Hello and welcome back to Burning Questions, your weekly look at the hottest topics in Marvel Snap! This week we're talking about the recent OTA balance changes, interesting designs, and more!
1) Is Luna Snow too strong now?
The refrain I've heard about the Luna Snow change is that it's unreasonable for a 3-Cost 6-Power card to have no downside. I'm not a fan of using that kind of restrictive logic when it comes to design. The whole upside/downside per cost/power ratio concept imported from other card games has always felt more confining than useful to me, particularly given how cards needed to compete for just one of Snap's 12 deck slots. Whether a card is in line with other cards of its cost is far less interesting to me than whether that card is fun or is seeing play or not. I kind of think Luna was probably already fine and just wasn't seeing play because she was under-explored. In the end, she wasn't attracting players, though. This buff should help increase the amount of players that are trying to cook up interesting Luna Snow decks and I view that as a solid win. Here's a promising Luna deck to try out:
SnowDeath
2) Did move/bounce deserve its nerf?
I believe so. Among top ladder players this is largely seen as long overdue. Balance should not revolve around the very top of the post-infinite ladder, but that's not what the developers did in this case. They waited until the deck's win began to swell at lower post-infinite ranks, but low MMR players still probably weren't seeing it much. I think the timing of these nerfs was perfect and I actually believe the deck remains quite strong, especially in the hands of someone experienced with it. Now though, Araña can't go totally crazy with Human Torch, while Dagger is powerful, but more reasonable.
3) What cards do you love because of their unique design?
We all love some cards because they help us win and others because they are fun to play. Here are a couple of cards that I love just because they're unusual or interesting in their design.
Living up to his name, Mysterio is one of the strangest cards in the game and is a part of some of the most inscrutable interactions for new players. I love how he acts as three played cards to synergize with Sasquatch and Hit-Monkey. His illusions can be manipulated in interesting ways. Buffing him with cards like Bast, Agent Venom, or Gwenpool is an incredibly fun way to create a makeshift Doctor Doom. All of that and he's a fun little guessing-game challenge for your opponent at the end of the game. Mysterio is deeply interesting, but also just deep from a design perspective.
Makkari is a card I didn't think I would like when I first saw her. In fact, I thought she looked notably boring from a design standpoint. I didn't even get her until several weeks after she came out. Then, she quickly became one of my favorite cards! No other card fulfills the same niche roles. I love her in Silver Surfer decks just to get another body on the board. She's great with Sandman (who just got buffed!) Electro ramp decks, or Storm/Legion lockdown decks, since she often acts as a way to put out power those decks need in order to stay ahead of their opponents. Another great use is to clear space in your hand to narrow your Gwenpool hits or make room for Moon Girl copies. She's also a champ at winning priority, so I often play her alongside Alioth (or Cosmo, Juggernaut, Negasonic, etc.).
Let's hop over to the ask-the-team channel on the official Marvel Snap discord and grab some developer answers.
4) Q: Hey y'all, love the new location, Asgard Besieged! I'm curious from a design and flavor standpoint if the reverse of this location was ever considered - "Spawn the Destroyer on the LOSING side".
Design-wise, it changes the play of the location a bit, as losing that location then means the loser gets the Destroyer in exchange for probably getting their board wiped, which isn't the worst punishment on turn 3 and might even be a plus if their deck doesn't rely on early turns. Versus right now where it seems like a "win JUST this location more" most of the time.
Flavor-wise, it just seems more intuitive to me that the Destroyer would come out when Asgard is "in trouble", ie, on the losing side, and not on the side that is winning the battle.
I could see arguments for or against this version, so I'm just curious if it was ever considered. Thank you for your time!
A: No, because that design would essentially always force both players to contest Asgard Besieged—doing anything else would just get you blown up. With this version, it’s (mostly) each player’s option to figure out if and how to use a potential Destroyer.
-Glenn
Author's note:
I love locations that feel like a mini-game. This is one of my favorite locations in a while. The Destroyer is such an interesting payoff since you have to organize your board around it.
5) Q: Why nerf Araña's one-time activate bonus by +1 to hurt synergy with Human Torch when you could have nerfed Human Torch (the guy with a ridiculous, uncapped ceiling for only 1-cost)? Change him from 'x2 per move' to '+2 per move' or so and he'll calm right down (then Araña's effect can go back to +2)
A: It's explained in the blog:
"In addition to the Dagger change, this softer nerf specifically aims to weaken Araña's synergy with Human Torch. Tucking an extra point of Power into Araña won't damage the card in other use cases very much, so it's just a soft hedge on top of the Dagger change.”
-Griffin
To elaborate further, doubling Human Torch's Power is a very appealing dream. The card's effect is exciting, and we'd like to preserve that excitement if possible.
+2 per move would be a dramatically less appealing card, and also quite clearly too weak to see play. Human Torch hasn't always been strong enough for competitive play as-is, so exponentially nerfing him would be a super harsh change and no doubt very frustrating for fans of the card.
-Glenn
Author's note:
I agree that Torch isn't particularly interesting or exciting at +2, even if that would make that deck more balanced. Also, I think Araña can pretty easily absorb that nerf and remain viable.
That's it for this week! Come find me on Bluesky (@scosco) for more Snap and Comic discussion!