While I still enjoy Marvel SNAP I'm going to be honest, part of the fun for me was following your matches and hearing your breakdowns on the meta and the business of the game. I don't know what it would take for you to come back but thanks for the video.
Appreciate the upload Jeff, still following your pocket content but miss your Snap deck brews. Absolutely agree with both the mirror match problem and polarized match up problems with the singular card release schedule. When it becomes less beneficial to ladder up with the most recent releases and more beneficial to try to play with the most beneficial tech match-ups, it does feel like a net negative for game experience. I do still appreciate that Second Dinner is balancing on a regular basis, and as tech cards increase hopefully there becomes a cycle of being able to play into the least popular ones of the season, but I agree that the slow drip might be less sustainable than the large volume/"figuring out the meta" phase of traditional TCG's. Thank you for still being a thoughtful voice in the online card game space!
Completely agree here. Great to see you back here. I’m watching your pocket content and playing that much more, but still a snapper at my core : ) The drop of new content in pocket typifies what I find frustrating about Hearthstone/Pocket/etc. The big set reveals vastly benefit the whales who will buy so many cards all at the same time. As a FTP player, my engagement with snap means that I do get the “new shiny toy” a lot of the time. In January, Bullseye for example was a really amazing refresh of discard decks and I am loving playing with that card. In pocket, I have very few double copies of ex cards, so I’m struggling to play any competitive decks. Your video today had some cool decks to check out without ex’s, but even there I’m missing two copies of lots of two diamond cards. It may be a month or more before I am able to get my collection to a useful level, and that’s a really frustrating feeling. To me, snap’s acquisition was so novel and still remains one of the best things about the game. I love the weekly freshening up, but not the requirement to get everything. I’ve skipped this week, and am loving the season pass card without the extra other one. Hope you come back to snap soon! My fingers and toes are crossed for them to do the economy right so that you and some of my friends return to this game I love.
I hope you do whatever brings you the most benefits and I will always wish you all the best, but I would be lying if I say I didn't miss watching you playing snap hahahahah
I’ve really been missing it the last few weeks because I lovedddd the decks Jeff would brew, his reasoning behind his deck building, etc. Hope to see him return soon, I think the game is in a healthy meta right now imo.
I think one of the periods of time I had the most fun with snap was when they had the valentines pair up event. It gave us multiple new toys to play with, and reinvented existing decks. It was fun to deck build with specific restrictions and still come up with something good
Glenn said that the Sanctum game mode was something he came up with when he was reimagining Snap since he came on after the game was already designed. So seems interesting
He also said this: "I do believe the core gameplay of Showdown is robust enough to support its own game, with card and location designs more suited to it. I hope to design some of those for future runs!" That seems pretty promising!
I feel like they rely too heavily on the location variance for a “unique” experience. I definitely agree that the location aspect of it makes these same ole deck that do the same ole things hurt a little less. Now what is the solution nobody know but what worked three years ago isn’t working now and they need to freshen things up a bit and bring the excitement back because right now it’s hard for new players to come in and hard for old player to stay. All in all I hope you are having fun Pokémon pocketing and if you decide not to return we will not blame you but for those of us who await your return we hope it’s a glorious one. Thank you for everything you do Hoogland ❤
I also want to thank you for checking in. I've sorely missed your commitment to nuance and as a long-time magic player (used to statements like "it's broken" / "not close" / "this matchup is a bye") it's been tough to go back to the hyperbole and salesmanship you get with a replacement-level content creator. I was playing hearthstone right as "Wild" was introduced, and remembering that as you spoke on how other TCGs have formats (now) also reminded me about their weekly Tavern Brawl mode, which (for folks unfamiliar) was a week-long special ruleset / mode that was sometimes was constructed. My personal approach for introducing formats to Snap would be a play on Tavern Brawl with the period being "The Length of the Season Pass" instead of weekly. The change I primarily would expect would be location / card bans for the duration in the "Season Ladder" (plus the additions that are already coming in the current ladder concept ("Unlimited Ladder" ?) We're already primed to expect that a season will be different based on new cards coming in and the latest toys, and they already have a concept of older cards that are thematically related to the season pass card being highlighted via exclusive variants (e.g. original Captain America)
I miss the snap content, but I love the Pokemon content. I stuck around through Snap, Unite, Pocket...I just like the content. Still happily playing Sanp, but I'll watch a lot of your content. So, do you.
as someone just getting into the game more competitively, hovering between vibranium and diamond, what the difference in infinite+? deck variety or what?
@@ryandeluca1669 just the metal block of pre-vs-post infinite. Post-infinite some players don't care as much about winning. 90s are where you tend to get the hardest matches, so infinite by comparison is less hard. (unless you are aiming for high ranks of course. However, as a human being with free will, you can play whatever you want. Since you are on the climb, retreat smart, snap before your big plays, and have fun.
@@ryandeluca1669 after you get there, you stay for the season. post-infinite it displays both your Mach making score "Snap Points" and your Global Leader board rank. Most people aren't super duper serious about rank unless they are trying to get really high on the leader board.
I definitely see where you're coming from, but as a casual player I haven't ran across the mirror match problem as much. I actually like the slow drip of new cards as if it's not interesting I can skip that week. I've found that I kinda dislike the new pack drops of other card games, because while content creators can buy the whole thing day 1, by the time I get the best cards from the new pack, they're either old news, or completely irrelevant due to power creep. I like how SNAP tries to balance so that old cards are still playable
Everything you said makes sense, and it'd definitely be interesting if Snap made some of those changes. I haven't been playing nearly as much, but it's not about Marvel Snap. I just haven't been having fun with card games in general. I go through cycles where I enjoy the strategy and randomness at all, and for a couple of months now, I've been in a phase where I just don't enjoy the randomness of card games.
A draft mode each week that has people drafting 11 cards and getting the weekly card to play with would be very interesting and offer a different play mode. Would not be opposed to the season pass release and then two weeks later have the multi-card release for the month all at once. SD would need to drastically change the key/spotlight system.
One thing with making some form of rotation is that you can also use that to re-introduce cards that fell out of the rotation at some point and as a lever to ease new people in to a larger and larger card pool.
You've made an excellent point about what the release cycle means for the meta. Play-the-thing vs counter-the-thing leaves little to no room for any sort of deck experimentation for us mere mortals. I always try to make my "own" deck with a card and then get frustrated by those countering the meta card. There is (still) no place to experiment with new decks without repercussions
I think the way they set up MS with the card acquisition model worked very well when there was a large volume of people all starting at the same time and generally all having the same experiences. Once we got to a point where the bulk of players had made it mostly to the end of Pool 3, that's when the big issues really started to rear their head. It's just not realistic to expect new players to wait many months to get somewhat caught up to where friends they want to play with already are. Then, for those who have been here since the beginning, I think Jeff nailed it on the slow drip releases.
Kind of a bittersweet thing - I'm realizing that I've really missed hearing your thoughts on marvel snap, but one of the reasons I've always respected your opinions is because you're very honest and straightforward with your criticisms - and these are extremely valid ones, I think. Personally I'm still playing and enjoying marvel snap quite regularly, but I'm not confident I'll still be doing so even a couple months from now, let alone longer term. Also, I know that when I stop it won't just be a break - one of these days l'm going to fully drop Snap and never look back. A sharp contrast to magic the gathering, which is a game I have played on and off for nearly a decade and don't expect to fully drop anytime soon. Part of that is economy of course - even if I take a months or years long break from magic, I can still hop back in and have just as much fun. Snap's FOMO-first model encourages the opposite of that. But it's probably true that part of it is the card release model as well. I'm getting back into magic lately with a new full set release, something Snap just doesn't have the equivalent of.
Agree with most here …. Miss your snap days Jeff but happy you are enjoying pocket. Always appreciate your insight and hope folks at sd are taking notes
I believe you have hit the nail on the head. I've played snap since the beta till August of 24. Since Pocket has released it made me realize how incredible the different styles of deck design is, choosing to play Ex's or all 1 Knockout points lets you customize. When playing snap the most I could tailor my deck was Cerebro. There is diversity but having tech cards being the main form of customization choosing if you are trying to beat them or just play them limits so many deck options. It's a different style not a wrong one but I feel it's quite impactful for my enjoyment.
I think there's a fundamental difference in Snap's flavor/presentation that matters here: each card is a character on it's own. That's why "skins" and "character mastery" even make sense as concepts. This makes format rotation kinda akward, it also means that every card being somewhat usable is a good thing.
I think it makes a traditional age-based format rotation awkward, but just like Snap came up with a new card release model, maybe they could come up with a new rotation method. Maybe the way a Snap limited format where the card pool cut in half each month, not necessarily fully randomly, but sorta-kinda. Every month, there’s a new mix of cards that are missing. Core pieces of some decks might just be gone. Maybe there’s a common 40% of the card pool that everyone has, maybe everyone has their own 15% of the card pool that might be different. One has Doctor Doom, one has Magneto. Would it be fun to try to recapture that early Series-3 feeling where everyone has got to piece things together? Maybe the card pool expands 5% each week before resetting. But the core thing that a limited format at like that would do is partly fix the problem which could arise if someone’s favorite cards and heroes were out because they’re too old. Now, they’re out for a month, will be back next month.
@thebitterfig9903 Yes, it can be worked around, but it's something that has to be considered. One thing that could be cool is to make formats based on flavors, like Spiders VS Symbionts, or Villains Month, etc.... Maybe as a side thing. It would make deck building very challenging.
Something like Hearthstone's tavern brawl that has a new goofy rule each week that makes you challenge yourself to build a new deck to take advantage of the rule could be fun. Even only cards, odd only cards, every card played randomizes after it's effects triggers, Agatha takes over everyone's first and last turn, etc. It would give the player base something to look forward to every week.
The mirror match problem is probably built into the system. For every player trying the new cards and for everyone countering it, there's like 5 Destroy Bros that are just going to play what they already like, but you hardly ever match into them. And for anyone who doubts it, just play a regular on reveal deck like 5 matches to completion. Win or lose, the next game you play a regular move deck, and your opponent is playing move as well. It's less of a trend thing than it is the matchmaking forcing it.
Been a long time lurker, but I'm glad to see you're enjoying Pokemon more than you were Snap. It's always a scary thing to see your enjoyment dwindling when it's also the source of financial stability for yourself/your family. Random musing about Snap, but I think one of the strengths of Snap is that they don't need to functionally reprint cards. We don't need a suite of Doom Blade/Murder/Go For the Throat/etc, because we have Shang Chi, which always does the thing and always will. Although I do think this is a strength, this does make rotating sets much more difficult and does mean the design space is a lot more limited when everything always needs to compete with the baseline Shang Chi. I don't have any real answers, but I think Snap is an interesting case study on why traditional card games have chosen to do various things. People complain endlessly about reprints, sets, and Standard in the MTG space, but Snap pretty clearly shows the downsides to not doing those things.
For context I'm a middling player who typically ends the season in the 90s and occasionally will hit infinite. My rank up pace is plodding and I often hit 90 in the final days of the season. That said my experience with mirror matches is minimal. Like Jeff said metas move fast week to week and even within a week. But I move slowly. Slow enough that even if I am playing a meta deck one day I'm not for the next 10 days. For me this results in matches that seldom feel stale. I hope others are having this experience because it's a pretty enjoyable snap experience.
These are a really good points. I didn't really think about the release system and its effects on the game like this. Very well said and I agree with both.
Glad to see you Jeff. Appreciate the update. For me, I don't face as many mirror matches but I'm also not playing the shiny cards when they come out all the time. I think that's where being a content creator differs a bit from someone like me. If anything, I like to play those shiny cards that came out a few months back since a good chunk of the player pool forgets that good deck but with less shiny bits. I'm hopeful with Second Dinner getting a new publisher and the series drop that things will be better in a couple of months. I also like breaking playing Snap with other activities including Rivals which I'm not very good at.
Hey Jeff! I also took a break from Snap, skipping the December season and came back fresh and happy with Snap specially with the upcoming changes, hopefully I cam get to see your videos and decks back soon
I wholeheartedly agree with the exhaustive duality of mirror matches and tech counters. I wonder if it would be better to release all 5 cards at the beginning of the season instead? Or maybe even make all 5 cards available, but you can only choose 1 a week? At least that way there would almost certainly be much more variety, at least for the first couple weeks until it was known which cards should avoided until the end of the month.
I agree with most of your points. 1 other aspect that soured me on Snap after playing Pocket is the daily missions and alliance missions feel like work. They dont enhance play experience, they tend to limit how I "should" be playing. I found myself logging in to clear dailly missions, but not enjoying the gameplay, so now I just don't log in at all.
Looking good Jeff! And I agree with all the points raised. I don't know if a full rotation of cards would help Snap but certainly a curated list cards should be taken out at least temporarily.
Thanks for the upload, Jeff. I miss your regular content, and I greatly appreciate your thoughts and musings on the game. I'm glad to see you're doing well and looking healthy!
I think they could put all the seasons cards out at the start of the month and change card acquisition so you have more control over what you target and acquire. So at the start of the season, everyone goes after the new shiny they want and it's not just 1 week of new shiny and it's counters.
Yep, first game I actually drew and played Sam Cap on his release Red Guardian showed up to piss in my cheerios. The mirror/ tech match up release week is demoralizing. Probably why the Lasher release felt less toxic since his entrance was staggered for a lot of people, which meant the tech/ mirror match-ups weren't anywhere near as prevalent. Still feels amazing in Cerebro 2. I don't play a super large amount, so getting tech carded out of playing the cards I actually want to use is SUPER exhausting. I've stopped playing the deck I want to play cause the match-ups and locations just kept telling me to stop. Super wish they'd change Crimson Cosmos. I do still enjoyed playing, miss your deck builds though.
I don't mind the one per week, since I don't desire to get every new card. I've only been snapping for about a year and a half now I see your points about mirror matches, but I only experience it once every few weeks it doesn't bother me. The tech cards do need to be there for sure. Maybe they could try something where every other month they "ban" and "unban" certain cards like Wong and Cosmo for a month. Then bring em back. This could help liven things up. Especially if you plan the "bans" around the new cards for the month. For example having big crazy five drops (with on reveal) on the schedule in the same month Wong and cosmo are "jailed" would let people experience the new toys without breaking them. Then, in the next month, we have a new set of cards to play with, and the previous two jailed cards, Wong and cosmo, are freed. Breathing new life into last months shiny new toys, while having this months shiny new toys coming out still, with some different jailed cards.
It's nice to see you back on the snap channel albeit a short lived thing - I havent really been following pokemon. But what I would like to say is it's really nice to see you sounding a lot happier in general and less stressed about playing snap or anything like that - keep doing you bud and I hope to see you back when/if the time is right for you
I don't think having "limited" formats is going to solve the mirror match problem. They should do something more like High Voltage and Sanctum mode that changes the rules and makes cards' relative power levels drastically change. I do agree the exhaustion with the tech cards right now. The decks that can run all the tech cards are super annoying, basically all the cards you mentioned plus Alioth, and the game becomes "Did my opponent make their deck worse for most match ups just to add a tech card that will complete screw over my deck?" It adds too much variance and doesn't really reward better deck building or game play. It's instead "Will my opponent Alioth or Shang Chi or Cosmo the right location at the right time?" Also Conquest is somehow even more annoying than ranked. I only play it to farm the rewards or complete bounties, that mode needs a drastic rework. Conquest needs to be less of a time commitment, IMHO.
I definitely agree with this take when a new card is fairly narrow, but there are a lot of releases where card can be used in many ways. I’ve been loving Iron Patriot as a solid card that can go in a variety of decks but feels pretty fair
Thanks for posting and definitely I have missed both your takes on the state of the game as well as the off-meta decks. I really appreciate this video because I've had all of the same questions as those people but didn't want to impinge on your "following your joy" by taking a Snap break. I still enjoy Snap although I'm heavily invested in the IP so that makes it easier for me to get over the problems in the game play and the economy. As another commenter mentioned, the amount that I play is much less than a streamer so the mirror matches and tech cards don't bother me as much. I would love to see some kind of alternate format, deck building restriction, or something to encourage different decks than what is commonly played. The mentality of playing the new card is so strong among the masses even though its not strictly necessary -- during DD2 I played your Wong Namora build (a 5-month old deck) the whole time and earned all the rewards. Glad to hear that you are enjoying the Pocket experience and hope to see you playing Snap when you feel the time is right.
Great vid, especially on the rotations of cards. As I was mostly a Legacy/Vintage MtG'er, I usually do like to play the most powerful tech-cards, and don't get as frustrated when I lose to a Shang/Alioth/Cosmo etc. A card like Enchantress will make sure that a pure ongoing deck will never be the top performer and that's fine in my book. One of the best things I enjoy about Snap, is the weekly meta-change due to new cards and OTA's. But I do understand that people without a full collection experience a downside from that. I see that from content-creators as well; where I mostly follow the 'old'-streamers. Even though there are a lot newer ones, but they are struggling with the game-economy, and feature decks that were meta 2 months ago. You said in a previous video as well: you couldn't allure to newer players, as it would take them months, or even years to be able to play the decks that you are playing. What I'm struggling with in the most recent months is the inconsistency with bots these days. They are very regular in the 70s, and almost 1:10 in 80s and totally absent in the 90s. The climbing is tedious, and feels unrewarding. Bots shouldn't be the main-aspect of the climb, but the climb shouldn't be a zero-sum game either.
Here’s where I think 2nd Dinner should start with the polarizing tech cards by restricting their effects: Killminger: destroys 3 random 1 cost cards on the board. Shang Chi: destroy any card here with 10 or more power that costs more than Shang chi. Enchantress: disable the text for 2 random ongoing cards at this location. Cosmo: block on reveal effects for 4-6 cost cards. Above are all examples I just came up with and are probably not realistic, but the idea still stands. I think restricting the effect of the tech cards or building on some consequence to their effect will go a long way with this game imo.
I just came back to the game about two weeks ago. My break was about 2 1/2 months. It was definitely good to take said break from a financial perspective; now I'm only buying the season pass instead of most of the art bundles. If you takes step back, you see just how gouging the game can really be.
Okay, gonna try a brief answer to some of those questions you asked at the end. I enjoy the one-new-card weekly release cadence enough that the mirror match issue hasn’t killed it for me, though I have to acknowledge your point. It isn’t ideal to have a new toy with a label saying “Will be fun a few weeks from now, when people are bored with it!” The key difference between you and me here is probably that I don’t do this for a living. I play maybe an hour a day, and actually, this season, for the first time in two years, I’m playing even less. Fresh new discovery: if I don’t pretend I care about ladder rank or infinite rank and just play a few games for fun whenever I feel like it - like a casual gamer! - the game gets way more fun. It had, if I’m honest, drifted towards feeling like a job.
It might be just a feeling, but OTA's and patches used to be "new card releases" too - if you didn't get the Tuesday release, then on Thursday there were 2 or 3 cards you forgot about that are now "real", and if that didn't happen then the patch would fundamentally rework two cards. Again, maybe just a feeling, but nowadays OTA's either "absolutely kill a card" (= will have 1% less playrate), or sort of nudge a card in a way that might help an older deck but won't bring some new challenger, new type of deck to try. Which is extra funny considering OTA' used to change 3-4 cards and the last few changed 10-ish each...
I completely understand your points. I still love Snap and play daily. But the biggest obvious difference is of course if something like shang or cosmo ruins my mood I can just stop playing for a while and come back later. I think a game mode where cards “rotate” maybe on a monthly cycle would probably fit snap the most. They definitely need to add something that is available permanently but is different enough from the normal experience to provide options. Conquest is just boring right now and more of the same like you said.
I play both snap and pocket and pocket has really blown me away in how easy and fun the card acquisition is. However I do still prefer the gameplay in snap. I hope they figure it out because I really do enjoy the core game and it would be a shame to drop it. I'm looking forward to future videos Jeff whether its pocket or snap :)
I stopped playing for the second and final time about a month before you decided to take a break. To me, I became exhausted with trying to keep up with how quickly the meta changes with the releases every week. I had a few decks that I really liked, but needing to constantly tweak them or play something else was becoming too irritating, especially when I wasn't trying to play the game full-time.
Thanks for the video, I appreciate your perspective and I do agree with you for the most part. The other card games I've played heavily are yugioh and hearthstone and I vastly prefer marvel snaps acquisition even though its not perfect. Other card games may have new sets where hundreds of cards are introduced but the majority of them are useless/filler/non competitive. The cards that are competitive tend to be expensive (especially if you need multiple copies or they're short printed) or hard to acquire, as there are often other cards printed at the same rarity to lower your chances of getting the better cards. The sets might also introduce a new archtype which is either overpowered (and you have to play it to compete) or lacking key pieces (they tend to release the full archetype across multiple sets to maximise sales). Also the card balance is much better in Marvel Snap as problematic cards can be quickly adjusted with OTA's or older cards can be buffed. Other card games might not address problematic cards for months or they might just wait until the cards rotate out of play or they may just ban/limit them in certain formats. Other card games might have different modes but they might not be supported well (lack of card balance). Traditional/wild formats tend to be supported less because more money is made from the current advanced/standard formats. Mirror matches will always be divisive. Some people find them boring/frustrating, others find them to be a test of skill. Most of the time I think it comes down to who drew what at the right time but at least with marvel Snap it isn't decided by who won the dice roll and has the first turn.
I agree with a lot of your points the only thing is I don't think set releases is the way to go. Pocket, Magic and Yugioh it is extremely rare for an erata to a card so they can release and forget about it whereas snap has constant balance changes to available cards. I do think there needs to be something else other than the one card a week to keep people engaged. Maybe permanent new game modes since Conquest is just a longer form of standard snap
Wow! If I could choose a bunch of cards I actually wanted to play with, without the mirror matches and counters, that would be great! Spending what I've saved, to get countered constantly doesn't feel great, now I'm saving tokens up, because cards fall out of favour so quickly... And if you do get a good combination, everyone else has it, and it gets nerfed. Really appreciate this kind of input!
As someone who can only consume your content via TH-cam due to scheduling conflicts, it's great to see you again! I agree with the mirror match problem, and also with the economy problem. I have several friends whom I'd love to recommend Snap to, and play against -- but as another closed Beta player, I don't actually recommend it because we couldn't really have meaningful games for another 6+ months at least. They need to do something. What is that thing? That's tough to say. I don't know that there is a good solution to help newer players that won't alienate veterans, and vice versa
I think the meta has really improved with the move bounce nerf. That deck had a warping effect on the whole meta and the format feels way more open now. Something still feels a little off but it’s better.
My experience is different, but I can definitely see how our situations diverge. I don't see as many mirror matches and often I just don't see the new cards on release, good season pass cards excluded. I started in the beta and do hit infinite every season. The decks we used to play just don't exist anymore. There are new archetypes emerging and old ones getting new life every few weeks.
Hope that youll pop in after character mastery drops. Would love to see what your collection produces. Enjoy the snapcation. Hoping for big time changes to bring you back.
I really like the one card per week schedule. There’s not all the “fluff” cards that typical TCG sets have. And typical set releases can be fun for a short period but I feel like they can feel a little stale as it nears the end of a set and I want to play less. But of course that’s just personal opinion
Personally I've been having fun brewing with recent releases and very recently been finding success on ladder playing one of my favorite cooks. I completely agree with you in terms of the mirror match, but some weeks i actually like the challenge of preparing for the mirror matches, but it does feel like i am more limited in deck building when the card being released is projected to be strong. In terms of game modes, i hope that they find a way to implement a limited or ideally draft format, i think it would create really fun gameplay. Though if they ever do make a gamemode like that they probably need to rework or ban arishem from it 😅 Overall nothing to complain about. I still have a lot of faith in second dinner. One thing that you didn't mention but also often creates mirror matches that really annoy me are hot and featured locations.
This is one thing i think Legends of Runeterra PvP got right. They have rotation, but they rotate cards in and out of their 'standard' format to cultivate the play experience instead of just killing year 1 series 3 cards forever they could do something similar for Snap
I think being a streamer may affect the mirror match experience; as a content creator, you're heavily incentivized to play the shiny new thing, while a rando like me can play whatever I feel like at the moment, dodging the mirror matches completely if I wait until later in the week to even decide if I even want the new card, much less play it.
I think you’re right. Jeff is highlighting some real weaknesses in Snap’s design, but those weaknesses don’t actually have too much of an impact on my play experience as someone who plays probably 1/10 as much as he was doing and doesn’t have to entertain a chat who wants to see the latest thing every day.
I am enjoying marvel snap but also not playing it too much because I’m also enjoying other games and other things that aren’t games. Recently became rare variant complete so I would like to see more rare variants in game or replace all mv with pmv. Eventually I would like to go back and play some of my favorite old decks like surfer again. Also would really like more deck slots.
I see a lot of bots because I like to hang out in the lower ranks, lol. Still supporting you on twitch even though I don't really play it. Hope to see you back in Snap one day but will continue to support your content either way.
I log into Marvel Snap, get sent to my in-box on the wrong page. Claim stuff. Tap through a "MAYBE LATER" ad. Then spend 5 minutes wading through upgrade and collection track animations. I'm already exhausted. That's enough for me. I could play a game, but... maybe later.
I've personally never minded Shang-Chi himself before, I've always enjoyed the puzzle of making sure you never put all of your eggs in one basket and trying to make sure to spread out your power, but I have been rather annoyed by the return of Enchantress. The way that Ongoings in particular either tend to require clustering (Moonstone for instance) or they often cause you to lose priority (Mystique failing to copy an Enchantressed Iron Man) has made it very frustrating now that Enchantress has started showing up in random decks like Scream decks now. I don't know what the solution is or if there even needs to be one but that's just been something I've been annoyed by lately.
Imho enchantress is needed for exactly that reason. At the current state alot of powerfull cards are ungoing so there needs to be answers to those. You could still hide your moonstone behind a cosmo and back it up with cards like Captain America and Mr. Fantastic instead of trying to get huge value with Mystique. Moostone is a really strong card but it telegraphs what you're trying to do, so its understandable that it gets countered if the opponant has the tools against it. Same thing with the old wong into black panter, you know Arnim Zola is coming next so you play according to that happening. If you're encountering alot of enchantresses switch to a deck that doesn't instantly lose to it. When more people start switching to decks that don't relay on ongoings enchantress will be played less and the game will balance out. That being said, since enchantress is a really strong counterplay card in the current state of the game they could reduce her to a 4/4 to make her more of a tech card and be bad in other matches so less likely to be jammed in any deck.
While I like the card pool idea, I am concerned that it would be difficult to balance when certain tech cards are not available. It also makes mirror matches more likely to happen. P.S. I also miss your deck brews. I feel there was less mirror matches when you had them as they felt fun to play and weren't meta but were still competitive.
To be honest, my game time with Snap has been reduced significantly since your channel went on a hiatus. I enjoyed your left-field approach to deck designs and would often earmark a specific card to buy with tokens based on the decks that you would share (specifically the Jeff’s Picks decks). So now I around 30 spotlight keys and 30000 tokens as I have no way of knowing when and how to best spend my resources in relation to a deck that would merit their inclusion (I.e., a Jeff’s Picks deck) 😊😊😊
One thing I haven't really noticed from Snap content creators is they suggest same OP decks but they haven't really delved into the counter deck suggestion space to help new players and old.
Curious as to your thoughts on TCG Pocket with regards to a rotating format. You talk about it being a struggle in snap, and currently there don't seem to be plans to have a rotation cycle in pocket. Do you think this will be an issue down the line or should power creep take care of it?
Idk I feel even with the lessened amount of arishem that's being played the game still feels the same. Especially when it comes to the decks being played. I do like the fact they're banned cards in high voltage, maybe they can implement something like that on the regular ladder but they could rotate cards in and out like every couple of days/week. I'm still waiting for the new bigger batch of drops they promised to see if maybe that could help diversify the game more as well.
Hope all is well Jeff. Things feel better for me. The recent compensation made me feel better about not making the game my life lately. I hope this economy is here to stay.
Love to hear your thoughts. Much miss watching your stream but sadly cannot get into pocket. I really enjoy High Voltage. And yes I would be interested in more game modes….and I’d like more game modes available all the time. Still enjoying snap enough to buy the pass. But if something else came along that I really enjoyed I guess I’d be prepared to stop snapping…so that says something about the current game state. Hoping the next few months bring meaningful changes. And hope to see you back sometime! But glad Pocket is making you happy and a living. All the best to you and the family.
Thanks for the upload! For me, last season gave me no reason to play. This season, I'm highly enjoying the new season pass card, which brought me back to the game, but none of the other releases gives me the same feel, so I might drop in a week again. Pocket is definitely there for me, but ever since I stopped caring about infinite in snap and started only playing when it's fun I've... Had more fun. So surprising.
Maybe they can do something like Pokémon with packs. Release a lot of new cards in packs and people get random stuff to make decks and it will be less mirror matches. So people who don’t get certain cards at the time they can make counter decks or just decks u love playing. I don’t know just my opinion to throw ideas what could be cool.
Love Pocket and been watching you play it Monday through Friday, but I would love if Second Dinner could address some of these issues. SNAP doesn't feel the same without you. A big release would be killer.
A question for those more familiar with streamers: who would you recommend to watch (on TH-cam) who is most similar to Jeff, for Marvel Snap content? There's a couple I check out here and there who are fun but I really enjoy Jeff's analysis and explanations while playing games; I wish I didn't find Pokemon Pocket so boring to watch as I'd love to follow him over to that one!
I wanted to hate the idea of quitting months ago. I wanted to miss playing if i did in fact quit months ago I just knew neither would be the case.... So I quit months ago I still want to regret it, because i enjoyed the game. There were just too many factors that ppinted to SD's growing greed. And in all the months away, that has clearly not changed. What finally did it for me was 5 straight spotlights of 4 keys, 4 keys, 4 keys 4 keys and 3 keys to get the card i wanted. 19 keys for 4 cards. Hell of a punishment for always making sure to have 4 stocked up (which also means you miss out on cards in the meantime) while trying to keep 4 on hand. 5 straight purchases like that is egrigious and a slap in the face. Which by the way 5 straight times of getting base card dupes during that LONG stretch is still only 5/8 of a new card. That is crazy. In each of those scenarios id keep getting duped...not even with alts, but with base card dupes I already had. Here you go, have 1/8 of a new card with your thousand tokens. All while every single card was s5. Previously, they at least had some s4 cards more regularly so you could actually decide to use tokens and save caches to plan going forward. It felt good to get by for a week while planning going forward. Time frame of the beginning of the end for me was having to pass on White Widow and getting hit with it for literal weeks/months while building back up to 4 for weeks only to keep using them all to get one card. In that time frame many important cards were missed. There are other things along the way that were ridiculous too, but that crazy wall of BS i hit compounded my decision to stop playing the game.
The negative feels from the 'new card each week' release does depend a lot on the card. This week, for example, I've sent very few Joaquin Torres despite him being a highly fun addition to Bounce (and seeing some interesting fringe stuff in other builds). I'm also not expecting to see a lot of Thaddeus Ross next week. But when the card is clearly just 'Very Good In One Obvious Deck' like the insanley boring Doom99 or ridiculously cracked like Bullseye, the meta becomes extremely one note and it sucks. Sadly, there's a lot of the latter style of card. It's good when we get two cards, like the first week of the season, but sometimes those cards have synergy (Iron Patriot and Victoria Hand) and that just defeats the point. Weekly releases should be keeping the game fresh, but often just move it to the next "this is what 80% of your games will be against". I also think the last few OTAs have been very unimpactful, to the point of being pointless, which doesn't help at all.
Agreed with everything you’ve said but also just uninstalled the game because I have enough real life chores to do, I don’t enjoy feeling bad just from missing a few days of snapping
For me, what has made the game feel the most monotonous is that I don’t think there are enough unique mechanics. Activate was their chance to fix that, but that mechanic has generally been a bust. I’ve always said I want Trigger to be an explicit mechanic. There are a handful of cards that are currently kind of Quest or Conditional cards like Iron Patriot that they could explore more. It just seems like there is a lot of design space that they’re not using.
Not sure how i feel about te game. Start of a new season is generally fun, but declines rapidly when a specific popular card comes out. The game surely feels like doing chores instead of having fun sometimes. But at least it is not impossible anymore te get the new card. That feels better than before. Miss your decks of the week! Jeffs picks were often the style of play i like!
This combined with the Weekend Missions meta and the Hot Location meta. There's very little space for an actually "free" meta in any week, unless the new release is a dud or goes into multiple archetypes
You’re a content creator so you were always pressured to play the latest thing. Honestly now that there are a ton of cards out and I’m also fulfilling Alliance Bounties, I play way more types of decks than I used to when I was new to the game and it keeps it fresh. Good luck on your journey. I know it’s hard to keep the passion for a game through multiple years.
I think all the issues presented here are inherent to snap. You could tweak, prod, smooth but the nature of small cardpool and one card per character makes rotation unlikely. Funnily enough, true innovation goes counter to monetization but second dinner are pretty good at making an enjoyable game so i might be wrong
While I still enjoy Marvel SNAP I'm going to be honest, part of the fun for me was following your matches and hearing your breakdowns on the meta and the business of the game. I don't know what it would take for you to come back but thanks for the video.
Appreciate the upload Jeff, still following your pocket content but miss your Snap deck brews. Absolutely agree with both the mirror match problem and polarized match up problems with the singular card release schedule. When it becomes less beneficial to ladder up with the most recent releases and more beneficial to try to play with the most beneficial tech match-ups, it does feel like a net negative for game experience.
I do still appreciate that Second Dinner is balancing on a regular basis, and as tech cards increase hopefully there becomes a cycle of being able to play into the least popular ones of the season, but I agree that the slow drip might be less sustainable than the large volume/"figuring out the meta" phase of traditional TCG's.
Thank you for still being a thoughtful voice in the online card game space!
Completely agree here. Great to see you back here. I’m watching your pocket content and playing that much more, but still a snapper at my core : )
The drop of new content in pocket typifies what I find frustrating about Hearthstone/Pocket/etc. The big set reveals vastly benefit the whales who will buy so many cards all at the same time. As a FTP player, my engagement with snap means that I do get the “new shiny toy” a lot of the time. In January, Bullseye for example was a really amazing refresh of discard decks and I am loving playing with that card. In pocket, I have very few double copies of ex cards, so I’m struggling to play any competitive decks. Your video today had some cool decks to check out without ex’s, but even there I’m missing two copies of lots of two diamond cards. It may be a month or more before I am able to get my collection to a useful level, and that’s a really frustrating feeling.
To me, snap’s acquisition was so novel and still remains one of the best things about the game. I love the weekly freshening up, but not the requirement to get everything. I’ve skipped this week, and am loving the season pass card without the extra other one.
Hope you come back to snap soon! My fingers and toes are crossed for them to do the economy right so that you and some of my friends return to this game I love.
I hope you do whatever brings you the most benefits and I will always wish you all the best, but I would be lying if I say I didn't miss watching you playing snap hahahahah
I’ve really been missing it the last few weeks because I lovedddd the decks Jeff would brew, his reasoning behind his deck building, etc. Hope to see him return soon, I think the game is in a healthy meta right now imo.
I think one of the periods of time I had the most fun with snap was when they had the valentines pair up event. It gave us multiple new toys to play with, and reinvented existing decks. It was fun to deck build with specific restrictions and still come up with something good
Yeah I really loved the imbalance patches they did twice
Glenn said that the Sanctum game mode was something he came up with when he was reimagining Snap since he came on after the game was already designed. So seems interesting
He also said this: "I do believe the core gameplay of Showdown is robust enough to support its own game, with card and location designs more suited to it. I hope to design some of those for future runs!"
That seems pretty promising!
Thanks for checking in and keeping the discord useful. BSR remains a delight to play.
I feel like they rely too heavily on the location variance for a “unique” experience. I definitely agree that the location aspect of it makes these same ole deck that do the same ole things hurt a little less. Now what is the solution nobody know but what worked three years ago isn’t working now and they need to freshen things up a bit and bring the excitement back because right now it’s hard for new players to come in and hard for old player to stay. All in all I hope you are having fun Pokémon pocketing and if you decide not to return we will not blame you but for those of us who await your return we hope it’s a glorious one. Thank you for everything you do Hoogland ❤
I also want to thank you for checking in. I've sorely missed your commitment to nuance and as a long-time magic player (used to statements like "it's broken" / "not close" / "this matchup is a bye") it's been tough to go back to the hyperbole and salesmanship you get with a replacement-level content creator.
I was playing hearthstone right as "Wild" was introduced, and remembering that as you spoke on how other TCGs have formats (now) also reminded me about their weekly Tavern Brawl mode, which (for folks unfamiliar) was a week-long special ruleset / mode that was sometimes was constructed.
My personal approach for introducing formats to Snap would be a play on Tavern Brawl with the period being "The Length of the Season Pass" instead of weekly. The change I primarily would expect would be location / card bans for the duration in the "Season Ladder" (plus the additions that are already coming in the current ladder concept ("Unlimited Ladder" ?)
We're already primed to expect that a season will be different based on new cards coming in and the latest toys, and they already have a concept of older cards that are thematically related to the season pass card being highlighted via exclusive variants (e.g. original Captain America)
I miss the snap content, but I love the Pokemon content. I stuck around through Snap, Unite, Pocket...I just like the content. Still happily playing Sanp, but I'll watch a lot of your content. So, do you.
Pre Infinite, the game is a CHORE and extremely boring. Post infinite, its a much more enjoyable experience.
as someone just getting into the game more competitively, hovering between vibranium and diamond, what the difference in infinite+? deck variety or what?
@@ryandeluca1669 just the metal block of pre-vs-post infinite. Post-infinite some players don't care as much about winning. 90s are where you tend to get the hardest matches, so infinite by comparison is less hard. (unless you are aiming for high ranks of course.
However, as a human being with free will, you can play whatever you want.
Since you are on the climb, retreat smart, snap before your big plays, and have fun.
@@snowpoint720 this is news to me, but can you not drop out of infinite?
@@ryandeluca1669 after you get there, you stay for the season. post-infinite it displays both your Mach making score "Snap Points" and your Global Leader board rank. Most people aren't super duper serious about rank unless they are trying to get really high on the leader board.
I've hit infinite a few times, and it feels to me that pre-infinite is also becoming a considerably more difficult chore to climb.
I definitely see where you're coming from, but as a casual player I haven't ran across the mirror match problem as much. I actually like the slow drip of new cards as if it's not interesting I can skip that week. I've found that I kinda dislike the new pack drops of other card games, because while content creators can buy the whole thing day 1, by the time I get the best cards from the new pack, they're either old news, or completely irrelevant due to power creep. I like how SNAP tries to balance so that old cards are still playable
Everything you said makes sense, and it'd definitely be interesting if Snap made some of those changes. I haven't been playing nearly as much, but it's not about Marvel Snap. I just haven't been having fun with card games in general. I go through cycles where I enjoy the strategy and randomness at all, and for a couple of months now, I've been in a phase where I just don't enjoy the randomness of card games.
A draft mode each week that has people drafting 11 cards and getting the weekly card to play with would be very interesting and offer a different play mode. Would not be opposed to the season pass release and then two weeks later have the multi-card release for the month all at once. SD would need to drastically change the key/spotlight system.
Draft mode is the only thing that would bring me back to the game. But we have been asking for a draft mode since the beta days…
Your takes are always refreshing, as was watching your deck building.
There's a Jeff sized gap in SNAP.
Fingers crossed, you'll be back...
One day
One thing with making some form of rotation is that you can also use that to re-introduce cards that fell out of the rotation at some point and as a lever to ease new people in to a larger and larger card pool.
Draft/arena mode would be a good addition too for variety
You've made an excellent point about what the release cycle means for the meta. Play-the-thing vs counter-the-thing leaves little to no room for any sort of deck experimentation for us mere mortals. I always try to make my "own" deck with a card and then get frustrated by those countering the meta card. There is (still) no place to experiment with new decks without repercussions
I think the way they set up MS with the card acquisition model worked very well when there was a large volume of people all starting at the same time and generally all having the same experiences. Once we got to a point where the bulk of players had made it mostly to the end of Pool 3, that's when the big issues really started to rear their head. It's just not realistic to expect new players to wait many months to get somewhat caught up to where friends they want to play with already are. Then, for those who have been here since the beginning, I think Jeff nailed it on the slow drip releases.
Kind of a bittersweet thing - I'm realizing that I've really missed hearing your thoughts on marvel snap, but one of the reasons I've always respected your opinions is because you're very honest and straightforward with your criticisms - and these are extremely valid ones, I think.
Personally I'm still playing and enjoying marvel snap quite regularly, but I'm not confident I'll still be doing so even a couple months from now, let alone longer term. Also, I know that when I stop it won't just be a break - one of these days l'm going to fully drop Snap and never look back. A sharp contrast to magic the gathering, which is a game I have played on and off for nearly a decade and don't expect to fully drop anytime soon. Part of that is economy of course - even if I take a months or years long break from magic, I can still hop back in and have just as much fun. Snap's FOMO-first model encourages the opposite of that. But it's probably true that part of it is the card release model as well. I'm getting back into magic lately with a new full set release, something Snap just doesn't have the equivalent of.
Agree with most here …. Miss your snap days Jeff but happy you are enjoying pocket. Always appreciate your insight and hope folks at sd are taking notes
I believe you have hit the nail on the head. I've played snap since the beta till August of 24. Since Pocket has released it made me realize how incredible the different styles of deck design is, choosing to play Ex's or all 1 Knockout points lets you customize. When playing snap the most I could tailor my deck was Cerebro. There is diversity but having tech cards being the main form of customization choosing if you are trying to beat them or just play them limits so many deck options. It's a different style not a wrong one but I feel it's quite impactful for my enjoyment.
Thank you Jeff, always appreciate your insights and you are missed in the Snap world!
I think there's a fundamental difference in Snap's flavor/presentation that matters here: each card is a character on it's own. That's why "skins" and "character mastery" even make sense as concepts. This makes format rotation kinda akward, it also means that every card being somewhat usable is a good thing.
I think it makes a traditional age-based format rotation awkward, but just like Snap came up with a new card release model, maybe they could come up with a new rotation method. Maybe the way a Snap limited format where the card pool cut in half each month, not necessarily fully randomly, but sorta-kinda. Every month, there’s a new mix of cards that are missing. Core pieces of some decks might just be gone. Maybe there’s a common 40% of the card pool that everyone has, maybe everyone has their own 15% of the card pool that might be different. One has Doctor Doom, one has Magneto. Would it be fun to try to recapture that early Series-3 feeling where everyone has got to piece things together? Maybe the card pool expands 5% each week before resetting.
But the core thing that a limited format at like that would do is partly fix the problem which could arise if someone’s favorite cards and heroes were out because they’re too old. Now, they’re out for a month, will be back next month.
@thebitterfig9903 Yes, it can be worked around, but it's something that has to be considered. One thing that could be cool is to make formats based on flavors, like Spiders VS Symbionts, or Villains Month, etc.... Maybe as a side thing. It would make deck building very challenging.
Something like Hearthstone's tavern brawl that has a new goofy rule each week that makes you challenge yourself to build a new deck to take advantage of the rule could be fun. Even only cards, odd only cards, every card played randomizes after it's effects triggers, Agatha takes over everyone's first and last turn, etc. It would give the player base something to look forward to every week.
The mirror match problem is probably built into the system. For every player trying the new cards and for everyone countering it, there's like 5 Destroy Bros that are just going to play what they already like, but you hardly ever match into them. And for anyone who doubts it, just play a regular on reveal deck like 5 matches to completion. Win or lose, the next game you play a regular move deck, and your opponent is playing move as well. It's less of a trend thing than it is the matchmaking forcing it.
Been a long time lurker, but I'm glad to see you're enjoying Pokemon more than you were Snap. It's always a scary thing to see your enjoyment dwindling when it's also the source of financial stability for yourself/your family.
Random musing about Snap, but I think one of the strengths of Snap is that they don't need to functionally reprint cards. We don't need a suite of Doom Blade/Murder/Go For the Throat/etc, because we have Shang Chi, which always does the thing and always will. Although I do think this is a strength, this does make rotating sets much more difficult and does mean the design space is a lot more limited when everything always needs to compete with the baseline Shang Chi.
I don't have any real answers, but I think Snap is an interesting case study on why traditional card games have chosen to do various things. People complain endlessly about reprints, sets, and Standard in the MTG space, but Snap pretty clearly shows the downsides to not doing those things.
For context I'm a middling player who typically ends the season in the 90s and occasionally will hit infinite. My rank up pace is plodding and I often hit 90 in the final days of the season. That said my experience with mirror matches is minimal. Like Jeff said metas move fast week to week and even within a week. But I move slowly. Slow enough that even if I am playing a meta deck one day I'm not for the next 10 days. For me this results in matches that seldom feel stale. I hope others are having this experience because it's a pretty enjoyable snap experience.
These are a really good points. I didn't really think about the release system and its effects on the game like this. Very well said and I agree with both.
Please come back to Snap! You are an incredible analyst and your thoughtful inaights are sorely missed in this community.
Glad to see you Jeff. Appreciate the update. For me, I don't face as many mirror matches but I'm also not playing the shiny cards when they come out all the time. I think that's where being a content creator differs a bit from someone like me. If anything, I like to play those shiny cards that came out a few months back since a good chunk of the player pool forgets that good deck but with less shiny bits. I'm hopeful with Second Dinner getting a new publisher and the series drop that things will be better in a couple of months. I also like breaking playing Snap with other activities including Rivals which I'm not very good at.
Yeah, like Content Creators making a deck popular seems to be something extremely underestimated here in Jeff's thesis.
Hey Jeff!
I also took a break from Snap, skipping the December season and came back fresh and happy with Snap specially with the upcoming changes, hopefully I cam get to see your videos and decks back soon
I wholeheartedly agree with the exhaustive duality of mirror matches and tech counters. I wonder if it would be better to release all 5 cards at the beginning of the season instead? Or maybe even make all 5 cards available, but you can only choose 1 a week? At least that way there would almost certainly be much more variety, at least for the first couple weeks until it was known which cards should avoided until the end of the month.
I agree with most of your points. 1 other aspect that soured me on Snap after playing Pocket is the daily missions and alliance missions feel like work. They dont enhance play experience, they tend to limit how I "should" be playing. I found myself logging in to clear dailly missions, but not enjoying the gameplay, so now I just don't log in at all.
I always appreciate and value your takes Jeff. Thanks for being such a great human in this Community and know whatever it is u do, we support
Lovely to see you again, really miss your streams and videos 😢
Looking good Jeff! And I agree with all the points raised. I don't know if a full rotation of cards would help Snap but certainly a curated list cards should be taken out at least temporarily.
Thanks for the upload, Jeff. I miss your regular content, and I greatly appreciate your thoughts and musings on the game. I'm glad to see you're doing well and looking healthy!
Thanks! Limited card pool could be a great fresh take on Snap, agreed.
I think they could put all the seasons cards out at the start of the month and change card acquisition so you have more control over what you target and acquire.
So at the start of the season, everyone goes after the new shiny they want and it's not just 1 week of new shiny and it's counters.
Yep, first game I actually drew and played Sam Cap on his release Red Guardian showed up to piss in my cheerios. The mirror/ tech match up release week is demoralizing. Probably why the Lasher release felt less toxic since his entrance was staggered for a lot of people, which meant the tech/ mirror match-ups weren't anywhere near as prevalent. Still feels amazing in Cerebro 2.
I don't play a super large amount, so getting tech carded out of playing the cards I actually want to use is SUPER exhausting. I've stopped playing the deck I want to play cause the match-ups and locations just kept telling me to stop. Super wish they'd change Crimson Cosmos. I do still enjoyed playing, miss your deck builds though.
I don't mind the one per week, since I don't desire to get every new card. I've only been snapping for about a year and a half now
I see your points about mirror matches, but I only experience it once every few weeks it doesn't bother me.
The tech cards do need to be there for sure. Maybe they could try something where every other month they "ban" and "unban" certain cards like Wong and Cosmo for a month. Then bring em back. This could help liven things up. Especially if you plan the "bans" around the new cards for the month.
For example having big crazy five drops (with on reveal) on the schedule in the same month Wong and cosmo are "jailed" would let people experience the new toys without breaking them. Then, in the next month, we have a new set of cards to play with, and the previous two jailed cards, Wong and cosmo, are freed. Breathing new life into last months shiny new toys, while having this months shiny new toys coming out still, with some different jailed cards.
You’re looking great! Glad to hear from you, great take on all this. 👍
It's nice to see you back on the snap channel albeit a short lived thing - I havent really been following pokemon. But what I would like to say is it's really nice to see you sounding a lot happier in general and less stressed about playing snap or anything like that - keep doing you bud and I hope to see you back when/if the time is right for you
I don't think having "limited" formats is going to solve the mirror match problem. They should do something more like High Voltage and Sanctum mode that changes the rules and makes cards' relative power levels drastically change.
I do agree the exhaustion with the tech cards right now. The decks that can run all the tech cards are super annoying, basically all the cards you mentioned plus Alioth, and the game becomes "Did my opponent make their deck worse for most match ups just to add a tech card that will complete screw over my deck?" It adds too much variance and doesn't really reward better deck building or game play. It's instead "Will my opponent Alioth or Shang Chi or Cosmo the right location at the right time?"
Also Conquest is somehow even more annoying than ranked. I only play it to farm the rewards or complete bounties, that mode needs a drastic rework. Conquest needs to be less of a time commitment, IMHO.
I definitely agree with this take when a new card is fairly narrow, but there are a lot of releases where card can be used in many ways. I’ve been loving Iron Patriot as a solid card that can go in a variety of decks but feels pretty fair
Thanks for posting and definitely I have missed both your takes on the state of the game as well as the off-meta decks. I really appreciate this video because I've had all of the same questions as those people but didn't want to impinge on your "following your joy" by taking a Snap break.
I still enjoy Snap although I'm heavily invested in the IP so that makes it easier for me to get over the problems in the game play and the economy. As another commenter mentioned, the amount that I play is much less than a streamer so the mirror matches and tech cards don't bother me as much. I would love to see some kind of alternate format, deck building restriction, or something to encourage different decks than what is commonly played. The mentality of playing the new card is so strong among the masses even though its not strictly necessary -- during DD2 I played your Wong Namora build (a 5-month old deck) the whole time and earned all the rewards.
Glad to hear that you are enjoying the Pocket experience and hope to see you playing Snap when you feel the time is right.
Great vid, especially on the rotations of cards. As I was mostly a Legacy/Vintage MtG'er, I usually do like to play the most powerful tech-cards, and don't get as frustrated when I lose to a Shang/Alioth/Cosmo etc. A card like Enchantress will make sure that a pure ongoing deck will never be the top performer and that's fine in my book. One of the best things I enjoy about Snap, is the weekly meta-change due to new cards and OTA's. But I do understand that people without a full collection experience a downside from that. I see that from content-creators as well; where I mostly follow the 'old'-streamers. Even though there are a lot newer ones, but they are struggling with the game-economy, and feature decks that were meta 2 months ago. You said in a previous video as well: you couldn't allure to newer players, as it would take them months, or even years to be able to play the decks that you are playing.
What I'm struggling with in the most recent months is the inconsistency with bots these days. They are very regular in the 70s, and almost 1:10 in 80s and totally absent in the 90s. The climbing is tedious, and feels unrewarding. Bots shouldn't be the main-aspect of the climb, but the climb shouldn't be a zero-sum game either.
Here’s where I think 2nd Dinner should start with the polarizing tech cards by restricting their effects:
Killminger: destroys 3 random 1 cost cards on the board.
Shang Chi: destroy any card here with 10 or more power that costs more than Shang chi.
Enchantress: disable the text for 2 random ongoing cards at this location.
Cosmo: block on reveal effects for 4-6 cost cards.
Above are all examples I just came up with and are probably not realistic, but the idea still stands. I think restricting the effect of the tech cards or building on some consequence to their effect will go a long way with this game imo.
I miss watching you play Snap while I work. I hope you come back soon.
I just came back to the game about two weeks ago. My break was about 2 1/2 months. It was definitely good to take said break from a financial perspective; now I'm only buying the season pass instead of most of the art bundles. If you takes step back, you see just how gouging the game can really be.
Okay, gonna try a brief answer to some of those questions you asked at the end. I enjoy the one-new-card weekly release cadence enough that the mirror match issue hasn’t killed it for me, though I have to acknowledge your point. It isn’t ideal to have a new toy with a label saying “Will be fun a few weeks from now, when people are bored with it!” The key difference between you and me here is probably that I don’t do this for a living. I play maybe an hour a day, and actually, this season, for the first time in two years, I’m playing even less. Fresh new discovery: if I don’t pretend I care about ladder rank or infinite rank and just play a few games for fun whenever I feel like it - like a casual gamer! - the game gets way more fun. It had, if I’m honest, drifted towards feeling like a job.
It might be just a feeling, but OTA's and patches used to be "new card releases" too - if you didn't get the Tuesday release, then on Thursday there were 2 or 3 cards you forgot about that are now "real", and if that didn't happen then the patch would fundamentally rework two cards.
Again, maybe just a feeling, but nowadays OTA's either "absolutely kill a card" (= will have 1% less playrate), or sort of nudge a card in a way that might help an older deck but won't bring some new challenger, new type of deck to try. Which is extra funny considering OTA' used to change 3-4 cards and the last few changed 10-ish each...
I completely understand your points. I still love Snap and play daily. But the biggest obvious difference is of course if something like shang or cosmo ruins my mood I can just stop playing for a while and come back later. I think a game mode where cards “rotate” maybe on a monthly cycle would probably fit snap the most. They definitely need to add something that is available permanently but is different enough from the normal experience to provide options. Conquest is just boring right now and more of the same like you said.
I play both snap and pocket and pocket has really blown me away in how easy and fun the card acquisition is. However I do still prefer the gameplay in snap. I hope they figure it out because I really do enjoy the core game and it would be a shame to drop it. I'm looking forward to future videos Jeff whether its pocket or snap :)
Respect you living your truth, but I will miss your analysis and perspective greatly. As an EnBy you always made me feel seen!
I stopped playing for the second and final time about a month before you decided to take a break. To me, I became exhausted with trying to keep up with how quickly the meta changes with the releases every week. I had a few decks that I really liked, but needing to constantly tweak them or play something else was becoming too irritating, especially when I wasn't trying to play the game full-time.
Thanks for the video, I appreciate your perspective and I do agree with you for the most part.
The other card games I've played heavily are yugioh and hearthstone and I vastly prefer marvel snaps acquisition even though its not perfect.
Other card games may have new sets where hundreds of cards are introduced but the majority of them are useless/filler/non competitive.
The cards that are competitive tend to be expensive (especially if you need multiple copies or they're short printed) or hard to acquire, as there are often other cards printed at the same rarity to lower your chances of getting the better cards.
The sets might also introduce a new archtype which is either overpowered (and you have to play it to compete) or lacking key pieces (they tend to release the full archetype across multiple sets to maximise sales).
Also the card balance is much better in Marvel Snap as problematic cards can be quickly adjusted with OTA's or older cards can be buffed.
Other card games might not address problematic cards for months or they might just wait until the cards rotate out of play or they may just ban/limit them in certain formats.
Other card games might have different modes but they might not be supported well (lack of card balance). Traditional/wild formats tend to be supported less because more money is made from the current advanced/standard formats.
Mirror matches will always be divisive. Some people find them boring/frustrating, others find them to be a test of skill.
Most of the time I think it comes down to who drew what at the right time but at least with marvel Snap it isn't decided by who won the dice roll and has the first turn.
I agree with a lot of your points the only thing is I don't think set releases is the way to go. Pocket, Magic and Yugioh it is extremely rare for an erata to a card so they can release and forget about it whereas snap has constant balance changes to available cards. I do think there needs to be something else other than the one card a week to keep people engaged.
Maybe permanent new game modes since Conquest is just a longer form of standard snap
Wow! If I could choose a bunch of cards I actually wanted to play with, without the mirror matches and counters, that would be great! Spending what I've saved, to get countered constantly doesn't feel great, now I'm saving tokens up, because cards fall out of favour so quickly... And if you do get a good combination, everyone else has it, and it gets nerfed. Really appreciate this kind of input!
As someone who can only consume your content via TH-cam due to scheduling conflicts, it's great to see you again!
I agree with the mirror match problem, and also with the economy problem. I have several friends whom I'd love to recommend Snap to, and play against -- but as another closed Beta player, I don't actually recommend it because we couldn't really have meaningful games for another 6+ months at least.
They need to do something. What is that thing? That's tough to say. I don't know that there is a good solution to help newer players that won't alienate veterans, and vice versa
Good to see this post. Always enjoy your perspectives on snap.
I think the meta has really improved with the move bounce nerf. That deck had a warping effect on the whole meta and the format feels way more open now. Something still feels a little off but it’s better.
My experience is different, but I can definitely see how our situations diverge. I don't see as many mirror matches and often I just don't see the new cards on release, good season pass cards excluded.
I started in the beta and do hit infinite every season. The decks we used to play just don't exist anymore. There are new archetypes emerging and old ones getting new life every few weeks.
Hope that youll pop in after character mastery drops. Would love to see what your collection produces. Enjoy the snapcation. Hoping for big time changes to bring you back.
I really like the one card per week schedule. There’s not all the “fluff” cards that typical TCG sets have. And typical set releases can be fun for a short period but I feel like they can feel a little stale as it nears the end of a set and I want to play less. But of course that’s just personal opinion
I think a monthly release would be worth looking into
Personally I've been having fun brewing with recent releases and very recently been finding success on ladder playing one of my favorite cooks.
I completely agree with you in terms of the mirror match, but some weeks i actually like the challenge of preparing for the mirror matches, but it does feel like i am more limited in deck building when the card being released is projected to be strong.
In terms of game modes, i hope that they find a way to implement a limited or ideally draft format, i think it would create really fun gameplay. Though if they ever do make a gamemode like that they probably need to rework or ban arishem from it 😅
Overall nothing to complain about. I still have a lot of faith in second dinner. One thing that you didn't mention but also often creates mirror matches that really annoy me are hot and featured locations.
Similar to having a “standard” and “vintage” format, Snap could have a rolling Blip, where half of the card pool disappears for a time.
Would like to see a "pauper" mode in snap that excludes series 4 and 5 cards.
Engagement comment for daddy jeff
This is one thing i think Legends of Runeterra PvP got right. They have rotation, but they rotate cards in and out of their 'standard' format to cultivate the play experience instead of just killing year 1 series 3 cards forever they could do something similar for Snap
I think being a streamer may affect the mirror match experience; as a content creator, you're heavily incentivized to play the shiny new thing, while a rando like me can play whatever I feel like at the moment, dodging the mirror matches completely if I wait until later in the week to even decide if I even want the new card, much less play it.
I think you’re right. Jeff is highlighting some real weaknesses in Snap’s design, but those weaknesses don’t actually have too much of an impact on my play experience as someone who plays probably 1/10 as much as he was doing and doesn’t have to entertain a chat who wants to see the latest thing every day.
I am enjoying marvel snap but also not playing it too much because I’m also enjoying other games and other things that aren’t games. Recently became rare variant complete so I would like to see more rare variants in game or replace all mv with pmv. Eventually I would like to go back and play some of my favorite old decks like surfer again. Also would really like more deck slots.
I see a lot of bots because I like to hang out in the lower ranks, lol.
Still supporting you on twitch even though I don't really play it. Hope to see you back in Snap one day but will continue to support your content either way.
I log into Marvel Snap, get sent to my in-box on the wrong page. Claim stuff. Tap through a "MAYBE LATER" ad. Then spend 5 minutes wading through upgrade and collection track animations. I'm already exhausted. That's enough for me. I could play a game, but... maybe later.
I've personally never minded Shang-Chi himself before, I've always enjoyed the puzzle of making sure you never put all of your eggs in one basket and trying to make sure to spread out your power, but I have been rather annoyed by the return of Enchantress. The way that Ongoings in particular either tend to require clustering (Moonstone for instance) or they often cause you to lose priority (Mystique failing to copy an Enchantressed Iron Man) has made it very frustrating now that Enchantress has started showing up in random decks like Scream decks now. I don't know what the solution is or if there even needs to be one but that's just been something I've been annoyed by lately.
Imho enchantress is needed for exactly that reason. At the current state alot of powerfull cards are ungoing so there needs to be answers to those. You could still hide your moonstone behind a cosmo and back it up with cards like Captain America and Mr. Fantastic instead of trying to get huge value with Mystique.
Moostone is a really strong card but it telegraphs what you're trying to do, so its understandable that it gets countered if the opponant has the tools against it. Same thing with the old wong into black panter, you know Arnim Zola is coming next so you play according to that happening.
If you're encountering alot of enchantresses switch to a deck that doesn't instantly lose to it. When more people start switching to decks that don't relay on ongoings enchantress will be played less and the game will balance out.
That being said, since enchantress is a really strong counterplay card in the current state of the game they could reduce her to a 4/4 to make her more of a tech card and be bad in other matches so less likely to be jammed in any deck.
I haven't experienced the mirror match problem, but the other ideas resonated. I'd love a different game mode every week.
While I like the card pool idea, I am concerned that it would be difficult to balance when certain tech cards are not available. It also makes mirror matches more likely to happen.
P.S. I also miss your deck brews. I feel there was less mirror matches when you had them as they felt fun to play and weren't meta but were still competitive.
To be honest, my game time with Snap has been reduced significantly since your channel went on a hiatus. I enjoyed your left-field approach to deck designs and would often earmark a specific card to buy with tokens based on the decks that you would share (specifically the Jeff’s Picks decks).
So now I around 30 spotlight keys and 30000 tokens as I have no way of knowing when and how to best spend my resources in relation to a deck that would merit their inclusion (I.e., a Jeff’s Picks deck) 😊😊😊
They could shuffle the cards release order for each player inside the season to fix the mirror Match problem. But some will get better cards ofk
One thing I haven't really noticed from Snap content creators is they suggest same OP decks but they haven't really delved into the counter deck suggestion space to help new players and old.
Curious as to your thoughts on TCG Pocket with regards to a rotating format. You talk about it being a struggle in snap, and currently there don't seem to be plans to have a rotation cycle in pocket. Do you think this will be an issue down the line or should power creep take care of it?
Pocket is 3 months old. I expect by the time it is nearly 3 years it'll have a rotating format in place.
I miss your decks, hope you come back when you feel it
Idk I feel even with the lessened amount of arishem that's being played the game still feels the same. Especially when it comes to the decks being played. I do like the fact they're banned cards in high voltage, maybe they can implement something like that on the regular ladder but they could rotate cards in and out like every couple of days/week. I'm still waiting for the new bigger batch of drops they promised to see if maybe that could help diversify the game more as well.
Hope all is well Jeff. Things feel better for me. The recent compensation made me feel better about not making the game my life lately. I hope this economy is here to stay.
Love to hear your thoughts. Much miss watching your stream but sadly cannot get into pocket. I really enjoy High Voltage. And yes I would be interested in more game modes….and I’d like more game modes available all the time. Still enjoying snap enough to buy the pass. But if something else came along that I really enjoyed I guess I’d be prepared to stop snapping…so that says something about the current game state. Hoping the next few months bring meaningful changes. And hope to see you back sometime! But glad Pocket is making you happy and a living. All the best to you and the family.
Thanks for the upload! For me, last season gave me no reason to play. This season, I'm highly enjoying the new season pass card, which brought me back to the game, but none of the other releases gives me the same feel, so I might drop in a week again. Pocket is definitely there for me, but ever since I stopped caring about infinite in snap and started only playing when it's fun I've... Had more fun. So surprising.
Maybe they can do something like Pokémon with packs. Release a lot of new cards in packs and people get random stuff to make decks and it will be less mirror matches. So people who don’t get certain cards at the time they can make counter decks or just decks u love playing. I don’t know just my opinion to throw ideas what could be cool.
Love Pocket and been watching you play it Monday through Friday, but I would love if Second Dinner could address some of these issues. SNAP doesn't feel the same without you. A big release would be killer.
A question for those more familiar with streamers: who would you recommend to watch (on TH-cam) who is most similar to Jeff, for Marvel Snap content? There's a couple I check out here and there who are fun but I really enjoy Jeff's analysis and explanations while playing games; I wish I didn't find Pokemon Pocket so boring to watch as I'd love to follow him over to that one!
I wanted to hate the idea of quitting months ago.
I wanted to miss playing if i did in fact quit months ago
I just knew neither would be the case....
So I quit months ago
I still want to regret it, because i enjoyed the game. There were just too many factors that ppinted to SD's growing greed. And in all the months away, that has clearly not changed.
What finally did it for me was 5 straight spotlights of 4 keys, 4 keys, 4 keys 4 keys and 3 keys to get the card i wanted. 19 keys for 4 cards. Hell of a punishment for always making sure to have 4 stocked up (which also means you miss out on cards in the meantime) while trying to keep 4 on hand. 5 straight purchases like that is egrigious and a slap in the face. Which by the way 5 straight times of getting base card dupes during that LONG stretch is still only 5/8 of a new card. That is crazy.
In each of those scenarios id keep getting duped...not even with alts, but with base card dupes I already had. Here you go, have 1/8 of a new card with your thousand tokens. All while every single card was s5. Previously, they at least had some s4 cards more regularly so you could actually decide to use tokens and save caches to plan going forward. It felt good to get by for a week while planning going forward.
Time frame of the beginning of the end for me was having to pass on White Widow and getting hit with it for literal weeks/months while building back up to 4 for weeks only to keep using them all to get one card. In that time frame many important cards were missed.
There are other things along the way that were ridiculous too, but that crazy wall of BS i hit compounded my decision to stop playing the game.
The negative feels from the 'new card each week' release does depend a lot on the card. This week, for example, I've sent very few Joaquin Torres despite him being a highly fun addition to Bounce (and seeing some interesting fringe stuff in other builds). I'm also not expecting to see a lot of Thaddeus Ross next week.
But when the card is clearly just 'Very Good In One Obvious Deck' like the insanley boring Doom99 or ridiculously cracked like Bullseye, the meta becomes extremely one note and it sucks. Sadly, there's a lot of the latter style of card.
It's good when we get two cards, like the first week of the season, but sometimes those cards have synergy (Iron Patriot and Victoria Hand) and that just defeats the point.
Weekly releases should be keeping the game fresh, but often just move it to the next "this is what 80% of your games will be against". I also think the last few OTAs have been very unimpactful, to the point of being pointless, which doesn't help at all.
Agreed with everything you’ve said but also just uninstalled the game because I have enough real life chores to do, I don’t enjoy feeling bad just from missing a few days of snapping
Looking fantastic Jeff!
For me, what has made the game feel the most monotonous is that I don’t think there are enough unique mechanics. Activate was their chance to fix that, but that mechanic has generally been a bust. I’ve always said I want Trigger to be an explicit mechanic. There are a handful of cards that are currently kind of Quest or Conditional cards like Iron Patriot that they could explore more. It just seems like there is a lot of design space that they’re not using.
Not sure how i feel about te game. Start of a new season is generally fun, but declines rapidly when a specific popular card comes out. The game surely feels like doing chores instead of having fun sometimes. But at least it is not impossible anymore te get the new card. That feels better than before.
Miss your decks of the week! Jeffs picks were often the style of play i like!
The weekly card of the week meta is boring, for me.
This combined with the Weekend Missions meta and the Hot Location meta. There's very little space for an actually "free" meta in any week, unless the new release is a dud or goes into multiple archetypes
You’re a content creator so you were always pressured to play the latest thing. Honestly now that there are a ton of cards out and I’m also fulfilling Alliance Bounties, I play way more types of decks than I used to when I was new to the game and it keeps it fresh. Good luck on your journey. I know it’s hard to keep the passion for a game through multiple years.
Good marvel snap vibe check. Marvel Snap has a lot of good and a lot of bad and I still want it to be successful even though I bounced off.
I think all the issues presented here are inherent to snap. You could tweak, prod, smooth but the nature of small cardpool and one card per character makes rotation unlikely. Funnily enough, true innovation goes counter to monetization but second dinner are pretty good at making an enjoyable game so i might be wrong