Patch 03/12: Good, Bad, and Ugly

It’s been a good few days since the most recent patch, and we have much to cover, so let’s get to the latest patch's good, bad, and ugly.

The Good

Subterranea

Shuffle 4 rocks into each deck.

This is a fantastic change. While it is only a small one, removing one rock makes the location slightly less frustrating to play against. It’s a positive that they consider location balance, so while this is a bit about locations, it is good that location balance is in the conversation since they are a vital part of the game.

Selectable Borders

This is also another great change that was implemented. I know some people find this change to be the bare minimum and lackluster, and while I agree somewhat, it is nice to see some of the changes stated in the roadmap being implemented. As a bonus, this simplifies splitting your favorite variant while you hunt for that god split. It's a good start for cosmetics in the game.

Graveyard

This feature should have been there all along, so I am glad it is finally here. Hopefully, they will continue adding these features, which are standard for competitive card-type games.

Card Balance Changes

Miek

Miek

When you discard a card, this gains +1 Power and can move next turn.

Discard is in a really good place right now, and while Miek wasn’t so bad before his change in a discard deck, the additional benefit of being able to choose where Miek moves is a nice change. Instead of adding more variance to the game, this change allows the player agency over where Miek is and how he is positioned within the game. This can allow for many more mind games and priority plays within a game that adds much more complexity and depth to a simple card. That’s a good change in my book, especially as one of the only series 4 cards to be released recently.

Miek Discard

Elsa Bloodstone

Elsa Bloodstone

Each card you play to fill your side of a location gains +2 Power.

Finally, we get an Elsa buff. Just looking through the “ask the team” section on the Marvel Snap Main discord, there are countless questions asking when she would receive her buff that was teased a couple of months ago, and it has finally arrived. This is a great change back to being a global effect and a much more reasonable and balanced cost for that effect. She now has to compete with other 3-cost cards that are great to play, like Mobius M. Mobius, Hope Summers, Cosmo, and others. This all promotes interesting deck-building choices and play choices to consider. It also helps the usage of Kitty Pryde back into the mix, and with the loss of Forge as a one drop, it is nice to be able to use another scaling one drop to better effect again. While this change is good and has brought her usage rate up just slightly, there are a lot more 3-cost cards that I mentioned before that you need to consider, so even though this is a good buff, I don’t think she will become as overpowered as she was before. Hopefully, she stays in this place for a while because she has undergone many changes since her initial release.

Elsa Bloodstone

Here is a deck that I have been playing. I believe Tanjo, who is number 1 on the ladder, is also the main user of it.

Elsa Loki

Leech

Leech

On Reveal: Remove the text from cards with On Reveal abilities in your opponent's hand.

Ah, poor Leech. As a character who was abandoned because of his looks, the fact that he is disliked for his ability in the game is a little fitting. I didn’t mind his previous usage because while it was annoying on the ladder and I just retreated for 1 or 2 cubes, he was interesting to plan and play around during conquest. All that being said, and my thoughts aside, I think this is a good change. Understandably, he is a frustrating card to just completely blank a person's hand before the final turn, which some could argue is the most important turn in the game, especially with no counterplay. Now that his ability is again an On Reveal, he has some counterplay with a possible Cosmo or a location swap. It is minor, but adding that counterplay is good. Also, limiting his ability to just On Reveals means that players need to think about other options to counter ongoing strategies instead of a 1 card catch-all. Changing him also means he has a slight buff because you can get his ability off early if you want to cheat him out. This is good for the game overall, even though this is bad for the card Leech because this is a nerf, and he has and will continue to see less play. It is overall a good change. As a quick personal note, I wish they would bring back the old leech that was On Reveal and eliminate all card abilities, but I like chaos... Anyway, this is currently his best-performing deck.

LeechNaut

Cable

Cable

On Reveal: Draw a card from your opponent's deck.

Moving Cable back down to 2-cost helps the card immensely. Sitting at 3-cost and only generating one card means he was in drastic competition with Agent Coulson and had to compete with the other 3-cost cards that were much better to play on turn three. That was a bad place for him. Now, at 2-cost and pulling a card from your opponent's deck, you produce fear of the unknown and gain valuable information. This fear, coupled with the information you have, can lead to some good bluff snaps. Overall, this is a good change, and I look forward to using Cable more often.

Bad

Mantis

Mantis

On Reveal: If your opponent played any cards here this turn, copy one of them into your hand.

This is in the bad category mainly because Mantis lost power in the patch. I understand the reasoning behind the change with two other cards, Mirage and Cable, being at 2-costs that generate cards and wanting diversity on how the cards are gained, so the text change makes sense to me, but the loss of power is a little odd. Mantis already wasn’t seeing a lot of play because Mirage guarantees you a card and one that has more power at a low cost, so in decks that want to generate cards, Mirage is the more consistent card to play, even though Mantis had more base power. Now Mantis has the same power, and while the potential upside for the card she steals is a little higher like they mentioned a powered-up Venom in the description, she is still widely inconsistent. It is completely possible that you can play Mantis and end up with nothing or something bad like a Widows Bite since her ability is random. This is compounded by the fact that they moved Cable back down to 2 cost and gave him 3-power. Both Mirage and Cable guarantee cards, and while the potential ceiling for the card gained is different for Mirage, Cable, and Mantis, the inconsistencies of Mantis will mean that she is the card left behind once again. Just using the argument that she could get such a card is not a good enough argument, and I would rather have her with a little more power to mitigate the potential downside of pulling nothing or a dud of a card. Even when you argue that Mirage is Series 4 and Mantis is Series 1, it isn't a good way to establish why she has two power because Cable is also a Series One card. This is bad, and her usage stats don’t prove otherwise.

Here is the best deck that I could find currently using Mantis.

Mantis

Ugly

Yondu

Yondu

On Reveal: Destroy the lowest-Cost card in your opponent's deck.

Yondu seemed fine in the spot he was in. Yes, I agree that he was being pushed out of destroy decks, and that was the main deck that included him, but his ability seemed fine, and honestly, when I faced Yondu, it sniped the next card I wanted to draw. I always felt annoyed. Now, when I see Yondu, I usually am thankful for deck thinning of my low-cost early gameplay, which I don’t need anymore since it turn 4 or something. So, unless I see Yondu exactly on turn 1, he is a blessing a good portion of the time for me and not exactly helping my opponent. This is also ugly because the three main 1-cost cards in the stock Destroy list are all Series 3 and above. Yondu is Series 1, which means he is a great 1-cost card in your destroy deck while you wait for the more powerful Series 3 or 5 cards. Now, he has a lot less upside to play since he is guaranteed not to help your Knull out in a big way. The combination of these two factors makes the change to Yondu head-scratching, and again, his usage stats don’t help confirm that this was a good change. I also don’t see a lot of Cable and Yondu being run together, which is one of the reasons they used to justify the change. However, maybe in Series 1 and 2 land, the combination could be potentially potent, so if you are still in the game's early phases, I would try it. This may be a good change for that section of the metagame.

Time Stone

Time Stone

On Reveal: Give Thanos -1 Cost next turn. Draw a card.

This is an interesting change because while I think it is a good one, it comes across as an ugly, too-little, too-late change, mostly because this patch was released the same day that Mockingbird was released into the game. Not only were Thanos's decks already in a dominant position, but the addition of Mockingbird helped move Thanos's decks into an even better position. Coinciding with the change to Time Stone did almost nothing to stop this from happening. Currently, Thanos is above a 25% usage rate in the upper portions of the infinite leaderboard. When you widen the parameters to include almost any rank, his usage drops to a whopping 20%, which is still pretty high. The actual change to Time Stone will be pretty forgotten as relevant because it didn’t change anything about Thanos deck usage. They have a lot more tools to accomplish the same game plan still, and all this change did was make it so you can play Time Stone out any turn, and the information about what card is discounted is hidden from your opponent, which can cause a lot more turn 6 game swings. Honestly, this could be a buff. I have lost many games to a turn 6 Blob plus something I wasn’t considering because I didn’t know they had a 5-cost Blob. This change didn’t weaken Thanos as they had hoped, landing it squarely in the ugly category.

Irrelevant

M’Baku

M'Baku

At the end of the game, this jumps from your deck to your lowest-Power location. (that isn't full)

Poor M’Baku. While he is scary to see jump out in games that involve the location District X, I haven’t seen him at all. Now, jumping to the lowest location is great, but they could have at least gone a step further and given him the same treatment as Angel so he could jump from the deck or the hand. Either way, I don’t see this change making that much of a difference, but I am happy to include him in my C2 decks as a surprise since he can help win a lost location.

Cerebro Watch

This patch was a little bare for our Cerebro players. Most of the cards they changed are unsuitable for Cerebro because they either buff cards or gain random cards from other people's decks that are probably not usable. So, just as some fun because I mentioned he was irrelevant, here is a Cerebro 2 version, including M’Baku, for some added surprise fun. This deck is hilarious when he jumps out and wins a game. Give it a shot!

M'Baku C2

Overall Patch Feel

This patch feels pretty good. They added some new features; they made some good changes to some cards, but I think this patch's timing is poor overall. This was already delayed a week, and while it did add a couple of nice features, there is a lot to consider when thinking about a patch that didn’t make a meaningful impact on the metagame and, with the release of new cards, didn’t hinder the metagame from becoming a one deck to rule them all format which is what seems to be the case of this moment. Patches should make a lot more of an impact than a typical OTA, and while this made some changes, it didn’t make a big enough impact that I think people expect from a patch. Add to that the imbalance event that quickly happened after, and the patch felt like it was old news before it got off the ground. Let me know what you think and how you want patches to be in the future down in the comments below!