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70: Vegetables Can Be Fine, Too
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😮🫢 Will the cohosts clash out over the new limited time mode? Find out in this week’s episode 🔉🎧💁♀️ The cohosts keep it snappy and happy in this week’s episode 👋🥰
For our esteemed listeners’ consideration:
- 🫰 Weeks in Snap
- Maverick 🕶️ & Marrow 🦴 (otherwise known as the forbidden M&Ms)
- 📣 Team Clash 🏒
- OTA opinions 💁♀️
- 📀 Datamines of the Galaxy 🌌
- Secret Homework 🤫: Make your own Team Clash team up! 📓✏️
Follow us on Twitter/Bluesky:
Check out the other great shows in the Snap Judgments Network:
- Snap Decisions
- Snap Judgments
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:
- Spectrocity - Rescue Me
- Ben - Final Surfer 2025
- Ben - Distant Future
- Smlz - Avengers Team Clash (Midrange)
- Bones - X-Men Team Clash (High Evo)
- Lauren - Thunderbolts Team Clash (Sera Tech)
- Lauren Homework - A-Force to Be Reckoned With
- Ben Homework - Masters of Evil
Credits:
- Cover art by Lauren
- Snap On This!! Theme by Ben
- YouTube thumbnail by Lauren’s kid, Reggi
- Thumbnail portraits by Adam Star
Timestamps:
- 0:00:00 Intro / Our Week in Snap
- 0:24:03 Maverick
- 0:35:28 Marrow
- 0:39:17 Aurora
- 0:42:03 Team Clash
- 0:57:04 Adamantium Infusion
- 0:57:51 OTA Discussion
- 1:08:19 Datamined Cards
- 1:40:32 Secret Homework: Team Themes
- 1:55:51 Next Week's Secret Homework
- 1:56:55 Housekeeping / Closing Remarks
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Challenge
00:00:01
Speaker
Hello and welcome to episode 70 of Snap on This, a Marvel Snap podcast. This week's secret homework, create a theme deck. I'm your host Lauren Woodevs here with my usual amazing, delightful, sparkling co-hosts.
Weekly Snap Highlights
00:00:15
Speaker
First up, this week, Ben, how was your week in Snap? And keep it snappy. Well, my week in Snap, and everything to keep it snappy, as I frequently do.
00:00:27
Speaker
Every time. Um... Every time, yeah. i was absolutely but you know It was a pretty good weekend snap. um There's a new limited time game mode.
Deck Strategies and Preferences
00:00:41
Speaker
Here's little baby trip to Cosmetics Corner. I've ah been getting a lot of coveted ink splits on some of my favorite cards in recent weeks, perhaps. I don't know. Maybe I'm thinking of recent months. It seemed like there were many months when I was just like not getting any of my my beautiful ink splits, but now my whole ah Sanctum Showdown deck is fully inked out. The one that I've played the past three Sanctums.
00:01:14
Speaker
and hope to play again like in the next that's a true measure of like loving you're you keep an event that as soon as i voltage it is over i'm like get get out here unless i guess i'm going to podcast or something yours is still together yeah well i i've used it a couple times it's a real good one sanctum's the best game mode It is the best game mode and Team Clash has not done much to convince me otherwise. Wait, wait,
Card Inking Approaches
00:01:46
Speaker
wait. You invited us into Cosmetics Corner. I want to take this opportunity while we're here to ask what your, both of you, what what is your general like splitting strategy? What are your goals?
00:01:59
Speaker
ah Cards that I like and like think that I'm going to use a lot I will try to get them to ink. Usually that means move cards, discard cards, surfer cards, and then there just like sort of general cards that I like that I'm going to like use in multiple decks.
00:02:27
Speaker
Like forever, like, you know, I've got inked out Merlin and I'm working towards inked out Stardust, you know, like I've got, ah you know, and when I say move cards, I'm also including like scream cards in there. for a minute, my goal was to have like all kinds of move cards inked up, but like really only just move cards I like. It's probably not going to happen from Adam Webb because we're just not tight like that.
00:02:53
Speaker
Yeah. You know what? Torch is like, has been in the game so long. I've i've thrown some, some boosters his way. Cause like in theory, you know, like my, my principled stand against human torch, it's gone through many phases and, uh, had different feelings behind it. And I've just, you know, I've never been a fan, but, uh, I used to dislike him because he died to Killmonger. That was my i was my original reason why I did not consider Human Torch to be you know one of one of my movers. But but yeah, I don't know. if If the card is good, I like to get it to ink. Or if the card is interesting to me, I like to get it to ink.
00:03:36
Speaker
um Do you stop as soon as you get it to ink and then you move on to the next card? Yeah. There are a couple of ones I've been trying to get to ink for a while. the The next ones that are like really on my list that I must i must see in monochromatic ah whateverness.
00:03:58
Speaker
um um um I'm talking about Surge and Cannonball. These two. If if I get these two, they're they're both stuck on gold. ah ah ah ah My custom card will be set to gold until the ink shows up, you know?
00:04:11
Speaker
But that that like reminds me that I'm close and I've got to keep trying. But, man, if I get those two inked out, all kinds of decks will be fully inked. That's my approach.
00:04:22
Speaker
Rhi, what do you do?
Immediate Satisfaction vs. Long-term Planning
00:04:25
Speaker
um I have more of, like, a Dark Lord strategy um based purely on ah personal whimsy and whoever's in the room with me at the time.
00:04:37
Speaker
Like... Which means, like, whatever, like... that Sorry, and I say Dark, I mean more of, like... More of like a dark queen. more of like Galadriel turning bad. Pretty spooky.
00:04:53
Speaker
Yeah. So that's me. It really is. It's almost always late at night that I'm doing it as a reward for myself. Because I did my missions or whatnot.
00:05:04
Speaker
Somebody offered you the ring, you know. And I have, I have, I'm always looking for the magic number of getting the over 1500. Sometimes if I'm almost there, i hunt or I just Oh, do the whole thing once. Because I'm like, I bet if I split, I'll get enough to put me over that last year. Sometimes it doesn't happen. And I have to remember I left one on, like, Ultra or whatever. And sometimes I forget I did that. And then it's ah it's a nice surprise for a future read. Like, oh, look, here's one I can split for 500. Yeah.
00:05:36
Speaker
Anyway, and it's always, like, a deck I'm playing because it's not exciting to me. I know there are cards that I love and I want to get good splits of. But I'm more about – this is – for me, Snap is more about immediate satisfaction. There's so much in life we have to plan for. Like, you know, and I used to do that for Snap, but why? Why should I not live carefree and happily in in my fun time game? So anyway. So yeah, it's just, you know, whatever deck I'm playing and what I have boosters for...
00:06:09
Speaker
And ah all of the credits, usually, as soon as I get at You know, I haven't been playing a lot. or I've been in a bad mood when I'm like, oh, look at me. I have like four or five credits. Yeah. But a couple of cards.
00:06:24
Speaker
um Yeah, that's how we do it. Great. Split fast. But what's your goal? Or do you not have one? Oh, ah a good looking split? i like crackles. I really, you know, obviously or you're always desirable.
00:06:40
Speaker
um And then otherwise, you know, i have also just found myself less and less using backgrounds except for inks of ah stuff and just going for borders.
00:06:53
Speaker
And ah usually yeah i go to the level of just good enough. Like, oh this one this one's just vanilla. It's just plain. And it's, like, the only one the deck. And it's new. it's, like, the awkward kid at school. And, like, doesn't even have cool shoes. And it's, like, then I feel bad for it. and like, okay, we'll get you at least little sparkle or something, you know? And then that's, like, the good enough split where it has a split. It won't feel like... alone and then and then we go for like the split that I'm like yeah that's it you know like when when like drag hit with the way I haven't changed drag forever you know there's cards that are just like no you're there like Enchantress Enchantress was the very first one for me ink white crackle was beautiful and everything yeah once I hit there it's like why even split more you know what I mean like a mastery is not a good enough reason Right! no like There's only so much greed we should have.
00:07:51
Speaker
We could get our one tier-esque god split and just be happy with that and move on. you know We don't need five god splits floating around in the ocean. Okay.
00:08:03
Speaker
Sorry. that's That's how I do it, though. I chase crackles. About 99% of my collection is sitting on base finish. I want crackles on i on a crackle that matches. so i will Even if I get a crackle, I will keep going on a card...
00:08:17
Speaker
to get a color that's good uh sometimes that means one color and sometimes that's just like i don't care as long as it's okay like i've been working on sam wilson purple was the first one i'm like this doesn't fit this character at all purple is not the right color for him i was going for red white or blue but i ended up with gold and it's like it's pretty good the split or the variant i have has like a sunset background so like i might stop there i haven't decided yet um And I used to try to get every card split at least once so I could run the custom card and, you know, ah put the whatever frame I want on it. But I've stopped doing that the last few seasons because I was like, there's so many cards that come out that I'm hardly ever going to use. I would much rather pour those credits into a card I love.
00:09:04
Speaker
So I'm actually running pretty low on cards I love that need crackle, which I think says more about how picky I am than about how... Your steak is too juicy, posting. That's what you're doing right now. Like, oh no, I've got so much crackle.
00:09:20
Speaker
Abundance of crackle. Look, I'm splitting Uatu right now. That's how like thin I am on like clip cards that need to be crackled. That's wild. You got to Uatu. See, I was thinking, like, i I was getting pretty far afield because I finally inked out Shang-Chi.
Card Strategies and Evolving Meta
00:09:39
Speaker
who, you know, in in my very early days with Marvel Snap, I got him to gold and I was like, oh, that's good enough. yeah but I've been playing him ah like probably more than I have in years in the past month or so. So I figured it I should just, I should get him inked out, take him all the way, you know, get get him home.
00:09:57
Speaker
um Also I've been buying some variants. I've just been going, i like that's the the fact is like brand new Ben roller. This, this isn't a secret, but like, it's not that hard to stay. like up to date on cards if you're like generally pretty good like about you know stuff and you know like i'll skip i'll skip a few ah but like i've got i've got enough tokens that i could i could unskip those i i could be 100 like i'm just i'm just i'm hanging comfy you know like i feel like i've mismanaged my tokens wildly
00:10:33
Speaker
I feel like you have also. You've also had a healthier relationship with the game lately, right? You're not keeping up with every single mission, every single refresh. That's true. not. It's true, but I have also not doing that. Are you claiming your 100 free credits a day from the web shop? There might be things that you're missing, and then it's not possible to keep up. There's lots things I'm skipping. Okay, yeah.
00:10:53
Speaker
So you're good. You're just having a healthier relationship with the game. Anyway, I appreciate the little detour. I did not mean to resource shame you. You're doing it Resource shaming. It's okay. You can poor shame me in the game. It only, you know, cements my underdog narrative. So, like, you know.
Community Reflections and Inspirations
00:11:14
Speaker
Anyway, but i do appreciate the detour. Ben was talking about splits, and I was like, I don't even know what my co-host's like. What is their what is their cosmetic strategy? Maybe we've talked about it before, but we We may have. But yeah, I i dropped some token. I think this was a 1200 gold variant, but I got a fancy Hope Summers recently just because i want i wanted one that wasn't Pandart because I don't fucks with them. Yeah, same-sies.
00:11:43
Speaker
Yeah, so I've been rocking the base art Hope Summers like this whole time and i just wanted i just wanted to mix it up, you know? um so i bought a fancy hope and it looks real good it's a cool one um i can i can find the name of the new one where she's like holding the little like fireball thing uh it is the alex dos or is it one i've been rocking the n var and i don't think i bought it i think i got lucky and got it in a mystery variant Yeah, that one. Oh, yeah, I also have that.
00:12:17
Speaker
Yeah, I dropped i dropped the the coinage on that. And i've I've been, yeah, I've just been getting wild by invariance. Those Brett Bean ones last season, i it i didn't get all of them or anything, but I got i got the ones that I really, you know, that that spoke to me. And it has... ah It's made me more excited about playing those cards. Now I'm extra happy when I play a Spider-Man noir.
00:12:44
Speaker
Although that deck that, uh, well, anywho, there, there is a deck that I will talk about, but it's got Maverick in it. So I can't talk about it now. It would be wrong. those are the rules.
00:12:55
Speaker
Those are the rules. Been, uh, been playing other games and stuff. Um, I don't know. I feel like I didn't really, mostly we just talked about cosmetics in my weekend snap, but that's okay. That's okay. I'm sure we'll get to what other, whatever other snap things happened.
00:13:12
Speaker
Um, We'll talk about Maverick and Team Clash. It'll happen. Okay. Rhi, how was your week in Snap and Keep It Snappy? Okay, so we are recording several days late and that should have made me more prepared.
00:13:32
Speaker
But it was a week I got in pretty late. So, you know, either came in and then I was mostly like playing Team Clash that we'll talk about um later so no i'm normally not one to uh think a lot about the structure of my thoughts but earlier today i was saying like oh my god that we got podcasts i'm not ready i'm like what is what is the story of like this week in snap and I um commanded my brain butt to play me a montage of like snap and podcast moments so I could my brain could do its natural thing and like fit it and into something like a television a game or something like that so um and you know what I realized about this week though it was just like
00:14:22
Speaker
ah I don't know. a lesson in kindness and friendship and stuff. It was all just for me when I thought think about everything touching the podcaster with Snap. It was all just like people being nice to me. um One of our speakeasy patrons, Spectracity. don't know if I'm saying that right. And also is it more of like a Spectro City? Like ah like a Like a cyberpunk, you know, like Tron? like Because that's what I kind of picture like a beat. Or is it like like atrocity, but like a spectrocity? I'm very curious. I need to know now, because i've I've been thinking spectrocity this entire time. I've been entirely in spectrocity camp, but like you raise a, is it spectrocity? I don't know.
00:15:11
Speaker
Okay, whenever you see the handle though, like I start, like a beat starts going my head and I want to like hoverboard with like electric lights. Anyway, so okay. They made, like tying into my last weekend snap, they did, they made a Jessica Jones rescue a deck using my idea of Silver Surfer. And like of like other cards that I love, like, you know, like Kate Bishop Hawkeye and Merlin and stuff. And it's got Penny Parker, who I just always mean to play more of. It's a card of I'll put in decks occasionally and I'm always like, yeah, I mean to try and do more with that. And, ah you know, it's got the the Quicksilver wi can Galactus set up, so I feel right at home, because that's what I've been playing, like, kind of have kept coming back to recently. so like, that was really nice and sweet, and, like, um i did do my secret homework, but...
00:16:06
Speaker
And, like, I obviously, you know, like, I didn't announce it because I didn't stream in a long time and I was worried, like, I don't announce it ahead time and check it out or anything. And, like, and so it kind of came randomly and I said, like, you know, like 10 people are going to be there. whatever showed up, like, out of the blue. And it's been such a year for me where I haven't been like, I've kind of just had to be wrapped up in my own stuff, and I haven't been able to be around and be as supportive of other people or be in the forums like I wanted. it was still just, like, people came to just be like, hey, you know, like, say hi and show me the other, like, they still supported me in, like, stuff I was doing. And I was just like, oh, yeah, like,
00:16:48
Speaker
humanity Like, you know, we don't all have to live in this, like, transactional world. You know what I mean? Sometimes, like, it's just like, yeah, like, people are just nice. And they're just cool if, like, you're in a time when... Is this the part of you yeah where we can gush about how cool the game is looking? And how fun and fancy it seems? Oh, thank you.
00:17:14
Speaker
I love seeing the but an earlier version of it and it was fun then and it looks like it's even more fun and like the The art is so good. So pass my compliments to the Frank. Yes, Frank listens to the podcast. It would be so good to hear Just everything about it is just coming together and it looks so
New Project Introduction: Fourth Location
00:17:36
Speaker
cool. And it's just so neato and I'm so impressed.
00:17:40
Speaker
It was a fun stream. It was a fun stream. That's the thing. It was not it was not vegetables. It was dessert. yumym Yum, yum, yum. okay I appreciate that. I haven't like streamed in so long and stuff. So, yeah. Like, um...
00:17:58
Speaker
it was cool. Everything, even though, like, I was kind of, uh, like, coming belatedly, and then, like, all my snap time got sucked into Clash, which we'll talk about later, so I won't get into now. Um, it just, it was still, it was good feelings, because it was all, it was, I was thinking about all the ways, um that the game was connecting me to other people, and,
00:18:20
Speaker
I hope it's done that for other people as well. So um that being said, i would i would love to hear about our um shimmering third co-host.
00:18:35
Speaker
ah How was your weekend snap, Lauren? You may keep it snappy if you so choose. I am actually going to keep it snappy, even though I have a lot to say. Um, fourth location, which has been teased here before I'm pretty sure, launched a few days ago. We got in like right before team clash launched, which was our goal. I'm glad i appreciate Scott pushing me so hard to do that because yes, if it was my own project, it would have taken another month or two to launch just because of my perfectionism element.
00:19:08
Speaker
Um, But yeah, there's there's a bunch of stuff from Scott up right now. For me, there is only the economy guide. But the economy guide takes... very good.
00:19:19
Speaker
it takes so much time to put together. Thank you, Ben. um Especially when it's a new event. Because I'm trying to build spreadsheets so that next time Team Clash runs, I can mostly just plug in numbers. They do tend to change things a little bit at each time, right? Like, oh, now there's different, now there's missions added, which is missions were the big thing to integrate for Team Clash versus ah Arena and Showdown. But anyway, i'm trying to I'm trying to make good spreadsheets. I'm also like triple checking my math along the way. So that just, it just makes everything very slow. but
00:19:56
Speaker
There will be lots more there. Also, the website itself represents a lot of work for me, like the look and feel of it and all that. it is it It was based on a template, but also there's like a thousand lines of injection c CSS that's affecting the presentation, which is not the cleanest way to do it.
00:20:13
Speaker
ah Modsprey Models, who is a web dev, has already like reached out to me about like, hey, there might be better ways. I'm like, yeah, maybe. but But also, we're trying to trying to move fast and and break things, um which is not normally my style, but honestly, the response has been really good.
00:20:30
Speaker
i really appreciate everybody who supported us along the way, very much including you two, and everybody who signed up for premium. I understand if you can't sign up for premium, but if you can, it's like $4 a month and you get There will be some exclusive content, but mostly it's like early access and just supporting two humans who are putting a lot of time into Marblesnap.
00:20:49
Speaker
um
00:20:52
Speaker
that's That's my like passive plea. The whole point all along, well, there ah there's really two things I wanted to do with Fourth Location. One, i wanted to make Snap content creation sustainable for me.
00:21:07
Speaker
And two... I wanted to not have any editorial oversight. Not that, you know, like Marvel Snap Zone has been pretty good about letting me write about whatever I want. I think there's only been one or two articles I've ever pitched where they said no. um But still, I want to be able to write whatever I want without anybody signing off on it.
00:21:28
Speaker
and and know that I'm contributing to something that I built. And just because just because I'm doing this for the love of it. Like, it's it's an accident that I got into content creation. I just like the game and the community a lot.
00:21:41
Speaker
um that That is the main thing I've done this week. The community likes you too, Lauren. Oh, yeah. oh thank you. i know Like I said, the response has been very good. yeah As a representative for the entire community. Yes, I confidently speak on behalf of your Snapchat. Well, I really appreciate it.
00:22:01
Speaker
the The response has been very good for just, you know, for the few days it's been going. I think... there's a good chance that it will lead to being something sustainable um but i also know like the first few days are going to to have more sales than any other time in the history of the of the website like there will be oh i don't know about that small long tail that's true maybe we'll uh interview glenn or or invent ah and an amazing tool or something i don't know we're thinking about it. We're thinking about ways to monetize without being assholes, right? Like I don't want to take away stuff I was already doing for the community for free.
00:22:38
Speaker
So like my economy articles, basically my strategy with them there'll be early access for 24 hours and then, and then free to the public. also really, really want fourth location to be ad free because i As much as I like SnapZone and SnapFan, I really dislike how junky they are with ads. some of Some of the fan sites are worse than others. Oh my gosh. You know, it it is so easy to keep fourth location open on one of your and one of your browser tabs. Oh baby, the memory usage is like two digits. It's very, very nice. yes so ah we will eventually incorporate ads if we have to but i hope we can avoid it um of course we are also doing youtube content and
Analyzing Maverick Card
00:23:24
Speaker
that's gonna have ads because i don't think we can control that but um anyway it's it's my big project i have put a lot of time into it lately if you follow me from my clips there haven't been clips for like i don't know four weeks or something like that because fourth vocation and work have kept me very busy is busy season at work if I didn't say that already um I look forward to that I look forward to work slowing down a little bit in the new year anyway let's move on um we decided ahead of time we don't have new thoughts about Wade Wilson and Weapon H except of course when we talk about the OTA later um
00:24:03
Speaker
But this week's cards, we have some bangers this week, I would say. Maverick, a three three Activate. Give the next card you play power equal to this card's power.
00:24:16
Speaker
Ben, do you have Maverick thoughts? Oh, yeah, of course I've got Maverick thoughts. The card's very good. ah I mean, for one thing, seems to... ah I don't know if y'all have noticed, but zombie Galacti has been around a fair bit. And I think a lot of that has to do with Maverick. Um, I mean, like, I know some, some folks are strictly doing like Wong Shuri things, but I don't know. I feel like Maverick is, uh,
00:24:48
Speaker
Maverick's a very strong card, I guess, is what I'm trying to say. ah And a better card than Zombie Galacti. I'll plant my flag there, too. Wow, so brave.
00:24:59
Speaker
All right, here's what I'm doing with Maverick. though i'm I've actually been trying a lot of different things with Maverick. I'm just going to tell you about the one that I think is the best. ah It's just my Golden Gauntlet Surfer deck with Maverick in it. And that's America Chavez, Surge, Merlin, Brood, Captain Carter, Silver Surfer, Maverick, Hope Summers, Mercury, Sebastian Shore, ah but but but but Absorbing Man, and Cannonball.
00:25:27
Speaker
And I call that deck Final Surfer 2025 because... wasn't feeling very creative. And there are only so many Poseidon boons in the two Hades games. I don't want to burn all the good ones super fast. Definitely not i've i've thrown ah I've thrown away some great boon names on some real forgettable surfer lists. And you can't reuse them. You've got to be careful. Well, that's the thing. i
00:25:57
Speaker
I do worry that someone would get confused or something. ah But yeah, that that deck is feeling great. The card that I cut for Maverick was Copycat, but I feel like in a tournament setting you're going to want Copycat because it's really good knowing what's on the bottom of your opponent's deck. It's very good. Oh. um But, you know, I'm... so I kind of think that the version of Surfer with Mercury and Cannonball is maybe the best one. Although I do miss my Spider-Man noir stuff. There's just not enough room to do all the stuff.
00:26:35
Speaker
This is always the trouble with Surfer because you can do whatever you want. And that's the the joy of the archetype. But um yeah, I've also...
00:26:47
Speaker
I guess I'll talk about another one. i'll talk I'll talk about one other one other surfer deck that I built with Maverick. This one is less a surfer deck and more an activate deck.
00:26:58
Speaker
That's right. It's about robots. This deck is called the distant future as in the year 2000. The distant future. it does sn future Okay.
00:27:11
Speaker
quite different ever since the robotic uprising of the late 90s. Instead of saying yes, we say affirmative, unless we know the other robot really well. um But that one is America's Hubba's Surge Lasher.
00:27:25
Speaker
Herbie, the original robot who meant activate before the season, they were calling their shot. Very, you know, I appreciated it.
00:27:35
Speaker
i I noticed these things. Brood, Captain Carter, Silver Surfer, Cosmo. That's right. The dog. The one that makes the on-reveals go away. ah Historically, one of my natural predators, but sometimes you gotta, you know, the the bedfellows, they get real strange. um ah Then we got Jocasta. um Then the you know The reason for the season, Maverick, Omega Sentinel, and Scarlet Spider.
00:28:07
Speaker
card that I've always believed in, but have not as often as I would like to found excuses to play. So ah that's sort of just an activate surfer-y thing. Honestly, like you could probably throw other cards in there. You might throw some other cards in there you might you might even it It could be retooled to be sort of a zombie galacti kind of thing. And I don't know.
00:28:34
Speaker
i'm I'm not as confident in that deck and its goodness. That's more experimental for me. But if you want the good surfer, it's the first one I told you about. But yeah, I've been i've been loving Maverick. Maverick, very strong. Hey, um is it Atlantis? Is that the location that loves it when you've got only one...
00:28:50
Speaker
one thing or on it. Uh, you notice that, save it for Maverick. If, if your deck has Maverick, save that spot for Maverick. Cause he will boost something plus eight. Uh, same story with Nita Valir. Also remember to stick him behind, um,
00:29:07
Speaker
cheese
00:29:11
Speaker
You didn't need to do it in the middle of your train of thought. ah But, anywho. For the listeners, i I chatted in in the Zencaster chat. I said, hey, one of you is being noisy.
00:29:22
Speaker
well So Ben got up to shut his door. I've got house guests. It was sounds like they're having a good time. Yeah, well, they are. But I wish...
00:29:34
Speaker
ah Anywho, anywho, yeah, but if you've got locations that can help Maverick bestow more than his natural three power, do that. If you can stick him behind Captain Carter, do that. Because, like, that's the thing. Captain Carter loves to receive a Maverick buff, but she also loves to, you know, assist a Maverick buff as well.
00:29:59
Speaker
I hadn't thought about how Carter is also in that Maverick space where she loves getting and receiving. Well, I mean, like historically that hasn't been how it worked. It's just that Maverick is like the, the the universal donor. And just like, you can, yeah you can place him at any like point in your, know,
00:30:18
Speaker
your infernal contraption and, uh, you'll be multiplying your stuff. Uh, so like, it's also great to Maverick sometimes after surfing, you know, like there's, there's like a lot of stuff you can, you can mix up your play order where, uh,
00:30:35
Speaker
Yeah, so sometimes you play Brood after you've surfered. like not It's not like always the thing you're trying to do, but like sometimes that's sometimes that's the thing you end up doing. I don't know. Maverick is just really hard to go wrong with and really easy to eke out extra value with and is a very strong card. Probably too strong. I'll say it.
00:31:02
Speaker
I've said it. It has now been said. Maverick, too good. It's on the record. Rhi, did you get to play any Maverick? Or play against? No, I won't lie. I haven't like even been on there. I mostly have gotten mind-trapped into Team Clash. Against my will, I just meant meant to dabble and then also do other things. but um So I really haven't like seen a much or...
00:31:25
Speaker
um I'm sad that he's he's made zombie galacti better, if that's true. Because, like, yeah i when you said that, I was like, yes, I remember, even though I was talking about the before times. And it's like, because I was already still seeing it.
00:31:39
Speaker
I'm like, don't want more of it. All right. Cool, cool, cool, cool. Yeah. ah That is the Zombie Galacti deck. I'll tell you, I don't know how it happened, but as Snapdecks on Twitter, like half of my feed is Japanese Marvel Snap.
00:31:57
Speaker
Probably because I repost them sometimes. Zombie Galacti is huge over there. I would say possibly bigger than Mr. Negative, but it feels like the same sort of deck to me. I feel like it's definitely more fashionable than Mr. Negative, even... ah Well, I don't know. Mr. Negative is also pretty hot right now, at least where where I'm getting matched up.
00:32:17
Speaker
It's a little bit sneakier because it can come down on the last turn. And I'll tell you. i'm I'm surprised by how often Zombie Galacti surprises me. Like, it does a whole animation when the match starts, but apparently sometimes I'm not watching that, and I'm also not catching the green aura around my opponent's cards, and all of a sudden, they're doing Wong Shuri and Zombie Galacti, I'm like, oh, I didn't even know this was a Galacti deck.
00:32:45
Speaker
I had a similar experience at first, but I feel like my... performance against zombie galactidex has really improved as my ability to recognize them and ah just paying more attention. Like just being more aware of the threat has really helped. Cause like the first couple days of the the new popularity of zombie galacti, yeah, they were sneaking up on me 100% of the time. But like once i started to notice them, it became a lot easier to thwart them or retreat for one or two cubes. In some ways it feels even more embarrassing than like not noticing an echo, but I agree with you. Having been surprised by it a few times, I hope that now I'm better at detecting the patterns. Like, oh, long shuri probably means galacti. Maybe I can look and see if I can detect any infectious glories around the world. Yeah.
00:33:43
Speaker
Um... and Anyway, it feels like very similar deck to me. If you don't have tech to stop long, then like then you kind you know... You retreat before they snap, hopefully. That's what I'm saying. You just retreat. That's why I think it's a very Mr. Negative deck. Like, if it does its thing, it's just going to beat you. Like, it can go so tall.
00:34:02
Speaker
um but maybe you can stop it from to it's doing its thing, or maybe you can get out before they snap. How many times do you think they're just bluff snapping you, like, on turn two? Like, you know what i mean and I mean? those are the kinds of decks that actually can bluff, right? Like, that's one of the very few decks in the game that I think can bluff. And you just have to trust that they are that they mean it.
00:34:27
Speaker
On turn two, are they bluff snapping, or are they hope snapping? Because, you know... It's like, do they have the negative? They play the Ravonna. They have the negative in hand. like there There are certain snaps where like I don't have like all the game plan figured out. like I don't know what we're doing like all the way until the end. Just feeling for success.
00:34:51
Speaker
Yeah, I don't know. I don't like when the negative player is feeling good, though. No. Anyway, we're talking about Maverick. um I will say, hey not surprised that I played him a bunch, mostly in Surfer. Not surprised at all that he's good there. I expected him to be very good. I think he was like my third of the ah ranked number three of the season behind the skills. um What I didn't know is if he was going to be good outside of Surfer. And I've been surprised how good and flexible he is in other places.
00:35:20
Speaker
But yeah, I've seen a lot of people say he's basically a must get card. So ah grab him if you can.
Evaluating New Cards: Mero and Team Clash
00:35:28
Speaker
We'll move on to Mero, Series 4 that came out on Thursday. A two three when discarded or destroyed, randomly split negative... um The data might have said negative 6, but I think it's negative 7 in the game, right? Mm-hmm. Do have you know offhand?
00:35:43
Speaker
Yeah, negative 7. Randomly split negative 7 power among enemy cards, putting her on par with Proxima Midnight um in many cases. Mm-hmm. Did either of you get to play her? i haven't get to I haven't been able to play her yet, but I have played against her a few times, and I will say animation, very cool.
00:36:01
Speaker
Very Killmonger-y. Yeah. All that. I got her. have not played her. ah It's not because I haven't had a chance to. It's because I think the card is not good. um that's That's why I have not played her. Okay.
00:36:16
Speaker
not not Not the must-get card that I would describe Maverick as. you know like ah it' This one is... You can get. I'm a fan of Mero.
00:36:28
Speaker
got some Just off-screen, I've got some X-Men comic books with Mero in them, but ah I'm not putting her in a deck. Not right now, anyway.
00:36:38
Speaker
ah I don't know. and Anyone have a more hopeful read on on this exciting new card?
00:36:48
Speaker
No, I don't know when I'll get her. and just oh That's too bad. because She's a discard card. i I've seen a few people say she's better than they expected.
00:37:01
Speaker
um away Or that i she's better fun. um Which to me, like... The way that she would cross that line is if it's good to have the critical mass of having Mero and Proxima Midnight in the same deck. But the other argument I heard is if you can get Mero off early, she can she can ruin some game plans like a Deadpool, for example.
00:37:23
Speaker
That still seems like a very niche interaction. That's very niche. It doesn't single-handedly make her better than Proxia. I win every game when my opponent plays Adam Warlock and I marrow it. think Were you losing every game to Adam Warlock before?
00:37:39
Speaker
He's pretty good. He's he' fine. He's fine. no just don't need a specific anti-Adam Warlock hoser card. you know like it It just doesn't... Yeah, I don't know.
00:37:53
Speaker
I definitely haven't played enough to make this call, but I would still expect Proxima's the better card. Being able to reach a location that you couldn't otherwise reach seems stronger to me. and to put And put it all in one lane. A meaningful amount there.
00:38:07
Speaker
It's the same amount, right? no Yeah, but like a meaningful amount in like one lane, whereas Mero is like, I'll have a couple points here, and like that's not enough to win anything. But the one thing you're forgetting is like the nice targetability of it. The thing with Proxima is you're mostly just catching it in a MODOK sweep kind of stuff. Because, like, often there's something higher cost in your hand for targeted discard or lower cost. So maybe you're looking out in a blade. Mero with Colleen and, like, the other cards is much more targetable with Silver Samurai than, like, Proxima. And that would be the only maybe edge case that she has.
00:38:47
Speaker
You know, I mean, not the only, but, like, that would be the thing I would think of. I think I probably was a little low on her. um But also... Also, when you rated her, she was minus six.
00:38:58
Speaker
It's true. ah From what I've seen so far, mostly people are not playing her in Destroy. And I will still be surprised if that ends up being a thing. yeah Okay. um We'll talk about Wildchild and...
00:39:13
Speaker
What's the other one? Fastball Special. we'll talk We'll talk about them next week. um Let's get quick vibe check on Aurora. 6-6 on reveal. Give one of your other on reveal cards at each location plus two power. Repeat for ongoing, activate, and end of turn.
00:39:29
Speaker
you excited for Aurora? I only have 4k tokens, so no. So you can't be even if you want to be. Yeah, I'll probably pick her up.
00:39:42
Speaker
I, uh, you know, it's an interesting card. I don't, I want it to be good. It reminds me a little too much of Spectrum. I'm a little worried about that because I don't think Spectrum is a great card.
00:39:59
Speaker
I think she she will have her moments, but she's going to prove to be fairly restrictive, actually, in which decks she's good in. And even then, I don't know how often she's going to be your best turn six play.
00:40:12
Speaker
and
00:40:15
Speaker
I don't know. I think she just slots into the end of turn deck, maybe, right? Or is it too... Is she too costly for that? Because it's like, that's where you're combining a lot of those cards already.
00:40:27
Speaker
think she could. The challenge is you have to figure out how to play her with Thena. Right? Like... If you're playing only her on turn six, you're not benefiting from Fina's plus three. And that is... But it's about, like, Vizwoman, right? Like, it's like, and Jocasta, and, like, what turns you can play those. Do you think maybe you you bring Yellowjacket for an on-reveal that costs zero? Ooh, I was thinking of Wasp, but Yellowjacket might like it. Wasp doesn't have any keywords, right? Right, yeah. Or wait, maybe maybe this is a high Evo card. Maybe that's how you get Wasp with keywords, and it's also an end of turn deck? I don't know. Look at you go. They also have end of turn abilities, the high Evo cards. That's true, they do. Ooh, maybe that is something.
00:41:18
Speaker
I'm into it. See, I feel like she she lets you think of interesting ways to bind cards rather than that like tribal... idea. So I like that about it. It's definitely a card I want to have in my collection.
00:41:30
Speaker
Yeah. I've seen people talk about zombies, especially because of Mr. Fantastic having dual abilities. I've seen Thanos because like what, two or three of the stones have dual abilities. And I've seen what's the other one?
00:41:43
Speaker
ah Doom 2099. That's the other one. But I really like my gosh i can't hold all these ideas in my head at once what was the one you just said ben high evo i really like that call especially that's cool now that high evo just had a bunch of buffs they sure yeah uh we'll talk about those in a second this week we've been playing team clash brand new game mode uh hinted at several times already what are your what are your thoughts i don't think we need to cover like exactly how the mode works but broadly there are five teams that each have their own ability and six cards that have new text and sometimes new stats uh it's a lot to learn because it's it's five new team abilities and so and 30 cards 30 cards to learn i've seen some people turned off by how much that is to learn although i don't know i feel like i absorb most of it just by playing a few games yeah what do you how's it been for you too
00:42:42
Speaker
My feelings have certainly like changed a bit as I've played it. I didn't... like i didn't when i When I first played, I was a little bit intimidated by all the cards and the you know the team abilities and things. And i think that the people who didn't give it a chance passed however... you know like the The people who formed their first impression and decided it was too much. Those people are not wrong. That's a very valid way to feel. And frankly, they're kind of asking you for you to feel that way. ah That like, that's like, that's the normal natural response to being confronted with 30 new cards and like,
00:43:31
Speaker
and it's all for a game mode where you don't even get to snap. I mean, like, ah fuck off a little bit, right? Like, i i totally I totally get where those people are coming from. Like, that i I stuck with it enough to find some charm to it, but like...
00:43:49
Speaker
it's not like super balanced and but there's no snapping. And like, you know, if, if you hate it, I totally get it. And uh, it's not my favorite either, but it's fine. I guess that's where I've landed. I think it's fine.
00:44:06
Speaker
I feel very differently. i feel like this delivers on a fantasy like a lot of people have wanted for a long time, which is just to simply be rewarded ah for playing, ah you know, thematic characters together, playing the Avengers together and stuff, and a lot of...
00:44:24
Speaker
them have been really far apart and you know a lot of the people who are into that fantasy a lot of them feel like they don't need like there are plenty of people who would be fine and i I like the snap mechanic and I think it does something for the game but there's a lot of people who are happy to just win or lose a game flat you know what I mean without the component of um snapping so I think that's interesting to put it this is the place for it right a limited time mode um What gets me is it did, like, I did feel trapped into it in that I couldn't, like, run out my tickets. And I did get the season pass because I think I saw, like, I can't keep on top of, like, all of the Snap stuff anymore. But I feel like I saw Lauren say you only get the free 15 levels.
00:45:15
Speaker
if you had zero and you got the seeds in pass? That's like a technicality. You get the same amount of XP either way. They just wrote it as levels, and it's only 15 levels if you started at zero. If you started higher up, it would be 14 or fewer.
00:45:30
Speaker
Well, I'm the kind of low-information snap player right now that would get mocked mercilessly this site, formerly known as Twitter, probably. oh Because like, yeah, I was just like, I don't know. So I went and I picked that up because I decided i looked at the shop and it's like, oh, there's two premium mystery variants. That's my favorite part.
00:45:53
Speaker
like Oh, no. And then it was like, OK. And then obviously there was the fastball special card. Which like seems like a real fun card, you know? like Think about all the like red skulls and typhoid marys. You could just cannon launch. you know Okay, I won't say cannonball because that's an actual card, but you know i mean? could just wow. Never stopped any. I'll launch, man. could just eject from your side of the board and be like, get out of here, red skull. Go be 15 pounds for me. Okay. Anyway, so, ah and I was like, i who knows how much time I'll have to play the mozada. I went ahead and got it. it was And it was, like, less than a variant, whatever. So I picked that up, and now I just, like...
00:46:38
Speaker
you know i just can't run myself out of tickets. and then i feel like So I feel like I should because they're like a regenerative thing. and it meant I kept playing even after I'd like done all the missions and stuff and where it wasn't like even feeling good. But I was like, I don't have Fastball Special yet. I don't have all these other rewards yet.
00:46:58
Speaker
um And I would just rather be trapped here than go like look up and and put new information into my brain right now about how I should do this mode. Anyway, so that's my complaint with it. But as I think there should be, like, I think for people who love marvel And plenty of people who are playing this game, like the draw was Marvel and the snappiness and easiness to get into of the card game kept them in and they want the fantasy of playing like cards and being able to deck build with that, even if it's not the best deck in the world. And I'm kind of just sad I haven't gotten to play with that and been like as much and be like, here's my Thematics. because they just didn't have as much time. So um I'm much more up on the mode than maybe some of you.
00:47:53
Speaker
I like the mode. Currently, i would I would consider it my least favorite of the modes that I like, um with high voltage and high voltage overdrive being modes that I do not like.
Team Clash Experiences and OTA Updates
00:48:04
Speaker
Mm-hmm. I think it's fun. I do agree with you that the faction element is something that's important to a lot of people. And if it's going to be in the game, personally, I want it contained into its own game mode instead of making it over to ranked. I'm okay if there's some sort of pseudo factions in ranked, like there are archetypes, or there's the high evo, the way that those interact. I'm fine with that. Robots does mean activate.
00:48:30
Speaker
Right. Love that. But I don't want... I don't want to limit deck building by introducing faction abilities that are too strong that it hurts decks that aren't on that.
00:48:44
Speaker
Yeah. Um, and so I think a mode is a perfect way to introduce those abilities. Uh, I agree. it's is like there' weird There's this weird tension where it's like removing snaps and adding factions. like These are things that make it like more casual friendly.
00:49:01
Speaker
But then, hey, learn five new abilities and 30 new cards is something that is not casual friendly. and Also, learn which characters are like ancillary reserve members of whatever team. like that Yeah, the collection filter is pretty good.
00:49:18
Speaker
I didn't say it like that. You know, bug your game out, you know. Yeah. I just started loading the pre-cons. like i'll read i like like I looked at the X-Men and I was just like, I can't. like and then i was just like I just jumped in and then I read them as they came up.
00:49:35
Speaker
because like yeah What do I care? Yes, that was trying to to my approach. tickets but Also, aren't the X-Men so hard? They were the hardest. I could win with like everything else, but the X-Men, I could just not i couldn't even. what the What the hell is that deck? Yeah. Make it work.
00:49:51
Speaker
From what was set, so there there they did an OTA to balance the pre-cons and some of the cards um just like two days after the mode started, which was awesome. Like they learned something from Grand Arena. Or no, it was one day after the mode started.
00:50:06
Speaker
because the reality is the player base can, can play way more games in a single day than the entire, uh, second dinner team could play in a year. And so they get better balance data. And I love that they were ready to do it early in this event. Whereas for this last grand arena, they did it with like two days to spare.
00:50:26
Speaker
Um, so hopefully the pre cons are better now. Um, The X-Men deck is really fun if you if you learn how to play it, but like that's part of the thing. It's hard to learn how to play it. It just barely clicked for me today where it's like, okay, I want to get three down in one location as soon as possible so that I can get Professor X out, and then I'm sitting on tons of energy, and I can do something with it.
00:50:48
Speaker
um Anyway, cool mode. i I don't know. I don't know why it it's not clicking for me as much as others. At first it was, i was losing. I was doing very poorly. I burned through my first set of tickets very fast.
00:51:05
Speaker
And as we've talked about before, the game is more fun when you're winning, even if you're not a super competitive player. What's your favorite deck? My favorite deck of the pre-cons. Mine's Thunderbolts. Thunderbolts, yes. thunder thunderbolts and avengers Thunderbolts and Avengers were my favorites until the OTA. um Guardians is really fun, but I'm not doing great with it. That's like the deck that I'm that i'm having a disproportionate amount of fun relative to how well I'm performing.
00:51:34
Speaker
Okay, I hate to like ever be a troll, but I have been getting fun out of like infuriating Guardians players by them not being able. Like there's one game and they could not get there's been like three games they've played where they could not guess a single time where I would play and match me up and whiffed on literally everything. And I'm just like...
00:51:56
Speaker
Yeah, that's my goal when I'm playing Guardians. When Guardians whiff, that's like real bad. That's real bad for them.
00:52:07
Speaker
yep um i miss i miss Sanctum with all the Guardians still in it. Do either of you have any of the... and Any favorites? I know it's only been a few days, but of the like new cards or abilities that like you almost wish were in the game?
00:52:23
Speaker
The core game? I didn't mention the stuff that I have been playing and that I do like. I really like playing the spider frenemies. In fact... uh since since the balance update they're much better agony at one cost is uh makes a big difference also that was the that was the team where i was trying to do custom stuff and before the balance update my custom stuff was better than the regular ah pre-con except the thing is
00:53:02
Speaker
I don't have man spider. And I thought about getting man spider just to like, just to make the best version of the, the spider verse stack is like the big payoff card for that. that's the thing. Since, since they like updated the things,
00:53:20
Speaker
Now it's just better for me to play the the pre-con ah Spider-Verse deck than play any version of it without Man-Spider because Man-Spider is so good in that deck because of all the merges and stuff. and yeah You can really get crazy with the cheese whiz.
00:53:37
Speaker
um Yeah, so that's that's what I'm about. Oh, I wish they would prima change Bucky. It's so much more interesting that you can only play him at a place you're losing, but he's like a 2-6, right? and i and I'm like, oh, when I was playing, I'm like, oh, I've never played Bucky so much. Like, since, I don't know, early years. 2-8. Yeah, I was going to say, I've never seen him with 6 power. i've I've seen him with large rewards. Oh, okay. Well, you know numbers, whatever. You're good. Yeah.
00:54:09
Speaker
Yeah, with the Thunderbolts ability, he's he's basically always a 2-9, at least. um My favorite card in the mode is team Clash, Doctor Strange.
00:54:21
Speaker
He is a two cost that pulls an on reveal ability to him and then repeats it. So it's kind of, kind of grand master ish, but in reverse, I thought he, I thought he was taking a bite out of Wong's ah cake, you know, I think that that's why he's like that. Yes. But like mechanically, it feels more like grand master to me, like move the card and then make it do its ability again.
00:54:42
Speaker
um And there are some really cool things you can do with that. My favorite is proccing Shang twice, which is ah very sandcastle kicking thing to do, especially by my standards. But ah okay, there's a lot of cards in this mode that go tall. Shang has been very good for me in this mode.
00:54:58
Speaker
And if you're just playing the pre-con Avengers deck, it's fun to, like, frustrate a Guardians player because you play Hawkeye and they think they know where you can play the card, but then you just play Strange somewhere else.
00:55:13
Speaker
Okay. Anyway. I think that's my favorite. um Gamora killing a card is very cool, although it's been really hit and miss for me if she destroys something that's worth for like more than four power.
00:55:27
Speaker
And if she doesn't, it would be better to just have basic Gamora, you know?
00:55:33
Speaker
Yeah, I think those two are the highlights for me. um That I would like actually like to see be real abilities. I think I want to see Vision go to a four cost also.
00:55:45
Speaker
His ability makes so much more sense if you have multiple turns for him to do it. right like That's always been like my issue. with I've never been excited about it. I just can't bring myself to play the card even when it's good and like justifiable. i just I hate that like the text box is so frequently just unfulfilled. It's such a bad text box for a 5-cost card.
00:56:08
Speaker
What? So frustrating. like i just i like i It's not rational, but like i feel very i' felt very vision-averse this entire time playing the game.
00:56:20
Speaker
Well, I will have... um And Rhi and Ben, I'd invite you to also, if there are decks that you're loving. But we'll have we'll have a few of our favorite Team Clash decks in the in the show notes or video description. I'm playing an Avengers deck from Smiles, an X-Men deck from Bones that's like a high high Evo deck. that's That's been really cool.
00:56:40
Speaker
And then... my own, I started with Scott's Thunderbolt Sarah tech deck, but it had leader and it just like felt too expensive. So I I've kind of like lowered the curve on Sarah tech, but I have enjoyed that deck a lot too. So I'll have a few in there.
00:56:55
Speaker
If you're interested, if you're looking anything else on team clash,
00:57:02
Speaker
Okay. The OTA that affected Team Clash did also change Adamantium Infusion. It wasn't in the notes at all. It sounded like it was an accident. Adamantium's text didn't change, but it now banishes first and then revives a card.
00:57:18
Speaker
Oh, you can play so you can play it in the fourth location. Yep. The downside to this is some people were doing adamantium infusion to revive like a carnage or venom, and then it destroys adamantium infusion and fire hair does a revival also. You can't do that anymore because the revival happens after adamantium infusion vanishes. So it's like has some pros and cons, but I think it's probably a good change in the long run to make the card less disappointing when you put it in a full lane. Yeah.
00:57:51
Speaker
Okay, we are going to briefly go through Thursday's OTA because it's it's a few days old and we have data mines to go through.
00:58:03
Speaker
So first up, Victoria Hand and and Quinjet both take a hit to their power. ah Just one, 2-3 to two two and one two to one one Okay, this is my kind of one one little a short spiel. is that i this When I saw this one, I do think it's justified because I've seen it. But thinking about how much yeah how much Victoria Hand I've seen around it, think about how bummed out I am.
00:58:29
Speaker
at like the promise of victoria hand like disappointing me because when she was gonna come out i was all excited because i love the improvisation of shield cards you know i love messing with that or even like something that's more toned down like mirage or something that's limiting yourself to their deck but then it turned out the single most powerful thing to do with victoria therefore the thing everyone will do is to just copy her over and over hope you draw her And then kind because then she'll just power her and then you just have a bunch of super powerful Victoria Hand clones running around. So the decks, you know, it does still have a little bit of randomness, but it's mostly geared toward trying to do that as like the strongest thing you can do. And that's just kind of a bummer for me as to what I was hoping from her.
00:59:20
Speaker
Yeah. Valid. It's also a good point. Like those decks are generally trying to make lots of Victoria. So one hit one hit to her is actually like... 2 to 4 negative power to the entire board. Kinda, yeah. That's that's true.
00:59:35
Speaker
She still gets huge. Yeah, I still... I think she's been way too good. I think she's still too good. That's what I think. Yeah. I hope that they keep her at 2 even if they have to nerf her again. i think it would change the the identity of the deck too much if she was a 3, but maybe that would actually put her closer to Rhi's vision of the deck.
00:59:58
Speaker
right Made her harder to copy. would be so weird. Do you think if she were three, she'd be... Friends with Esme Cuckoo and a silly surfer. yeah Yeah. she goes I bet she eventually goes to three.
01:00:14
Speaker
Like, right? Like, I bet, you know, now that you said it, I'm like, that's what they're going to do to her. It's where everyone ends up. Yeah, they could make her a three or a four with a bigger power buff, and then it's like, she's not there to buff herself. She's there to buff your other cards. Yeah.
01:00:29
Speaker
Also, I'm loving this Quinjet nerf. Nerf it into the fucking ground. I don't give a shit. It has so much upside. yeah Also, it's a plane. It's not even a character.
01:00:39
Speaker
it's like, I don't know. It's like anthropomorphic though. It's cute. Is it anthropomorphic? I don't know if even... i don't think so. i don't think no you like The make it feel that way now. you know yeah That's how is. It's neither here nor there, but when the pop-up shows up in the game to tell you what what changed in the ota this one like thinks Quinjet is two words. And I'm like, oh what's a Quin?
01:01:12
Speaker
What's a Quin? Yucky. I don't know. Now you have me thinking about the etymology of that word. like Does it have five jets? Yes. I don't know. I'm sure there's an answer. like where it's named after someone. i i feel like I should know this and I've heard it before and I can't remember. And the Avengers, like, counterpart to my Spider-Man The Ultimate Guide, I'm sure i'm sure they go deep on the Quinjet. It's probably a cross-section.
01:01:41
Speaker
Show you all the compartments and doohickeys and things. You see a lot of Quinjets in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. They often travel by Quinjet. Okay. They buffed a bunch of Vanillas. Misty Knight goes one two to 1-3. Shocker two three to Cyclops to that's it.
01:02:00
Speaker
hu six twelve to six for team
01:02:06
Speaker
i mean like taivo i eo buff and that's it That's ultimately what it is. Yeah. These are not big enough numbers to make them fit in Patriot.
01:02:17
Speaker
Which really makes you feel like Haiva must have been pretty underpowered before, that like like every card. I guess you never play with all of them, usually. Nope.
01:02:30
Speaker
I almost never see Shocker. Haiva's been on an interesting journey. Really? I see Shocker. Oh, yeah. It used to be so popular and so strong, they nerfed a bunch of the cards. And they haven't been reverted, right? Like Hulk used to buff in your deck. Thing used to hit could hit one thing three times. Wasp used to be a minus two. And it's just like they've they've hit them a bunch and never returned them.
01:02:54
Speaker
um Do you have any thoughts about Wasp, Thing, and Abomination not being buffed along with the rest? um i mean they buffed thing at some point recently already and abomination got a buff a while ago um so i think that's what that's about also i would just like to plug the the wonderful video that you and scott did for fourth location where you talked about the ota and um
01:03:28
Speaker
I thought Scott had some really good observations about how the team at Second Dinner has been thinking about these vanilla cards and talking about them and how it hasn't been entirely consistent throughout. Check that out if you haven't yet.
01:03:46
Speaker
We covered the vanillas quite a bit. Okay, and then a bunch of cards got a one power buff. Colossus, Cable, Iron Fist, Air Walker, Master Mold, Joaquin Torres, and Doom 2099.
01:03:59
Speaker
And also, sort of, Wade Wilson. He didn't get a power buff directly, but now the card that, the one cost that he pulls when he's destroyed gets a plus two buff instead of a plus one buff.
01:04:10
Speaker
Just the better kind of buff for him. This kind card. um Okay, I just want to say I'm actually a hype about Colossus because I've long thought, I'm like, Colossus is such a great Nomura pillar.
01:04:25
Speaker
like And now it's like, it's, you know, want to mess with it. I feel kind of neutral about the Colossus thing. Like, i'm I'm happy for Colossus, but I'd be happier for Colossus if they just pre-worked him and made him good.
01:04:40
Speaker
ah But you know what I don't like? I don't like buffing Cable. That's not good. Let's not do that. Let's not Cable. Hey, you know who deserves to be a 2-4? Colleen Wing.
01:04:51
Speaker
How is Cable a 2-4 and Colleen Wing's a 2-3? That's some little horse shit is what that is. I'm with you. Colleen is bigger upside. Let's be real. But also, I would rather see discard in the meta than see Mill.
01:05:07
Speaker
Yeah, that that's that's also what I'm saying. I'm saying just like, no matter how you slice it, Colleen should still be a 2-4 and Cable should have stayed 2-3.
01:05:17
Speaker
That ability is good. Let's not forget that like people have played this card for that ability. like It's kind of the copycat thing. ah like i i don't I don't like 2-4 Cable. Get out of here, 2-4 Cable. You're trouble. I'm calling it now.
01:05:34
Speaker
I was likewise surprised. Like, like really? who That was the one that surprised me the most. um Rapid fire thoughts on some of these. Colossus, I don't think needs to be reworked. I just think needs a different stat line. And I don't think 2-4 is it. Friend of the Pod, Ironcloak, did point out, it now a Valkyrie friend. But honestly, it's the same level of Valkyrie friend as Angela. Barely a Valkyrie friend. Yeah, whatever. um Iron Fist, great. Love seeing that go to 1-3. Match Ghost Spider.
01:06:04
Speaker
uh you know i'm i'm in favor of yeah yeah hitting like no yeah i'm i'm in favor of hitting the move scalers like they did for human torch and making these enablers like maybe possibly good enough to be used in other decks too i think iron fist and and ghost spider are both sneaky cards to fit into not move decks um joaquin torres i think that point of power actually matters quite a bit um yeah You know, it's 50% increase in power. He's a good card. I know Mastermold got the same buff, but i just that's still not a real card except for in that one very specific deck. um
01:06:39
Speaker
And then Doom 2099, I don't think it's enough to make him too strong, and I hope it's not enough to make him too strong. I did not like that one. That was a popular card. I don't like this at all. This is another one that does not... We don't need to be pushing Doom 2099.
01:06:54
Speaker
Especially when we have cards like Aurora and Moondragon that we'll be talking about later that like already are buffs to that deck. Maybe. ah And then finally, Wade Wilson. i want i want to know, do you guys think this is enough to make him a Deadpool card?
01:07:09
Speaker
No, I think he's still too slow. yeah I mean, i you did i played a bit with him, but like not fully enough to get whole consensus on the card.
01:07:22
Speaker
And hi okay i you know, he doesn't need a buff, but I still think finding finding a card still feels, especially Deadpool.
01:07:34
Speaker
don't know. want to try it more. yeah I think this might i think this might be enough. It might be. i don't know. I confess, I just don't want it. I'm not interested in having to worry about all three stupid Deadpools.
01:07:49
Speaker
You know, like, the the fewer Deadpool cards I have to hold in my mind, the happier I'll be. But no, this might make him relevant. I would just prefer that it didn't.
01:08:02
Speaker
i's just It's some interesting tension, because like if you make him good enough that like Deadpool is the clear best target, you start cutting other ones from the deck to make sure that you pull Deadpool. Yeah.
01:08:13
Speaker
Consistency is key. And maybe. Maybe it's just a different flavor of that deck. Okay. We had a patch. It came with datamines.
Season Pass and New Cards Discussion
01:08:22
Speaker
We are going to talk about the February cards, which is a Guardians of the Galaxy season.
01:08:28
Speaker
I don't know if either of you have had time to look at these already, so maybe they will be surprises. have. Some months I do not, but this time I did. yeah um it's Honestly, I think it's more interesting if we're all at different levels with these. Um...
01:08:45
Speaker
First up, season pass card, Star-Lord, comma Master of the Sun, 4-5 on reveal. Next turn, you get plus one energy for each turn you've ended with unspent energy.
01:08:58
Speaker
um
01:09:01
Speaker
another high evo buff like is this why they're buffing um the vanillas now i think maybe yes uh i think this card feels slow compared to other energy cards like hope summers but maybe good enough if your plan is already to be skipping energy anyway yep Kind of at odds with Warlock, which is strange.
01:09:26
Speaker
Yes, I was going to say. You don't want to play them together exactly. Because ideally you're playing Star-Lord on turn 5 by himself. yeah you You think that's the the best you want to play him on turn 5 so that you've got your one... ah He's going to count because the thing happens next turn...
01:09:48
Speaker
So it's going to count that turn five, right? Right. when you play So then maybe you're getting like three to four extra energy. All right.
01:09:59
Speaker
Yeah. You know, I feel like that's it's good to get all the energy at once on the same turn. I think I like this card. i get i'm I'm tentatively... I'm a believer.
01:10:17
Speaker
Okay, I was just remembering because I was watching you paste this into show notes. When I saw this card appear, I immediately heard ah the song Daylord from It's Always Sunny. It's called Master of the Sun. I don't know. It just felt like that kind of thing. um Card with a theme song.
01:10:39
Speaker
ah Yes. Okay. Okay. ah No, it's not Daylord. It's Dayman. I combined it in my head. Yeah, yeah. I knew which song you were talking about. I know! It's funny.
01:10:50
Speaker
People can always tell what i'm saying, even though I vastly butchered it. Okay. um No, i just I'm just glad that they are giving i've I've gone on before about how it's just like not it has become increasingly not good to skip energy rather than do stuff with that energy. So, you know, here they are in addressing that by adding more cards that benefit from that energy. So see.
01:11:18
Speaker
OK, Ben, will you read our super premium season pass card? Is that... ah Next one down. Activate. Copy the text of a character in your deck with cost equal to your unspent energy. oh and this is a 3-5.
01:11:38
Speaker
Stat lines are important. um So... ah I think this is a very interesting card.
01:11:50
Speaker
I don't...
01:11:55
Speaker
think I like it. I'm not excited to play it. I am daunted by it. It's it think complexity is...
01:12:06
Speaker
you know It just seems very difficult to control exactly. because like You want to know exactly what you're getting, right? and so you have like You have a plan, but like how do you not draw that card? don't know. like this is i don't know
01:12:26
Speaker
Yeah, I think it's just a little too too much of a like a It's a little too Rube Goldberg-y. a little too too much of a bank shot. like This is just too... It's too silly.
01:12:42
Speaker
And i have I have a high tolerance for silliness in cards. And this one is just a little too wacky for me. Three?
01:12:54
Speaker
Um... Is it a hard G? In my head I've always said magus. I'm like, is that wrong? I don't know. yeah And what's the A? Is it magus or magus? like I don't know.
01:13:06
Speaker
I can live back check that while you tell me what you think. No, I hate it. That's not... I feel like if I did it, I'm mostly trying to copy like one cost or sent something easy, but like, no. Like, I don't want to have to like add all that up. and then yeah youre So you're deck building first.
01:13:28
Speaker
you know like But this one is a warlock friend. So there is that.
01:13:35
Speaker
The cost. And it's not necessarily on reveal. I hate it. i don't want to play with it. It's too much to think about. It is too much. that's That's my feeling.
01:13:46
Speaker
That's where I'm at. um i I have several. It's Magus. Magus. By the way, Magus, long A and a hard G. Magus. Scott brought up an interesting question about this card.
01:14:02
Speaker
So Magus is like an alternate universe version or ah an evil version of Adam Warlock, right? Yeah. it is magus is also a different a different magus is warlock new x-men but they're confused because this one's got clear synergy this looks like a warlock a ability like this looks related to warlock did they mix up adam warlock and warlock and magus and magus maybe um Okay, second thing.
01:14:31
Speaker
Do you read this as your total unspent energy or your unspent energy this turn? It's this turn. I read it this turn. That's how I read it too, but I've seen people read it the other way. It be that, because how are they expecting you to like mentally track all your unspent energy? Okay, no way agreed.
01:14:51
Speaker
So there are some interesting things to consider with this card. Number one, activate means it can be a Jocasta card. Number two, my favorite use of it, if it's same turn unspent energy, is Mjolnir.
01:15:05
Speaker
You have zero unspent energy. You put Thor or Beta Ray and immediately hit them. like that a lot. I don't know if it's enough to make them a real deck, but it's cool.
01:15:20
Speaker
Could you do it with ah Beta Ray Bill? Because like doubling is better than plus sixing. yeah Yes, you could do it with Beta Ray Bill, and also that that makes the curve play nicer. Except for it's still activate.
01:15:36
Speaker
Ugh, gross. Yeah, but that could be a strength in this situation. But you want to be playing Thor on three. You want to be playing Beta... Beta... Beta Ray Bill. You want to be playing Beta Ray Bill 1.
01:15:50
Speaker
Ray Bill Beta. Does Stormbreaker cost 1? It's 0. It's 0 also? No, it's a 0 cost. Yeah. See, that just tells you how much Beta Ray Bill I'm out here playing. yeah I think it's a zero three the I like trying to... Maybe a 0-1-3. Maybe it's the most thematic. Like, we were talking about Clash, but the Thors are the most, I feel like, thematic, existing, cohesive, like, goes together. you know?
01:16:17
Speaker
For Asgard. Yeah. It's a 0-3. So, that yeah, this seems like a beta-raveal card, right? i mean um But yeah, that's what I'm saying. Like, you don't you don't want to be playing it, so I would prefer if it was on on reveal, because I'm expecting play it later unless it's cheaper and I can get it out before I'm playing Thor or beta-raveal. Yeah, well, what what is there something about going...
01:16:44
Speaker
Magus on three, Beta Ray Bill on four, activate. Is there something about that that doesn't work for you? Because that sounds like a great play line to me. I think it's good.
01:16:56
Speaker
Because like you just stick right to the curve, you're not even wasting energy, it's just like... Yeah, okay. They're tight. And you know for sure it's in your deck. Yeah, it it like it's foolproof.
01:17:10
Speaker
He's capital C cost, which makes me think he wouldn't work with, say, mr Negative. Something that had been reduced to... oscar But also, they messed up all the lowercase and capital Cs in the last Spider-Verse season. Okay. I don't know if I trust them.
01:17:26
Speaker
I also don't know. Here's what I would prefer, though, for the Thor's deck, is if it was a lower cost, so I could get it out ahead of those, and it could be like ah and it was a lower power, it would be a Red Guardian buffer for Thor or Beta Raybill. Because they're always, like...
01:17:46
Speaker
Yeah, because sometimes those decks are like higher stats, where sometimes Thor is your first thing in the lane, but that leaves them vulnerable. So like, that's what I want. This card feels like it's budding into my Thor, into my full time. If they Red Guardian your Thor or your Beta Ray Bill, they still get the stuff. The the text is on the hammer. They don't really care about the Red Guardian. I mean, it hurts to double reduced power.
01:18:09
Speaker
Yeah. Like, Mjolnir still does its thing even if Thor loses his text. Sometimes you're trying to, like, sometimes you're trying repeat the beta ray bill, like, friggin' them. That's true. You know what I mean? Occasionally you're trying to double up on you know?
01:18:27
Speaker
Yes, it would ruin a friggin' plan. Okay, moving on. Rhi
New Characters and Card Mechanics
01:18:32
Speaker
with the first week Series 5 card. oh Moon dragon is cool. I keep like looking up her character to get a backstory straight and I'm like, okay, now I have it straight. And then three months later I've forgotten it again. yeah She's Drax's daughter and martyr's wife and at some point is like possessed by the dragon of the moon.
01:18:51
Speaker
but There's also like two moon tracks. I don't know. Okay, I give up already. It's like the Kingdom Hearts narrative. I'm just never going to keep it all in my head. All right. End of turn. Oh, she's a two two End of turn plus two power if you played one card this turn and spent all of your energy.
01:19:11
Speaker
Oh, she's she's a ramp card, huh? She's a Wiccan? Doom 2099 kind of card.
01:19:21
Speaker
Huh, like a ramp Wiccan kind of deal. intrigued. You know, she feels very narrow. Like you're definitely, there's definitely a deck build around her, but like maybe the, but you know, ramping is usually okay to do. So we'll see.
01:19:41
Speaker
What do you think? yeah like Electro's no downside if this is the way like if this is your deck that you're building anyway. yeah um I think she's good. I think if she only gets to 2-6, that's good enough. right And she can get bigger.
01:19:57
Speaker
You don't think 2-6 is good enough? 2-6 is not good enough. no oh I'm surprised you think that she's good then, because like end of turn, like that means you have to get her out early. Are you doubling up on your end of turns and stuff? Like, You're probably playing Invisible Woman in this deck. I don't know about that because then you have the Thena problem again.
01:20:17
Speaker
That's what I think. and and I think she can hit 2-8 and 2-10. I just don't think she needs to. I think you're fine if she hits 2-6. I mean, like, you don't you don't you don't concede if it looks like she's going to finish at 2-6 or anything. But, like, I don't think you put her in the deck with the expectation that, like, 2-6 is enough.
01:20:40
Speaker
I don't know. okay Like like Thina. Do we, do we like Thina when she's two six? I don't think so.
01:20:47
Speaker
Well, so that's where I'm like, I don't think she belongs in an invisible woman for steps deck because you're missing out on Thina. I think it's obviously one or the other. Cause the, those two do not mix, but I mean like put invisible woman first steps in a doom 2099 deck.
01:21:03
Speaker
That's what I'm talking about. Yeah. Hell yeah.
01:21:08
Speaker
okay so I think she gets bigger than 2.6 and I think she is good. ah The next week's Series 5 Drax, a new flavor of Drax because that's what we were all missing in our lives. Drax, Avatar of Life, a 4.4. He has a gigantic flowing cape and a belt buckle with a skull on it.
01:21:30
Speaker
cool Cool looking guy. End of turn. Plus 4 power if your opponent played a card with greater power this turn. Move to that card if you'd be winning this location.
01:21:41
Speaker
Or sorry, if you'd be winning its location. moves Moves to your enemy's card if it would... That's so weird. location It's a funky card. You don't move to a card under any circumstances. Yeah, it's like a ghost spider except she pulls herself over. Like she's grappling.
01:22:02
Speaker
don't know. it's It's Captain Marvel. Kind of. Kind of.
01:22:13
Speaker
Oh, I'm supposed to talk about what I think about it. I think this card is cool. He can do the end of turn ability on his turn and like the turn you play him.
01:22:24
Speaker
possibly two turns after that you could involve invisible woman first steps. Maybe that's more of like the doom 29, like slow version of it. Um, you know, maybe, maybe you play him with his daughter, moon dragon in the same deck. Um, but that's pretty big, right? If he gains like eight power, 12 power, and he only moves if he's going to win the location,
01:22:49
Speaker
If not, you get to keep all that power in his current location. He will also lose you games by leaving a location where he was a critical piece. But he's only doing that if he's flipping another lane. So, like, I think it's probably okay.
01:23:03
Speaker
I like the theminess of it. Can you count on your opponent hold on and be playing bigger things every turn?
01:23:12
Speaker
know but if they're not like if they're not playing something bigger than a four like well i'm I'm just considering this like from the point of view of say a surfer deck slash player I'm playing things smaller than Drax all the time and if I do happen to play one large buffed up brood or Captain Carter that's fine you can have your big four eight Drax woohoo good good luck with that um Fair. Yeah, he he struggles with small small card decks. I just thought about something. He says move to that card if you'd be winning its location. Does that mean he'd move even if you were already winning that location?
01:23:53
Speaker
Yes. Yeah, that kind stinks. I think there's something uncontrollable about that. He just swoops in to claim the victory. Yeah, he he gets the credit for the victory that you already had. Yeah.
01:24:08
Speaker
do I mean, like it's probably good enough to go in some kind of end of turn deck, but i I think there's something clunky here about this design like that makes me not want to play it Yeah.
01:24:21
Speaker
I'm really interested if that second sentence is like misleading and he would only move if he swings the location. Well, it's written so... like I bet they're going to rewrite it at some point because you don't move to cards. That's just not a thing that any other card does. Oh, I don't think that they're changing that. that's That's new. That's what he does. He moves to where your your opponent played something.
01:24:40
Speaker
He moves to a location. He doesn't move to a card. I see what you're saying. um I don't don't trust them to catch that templating. Yeah.
01:24:51
Speaker
Oh, there's a fucking wonky-ass on-reveal coming in a minute. Starhawk. That's not an on-reveal, kids.
01:25:03
Speaker
We'll get there when we get there. well We'll get there when we get there. Any other thoughts on Drax? We didn't really do that one in in order, and that's fine. It was a conversation. Ben, with Major Victory.
01:25:15
Speaker
ah Major Victory. On-reveal. Oh, this is the way. 3-4. um On reveal, add two members of the Guardians crew to your hand. Not clear which members of the Guardians crew Right. What does that mean? Yeah. For all we know, these are, like, unique... For all we know, these are Kate's arrows. Like... Oh!
01:25:42
Speaker
Yeah, do you think that? Well, like, maybe... It's alternate Yondu or something or like, you know, like maybe it's like guardians that don't have their own card or maybe it's, you know, from a list of guardians. Maybe it's from this season. Maybe it's since the beginning of time.
01:26:03
Speaker
um but yeah i don't know my two leading my two leading theories are it's either the six main ones that are like that are in the team clash guardians deck so the the ones that get the plus four power plus mantis or it's every card that's on the guardians faction from team clash like this is them bringing factions into the main game i want it to be like thieves tools or arrows that's what i want it to be Because that would make the card better and more... Yeah, it would just... it it I don't think it's a real card if it does any version of the other thing.
01:26:40
Speaker
Well, maybe... i don't know. Like, Coulson, does he give you two? No, he gives you one. You know what the costs are. He gives you two. He gives you a four and a five. This is a very Coulson-ish card.
01:26:52
Speaker
But he could give you a small one and a five or two ones. Right? Like... this is just I just don't see it. yeah If it's not Thief's Tools, I don't see it.
01:27:03
Speaker
I like a card that gives you more cards. you know I just talked about liking shield cards, but we'll see. Like I said, this is hard to say that it's it's not going to be a lot worse than a Coulson was immediately what I was thinking. And it and really, now where it depends on like what counts as Guardians. Wait, my fact check. I just thought to check the... ah the page on snap
Banishment and Strategy Deliberations
01:27:28
Speaker
fan yeah they actually have the references here it's the six main guardians and that's it oh yeah then it's honestly not gonna be any better when you'd rather just play colson or stuff if you're trying to gen random cards even in a guardian stack i don't know that you want to play this to be honest no and you know what's cool about guardians when your opponent knows they're coming nothing they're even worse
01:27:55
Speaker
ah listen you're You're announcing that like I'm going to be playing Guardians now. i Yeah, I don't... When do you play this instead of Coulson?
01:28:07
Speaker
Right? You could put in a Guardians deck. Maybe you're running Jean Grey. Maybe you're running yeah Victoria Hand and Quinjet. But that is just worse than a regular-ass Victoria Hand or Devil Dino deck.
01:28:19
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. i don't I just don't see it. I hope they change it to do arrows slash thieves tool. i I hope they give some real... Yeah, wow. This card's bad.
01:28:31
Speaker
Datamind has a limited time event card, so it's probably series four. Maybe it is just a bad, goofy, weird card.
01:28:39
Speaker
Rhi with Kraglin. Okay, Kraglin is three cost with two power. um This says on reveal, banish the top card of your deck. If it was a four cost or higher, plus two energy next turn. Otherwise, give this plus four power.
01:28:59
Speaker
um yeah and I was sitting here looking at it. I don't like it that much. I feel like, I don't know, it's a ramp card, right? so that's the way you it. Because normally when I think about banishing the top card in my deck, I think about a card I want to play late when maybe I know there's a big, you know, a big ah thing to kill in the deck, like a red skull I didn't draw or something if I'm playing a Surtr deck or whatever. And...
01:29:32
Speaker
And then, but then you're hoping to get the power from it. And this is something you definitely want to play earlier to get the energy over the card.
01:29:43
Speaker
and then it's like, you know, the plus four power, there are better ways you can get to three six. So you're like not super excited to get that unless you're doubling up or something. So, um...
01:29:56
Speaker
I guess then it's just like, how does this fit in with ramp compared to the other options? Those are my thoughts. Yeah, I think you're looking at it the right way.
01:30:07
Speaker
ah i i like My best thought for this card is like, is this like your backup in a Wiccan deck if Wiccan doesn't show up? like Because then you don't... But you're maybe killing your Wiccan, right? Yeah.
01:30:24
Speaker
You're maybe killing off the Wiccan you would have drawn. So it's like, that's why I want to pull these cards later. What mean you're worried about banishing the card? you played on three, what if the next card you were going to draw for turn four was going to be the Wiccan you wanted to play?
01:30:40
Speaker
and now you've banished Yeah, I suppose that's true. In general, though, i am against worrying about banishing the top card of your deck. um yeah I like to worry about it Oh, I think that way was madness. yeah yeah um I'm with you. I think that, yeah, maybe this is playable in something like that, where like...
01:31:03
Speaker
the plus The guarantee of plus two energy, or I guess it's a high chance because it might just be plus four power. High chance of plus two energy. If you Quicksilver Domino, Wiccan, you can guarantee. Oh, guarantee Okay, I like that. um The other thing that I can see happening with this card, so this is Sean Gunn's character in the MCU. It's the guy who uses Yondu's arrow after Yondu.
01:31:24
Speaker
ah Fun fact, Maxwell Lord is his character in the new DCU.
01:31:32
Speaker
Oh, Sean Gunn? Okay. I was trying to follow, like, Kraglin's in the DC universe? There's a pretty funny scene in ah Peacemaker Season 2 with Nathan Fillion and what's her name?
01:31:45
Speaker
I still haven't seen that. Hear me out, okay? Something that you two may not realize is that in the data mines, we have two guardians that don't have any abilities or stats.
01:31:56
Speaker
Bug and Yaka Arrow. Yaka Arrow being Kraglin's in universe. so Maybe those are the cards that I hope that... That's what Major Victory generates. um Here's my thought. Kraglin and Yondu are both using Banish.
01:32:14
Speaker
What if the Yaka Arrow is a Banish tribal card? Like like ah Nicholas Scratch. I think that's a very reasonable expectation, and I thought, yeah, I'm i'm on the same page. Something like that is the only... like a banish A card that is benefiting from banishment is the only way I can see Kraglin being a real card. And he's Series 5. Yeah, they think you're going to do something with him.
01:32:40
Speaker
right I don't see it right now. And it maybe even if Yaka Ero isn't a banished tribal card, or a typal card, maybe we'll get... one of those in the future.
01:32:51
Speaker
ah Glenn has said we will not be ever reviving things from the banishment pile, but we might have things that like do like a Morbius or a Null or something like that. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.
01:33:03
Speaker
Okay, ah Jack Flag, a 3-3 ongoing. Your cards here with increased power have plus two power. He feels a lot like Captain America to me, but more flexible. Doesn't have to be an ongoing card, just a card with green power.
01:33:18
Speaker
um And also, I think, a very cool card to play with Moonstone, because then it would be plus four. That's very interesting. i feel like... know Oh, no, Reed, go for it.
01:33:31
Speaker
Okay. No, was just going to say, i feel like that's more where he goes in like Moonstone Spectrum stuff than like with Victoria Hand, right? Because I feel like you'd still probably just be like copying Victoria Hand and stuff. what What were you about? i know where I would play this card.
01:33:49
Speaker
I would play this card in Silver Surfer. Yeah, okay. Yep, yeah. That's the place. Let's go back to the Maverick discussion. Maverick likes this card. Maverick likes being told that his number is higher than it. like He'll pass this on to somebody else. Captain Carter likes this card. Maverick likes Captain Carter and this card. If we're all hanging out in the same lane, oh, baby, something's getting big in another lane, I tell you what. Yeah, this card's are real. Yeah, this card is very real. like this is This is like, what if Captain America fucking, you know, like, ah kicked ass.
01:34:30
Speaker
You're so right. How did we miss the surfer of it all? It's a three. It's obviously a surfer. Kraglin's a surfer. I don't know about Kraglin I'm not saying I'm not batching for Kraglin and Surfer not even a little bit 2-6 or 3-6 like 3-6 is nothing nothing is decent 3-6 is nothing they could make Cyclops 3-6 and I still wouldn't give a shit okay one more Ben ah Starhawk 2-2
01:35:06
Speaker
two two End of turn. On odd turns, give you... Oh, wait, no! On reveal! no I... um I don't know why I wanted to play like like it was... But no. What a cruel joke. Okay, here's here's what it does. On reveal. On odd turns, give your cards at the left location plus one power. On even turns, give it to the right location.
01:35:32
Speaker
it is is this really an on reveal? ah You best end up turn, but to me, i think activate is also ah possibility. like No, I think they're just... I guess maybe it could.
01:35:45
Speaker
is Is this card just... They're saying this is it like a possible like two six right? and Unless you're doubling it up, and then it just depends where it goes on the turn level it is, which makes it way worse. oh yeah Something about it just made me think it it had it has to be like every turn, right? like It has to.
01:36:06
Speaker
That would be a good card. That would be good of a card. Yeah, that would be a... Well, would it? I don't know. It would be better than... Did you see that they took new Shang-Chi up to 3-5 in this patch?
01:36:17
Speaker
They also changed Shang-Chi so the first level of rings is on reveal instead of end of turn. Oh, okay. So maybe that's what that's about. Just a big hit. This two six I mean, like obviously you're hoping like one of the...
01:36:32
Speaker
like maybe maybe is this also a surfer card are are we hoping that maverick and captain carter are already in position on one of these put them in your left lane play him on five yeah i guess maybe maybe this car maybe maybe it really is on reveal i don't know i just thought thought it could i think it is think it's too strong if it's end of turn i think activate would okay um I think it's bad as an on reveal.
01:36:58
Speaker
But yeah, you don't want to play it early. You have to play it late. Like, I guess it wants it. I guess it's cool in Sarah or something. But like, don't don't you want to be like solving big problems with cheap tech? sarahs I don't know. I generally dislike a two that you don't want to play early.
01:37:17
Speaker
I also dislike a two that you don't want to play early. And when I first read it, i thought it was like, I misread it as like an end of turn in my head. Like, oh, every turn it'll alternate giving points. Yeah, that's that's like what I was thinking. And I'm like, oh, what a quirky little card. That seemed like it had to be the intention.
01:37:36
Speaker
No, this I think this is right, but it just sucks. He looks like a
Thematic Deck Building
01:37:42
Speaker
dork, too. Can I tell you about this card? I looked up the the ah the theme of this card.
01:37:48
Speaker
Starhawk is a husband and wife merged together in a single body. ah and And also adoptive siblings. um But a husband and wife who ah who share a body, and generally speaking, only one of them has control at a time.
01:38:03
Speaker
So I think maybe it's kind of a cool ability that every turn it does something different. That's the husband and wife swapping control. That's cool. An effort. That's the coolest thing I can say about it. design I don't... Does he always look like a dude, though?
01:38:22
Speaker
I have no idea. Yeah, when she when the body completely transforms when she takes control, I have no idea. i mean, like, does this go in an Aurora deck with, like, some... oh No, activates. No, yeah.
01:38:36
Speaker
You know, like maybe maybe there's a kind of lane that you're building in your... I'm just trying to make this card good. i i don't like it. I'm not convinced. Maybe it is.
01:38:49
Speaker
i really... i i don't know. I like buff cards. Oh, I forgot to say I loved about Clash. I still play Toxie Doxie. She's like a permanent fixture in my party buff stack now, and was psyched to see her in Clash. That's one the reasons I love Thunderbolts.
01:39:06
Speaker
Okay. What about Starhawk with Jack Flag? You're spending five energy on that, but then it's plus three to an entire location. want to be...
01:39:18
Speaker
I want to be a meme like, stop trying to make Starhack a s thing, Lauren. yeah i like I like it, Lauren. i Maybe this card is fine as an on reveal. I don't know.
01:39:32
Speaker
like how How many good hits can you get? and and i mean Maybe you want to build... I don't know. like But the plus one power... It does seem like not enough.
01:39:47
Speaker
I'm like feels like, wouldn't it be cool to buff Sebastian Shaw and Scarlet Spider? Wow, you you made, you got a total of three extra power out of out of including those two cards in a lane. And like, that's not enough extra stuff to, I don't know. It's like a two yeah seven or two eight or something. It's like, it's not atrocious. yeah I have the same enthusiasm for it that I have towards sad films about a couple's sad marriage that's ending.
01:40:18
Speaker
Just like, nah. But it's just going to be a bummer though, right? like Yeah, i i know I know the films you're talking about and I also have not found the time for them. I'll be talking about Starhawk this long. ah Anyway, on to our side quests. First up and only this week, secret homework. I assigned it. in ah Inspired by Team Clash, I asked you to create a thematic deck that used at least six cards from the same team or genre or whatever. It was meant to be open-ended. um And then fill in the rest of the deck. built a deck where all 12 of them match the theme.
01:41:00
Speaker
Perhaps surprising nobody, the theme is A-Force, which is sort of an all-ladies Avengers sort of team. um And I think the only major A-Force character who is, or the only, even minor one, I think the only A-Force team member who's missing from the game is my single favorite Marvel character, Singularity.
01:41:23
Speaker
She is darling, a little pocket to dimension that that reminds me a lot of like Teen Titans cartoon Starfire. Oh. She has such cute variants. Yes. She is a darling character. Anyway, I really hope she gets added to the game eventually. There are some other like niche, uh, A4, but they'd be like variants like Dazzler in this universe is actually a Thor.
01:41:45
Speaker
Um, and Valkyrie also is a Thor and Gamora is a Thor. there's a bunch of There's a bunch of Thors. um Okay, so here's my deck. Wasp, Loki, Niko Minoru, Ghost Spider, Dazzler, Medusa, Storm. You see, this is not it's not the strongest deck in the world here. Storm, Elsa Bloodstone, Captain Marvel, Valkyrie, Spider Woman, and She-Hulk. I played it until I won with it without using Loki.
01:42:15
Speaker
um The idea is... You're going to swing a lane with Valkyrie or a Storm. One of those lanes will get swung. Captain Marvel can help you do that. Elsa Bloodstone can help you do that. The other lane you just hope that you go big on.
01:42:29
Speaker
Something like Elsa Dazzler or Spider Woman or She-Hulk. Things that are just pure power. Medusa's decent power on rate, right? Two fives, not too bad. um But we don't have any way to reprock her. So that's... a That's my deck. It took, I don't know, probably like six games to to win with it.
01:42:51
Speaker
The name of my deck is a Force to be reckoned with, which I thought was ah moderately good. Oh, wordplay! Okay. That's my deck. It was a fun challenge. ah Thanks for assigning it, Lauren. Ben, what's your theme deck?
01:43:07
Speaker
My theme deck. All right, so I had some thoughts. um My first thought... Was, of course, the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants.
01:43:19
Speaker
Specifically with evil, when evil was still in the name. But I feel like people expect that from me. But the thing is, I am so fascinated with, you know, the the bygone era when the villains used to fucking announce that they were villainous, goddammit.
01:43:37
Speaker
So, you know, i was like, do I go with the Sinister Six? And I'm like, no, they're going to expect that too much. Everybody knows you you fucking love your Spider-Man villains. And I do.
01:43:48
Speaker
And, you know, they might be involved in what I did end up with. But i I thought back to that first one and how much I love saying the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants.
01:44:00
Speaker
And there's another... pretty like major iconic villainous ah group that keeps coming back again and again in Marvel comics. And they've got the best name.
01:44:14
Speaker
Well, not quite as good as the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants. Second only to the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, but it's very direct. The Masters of Evil! um and the yeah you'll find that there's a lot of ah overlap with ah the optional the the reserve cards that you can play in Thunderbolts right now, because the Thunderbolts were originally...
01:44:38
Speaker
just like the sneaky reskin of one of the iterations of the masters of evil. That's, that's how they got started. Um, though that was the first Thunderbolts was, uh, Baron Zemo's little side hustle. Well, not side, ah a pivot. I don't know. I read it when I was much younger. I don't remember exactly how the whole thing unfolded, but I do recall in the, in the library. Um, any who with the, with the lead pipe,
01:45:09
Speaker
because Clue. um Anyway, um but for my Masters of Evil deck, i I haven't decided which six of these cards are going to be not the cards. I mostly just picked characters for the character's sake. i didn't expect it to hold together because I intend it to be like a team clash thing where there's some unifying team ability and ah half of the cards are made up versions that differ from the real cards. But the the members of my Masters of Evil are Black Knight, Baron Zemo, Enchantress, Kang, because one one of the Kangs is up in there, Ultron, Claw, Scorpion, Shocker, Absorbing Man, Titania, Yellowjacket, and Hydro Man.
01:46:00
Speaker
those are Those are the cards in my Masters Evil. you have Hydro Yeah. How are you feeling about him? Oh, I'm not playing Hydro Man out here in the world. This is an art project.
01:46:16
Speaker
For all I know, Hydro Man is... Hydro man might be one of the six that is totally reworked and has a different ability. That's only for team clash. Yeah. i so Like this is, I'm, I'm pitching a hypothetical team clash faction, you know? I got you. Other things that crossed my mind were a shield. And I also of course thought like, what about Hydra? Except like, i don't know, kind of a lot of Nazis up in there and I just wasn't in the mood. Fair.
01:46:45
Speaker
But shield seemed like it would be a fun one. So I hope maybe. somebody Somebody thought about that. I hope we do see evil teams in Team Clash, but heroes team up a lot more often than than bad guys do. so They could do the Sinister Six or Syndicate or whatever as they want to do. Oh, yeah yeah. That would be cool to see that versus the Spider-Man decks. Just the actual, yeah.
01:47:10
Speaker
I'm into it.
01:47:14
Speaker
Shall I go now? Are you done? Yeah, yeah. Did finish this? Riu, let's hear your homework. um Okay, so my homework, I don't have good excuses. i'm going to cut off about maybe two minutes of planned excuse making.
01:47:37
Speaker
stories and um say I don't have one because I was reminded multiple times by people and then but I was like sick earlier in the week and I was kind of scrambling to catch up on stuff and it was kind of for me it was part of my my montage of like of snap kindness that I was like uh you know i've been like oh no i don't i haven't done the homework yet because instead of doing homework i was like weaving in the million ends it took for this like cardigan i made so i could look like a space steward on the podcast because it's so good was gonna bring it up on the outro but yes it rules
01:48:21
Speaker
It's very good. Audio listeners, you gotta see it. You gotta see it to believe it. It's so good. Yeah, on our YouTube. Okay. um so But like I was talking to Frank, who's the artist in the game and a very good friend, and um he was like, oh, I was thinking about for the secret homework for teams. What if it was like...
01:48:47
Speaker
West Coast Avengers because he was thinking about my comics corner because I often subvert secret homework to just talk about comics. I agree. Yeah. and he And it was like, ah you know, talking that it's like, I don't know, maybe it could work like Guardians where there's like a sunshine location. And, um you know, you you would have like reduced energy to play a West Coast Avengers Or something. And then but then he said something I thought that like really struck me. Because I'm so interested in it as a card idea. Because it was like, okay, what if there was like the Killer Watt card and it was a negative power card? But if you fulfilled a condition, um like say for the if you, i think it's actually just like you filled this space with other West Coast Avengers, it would flip to a positive power. It would become Blue Bolt.
01:49:44
Speaker
And I was just like, oh that's such a cool idea for a card. If you had a card with negative power, that you could increase its negative power with the idea that later you would fulfill a condition. Not using another card to do it, but like built into the card itself to flip it into positive power.
01:50:02
Speaker
Especially if you had the alternate option to just Viper it. I'm like, I was just like so intrigued by the design space that it immediately, it like struck me. This is like the interesting, sorry, thing that I pulled out of secret homework that I wanted to talk about was that like, one, first I'm like, oh, there is still. I was worried because of some of like the kind of,
01:50:28
Speaker
Oh, this is so mean if I say it, but i already entered my head brain space. But I'm like, some of some of the card designs that come out feel like AI slapped me yeah And it's like, and it's just like, is Marvel's out of design space? They have design space. It's like, no, look, here's a whole new interesting thing they could be doing. And I'm like, what's the problem? And it's like, I used to feel like every card had some kind of new interesting design space. And it's just a matter of whether that would be good or not, you know, not whether it was boring or weird or hard to understand or it didn't fit anywhere, whatever. and um And I'm like, oh, this is just the end result. I was looking back. I had been excited or at least been willing to give it a chance for this influx of a bunch of new cards, right, getting released instead of the old slow cadence. Even though it means I'm no longer collection complete, which I had worked hard to get, I'd been willing to look for it.
01:51:26
Speaker
I do think it mitigated a bit the problem of mirror matches in the week one of a new card release. Because, like, you're not seeing everyone running around playing mirror. There's just too many cards. People are being selective. You will on a big card release day. card like Arisham releases, you're going to say nonstop that for sure.
01:51:47
Speaker
Overall, it did improve. But on the flip side... I don't think they're taking all the care with the cards they could have. And that can be a real bummer in multiple ways. Like if you've been excited for a Marvel character and it gets released and it's like, blah. Or it could be like Zombie Sentry, which I don't think anyone was super excited for that character. And
Managing Content Releases and Community Engagement
01:52:07
Speaker
then just completely feels like a I don't know, just not exciting card. Like it fits into the deck and it's not bad at it, but it's not...
01:52:15
Speaker
I don't know. It used to be every card either had some interesting design space you were looking at, and I think that's the problem they just don't have time to put that care into the cards, and therefore we're getting kind of some sloppier designs on some less good cards with the thought that, like... And it's just, like, if the idea is just they're going to rework them all later, then, like, it's almost, like, or keep adjusting them, then it it makes the release not exciting because it's just, like...
01:52:43
Speaker
By the time I get around to playing the card, it'll be different or it'll still be a dead card. i don't know. So just looking on a retrospective of us and like what we thought about this mass release of cards and I was willing to give it a chance. And overall, i think I find it a little bit disappointing, although I am happy about the last mirrors when that happens.
01:53:07
Speaker
You guys have any interesting thoughts to share about that? I'd love to so hear about how you feel about it. I'll be super brief and say that i was very distrustful at the beginning of the increased ah release schedule. you know the The three cards a week situation, I thought it was bullshit from the jump, and I think I have been well and thoroughly proven right.
01:53:38
Speaker
that's that's That's my feeling. i don't I don't think it's good. I think they should go back to like one a week and try harder. That's what I think. Because, yeah, I do think that some of these designs, they don't feel like whole cards. I think Zombie Sentry was a great example of something that is not really like... it's not like That's not a whole thing. It's not exciting at all. It exists as function the zombie package and... like it's it's says It's a nothing card.
01:54:06
Speaker
It's... Like, yeah. it's It's got nothing going on. Okay, i'm sorry I'm also now vastly curious... Yeah, Lauren, did you... How do you feel? I have, like... I'm interested in having a new card every week that's, like, the main major release, but also having little mini packs of cards released in bundles. I think both for a meta mix-up, and also I think, like...
01:54:32
Speaker
like using limited time game modes as a way to inject some series four cards into the game that are like abilities that are probably like good to have into the game, but like aren't very exciting. Also a way to get through a bunch more Marvel characters faster. Like I'm in favor of that.
01:54:47
Speaker
I don't, I think it needs help. Like I think they need some adjustment and all that. And I've definitely like, I used to feel like I was very on top of every card in the game. And now there there are weeks where I just, there are there are cards I just don't play.
01:54:58
Speaker
And maybe I get like one or two where I play just enough to do the weekend missions and then never play them again. And I mean, it's okay if there's cards that are like in archetypes I'm not going to use or whatever. But often it feels like it's just because I just didn't have the time to try out every new card.
01:55:13
Speaker
um So I'm not, I have no idea what the answer is. Just that I have found it hard to keep up. Yeah, for real. No, same thing where it's kind of a bummer when it's like, oh, I don't have time to keep up and play all the cards I wanted to as well as do the team clashes and do all of that stuff. And I don't want to knock it as like, too much content for the game. But like, um I don't know. Yeah, we definitely can't is keep up. And in in some ways it makes excuse the meta in different ways than it used to. Okay.
01:55:49
Speaker
Okay. Alright then, I am assigning next week's homework and my criteria to myself and think of the homework where this is a holiday weekend for a lot of people so I wanted to keep it easy and breezy, especially as someone who i didn't completely fulfill el last week's secret homework. So, and then...
01:56:13
Speaker
And, you know, I always like to hear um an interesting story whatever. So I thought this week in honor of ah presents, which are one of my favorite things, about holidays that aren't Halloween, um I want you to tell me a toy story.
01:56:34
Speaker
So that can either be, ah it can be a personal story. it could be so an interesting story you found about a toy. in some way, a toy must be involved in the story um in honor of toys being given out frequently um at this time of year.
01:56:53
Speaker
Love it. Well, listeners, if you liked what you heard and you haven't already, please like and subscribe. Even if you're one of those podcast listeners, it still helps us if you come like and subscribe on YouTube.
01:57:07
Speaker
Anyway, rate and review on iTunes or Spotify. Leave a comment on YouTube or Spotify or come chat with us in the speakeasy, our little corner of Discord. It's part of the Snap Judgments League Discord. There are instructions to get into our little secret corner with a handful of channels in the show notes or video description.
01:57:25
Speaker
We are proudly part of the Snap Judgments Network. That's, you know, that's why we're on the Discord. ah Where you can listen to other great shows like Snap Decisions from Joe on Mondays. Special shout out to Joe this week, who he has been doing this podcast, his podcast, much longer than we've been doing ours. And he just made it into the creator program this week.
01:57:44
Speaker
Congratulations. Well deserved. He has a ah lot of work into that. um I think this week and this week only I will plug my new endeavor um maybe not this week only but generally speaking I'll plug it for you next week well we're not going to do it every week but come check out fourthlocation.com check us out on YouTube if you like what we're doing you know't support us by by spreading the word or pitching in some money understand if you can't totally cool ah we appreciate all of you
01:58:19
Speaker
And with that, find us next week at the Same Snap Time, Same Snap Channel. Yay, guitars.
01:58:31
Speaker
I don't know what to outro about now. because i was Oh, I do immediately because I forgot. i wanted to shout out to um i just my weekend step, even though it's completely unrelevant. um And I was just thinking
01:58:50
Speaker
DM, who moderated adventure for us. Um... Mon Mattel's Supreme. Okay. No, it was just a cool D&D. I was at, like, Pathfinder and, um... Because he's probably already heard of this.
01:59:05
Speaker
And my DM for Pathfinder was telling how he had been playing, um like, a game, an RPG game, a TTRPG where all you did like the point of the game was to like build a map.
01:59:21
Speaker
And that was the whole, like all the rules around. But the idea was this was the pregame game. Cause then you take that map to a different ah RPG of your choice. to do And I was like, oh, that's amazing because, like, are you like sessions. I like when people develop their characters together and have the basis. It makes that, like, initial, like, role-playing less awkward with people. It gives you a way for you to know your character. It's really hard for me when we just go around and monologue characters.
01:59:50
Speaker
um and stuff like that. And it's like when people build theirs together and they build in relationships already to like interact with. And yeah, and some ties to the world. I've definitely built characters that were completely wrong through world I've discovered and it's just like ah that's so clever it's like when you want to like you know when you're like hey we've got this party to go to but I'm like way too nervous so you like you know you pre-party and this is just the same it's like pre-D&D pre-D&D so you can show up all D&D'd for your d and d yeah so you can D&D more freely and I'm like I was super I'm super in the idea hope we get to do it sometime
02:00:32
Speaker
Okay. I was trying to find the name of the game. I don't know if I have it handy. I know Quiet Year is... It's probably Cartagromancy. No, I'm just making it up. Quiet Year is one of them that uses a deck of cards, but I don't think it's the one that we used. But... The last D&D campaign. That's the one they used on the Adventure Zone. Yeah.
02:00:52
Speaker
So that's one of the places I got the idea. But the one I did was more like, it was more based on index cards. So i'm not sure what it was called. But we spent two sessions building a world together before even playing the mode.
02:01:06
Speaker
or before even playing the game, it was challenging as a DM to like release some of that control, but it also like made the world feel so much more collaborative ahead of time to have every player pitching into like, how does this world work?
02:01:20
Speaker
And sometimes people would have very silly ideas and I'm like, really, do we need giant hydro, ah like giant hydro, why am I saying this wrong? Giant fire hydrants made out of emeralds or like, there were a couple of things that were like a little too silly and- Were there fires everywhere?
02:01:36
Speaker
I'm immediately curious what to know. And this was like a couple years ago, so I don't even remember what the context was. But there were a couple things that like really challenged me to like release Control. But also, i found it extremely rewarding that we had this world that we built together before playing in it.
02:01:51
Speaker
Super cool thing to do. Speaking of playing worlds and things, some nice people said nice things about Zombie Richard Reads Presents Snap Your Own Adventure.
02:02:08
Speaker
Hell yeah. There will surely be some more of that at some point. Yes!
02:02:16
Speaker
Oh, you both racked it so hard. I loved your writing. You entertained us, too. Your stream was a blast. It was very entertaining, Ray. Yeah, hopefully next year I can be more secret home ready.
02:02:30
Speaker
Cut up.