As we close the Black Order season, let's take a moment and review what happened throughout the season. Marvel Snap is a fast-paced game with constantly changing meta games and new cards introduced every week, so sometimes it's hard to understand what took place throughout an entire season. So, in these articles, we will discuss the latest season pass cards and how they have fared, as well as look generally at the different patches and how they affected the metagame.
Season Pass Cards
Black Swan
This was a small hyped season pass card that would hopefully bring bounce back to its former power. There were even a few hours at the start of the season where we got to see and play with her as a 2-cost card. However, this relatively fell flat for the majority of the season. Sadly, Black Swan was not worth the hype at the start of the season and currently has a low play rate and win rate. Because of this, even doing the weekend missions became a struggle throughout the month, and I would throw her in a random deck rather than try to make her work in an actual deck built around her effect. However, I will say that she is a little underrated, and her impact is beneficial. After this latest OTA, where the developers mentioned that they would try to buff more 1-cost cards, there is a potential future where she will become competitively viable. But, for now, she isn't as great as she could have been.
Hopefully, decks like this can help bring her into a semi-competitive position.
Thanos Zoo
Skaar
Skaar has pretty much kept the same position that he held last season, and I don't think that this is going to change anytime soon. Regardless of his position, he got a lot better this season because Cull Obsidian is a relatively cheap big guy who enables Skaar to be cheaper. This will be a consistent theme with Skaar whenever a card is released that helps allow him to be at a lower cost. Instead of consistently being a 4-cost card, it was much easier to make him a 2-cost card by the final turn. With the most recent OTA changing the main decks that Skaar was featured in, he may see a lot lower usage even though he is still the same; he has good stats and is helpful. Special note: the bug that allowed his cost to be reduced by Wave was fixed this season, so sadly, that is no longer a fun perk of using those two cards together.
Here are some of the best decks, including Skaar, from this season:
Shuri Skaar
BK Skaar
Sebastian Shaw
I contemplated copying my statement about Shaw from last season's article and pasting it here. Sadly, I don't think I saw this card once in the entire month. Shaw is in a bad place because most of the decks he is in don't go over the top of Hela and Thanos, who controlled the meta for the better part of two weeks. He hasn't been able to find a place outside of Surfer decks, but with Hope Summers releasing, maybe that will change things.
This is the best-performing deck featuring Sebastion Shaw from this season:
Shaw Brood Abs
Ms. Marvel
This is an interesting case. While Ms. Marvel is still a fantastic card, she works best in a metagame with many fair midrange-type decks because she adds a lot of stats for your side. In a meta that features a lot of decks that go over the top of just good general stats, she helps but doesn't close the gap as much as you want when facing a lot of unfair decks. She also took a small hiatus due to a buff to Omega Red. While there is a noticeable difference in stats, Omega Red has many easier conditions to meet. Because of this, several decks switched out Ms. Marvel for Omega Red to get that power easily. However, even though minor, she is still one of the best cards in the game and is featured in multiple competitive decks. This has been one of the best season pass cards over the last several months.
Here are a couple of the best decks she is featured in:
Loki Marvel
Lockdown
Elsa Bloodstone
….. Crickets …..
But seriously, the idea that she would get a change is still in the air, and she desperately needs this change. She currently has a popularity of less than 1% and probably a negative cube rate. That is such a sad way for her to end up after being such a fantastic card to use and play with only a few seasons ago.
As far as I know, this is probably the best deck that includes her at the moment:
Kitty Elsa
Loki
The God of Mischief is still here and still here to stay. Last season, he started with a slight nerf that, even though it removed him from prominence, he was lurking in the shadows the entire time, just waiting to strike. While his stats might look mediocre, he is a force to deal with. This season has seen him quietly there almost the entire time, and as of this most recent OTA, he is busting out of the shadows. I know this makes some people happy and will probably make many people annoyed once again. This is what happens when cards are indirectly nerfed, like the change that was made to Loki. Although, I will say that Loki probably isn't the problem and is a decently balanced card. The shell that he exists in is something that can cause a big headache to a lot of players when they come up against it.
So, as we continue to this next season, keep these decks in mind:
Loki Marvel
Loki Dino
Power Couples
During the Black Order season, Marvel Snap featured its first Imbalance patch, replacing the regularly scheduled OTA. This event took place over the week in the middle of the season and buffed certain cards if you had their pair on the battlefield. These were all the pairs that were included:
- Angela & Sera: +1 Power
- Black Panther & Nakia: +1 Power
- Captain America & Agent 13: +2 Power
- Gambit & Rogue: +2 Power
- Invisible Woman & Mr. Fantastic: +2 Power
- Iron Man & Rescue: +1 Power
- Miles Morales & Ghost-Spider: +1 Power
- She-Hulk & Daredevil: +2 Power
- Star-Lord & Gamora: +1 Power
- Vision & Scarlet Witch: +1 Power
This event was well received and provided fun deck-building challenges and exciting gameplay. However, the meta got stuck in a weird spot for multiple weeks, which led to some player frustration that overshadowed this pairing. In the future, I think they should do these events for a shorter time and still include regularly scheduled OTAs.
OTA/Patch
This season, we saw 11 cards being buffed and nerfed. That is 9 less than the last season, including a total of 20. These buffs and nerfs were also a whole 23 days apart from each other, which led to a pretty stagnant meta-game for multiple weeks in the middle of the season. Due to the power coupling, there was one less OTA than last season, so the only change came from the new cards in the game. This is both good and bad because it was interesting to see how just adding one card can change the game, but it also led to a frustrating meta-game that stuck around a lot longer than most people wanted.
Here are some of the top-performing decks from this season:
Thanos Lockjaw
Hela
Oh wait, those are the top-performing decks from last season. Here are the ones from this season:
Hela
TLT
LJ Thanos
Junk
If you notice, two of these from this season are pretty much the same as the last season. While that isn't bad, it is a testament to what losing an OTA can do and how a meta-game can become decently stagnant.
Conclusion
Overall, this was a slightly frustrating season because of the lack of movement in the metagame and a lackluster season pass card. We had a slight reprieve at the end of the season that hopefully keeps the game feeling good with a wide-open meta into the next season.
The new cards were not as flashy as others released but provided some small movements within the game that I think will only increase as we continue into the following months.
In the comments below, let me know what you thought of the Black Order season.