On Saturday night, Ben Brode answered some player questions on the Marvel Snap Discord, and we've got a recap of everything he talked about! We've summarized the salient points, but a full transcript is included below for your perusal.
Upcoming Balance Patch
- They're having a meeting about patch notes on Monday.
- The plan for the patch is to have it out sometime this week.
- Two weeks ago, Brode confirmed that this patch will have balance changes.
- They are currently unable to do balance updates without a client patch, but they're working to make sure that changes.
Gameplay
- Less than 3% of all players have hit Infinite Rank. 25% of people are at Gold Rank.
- Current matchmaking is based on MMR.
- They are making changes to limit matchmaking gaps (i.e.- matching with someone far above you in Rank).
- They are several months away from adding an unranked mode to the game; other things like a "game modes" screen need to be in place before then.
- They are not currently working on a 2v2 mode, but it sounds cool.
- Cards with an On Reveal and a Played effect trigger their On Reveal effect first. They made this choice because it feels simpler.
- The turn won't end within 15 seconds of a Snap, even if a player has passed the turn before their opponent snaps. If the turn does end immediately, it's a bug.
Collection
- Ranked rewards change each season. Ranked rewards in beta will become available again after global launch.
- Wave won't move from the Season Pass to the standard Collection Road until the season after next.
- New cards will be released through Season Pass, Nexus Events, and potentially another feature they haven't announced yet.
- Not receiving boosters for a particular card is rare, but not impossible; it's random what cards you receive boosters for.
- The amount of credits you have is related to how much you play after completing daily missions and how your boosters are distributed.
Progression
- There is room for improvement in the Mystery Box system.
- You should be able to leave a Variant milestone on the Season Pass unopened if you want a chance at a Variant for a card you don't have, but he's not 100% sure. It will stay there until the season ends.
Miscellaneous
- He won't comment too much on the leaks, but some of them are old cards that are no longer accurate.
- They'd love to add interactions between cards at some point.
- The discard animation of a sword slicing through the card isn't the default; it should be unique to Blade, Lady Sif, and Sword Master.
- Cable is known for traveling to the far future. He thinks the card's effect ("Put the bottom card of your opponent's deck into your hand") is a cool way to represent that.
BONUS: Update on Ben Brode's Voice Acting Career
- Another Snap developer on Discord said that, right now, Ben Brode is the temporary voice of 3 cards and 1 location in the game.
- There's a soft confirmation that Hulk is one of the cards he voiced.
- After the next update, a lot of the placeholder VO is being replaced.
Full Transcript
Quote From Ben Brode Can we get some clarification on this upcoming patch. Is it still happening this coming week? How will the patch notes work? Will the come a day ahead or some hours before the changes drop.
Brode: Haha we have a meeting today about patch notes on Monday! I believe the plan is still some time next week. (Source)
(From June 14) Any ETA on the balance updates for the beta? Really hating nova
Brode: we have a client patch coming in 2 weeks that will include balance changes.
Eventually we would like to be in a position where we would not require a client patch to do balance updates, but we're not there yet. (Source)
Are there any metrics on where the player base currently sits in each rank? (% at gold, % at infinite etc).
Brode: Right now it's <3% at Infinite
25% of people are Gold right now (Source)
How does Ranked matchmaking work? I'm playing against people with the sunspot avatar when I am below rank 40 and it feels very bad.
Brode: Right now it's based on MMR, but we will be making some changes soon to limit how far away you can be to match with someone (Source)
How far away are we from having a unranked mode to play in? I have deck ideas that I'm not confident in but I want to try to play with, but I don't want to drop down the ladder
Brode: we are still several months away at least - we have to get out "game modes" screen in to get that in there. (Source)
Is there any plans for a 2v2 mode or things like clans
Brode: not in the short term, but that stuff sounds cool (Source)
Whats the reasoning behind cards doing their on reveal before they do their played trigger?
Brode: gotta choose one - this one felt simpler (Source)
So, for a mathc to be worth 8 cubes, both players have to snap before turn 6 reveals. Also, as soon as both players tap "end turn", the turn starts playing. If I already hit end turn, and my opponent snaps and hit end turn inmediately I can't neither retreat or snap back. Do you guys like this interaction or could you maybe add a pop-up for that scenario with the options to snap back, retreat or continue?
Brode: That shouldn't be possible. The turn can't end within 15 seconds of a Snap. if you see it end within 15 seconds of a snap it's a bug and you should feel free to hit up #report-a-bug ! (Source)
Will rank rewards change next season (together with battle pass’ last day)? I want the Sunspot avatar so bad and I’m still at rank 54.
Brode: yes they will. On the bright side it will be available again after global launch (Source)
When the new season begins in a couple of days, which pool will Wave be added to?
Brode: Wave won't enter the Collection Road until the season after next. (Source)
Will new cards release exclusively through the Season Pass? Are there concerns that the meta won't shift enough to keep players interested?
Brode: No, they will also be released via nexus events and potentially through another feature we haven't announced yet (Source)
I've leveled up 120 cards and Black Widow seems to never yield any boosters. Can you check to see if it's bugged? I've played many games with her as my only common and never gotten any boosters.
Brode: I have gotten Black Widow boosters! It's random though, i hope you get some soon! (Source)
In a game thats so badly credit starved why is the “fast upgrade” section still in the shop? In my first few days of playing the beta I bought from there thinking it was efficient…… i still regret it
Brode: some folks aren't credit starved - depends on how much you're playing after completing your daily missions and how your boosters are distributed (Source)
Has the team considered a pity system for the mystery boxes? Something like, the likelihood is compounded every time a player doesn't get a variant, so they are guaranteed to eventually get one. Because theoretically, someone might never get a variant from them since its only a % chance.
Brode: yeah there's definitely room for improvement in this system (Source)
When you reach a random Variant milestone (for example on the season pass) is it already decided that it will pick from my currently available pool of cards or can I just leave it there and collect more cards so the random variant drop will also consider those as potential targets?
Brode: I'm not sure, but I believe you can leave it. Just don't leave it too long - the season ends at some point! (Source)
What does the team think of leaks? Should we be discussing them openly or just wait for them to be official?
Brode: Some of the "leaked' cards are not accurate (they're old) so I probably won't comment too much on 'em (Source)
Any plans for card interactions? :0 like, characters reacting to places or each other?
Brode: yes we'd love to do that stuff! (Source)
Why did you pick the discard animation to be a sword slice specifically? Was it due to all discard cards having them or was this purely coincidental?
Brode: the default discard isn't a card slash, I think. It's only for Blade, Sif, and Swordmaster. (Source)
Is there a plan to standardize the wording / effect of cards that interact with you or your opponents deck? Yondu, cable, jubilee, mantis, etc? Some take from the top, some from the bottom, some just “a card”. Seems these should all just be “a card” leaving interactions with specifically the top / bottom of a deck as future design space. Also solves the issue with America Chavez being on top
Brode: Cable travels to the far future - we thought that the bottom of your deck was a cool way to represent that. (Source)
This is like the 5th time I've seen a dev say this, but nobody even has a theory. Can you just tell us where he is?
TheChrisAlan: I'll tell you he is currently (and temporarily) the voice of 3 cards and 1 location) btw! After the next update there will be a lot of new VO brought in and placeholder removed. (Source)
Comments
I'm so confused on what he means. I'm not recieving any credits after completing missions, is he saying matches are suppopsed to be rewarding credits and it's bugged? Or does it mean some people who just do missions every day aren't getting the boosters they need to upgrade cards - so they can't spend credits at all?
He's saying that depending on the RNG of the distribution, some people might be playing very little games to complete their quests and therefore have a surplus of credits while not having too much boosters.
...Which is utter bullshit btw, if you do your quests at any pace you WILL have boosters. Once you hit a certain point, credit becomes the limiting factor even if you have the most absurd RNG he's stating some people has.
This is just his way of saying, we're not gonna do anything about the amount of credits you're getting but on a slightly less aggressive tone.
Also on a related side note, Ben Brode did talk a bit more extensively about the issue of surplus boosters that people are getting (contradictory to his statement here) and boosters being in the reward track. He's saying that he is/was planning to add a daily cap to how many boosters you can get so the booster rewards feel better.
I love the guy and I love the game so far but god what the fuck.
This is the screenshot to his comment btw: https://www.reddit.com/r/MarvelSnap/comments/ve7ho9/not_only_are_boosters_going_to_stay_in_the/
Could you explain what this means for the people who haven’t played Marvel Snap yet? I don’t understand what credits or boosters are.
This makes it sound like you have limited credits to play games each day (but why?). I can’t tell whether boosters increase your collection (but isn’t the only mechanic there one where you increase a collection level to get the next card?), or whether they are used to get variant art (but I thought that was tied to “infinity splitting” or something).
So the card collection system is strange. Basically it's a reward road that's tied to your level. You can increase your level by upgrading your cards. Upgrading cards doesn't do anything in terms of gameplay, just aesthetics and increasing the level.
To upgrade a card you need both credits and boosters to do it. A booster is similar to Hearthstone's Mercenary coin, there's a unique one for each card and to get them, you need to play games with that card in the deck. Credits are like gold in Hearthstone, you can get them from doing quests and sometimes in the multiple reward roads in the game. However, you cannot get credits just by winning or playing, you NEED quests. Quests are your main income basically. So credits are timegated pretty much unless you wanna grind your way through the ranks and even then the rewards are limited and sparse.
This is why boosters are almost unlimited. It's because if you try to complete a quest, regardless you will have a surplus of boosters. No quest in the game can be done in a single match. It takes multiple. So if you get a couple of quests needing you to use different decks, it's likely that you play like 5-10 matches each day.
To illustrate how much credits they give you, they give you 6 quests a day. 3 hard and 3 easy ones. Hard ones give 100 credits and easy ones give 50 credits. You also get a 50 credit bonus each day that you can claim. There is also a daily challenge that gives you 100 credits as well for completing 2 quests. Completing 7 daily challenges gives you 650 credits from the weekly challenge.
So in a week, you can get up to 4850 credits. That's quite a bit, however how much is that in Collection Level? That's a relatively easy calculation actually. You can pretty much just consider 100 credits = 2 levels. So in a week you can get 96 levels at the lowest. That's not including the credits you can get from the collection level as well or the small discounts you can get.
So how many cards is that in terms of collection level? Well that depends on what CL you are in actually. At the start every 2 CL gives you a card, then every 4, 6, 8, 12, 16 and the numbers goes up to as high as 48. You can look up at how much time is required to get all cards but I believe the calculations for a F2P is approximately 7 months.
Sorry if this is too much to read.
tl;dr, boosters are like Hearthstone merc coin, and credits are like gold. You need both to upgrade cards which in turn gives you collection level which unlocks cards. Boosters you can get by playing but credits are timegated with daily quests. Therefore if you play for quests, you will get more boosters than credits. Credits will always be the limiting factor.
Thank you for taking the time to write all that! It’s a great explanation, and it helped me understand a lot of the random comments I’ve been hearing.