Table of Contents
Hello all! Welcome back to this week’s breakdown of what’s happening over on the Marvel Snap official Discord! This week, we get answers to questions such as: do the developers expect free to play players to be collection complete, will the player reporting function ever improve, could Galactus see a buff, and more! If you want to stay up to date with what’s coming and what answers developers have for the community, make sure to check back here each week!
This week’s edition comes after the launch new card Grand Master! If you don’t know if this card is worth a Spotlight Cache, make sure to check out our weekly Spotlight guide, as well as our Grand Master guide!
Answers and questions may be slightly rephrased for more clarity and ease of reading. This week’s topics will be divided into Card Specific Questions, Other Questions, and Questions From You!
Remember, you can check out our new Marvel Snap Developer Tracker to see all questions and answers in real time! Topics can also be searched, filtered, and sorted.
Card Specific Questions
Q: Why doesn’t Shang-Chi destroy both players cards, when other tech cards effect both players?
A: Glenn “Cards have the functionality we determine they need—we don’t dogmatically assign rules to entire categories of cards. We could determine differently in each case in the future.”
Q: Could Galactus possibly see a restoration to 7 Power this year?
A: Glenn “Sure, it could happen.”
Q: Can you explain more why the Annihilus and Debrii interaction was changed?
A: Glenn “The change we made to Annihilus was primarily about slightly reducing Annihilus‘s strength, which was too high. There were a few reasons we liked that specific change, including that we had already played with it a lot.
If the Debrii–Annihilus combo was popular and/or performing well, we might have been more inclined to protect it, sure. But neither was true. The most relevant issue for Debrii was that Annihilus being so strong and popular damaged Debrii’s performance, so we considered it upside that Annihilus would no longer so powerfully counter Debrii.
In short, we believed a weaker Annihilus for everyone would be better for Debrii than a weaker Annihilus that still worked with (and especially against) Debrii. Debrii‘s a pretty good card to have around in the metagame, but tends to struggle because of specific popular cards handling the Rocks ‘by accident.'”
Q: Any plans on buffing Quicksilver?
A: Glenn “Quicksilver‘s card fills an important role for us in onboarding new players. We expect the context of how he can be useful may change, but don’t expect to rework the card.”
Q: Can
A: KentErik “we’ve got it earmarked to re-evalaute our Fast-Forward feature, as it is sometimes over-zealous, and sometimes doesn’t kick in when it feels like it should!”
Q: Can you explain why some cards get Fast Forwards, and others don’t?
A: Glenn “Fast Forward is currently automated based on the number of trigger actions created by an instance–we don’t turn it on and off for specific combos. However, some interactions aren’t tripping the check for some reason, which we’re working on adjusting.”
Q: If I play Grand Master on to Odin everything works like I expect. Odin moves mid and he retriggers on middle.
If I play Odin on to Grand Master, my expectation is that he retriggers Grand Master and Odin will be moved middle to retrigger everything there but instead Odin just stays where he is. Is this intentional or is this a bug?
A: Glenn “Based on what is described here alone, that sounds like a bug, but there could be other factors.”
Q: Just to double check, the checker pattern on Grandmaster’s VFX is intentional, and not missing texture, right?
A: KentErik “correct”
Q: Why does Hercules interact with opponent’s cards, when you primarily want to use him in move decks?
A: Glenn “The goal was to widen his space for some meaningful synergy with Polaris, Spider-Man, Stegron, Juggernaut, and Aero.”
Other Questions
Q: Do you consider card generation when balancing cards? Like do you balance Agent Coulson around the fact that he can generate Shuri and Red Skull?
A: Glenn “No, we don’t account for the cards generated—it’s not meaningful, because all of the outputs are already aggregated by examining the card. Coulson makes ‘Shuri Red Skull’ exactly as often as any other combination, so they all contribute equally in frequency (but not quality) to his metrics. If his average quality is bad for a deck, his metrics will reflect that.
For example, we wouldn’t evaluate Gambit by identifying how often he destroys good cards—we just look at the games and cubes won by drawing Gambit, and it all balances out.”
Q: Do you use common sense when balancing? Is it not better to under tune a card than over tune it?
A: Glenn “Of course we use common sense evaluations of our game pieces, but we don’t nerf or buff cards exclusively based on reading them—we wrote them, after all. We apply changes based on insight gained from experience and evidence. We released Blob too strong, but internally our Blob decks were playing a very different metagame than what turned out to be live once he released, and even some card functionality had changed in the interim.
If we release a new card, and it sees little to no play, it’s like we didn’t release a card at all. We don’t want a card to need nerfing, but for all his faults Blob was a more fun release than Martyr, for example, because people played with and enjoyed the card in much greater numbers.
Players don’t acquire cards in the hopes they’ll be buffed later, generally speaking—they acquire cards they want to play with immediately. We also know that for some players, seeing a card buffed once it leaves Spotlights can be frustrating. That’s a practical issue we can’t sidestep, and another incentive to try and get the balance on the appealing side of the line to start.”
Q: With the addition of a new Spotlight card each week, how are free to play players expected to stay caught up and be collection complete?
A: Glenn “While every card is F2P accessible, we don’t expect F2P players to become collection complete. That’s not a sustainable model for us. The additional card is another optional piece of content for everyone to enjoy, if they choose.
As we expand our reward sources via new game modes and features, players interested in additional progression through play will be able to earn more content.”
Q: What card cost group is currently the weakest set?
A: Glenn “As a class, 3-Cost cards are probably overall the weakest, even though there are some strong decks built around some of them.”
Q: If 3-Cost cards are the weakest set, does the team think that Silver Surfer limits the ability for these cards to be better started?
A: Glenn “Not especially—it’s created more by the Power curve restricting 3-Cost cards more tightly. We have a lot of conditional 4-Cost cards reaching 8-14 Power, while 3-Cost exists in a tighter band. It’s possible Surfer might affect that kind of issue, but one of Surfer’s strengths is its ability to play a lot of tech cards—historically stuff like Gladiator doesn’t see as much play there.”
Q: How much of the player base reaches infinite? And are you satisfied with that number?
A: Glenn “The population information is proprietary player data we don’t intend to reveal. We are currently satisfied with rank distribution, as Infinite is achievable but also a meaningful achievement.”
Q: Is Tarnax IV supposed to factor in base Cost, or modified cost? My High Evo was reduced to 3 Power by Shocker, and he transformed into Silver Surfer.
A: Glenn “Base Cost—that’s a bug.”
Q: After buffing or nerfing a card, how long does it take to determine if the results are satisfactory?
A: Glenn “At least a week, occasionally more.”
Q: Are there any design spaces you avoid in fear of conflicts with future game modes?
A: Glenn “No, that’s definitely a ‘cross this bridge when we get to it’ concern”
Q: Do cards that change the location(Scarlet Witch, Nico, etc) get the boosted odds from a featured location?
A: KentErik “They do not”
Q: Are there any plans to improve the reporting function? For example, we currently have a player on the infinite leaderboard with the name “Metaplayer=h0m0s.” Reporting them hasn’t had any effect in over a week.
A: KentErik “yep, we agree our reporting could be improved, and are taking some steps to improve it. i’ll follow up on this case, thank you!”
Q: Are there any cards you think are perfectly balanced?
A: Glenn “Given our goal (unlike most CCGs) isn’t a state of perfect, lasting balance in general, the question is a bit at odds with our philosophy. However, there are a number of cards that can range in strength without necessarily having much potential to become too weak or too strong. This is most common at lower Costs, where a single point of Power is a more meaningful change and a Cost change might damage the goals of the card too much.
Armor is probably a decent example. It’s clear 2/2 Armor would not be very good and that 2/4 Armor would be too strong. However, if Armor cost 3 or 4, that would give us more flexibility on Power that might be playable under various circumstances. However, it would also cost Armor a lot of the early use defending cards, so it’s likely not fruitful to even try. Sometimes 2/3 will be great, sometimes 2/3 will be bad, but we don’t have great dials either way.
Nightcrawler may be another example.”
Q: Does Discard (or other cards/archetypes?) being “face up” effect balancing decisions?
A: KentErik “face up / face down has not been a major factor of balance consideration for us”
Q: Do “face up” effects and archetypes tend to do worse in the cube rate department? Does it have any effect on win or play rates?
A: KentErik “discard being “face up” has had very little to do with cube rates / win rates. If there’s an impact, it’s too small to see in the data.”
Q: Was Spider Ham envisioned as a card that visibly transforms cards? Did this feel different when designing other cards that effect your opponent’s hand like Iceman?
A: KentErik “we do discuss quite a bit about whether or not revealing the card hit by something like Ice-man and Spider-ham, and the implications therein. It felt right for spider-han, we’re still discussing for Ice-man.”
Q: What are your thoughts on a card that would somehow reveal your opponent’s hand in some way?
A: KentErik “We’ve playtested back in the early days designs that let you see your opponents hand, or top card of your deck. The major issues are 1. the cognitive overhead it asks of the player, 2. the element of surprise/bluffing it undercuts. Now your opponent snapping the cube is more obvious. TO your point about destroy decks, if they snap on turn 6, you probably *think* they drew Knull + Death. (But it’s totally possible, and i’ve won a few games this way from my opponents retreating, that they don’t, they just want you to think they did, because actually they don’t have their combo. Works better in conquest than on the ladder, FWIW).”
Q: Why did you decide on the hand limit being 7 cards?
A: KentErik “odd numbers are the best! (but…seriously, as a game designer, we love odd numbers)
but for hand size, a few considerations:
it’s 12-card decks, with only 6 turns, so hand size getting…*out of hand muhuhaha*…wasn’t something that would happen very often. If the cap is too high, it’s essentially non-relevant. If it’s too low, it’s very restricting. 7 hit that sweet spot.”
Questions From You!
Each week, I ask readers of the weekly dev update to leave their questions down in the comment section. That way we can ask those questions on your behalf, or let you know the answers if those questions have been asked before! I read each comment you leave, so I will be adding this section at the end of each week’s edition to highlight your questions that you asked last week!
Q: Why only Marvel comics and not DC comics, like Marvel VS DC?
A: Second Dinner requires paying Marvel for a license to use their property, as well as staying compliant with their standards. To include DC would mean not only doubling their licensing costs, but both Marvel and DC would have to be OK work their properties being mixed (and not many companies have pulled that off)
Q: We need a Kang rework! All the other big bads have their own archetypes, but why is kang still the way he is?
A: Glenn “We may adjust him in the future. His canon status and the impact+novelty of his effect both suit Big Bad levels—it’s not all about meta strength.”
Q: It was noted America Chavez was changed due to her lack of interaction with the game, can we do the same to some of the big bads?
A: To summarize lots of different quotes from developers from previous responses, Big Bads are named as such because they are more widely known Villains with a design goal of fulfilling a “fantasy” of that card. High Evo fills his fantasy by “evolving” cards in your deck. Thanos adds infinity stones (that he collects) to your deck, and he gets stronger by “collecting” them all. Kang manipulates time without warning. Galactus destroys worlds. While you may not “play” High Evo or Thanos most games, they fulfill the roles they are set to have, and players know when you have them in your deck. America Chavez used to be added to your deck, and your opponent would never know because she had no interaction with the game other than increasing draw consistency.
Keep Your Questions and Feedback Coming!
That’s all for this week’s update! Be sure to check back here at Marvel Snap Zone for next week’s update! If you enjoyed the amount of content in this edition, make sure to keep asking your questions to the developers by submitting it in their official Discord in the “#ask-the-team” channel. If you have questions and don’t use Discord, leave your questions for the developers in the comment section here, and I will make sure your question has been answered by the devs!
If you have feedback or changes you would like to see with these weekly updates, also let us know in the comment section!
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