Spotlight Cache Week of October 22, 2024: Are Toxin, Zabu, and Elsa Bloodstone Worth It?

Welcome back to our new weekly series Cache-ing In! Each week, we break down what cards will be available in the new Spotlight Caches, as well as the Spotlight Variants! The goal is to help you determine if you should “Cache in” for the content, or hoard for a better week.

Spotlight Cache Week of October 22, 2024

This week, we get the newest Series 5 card Toxin! Joining it will be the return of the Series 5 card Elsa Bloodstone and the Series 4 card Zabu!

Toxin

As we enter the back-half of the season, we get our newest card Toxin. He is a 2-Cost, 1-Power card with the ability “On Reveal: Return your other cards here to your hand. +2 Power for each returned.”

I think this is the easiest to predict card of the season. Toxin is essentially Beast that trades a Cost Reduction for Power. We already know a [2/2] Beast is incredibly strong, and Falcon sees tons of play without any kind of discount or Power buff. So a [2/1] that can bounce 3 cards and become a [2/7] seems incredibly strong to me. Combine this with Black Swan‘s new activate ability, you open up a ton of new possibilities for the Bounce archetype.

Possible Meta Deck

Toxin is designed specifically for the bounce archetype, so it’s no surprise this deck style will be his most meta competitive option. With Beast, Falcon, and now Toxin, you have 3 ways to bounce key cards that give good value. With all of that consistent bouncing and a few card generators, The Collector could see a return to bounce lists. After you go into turn 6 with a hand full of 1-Cost cards, Black Swan can reduce them all to 0-Cost to give Bishop and Hit Monkey insane value.

Low Collection Level Deck

For new players, you don’t really get Bounce cards until Series 3. Toxin gives you a head start into the archetype. Since you don’t have any Cost reduction tools at this level, you have to be more strategic on which cards are worth bouncing. High value targets like Rocket Raccoon, Star-Lord, and Medusa are great examples. Iceman, Korg, Elektra, and Cable give you tools to disrupt, with the option to bounce if those disruptors would be beneficial to play again. Bishop and The Collector are your passive Power generators here, and will ultimately be your finishers since you don’t run any cards with a higher Cost than Bishop.

Fun Toxin Deck

While this is another bounce deck, Werewolf By Night (WBN) is a very fun card to use, and much trickier to use than Hit Monkey since you have to manage board space strictly. With that additional bounce tool available, WBN is less likely to get stuck with nowhere to move. It also makes your final turn less predictable on which location WBN will end up at.

Toxin Prediction

Toxin feels a card that doesn’t create a new archetype, but enhances an existing one (like how Proxima Midnight enhances Discard). Toxin allows bounce decks to be more consistent at bringing those key cards back to hand. Black Swan being a 2-Cost also really helps Toxin to be a strong card. He can bounce 3 1-Cost cards, gain 6 Power, and Swan lets those cards be played for free next turn. You can already use this combo with Falcon and Black Swan, but Toxin is a better value and having 2 cards for that combo makes it more consistent to pull off.

There aren’t many cards I consider a must have, but Toxin looks like a must have for bounce enjoyers. A potential [2/7] that slides perfectly into an already strong archetype looks like a homerun to me.

Best Toxin Decks to Try on Day 1 and Strategy Guide

Zabu

Joining Toxin this week is the return of Zabu! This card has been recently buffed to a 1-Cost that targets cards in your deck, rather than your hand. This makes Zabu viable again, without being overly oppressive like he used to be. With his change so recent, players are still testing how viable he will be long term.

This deck is one of the popular Zabu decks that has seen positive results. The idea is to combine Zabu with buff cards to allow your big 4-Cost cards to gain better value. This specific list aims for Skaar value through Scarlet Spider, Symbiote Spider-Man, and Namora. For your other cards, Okoye, Phastos, and Gwenpool give you buff options. There are many different versions of this deck concept, with some running Grand Master and Iron Lad for different options. Zabu simply helps you play your 4-Costs on a better curve to set up for Namora and Skaar more efficiently.

While Zabu‘s buff is still recent, the popular card is significantly more playable than he used to be. While he may never see as much play as the height of his career, Zabu is in a much healthier place now. He is worth picking up if you don’t own him yet, but he is a Series 4 card, so keep that in mind when weighing if this week is worth Cache-ing In.

Elsa Bloodstone

Wrapping up this week is the return of another former Season Pass card, Elsa Bloodstone! Like Zabu, this card has seen significantly less play than during her release, but that’s a good thing for the meta. Her ability is strong and noteworthy without being dominating. She frequently finds homes with bounce decks or Kitty Pryde and Angela centered decks, but rarely sees play elsewhere.

This list falls into that Kitty / Angela style deck. It uses Madame Web as an alternate way to clear a location for additional Elsa value without relying too hard on Kitty Pryde. The deck leans into Agent Venom, Sage, and Bishop for Power. Mysterio helps you to fill location slots to give Elsa additional value in multiple locations.

With Agent Venom and Bast heading many Kitty decks, Elsa doesn’t see as much play as she used to. With that said, she is still a decent card and offers solid stats for her Cost. I wouldn’t go out of my way to pick this card up, but wouldn’t be upset to pick her up while aiming for other cards in a cache.

Spotlight Variants

If you already own the cards the Spotlight Caches offer, one of the variants below will take its place! If you own none of the cards, the variants will appear after you open all four caches. Spotlight Variants are time exclusive to their release week and will only become available again after one full year has passed.

Daily Offer – How to Purchase Variants

After one year, these Spotlight Variants will be available for purchase from the Daily Offer section of the shop. They will cost 2,400 Gold per variant. So, if any of these Spotlight Variants feel like a must have for you, make sure to Cache In if you have enough caches saved to guarantee the pull!

Our featured artist of the month is PANDART STUDIO, and this week brings us the variant for Toxin!

This Zabu variant comes from Sean Galloway, who offers some cartoonish takes on several Snap cards.

Artist David Nakayama, who creates both base cards and variants, launches his take on Elsa Bloodstone this week!

Should I Cache In?

This week returns to the standard value of 1 Series-4 and 2 Series-5 cards. Zabu is finally playable again, but has been available to collect for well over a year and a half. Elsa Bloodstone is a solid card, but isn’t mandatory in the current meta. Toxin looks like an incredibly strong bounce tool with strong meta potential.

My recommendation this week is a bit less straightforward. The cache itself isn’t a great value. The returning cards are old and not highly meta required currently. Toxin, however, looks like a must have for bounce enthusiasts, which makes the cache more worth the resources. With that said, here is my reccomendations:

If you need either Zabu or Elsa Bloodstone, Caching In could net you a strong enough value alongside Toxin. If you already own them both, I would Hoard Your Caches unless you really enjoy bounce and don’t have tokens to spend on Toxin. I think Toxin alone could be worth the cache if you enjoy bounce, but someone low on resources may need to hoard for a better value week. I’m sorry this isn’t a clear cut answer, but the supporting cards this week make for a tricky recommendation.

Wrap Up

Do you think Toxin will be a good card? Will you be Cache-ing In this week? Let us know in the comments! For the full schedule, check out our guide below:

Marvel Snap New Card Release, Spotlight Cache, and Series Drop Schedule