Welcome back to Spotlight: Cash, Snap.Fan’s monthly look at upcoming cash bundles and the role that money plays in Marvel Snap. In the ever-shifting in-game economy, Second Dinner can dial back the gold players receive, credits only stretch so far, and Token Tuesdays will come and go. Still, there is one currency whose flow the players–not Second Dinner–can control, and that currency is cash. Join us to dig deep into the data mine as we preview January’s cash bundles. As always, bundle details are subject to change.
Something to Chew On
Though the first bundle of the new year, Bubblegum Pop offers an interesting perspective on the trajectory that Snap’s cash bundles have taken over the last several months. Previously, we compared it to Naughty or Nice. Both bundles were ultimately upgraded to have 1,000 gold and 500 credits, right in line with the data mined December Ticket 1. That bundle, however, was also altered to provide 2,000 gold and 1,500 tokens for $19.99. Those last-minute changes have been increasingly common, to such an extent that around half of December’s cash bundles were reworked shortly before release. For the most part, bundles were changed to make them better values–though in some cases, they were more expensive–but the uncertainty introduced has made preplanning your purchases more difficult and overspending easier.
This is all part of a broader deflationary effect that has been ongoing for the last few months, on account of which bundles that appeared to be surefire value purchases as recently as October and November–think Magik’s Birthday Party and Half a World Away–have slid outside the top 25% of bundle values all time. Within that quartile, coincidentally 25 cash bundles to date, five were released in November, seven in December, and two through the first week of January. While bundles and progression becoming cheaper is a good thing, this trend certainly raises questions about how wise today’s expenditures will look in a few months.
All that to say Bubblegum Pop is right in there with Magik’s Birthday Party and Half a World Away for currency value; a bundle that would have looked great two months ago is now reduced to being just pretty good. It does present an opportunity for anybody yet to collect Dazzler to get their hands on her, though she has yet to experience her moment in the meta sun.
Bubblegum Pop
Gold per dollar: 100
Credits per dollar: 50
Return of the Mystery Machine
Mysteries have come and gone since part 1 of Spotlight: Cash went live, and surprisingly none of them were changed for release. All that remains is January 2024 Mystery 5, remarkable only for the poor value it represents. Perhaps that makes it an ideal candidate for Second Dinner to revamp before it goes live.
January 2024 Mystery 5
Tokens per dollar: 50
Gold per dollar: 27.5
Return Ticket
As predicted, January 2024 Ticket 2 received a sizable shot in the arm before release, raising its currency return from abysmal to pretty good. January Ticket 3 is a gold bundle we examined in this month’s Golden Opportunities article and recommended against. That leaves only Ticket 4, a great offer supplying 1,000 gold and 3,000 credits at $19.99.
January 2024 ticket 4
Gold per dollar: 50
Credits per dollar: 150
Step Up Your Game
Well, the good folks at Second Dinner have innovated another new way to get you to spend your money; they have introduced a series of bundles to the web store that unlocks sequentially as you claim them under the heading of “Vibranium Powered Offers.” Surely something so named must include Black Panther or Captain America, right? Maybe MCU Ultron or Vision? Nah, it’s more pushing of the Shuri-Red Skull archetype, fresh on the heels of Wakandan Wunderkind and Take Flight, Soar On.
The first two steps are free, supplying 100 credits followed by 30 Lizard boosters, and after that, we start the paid bundles. Coming in at $3.99, step three offers 500 credits, a Shuri variant and avatar, and boosters; it also unlocks a free 250 credits at step four. Taken together, 750 credits for $4 is excellent, comparable to and ahead of the set of mystery bundles in August and September that charged a dollar more for the same credit return. The next gate sits at step five, $9.99 for 1,200 credits and Lizard's cosmetics and boosters. Add to that another 700 credits for step six and Red Skull boosters for seven, and it comes out as another great bundle, just 200 credits shy of November’s Wolverine “Friend or Foe” web bundle at the same price.
The final few raise the price quite a bit, with step eight giving you 2,000 tokens and Sauron cosmetics for $29.99 and step nine being a freebie for another 1,000 tokens. Altogether, that is a good but not great value comparable to October’s Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing (2,500 tokens, 800 credits at $29.99). Step 10 is available for a whopping $49.99 and delivers 5,000 tokens, 650 credits, and a Red Skull variant and cosmetics, which makes for another excellent purchase.
Seen as bundles in their own right, all four pay gates here offer good currency returns, and there is, of course, added value for anyone still trying to collect these cards. However, a player who only wants one of the latter cards is roped into buying the entire series up to that level, and–the bigger problem–the entire thing is selling a specific deck archetype with a track record of meta success. Or, in other words, this is as plain a pay-to-win arrangement as Second Dinner has ever put into action.
Vibranium Powered Offers
Steps 3-4 credits per dollar: 187.5
Steps 5-7 credits per dollar: 190
Steps 8-9 tokens per dollar: 100
Step 10 tokens per dollar: 100
Step 10 credits per dollar: 13
The Queen Pays Credit
Kneel Before Your Queen is the barest sort of bundle, one kind of plain variant, one avatar, 10,000 credits, and enough boosters to get two infinity splits. The credits, the most ever offered outside of a Pro Bundle–which, of course, retail for twice the price–are the clear driver of sales for this one, so it’s a good thing that Second Dinner added in a casual 2,000 of them between data mine and release. That change raised Kneel Before Your Queen from a middling value on the order of August’s Death Becomes Her or October’s Clever Girl to probably the best value above $25 released to date. For anyone who doesn’t mind paying the price of a new triple-A game to get some progression in a mobile one, this is an excellent buy.
Kneel Before Your Queen
Credits per dollar: 200
Out of Step
Following the recent trend of bundles receiving bumps to their currency awards before release, you might expect Demon Legionnaire to have been beefed up. And it went all the way from 2,000 gold to 2,100. Even with that embarrassing augmentation, it remains in the worse half of bundles of all time, as the $19.99 price tag puts it in the same weight class as January 2024 Ticket 1 (2,000 gold, 1,500 credits) and January Ticket 4 (1,000 gold, 3,000 credits). Even Ice in the Veins, also released this month, supplied 2,000 gold and 500 credits at $14.99. By comparison, Demon Legionnaire’s 2,100 gold and no other currencies fall well short. Unless you cannot live without the cosmetics, give it a miss.
Demon Legionnaire
Gold per dollar: 105
Swing, Batter
As January’s last and largest cash bundle, One Man Battering Ram is data mined as providing 6,000 Collector’s tokens and 1,500 credits for $74.99, along with one variant and the usual accompaniment of avatar and boosters. That positions it as a mediocre value in a historical context, very much in the same category as the game’s two prior $75 bundles, Death Becomes Her and September’s Aspect of Heimdall.
Although it offers the biggest lump of tokens this month, One Man Battering Ram ranks as one of January’s worst bundles. However, with the strong ongoing shift away from tokens and toward credits in bundles, we should not be surprised to see this one rearranged before it hits the market.
On Man Battering Ram
Tokens per dollar: 80
Credits per dollar: 20
The Bottom Line
The conditions of rising bundle values relative to dollar spent and reduced consumer information that we identified earlier in the month continue, as we have seen January 2024 Ticket 2, Kneel Before Your Queen, and Demon Legionnaire all enlarged from their datamined values, just in the last two weeks. Consequently, it is increasingly challenging to say what bundles will or will not be worth purchasing looking ahead. Even once a bundle has entered the shop and its value set, it might be superseded by another in a week without forewarning. Add in the turn toward pay-to-win marketing strategies evidenced by Wakandan Wunderkind and especially the Vibranium Powered Offers step-up bundles. Marvel Snap is as uncomfortable a place to spend money as ever.
Best tokens per dollar
- Vibranium Powered Offers steps 8-9 and 10 (100)
- One Man Battering Ram (80)
- January 2024 Mystery 1, January 2024 Mystery 2, January 2024 Mystery 3, January 2024 Mystery 5 (50)
- Wakandan Wunderkind (10)
Best gold per dollar
- Ice in the Veins, January 2024 Mystery 4, Kings in the Castle (133.33)
- Demon Legionnaire (105)
- Naughty or Nice?, Bubblegum Pop, Wakandan Wunderkind, January 2024 Ticket 1 (100)
- Season pass premium [if you reach 49] (90)
- January 2024 Ticket 4 (50)
Best credits per dollar
- Kneel Before Your Queen (200)
- Vibranium Powers Offers steps 5-7 (190)
- Vibranium Powers Offers steps 3-4 (187.5)
- January 2024 ticket 4 (150)
- Cherry Blossoms (146.67)
Best overall currencies per dollar*
- January 2024 Ticket 4 (212.61)
- Ice in the Veins (201.80)
- Kneel Before Your Queen (200.54)
- January 2024 Ticket 1 (200.10)
- Vibranium Powered Offers steps 3-4 (194.24)
*Expressed as credits per dollar, valuing gold at 1.25 credits (shop rate) and tokens at 1.4 gold (modern Token Tuesday rate), and adding 25 credits for each new card and variant
Thank you for joining us to look at January’s cash bundles and the effect that money has on the game of Marvel Snap. We will see you back here soon to cover February’s bundles. Until then, have fun hulking out!