Table of Contents
Marvel Snap releases a new card every week (Tuesday 7 PM UTC) throughout the Season as a Series 4 or 5 card available via the Token Shop or Spotlight Caches. This guide is our overall review for all the upcoming new cards in the Planet Hulk January 2024 Season of Marvel Snap. We also provide a more detailed guide on each of the cards prior to their release.
Cards
Decks with Skaar
Decks with Hercules
Decks with Miek
Decks with Grand Master
Decks with Beta Ray Bill
| Card | Source | Release Date |
|---|---|---|
| Skaar | Season Pass | January 3, 2024 |
| Caiera | Series 5 | January 3, 2024 |
| Hercules | Series 5 | January 10, 2024 |
| Miek | Series 4 | January 17, 2024 |
| Grand Master | Series 5 | January 24, 2024 |
| Beta Ray Bill | Series 5 | January 31, 2024 |
Overview
Hellfire Gala has been a pretty quiet season compared to the previous three that saw Loki, Elsa Bloodstone, and Ms. Marvel all become powerhouses in their own right, in addition to some other card that month becoming a staple of some sort. In December, only Blob can make a claim at being a really impactful card that shapes the meta around it (at least for a bit). Otherwise, Sebastian Shaw, Havok, and Selene all have their merits, but they were either too niche to be truly significant, or simply didn’t manage to become anything relevant. As such, even if the return of regular balance patches should help with making the game feel fresh on a weekly basis, I would understand if you were eager to see some of the January cards cause a big shake up to the powers in place.
I don’t know if any of the January releases have the power to be a game-changer, but I do have high hopes for Skaar, Caiera, and Miek. They’re all potentially able to push the community to reconsider some established elements of the current meta. Caiera could spell the end of Killmonger (and maybe even Shang-Chi), which could cause a few decks to be in an “adapt or die” kind of scenario while others would thrive under Caiera‘s protection. Blob, in particular, should gain a lot of momentum with two cards directly helping the kind of strategy it wants to build around. I wouldn’t be surprised to see Skaar and Caiera join Blob in Thanos, or at least help another shell based on high power cards exist.
As for Miek, the card is a simple asset for Discard Dracula to just plug and play, and it should be fairly popular thanks to being the Series 4 card of the month. The other three cards have their merits; Hercules looks solid in a Move deck, and Grand Master has many good On Reveals to pair with. Beta Ray Bill might be the one I am most worried about since the immediate connections one would think about aren’t exactly playable archetypes currently.
Overall, I think the balance updates we will get during the month will have a huge impact on how popular these cards will become – especially Hercules and Beta Ray Bill considering how competitive the 4-Cost cards can be in Marvel Snap. The community is starting to voice their concerns about Ms. Marvel and Loki just being too good at what they do and limiting the design space to innovate and try different strategies. If the developers were to step in and change some of the very impactful cards, who knows what the meta will be by the end of January?
Until we know more about those potential changes, let’s take a look at the six new cards we are getting for the Planet Hulk season!
Skaar
Decks with Skaar
Skaar will release as the Season Pass card on January 3, 2024 and will become available as a Series 5 card on February 7, 2024.
Strengths:
- Even as a 4- or 2-Cost, you could pair Skaar with cards like Shang-Chi or Shadow King on the last turn of play to mix points and reactive ability.
- A [4/11] already puts Skaar amongst the best power-to-cost ratios available in the game with a pretty reasonable condition considering how many 4- and 5-Cost cards can reach 10+ power in the game.
- Even if the cost changes, Skaar remains a 6-Cost card, meaning it can benefit from Caiera‘s protection (both cards release on the same day).
Weaknesses:
- High power cards aren’t currently dominant with Shang-Chi roaming in a lot of decks and some synergies growing certain cards to huge numbers. The best strategies rely on powerful abilities and flexibility in how to develop rather than big, raw numbers.
- All the 10 power cards in the game are a minimum of four energy, meaning you need to cheat energy in some way in order to play enough cards to get Skaar to be a 0-Cost. You can’t use Electro because of the limitation it imposes on you.
- Skaar forces you to develop proactively and expose yourself to the opponent, revealing your points potential early on. It could be tough to keep the opponent in the game when you Snap unless you do it very early in the match.
Featured Deck:
With Blob already pushing for high power cards to see play, Skaar has one easy ally to pair it with as soon as it releases. Plus, with Caiera releasing the same day and both cards conveniently sharing similar interests and synergies, I could easily picture someone playing both cards in the same deck. I didn’t include Caiera since acquiring both cards could be difficult for a lot of players, but keep it in mind if you enjoy building around Skaar.
I expect that deck to be Thanos Blob, but there is another deck based around Blob that features Attuma and Sentry as 10 power cards, and it could also make sense to fit Skaar in there. I decided to go with Thanos because you also have Doctor Octopus and Devil Dinosaur that you can easily leverage in that deck, which might be a little more complicated in the other build. Here, the idea would simply be to beat the opponent through sheer amount of points, as well as the ability to disrupt their synergies a bit thanks to Armor and Cosmo (while having a flexible deck if you need other counter cards).
In this deck, Skaar should routinely be a 2-Cost since your goal is to play a 10 power card on Turns 4 and 5 by using Psylocke, Wave, or the Time Stone to give you some extra energy to work with. I’m not sure this approach would be stronger than the current build that features much more flexibility and disruption (something I tend to value more than sheer power), but a lot of points leads to constantly having priority. That could make it great at landing Cosmo late in the match, or simply never care about Alioth destroying your cards.
If you are curious about that other build, here it is:
Black Knight is the last route I could see explored with Skaar, but it’s one that is a little more difficult to build without actually being able to test how fast we can get our big cards out on the field.
Caiera: Killmonger and Shang-Chi Beware!
Caiera will release as a Series 5 card on January 3, 2024.
Strengths:
- Caiera immediately positions itself as a protective tool against some of the most popular destructive cards, Killmonger and Shang-Chi.
- Caiera isn’t restrictive, so you can slot the card in any deck with cards that are worthy of being protected.
- As long as you have priority, Caiera can be played at any point during the match on any location, and it will protect all your 1- and 6-Cost cards.
Weaknesses:
- The Ongoing synergy is already being targeted due to Ms. Marvel‘s and Darkhawk‘s popularity and strength, so Caiera could immediately be met by Rogue or Enchantress.
- [3/4] is on the lower end of the spectrum currently, with [3/5] being the norm (unless you are making another card stronger, such as Rockslide with Darkhawk.
- Certain cards won’t be usable on your 1- and 6-Costs with Caiera in play, such as Arnim Zola.
Featured Deck:
den
Several archetypes should welcome the opportunity to completely ignore the threat of Killmonger, such as Kazoo and Bounce. However, there is one deck that should largely benefit from protecting both cheap and expensive cards: Thanos Blob.
The archetype focuses on developing points, but it can’t really play Blob early on because, unless you can play it behind Armor, the opponent will be quick to destroy it. Caiera won’t solve all the card’s troubles – Shadow King will remain a good counter – but it should make it much easier to ramp into Blob whenever the opportunity presents itself. For example, you could play Wave on Turn 3 and follow it up with Blob. Then, with priority, play Caiera to deny the opponent’s Shang-Chi.
The perfect build might take a bit to figure out, but Caiera should reward Thanos Blob for a much riskier approach thanks to dodging more counter cards by just playing a 3-Cost card.
Hercules: Can Move Do It on Its Own?
Decks with Hercules
Hercules will release as a Series 5 card on January 10, 2024.
Strengths:
- Hercules also works with the opponent’s cards, which means it could be a disruptive tool against Aero or Magneto trying to bring your cards to a certain location.
- There are several cards to synergize with like Kraven, Human Torch, Dagger, Multiple Man, and Vulture. You should easily be able to find a deck where Hercules contributes to the core synergy.
- Hercules could serve well in regards to priority because it would keep your power spread across several lanes by bouncing cards to other locations after they moved.
Weaknesses:
- Move isn’t a dominant synergy right now. It’s usually relegated to serving as support to another core. It isn’t the lack of points that is problematic; rather, it’s how simple it is to counter a Vulture or Human Torch.
- [4/6] means you need to have a great ability to exist in Marvel Snap, or you could join Spider-Man 2099, Stegron, White Queen, and Drax.
- 4-Cost cards are incredibly competitive in Marvel Snap right now. It is difficult to imagine Hercules finding value if a patch doesn’t lower the power of Ms. Marvel and other 4-Costs that are playable in almost every deck.
Featured Deck:
The ability is for sure appealing because it could make any card based around the Move synergy able to win a lane almost on its own. However, I’m more concerned about the cost of developing such an ability; as Hercules doesn’t give you much time to abuse it unless you use Psylocke or Zabu to get it a turn early. I decided to use Beast instead to reduce the cost of your cards. This way, you are potentially able to replay several 1-Costs the same turn you play Hercules.
Then, once the way to get a ton of points is figured out, you still need to protect your lead. Marvel Snap is still a game with very effective counter cards. This is where Leech comes into the equation; it acts as a shield against Shang-Chi, Alioth, and Shadow King – basically cards the opponent would keep until Turn 6 to turn a location around or prevent you from replaying your 0-Cost cards.
In this scenario, Hercules kind of acts like
Miek: Discard Dracula’s Long Awaited 1-Cost Card
Decks with Miek
Miek will release as a Series 4 card on January 17, 2024. Consider using your Collector’s Tokens.
Strengths:
- Miek has a designated archetype to be slotted into immediately in Discard Dracula. This is a perfect situation to asses the card’s potential, which should be really good from a power perspective for a 1-Cost.
- Miek has the ability to reach unplayable locations, which is typically a weakness for the Discard synergy since it can only rely on Hela to do so.
- As a 1-Cost, Miek won’t be much trouble for Discard’s hand management requirements. You will usually just play the card early or not care if you discard it later on.
Weaknesses:
- Miek is basically useless if you don’t care about the Discard synergy, and it probably doesn’t fit into a Hela deck where Black Knight has more appeal.
- Not controlling where Miek moves could lead to the card being in a lane where you have no use for it, or worse, preventing you from playing on a location when you would like to.
- Miek really needs to be played early in the match to impact a game. With
MODOK , it could grow enough (even when played late), but you need to have an energy to spare then. Maybe on Turn 6 you might still be able to make it a [1/5] or so, which is already a great deal.
Featured Deck:
Discard Dracula is an evergreen archetype in Marvel Snap that dates back to the game’s beta days. Unfortunately, even if the deck has received multiple buffs over the last year (like Gambit, Hellcow, Blade, or just
It is difficult to imagine a 1-Cost being the savior of the archetype, but Miek does have many great upsides that Discard Dracula has been looking for. The ability to reach unplayable locations, another card with variable power to join Morbius and Dracula, and a cheap one with the ability to grow to crazy amounts with
It should be a very limited use for Miek, but the card should be able to shine nonetheless. You don’t need several decks to make a card look good, only the right one.
Grand Master
Decks with Grand Master
Grand Master will release as a Series 5 card on January 24, 2024.
Strengths:
- There are a ton of On Reveal cards in Marvel Snap across multiple synergies, such as Discard, Destroy, Bounce, and many others.
- Grand Master is cheap enough to consider playing it alongside another card later in the match in order to prevent Cosmo or other disruptive cards from countering it.
- You can reposition a card to the middle location for power spread reasons thanks to Grand Master.
Weaknesses:
- [2/0] is a very weak stat line, and it’s often the cause for a card to struggle to see play.
- Because there are so many On Reveal cards, it needs to be top notch in order to see play in a specific synergy. The global aspect of Grand Master could lead to the card not finding a specific deck to be slotted into.
- Professor X in the middle location could be a bit of a bummer since it would block Grand Master‘s ability.
Featured Deck:
den
Mister Negative is obviously a strong candidate to welcome Grand Master since the deck features both plenty of On Reveal cards and two ways to reduce Grand Master‘s cost with Ravonna Renslayer in the mix.
It is unclear which of the two Negative builds will benefit the most from Grand Master since Black Panther, Arnim Zola, and White Tiger are also great targets for the ability. For now, I decided to go with the Silver Surfer build since it is arguably the more stable of both, and it features several great targets in Wolfsbane, Ironheart, and the Surfer itself. I don’t expect Grand Master to become the centerpiece of a deck, just a strong support card to help a deck boost its potential. Then, I feel like Grand Master will be at its best in flexible archetype that is in need for more points rather than one that is able to develop a ton in fringe cases (such as the other Mister Negative deck).
With Ravonna Renslayer able to discount Grand Master to a 1-Cost, I can see the card making it into other archetypes as well once we figure out which On Reveal abilities are the most interesting to duplicate.
Beta Ray Bill
Decks with Beta Ray Bill
Beta Ray Bill will release as a Series 5 card on January 31, 2024.
Strengths:
- We already have similar abilities in the game with Daken and Thor, so we know how to maximize the potential of a card like Beta Ray Bill (like pairing it with Jane Foster Mighty Thor in particular).
- Several synergies can use Stormbreaker to their advantage, such as Lockjaw,
Hit Monkey , and Bishop to name a few.
- Lockdown is a very popular synergy right now, and high power 4-Costs are great against Storm and Professor X.
Weaknesses:
- Outside of Jane Foster Mighty Thor fetching Stormbreaker, very few decks will accept adding a card to their deck in exchange for a potential [4/10] – or a bad [4/5] if you don’t find Stormbreaker in time.
- 10 power puts Beta Ray Bill in range of Shang-Chi, meaning you will likely will have to hold Stormbreaker in hand until the last turn on multiple occasions.
- Unless Ms. Marvel, Iron Lad, or Shang-Chi have lost interest by the end of January, Beta Ray Bill might be a skip just because it isn’t worth spending to just get “another option” when we have such solid cards in the game already.
Featured Deck:
den
During the Bloodstone season, there was a deck called Thor Miracle that found some success. It was using Thor and Jane Foster to build a super explosive hand going into Turn 6, which would then unleash
Adding a high cost card might make Kitty Pryde less appealing to replay every turn, but this should be mitigated by Stormbreaker synergizing with
I haven’t seen a pure Lockjaw deck since America Chavez was reworked, but if anyone wants to try to revive it, Beta Ray Bill should be a nice addition to the archetype:
den
Closing Words
I think what happens in January will mostly depend on how impactful the balance changes are, although I expect Caiera to be a great first step to set those coming changes. Skaar will also help push the game towards more raw power now that we have a reason to risk deploying them early in the match. If you want more diversity or different strategies to have a chance at competing with the dominant synergies, there needs to be a loophole to exploit in those decks that doesn’t exist right now. Indeed, Good Cards, Loki, and Lockdown are so well-rounded that they have managed to adapt to any new comer and shut it down real quick. However, we know their biggest upsides do not come from their raw strength; instead, it’s their incredible flexibility while always being able to put up good enough numbers on two lanes to compete.
Then, I expect Caiera to give more space to attack these decks through sheer amount of points since a deck like Thanos Blob (but also Electro Ramp) would be able to play much more carelessly, and Skaar comes as another support to that same idea. If power really becomes the measuring stick, Discard Dracula should have a reasonable shot once Miek is included in the deck. I picture the card able to rise to 10 power when played on Turn 1 and
As for the other three, I would decide based on which synergy you enjoy the most, even if Grand Master probably leads to the most potential abuses in that bunch (but also might be the easiest one to shut down with a Cosmo). As for Hercules and Beta Ray Bill, I can see some potential in both cards, but I also see how they could miserably fail since they are not joining a strong synergy, and they cost the same as a lot of cards you can just throw in any deck. Ms. Marvel and Iron Lad lead the way, but Shang-Chi and Enchantress are also simple to slot into many decks. I don’t think a player would suffer much from not having the new Series 5 cards in their collection, at least in the current environment.
I hope this breakdown helped you pick which cards you are interested in investing into. To share your ideas and creations (and maybe inspire other players to pick up one card in particular), leave a comment down below. Also, you can join us on the Marvel Snap Zone community Discord, or follow my Twitter page where I share decks and biased opinions about the game.
Good Game Everyone.
More Content