Repeated removal

The Third Doctor creates a token every time he resolves, but commander tax eventually becomes significant. Sarah, the Fourth Doctor, An Unearthly Child and the Clues allow the deck to continue playing without immediately recasting him.

Artifact destruction

Clues, mana artifacts, equipment and several engines are all vulnerable to artifact removal. Land-based ramp is retained so that the deck does not collapse after losing its mana rocks.

Stack-based combo

Doctor Who has limited efficient countermagic. Reverse the Polarity and Adric cover some decisive spells or abilities, but a fast combo that does not rely on permanents is a difficult matchup.

Colour development

The deck needs white early and both blue and green by turn four. Hands with filter lands but no independent coloured source should be evaluated particularly carefully.