Hey everyone, it’s Torikun…
I’m back again covering another Tournament on the SFWC (Snap.fan World Championship) circuit. Last Saturday, Snap Clash held their June edition of their monthly Snap Clash Open featuring 68 players playing a Conquest-format Tournament (closed deck lists, free deck swaps in between rounds). This Battle Breakdown will be a bit different because it’s not an open decklist format, hence there are no deck statistics to reliably talk about. Instead, I was able to interview the Tournament Champion, iviwin, and ask a few questions about their tournament experience. The answers to which I’ll be summarizing and breaking down in this article.
The Deck of a Champion: Sandman Ramp
First off, iviwin is a player who started in November but only started playing competitively in March. With a Collection Level of just 3674, iviwin was potentially hamstrung by their lack of recent premier release options such as High Evolutionary, Jeff the Baby Land Shark, and Iron Lad. Out of several popular series-three-focused choices such as Sera Miracle, Kitty Bounce, Discard, and Move, they eventually made the decision to bring Sandman Ramp to the Tournament. This was their deck:
iviwin chose Sandman Ramp out of respect for High Evo/Lockjaw. Against that deck’s ability to go extremely tall fairly consistently in multiple lanes, their solution was to rely on the Ramp deck’s ability to go even taller with the combo of Electro > Black Panther > Arnim Zola > Odin. Abusing the lack of Cosmo and Shang-Chi in popular HE Lockjaw builds and dumping 40+ power into 2 lanes kept the deck competitive. Iceman and Medusa gave this deck function before the crucial ramp turns. Iceman disrupted other high curve decks, including HE Lockjaw, and Medusa has fantastic synergy with Odin as well.
Evidently, this deck choice worked out well. Throughout iviwin’s 10-game Tournament run, their opponents archetype breakdown was: 4 HE Lockjaw, 2 Sera, 1 Bounce, 1 Dinohawk, and 1 Silver Surfer (a deck piloted by Meowcat in the Finals). The Ramp deck choice gave iviwin a favored matchup into the combo oriented Sera, Kitty, and Surfer decks, while the tech choices and a well-established game plan served them well versus HE Lockjaw decks.
The Secret to Success in Conquest
Whether it be in-game or in a high-stakes Tournament, iviwin claims that understanding what your strong hands look like, combined with being patient and retreating when things don’t go your way, is paramount to success. By identifying which hands in your deck matchup well against what your opponent is bringing, it brings forth an understanding of when to retreat, when to snap, and when to snap back. When it comes to a linear deck archetype such as Sandman Ramp, it means waiting for the strong hand with an on-curve Electro to naturally come to you, as well as understanding the ranges of your opponent plays and how they’ll likely react to the multitude of lines available to Ramp players on Turns 5 and 6. Against Sera decks for example, iviwin shared that a common play for them was to play Electro on 3, Sandman on 4, and then Wave on 5, expecting an Enchantress on the Sandman.
They also subscribe to the belief not to swap decks mid-tournament and continue with what works. Getting reps with the same deck, even during a Tournament, allows one to develop more skill and familiarity with a deck than you would otherwise. iviwin’s only Tournament loss came against Gregory_Black’s HE Lockjaw deck in the early Swiss rounds, which they attributed to being overly impatient. They quickly learned from that game, and became more patient overall in future HE Lockjaw matchups, to successful results.
Deck Lists Submitted by Top Cut Finishers
For posterity’s sake, here are some other deck lists submitted by other competitors from the Top 8, when asked about what they may have used.
Runner Up: Franklin (Meowcat)
Top 4: Maverick
Top 4: RagEX, Top 8: Gregory_Black, Theseus
Top 8: Top 8: Path of peak (Mawile)
Top 8: Primas19
Closing
iviwin’s Tournament run is a wonderful example of how perfect meta game reading, smart deckbuilding, and patient play can overcome the hurdle of not having a full collection. The qualifiers for the Snap.fan World Championship aren’t just the players spending the most to unlock all the cards, but the ones who put in the most effort into understanding the cards they do own. Once again, a huge congratulations to iviwin for winning the Snap Clash Openand qualifying for the Snap.fan World Championship next year.
Other opportunities exist for SFWC hopefuls, with the next weekend tournament that offers SFWC places being the Snap.fan June Open, which has 4 qualifier spots on offer. Snap Clash will also continue to host daily tournaments throughout the month of June, with the Top 16 finishers on their points leaderboard qualifying for their June Leaderboard Qualifier at the end of the month. The developments in Marvel Snap never stop, but for now, this is Torikun signing off.
Snap.fan June Open Signup Link: https://www.communitygaming.io/tournament/snapfan-june-open
Snap Clash Discord Link: https://discord.gg/VaUfnuwfU7
iviwin Interview Transcript
Note: This interview was conducted via Discord.
Torikun
You brought Electro Ramp to this tournament. Can you detail your thought processes in making your deck selection and the cards in the deck?
iviwin
First of all, I have some limitations because of my collection level and the cards I chose to buy with tokens. Right now I dont have High Evo, Jeff or Iron Lad My options were kinda limited to Sera, Bounce, move decks, discard or Ramp There's other options but those are the few Im more comfortable with
Torikun
for the record, what's your CL and when did you start playing?
iviwin
My CL is 3674 and I started playing a long time ago, but more seriously this March
Torikun
that's awesome man, your CL is honestly kinda low given when you started - and yet you won a tournament in spite of that.
iviwin
Against JaneJaw Iceman is really good, sometimes hitting the Jane or the Lock/thor if they dont have them both puts a lot of pressure on them --> A good time to snap.
The medusa pick was a personal pick, I dont have Jeff so I had to choose between Scorpion, Lizard or Medusa. In my experience, when you are playing ramp you need some power early, specially if u go for Iceman instead of Nebula (playing sandman/wave when you are behind wont work that much).
Lizard is a 2/5 and potentially 2/1, and Medusa is a 2/5 (90% of times) and potentially 2/8 in this deck.
Having Odin and being able to move it with Arnim, or playing the simple combo Doom + Odin in the mid location will give you those extra 3 points of power that I found helpful at times
Torikun
that's awesome man, your CL is honestly kinda low given when you started - and yet you won a tournament in spite of that
iviwin
Ty!
Torikun
That's a lot of good pointers - I can pretty much turn the interview into a Sandman guide. Personally I'm uncomfortable with the deck due to my playstyle of preferring more flexibility. I assume to be successful with the deck requires a lot of discipline and retreating well, also winning T5/6 mindgames, which is also a weakness of mine hahaha
iviwin
You are absolutely right, I think its a pretty easy deck in terms of "plays to make"
Pretty A-B-C
But thats the same for the opponent, they will expect the arnim behind your panther, and u can just doom or dino. There are a lot of mindgames T5/6 in that direction Something I did against a couple sera players this tournament was playing sandman on 4, and then wave on 5, since they would enchantress my sandman to get rid of the effect
I think the key to the deck is knowing that you have to wait for your moment, specially in this meta with not that many counters. If u dont have electro? Maybe retreat, be patient
I think I won the tournament because I had discipline in that sense
Torikun
that's a good summary of your play and deck, and no question your victory was well deserved
let's move on to discussing the tournament format
The Snap Clash Open is a bit of a unicorn in that it's the only major tournament on the SFWC Circuit that uses the Conquest format - essentially closed decklist and free deck swaps in between rounds. We are very close to finalizing the structure for the SFWC itself and the rest of the tournaments for the year and I can definitely say that Snap Clash Open will be the only tournament with Closed lists, probably for removing disadvantages of being streamed.
What are your thoughts on using the Conquest format for tournaments? Would you swap decks in between rounds? How varied was the metagame you saw?
iviwin
In my opinion, Conquest format is more fun, but I prefer open deck lists in the competitive sense
Surprise plays like a Heimdall turn 6 are pretty cool, and being afraid of a possible Shang chi you dont know they have is nice aswell
But I dont really think that helps in terms of showing "who's the best player". This is a game of probabilities and you can lose being the best player in the world if you dont get your cards on curve, and I dont love adding more unpredictability
iviwin
There are a lot of things to think about, what will they choose to play, where will they choose to play it, and I think the games with Closed deck lists are cooler and more strategic as the game advances and you know your opponent decklist
So from my point of view, I just prefer open decklist
Although I understand the problem with streamsnipe
I would never swap decks in between rounds, unless I find that the meta of the tournament is clearly against the deck I've chosen at the start. I think you grow with your deck as the tournament advances, developing more plays and improving your game
Obviously you need to know your deck from previous experience, but there's always a growth as the tournament advances I feel like, at least in my case. For example, the first player I faced with JaneJaw (gregory I think) destroyed me, but I used that game to take notes and apply that knowledge the next time
In this case, I realized I wasnt being patient, so I tried to be more patient the next time I faced a JaneJaw and it really paid off, as we discussed before
In terms of the metagame, I played 10 games, I faced 4 JaneJaw HE, 1 bounce, 3 sera decks (2 control sera and one silver surfer in the final) and 1 Dino Darkhawk. I also faced ramp once
iviwin
Obviously picking ramp worked really well, as I had a huge advantage against 4 people (sera, bounce) and a fair chance against 4 with JaneJaw
I didnt expect so many sera/bounce, as I said before I find it very risky
The 4 HE were expected tho
iviwin
I didnt expect so many sera/bounce, as I said before I find it very risky
Torikun
Bounce can deal with Wave decks IMO, but not Sandman
iviwin
I agree!
The 4 HE were expected tho
Torikun
I find that beating HE with Sandman relies on preventing multiple cards on T6 without being too far behind, or maybe just highrolling the Black Panther combo
iviwin
Yea thats why I went for Iceman, another tool to hurt them
If you play nebula they have too many options to deny her power (0 costs, etc.)
And it surprised me, but the 4 HE i faced had Killmonger in the deck (a good choice after seeing so many bounce decks)
I expected them to play Iceman for the mirror match (I dont have HE, so Im definately not an expert haha)
As a side note, apart from the game I lost against Gregory (with HE), the most difficult game I had was against a Control Sera that had Doom to face people like me
I really like that choice when entering a tournament, because it gives you so much more flexibility
Torikun
nice thoughtful answers
next question
more generally speaking
Do you have tips for the average player playing Conquest, whether it be ingame or in a tournament?
iviwin
As I said before, dont be afraid of retreating
BUT
I feel likE I tend to be "too coward" at times. If you have a good hand, the locations dont go against you, go for it, dont feel intimidated if the opponent snaps
Just know your deck and what are "good hands" and plan the game with that in mind
Thats it
Torikun
awesome
that's the interview
one last thing
I'll give you the floor to say anything you want, which may or may not appear in the article. If you have socials to plug or whatever, this is the time to do so
iviwin
I dont really want to share my socials as I dont really use them, but I wanna give props to you and the people who manage the tournaments. I love competing and I love this game, and in this case the existence of a competitive scene depends on the community. So thank you so much! I dont have a simple complain about any admin in all the tournaments I played, It really shows that you're passionate people who care about what you're doing
Much love