Free Pizza: Visions of the Future

This was a LOT of fun. I hit my Free Pizza this month on the back of two decks, which I am enjoying quite a bit of. I hope you find some inspiration in these, because I've had a great time playing them.

While this says Auto-Air Walker, I just didn't change the name after messing around with it. 

This deck wants to use the destroy package to ideally trigger Air Walker into Morgan Le Fay. Moira X isn't necessary but IS a but of fun in this deck, potentially setting up multiple Morgan triggers. But even if Morgan isn't used, there's a nice destroy backup: The Thing First Steps and Lady Dethstroke can flip lanes, which can't be overlooked.

I didn't build this entirely from scratch; Uncle Ben is a character I added after seeing someone with a list online, for example. But it's been pretty neat to play with and it definitely pushed me up in the ranks. 

This next deck I'm really proud of: 

I started off using Viv Vision as a card in a move deck, and she was terrible. But once I shifted the deck to a Sebastian Shaw- boost deck it came alive. Frankie Raye Nova and Nakia are flex slots: Frankie is a fun card to pair with Sasquatch, and Nakia really could be something better. Red Guardian is probably a better choice but all in all; this is fun! 

Free Pizza: Fantastic Four season

 I got there with this:

I have to admit, I had a lot of fun working the last few ranks with this deck. It offered me the consistency of reliable powerhouses like Collector and Dinosaur, with some random bonuses from the Shield package. 

But...I am starting to wonder what the future of Snap is. The playerbase has had a lot more to complain about lately, than celebrate. The squeeze for money seems to be in, instead of building an exceptional experience for people that makes some of the money instead of a miserable grind that tries to make all of the money.

I haven't quit--the new season has started and I really like what Galactus: First Steps adds to the game-anytime they make "lanes matter" cards like Iron Patriot, I feel like there's a good strategic element being brought to the game. 

But...the enthusiasm for play has started to wane and it's a bummer. 

More is Too Much

 This season of Marvel Snap has been a mess. 

First; every since the Golden Gauntlet 2 (which was entertaining as HELL to watch the finals of), there's been a mild Thanos/Arishem/Agamotto meta, where you throw ALL THE CARDS in your deck, which I haven't been able to beat even with cards like Cassandra Nova and Darkhawk.

When the tech cards no longer keep the meta in check, you have a problem.

What's created more outrage among the community though has been the tweaks to the High Voltage. 

Effectively; the mode does three things:

First, it adds random "charged" cards to your deck, making every deck an Arishem one.

Second, it offers a random "overdrive" ability which triggers if enough charged cards are played. Sometimes it's beneficial, as when you can earn double credits for a win, but it also includes "Cull all the weakest cards" or "transform all the charged cards" and you just have NO idea what you're going to get. 

And third, the visual effects of all these things-charged cards, the overdrive trigger-crates this visual mess that just makes the whole board difficult to track.

Making things worse by far are two other things-cards they didn't ban before the mode started, then had to fix 24 hours later (which, kudos here but a card like Gorgon should NEVER have been allowed).

However, the real chafing has been in the store; the communication about the funds players get, and the cost of the new cards. 

New cards that are kinda assy; Kid Omega and Cobra are baffling to me. On top of that, the price to get them is brutal. Players are supposed to get something like 500 "charge" points a day to help us afford these things but that wasn't communicated to the playerbase well at ALL. 

And these changes come to a game mode that people loved once upon a time! Now people are just frustrated and angry about all these things. 

Adding more to the mode didn't really help.

However, I want to say that: I get it. I'm a homebrewer, both of beer and Magic decks and I understand that people like to tinker with things! And this is a temporary thing as all things are in Marvel snap. 

But dang did this one not go well

Marvel Snap: Masters of the Arcane

The new cards this month!

Merlin, the card for the month feels like a fun boost for the small decks archetype. I think it's going to provide a lot of interesting versatility while ALSO having the problem that randomizer cards have. Some moderate variance for fun times. 

Morgan Le Fay-does this card have a home? It's an interesting twist on Ghost Rider, but because she returns cards to hand, how much help is that? She's interesting, to be sure! At the very least, she could remove the drawback of having Corvus Glave discard Hela.

Jennifer Kale is fine. You play her anytime before T5 and you get a boost; I think this is a solid card that you'll be happy to see more often than not. Not sure that she's a Series 4 card though. 

Nicolas Scratch is a card I didn't understand until I saw it in action. The bonus happens whenever you play a "spell" like Merlin's Incantations or Agamotto's Ancient Arcana (or the upcoming effects from Clea & Dormammu). But because the card says "skill" I had no idea what that meant. Seems like there's going to need to be some wording cleanup. 

The Ancient One is absolutely cracked. Get it; the ability to duplicate ongoing abilities from Blue Marvel to Goliath is too strong to ignore. 

Nightmare has been the hype card of this season; everyone is expecting it to do insane things with Sauron decks. I don't think that's going to be true; I think the RNG is too  high for this to be consistently good. When it hits, it'll be a lot of fun but what I think Nightmare is mostly going to do is make players think extra hard about how to play their cards. 

Clea provides an interesting tool-I like the 'boost' decks that use Forge, Nakia, etc but now there's a little affliction added in. I don't think she's great but she's not bad. 

As for Dormammu, this one will likely spawn a new deck, some kind of destroy offshoot. Worth getting just for that: new archetypes always find interesting ways to evolve the game.

As for the game mode rewards (and yay, High Voltage is coming back) 

Cobra seems like a very niche card. How often will it be useful? It's not like Victoria Hand/SHIELD decks are running wild. Seems like a solution in search of a problem. The stat line isn't anything to write home about either. 

And Kid Omega's ability seems odd-do we need another take on Venom? But free cards are free!

Free Pizza: New Mutants Season

 I feel like this one came a little later in the season but, I still hit free pizza! 

While typically I am not a fan of Arishem decks because they are too chaotic, chaos seemed to fit very well in a meta full of Thanos decks. Color me surprised! That's emphasized all the more by the use of Loki. Having to suddenly play someone else's deck means knowing what the metagame is like and how decks basically function. 

I believe I saw a version of this on Snap Judgements and I wanted to play something that wasn't Thanos, a deck I just never seem to be comfortable with. Remarkably, this deck did the work! It needed me to play very smart; Arishem can throw a lot of different cards at you. Knowing what cards do and how they work is really important. 

But I got there, and that's always nice. 

Free Pizza: What If...?

I managed to get my free pizza pretty early in the What If...? season, and while I got to the finish line on an old reliable, the workhorse for me was a metagame call.

Here's a Cassandra Nova & Darkhawk deck. I know people like to try the "hawks and rocks" deck combing Darkhawk and Devil Dinosaur, but I always found those two cards to be pulling in different directions. One or the other, not both. Even when that deck was the hotness, I felt it was a poor choice and filled with bad design. 

However, with Thanos being everywhere (a deck that runs an additional 6 cards) and Arishem always being present in a meta where people just don't know what they're going to do, I felt it was time to hit 'em where they live. 

I love hitting 'em where they live. 

Free Pizza: Prehistoric Avengers

 With some challenges this season, I took advantage of a Khonshu meta and got my Free Pizza with this

Why this? Because I can use Mystique to copy Cosmo and shutter the on reveal actions of the discard decks. Blanking two lanes is pretty strong. 

I also used an affliction deck to climb most of the way there and here's what that looked like:

This list isn't ideal but there's potential there to develop. 

What I've found challenging is where to place cards-Laufey, USAgent and Man-Thing all have the potential to dominate their lanes when combined with cards like Diamondback or Spider-Woman but they don't all play nice together. 

Which I suppose is thematically appropriate! But it makes for some pretty wild swings in gameplay. 

Sanctum Showdown

We got a new game mode for Marvel Snap: Sanctum Showdown. After putting in just under a week into it and getting what I wanted, here's my takeaway.

It's fine. 

The new take on the game is an interesting one, where locations matter for points and the game doesn't end on turn 6-but rather the first player to 16 points. 

It's also a bit grindy, as you need a "scroll" to enter and while if you win you keep your scroll, if you lose there goes your scroll. And with scrolls being handed out at what feels like a paltry 2 per 8 hours losing feels like a pretty big punishment.

That said, if you remember to play for points, it doesn't seem to be too restrictive. And since you take points with you, win OR lose, players want to exploit the system for points. 

So the gameplay mode does change things up in interesting ways. And I firmly believe that if you play it smartly and with some consistency, you'll get the three new cards, no problem.

But the grind IS a thing and the gameplay doesn't change things up quite enough; the best deck to be running was quickly discovered (Bully move, then Guardians) and a meta that is solved is rarely a good one. 

To the devs' credit; they nerfed things so Bully move couldn't wreck the day and Guardians has counterplay.

Which is why I run this: 

It's been a fun deck to play, with some surprising wins! It can struggle when locations add cards, like Central Park, but all in all I am having a good time with it.

Free Pizza: Brave New World

 I finally got over the hill with my Black Knight deck but the deck that got me into the neck of the woods was a Namora one!

I had the idea awhile ago; Agony & Hulkbuster to suit up a character and then use the Wong/Namora/Odin combo to really blow things up. However I didn't have a Namora at the time-but Rebecca did and took on the challenge of making the deck a thing. That means I have her testing to thank for this build. She was the one who came up with Sebastian Shaw, which was such an obviously good idea I almost smacked myself for not coming up with it. 

It's definitely a bit of a meme--I've even titled it "The Meme Is Alive" since this pic-- but it's been fun to play! Captain Marvel is probably the weakest link in the deck, which is strange to say but I just never want to play that card. Rescue might be a better option, since once the Ironheart goes down, I usually want to play multiple cards in the same lane. 

Colossus became important because it was too easy for an opponent to Shang-Chi a lane but otherwise it's been a pretty fun lark! 

Free Pizza: Dark Avengers Season

 I got my free pizza with this: 

Initially found at the MarvelComp subreddit, compliments to user Decent-Cold862 for the idea. 

I didn't change anything; I was just intrigued by the notion of a Werewolf by Night deck being decent! 

I still don't like the Bast/Agent Venom combo much: too often I found those cards shrinking Beast or Agent Venom and the power boost given to the other cards felt minimal. 

However; it worked: I hit level 90. So maybe it is just good to get out of my comfort zone and play something different. 

AC/DC

 High Voltage is the newest format in Marvel Snap and this one is great. 

If you haven't heard about it yet, here's an overview in written form but the quick and dirty is; 

Games are only three rounds, and you get increasing amounts of energy each round.

Now, there were some red flags for me before I started playing High Voltage; a new card was part of the winnings and there was a new currency (volts) to earn. I was worried that this would turn into a massive grind, the way Deadpool's Diner did. 

I am very pleased to let you know that High Voltage is a TON of fun (again).

The games are very fast. Losing doesn't incur a penalty; you get volts if you win, and you get volts if you fulfill bounties. That's it-losing doesn't mean you lose volts. Playing at a steady rate will eventually rank you up to the rewards. There's zero drawback to play that I can tell and because the games are risk free, here's a great chance for players to just mess around. 

On top of that, if you lose, you just bounce to the next one. Lingering isn't the point.

So maybe y'all can stop with that Odin/Mystique/Gambit/Wong nonsense. 

Free Pizza:: Venom Season

 

Sometimes, you gotta play dirty.

Hela is certainly making a run for 'best deck in the format' right now so to hell with it, let's play. 

Why? Because I couldn't find anything interesting or fun to do. That's a drag but when that's a drag, fuck it, let's just win.

My little note of cleverness was to sub out Moon Knight (which was getting me more often than it should) with Sword Master and add in Spider-Woman as a target specifically for it. I'm sure someone else did that--or maybe I read someone else doing it. Either way; the deck carried me well from low 80's into the 90th rank.

Now I'm fucking around and the meta seems very screwy but not in a fun way. We'll see what we see in the coming weeks. 

Free Pizza-Spider Season

This is probably the fastest I've hit Free Pizza in Marvel Snap. I won't say it was easy, but the idea was remarkably effective.

The deck idea from Reddit user wu11 and is showcased here. I wasn't seeing enough Arishem decks to keep Cassandra Nova in there; Rogue and Killmonger both did stints in the deck before I settled on Killmonger being more useful.

The use of Symbiote Spider-Man into Black Panther then Zola was the real win condition, but if Negative hit, a flipped Iron Man that got Zola'd backed up by Mystique, with a Knull to offer some extra power? The possibility for extra lines to win was extremely flexible and made for a deck that offered me a lot of opportunities. 

I've gone back to a Cassandra Nova/Darkhawk deck, as apparently my meta has now flipped TO Arishem decks and suddenly messing with them is Very Important. 

Still, I enjoyed this take on Mr Negative, the excellent use of Symbiote and getting to chill for the rest of the season. 

Free Pizza-Young Avengers Season

 This season was a bear. I felt like I just couldn't find a good deck or a rhythm with the ones I knew well. The meta game felt all over the place, and sometimes I just had RNGesus tell me to get screwed. 

I did have some very memorable moments, like this:

Full kudos to my opponent there. I love it. Plus I continued robbing Tribunal players of cubes with a turn six Enchantress. 

But damn, do my decks always seem to need Enchantress. 

I did earn my free pizza though on the last weekend and I did it after the Attuma tweak. Something about that deck hummed. 

Is this good? Will I keep it?? No idea. This deck doesn't have a name yet and this would be my third destroy deck. I'd almost rather incorporate something into a deck I already have--but I had a bounty on getting wins with Armor and Attuma in the same deck. 

I got that bounty and suddenly found myself hitting rank 90 after languishing in the 80s most of the season. 

Destroy is still a pretty good deck and Killmonger has become pretty important against the Marvel Boy decks. 

Which is a little bit of a shame: I think the Marvel Boy decks are pretty neat! But they seemed to lead to a metagame that I couldn't get my head around. I had a lot of fun with Ultron decks though-they did a bunch of work for me...until they didn't. 

Similarly, I had some success with a deck using Cassandra Nova and Ajax or Darkhawk: for a hot minute my meta seemed to shift to all Arishem all the time. 

You can mess a Arishem player UP with a Cassandra Nova played on turn 3. 

But I made it, and I'm glad I did. Whew!

Free Pizza: Deadpool Season

The last day of the season, but I did it. Despite the drag of the game and Deadpool's Diner being a real slog, I earned my free pizza. (Well, so to speak).

I did with a bit of a metagame call: Darkhawk is a decent counter to Arishem decks and those are currently still the rage. Once I got a Cassandra Nova, I figured I might as well use it!

However, prior to having a Cassandra I was using Absorbing Man so if you don't have one, that's a super useful card in this deck and a good replacement. 

I can't say this is the most original idea (the deck name is a reference to the Devil Dino & Darkhawk decks that were popular a year ago), but it did get the job done!

 

Upsides

 

I got a Cassandra Nova in the Diner. Let us never speak of it again.

Except...

Except for one thing. I got my Cassandra because someone deliberately lost a game to me--giving me 3,000,000 Bubs. 

See, turns out that some of the community on Reddit decided that this game mode was some nonsense and began donating to other players. Which is awesome! Posts were made, threads created where people were giving their usernames and an established signal for how to let someone know you were donating was set up. 

I wanted to be a part of that, so I promptly started going in to lose games in order to give other players a leg up. 

Which is pretty awesome. 

One small apology to user Brody though--I messed up trying to give you Bubs and inadvertently won the game. I'm so so sorry! I gave them away to the next user, I promise!

Hey, Bubs

Deadpool's Diner as a gameplay mode has been released for Marvel Snap.

I have found myself not enjoying it much at all. There's multiple issues here for me, so I'm going to outline them.

First; It's predatory. Studies have shown that the more "currencies" you put between the real dollar amount and acquisition, the more people are likely to spend. Because the "currencies" aren't 1=1 versions of money. 

Well, the Diner introduces Bubs as a currency that you can earn ONLY in the diner and that you MUST use if you want to play...unless you want to pay some gold. How do you get gold? Funny you should ask! You get THAT by playing the regular game or by paying actual money. Playing the game gives you gold at an incredibly slow rate so hey, you want to get in on the Diner action right? 

And you just lost 20k Bubs and are broke?? They won't refill for hours so you can't keep playing the Diner? 

Well I'm sure you DO have $99 for 8,000 gold which will then get you 945,000 Bubs! How does math work?

Second, the Diner forces you to bet, automatically raising the stakes on turns 4 and 5. I've already seen comments online about how this feels like gambling and the issues it raises for people who just want to play a 3 minute game and maybe get their daily goals met. 

As a subset of this, if you want to get to the fifteen million Bubs you need to complete the sequence, you have to start betting at higher and higher and higher stakes. That's a must; there's no way to get there without it. 

Third, it uses the worst FOMO to encourage play: a new card is available. Yes, it'll become part of the shop in August but you could just earn it now, right? F2P players pretty much have to grind this out if they want the card.

And this is coming at the worst possible time because Arishem decks have taken over the meta and are not that fun to play against. Which matters because:

Fourth, holy shit this is grindy as hell. Because of the way the Diner is set up, players are encouraged to play their best decks at all time to maximize everything. Experimentation is cast aside for pure competition. 

But part of the joy of Marvel Snap is making up weird shit and playing it in the Conquest modes where your rank isn't impacted, or just changing decks up when you realize that what you have isn't facing the meta well. Yes you can change in the Diner too but the impact feels bigger. If you aren't playing the best deck, it feels like you're playing it wrong.

Fifth, they did a terrible job of explaining how things worked. And given the FOMO and betting aspects of the Diner, I'm thinking they did that on purpose. That feels incredibly shitty. 

Now, there is one thing they did right: once you hit a certain level of Bubs, you can't go below it. Every time you hit that rung on the ladder, you don't fall further, even if you lose. You just have to stop playing until your Bubs refill. 

But the downsides have been such that it's done something even worse for me. 

It's made the game unfun to play. At least for now. 

Free Pizza-Celestials' Season

I hit level 90 in Marvel Snap and this time I did it with a deck I built myself! I present: SwanBounce.

Obviously this is a derivative deck using the Bounce deck principles, and it is a little challenging to play. If there's a clear flex slot, it's probably Echo. It might seem like Werewolf could be cut but I'd be wary of doing so. That card can get up to 9 power pretty easily if you are playing wisely, and can almost (if not occasionally exceed) your three big dogs. That's really helpful when those cards decide to be the last three cards in your deck. 

That said; it suffers when there are locations like Central Park or Savage Lands that add small creatures to your board. Yes, you can bounce them but filling up your hand with garbage is a real risk. Drawing your hitters is important and getting the discounted Sasquatch to lead to a cheap Skaar is a big deal. And finding another cheap card to add in-Ant-Man might be good here, but there aren't many given how SwanBounce wants to play-isn't easy. 

It might be fun to try with Phastos, the newest card. Making everything here either cheaper or stronger seems neat! Forge, however, is probably the best substitute, especially if there is a lot of Killmonger running around. (And it seems there always is for me).

Anyway, that's what I've been rocking and it's been fun so far. Good luck to everyone for the rest of the month!

Snapping Dolphins

Here's a solid video on the breakdown of the Marvel Snap in-game economics. Understanding how to best use your resources is always helpful, as well as understanding how they are attempting to manipulate the FOMO of the audience. 

Plus, I think Hoogland does an excellent job framing what the makers of Marvel Snap are about. Knowledge is power. (Sorry I meant to get this up yesterday!)

I Dug This

I came across this person's take on a Mr. Negative deck and wanted to give it a little love. 

First, I like the angle he's going for with this deck. I've been a fan of Negative decks for awhile but like a lot of namesake decks, they falter if you don't get the right card.

More importantly, though: I like the way he talks through this play lines and thought processes in the games he plays. If someone is newer to Marvel Snap, I think they might find this really useful!