Fallout is the newest Universes Beyond set, and it releases with four new Commander decks. Science! Is the Jeskai artifacts precon that focuses on the Energy mechanic. Energy was last supported in Kaladesh block, so how does the mechanic shape up with a dedicated Commander and new cards?
Science! New Fallout Commanders
The face Commander of Science! is Dr. Madison Li, a scientist residing in Rivet City in Fallout 3. She was a pioneer in Project Purity, and managed to grow radiation free produce through her efforts, which is a huge achievement. Is she similarly prolific in Magic?
In short, yeah, she’s a pretty solid Commander. Her abilities don’t cost mana, but energy, and you can accumulate energy through playing the game. You can choose when to spend it, and how much, and in many ways the extra value accrued is similar to landfall decks – just much more flexible. For starters, she generates plenty of energy herself, and her abilities are all relevant, with a zero-mana reanimation ability icing the energy cake very nicely.
We’ll be running Dr. Madison Li as the Commander for our upgraded deck.
Liberty Prime is the huge mecha that the Brotherhood of Steel consulted Dr. Madison Li to help restore. She resolved its energy issues, and the Brotherhoood were able to utilize it to great effect in the Wasteland. It comes in swinging for five mana, but it costs energy to keep it online. That would be fine, except for the fact you have to sacrifice it if you don’t pay the energy cost. That is a bit steep for me in the command zone, with other aggro options being better. Shorikai, for instance. Damn, Shorikai is strong.
PRECON REVIEW: SUPERCHARGED
Science! Is a love letter to Fallout 3 (and also Fallout 4). It contains so many iconic characters and moments from the games, it’s a sure fire hit for any fan of those games.
While it does have a bunch of energy synergy focused cards, it also has other tech too. James is great for Clues decks, while Nerd Rage is both hilarious and a real beating.
Out of the box, the deck runs quite well, with Dr. Madison Li offering consistency in the CZ to help the deck keep trucking on. The deck does feel like it suffers from trying to do a few connected but ultimately disparate things, though, so it does benefit from a little tinkering – much like Liberty Prime itself. Always the way with niche mechanics, eh?
SCIENCE!: $50 BUDGET UPGRADE
For the budget upgrade, I focused on giving the deck some much needed upgrades to consistency, and also to win conditions. As it stands, if you stare at Dr. Madison Li long enough you can feel a combo – and you’re not wrong. Given her abilities cost only energy and not mana, untapping her does seem like a great goal.
So, what can we do with her? Well, if you use Myr Battlesphere, and Decoction Module, you’ll get enough mana to recur an artifact. Interesting, right? So if we add in Intruder Alarm, we can then untap Dr. Madison Li and keep bringing back the Myr Battlesphere. We just need a sac outlet – like Ashnod’s Altar. That gives infinite colorless mana too, actually.
These cards are generally great in the deck, but I went for Ashnod’s Altar for the Budget Upgrade, as it’s way cheaper.
To help us get the combo going, I added Muddle the Mixture, which can be transmuted to find Decoction Module. It also finds Trade Routes and Walking Atlas, which incidentally can offer us another combo. Hey, why not, eh?
While Intruder Alarm won’t untap Walking Atlas for combos, Retreat to Coralhelm does, and I wanted to put it in for synergy with our Commander anyways. You can ping everyone to death with Sunscorched Desert by using the desert to pay to return itself to your hand with Trade Routes.
Alternatively, you can use bounce lands which auto-return to hand, and either make infinite kitties or grow your team arbitrarily big with Felidar Retreat, or just straight up murder everyone by exiling your library with Valakut Exploration.
The deck felt like it needed that extra win condition, but I also added some value pieces. Flux Channeler and Illustrious Wanderglyph help a lot with energy generation and making a foreboding board, and Gonti’s Aether Heart just kinda has to make it in, right?
The final deck feels more consistent, and you can see what I’ve taken out in the Sideboard section on Moxfield. Most of the cards I took out were non-artifact creatures or cards that didn’t directly synergize with our gameplan. Thought Vessel is a great rock, but we don’t want it when we’re using our Commander to reanimate artifacts.
FURTHER UPGRADES
The big one for the deck is of course Aetherworks Marvel, which would, along with some fetchlands, really help with the landfall micro-synergy I baked into the budget upgrade.
Krark-Clan Ironworks is of course more expensive than Ashnod’s Altar, and for good reason – it’s way more flexible for an artifact deck. Likewise, Smothering Tithe always makes any white deck better, and in our case, also gives us more synergy.
If you’re willing to “cross the streams”, you can dip into Tales of Middle-earth for Sting, the Glinting Dagger, which would allow you to use Dr. Madison Li multiple times a turn cycle.
Ultimately, when looking at what Energy cards to put in, you just need to be conscious of not adding too many non-artifact sources of energy. While some of the fatter creatures grant a nice chunk of energy, it’s a bit of a trap, really.
If you really want to lean into the mecha angle, then consider the Brother’s War bonus sheet Transformers cards. A bunch of them are really good, and if you chuck in a Roaming Throne, you can ride Liberty Prime to victory.
END STEP
Did you play Fallout? Or do you just like the Energy mechanic? Let us know on X.
Kristen is Card Kingdom’s Head Writer, and member of the Commander Advisory Group. Formerly a competitive Pokémon TCG grinder, she has been playing Magic since Shadows Over Innistrad, which in her opinion, was a great set to start with. When she’s not taking names with Equipment and Aggro strategies in Commander, she loves to play any form of Limited.