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In order to make the Seasonal Series 4 Snap Pack more appealing, as it was only a collection of cards you could have collected from events, Second Dinner decide to add three new cards to the pool: Batroc the Leaper, Fan Fei, and Topaz.
Today, we take a deeper look at the trio of new cards and, of course, the best decks to try them out in.
Decks with Batroc the Leaper
Decks with Fan Fei
Decks with Topaz
Seasonal Series 4 Snap Pack
All three cards will be a part of the Seasonal Series 4 Snap Pack. These new cards cards will technically be part of the current What If…? Season. As such, Batroc the Leaper, Fan Fei, and Topaz should remain in that particular Snap Pack until the June 2025 Season kicks off.
Strengths and Weaknesses
All three cards belong to the same synergy, Move, and they should serve as great support to the newest Series 5 Hydra Stomper. But spending tokens to get all four cards might be too expensive for many, so let’s discuss each card individually for the time being. I’ll get the gang together when I discuss decks further down in this article.
In this trio, there’s one card that is able to grow its power, Batroc the Leaper, and two support abilities, Fan Fei and Topaz. At their best, here is what each card might look like:
Batroc can grow up to a [1/12] if you manage to move it every turn starting on Turn 2. That is quite unlikely, but Sam Wilson alone allows you to move it from Turn 3 to Turn 6, meaning Batroc the Leaper should fairly often be a [1/10]. This card is kind of scary if I’m honest.
Topaz should allow you to move four times if you optimize it, and even more if you get cards that can move Topaz‘s ability and then move again with their own ability. We will have to see if Turn 3 (when Topaz shows up “on time”) is already too late. The 3-Cost slot has a super competitive pool of cards anyway.
Fan Fei is kind of a mini Heimdall, moving all other cards on her location (so between one and three cards) to the right. Immediately, there’s some synergy with Topaz here, as one sends cards to the middle and the other can move them one more time to the right. The card is limited in the sense she tells your opponent you are likely to move the cards on her location to the right.
However, the fact that can move in the opposite direction as Heimdall can be huge, and it could give Move more agency to use all three locations; the left location is often tricky to leverage without Madame Web. A Turn 6 Fan Fei can activate to move her location to the right just before Heimdall moves everything back to the left, which keeps your positioning basically the same but might have doubled or quadrupled your points on some lanes.
The Verdict
I don’t think there is much of a doubt about Batroc the Leaper being the best card of these three. Plus, the new 1-Cost doesn’t seem to require you to move one of your cards—an opponent’s card is fine as well. While Topaz and Fan Fei have interesting abilities to build a Move deck around, Batroc the Leaper feels like a card I can plug and play in Scream Move, as well as any deck I manage to craft around Hydra Stomper.
Unfortunately, you can’t target the card you will get when opening a Snap Pack. This release kind of feels like a Spotlight Cache of some sort because of that. There is clearly one card I want from the bunch, and I’m hoping I get it on my first try so I can ponder what I want to use my tokens on next. It might actually be good to consider spending 3,000 tokens for Batroc the Leaper and not risk the roulette of Snap Packs if you are on a budget.
Batroc the Leaper Decks
There are a lot of things that come to mind with a 1-Cost that is able to grow to rival a 5-Cost in power. Still, I don’t think anything will beat the Sam Wilson Captain America, Kraven, Silk trio that I already built around Hydra Stomper.
I’ll start with the decks where I managed to fit those in. Otherwise, it’s probably fine to just throw Batroc in a Move deck if you’re missing Sage or another non-vital piece in the deck.
Topaz Decks
I’m not going to lie, Topaz is a support card and it feels like its power will come from finding strong cards to support. Sure, the 3-Cost has more synergy with the Move archetype; it would be great alongside the likes of Vulture, Dagger, and Human Torch.
Apart from those, however, Topaz will likely follow Batroc the Leaper in decks where you have an open spot or need to replace a card. For example, I wouldn’t be shocked to see Topaz in the Silver Surfer deck I built above.
One thing to give the card credit for is that Topaz synergizes much better than Batroc the Leaper with the original Move cards. For a player who is missing something like Sam Wilson Captain America or who is unable to get Hydra Stomper, Topaz doesn’t require you to own any Series 5 cards to fit into a deck.
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Fan Fei Decks
Much like Topaz, Fan Fei comes in as a support card, except she is a bit pricier and the Activate keyword doesn’t have a great track record. Honestly, I feel like Fan Fei will likely end up as the worst of the three due to being the least flexible. Still, just like Topaz, the card has obvious synergies with certain Move archetypes. She could replace or complement Topaz in any of the Move decks above, or she could follow her own route in the Phoenix Force archetype.
I know that deck isn’t very good at the moment, but Fan Fei could help protect Nimrod heading into Turn 6. If you play Nimrod behind Fan Fei, you have the opportunity to move it to the right in order to destroy it on another lane. Doing this might allow you to dodge a Cosmo, Armor, or Alioth. Otherwise, Fan Fei can still act as a support card to move Phoenix Force or Dagger to create points.
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Closing Thoughts
There is a scenario I really don’t want to see happen: this release widens the gap between players who own Sam Wilson Captain America and players who don’t. Sure, Batroc the Leaper can be played with Kraven and Silk, but it has a very similar condition to Hydra Stomper, a Series 5 card. That is already at least 8,000 Collector’s Tokens to get both cards, or 9,000 if you can’t target Hydra Stomper in the Seasonal Series 5 Snap Pack. If that synergy is going to be as good as I fear, Sam Wilson Captain America will act as the tiebreaker to push the Move archetype from good to completely bonkers. And if not that, Scream will likely be the counter, and that’s a Series 5 card as well.
Unfortunately, the only way to get either Sam Wilson or Scream if you don’t own them already is to hope one is featured in your shop for 6,000 tokens, or play roulette with the Collector’s Series 5 Snap Pack for 4,000 tokens (which I would not necessarily recommend). The total bill is heading north of 10,000 Collector’s Tokens for those without Sam Wilson Captain America already.
I love getting new cards, especially if they can shake up the meta. However, the fact that there is one great and two average cards being released simultaneously doesn’t really entice me to open Snap Packs. At least, not unless I enjoy creating decks and being okay with certain cards not leading to anything competitive.
I believe I’d rather spend 3,000 tokens for a guaranteed Batroc the Leaper if I were to get the opportunity. Indeed, even if collection complete, spending 11,000 tokens to get all four new cards releasing today should dig a pretty sizeable hole in my savings, and possibly create a precarious situation for future releases.
Also, make sure you enjoy the Move synergy before pulling the trigger (but that should go without saying).
I hope this review of the Series 4 batch release was helpful. You can find everyone on the Marvel Snap Zone team in our community discord to have a chat or ask any questions.
Good Game Everyone!
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