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32: An Amazonian Woman of Any Type
203 Plays4 days ago
🧑🚀 To Infinity and Ultron!! 🚀
For our esteemed listeners’ consideration:
- Week in Snap 🫰 (and keep it snappy!! (🫰🫰) )
- 🌖 Khonshu 💀 The First Ghost Rider
- What If..the cohosts ranked the cards from next season? 😏
- Secret Homework: Past Prediction Profits 📈 & Pitfalls 📉
Follow us on Twitter/Bluesky:
Check out the other great shows in the Snap Judgments Network:
- Snap Decisions
- Snap Judgments
- The InfiNOT Podcast
Join us on Discord! 👾
- Join the server
- Head into the channel "welcome-rules-and-tickets"
- Find the "SJPN Podcast Fans" message, and press the button for Snap On This!!
Featured decks:
Credits:
- Cover art by Lauren
- Snap On This!! Theme by Ben
- YouTube thumbnail by Lauren’s kid, Reggi
Timestamps:
- 0:00:00 Intro / Our Week in Snap / High Voltage Post-Mortem
- 0:41:40 New Card: Khonshu
- 0:52:40 New Card: The First Ghost Rider
- 0:53:36 OTA Discussion
- 1:07:48 April Card Ratings
- 2:00:07 Secret Homework: Card Prediction Hits and Misses
- 2:11:49 Next Week's Secret Homework
- 2:14:19 Housekeeping / Closing Remarks
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Episode 32
00:00:01
Speaker
Hello there, discerning listener, and welcome to episode 32, if you can believe it, of Snap on This, a Marvel Snap podcast. I'm your host, Lauren Whatevs.
Ben's Week in Marvel Snap
00:00:11
Speaker
With it being even-numbered episode, as far as I know, we're going to throw it over to Ben first.
00:00:16
Speaker
Ben, how was your week in Snap? And keep it snappy. Whoa. My weekend snap. Endeavoring to keep it snappy, as I so often do. um It was alright. It was pretty decent.
00:00:30
Speaker
um Let's see. What happened this week? I finished up high voltage. Just got it all done. Got it out of my system with a few days to spare.
00:00:40
Speaker
I used exclusively a safety blade deck that I have since deleted. And i I would tell you about what was in it, but...
00:00:51
Speaker
ah It's gone from my memory. Great job safety plays. The deck worked. I played that one a bunch too. um High Voltage is's over tomorrow anyway.
00:01:03
Speaker
Yeah, I just decided I wasn't even going to try to have any fun with it this time. I was not going to build any decks. I was not going to do anything creative. I was not going to test any ideas. I just wanted this stupid card that they hit at the end of the rewards track this time.
00:01:18
Speaker
I don't know about y'all, but I skipped that Iron Man variant last time or whatever. Could not be bothered. No, no, no. Like, i already had the card. No, I got it last time. Yeah. I like how your goal is to be less creative. That does surprise you.
00:01:32
Speaker
Well, the thing is, like there's only so much of me to go around. like i I really try to, like when i when I apply myself to something, I really do bring the A game.
00:01:42
Speaker
um So I just didn't didn't feel like ah putting on the whole production for high voltage ah game mode, about which I feel ambivalent at best.
00:01:53
Speaker
Perfectionist problems. I realized I would be... yeah not I would be happier just having the first Ghost Rider sooner and not caring about anything else. And that was fine. And i yeah I guess I played a bunch of it. I did make top three in ah the Alliance Bounty Points, which I think mostly happened Tuesday morning.
00:02:16
Speaker
ah probably preparing for, ah yeah, I, I have no idea how that happened. I don't feel like I've been playing a ton of snap. I think, I think it was because I'd done the ladder climb on Tuesday morning or Tuesday afternoon of last week.
00:02:31
Speaker
Wednesday morning, i I think I climbed to infinite before we recorded the podcast last week. And that's when I got all the bounty points. That all adds up. But you may be wondering, what was i what was I playing when I was racking up all these bounty points?
00:02:44
Speaker
Because I can't tell you about the safety blade deck that I played in high voltage. So what was it? ah Mostly it was Silk Scream, my ah deck with Silk and Scream in it.
00:02:54
Speaker
ah It's still real good, still real fun. Been playing it since before Scream was nerfed. um
00:03:03
Speaker
Or nerfed most recently. or what what are i Has Scream been nerfed more than once? My my brain is... ah just one hit Just once, Just once. It just feels like twice.
00:03:14
Speaker
That's fine.
Decks and Strategies Discussion
00:03:16
Speaker
All right. So yeah, I was playing that. I was also testing a lot of fire hair ideas that didn't really work. And now some Khonshu ideas that I can't tell if they really work. ah the The meta is weird. And a lot of people are also playing Khonshu things and ah locations. And yeah, as ah as I'm sure we'll we'll discuss, are we going to discuss Khonshu? I forgot what the format change is.
00:03:41
Speaker
We're talking about Kanshu. Okay, then I'll save my Kanshu thoughts for later. Interesting card. um But more more on that later. Yeah, I tried fire hair things that weren't working. Probably more on that later, too.
00:03:52
Speaker
Man, lots of things we'll be talking about later. So, yeah, still love Scream. Still love Surfer. There's still cool things to do. Raven's still great. Keep playing the decks I've already told you work.
00:04:05
Speaker
ah They still work, and I haven't built new ones that work. So ah stick stick with the classics if you want to if you want to play anything that I made. Yeah, I still need to play more Wave Flourish. I think I played it, like, twice, and I need to, you know...
00:04:22
Speaker
Give it. I feel like maybe I need to give one or two updates on a couple of other topics in case you're worried about it. I have, I have cleared a 32 on the surface in Hades two with the most recent patch. I've defeated Typhon, but I'm trying to do it with at least one aspect for all six of the nocturnal arms. So that's, that's one more mountain to climb.
00:04:47
Speaker
yeah, just Just thought people really wanted to know about that. ah The aspect in question, I believe it was aspect of Moros on the twin flames.
00:04:58
Speaker
um the are the the I don't remember what. that they They've got a name. Igneum. I forget what kind of flames they are. But they're flames, and there are two of them.
00:05:09
Speaker
It's the Twin Blades. It's the something else flames. mr Names, they're they're important, but are they? anyway Anyway, yeah, those those were the two decks that I wanted to recommend. Wave Flourish and Silk Scream.
00:05:23
Speaker
um I got an Infinity Ticket with Silk Scream. I guess I should mention that. that That was the most exciting Conquest thing you could do until...
00:05:34
Speaker
I suppose is, is infinity conquest. Now the thing I should be worried about is it, is it that week? Have we reached the final week? It always sneaks up on me. So yeah, infinity tickets. Those are old news. It's time to convert them, baby.
Bugs and Gameplay Issues in Marvel Snap
00:05:49
Speaker
All right.
00:05:50
Speaker
this time next week I'll be telling you about the avatar have you guys noticed a bug I assume this is I think I saw a team answer I've lost so many tickets because I keep forgetting that this will happen it happens like the first time ah you try to join a conquest of any kind it like matches forever and then like freezes and kicks me out and I've just lost a ton of tickets because I keep forgetting it'll do that and it happens again that was the There was actually a topic I was like, I hope I remember to talk about this in my Week in Snap. And that's the general bugginess of just like everything about this game. Oh my God, all the pieces are falling off.
00:06:24
Speaker
It sucks to lose that many tickets like when I'm like, I need to i need to get myself a debris variant. They said for like this week only, they're automatically giving tickets as compensation.
00:06:37
Speaker
they're not making up for the 10 I already lost. Yeah, or what if you lost one on like game four or game five? like It's nice to get the ticket refunded, but it doesn't like change the fact that you blew your run. like no it like really really sucks. Yeah.
00:06:54
Speaker
flows yeah The flip side of it is if you notice it's happening fast enough, restart your game, get in, then you get a free win. I tried that. But like, no, every time that I get back, it by the time I get back in, because it takes forever to load on my phone or whatever, it's like escape.
00:07:14
Speaker
Yeah, I think the safest way already, okay, I already, to be honest, I only play Snap now on what I call my Snapsle, which is my old phone. I had to get a new phone because the battery died. So the older phone only works only plugged in, but my new phone isn't, I don't know, the game crashes on it constantly.
00:07:32
Speaker
so i play my old phone plugged in. That is now my Snap console or my Snapsule, which has contributed to the lesser amounts of Snap I play now, to be honest. And if they would fix this so it so wouldn't crash on my other phone, or I wouldn't lose all my Conquest tickets, that would be great.
00:07:53
Speaker
it's a like I feel like the the bugginess is getting just like worse and worse at and at an alarming rate. because like I used to be one of these people who was not having problems, and I would listen very politely while other people told me about all their problems they were having, you know like starting games and stuff. and like It would happen to me like every once in a while, and I'd be like, wow, this stinks. That happens to you a lot, doesn't it?
00:08:18
Speaker
That really sucks. I believe you, but that that really sucks. I'll have to use my imagination, but I no longer have to use my imagination. The game is falling apart before my eyes. Okay. yeah I read it was somebody on Twitter who was saying like the game, they have to restart their game like every four matches. I'm like, I love Snap, but I don't know how long I would keep playing it if that was the state that it was in. Like, that's terrible.
00:08:44
Speaker
Oh, to to preview some Khonshu discussion, just because it it relates to this, I was having a lot of difficulty playing on my phone because my discard pile kept lying to me about what was in it.
00:08:57
Speaker
cards that were like but like Cards that I played like two games ago. like Like, what is going on with that? You kind of need to know, like, what's the point of displaying my graveyard if it's going to...
00:09:08
Speaker
spin fictions. Like, if it's going to tell me stories about cards that are not in it, like, what the fuck? It's completely... That's ridiculous. So it's real hard to play a Khonshu deck, like, effectively, if you think different cards are in your discard pile than actually are Um...
00:09:26
Speaker
Just so you know, be careful about that.
Creative Freedom in Comics and Cinema
00:09:28
Speaker
I don't know if that happens every, like it wouldn't happen to me on the PC because I'm sure the deck tracker would display an accurate discard pile for me. But as I mentioned last week, I'm pretty much exclusively mobile these days.
00:09:41
Speaker
Okay. That was my weekend snap. I relinquished the, the, the conch or whatever. Okay, yeah, the conch gets passed, too. The conch? Can it be like an ocarina?
00:09:52
Speaker
Okay, say. Absolutely. It can absolutely be an ocarina. The ocarina of this week in Snap. Three! Okay, say. A big ocarina.
00:10:05
Speaker
Songs to summon the wind. Okay, um... um My week in Snap um is about, okay, so something, normally I don't remember things that I've said, because my mind is just better tuned for remembering dialogue options I've chosen in video games and things.
00:10:27
Speaker
said in real life. The consequences are obvious in video games, right? So the narrative is just, I know. That's how my brain works. Anyway, but some was bothering me as it does when I say something that I immediately disagree with in the back of my head.
00:10:41
Speaker
it's been getting me I was talking about, and so this is, I said it would be Daredevil. It is Daredevil thoughts, which I have very many. I've been a fan of Daredevil for a long time.
00:10:53
Speaker
Oddly, self is topic of discussion. But Daredevil, and we're going to say it's in relation to ah the Nouvelle Vague, where the the French cinema movement, the new wave.
00:11:09
Speaker
um and And how we get there is I have been saying, like, hey, I'm No. Let's start with what the French New Wave is, if you didn't know. Here's my fast, bad, so don't at me.
00:11:24
Speaker
a Summary of the French New Wave. Mid-century France, um they're talking about... This is where there's still a film's art. Do you remember when that was for games back when like Braid came out? Because I'm old.
00:11:39
Speaker
Yeah, I do. Can games be art? It's like any new media. Yeah. Yes, it's like UFOs. Of course it is. Without fail. It's a medium. It's a medium. And any medium that is medium for the human imagination, even if we disagree about what is, it has the potential to be art. Always. Every time.
00:12:02
Speaker
Yes. So, I mean, but that's where we're at in, you know, film is new enough to be like, it's new and it's a novelty. And therefore, you know, it's new and therefore garbage. So, like, so what they considered the most highbrow films at this time, let's say mid-century France.
00:12:20
Speaker
was basically like a camera put in front of a theater play. You know what i mean? Because that was what, you know, theater was like the highbrow thing. um So it was just kind of a very static camera with a play happening in front of it.
00:12:33
Speaker
And, ah you know, at this time, there was there's a young man called Francois Truffaut, which ah to my to my American ears sounds like someone ah fancy and rich, but was in fact a very poor, troubled kid who who snuck into movie theaters because he couldn't afford them and like to watch like American flicks and like B films and all kinds of things.
00:13:01
Speaker
And when this kid grew up and broke into that, like, upper crust PBJ sandwich of art academia you know, where we've decided, like, wealthy people get to decide what's good instead of, like, challenging people.
00:13:18
Speaker
of course. You didn't need to clarify.
00:13:24
Speaker
So, you know, and he's like, you know what? This is this is all garbage. You know, think the paper, the big paper that broke this open was like a certain tendency of French cinema. um But he basically said everything you think is no is garbage. Throw it out.
00:13:39
Speaker
The real art, the real art in film is like, are you seeing what like Hitchcock is doing and John Ford, like out in the America, you know, like this is, this is what art is. And and the reason it can be art is because it can be someone's like, it's it's someone's vision. It's not being tampered by the studios because they're famous. filmed way out the fuck in the desert doing cowboy movies and horror movies and nobody cares because they're B schlock films. So nobody is trying to like editorialize them. Right. And that's why they could make, um, really good films.
00:14:15
Speaker
And, sorry, I'm like under the weather. Making me kind of shaky. Okay. Um, And there's also the auteur theory that goes with this, which I disagree with, but I don't want to get really into, which is just the idea that like one person's vision is what makes great art. and not And I think that's ah a dangerous philosophy to get into, it's something that's made by a lot of people who each make individual decisions on it, all going to the credit and glory of one individual is a dangerous cultural affectation. But...
00:14:49
Speaker
um The part of this that I glomm on to is like the thing that these films did to Hitchcock, right? And John Ford's and cowboy films is they embraced the medium, right? And that's where you see like what, what, like the best we consider of each film.
00:15:10
Speaker
genre of each medium is like what actually uses the medium. When you think about comics, like people talk about Watchmen and stuff. And that's because it cannot be translated well into another medium. Like they couldn't do it well into, because why?
00:15:22
Speaker
Because it uses the language that of comics, you know, as part of the story. And usually the best pieces of art like this are also somewhat self-reflective. Okay. But this isn't, it's a daredevil.
00:15:36
Speaker
Coming back around Daredevil is what I had said was that, like, it's like these characters that don't get paid attention to um Sometimes they just put them out there and do weird stuff with them.
00:15:55
Speaker
kind of, like, it's weird and bad. I think I thinking about Black Cat and how I didn't like where they had gone with her. like... But then I thought about the French New Wave and how sometimes the best art is the stuff that is fringe because it is not editorialized because it doesn't have the the the restrictions that the editorial staff like put on Batman and Wonder Woman and Superman that kind of hold them back sometimes. you know
00:16:26
Speaker
um And like a great example of this is a silver surfer red by Dan
Daredevil's Storytelling and Adaptations
00:16:34
Speaker
Slott. um He's mostly known by people often talk about his superior Spider-Man.
00:16:42
Speaker
um But ah where I got to know. You often talk about his superior Spider-Man. No, I see this a lot. When I was part of Snap social stuff that I'm not really part of anymore, people often... was weird to me.
00:16:57
Speaker
That was like the number one comic I saw, which I read and liked. It's just like not like the top of my mind. It's just I think it's like one that a lot of people have read or something.
00:17:08
Speaker
But yeah, but it's not the one that I read. i I looked it up afterward. I felt so disappointed. Like i was like, we was excited. We'd read the same thing, but we hadn't read the same thing. i read some later, less good, superior Spider-Man run for which okay I feel the need to apologize.
00:17:27
Speaker
Like this this feels like my fault or at least the Des Moines Public Library. It is true that once, like, something gains success, they try to, like, once Superior Spider-Man did well, they're like, now we shall make Superior Iron Man. You know, like, let's do it for everyone. And, like, let's bring it back a million times. And, like, but, um...
00:17:46
Speaker
But okay, but Silver Surfer, right? And it's kind of because at this time, this wasn't a time that Silver Surfer was like, kind of big in any way. um and I think they just kind of let him do what they wanted with him. And he like, what Dan Slott did, very intentionally made it ah a Doctor Who story. He gives him a companion and they go off on all these space adventures that are insane and this wacky.
00:18:11
Speaker
And it's, you know, not what I was used to seeing out of Silver Surfer, but it really worked. um But the bad side of it was the example i want to bring up was was when they did it with Daredevil once.
00:18:28
Speaker
They... um Oh, man. theres Mark Wade wrote it. And there are things that Mark Wade wrote that I really like. and chris Was this like in the early 2000s? I think I did read this Daredevil run.
00:18:42
Speaker
Maybe. When he moves to San Francisco? And maybe his identity becomes public. Is that part of the thing, too? Yes.
00:18:53
Speaker
Yeah, they had to retcon it all later. They used, like, the Purple Man to retcon it from, like, Jessica Jones. Like, it was a Charles Solren later. But yes! So they're like, okay, like, guess Daredevil had just been under the radar and they're just like, do whatever! And they're like, okay, let's embrace as we don't always do his age. Because, like, you know, the superheroes should be all be really old by now. And so they...
00:19:21
Speaker
They made him like an old man and they gave him, they redesigned it. So instead of like his daredevil suit, it's like a literal like red business suit.
00:19:32
Speaker
like And he has a cane that he fights with. And they took him out of New York, out of Hell's Kitchen, and he's San Francisco. And it's not like it was the worst thing ever, but it's just like, what?
00:19:46
Speaker
oh What is going on? This is not... It was so insane. It's like, too much, too much. And it's like, why didn't it work? Removing his identity.
00:19:58
Speaker
Yes, and I think that's part of because when I think about what I like most about Daredevil, it's like, honestly, not really do himself. It's like, Hell's Kitchen kind of like the Gotham...
00:20:14
Speaker
ah You know, of the Marvel universe. And so, you know, yeah I do have a Batman tattoo. It was the first tattoo I got was Batman. symbol So like, it's definitely a big Batman So it's like, it's kind of that. I love how Daredevil stays ground level. He never gets to call. He doesn't get that power creep. I mean, not never, because it's, you know, comics and the history of everything. They've done everything.
00:20:36
Speaker
Mostly the best daredevil. It's all like crime. It's all like street level crime. You know, we're not like out fighting for this, you know, sake of the world. It's like stays focused kind of on on the streets on, so and you know, the little people kind of stuff. Yeah.
00:20:55
Speaker
I've been really watching the show with yeah with my fiance. like She hasn't seen it. And i just, I have been loving it. And like, I like forgot, like, you know, all the superhero content I'm doing, that's always so large, or that I'm always watching. And it's so large scale.
00:21:11
Speaker
And then to go back to Daredevil, just like, this is so good. Like, and part of it is, I think like the TV series have an opportunity to say tell better stories than the movies do. But, um or at least, you know, more character development stuff like that. But I'm just like,
00:21:24
Speaker
I love this. I want more like small scale superhero stuff. Like anyway, right. Also that Daredevil Netflix series is like, it's high quality in like a number of like, kind I mean like Vincent D'Onofrio, like just, as he elevates the dish as they used to say on MasterChef in like 2015.
00:21:46
Speaker
um and Right, it's excellent, and it has you know multiple good actors. Vincent D'Onofrio, definitely one of them, but it just I don't think it would hit the same if it was like big, cosmic-level...
00:22:00
Speaker
That's what saying. It brings down the stakes. We're used to seeing these big, like watching Scarlet Witch and her her ah progeny change reality.
00:22:11
Speaker
reality We're watching these, like the whole earth is threatened and stuff. We're watching Captain Marvel punch through ships. And you get to come back and you see Daredevil.
00:22:22
Speaker
And you him take a knife wound or something, and you feel yeah like, oh, what do you know? You feel like that hurts.
00:22:33
Speaker
that's what I love, Daredevil. brings it back to Fillmore as a great cast of characters. I love Elektra. I'm very picky about how she's portrayed. She's the Catwoman for me of the Marvel Universe.
00:22:44
Speaker
So like, I didn't care how the show portrayed her, to be honest. I like her to be a good one at heart. No, that super fair criticism. I, yeah. So, um...
00:22:56
Speaker
But, you know, speaking of cosmic threats and the Earth being threatened, I mean, like, I do feel a need to mention perhaps the greatest Vincent D'Onofrio performance as Edgar in Men in Black.
00:23:09
Speaker
Yeah. Sugar. Sugar in water. um just and It needed to be addressed. We can't talk about Vincent without Men in Black. um All right. All done. All done. I also, to be honest, because when I was young, like I said, I wanted to be a detective. i was very much like thought I would grow up to be like Vincent Donofrio's role in Law and Order Criminal Minds. I think it was called.
00:23:34
Speaker
but and I think right I get into the heads of serial killers because I can think like them, but I'm not a serial killer. I can just think like them. Let me stare at you while I figure out. I watched the show where that was Jonathan Groff's thing.
00:23:48
Speaker
Yeah, I know. It's so, it's just easy to love as a teenager anyway. So, um, So, yeah, and taking all that away from Daredevil kind of just took away Daredevil and didn't replace it with something that interested me.
00:24:07
Speaker
I like my, okay, no, that's, that's very ageist to me. and say I like my little old protagonist to solve crimes. So thinking about mysteries that I like, but like, of course obviously I think a little old protagonist should be able to carry out many things of all protagonist things.
00:24:26
Speaker
yeah We should all like to be so capable and our later years. Yeah. sometimes, you know, when they, when, when characters, you know, are taken out bed, but oftentimes, oftentimes when editorial takes their little fingers off and lets creators, you know, ah free get loose characters, you can get, yeah, you can get some of the best stories. i would love to hear,
00:24:54
Speaker
um From any of our listeners, I've been kind of struggling to keep up with things lately. But, yeah, like, there's so many little comics like that where it's, like, some little side character, but it's an amazing story. Anyway.
00:25:09
Speaker
ah So that's my not-weak-and-snap comic stock.
High Voltage Mode Critiques
00:25:15
Speaker
Oh, right as Lauren gets up. Lauren, how was your weak-and-snap?
00:25:21
Speaker
Yeah, the fiance is sick, and I don't know what the kid's excuse is. So I'm umm on dog duty myself. I appreciate the patience. um Yeah, I did high voltage. I finished with, like I don't know, two and a half, three days to spare. finished being I got the first Ghost Rider, and I had zero intentions of ever playing high voltage again.
00:25:41
Speaker
I did actually play a couple more games today because there was a question of mechanics. Then I was like, oh, this is going to be easiest to answer in high voltage. So I went and did that. By the way, a Living Tribunal calculates twice, both before and after Omega Red. It's very weird.
00:25:56
Speaker
um That is weird. yeah So, Living Tribunal can activate or deactivate Omega Red, but then afterward will redistribute the power that Omega Red applied.
00:26:07
Speaker
Oh my gosh. fewer fewer Fewer points of checking. Just yeah fewer points of checking, please. Literally, the animation showed like Tribunal evening things out, and then Omega Red whipping, and then evening again.
00:26:23
Speaker
ah Anyway. That's not the point. It's part weird toting mess around their, like, windows of things happening. Well, Tribunal is certainly just, like, an edge case, right? Because they they never want Tribunal to be on the board, but you don't have even power. So he has to calculate last.
00:26:38
Speaker
I don't know why he also has to calculate before that, but anyway. Yeah. Surely to capture some some edge case or something, but... Well, I mean, like, you do need somebody to be winning at places the whole time.
00:26:51
Speaker
i don't know. Ugh. I guess I'm glad it's not my job to to make that fit together. But I wish whoever's job it was was better at it.
00:27:03
Speaker
Some of the calls are weird. um Like how Throne Room goes before Ajax, and that confuses people often. um Anyway, that that wasn't the point. The point was High Voltage 3, the most recent one, is my least favorite limited time mode that we have had so far.
00:27:23
Speaker
I didn't like high voltage the first time and I've liked it less each time it shows up. And I'm not here to just shit on it because again, i love snap. Generally, I like being a positive voice in the community. So instead of like criticizing high voltage, I'm like, why?
00:27:38
Speaker
i came out of it wondering if it was my fault because like I saw people who, um, I consider to be, similar sort of players to me, um you know, of various levels of of ah competitiveness, but who like, yeah, I had to like really try to make myself care about winning it in high voltage and suddenly it was fun. And I was like, but winning doesn't matter high voltage. Like a win is worth like one 40th of like an entire mission set.
00:28:10
Speaker
So like my experience going through high voltage, I, after like two days, I had built two decks to deal with the various missions I was getting. Um, I built a tribunal deck to to win all three locations.
00:28:22
Speaker
And I built a Mr. Negative deck that had like three, three fives that would go to zero cost and three sixes that would go to zero cost. And it was just, it's just a way to pump out as many five and six cost cards in a single game as possible.
00:28:36
Speaker
And it worked great, but it was still just like, it felt like such a chore every single time I got a mission refresh. It was like, okay, well, going to do my three games to knock out these missions.
00:28:47
Speaker
And it just doesn't matter. Like, you know, and so my first thought was like, well, is it because I'm more competitive than I thought and high voltage isn't about winning? And so is that why I didn't like it i' was like...
00:28:58
Speaker
That's not it because I'm not a competitive person. it's just, you know, I'm very, we've talked about the, the um magic psychographic profiles before. And I'm very much a Johnny. Like the part of games that I like is being able to express myself, being able to win in creative ways.
00:29:12
Speaker
I think they have some more interesting names. I yeah can never remember. i know I should know all the archetypes, but all the names. It's just so like how, you know, why all these actors got to be named Ryan? Am I supposed to remember?
00:29:25
Speaker
They all look too similar. I don't know. anyway Johnny Spikes it and Timmy's. So Spikes want to win as often as possible. there there are There's like Melvin and There's always more complication if you if you want to get to it.
00:29:39
Speaker
You name them as references to other nerdy things. It would be easier to remember. But those are actually the other Psychographic profiles. The other two are like, how do you find beauty in the game?
00:29:51
Speaker
Whereas the main three are, what keeps you Oh, I love that. How do you find beauty in the game? It's like a separate axis of whatever. Seeker of a Beauty. want that to be my title.
00:30:04
Speaker
Anyway, it's really cool stuff if you want to get into it. ah What's his name? Mark Rosewater, who has been lead... i don't know he still is. I think he is lead designer over Magic for a very long time. I would kind of be surprised if he still was, but like maybe. Who knows?
00:30:19
Speaker
I don't know if he's still at ah Wizards or not, but... He has written many articles and published many podcasts about game design, and it's fascinating, and I eat that shit up even if I don't play Magic.
00:30:32
Speaker
um Yeah, I read his column as ah as ah as a youngster, and I found it to be very ah you know influential and whatever. i don't know. My next thought went to this quote um from, I think it's Soren Johnson. It's a Civ IV designer.
00:30:49
Speaker
And it's like, given the opportunity, players will optimize the fun out of the game. I'm like, I think that's what happened here. I think I'm optimizing my resources. And the best way to play the game is not the fun way to play the game. And that's a fault of the game designer.
00:31:04
Speaker
And so I'm like, yeah, the first three words of that quote are ah the important ones given the opportunity. And yeah. So you either don't give them the opportunity or it's the job of the game designer to make the good strategy, the fun strategy.
00:31:20
Speaker
right there are plenty of board games and video games and all that where the optimal strategy is either really repetitive or really mindless or lets you skip a super fun section of the game it's like you failed something if you didn't make like the best thing to do also the fun thing to do and of course there's all kinds of go ahead I was going to say, no, I agree with you because I know I had talked it up a lot more, but I had a lot less fun this time. And I think part of it was like they didn't swap it. I thought, you know, we didn't get new bands.
00:31:50
Speaker
And so it feels even more solved than all the other times we played it. It's just a couple swaps, maybe for any new cards that came out, but it's still like Ebony Ma, Baron Zemo. It's like, okay, Rocket Raccoon goes in now in group, but like...
00:32:05
Speaker
um Yeah, and like, grindy. Like, my position I'm in is I haven't finished High Voltage. I thought I'd been playing fast enough, and I just, I've been sick, so I didn't play even yesterday, which is unusual for me. i almost always get my missions done, at least. But like, and should still be good. But then when i was talking to Lauren for before the podcast, she's like, no, it's almost out. And it's like, Yeah, that's what i thought last time. And I still have to the calm plus.
00:32:33
Speaker
It's not even casual enough anymore to grind out everything. than you know To get my Debris in. Not a good feeling. I love Snap, but I have a lot of other stuff happening in life. For real. like yeah ah Let me have my stuff. this is i'm ah i' but Once again, if I feel like if I'm a subscriber to the game, which I subscribe to it like it's in an MMO, I buy the season pass every month, like You know, like making stuff.
00:33:06
Speaker
Don't limit time stuff like that. yeah And there are like there are ways that I can add my own restrictions or goals to the game to make it fun again, right? And I do that. like the minding and ah Yeah, It's one thing where I'm just like, okay, the meta is not super fun right now. What if I try doing something zany or see some interaction I haven't seen before? you know I'm going to evolve Wasp all the way into death in a single move. like Something like With Cersei, I should say.
00:33:33
Speaker
um You know, I'm going to do something wacky like that makes me be creative because there's this new constraint, this new goal I haven't had before. But why wouldn't I optimize a time-restricted mode that gives me a game piece?
00:33:48
Speaker
Like, of course I'm optimizing it. Like, I have every incentive to make this this mode as little fun as possible. and As you said, the only bands that have been added, the second one added Eliath, the third one added Gambit.
00:34:02
Speaker
That's it. So I'm like, every single time we see high voltage, if it doesn't change, it's just going to be worse. Yeah. yeah Yeah, which makes me worry about Sanctum a little bit, too, to be honest.
00:34:18
Speaker
A lot of the fun of that was solving it, right? I would have played that for another week. Oh, baby. Yeah, I would have kept playing it, too. but but And so it's like it's a more complicated mode than Voltage is, and certainly winning matters more.
00:34:33
Speaker
ah you know optimizing it looks like carrying about how to get the most points possible like when often but also when you lose like get some points there too and like it's a more interesting problem i'm like how do you make high voltage more interesting and i think i think the answer is a lot more bands right either that or you have to add some rule that mixes up the game mode I think that high voltage, like, it's it's trying it's trying to be simpler, it's trying to be smaller. It's, like, three turns, so there's less time for interactions between your cards and the opponent's cards and stuff. like Yeah, it's hard to react.
00:35:09
Speaker
It is, like, squishing the game. Like, they this game has been put in trash compactor. It makes interaction impactful. You know what i mean? Yeah. I think that's what they want to, they would like that to be true.
00:35:21
Speaker
I'm not certain that it feels true when you're playing it, you know? Like, I can understand, like, why that would be, like, a theory that they wanted to test, like, do things feel more impactful if we make it a three-turn, tons of, like, energy flood, like, situation?
00:35:36
Speaker
And I can understand why that's a good question. You would want to find out the answer. i would argue the answer is
Game Mode Improvements
00:35:41
Speaker
no. Things don't feel more impactful in the three-turn energy flood situation. I disagree. juggernaut kind of deal. You know what mean?
00:35:50
Speaker
Like that kind of thing. They can't come back from shanging. You know, it's just like less time to recover. juggernaut on turn six is, I think it pops harder in my gameplay.
00:36:02
Speaker
because in my opinion, it doesn't because you've had less time to build into every lane. So a lane where you you're... cannonballing or something is always going to be more valuable where ends turns early because there's less time for them to do in the lane. Yeah, like he will have an outsized impact. And Jigarhawk can't solo a lane always on six.
00:36:22
Speaker
and That's true. guess I think the things you can do with them are more interesting and exciting in a turn six game. I think we have different play styles. So I think that's part of why it feels differently impactful to us.
00:36:35
Speaker
I always play more interactively, i think, generally speaking. I just think high voltage doesn't, it makes it hard to interact because it's hard to react. yeah And I see people call for like, ah this is supposed to be the mode where we do our big combos, like ban Shang.
00:36:51
Speaker
um And it's like, I get that. But also like, if you ban all of the tech cards, then it just is like, which deck can do the biggest combo the most often? And then everybody plays that. And so like, it doesn't really help.
00:37:04
Speaker
ah high voltage's problem maybe making matt ah making winning matter more would but I know a lot of people love high voltage because it is so casual it's like you should never be able to play a Black Panther Arnim Zola combo without like the fear of Thor upon you what that they're going to like shang you before you get that you know what I mean like it's why I end up sometimes taking Zola out of my destroy decks it's the most obvious play that people are expecting and it's the most countable thing so I don't know like I think I understand why people get frustrated with shang but it's like you need we need things you know like that to be taken out be able to I don't know
00:37:50
Speaker
Yeah, like I really get like how frustrating it is to lose to a Shang. But also, i think the game would be even more miserable if he wasn't in it. like Just protecting you. With great power comes infinite corruption. It's not one of the cards I would think about banning from the mode. That's all I'll say.
00:38:10
Speaker
yeah i know people have strong feelings about that card in particular, and I don't i i don't really want to talk about him too much because folks have feelings. Yeah. every counter card people have strong feelings about if it's the thing that counters the thing they love. Like, I don't care about Shang. I don't play cards that Shang can hit.
00:38:32
Speaker
I don't know. Yeah, I do worry about Sanctum being less fun the second time around or the third time around. Like, is this just a problem that's innate to these little game modes that keep coming back? I think part of it is that they highlight cards that are off meta, right? So, like...
00:38:47
Speaker
you know, your, your black Panther, ah for this mode or your, that's true. Yeah. That's a good point. Guardians in sanctum, like they're not good cards in ladder, so they don't get touched. So even if we wait three months until the next time we play sanctum again,
00:39:02
Speaker
the exact same good cards will be there exactly as they were untouched by any patches or OTAs. It's true. but like symptom comes around Maybe next time Sanctum comes around, people will stop playing the bad guardians and like maybe play more rocket raccoon.
00:39:21
Speaker
and I'm sure that's how it'll go. I don't know. Maybe a little less Drax. I don't know. That's just my, that's my advice to you, sweet listener. Next time Sanctum comes around, don't play Drax.
00:39:34
Speaker
Okay. My final thought on the matter is make the cards easier to acquire and then have extra things after that.
Khonshu's Impact in Marvel Snap
00:39:40
Speaker
Like if they were cosmetics at the top of the track, then it's on me if I'm going to push for those or if I'm just like, no, high voltage is not it for me. I got the card. I'm out.
00:39:49
Speaker
Um, and But I've also seen people who love high voltage who are like, I wish that there were more prizes for me to, you know, I want to keep playing it and I want to be rewarded for doing so. Oh, good for those people.
00:40:01
Speaker
So I don't doubt they're out there. I think there should be more prizes after the grand prize, right? Yeah, yeah for them, for sure. Diners that way and showdowns that way. That was where the sanctum shop was really good. it was like, hey, if you want to spend a lot of time here, there are rewards for you.
00:40:18
Speaker
What do you get after you get the last thing in diner, really? Like, you get to compete for the Bubz leaderboard for maybe getting a unique title something? The last thing the card. The card's, like, the fourth from the top, and then you get, like, two more boarders and the card's variant.
00:40:33
Speaker
But at some point, the giant thermometer is full, and, and like, there is no more diner for you. Correct. If you were, like, really loving the gameplay, just...
00:40:46
Speaker
Reel into that, I guess. like Diner, but mostly because it's just bladder. Like, it it's not really... you don't play that differently because there's extra snaps. This is true. Anyway.
00:40:57
Speaker
This week's card... Oh, I should say, we're thinking about doing a ah very slight... What was it? Ben, you teased it. Not a structure shift. ah a Anyway.
00:41:08
Speaker
We're changing taken up the format slightly. And we're we're thinking of not talking about next week's card, partially because it has this awkward situation where we talk about some cards three weeks in a row.
00:41:22
Speaker
In this case, it would be Kahori, where we talk about her in in weekly rankings, and the next week we talk about her as next week's card, and then the following week we talk about her as the current week's card. Let us know what you think, but we're not going talk about next week's card this week, except that we're doing the season rankings.
00:41:39
Speaker
um Okay, Konshu. Discard card card six five goes to 6-8, goes to 6-12 when you discard him. The on reveal is to resurrect a card you discarded to another location with its power set to 12, depending on the phase of your cone shoe.
00:41:57
Speaker
Did you get him? What do you think?
00:42:02
Speaker
I did, yes. um Interesting card.
00:42:09
Speaker
Um, again, i one of like the main things that I think of when I think of Khonshu is looking at my discard pile and not knowing what's in it because of the thing I'm like, that really does, uh, that affects how you play the card. Um, cause I, I can't always remember what's been discarded. uh,
00:42:32
Speaker
You know, sometimes it's, like, fairly simple. I'm like, oh, well, ah I know I've discarded only Apocalypse and Proxima Midnight this game, and, like, that's easy to keep track of because I can still see them.
00:42:43
Speaker
They're still around. ah The evidence, the proof is in the pudding. You don't have to explain it. I'm sure many of us play in a delirium of, like, our games blurring together being like, did this happen last game or this game? Did i already see the current...
00:42:59
Speaker
And the thing is, like with this discard pile glitch thing, it's like showing me cards that I have discarded in other games. like I'll i'll like switch decks, and it'll show me cards from the last deck I was playing in my discard pile.
00:43:11
Speaker
And like ah you know like these these are like credible lies. These are lies like presented in a tone of authority. like Those are the variants I have on those cards. They look like the real cards that could be in a discard pile. like is it should not the The game should not be lying so clearly.
00:43:27
Speaker
persuasively to me is is my thinking. um That's gross. Okay, but the card itself, ah it's very fun. It's very neato. um I guess the more successful of the decks that I built with them, I don't even know if I want to say what's in it. don't like it very much. um but You don't have to if it's not there yet.
00:43:49
Speaker
Yeah, it's not there yet. that's That's what I'll say. Actually, you know what? It's not thing. Screw it. Courage. that's That's what we're doing. All right. This deck is called Long Con, you know, ah like to as opposed to the short con.
00:44:03
Speaker
um And that's Blade, Morbius, Fenris Wolf, Ghost Rider, the first Ghost Rider, by the way. Gambit, Moon Knight, Corvus Glaive, that other Ghost Rider, Silver Samurai, Modok, Gore, and Khonshu.
00:44:18
Speaker
And I think I would probably swap Gore for iron man because i just don't like gore very much and i don't like that i don't know how big he is all the time you know like he's gonna i just he's i got gore he's gonna be big that's good enough silver samurai discards him though and like that's being played a decent amount right now Well, no, but like the plan is to discard him.
00:44:43
Speaker
you know Yeah. and bring That's why I've not been enjoying Khonshu, to be honest. I hate playing Discord mirrors. There's been so many. It's so hard to evaluate like anything about discard stuff right now. I've won so many matches this this week because people are discarding my Khonshu or my Iron Man or my gore. I'm like...
00:45:07
Speaker
if you can't play Moon Knight with Khonshu that's where at I just threw together because I knew this isn't I'm like I saw I already had been playing into some like like matches was four keys for me too but variants for the other guys since I told everybody about that bad Khonshu deck can i can I tell you about the second bad Khonshu deck yeah go ahead Okay, I'm doing it.
00:45:34
Speaker
All right, this one's got Hela in it. It's my first Hela deck. Very exciting. ah It's like this deck did not seem to work. ah This one's Blade, First Ghost Rider, Moon Knight, Corvus Glaive, Dracula, Ghost Rider, Iron Man, Modok, Gore, Gonshu, Hela, and Apocalypse.
00:45:49
Speaker
it's all the It's all the discard flavors. It's it's all the it's all the big things. It's it's all the final... the finishers it's too silly and you said it didn't go well yeah my i thought was like hey you know what would be cool you know what would be cool what if we discarded Khonshu three times three times and then we held him back and and got something else and you know what it happened a few times it was pretty fun uh did not feel hugely practical but I I like to try things that I can tell are not going to be hugely practical sometimes
00:46:25
Speaker
Yeah. just to You know, i I just wanted to get a sense of the card, what happens, what it does, who it's friends with. ah So, yeah, don't don't try the thing with Hela and Dracula and like all the all the stuff like that that. That's not that did not feel like a very fruitful ah option.
00:46:45
Speaker
um But, yeah, I'm having fun with the card. it it's it's so hard to play new cards when they come out because like everybody's playing the relevant stuff around them and it's just like it's weird and crowded and i just want to play in a normal metagame i don't know that's my thinking any anybody have strong feelings about khonshu
00:47:11
Speaker
Did play him at all, Lauren? Did you get Yeah, I did. i got him with four keys, but that also means I got Scorn. oh yeah, it was a four key week for me as well. I haven't played Scorn yet.
00:47:22
Speaker
um I have played a lot of Khonshu, actually, but only in one deck, which maybe makes me an irresponsible host, but I was having so much fun with Safety's deck. And...
00:47:34
Speaker
I really like, I've seen really mixed reactions on Kongshu from other people. Like some people who are saying it's bad and some people saying it's good. What's in safety stack? I haven't seen it.
00:47:45
Speaker
Yeah, I'll tell you in a second. But one thing that I think Safety's Blade... Safety's... Safety Blades deck does that I have seen very little of is, like, Konshu's, like, a little package in a good cards deck is how he's using it.
00:47:59
Speaker
You know, and I've seen some people doing some, like... I've seen quite a bit of Konshu Brood, which surprised me. Like, it's good. That's not real. I saw that, too, and I don't think that's real. Yeah. I have seen a few 5-power broods. I've seen one 12-power brood. like it's It's a little too... I saw a 12-power brood not in a game that they won.
00:48:22
Speaker
ah Yeah, they didn't win the one that i that ah for me either. partially because the 12-hour brood went on a lane where it could only make one broodling. It was like, okay, cool. yeah the You put a lot of effort into that one lane. Okay, this is safeties.
00:48:38
Speaker
So it's got First Rider, Blade, Sif, Ghost Rider, and Khonshu as like the discard package. It has Iron Man and Gora as our targets. Those are the main ones that we're trying to bring back.
00:48:54
Speaker
um And then outside of that, it has Kitty Pryde, Iron Patriot, Juggernaut, Hope Summers, and Galacta. um And yeah, sometimes it was just i first Ghost Rider gore and then bring it back with Ghost Rider. And then, but you know, it's just like, that's that's a good little chunk of power.
00:49:21
Speaker
Uh, sometimes, uh, the thing that I found really helpful with it, at least this week, this is not going to be an ongoing advantage of it, but because there's so many discard mirrors going, sometimes people had no idea i was playing a discard deck.
00:49:33
Speaker
And then all of a sudden I'm, you know, they discarded, they discarded some stuff for me and I bring it all back and but on the, you know, fifth or sixth turn. Um, Anyway, it is a little clunky and awkward. like if you There were times when I'm skipping turns two and three. It's like i could play a card, but like Blade would discard the wrong thing. or like that's you know That's discard for you.
00:49:55
Speaker
yeah it is definitely clunky, but I found Khonshu to very fun. It's just a lot of power. um just don't know if it can be consistent enough to be good-good, but...
00:50:11
Speaker
I don't know. I saw KM best had success with Konshu in a bullseye deck, so maybe maybe it can be consistent. one ah One other thing I think I i should have mentioned.
00:50:22
Speaker
i yeah i never really i never really get to play regular Ghost Rider. I've played more Ghost Rider in the past few days than I've ever played before in my Marvel snapping career. Pretty fun card, this Ghost Rider guy. We've been trying to tell you!
00:50:38
Speaker
Yeah, pretty cool.
00:50:42
Speaker
I recommend play ghostwriter. If you haven't yet, he's, he's a blast.
00:50:48
Speaker
Uh, also, uh, I, I think we'll be talking about him later, but, uh, yeah. Oh, first writer. Yeah. In just a sec. No, no. really join Classic ass ghostwriter. Uh, there, there are, there is a new reason to play classic ghostwriter. Yeah. He touched in the OTA.
00:51:04
Speaker
I was having fun with him back when he was a little four, four. yeah. Yeah. Sorry, you did want to say more about Khonshu? Oh, no. I was just saying, like, all the all the nice things I said about Ghost Rider just now were based on Ghost Rider before he even got the extra
Card Meta and Adjustments
00:51:20
Speaker
juice.
00:51:20
Speaker
I can't believe you right now. Okay. Rhi, did you say what you wanted to say about Khonshu? Yeah, I'm good. We can do that. Okay.
00:51:32
Speaker
ah Just this week, a transitional week, we're going to talk about Spotlight Friends for the current week's card. Scorn and Corvus Glaive. I've seen a lot of Corvus this week. I still don't think he's good. Scorn, you two tell me, is great. So I'm just going to trust you on that because I haven't tried yet.
00:51:49
Speaker
um Yeah, Scorn is still great. I've also played some Corvus. What was that? Oh, I said Corvus is still like, he's still, I don't know, he's what he was before. I mean, still have all the same reasons to play him or not that you did before.
00:52:07
Speaker
I don't know. Yeah. I still the one dislike the card and respect it, ah but I have played it a little more this week than I have in the past. Perhaps because I have a variant for it now. I don't know. But yeah.
00:52:18
Speaker
Powerful card that I still don't like. That's my assessment. One thing I saw with it this week was ah deck that was running Corvus and Khonshu and Hela and Odin. And then it was like, okay, maybe you you discarded your Hela, but Khonshu can bring her back. And if he doesn't, then, well, you played him on turn five, so you can hit him again with Odin. like The Odin was kind of a cool twist, but anyway. um And then first Ghost Rider, sounds like Ben and I have him so far, and Reed doesn't.
00:52:45
Speaker
He's the high voltage prize. two five on reveal. Discard the lowest power card from your hand. Remove that card's power from this. Targeted discard is good. I've seen a lot of people be disappointed by him.
00:52:58
Speaker
um I think part of it is just like... kind of needs to go with Hela or Cushion, but he's good there. i Who are these people who are disappointed and what did they expect him to be?
00:53:11
Speaker
That's what I'm wondering, too. like Did they not get the memo that you can't discard Hobgoblins? I don't know. I mean, you can discard Hobgoblins. if He won't lose power.
00:53:23
Speaker
He just won't gain...
00:53:27
Speaker
oh I thought he was kind of a narrow card. So, you know, yeah he's super narrow definitely accurate. I think he's good at his job. Okay. We had no TA today, just ah a tiny one, five cards. And most of the changes are very minor.
00:53:43
Speaker
uh iron patriot's uh discount is going from negative four to negative three i believe i called this i was like negative four is just too good at there's no way it lasts um before the card even came out they kind of blamed it on four cost cards going to free being the biggest problem there and yeah that makes sense free cards are very very good Definitely one of the problems. I still think this card is probably like, Bananagram's good. Like, still too good, probably.
00:54:13
Speaker
i don't know. That's just me. I don't know about too good, maybe. A three discount is still huge. Yeah. on On a six cost card, yeah. don't know. You know, little things that weaken it sometimes just add up just enough.
00:54:30
Speaker
Right, because is the next one... Because I kind of looped that in with Galacta, right? Is another season pass card. She went from 4... Sorry, I'm just saying it for you. No, you're fine.
00:54:42
Speaker
But she went from 4.6 4.5. And these two own together. Because one, they're season pass cards, which we're always paying attention to the power level of those comparatively and when kind of they get nerfed. Because it does seem that it kind of follows cycle of raining for like a month or two. Yeah, like a of players.
00:54:58
Speaker
Getting nerfed, you know, as they write off a little bit into the sunset. So I did notice. But I do think, and I was wondering, it's like, is that like really? And you know what mean?
00:55:09
Speaker
One point of power, it's kind of always so easily to immediately dismiss it as like, What is this, you know, what does this really change? is It's not going to change whether I play the card or not, but it does hurt the win rate of a card when I think about this. Because, like, I won a game the other day in part because my Galacta, soloing a lane, tied the Iron Lad, you know that was on the other side lane. And now she's not going to tie an Iron Lad, you know what I mean? So it's like...
00:55:39
Speaker
You know, the situations add up, but it's like they do feel like really tiny nerves. So, like, we'll see. yeah I think both cards are still great. They they they were too strong.
00:55:50
Speaker
They were everywhere. Yeah, I think that like proportionally, like the Iron Patriot nerf feels like larger on what Iron Patriot was. Because it's a cost nerf.
00:56:03
Speaker
and Yeah, but I think that Iron Patriot is still like so must-play-ish, and Galacta is still going to be good at her Galacta jobs. I just think that like Iron Patriot took the bigger hit but is still further outside of the norm like power-wise, is still more of an outlier, like is still more of the too good card. you know i think the reasons for that like compared to Galactur are one, it's much cheaper, which it's easier. It's so much easier for one of your cheaper cards to whiff than for a more expensive card to whiff on what you want it to do because there's no downside to Iron Patriot.
00:56:46
Speaker
So you get a card you don't really want to play. or is sometimes I get a card and I just play the next turn without even getting the discount on it. Because it's the best thing I got. I've watched that happen all the time.
00:56:57
Speaker
Right? sometimes when you're playing Agamotto or stuff. But like... um And so it's like, you know, and it's like, okay, if you miss the hit in the two or three, if you miss the hit in the card and you just don't play the card, it's... And also it's doing things like like dictating where your opponent's probably going to play, doing other things for you. It just does so many things for you without enough downsides to that thing. You know what i mean? Whereas like Galacta, there's a point where you... You know, there's been a point where on turn four or five or whatever, or in high voltage, on it's like I don't play Galacta because that's not going to be my optimal power thing, right? Yeah.
00:57:37
Speaker
And with Iron Patriot, you get them early enough. You always want to, right? ahead. What were you saying about Galacta? I think that one thing about this nerf is that now Galacta is out of the way so that Kohori can be new Galacta.
00:57:53
Speaker
Gwenpool can go back to being old Gwenpool. Galacta's just like stepping aside so that the other four-cost Galacta-type cards can do their four-cost Galacta-type things.
00:58:06
Speaker
And they've said that, which, right, they said they're fine with having, like, just a more powerful set cards. They've called it, like, shifting the meta, but what they mean is they're fine with newer cards. You're we like how it changes the meta, but what it means is, like, hey, newer cards, just probably going to be better. And then it's, like, fine.
00:58:25
Speaker
is a And their idea of balancing it is, like, we'll bring out these modes that'll make the bad cards playable for, like, a week. You know? I don't completely hate this strategy, because one thing, if you're releasing cards that are strong, and then once they're a couple months old, you tune them down to everything else, that that's one way to fight power creep, right? Like, there's a little bit of power creep, but it's not...
00:58:49
Speaker
ongoing, like the entire... I feel like it is, though. I feel like there it is. Yes. yes um like we have You do not play vanilla... like You used to like do things like play surfer patriot, and like Cyclops gotta be... like He would never do that anymore because it's like, why would you ever play?
00:59:12
Speaker
Anyway. i think and there are meta decks that are rocking 6 plus series 4 or 5 cards. so yeah um Cyclops and Patriots are... I forgot about Cyclops and Patriot Surfer.
00:59:26
Speaker
Once upon a time you did it. That was definitely that that was the thing. That was that was real. Once upon a time you could play Cyclops somewhere besides High Evo. Not ironically. Not ironically.
00:59:40
Speaker
yeah i only play codes ironically i mean kind of sometimes um don't all i think it's interesting they called out rate cards which is i think what we would just call good cards or some some people call it mid-range or just kind of a sloppy term i think uh anyway um i think ah They called out that they don't want cards that don't need any interaction at all to consistently be better than cards that do have synergy. And I agree with that. like old there and
01:00:11
Speaker
I think it's great when good card decks are good because it means those are usually when the meta is the most diverse because kind of anything can work. um But I agree that if you're paying if you're paying and investing for synergy, if you're gambling on drawing combos, like that should pay off when it happens.
01:00:26
Speaker
Yeah. Okay. Next up, Pixie goes from 2-1 to 2-2. yeah I don't think this suddenly makes her great, but like you were talking about, a point power good. I want to love She's a fairy. I want to play her, but I can't figure out what um anything that I want to do with her to be honest. You should talk to Adam. Adam likes Pixie a lot.
01:00:48
Speaker
um Pixie's a fun guy. think I did want to get some Pixie decks. I think when I did ask him, he's like, haven't been playing lot. months ago though we'll find out i guess this change is nothing to me like this it is 100 increase in her power like it sure is she has the same she's not a ravona card anymore Not that I don't know if that matters.
01:01:13
Speaker
She wasn't really, anyway. like Nothing is. Ravonna is like a negative card now only, and I hate it. I miss my own Ravonna. I keep trying. i you know There are all these cards that would go in maybe a first Ghost Rider-y kind of deck where you're like, could I also play Ravonna here? No.
01:01:31
Speaker
you can't. Every time I make a Ravonna deck, I send it to my friend Frank, and he's like, oh, you made a negative deck without the negative. I'm like, give Because I don't play negative.
01:01:42
Speaker
And it's like this deck would be better as negative. Because what if all of a sudden all these cards flipped? And it's just like, oh, Ravonna. She's always playing second fiddle to a megalomaniac. Just be your own woman, Ravonna. You can lead an army. For real but um maybe Maybe we could do like an ongoing thing with Ravonna. Like a Spectrum Ravonna deck. You know you get a Iron Man Mystique. Yeah, I've tried that in the past. I don't know how much more there is.
01:02:11
Speaker
problem is, it gets easy. I've done this before. It gets so easy for your Iron Man not to be able to get big because you didn't put enough power in. Exactly, that is the thing.
01:02:23
Speaker
I've done that many a time. Like, a little weak, weak, limp Iron Man is the saddest thing. Sure, it'll work out if your Sage gets huge, if you get lucky, but like... ah yeah you don't think it's I don't think it's that it's hard to make a good Ravonna card. I think it's that it's basically impossible to make a good Ravonna card that isn't also a good negative card.
01:02:46
Speaker
I mean, if the card has such that you want to discount it, then it's also, why wouldn't you want to discount it even more? don't know why I can't like negative. can't. i also can't like negative cards.
01:02:59
Speaker
I love negative, but acknowledge that he's a scourge of conquest mode, and so they don't touch him because
Season Rankings and Deck Strategies
01:03:06
Speaker
only affecting conquest mode. Also, it's a deck where you need card to show up. I hate decks where you need that one card to show up. Ever since Ravonna came out, you don't need negative show that the thing. the thing is, negative should be, oh, you need the one card to show up deck.
01:03:21
Speaker
Like, it's supposed to be that kind of deck that I hate, and it currently is not. And, like, that's... You put it away in the wrong place. You put this in the drawer where it doesn't go, actually. Like... yeah And negative is my tilt to play against, right? Like, you see, like, it's turn two. They play Ravonna and snap, and you're like, well, fuck, I guess we just retreat until you don't draw your negative combo, and then I snap, you know? It's just, like...
01:03:47
Speaker
I get why it's good to teach people like you know the very simplistic beginner 101 basics of snapping.
01:03:58
Speaker
but like i used to recommend negative as a beginner card because and before it was so consistent. It was a very good deck for knowing when to snap, when to retreat. Yeah.
01:04:10
Speaker
In the speakeasy this week, which is our liked our Discord channel for for Snap on this, in the Snap Judgments League Discord, ah we were talking about ways to fight Negative without Mobius.
01:04:22
Speaker
And Wombat Combat was like, we're going Viper over ah Fenris Wolf after we've discarded Negative and then play Negative again right before their Jane pops off so Jane doesn't draw anything. And I'm like, yeah, that'd be a great clip, but that's not real. Like...
01:04:37
Speaker
oh The dream of vipering anything is like... We're going viper over firehair, and then we're going to use Lady Deathstrike on their Mr. Negative. um It was fun.
01:04:50
Speaker
anyway. I feel like a good Lady Deathstrike. Sauron, this is probably the most significant change here. ah Goes from a 3-4 to a two two The most significant change to a single card. I don't know if it's the most significant change to a deck, because I still don't think Shuri Sauron's going to be meta.
01:05:07
Speaker
Um... Right, we talked about, I mean, we were slightly chatting about this before, but the problem is, is that like, Surtr doesn't need Sauron to get big cards. It has so many other ways to get big cards, and it's almost just better to go like a Zabu, Crossbones, you know, whole Obsidian kind of route than Sauron, because it's like, you can get big cards without worrying about having to draw Sauron.
01:05:35
Speaker
Right. Well, it's true Sauron's Yeah, Shuri's, like, that deck doesn't really put out anything that's much bigger than Surtur. Exactly! Yes, Shuri Red Skull is huge, but other than that...
01:05:47
Speaker
And you don't have the crossover where your backup cards that you want to play in Sauron, like, zero and stuff. You're not, like, zero doesn't help you with, like, crossbones or quilts. You know what i mean? The other things you're doing.
01:05:59
Speaker
And I meshed the two to together, and it just didn't. It's like, oh, poor Sauron. Dude just wants to make a Dynatopia. does help a lot with playing Starbrand. Like, that curve is a lot less awkward now.
01:06:15
Speaker
I want to try. I have a soft spot for Sorin. want to see what i could and can do with it. But ah to me, this was the only like real impact. Like a cost change is almost always pretty impactful on a card, right? Iron Patriot kind of had a cost change.
01:06:31
Speaker
um Ghost Rider,
01:06:36
Speaker
Right after Ben started caring about the card for the first time ever. I thought 4-4 Ghost Rider, pretty cool. 4-5 Ghost Rider, pretty cooler. Yeah. agree. Super needed. like ghost Poor Ghost Rider.
01:06:50
Speaker
I hadn't played him in a discard deck in a while. and you know I'm a huge fan of... But like the question is...
01:06:59
Speaker
Why do we get this change when first Ghost Rider just came out, which is like already going to offer Ghost Rider way better options than were previously available? It seems like kind of like giving him two buffs in the same week and then also Khonshu, sure. Like, I think Khonshu and Ghost Rider make it so that there's critical mass, where now I have two ways to revive something I discarded. I can run discard revive as a small package instead of an dedicated thing. Yeah, I think...
01:07:30
Speaker
um i yeah i think I don't know. I think first Ghost Rider probably would have been enough. I don't think Ghost Rider really needs this extra point of power in this new environment. But hey, I don't know. I'm not an expert on the card yet. I only started playing them five minutes ago. So who knows? I think it's ah it's a weird card to buff.
01:07:50
Speaker
All right, we're going to talk about April card rankings. This is the season for What If. um Our ranking system is like, it's a four-point scale. It was originally supposed to be two thumbs up to two thumbs down, but my co-hosts turned it into a four-point scale, and that's fine. That's what it is. It's not points, it's stars.
01:08:10
Speaker
Yeah, mine is stars now. that's That's how it's represented in my notes. Anyway, one to four. um Because, i don't know, I just, I didn't want, it's too easy to put something in neutral if that's one of the options.
01:08:22
Speaker
I think about it in Netflix terms, like, hate it, dislike it, like it, love it. Yeah, me too, except it's less about my feelings and more about how strong I think it is.
01:08:34
Speaker
Okay. First up, our season pass card, Captain Carter, a 4-3 ongoing. Add this card's power to your back row cards here. Can't add to itself.
01:08:46
Speaker
ill I'll manage the rotation. I'll go first with this one. I gave her ah three. um She's very easy to put into the same category as Gwenpool, Galacta, and Kahori.
01:09:02
Speaker
She's a four. That gives a bunch of power. um But hers is, I think hers is the trickiest to avoid.
01:09:11
Speaker
to gain and it's also limited to a single lane so it's like less flexible just makes her a more niche card that said it's a lot of power if you can buff her right like if you hit her with galacta or spectrum or captain america she's like 415 418 you have to put two cards behind her and she's a full it's like she's just a little clunky I'm kind of surprised she's the season pass card.
01:09:37
Speaker
um I mean, the character makes sense. the ability doesn't make sense for a season pass card in my mind.
01:09:46
Speaker
How about you, Ben? Yeah, I struggled with what exact number to give this because like the potential is obviously very, very, you know, it's enticing.
01:10:00
Speaker
The ceiling's mighty high, huh? You know, like, but I'm reminded of a card that I'll be talking about later. A little bit reminded of a Scarlet Spider, you know, like the other four costs, Sebastian Shaw type thing where, you know, like you want to give this power in your hand or whatever.
01:10:20
Speaker
I, the thing about Captain Carter is that like, she's just on the one lane, just on that one lane. And like, I do like that. She's a four nine, you know, like fresh out of the box. If you can fill the entire lane,
01:10:37
Speaker
But that's kind of a big if, like especially since she has to get out there before the last two cards. And like like you said, that's very like that's a hoop to jump through. That's that's an imposition. That's clunky.
01:10:49
Speaker
I feel like the same people who thought that Ms. Marvel would be too hard to fulfill are probably the same people who think this will be easy to fulfill. Yeah.
01:11:02
Speaker
they're going to be wrong about both. i know I've just invented, I've, I've invented a hypothetical person to be wrong about two different things in different ways, but like, I bet, I bet there's people like that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
01:11:14
Speaker
I'm just saying, like, I, I bet they're out there. The, the people who were like, no way, Ms. Marvel will never work, are probably also the people who are like, I bet, I bet Captain Carter's the easiest thing in the world to use.
01:11:27
Speaker
I don't understand. don't know why. I just think those people are are going to make the same mistake or different mistake. I don't i don't know. I think this card is a little clunky, but like just the the raw power. I mean, like cards only have to be big in one lane. I think it's cool when they're big in more than one lane, but this card is real big in one lane, and like,
01:11:45
Speaker
say you've got the empty lane, you play captain Carter here, then you play brood, boom, problem solved. You don't even have to like, think about it that hard. You know, that's, uh, That's it. Or you could play another card there first, then Captain Carter, and then, i don't know, Mr. Sinister or something.
01:11:59
Speaker
I don't know. But like if we're playing Mr. Sinister, if i'm if I'm conjuring hypotheticals that involve playing Mr. Sinister, like that's the red flag right there. i don't know.
01:12:10
Speaker
i So I went with three. They're not going to let this card be bad. It's a season pass card. And for the for the record, I don't think this is going to be an issue where if it releases like this, it will be bad. like i think...
01:12:23
Speaker
I think this is a fine card that's good at its job. i just don't think... I think that it does require some hoop jumping, and it's kind of limited in what it does and who it's willing to do it with.
01:12:38
Speaker
So, I don't know. Three. Yeah, ah that's all I'm saying. Three. I gave it lower than both of you. gave it a two. Interesting. Which, like, I think because the reason, i mean, lot of it was ah what Lauren was saying, um touched on earlier, is that she's a four-cost card.
01:13:00
Speaker
To activate her, you need to play, you know, two cards after her for sure, if not three. Right? Which means you're what? Either holding cards back in your hand, which is like any time where you have to hold dinky cards back to play them after, that gets tricky.
01:13:18
Speaker
So where I see her going... She seems just kind of like a good throwing card to like a shield deck somewhere where you're genning little cards that you're expecting to play for cheap, you know, something with Victoria Hand or whatever.
01:13:31
Speaker
So it's just kind of like, oh, she'll just be kind of generally good and whatever it generally pool. Or you're playing in like maybe a Wiccan style thing where you're like, I'm going have arrows to throw down, maybe have zabud some stuff. So it's something where you're going have a lot of cheap stuff that you probably genned over the course of the game. Because like I said, otherwise you're what?
01:13:52
Speaker
Building for her but like brood or something, which is, it's like normally goes into a, now you're getting away from like further from established synergies, you know, and stuff.
01:14:03
Speaker
And um the ongoing part, like we we haven't, um seen like Spectrum really ah be like super, super amazing yet. So it's just like for me, that's the it's a two-star power.
01:14:23
Speaker
Can I interject one quick thing? ah Since it's come up twice now with the brood thing, I do think this is a surfer card. I think this like works in surfer. I think it's cool to buff it. And like you know like this this goes with a America Chavez. This goes with Okoye. Rhi probably thinks this goes with Nikia. But in surfer, don't you want to play Gwenpool in that spot more?
01:14:47
Speaker
that is a question. That's what I'm saying. In a surfer deck, you don't have room for a bunch of four slots. Sometimes it's Galacta, sometimes it's Gwenpool, sometimes I think it might be Captain Carter.
01:14:59
Speaker
We build surfer decks a little differently, though, I think. because i' just You're more willing to expand out, and I'm still mostly... Because I like to play a lot of counter-tech in mine, so I'm playing more three-cost cards with more tech...
01:15:12
Speaker
in my deck and you are more about like getting big power out of surfer stuff so you're willing to stray a little more from the three costs but for me i'm only putting in one four cost maybe and if i am it's one pull over captain carter because once again affects more lanes as you yourself said it could hit my shot yeah yeah i'd rather hit the brood with the gwenpool than with a captain carter you know Yeah, and also I'm not saying I would play Captain Carter in Surfer, but like there are so many ways you can build Surfer, ways that neither Ree nor I would.
01:15:45
Speaker
like there There are people even beyond the ones on this video call. Patriot Surfer! I'm back. No, that one that one's not that that one's not on the menu for anybody, I don't The drones could go behind her. Ongoing, maybe Moonstone's in there.
01:16:02
Speaker
yeah got Brood. Get some Patriot. I don't know. I don't know. I'm just saying, like, I i could see it working. you know, like, in Surfer decks, in some of them, it feels like now there are It's about like, which of these four costs, Gwenpool, Galacta type cards, do you want to play? Do you want to play both of them? Do you want to play one of them? Are we still running, absorbing? like you know like there the There's an open question about four costs in Surfer, which ones and how many.
01:16:32
Speaker
And I do think that Captain Carter will become a part of that conversation. all Okay, sorry. I realized I was just like, I had one more thought that I needed to get and and I got it. it and one more thought and so you can have lots of more thoughts. I interrupted you. yeah no I only need one more. It's about like, so sad.
01:16:52
Speaker
So I do love Captain Carter. I always love an Amazonian woman of any type. And, ah but like, they had a comic, like a solo for her.
01:17:05
Speaker
I think this is maybe a couple years back. I don't know. Time is passing by for me too fast. But she finally came out and it was such a huge disappointment, to be honest, because it didn't...
01:17:16
Speaker
They made her, it's like whoever was writing her, it felt like they didn't understand her character. They made her like a Steve. Like where, you know what I mean? Like where she was also just like very, and it's like, well, I don't want, I didn't need a female Steve. I want Peggy Carter. And they also had her She's supposed to be.
01:17:33
Speaker
Making mistakes where she was like misunderstanding things that a woman who had to like thrive in a male dominated world would probably be a little more empathetic to.
01:17:45
Speaker
It really felt like a steed. You know what mean? It's like, you know, maybe like a clueless white male character would make these faux pas, but not Peggy.
01:17:56
Speaker
don't know. was just, it was, it was sad. was disappointed. And I like stopped getting in after a couple of issues. That's sad. Sen. I'm rooting for the character. I like that she doubles or triples any buff that happens to her, but Mysterio does that too, and he costs two, and he goes wide.
01:18:14
Speaker
still don't play enough Mysterio. That is something I absolutely love about Mysterio. um Anyway, the only other thought I had about her ah was Hitmonkey, but how much of that are you seeing these days? like that's ah That's a deck that wants to slam down tons of cards on the last turn, so a deck that presumably you could fill some spots behind four cost.
01:18:32
Speaker
um But that's not a deck that has any extra power on Peggy that way, are you? like i mean Not that you would only play Peggy in situations where you're trying to juice extra power onto her to multiply it more, but like I don't know.
01:18:52
Speaker
I feel like generally you are, though, aren't you? that's what That's where I would want to. That's where I'd be most excited about. I mean, like, a 4.9 is still a 4.9, but, like, come on, can't we make it, like, a 4.15, 4.21, something like that, something a little more ambitious.
New Card Releases and Predictions
01:19:10
Speaker
Okay. I don't like eventually Spectrum tips where she has enough ongoing counters to stuff that should, like, finally be better. Okay.
01:19:18
Speaker
Yeah, i mean, it's one of the things that Spectrum likes is they can run, like, Luke Cage and Mobius, and that's, like, it just gets to do that. It doesn't have to jam them in there. And Gorgon now, and it keeps getting, now with Madam Web, you can move the Cosmo.
01:19:32
Speaker
It's, like, all these, it's like you get in there. Speaking of Spectrum, the ah first spotlight card, Goliath, a two one ongoing, plus one power for each other ongoing card you have in play.
01:19:47
Speaker
Ben. I find it difficult to separate my feelings about, like, so sometimes if a card is good enough, I, you know, like, here's the thing. I just love this card. This card's very cool. I love the small scalers. I just love them all.
01:20:04
Speaker
um And they're they're all, you they're always good. They're never bad. I'm just like, I can't tell how good this one is. Because I just love it too much. I'm just like, well, this is the first card you put in the deck. This is this is the one.
01:20:20
Speaker
i i like this card more than I like Spectrum. ah Because small cards, better than big cards, even though they are like on the exact same thematic line. ah you know like you You wouldn't play one without the other. But um gosh, I like this one more than Spectrum.
01:20:35
Speaker
Yeah, I love Goliath. i I almost feel like taking a point away because I love him so much. But no, you know what? I'll say it. This is a four. This is a four whatever card. No. Is that hurting Lauren too much? Do I need to take it down to to reality? Do I need to call Goliath a three? You're allowed to add your feelings.
01:20:56
Speaker
It's fine. I...
01:20:59
Speaker
I'm just rooting for this card so hard, but no, it's probably is probably not. I mean, like how many ongoings are you going to like get into play? like The thing is, gore is gore is gore because on-reveals are so ubiquitous.
01:21:13
Speaker
That's what I thought. I mean, like... And it's like it's only the ongoing cards that you have in play. it's not It's not the enemy's ongoing cards either. I mean, like, I guess I'll take him down to three, but I can't go lower than three on Goliath.
01:21:28
Speaker
I just like him too much. Rhi. I also, I gave him a three because, um basically because of that narrowness. I feel like it's right, he's like Morbius. It's like, those are good, powerful slots for those genres. Like that two, that's like just into the synergy of what you're doing.
01:21:48
Speaker
Now, ongoing, know, hasn't been like a top of of the meta, but it's I've always liked. I'm definitely getting it. I'm also rooting, as Ben said, for my small card stack. I had a version that was kind of about mini ongoings, and then it got replaced with like friggin' nonsense, and I kind of wanted to return back to that.
01:22:11
Speaker
So, um you know, maybe maybe a Ravonna flavor. Maybe we finally break her free from negative. Yes, a Ravonna card. Yeah, but like I said, but as Ben also said, this isn't gore. I think this goes into your Spectrum or like Moonstone nonsense, like those kind of decks.
01:22:31
Speaker
It's very, you know, it's going to go on a deck where playing a lot of ongoing. Right, lot of ongoing cards, which like like negative, you know, definitely will go in negative, um i think. So it's just, you know, narrowness, I gave it three, but I think it's and it's a strong card. I think everyone's gonna wanna have it, right? Yeah! I had... my My thought process is basically the same. I started him at four and I'm just like, he's too narrow in a deck that's not very good.
01:23:01
Speaker
Like, he's probably best in slot for Spectrum deck. I was trying to think, where else can you play him? And i'm like, maybe Thanos. You know, they play, like, Devil Dinosaur and some stones that have ongoing power. You don't think negative is a big negative player?
01:23:15
Speaker
I mean, you're playing usually, like, Iron Man, Mystique. Like, usually playing a lot of ongoing cards, right? i just don't know that i want a one two like and then i guess maybe it's a one five or one six when you're done but it doesn't yank him out and you don't want to play him on two because you want to play ravona or sidewalk okay this is actually this is what we were talking about earlier this is a ravona card that's not a negative card um let's see maybe hmm very true that's what there needs to be more of maybe there needs to be more small like cheap ravona cards um
01:23:50
Speaker
I thought Doom 2099 maybe, because every single one of the Doom bots is a point. Yeah. i that When I was looking at these last night, I was like, this is probably just a stupid Doom 2099 card. And I my eyes and finished them up from my mind until right now when you mentioned it.
01:24:07
Speaker
And ah you know what? I'm going to banish it again. Good. I'm like, it could be a zoo? When 2099 got nerfed, I feel like I saw a comment of someone being like, well, yeah, that's because like they they looked ahead to see Goliath coming out. And I was like, oh, that's that was not what I thought about with Goliath. But I see where you're coming from.
01:24:31
Speaker
like It could be Zoo, but Dattler's probably just better in Zoo. Yeah. Kind of a Valk friend. He could swing that lane for you, but you need another ongoing. And it's like, why wouldn't run the Antrim? I mean, like any ongoing thing that adds power as a Valk friend, right? Captain Carter's a Valk friend, too.
01:24:47
Speaker
But that's just it's a lot of investment into one lane, which is... you know Okay, wait. want to pause so we can congratulate Dazzler. Do you remember how long... it They reworked Dazzler several times, right? They could not find a good place for And now she's a good card. Yeah, she is. I play her a decent amount. I kind of wonder why it took so long. like This version of Dazzler is not like...
01:25:12
Speaker
It's not like they really had to like pull something wild out. Like I don't think any, they were not waiting on like this bolt of innovation and ingenuity to just like, I, I don't know why it took so long. Right. At first, did she require every single location to be full?
01:25:32
Speaker
I guess maybe. No, she couldn't. Yes, it was like if every location is full, get this. I think there's a point where she was a three cost. yeah She was definitely three cost like a place longer than she's been two cost. She was three cost, right? Her first big change was to split it up so that it was per location instead of every location.
01:25:51
Speaker
um Okay. The following week, Kahori, a four, six. On reveal, each card in your hand gives one of your cards in play plus one power.
01:26:02
Speaker
Re. Thank you. Okay, also with three, I super like this card because I love cards that buff cards. I'm all about all of us lifting each other up, you know? we don't gotta tear the other person down. All right, sorry.
01:26:19
Speaker
you know, yeah, as as was said earlier, she's New Galacta, I guess. But I like this flavor of it because this asks you to have a lot of cards in your hand, and I'm sure there's some, like...
01:26:33
Speaker
bullseye shenanigans, other stuff to do, but where my mind goes with this is like devil, dino, shield kind of stuff, and I like those decks because I love decks where it gives you lots of options to play, you know? You're never mad to see like a hand of like seven you know cards with great variety for all the options. um so So I dig this flavor. I'm way into this flavor of buff, you know?
01:27:03
Speaker
ah I gave her a four. I think she's ridiculous. i think she is Galacta or Gwenpool on steroids.
01:27:13
Speaker
A point in her favor, or a point in the design favor, is that she's not so free, right? That's what I'm saying, though. You don't think that like she's more limited than what you need to... She's narrower, which she should be, because she scales so much higher. But...
01:27:30
Speaker
In the right setup, it only takes and a two-card combo to make her 416, 420. And that's you know Sebastian Shaw, Wong, Grandmaster, any of those. Okay, but Lauren, you also need to be, one, playing cards that gen you more cards, so you have more cards in your hand, while getting enough cards on board like to benefit from, you know...
01:27:58
Speaker
Yeah. right Which I guess is good, because a lot of those are small cards that you can play cheaply. It's a plus and a... It's a pro and a con that she puts the power on the board, right? Like, it doesn't let you be as sneaky as Gwenpool does.
01:28:13
Speaker
um It does leave things vulnerable to Shong if they get too big. But also, like, Gwenpool, sometimes the power that's in your hand stays in your hand. Yeah. Every single thing, every single buff she's giving is on your board.
01:28:26
Speaker
um And this is a problem with those decks where it's like when you're genning cards, you're filling your board with little cards. You know what i mean? That don't, that don't like have power. It's like, you know, your Kate Bishops, your other card, your shield cards, you know, Iron Patriot. And I've, I've run into that problem where it's like, ah, I'm out of board space. I can play a lot of stuff cheaply, but I don't have room to play things.
01:28:53
Speaker
So you want something that can buff all those little cards. Mm-hmm. Okay, so just you've tapped me. I'm like, have I given a four-star three? I'm so sorry. think Well, I hate to make it sound like I think that's what happened, but I'm going to say my rating now. Yes, four stars for Kohori. Oh my gosh, this card is nuts.
01:29:16
Speaker
The fact that like it's an on-reveal, right? And it hits the things on the board. This is like the immediate... like Gwenpool and Galacta, those are all like ah delayed gratification.
01:29:29
Speaker
like that that you even Even though they're like consistent and predictable and like you... I think they're both wonderful tools.
01:29:40
Speaker
But yes, you can play Kahori on turn six, and that's a really big deal. I think very often you will play Kahori on turn six. Another cool thing, she can hit Sebastian Shaw a bajillion times. like if If we thought that Gwenpool was like the juice for hitting Sebastian Shaw like a bajillion times, like, oh...
01:29:59
Speaker
kohori does not have the iron heart restriction like she's she's juicing sebastian a bajillion times is she i assumed it's each card your hand is giving somebody plus one plus one okay i thought it was gonna be need to be unique cards each get that would that would hurt my writing Wait, so are we are you absolutely sure then that it it will hit the same card on the board multiple times?
01:30:27
Speaker
I was reading it like a bullseye kind of thing where it's like... It does say each card, but the each card is for in your hand. The cards on your board, it says one of your cards. One of your cards in play plus one power. All right. Well... I calculated it. What's the... I assumed they had to be different cards.
01:30:46
Speaker
If on curve, if all you do is play Sebastian Shaw on three and Cahori on four, Sebastian Shaw's a 319. If it works that way... and It definitely... She is written so differently from the bullseye text. The bullseye text is, discard all cards that cost one or less from your hand.
01:31:04
Speaker
Afflict that many different enemy cards. Different, okay. Minus two power. So like if that's what they meant, they would have said that for sure. well um But yeah, other things to gush about Kohori.
01:31:20
Speaker
Sure, you want to be playing card generation with Kohori, but like if there are only four cards in your hand, boohoo, you just played like a 410 that's changing the numbers on multiple lanes. And like it's Yeah, this card's nuts. Four stars for sure.
01:31:39
Speaker
yeah um But yeah, it goes goes with Kate. like Honestly, you play Iron Patriot because you should still probably play Iron Patriot and everything. You play Kate Bishop because you're playing Kohori. You play nine other cards.
01:31:50
Speaker
um Whatever. It's a strong start. Victoria Hand. Yeah. yeah Yeah, definitely. Yeah, sure. All right. Yeah. Okay. Boom.
01:32:02
Speaker
Yep. Like the rest of itself, right? Like it's going to be fine. Like the Kohari's nuts. Also a surfer card. I'm surprised. Okay, I do honestly wonder if she's little bad. Because, like, I had read her differently than you guys. I assumed it was all different cards on the board. I think she might just be too good. Yeah, I think so.
01:32:25
Speaker
I'm kind of... I mean, like... I understand why she isn't the season pass card, but like, I kind of wonder if maybe they thought she was the season pass card. Cause this, like, this reads like a season pass card. Like this is the sequel to Galacta, which was the sequel to Gwenpool. Like there's a clear lineage here.
01:32:42
Speaker
Right. no like And like, look what happened to Elsa. You know what I mean? It's like, don't know if you can do this. All right. We'll see. yeah I know I cited Wong and Grandmaster, and those are just silly things. like I think she's plenty good if you only proc her once.
01:33:01
Speaker
Okay, this next one. Infinity Ultron. really do not like reading these cards that have so many moving parts. Me neither. A 5-6. On reveal, add two of Ultron's stones to your hand.
01:33:16
Speaker
I can't believe this card didn't change from the data mines. ah No, for real. I mean, I guess it might. We have a season video tomorrow. might be different. The space stone, the blue stone, three, four, move the low on reveal, move the lowest power enemy card here to the location of infinity Ultron.
01:33:35
Speaker
The redstone, a 3-1. On reveal, add a drone here. Set its power to infinity ultrons. So, you know, it's it's ah it's a 3-7 if you didn't do anything silly.
01:33:46
Speaker
The time stone. What's that? Green? On reveal, put a card from your hand here. and that's just That's just better um a redwing.
01:33:57
Speaker
But, you know, yeah you have to do some work to get it um and and roll the dice also it takes two spaces on one spot but i mean like that's that's a very minor consideration it's it's yeah i mean especially because you're probably doing this on the last turn uh mindstone uh the yellow one ongoing uh three two ongoing your on reveal abilities here happen twice it's it's long um yeah powerstone the red one three two wait no it's the purple one on reveal double infinity ultrons power that's a big card that's a that's a three eight um the soul stone orange the last one three three on reveal for each of your full locations give one of your cards there plus two power so it's a plus six at best and then on a full board um
01:34:49
Speaker
Anyway, it' it's my turn on the rotation. I'm giving him a three. I think that ah the stones are over, so you know, they're oversteady. It's kind of like Agamotto's Arcane Arts, where it's like,
01:35:01
Speaker
The stones are too good to be cards that you could put into your deck directly, but because you have to do some work and roll the dice, they're okay making these better than a typical three cost. But it's still like it's a lot of work.
01:35:12
Speaker
Five, six, and then you only get one turn to use them. And sure, there's things like ramp. and like There are ways to make this... more diverse. um But I think mostly this is a flashy card, right? Like High Evolutionary and Arashem are probably the two best-selling cards in the history of the game, at least like in the week that they released. And I think that he's i think Infinity Ultron's gonna be like that.
01:35:34
Speaker
Where it's just like, oh, seven cards for the price of one. It's more like a Kate Bishop. Yeah. It is more like a bishop. You're right. And she's such a fun card.
01:35:46
Speaker
no no. Yeah, no, that's why I like it. That's like a pro for me. yeah Anyway, I think Infinity Ultron looks super duper fun, and I'm sure there's going to be some nutty plays that come with it, but I don't think it's super consistent, and I think it's, don't know, just think it's awkward that like, you have one turn, and if you're going to use both the stones you get, you have to spend all your energy to do it. Uh,
01:36:12
Speaker
So maybe maybe the best decks are ones that are either using Limbo or getting Infinity Ultron out a turn early. Ben?
01:36:23
Speaker
Maybe. i This card is very hard to evaluate because of all these dang stones. And, like, it's very easy to see, like...
01:36:36
Speaker
Promising possibilities. There are cute things that could happen, especially with the Wong Stone and, you know, like the other on-reveal stones. and I think it's worth saying all five other stones are on-reveal. All five other stones are on-reveal stones.
01:36:52
Speaker
So, like, you... ah Most of them... seem like they probably are usually good with the Wong Stone, except maybe the move the lowest power enemy card here to the location of Infinity Ultron Space Stone. Like, I'm not sure you want to Wong the Space Stone.
01:37:09
Speaker
So if you get those two together, you probably feel like... a little sad. Actually, you probably feel like you retreat that game because you didn't get ah anything. You got nothing.
01:37:21
Speaker
Infinity Ultron delivered crap to your doorstep. um And yeah, I... i I feel like maybe Lauren is right and this is a three, but like in my heart, it's a one.
01:37:36
Speaker
So I'm going to say it's a two. I mean, like I just don't like this card. and it's it's I'm just annoyed. but like Kate Bishop is such a cool card.
01:37:48
Speaker
And they're like, what if we made it big and ugly and also like ah full of false promises? you I don't know. I just like... i I see so many combinations of these stuff. Like what kind of board state would these win you the game? I, there are so many ways this card can go wrong. It seems to me, but the thing is, I bet it's probably better than I'm giving it credit for. And like, they don't, I I'm like predisposed to dislike this card. So I'm i'm like trying to untangle my biases and things.
01:38:23
Speaker
you're going to be angry when people put it in surfer. No, I won't be angry. That would not be a productive emotional response. But, like, I i mean, i guess some of my feelings on that will depend on how good it turns out to be. I mean, like, I sort of, I wish people well. Like, if if they think that's a fun thing to do with this card, I kind of hope that it's there enough for them that they could do it.
01:38:49
Speaker
But, like... I'm not interested in doing that. and And I don't think it looks like the smartest way to play Silver Surfer. I mean, like, it'll be very, like, it would be very cool to have a three cost Wong. Like if Wong cost three for a week, I'd play that in Surfer and stuff. He'd be Surfer.
01:39:06
Speaker
I'm not going to play a 5-6 to make a 3-cost Wong. just seems like so background. Part of me thinks that like maybe I'm being too nice to this card. like maybe maybe like i'm Maybe this card really is card. I don't know. i just I'm not convinced about this card. I'm not convinced that I should like it, and I'm not convinced that it's good.
01:39:32
Speaker
i'm I'm convinced that it will definitely win some games sometimes, as most cards do. And it might be good. I'm not certain. um not certain All right, gave two because I like, I love cards. To me, this, like I said, fits. It immediately brad to mind Kate Bishop. It makes me think of Nico.
01:39:57
Speaker
what I love about those cards is I love all the options and fun of tools and getting all those cards. And because it's not consistent, because it's like, you know, um you don't know which of those you get. And this is a big range of of set. It makes it that people won't play it in a way that I find annoying.
01:40:16
Speaker
So I can play it and have fun.
01:40:20
Speaker
But and I like that they're exploring the idea of Kate Bishop in more expensive cards. But I want to see that in a four cost card, you know, not a five cost card. Because, you know, this is always the problem with five cost cards. It's like,
01:40:36
Speaker
They're, you know, they get real awkward to play. Now i only have like generally one turn unless I'm committing a bunch of other shenanigans. And then you have to compare when you have to do shenanigans to make something happen. It's like, well, can I use those same cards that are causing those shenanigans to do better shenanigans than these shenanigans? Yeah, I'm way more interested in in a four cost version.
01:40:58
Speaker
Right, so that's where I'm at, but I can see where they're like, that gets too powerful. But like, maybe not this, but a different four that does two costs instead of three costs, or even if it did three costs with Composite, that's what I want to see.
01:41:12
Speaker
still want to get this. I still think it's cool. I think, um, I don't think it'll be as popular as like R.H.M. or anything like that, because it is Morbicate. You're not for sure getting all of these stones into a deck Thanos style.
01:41:29
Speaker
um But people will be interested for sure. and I liked that you mentioned Nico and Kate Bishop because like those...
01:41:39
Speaker
You have so much longer to find the right uses for the tools that they give you. like you you can yeah there's just These are the two Infinity Stones you get, and you're playing them on turn six. Or what was the point?
01:41:54
Speaker
like Why did you play this bad 5-6 if you weren't going to play both stones? I don't know. Like, it seems like it's giving you two things which says, like, oh, flexibility. But, like, no, only Nico and Kate can give you that kind of flexibility because they got there early enough to, like... Well, that's what I'm saying.
01:42:11
Speaker
They have to explore space of what does cards like that look at a higher cost. And they need to be more powerful because you have less time. You don't have that time to, like, wait for Nico to get to the turn right one so you can get onto a Sanctum Sanctorum, you know, kind of thing.
01:42:28
Speaker
But, um... this is the kind of thing where where it starts is you throw in a deck where you're genning cards, you know what mean? So then it's like if they're not the best thing to do, they're making your devil dino bigger, which I guess is not a preferred thing. But yeah, it's that kind of it's the Victoria Hand, good card, good gen cards, you know, where it's like, I have some options to choose from.
01:42:51
Speaker
That's where I'll put them. And it'll be fun. I love saying, I'm sure there'll be all kinds of situations where I'll put the stones down and it'll be real fun. And it'll go in that kind of more generic deck for now, because it's not consistent.
01:43:04
Speaker
So you play in a deck that's not intended to be consistent in that way.
01:43:11
Speaker
That sounds smart. Okay. Um... um Strange Supreme ah two two Gains plus 2 power from merging.
01:43:27
Speaker
end of turn. Merge one of your created cards into this. I am reading this as pulling any of your cards on the board. agree. It doesn't specify location, you.
01:43:41
Speaker
Have we had that confirmed? I think we had that confirmed, didn't we? Maybe? um i don't think we will until we see the video on Friday-ish. But, but your cards that's like the wording on blue marvel like they're your cards are things that are on the board in your control so that's how i'm reading it uh ben i think oh well i am not sure exactly what to make of this card i am inclined to think it's probably really good because like
01:44:17
Speaker
A lot of things create cards and a lot of them are things that you want to get rid of. Um, not that white widow is, you know, a huge concern to anyone ever at all right now, but like, wouldn't it be, can yeah we all remember when we were worried about white widow, wouldn't it have been cool for strange Supreme to take care of that for you?
01:44:38
Speaker
i don't know. Like I realize I'm, I'm justifying like, this this new card. That will never interact. Well, it really would have solved the problem of this old card that doesn't exist anymore. But, like, that's just an example. you know, you get your collapsed mines and things. Like, that's that's a game that you just sort of, like, win, huh?
01:44:59
Speaker
You know? like Like, other stuff like that. like, locations aside, like, i i haven't I haven't thought about like what my Strange Supreme deck would look like, but like this gaining plus two power from merging, that's like a really big deal. like What's a card that you wouldn't eat for plus two power on top of its actual stats? It has to have a pretty cool ongoing effect to like not be something you want to eat, and most of your generated cards aren't going to be something with a cool ongoing effect. They're going to be something that you would rather eat for its stats plus two.
01:45:33
Speaker
like i I just think Strange Supreme is... Maybe a three, but i'm I'm going to go with a four. i bet I bet there are decks to be built here. That's what I think. Probably more than one kind.
01:45:47
Speaker
i don't know. That's just a hunch. Yeah. also went for partly out of excitement. I love the merge thing. I want to do more with it. I haven't, like...
01:45:58
Speaker
you know, keep throwing Agony and Penny Parker and stuff into things. I haven't quite found my merge thing that I want to, but I'm hyped to play with this card. It's just a fun, look at the end of pulling it from any card. It's like a new weird location, but it's a card that you have that you can build around because, that you know, so um I'm super into it. I think it'll be fun. And and exactly what Ben was saying. I'm like, this is a great RSHM tool or Gen Create tool because Like, a lot of times, you know, sometimes you get a red school and you're like, oh, because, like, people are filling locations now. you know, they're almost, ah red schools aren't always worth playing when you gen them anymore. But, you know, ah one that a Doctor is Strange ate sounds great.
01:46:45
Speaker
So, yeah. So it's useful in that way. And because it's only created cards that are merging, you do have kind of control over how it's going to do that. It will leave, like, if you want an Iron Man or something, you know, like, um for it not to eat. So I do think it's like, you don't want to get too carried away with thinking it's going to merge more than it might be able to. Because it's like, you know, like, you even if you put it on two, that means you're not playing, like, a Kate on two or, you know.
01:47:15
Speaker
Like what ah that probably not the best stuff you want to merge with strange, but you know, that kind of stuff. But like, what a great tool. Yeah. To mitigate downsides of merge cards and get, or like with that white widow, you're like saying you give them something they got to deal with and you're not filling up your spot with something that's,
01:47:34
Speaker
um That's become more of a thing in Marvel Snap for me as time has gone on is not filling my board with things that are too small. You know? um you got to be this tall to ride.
01:47:47
Speaker
So I don't Maybe ultimately three like power wise, but four in spirit for being a fun new thing. I gave him a four also.
01:47:59
Speaker
ah And my very first two words are super cool. As Ben said when we first saw it, this is like really good top-down design. It's so thematic to the character. um think it's really easy to just see like huge upside.
01:48:12
Speaker
He only needs two merges to be a two-six. I mean like... and that i mean like That's two six, like, ah just counting the bonuses. You're not counting, like, the actual, like, the merged stats from the... Just your Strange Supreme power.
01:48:26
Speaker
Just, yeah. He's adding six power to your board. um And I think there are lots of cards that want him. You know, he's anti-clog. um You could be the one playing clog. Maybe maybe you play debris, and that helps you. Absolutely. You're definitely playing debris with Strange Supreme. Helps you. Hurts your opponent. Like, that's cool.
01:48:43
Speaker
Thanos struggles with board space. Not anymore. um Although there are some of those ongoings, you might not want to eat some of those stones. Right. So then there's some downside is that he's unwieldy. You don't have control over him.
01:48:57
Speaker
Right. Maybe he does merge in the card you don't want or he pulls power from a lane you didn't want to lose power on. Um, And then the other the other downside is I think he's very often going to be bigger than 10, which, you know, he's shangable. very shangable.
01:49:10
Speaker
But that's never a reason not to play a card. Right. You shang me on this lane, and that's fine. I have two other lanes that I'm attacking, maybe. um Anyway, I think he's extremely cool and and i very strong. Like, this is a very strong two-cost card. I'm... so getting two merges does not seem difficult.
01:49:32
Speaker
Maybe we're playing merge cards on top of it too, right? Like, he would still get, wouldn't don't you read it as him getting extra two power? No, no, he definitely gets extra from Hulkbuster. I don't know.
01:49:44
Speaker
I just don't think that's like an efficient use of resources. Yeah, because you're focusing on creating cards. Yeah. That's fair. Um, hmm, hmm.
01:49:56
Speaker
Hydra Stomper. Ongoing. Plus one power for each time one of your cards moved. This game. 3.
01:50:07
Speaker
Did that text change?
01:50:11
Speaker
That text changed, didn't Yes. I think we already covered what it changed in an OTA, but... I don't think we... I think we only covered the previous version of this card. yeah It used to say each time each card that moved this game, but now it's each time one of your cards moved this game.
01:50:30
Speaker
yeah Ben is happy. Yeah, I actually... i didn't i didn't... I was working from the memory of the old version of this card. This is news to me that I've just learned on the podcast.
01:50:43
Speaker
Well, you're going last on Hydrastomper, so you have time to think about it. The number went up. I'll tell you that much. um I gave it a three-star. It's pretty much the same thing as Goliath. like those I mean, Hydro Stomper does cost more, which is kind of a bummer. Usually the ongoings are too power, but it's so it's that for moves. So I'm glad they have it.
01:51:07
Speaker
I have finally gotten... I played Scream... for the first time, and I was too lazy to go find... Sorry, auto-screen, but I crushed with it. ah She is as fun to play as it is annoying for me to play against her. She's a blast. Anyway...
01:51:23
Speaker
Yeah, Scream's great. I'm into it. ah But, like, once again, Scream is about moving your opponent's cards. I'm still not a full-blown. There's still too many squirrels in this world.
01:51:36
Speaker
so like, um i'm I'm less excited for me, but I think it's, you know, if if you're a move player, you're obviously going to have to get this one. Strong but narrow.
01:51:49
Speaker
yeah Yeah. I gave it a three two i might have given it a 2 if it wasn't for Ben's excitement before. I was going to give it 2. I was so going to give it a 2. I was completely going to give it 2.
01:52:01
Speaker
The first time we saw this card, you were very excited about it. Anyway, and then I just... I know it gets really big, right? like Like, Heimdall could move six of your cards like in a single sweep. Like, Hydrastomper gets big.
01:52:16
Speaker
But i three does feel very expensive for what it is. Like that's a vulture you're not playing. um It's true. It's true. Or a Polaris you're not playing. I guess Polaris doesn't help a Hydro Stomper, but you know, helps it helps like a Craven deck.
01:52:32
Speaker
um So I think, I think Hydro Stomper is a little awkward for what it is, but I am sure there are decks that where it's just going to get huge. And you know, someday we're going have Fanfay and you could have silk and you could have a werewolf or, uh,
01:52:46
Speaker
or ah Oh, werewolf surfer. Okay, I found an Hercules. Yeah! If you're going to be place with anybody, Hydrastomper seems like a decent choice. is Hercules?
01:52:58
Speaker
Hercules surfer werewolf. This is definitely a Hercules buff. like Most importantly, it's a silk buff. Come on. It very much is a silk buff. This is the silk buff. Perhaps not the one that we wanted, but the one we deserve. Okay.
01:53:16
Speaker
I do, I want to play it again. I think it's strong, but it's going to take a move deck. yeah yeah You have to figure out how to fit it in move when you're giving up like a scaler or a way to move things around. and that's Oh, there's there's room for Hydra Stomper.
01:53:38
Speaker
There's room. like you like Vulture is a three that scales better than Hydra Stomper does. Yeah, most cards aren't as good as Vulture. That's... mean, that's true.
01:53:48
Speaker
Most cards aren't as good as Vulture. That's been true for a long time. Said by Ben. Okay, take it away, Ben. Okay, ah yeah, I was so ready to give Hydra Stomper a generous two.
01:54:04
Speaker
A generous two for the previous version of Hydra Stomper, where it was plus one power for each of your cards that has moved this game away. Oh, wow. I wanted to like that design because like move Morbius, right? Move Morbius. But like just the the facts were the numbers were not good.
01:54:25
Speaker
it It would not have worked. But like I am all about moving the same card multiple times in a game. um So yeah, this and Silk, just, oh wow, every time Silk moves, that can be so many times in a single turn.
01:54:38
Speaker
like That can be like four or five times between your your cards that you played and the opponent's cards, depending on like if y'all had a busy turn four or five or something. Like, dang, this this is going to proc a lot of times.
01:54:53
Speaker
And ah it's a 3-2, so it goes with Moonstone. Not that I really think that we're playing... Moonstone in our move decks or anything. But no you happen to if you happen to generate one, it'll happen sometimes. Or you know play it on Onslaught Citadel. ah Wow. Yeah. i'm just I'm very excited about this card. The only question is, can I justify giving it four?
01:55:17
Speaker
i mean, like just the excitement of learning that like this text change happened and it's good now. um Wow. Yeah, we we didn't talk about this text change. I would remember talking about this text change. I think we glazed past it because we were like, we'll talk about it when we do card rankings.
01:55:36
Speaker
Yeah, we were only talking about select cards on that on that patch, on the things that changed. um Dang. Yeah, I'm so excited about this card. I will give it a three.
01:55:48
Speaker
Okay. Because I don't think that everyone needs this card. I mean, like, part of these rankings are these great things. Yeah, you do. Now that it will go with werewolf. what do what Yeah, but like, oh, if you like this card, get this card. I mean, like, this this card is going to, like, be in some good decks now that it's good.
01:56:07
Speaker
um Yeah, because because this effect is good. Oh. I see, i can understand why people would be skeptical, but like, you can move some cards a lot of times, folks.
01:56:18
Speaker
You really can. and believe it. Like, a lot of times. Like, you you don't, I mean, like, the Cravens, they get so big. like and that's that's And that's only when the thing moves to that lane.
01:56:31
Speaker
Like, ooh. This card is going to get big. Yeah, but this is only plus one and Kraven's plus two, so it evens out. That's true. um Although, granted, Silk doesn't always go Kraven off, Kraven off.
01:56:44
Speaker
Also, but like let's consider that Hydra Stomper is also a Morbius in that ah it remembers an invisible number that the game is keeping track of. That's true. You might play a very big three on the last turn.
01:56:58
Speaker
Yep. Uh-huh. So, like, that's that's why I think this might be a four. That's some hidden power for sure. I guess I'll take it down to a three because it's not for everyone for all the time.
01:57:09
Speaker
You know, it's it's... I guess I gave Kahori a four, so I should give this a three because it's not Kahori. Mm-hmm. okay And it's not Strange Supreme.
01:57:23
Speaker
Okay, yeah, three. Three for Hydra Stomper, but a four in my heart. Yeah, I'll ask you both, what what card are you most excited for this season? I think I'm most excited for Kohori. Strange Supreme does seem very cool, and Infinity Ultron's going to be fun.
01:57:39
Speaker
ah But Kohori's just easy to do silly stuff with. So, yeah.
01:57:47
Speaker
I'm the least excited about Kohori and the most excited about Hydra Stomper. Actually, no, the least the least excited about Infinity Ultron. Hydra Stomper, Hydra Stomper, Hydra Stomper. But honestly, I'm also excited about Goliath.
01:58:01
Speaker
Them's my thoughts. okay Yeah, I would have said Ghost Horror and Strange. The problem is, it's like, everything will be not... All the funnest things everyone will be playing with, and it'll be mirrors, and it won't be fun.
01:58:14
Speaker
So, like, honestly, I... okay so when you said that, I'm like, I want to say, like, Horror or Strange Supreme, or even Goliath, because I'm just consistently going back to Spectrum, because I love counters, so I'm like, one day, I'll make her work again.
01:58:30
Speaker
um really like Spectrum. I kind of wonder if I'll have a lot of fun with Infinity Ultron because i see because maybe people will think he's bad and they won't play And then I can have fun because no one else is playing with him and I'll have some fun with those stones.
01:58:44
Speaker
ah Even if agrees with all the things that's said. yeah i know. I don't know what I'm going to do with him. But yeah, if you can get him out early or hit him twice, he has four stones to work with.
01:58:57
Speaker
Right, or give him... We probably check, because that's what you want to do. You probably want to, like, proc him multiple times. want to silly things. I'll just stick one my, like... I'll just one my gens, where like, these are good options to have amid all the mini cards I'll have on turn 6. Probably where I'll go.
01:59:11
Speaker
and Anyway. So kind of wonder if that will be... Or even maybe a Hydra Stomper, just because... everyone will play Scream that week. I take it back. It'll be no fun. Scream only procs once a turn!
01:59:25
Speaker
But it hurts every time. feel it myself. You just have to keep doing your move things. like they I hate it. There's something that tilts I have certain things that tilt me and snap and other things that just don't bother me that really tilt other people. And Scream is just one of those things. I'm like, I put that card there I want it there.
01:59:47
Speaker
and don't you steal. You put that power back where it came from. Anyway, that's how I feel about Scream. And with Kingpin, I'm like, don't drag it to New York.
01:59:59
Speaker
Doesn't belong there. right. Anyway. That's what I meant. Okay. I'm very excited for the season. But on to our side quests. First up and only secret homework. I assigned it this week.
02:00:13
Speaker
My secret homework was to look back upon your card predictions over an indeterminate amount of time and tell me about ah one or two that you got really right and one or two that you got really wrong.
02:00:28
Speaker
um my My classic like best call ever was Cannonball. That one felt the best because I was like, he's best of this season. And as far as I know, Glazer and I were like the only two creators who were high on Cannonball.
02:00:43
Speaker
Cannonball was not a card that people called right. And it was just a month later that people were high on Cannonball and Pixie both. They were both showing up in meta decks and they were cards that lots of people skipped out on. and i was like, I told you guys, Cannonball's the best card this season.
02:00:57
Speaker
Was he? Maybe Hope Summers was better. Um, but that was when part of what made him so great was with Professor X, which is why reason you saw how good he was. Has never been nerfed.
02:01:10
Speaker
Cannonball got Professor X nerfed. Um, so I think arguably he was the best card that season. Why are the mutants always paying for the sins money? Okay. And I think I was just in a very good position to call that card because it is a lot like Valkyrie. It's a single card lane winner, and it's a friend of Lockdown, which is my favorite archetype. like I was just primed to be like, no, Cannonball, you can win a lane with a single card. That's very good.
02:01:36
Speaker
um
02:01:39
Speaker
I was high on Pixie also. um i think Copycat is another one where it's like... You know, some calls like... Saying Red Hulk is good, I might have been very accurate, but everybody thought Red Hulk was going to be good, right? like It's more impressive when you get one right that other people weren't getting right.
02:01:55
Speaker
um I was very high on Copycat, and that one was one that received kind of like mixed predictions. And then also War Machine. like When I had War Machine 3rd, which was frankly too high, people were like, really? 3rd? That's so low. people People were crazy about War Machine, and he ended up being... Oh, i remember, yeah. Yeah.
02:02:14
Speaker
yeah I was saying no, Infanaat's a trap. like Anyway. and the buff My worst calls ever, Black Swan. That one, again, is one where like I think a lot of people were wrong about Black Swan. like She lets you cheat out so much energy, she must be great, but no.
02:02:31
Speaker
ah Cheating energy when it means that you have to hold a bunch of cheap cards in your hand is not not necessarily a good thing to do. um So my worst call ever was Hope Summers.
02:02:42
Speaker
And this was the month right after Black Swan. And I'm like, oh, this is another card where it looks like it's very good because of the energy it can get you. But we just saw a perfect example of why getting in this extra energy isn't automatically a good thing.
02:02:55
Speaker
So I thought Hope was going to be bad. I thought she was too much work. She came out too late. But Hope is a very, very good card. So that is, Hope is my worst call of all time. ah Rhea's assigning next week's homework. So Ben,
02:03:09
Speaker
Reminisce. Well. Analyze. Reminiscing about all these these cards. There have been many of them. And i have gone on the record about some of them. There have been some that I have not gone on the record about.
02:03:25
Speaker
Back when I was on Twitter, i ah i had this draft in my drafts about Ms. Marvel for a very long time. I couldn't get the tone right before Ms. Marvel came out.
02:03:36
Speaker
And I was really trying to like remove... uh, any he and all like condescension or just like, I couldn't figure out a nice way to say that. Like, if you think Ms. Marvel is going to be bad, you're a dumbm dumb, dumb.
02:03:48
Speaker
Uh, you know what I mean? But yeah, I was looking at that draft for a long time. ah but yeah, I didn't call it cause I couldn't figure out how to be, uh, polite about it.
02:04:02
Speaker
But, uh, yeah, I was of the opinion that if you thought that Ms. Marvel was going to be bad, you were a dumb, dumb. Uh, So that was that was one thing that I didn't call that I should have called, and it it haunted me. And I really only thought about it once this secret homework got announced.
02:04:16
Speaker
Some things that I did call were Cull Obsidian being good. I decided not to worry about being nice on Twitter that time. i ah I made an image of Cull Obsidian adding an ongoing ability that ah ongoing can be destroyed by Shang-Chi.
02:04:35
Speaker
And um I forget what I said, but I was sassy about it. And I was like, that's not like this card. Yeah, it dies to Shang-Chi. So do like a a bunch of other cards that we play all the time because good cards are good um anyway.
02:04:52
Speaker
So, yeah, I don't know. I think I've got a pretty good track record of predicting card quality. I have been wrong sometimes, though, about some things. ah The one that sticks with me the most is Scarlet Spider, a card that I really thought would pop off and kind of like I still feel like it ought to. But like, I think maybe it only would have popped off in some previous version of the game.
02:05:14
Speaker
Like, From the first like year or two, i like i i think there was a time when Scarlet Spider would have been as good as I thought he would be, but ah he just wasn't.
02:05:26
Speaker
And it it's still kind of bothers me. i'm i'm I'm still hoping that... He has a ah moment to to really shine because I just would have thought that a 410 on two lanes for like no effort and bigger than that for more effort, I would have thought that would do something.
02:05:45
Speaker
But it doesn't. ah Some other cards I've been right about. Bruce Banner. Emperor Hulkling. um You know, ah mostly I feel like...
02:05:59
Speaker
But very often, as far as predictions go, I just sort of predict that the cards do what they say they do. And like I tell you whether or not I think that's a desirable thing for a card to do and why I think that.
02:06:11
Speaker
I don't know. When I evaluate these cards, sometimes I'm not even really thinking of them in the context of the game itself. I'm like evaluating them in the context of like all the cards I think might be. plausible to print, you know, like, I just, I don't know. I take a very zoomed out perspective on the the cards and the things and I i don't make, I try not to make bold claims so I don't end up with bold egg on my face. I love a bold claim.
02:06:40
Speaker
I mean, like, I guess some of my claims are kind of bold. I didn't think that he is Thunderbolt Ross was going to be very good. And I don't know. like Some other people thought he would be good. And but one thank I don't know.
02:06:55
Speaker
It's kind of all right. Yeah, he's not he's ah he's about as good as I said he would be. ah Yeah, I don't know. I think I'm generally pretty... I'm trying i'm like looking at recent cards and thinking, like who did I get wrong? Firehair. I thought Firehair was going to... I mean, like I think Firehair still will hit eventually. like Kid Omega is going to come out we're going to be Firehair-ing so hard.
02:07:20
Speaker
But... but I thought fire hair would have made a more immediate splash. so that's a recent one where uh, ah I was surprised that she didn't do more.
02:07:32
Speaker
um What else has surprised me? um
02:07:41
Speaker
Lasher, I guess. I kind of thought maybe Lasher would find more of a home. I don't think Lasher is a bad card, but like Lasher is not really doing anything at the moment. I'm you there. I'm kind of surprised. I think he's probably underrated. Yeah.
02:07:55
Speaker
Luna Snow, I think I expected Luna Snow to do a little better. Also, I think that we just have fewer players in the game, which means fewer people like trying things and experimenting. And it's harder to know if any card that releases is actually meeting its full potential.
02:08:11
Speaker
um i don't know let's look at some other cards on this other page let's see who did i get wrong i was initially somewhat dismissive of frigga although i did note that copying a card is drawing a card uh frigga did receive a buff so i mean like i guess i can't say that like i really missed out on frigga because like they did have to buffer before anybody played her but um yeah i i i feel like i i was low on frigga compared to what i think she does um other cards i may have been wrong about maybe you're just silver sable i was pretty low on silver sable i've got to be honest the first time we talked about her on the podcast i didn't realize that she actually gained the power that she stole i thought she was just afflicting something off the top of the de
02:08:59
Speaker
And that's that's why I came out the gate so low on Silver Sable. I was like, what's the point? She's just like bad America Chavez. But that's that's not it. she she She eats the power. So she's it's pretty cool.
02:09:11
Speaker
ah so I was wrong about Silver Sable. Is that enough? That's plenty. You have exceeded the assignment. Rhi. Okay, so I don't remember to come back full circle as if we planned it narratively to the beginning of the podcast.
02:09:29
Speaker
I don't remember what I've said often, and I don't like to listen to myself. So I came up with a trick answer instead of a quick oh trick question. I'm going talk about activate the ability.
02:09:41
Speaker
um And I think it solves both things. I think I was both right and wrong. Um, I think everyone maybe a little too hype on it. and Everyone's like, oh, it's so powerful. And it's like, I think I was right that on reveal is just, and people were like, yeah, on reveal is more preferable. But I'm like, on reveal is like way more preferable. Yeah, for sure.
02:10:05
Speaker
yeah You were so right about that, I was wrong. was super right about that. Right? Everyone was super hype on the activate. But I was also wrong in being so unhyped.
02:10:17
Speaker
And here's where I thought. I'm like, okay, the only activate cost I'm going to play are like a run, you know, like Lash or like a run. It's funny. Because you were talking about this, Ben, but the activate card I play the most, I play the most, is Scarlet Spider.
02:10:33
Speaker
Because I like playing buff decks, Scarlet Spider is one of the best recipients of receiving multiple buffs, which is... What the buff stack does.
02:10:46
Speaker
So, and I thought I would never, I'm like a forecast card and I only had two turns to play I was so down. I figured I was playing, it's gotta be like three or lower for me to play and activate. But you don't see me out there playing the black swan.
02:11:01
Speaker
Aranya briefly when it worked with Deadpool until they like did her weird nerf that was... so just somebody else's sin, not whatever. Human There we go.
02:11:12
Speaker
Boo, move. Why are you ruining my Deadpool plays? but um ah But yeah, that's the one. And honestly, I've tried. can't get Symbiote Spider-Man to do anything that cool for me.
02:11:24
Speaker
But the merge, the merge of it interests me. But yeah, Scar the Spider, happen to have played vastly more than the activate card, and I thought I would be a super not into four or higher activate.
02:11:37
Speaker
um So, you know, kind of a success andy and a success. Because I also found a card that I put sometimes. That's a great trick answer.
02:11:48
Speaker
you. Oh, and I am assigning next homework. Okay. And it's a little bit self-serving. um Okay. And that, you know, that I do the board game retreat.
02:12:00
Speaker
Okay. Right. But you see, you think this is going board games, but it's not actually. It's actually going retreats. Yeah. Surprise! We're all going to retreat. No, just kidding. It's not what's happening. Don't get excited.
02:12:13
Speaker
Okay. But, like, one of the fun things to do ah late at night, particularly when you are not very sober, is, like, we would love to and couch co-op play this game called Lovers in a Dangerous Space Time. I game. If you are familiar.
02:12:30
Speaker
Okay, it is called it is filled with cute. We decided for some reason when it started that all the little bunnies you save are all called Steve's. So we're like, oh, Go save Steve! Anyway.
02:12:42
Speaker
We have fun. But like, um it's a game where you play, ah you're piloting a spaceship um with three other people. You really want to have four players. It's really difficult, at least for me, if you have less than four, because you need someone to be piloting at all times.
02:12:59
Speaker
You need someone that runs the shield around, like, and then there's the two fun positions. In my opinion. Which are the gunners where you run around and you like you shoot and you can upgrade the ship in different ways.
02:13:12
Speaker
And it was so fun. I was so excited to play this every time. But the game's kind of small.
Gaming Experiences and Social Aspect
02:13:20
Speaker
We've now beaten the whole thing like several times. And there's not been like new stuff added. There's not been a sequel made. And we're kind of over it. So I want...
02:13:31
Speaker
um I want a recommendation for a couch co-op game. it can be really anything, and it can be just two people bonus points if it's for four.
02:13:45
Speaker
um But, yeah, that's the new homework.
02:13:51
Speaker
That is great. Let's talk about video games we like. i love video games. Couch co-op. I love couch video games. I've never gotten into PC gaming. I did a little bit as a child, but ah my heart has always been with the Nintendo.
02:14:05
Speaker
I did when I was a young edgelord. Yeah. PS2. Then you can brag about how you're like, console gamers. Mostly the Nintendo. I'm just a Nintendo girly.
02:14:17
Speaker
um Reasonable. Who isn't? If you like what you heard... Give us likes, comments, reviews, ah subscribe, whatever.
02:14:28
Speaker
If you're listening to this on ah on a podcast player, you can watch us on YouTube or vice versa. Not that you have to do both, just letting you know the options there. um to To consume it in a different way.
02:14:40
Speaker
um Our socials are in the video description or show notes. um There's other stuff there. Like if you want to come join us on Discord at the aforementioned Speakeasy, there are instructions on how you can find us there.
02:14:54
Speaker
um Or hit us up on socials if you can't figure it out because it's a little tricky. ah We're part of the snap Judgments Network. What do mean the best thing?
02:15:02
Speaker
What was that? I want to be the jazz singer of the Speak Easy. i would like to wear a sparkly dress and sing soulfully. You guys, uri has so many great little one-liners that I don't pick up on until I'm editing. and Anyway.
02:15:19
Speaker
I just think all missing out little bit. like seeing list, because I never remember what I've said. So I'm like, oh, it cracks me up. She's like, that's one of yours. Okay. So many, is that you just like sneak in there, and then, don't know.
02:15:31
Speaker
Anyway, ah we're part of the Snap Judgements Network, where you can listen to other great shows like Snap Decisions by Joe, who does podcasts at least twice a week, Mondays with guests, and Tuesdays the normal show.
02:15:43
Speaker
And then ad hoc ones for like OTAs and stuff. um But it's great. And um very casual friendly. I highly recommend it. if If you're into that sort of thing.
02:15:55
Speaker
um We've been on there. All of us have guested there. As individuals and as a group. Anyway. Anyway. ah you want If you want to find out what we think about what-if cards and co-op video games, oh, I'm excited because we're going to get answers from our listeners, too, about their favorite couch co-op video games. I'm always looking for more.
02:16:18
Speaker
Just finished Split Fiction with my fiancé, and we immediately followed that up with A Way Out and... i You haven't played It Takes Two with her yet because I played it with my brother like a year ago and it just feels a little too recent to play it again. um and you find How do you find the writing in those games?
02:16:43
Speaker
i I enjoyed the games. I thought they were fun. Does the writing bother you? Yeah. i don't I don't think they're native English speakers.
02:16:54
Speaker
don't. I think you're correct. it's out I think it's a French studio. Um, I might be wrong anyway. If you want to find out about, i up yeah, tune in next week.
02:17:05
Speaker
Same snap time, same snap channel.
02:17:12
Speaker
Yay. gotta say, uh,
02:17:18
Speaker
i gotta say ah the The besties, I listened to the the McElroys and the Christopher Plant and Russ Fresh Sticks podcast about video games, and they yeah they think those those games are just like wildly overrated, and the rating is like offensively bad. That's their opinion.
02:17:40
Speaker
But see, I'm not playing it really for the writing. Like, the story is fine. No, that is the thing. And they're like, they're so hesitant to express this point of view because, like, they know how much people love these games and people are just going to get angry at them for not liking these games.
02:17:55
Speaker
Oh, I see. Everybody loves these games. And, you know, i played I played enough It Takes Two to get the gist. ah yeah And i've i've now watched I've now watched people play Split Fiction and in in my home. And I've seen What's Up over there. And I'm sure it's very fun.
02:18:15
Speaker
Split Fiction was my favorite. And there were... A Way Out was really different from the other three, um and probably the best story-wise. um That's where two guys are escaping prison. That one's kind of fun.
02:18:28
Speaker
um Split Fiction had many moments, because it's just like... If you don't know, your two writers, one of them is a sci-fi writer, one of them is a fantasy writer, and so you're switching between fantasy worlds and sci-fi worlds.
02:18:45
Speaker
um They're in like a thing that simulates their stories. And it's like strictly co-op. You have to play at co-op. um And there's just, it constantly changes the world you're in, the mode you're in, the character you're playing, what you're trying to accomplish. And so some sections feel like mini games. Anyway, there were many sections where I was like, I would play ah whole game that was like this specifically.
02:19:10
Speaker
So I really enjoyed the gameplay. I think a lot of those levels are inspired by whole games that you can play. Are they not? Some of them definitely are.
02:19:21
Speaker
But like, okay, there was one that was a pinball game where one of you is playing the flippers and plungers and one of you is playing the ball. like, I'd play an entire co-op game that was pinball where can control the ball.
02:19:36
Speaker
That does sound like players. It was super fun. I have not seen that level. It's towards the end, but it is one of my favorite sections.
02:19:49
Speaker
games.