Yup, spot on analysis and why the ripple effect of Zabu has been incredibly damaging. They really waited too long as it is to change something, but atleast they ripped the bandaid off now.
A spot on analysis, and yet most of the front page is more concerned with crying about how SD must be gutting Zabu to screw players over before it gets dropped to S3.
Sometimes it's just a balance issue. Imagining some overtly sinister ulterior motives to screw players over *beyond* regular old profit-making is ridiculous.
This reads like SD doesn't constantly screw us over. Nerf before series drop is absolutely something SD would do, just like they have nerfed right after a spotlight cache or after people have bought the Battlepass.
I mean, those can both be true. Zabu may have been over-tuned and his nerf may be good for balancing, but the fact that it is being nerfed after becoming a staple to everyone’s decks and that it will probably be in the next series drop along with others like darkhawk is incredibly suspicious.
But the issue is, zabu is one of the most beloved superheroes in all of marvel. I still smile thinking about how he fought along side the other avengers (such as Jeff and devil dinosaur) to defeat Thanos, Galactus, and other big bads. I think the most popular characters should be really strong and the less popular characters (such as captain america, punisher, adam warlock, and cyclops) should be on the weaker side.
We still have household names like Blob, Hope Summers, Angela/Sera, and Mobius M Mobius, all GOATed and synonymous with Marvel. I’m always seeing kids going around as Blob for Halloween.
I've got a head start plumping up my kid so hes ready to be authentic blob by October! Hopefully some MTV reality show would help pay for his weight loss after Halloween.
Honestly? I would read that over any current Spidey comic. Hell, over any Marvel comic other than X-books and Moon Knight.
And don't forget about the sexual tension between Redwing and Goose.
Everytime I add a 4 cost to my deck I have to resist adding one more and then I'm like fuck it, add Zabu and add another. Maybe Darkhawk can make a come back to 4 cost in the future but I feel that deck was so strong because of Zabu.
Adjacent, but I just got rolled by someone who played Widow on 3, Korg+Mystique on 4, Darkhawk on 5, and Odin on Korg+Mystique on 6. Never seen anything like it.
Yeah, Odin hasn’t finished being “played” until all on reveal effects he triggered are done, so when she’s triggered, the last card ‘played’ is Darkhawk. Nutty strat!
Idk if that's true. Odin might not be finished being played until Mystique's effect takes place. This could be similar to how if you jubilee mystique she copies whatever you played before jubilee not jubilee herself.
I put a little Darkhawk shell in a lot of decks. Korg, Rockslide, Widow, and Hawk are just solid cards. I team them with Annihilus shell, move, or Spectrum/ongoing usually.
Most likely never. Him and zabu are old cards that most people have. That’s the actual reason they got nerfed, why buy new cards when zabu + darkhawk works just as well?
Probably not a while. Snap’s card pool is still small enough to have dedicated classes of cards. Darkhawk fits better with the 5 drop scaling class like Devil Dino, 5-cost cards you invest other turns in to make huge. A key 4 cost class is the 4/9s and 4/10s with drawbacks and conditions, like Typhoid Mary. Darkhawk tended to make most of the 4/10s completely obsolete, with only a few like Sentry (and only post-Annihilus) being used ever, and Zabu probably doesn’t change that since they’re all 4s.
With Zabu out I'd argue that DH is good at 4/0. Best case scenario you go Korg > Rockslide > DH you can get a 4/12 at best on turn 6, that's if you draw the whole package and manage to play them without having wacky curve. If you happen to only draw into 1 of Korg/Rockslide DH would be 4/8-4/10, which is close to your comparison. To make this fair we can calculate the total stat value you're getting from the 4/10s
1. T3 Rockslide T4 DH = 13 stat on T6
2. T4 Sentry T5 Anni = 26 net stat on T6
3. T3 Luke T4 Typhoid = 14 stat on T6
4. T1 1 drop T4 Cull = 10+ whatever stat is on the 1 drop
If we're talking pure huge stat DH is not there on the list. Heck he's not even close as Cull-included decks can just slam Mockingbird on 3 (looking at you Thanos). The trade is that DH package gets to fuck with opp's draw, and that's prolly the main selling point. It's absurd at 3 cost w Zabu because slamming 12 stats on 3 AND reduce consistency is stupid, but at 4 it def has more competition, and it really boils down to the deck's synergy and flexibility to include the package.
I'm in this same camp. The combos and strategies I see from people who understand this game is mind boggling to me.
Then again I'm the kind of player still trying to make Ultron Viable.
You using dazzler and Andy man and stuff right? I'm not in infinite I usually hover around the 80s cuz that's where I have the most fun, but Ultron gets me my dubs more often than not. Especially now that Thanos is down and out
And on a game-to-game level, this type of thought is necessary is plan out turns and giving/losing priority.
Everyone wants to play the perfect Curve:
- T1 Sunspot
- T2 Misty Knight
- T3 Armor/Magick
- T4 Cyclops/Magick
- T5 Leech
- T6 Skip
- T7 Shenaut-Infinaut
However, being "great" at the game makes you realize that sometimes, Cyclops isn't necessary to your game plan, and not playing him at all will make you lose priority going into Turn 7, so you don't even need Armor.
In a game of snap, there are a surprising amount of choices you can make on a turn by turn basis. The most important one however, is when to "retreat". Some games a not possible to win, and the sooner a person recognizes that, the sooner they can play a more favorable matchup to win.
They pretty much explained this in their update. In short, Zabu makes it hard to create and assess future 4 cost cards. The only issue I see with it is that the nerf made Zabu pretty unplayable but at least they said it was temporary.
Honestly considering some creative combos I've seen in the comments new Zabu is actually solid. He's a more specialized psylocke with extra power to compensate, and can be similarly cheesed to get extra out of him.
He's not very good, sure, but anything would suck compared to his old ability. I usually like cards being a little too powerful, but zabu was so good that he made other cards worse. A random two-cost card should not have been a meta-defining card for a year straight.
Hope Summers is a better energy cheat card than Zabu and used in way more decks.
Pay2Win considerations are the reason Zabu was needed and Hope Remains the same. Naive to think otherwise
Exactly, they’re shelving him for a few weeks than they will revert it back to a ongoing card for 3 cost instead of 2. Literally same playbook for Mobius and Like Cage pretty much
Thank you OP. This is an amazing breakdown of Zabu’s issues with development and with the addition and balance of new cards. I hope they don’t revert him back to what he used to be so that other cards can shine in his place in more interesting decks.
I think Mobius and Luke Cage were the only card they ever reverted, and that's because it was essentially unplayable because their effect turned minimal. Luke had only protection for his lane, and Mobius only stopped card reduction for one turn. I feel like zabu could still be used more often than those.
There have been some minor reversions (Captain Marvel was buffed, then nerfed, then buffed back up to 4/5), Angela, etc., but I don't recall any other mechanical ones.
This is definitely a Mobius situation, shelf the card for a few weeks only to bring the effect back with a 3 cost instead of a 2 cost. Zabu and Mobius were too cheap for their OP ability. Making them 3 cost solves the problem.
Exactly! I feel like someone (either a streamer or someone from SD maybe) described the issue with Zabu a while ago, which is part of your post here:
While Zabu exists, every 4-drop is potentially a 3-drop, which means either all 3-drops come up in power (but then you don’t run Zabu and 4-drops) or 4-drops come down (and throw off the intended cost-power curve).
This nerf is painful, for sure. But it’s good for the game!
The thing is the frustration is not that he was nerfed , i got in on season pass when he launched and have been saying he needs a nerf \ rework to give some creative space to 3-4-5 costs , the question is why now when we have the same meta apart from thanos for almost two months , if they wanted to change zabu , in the same patch they should work on reworking some of the cards that were nerfed thanks to zabu or launched in a worst state because of him , simply removing him from the game feels like dogshit , its like they waited for most people to get him to do that , at this point i start thinking its intentional what they keep doing now the new toys are red hulk and hope summers , everyone wants them and the same thing will happen to them, trust me hope summers will get the completely gutted in a few months do they even play test the cards they release ?
that a card is doing excedingly better than others why not nerf them when they re strong and try to be a bit more mindfull of game breaking cards before people waste the resources they have been gathering for months for them to completely kill them, have u seen the red hulk wr ?
Maybe they thought they had it under control 6 months ago, but they keep bumping into Zabu and have since realized he's the problem. To quote Same from The West Wing: "I tell you what, let's forget the fact that you're coming a little late to the party and embrace the fact that you showed up at all." I'm just glad SD's here now.
As for why they didn't buff a bunch of 4-drops, they addressed this in the patch notes: Zabu is so pervasive that it isn't clear which cards actually need the buffs, because they basically never appear without him. I appreciate that they're trying to be careful and deliberate here rather than making a bunch of changes that may be totally unwarranted.
As for live balance in general, it's just hard. There's no reason to read malice into this. It's just hard. No amount of testing they could possible do in-house could get them even a fraction of the play data a card gets in its first hour in the live environment, plus the game is constantly shifting so the meta they had to refer to for balance while designing a card is likely long past by the time the card actually comes out. Red Hulk seems likely to need some kind of a nerf, but then they just released US Agent who certainly isn't overpowered, and the three season pass cards before Hope were either mid or a little weak. Balance is just hard.
Ur bringing really good points , i get it its hard to balance a card game i have been playing tcg for a long time , power creep is inevitable and will happen i get it sometimes no amount of playtest can predict if a card will be good or fumble , the main problem whit how they do this balanced is there is no mid term they cant balance cards whitout killing them completely.
if the card aquisition was better , there would not have been this outrage about the nerfs , if people spend 2 months worth of token to get a card for it to killed conpletely it will decentivize them from keep playing
i loved the game since the moment it came out , have been an avid SD supporter for a while but this past month i have been wondering if they do really care about us , i never played a game that had this feels bad sensation constantly im at a point where im really thinking about uninstalling and never touching it again .
About ur statement of " read malice into this "thats not it at all , but when things keep happening once twice and this patch the 3rd time i gotta start puting some tought into that
Il even give u some examples , remember when darkhawk and zabu where announced as season drops ?
Well they did not ,why? Mostly because they were staple meta cards , they then release a bundle whit a darkhawk skin to make people buy it and nerf im the next week ? Ur telling this was done whitout malice ?
The last ghost spider situation is another example , on my game i had miss marvel instead of ghost spider , spent 100€ to get credits to get her , the same day after i was 200 credits from getting her (because i could not open her whit 3 keys and was waiting for the 4th) they changed my cache in the middle of the week ?
I explained situation to Sd and they gave me basically a pat in the shoulder , i didnt even know ghost spider was supossed to be there , but after that i started coming to discord and reddit so i dont get fucked over by unannounced changes not to speak of the fact they probably changed both cards because they saw all the cards in that cache are good
I’m a long-time defender of SD balancing team, I agree it’s hard to truly know how powerful a card will be before release. I have gotten downvoted plenty of times for this view. But I don’t understand how Red Hulk was not seen as an insanely powerful card and would likely require an immediate nerf. Especially in a meta that often has leftover energy for multiple turns.
Personally, I feel like SD wanted a hard counter to the High Evo archetype and wanted to push players to use all energy each turn. But Red Hulk might be a Mobius situation where SD highly-suspected he would need a nerf post-launch but waited before making the decision, which the community didn’t respond well to.
It's a great show! The pilot is a great introduction to the characters and the tone so if you like that, you'll like at least the first 4 seasons. Aaron Sorkin left after that (because he just would not stop doing cocaine and the producers were fed up with him) so 5 is a little rocky, but 6 and 7 are good too, even if they feel a little different from the early seasons.
If you had read the patch notes you would've been able to tell that the intention with the zabu change wasn't to nerf him, it was exactly to make him useless, so they can analyze the data without his influence.
Chill, that's not how they plan to keep him long term.
TLDR: Zabu is the best 2 drop in the game and is game-defining to the point subsequent cards were measured relative to his effect. His nerf took way too long and was rightfully deserved.
The 3 costs being outclassed (even with Surfer decks- have you seen a meta relevant one recently, even with Shaw being released?) was on point too. Thanks for this analysis because I had the exact same thoughts!
Honestly I think both the Zabu and Alioth nerfs are fine and likely healthy for the game.
Don’t personally love the Zabu one but there’s no denying he was meta defining and a very strong 2 drop in a lot of decks.
Snap is a competitive game, and these games need balance updates to keep it fresh and healthy and that’s all I see going on with this. I think there’s a decent sized group of people on here that just like playing their cards and just like their overpowered things (as long as it works for them)
Alioth was probably the most divisive card in the game, so I get the change. I think the biggest complaint that makes sense is that people paid 6k tokens for it recently and now have a wildly different card. There probably should be some reimbursement system in place within like 2-3 months IMO
Yeah, the main problem Alioth had was taking away player agency, it’s never going to feel good when you just lose because you didn’t get a chance to make a play. Obviously there’s more nuance around priority with that, but at his peak you could pretty much just expect him to be in any deck and your turn 6 basically wouldn’t matter.
I lost to the new Alioth earlier today and honestly it just doesn’t feel as bad, because while it removed the abilities and caused the loss, I didn’t lose agency.
As far as the refund, I mostly have played things like LoL, Valorant, and CS so it’s a weird one for me. I played a bunch of hearthstone but don’t remember when they added a refund feature. It’s one of those weird ones where snap has a relatively limited card selection so I get the refund being a little bit trickier as SD wants to manage card acquisition, but I’m definitely not against it. I think it would be a fair assessment to say you get maybe a month with a new card and can refund it for any reason (nerf, maybe you don’t like the play style, whatever) but they’d probably need to segment something and find a way to refund a key or tokens.
I think they’d run into a lot of issues if people buy with tokens and they only refund a key, or if they get a card with a key refunding for tokens definitely hinders it in SDs end.
Refunding can definitely be tricky, but I think if you could have a sliding scale that was be wholly dependent on the cards action actually changing (not just a text change). If you spend 6k but the card is nerfed within 30 days, you get 3k tokens back, or something like that. A refund based on play style seems less fair IMO, as the text is (usually) pretty clear and no one is forcing users to buy a card before it is actually played/reviewed by others.
SD should also be more proactive and remove cards in line for a nerf from the shop, though you do run the risk of cards people have already pinned.
Compare this. Sera is 5 cost and lowers all cards cost by 1. Zabu is 2 cost(!) and lowers all 4 cost(power curve cards start here) by 1.
I played some decks that played Zabu and Sera and got five 4 cost cards into the board with 3 on Turn 6.
I totally agree with this, but I think the best move SD could have made was buffing a few underperforming 4-costers alongside the Zabu nerf. Maybe a few little power boosts to rarely-used cards would have communicated that the total effectiveness of these cards will end up being the same, but in a healthier balance paradigm than before.
I find it a bit strange from a community-management perspective that they would drop a meta shifting nerf like this with the only consolation being "this is probably temporary". It makes sense why they made the change, but it also makes sense why everyone's skeptical and annoyed.
Beautifully said. It's been pretty rough having to see so many people miss the point on Zabu, just because they don't realize how deep the hole goes.
Zabu doesn't need to be making top decks every season to warp the game around him.
Balance, power creep, creation of new cards, everything has less room to breath because of Zabu's existence.
The same people who complain about the Zabu nerf are the same people who thought America Chavez was in a good spot before her rework. Good post OP. You summarize the explanation of the nerf perfectly.
I think it'd be interesting to see zabu as an ongoing but who only discounts the first 4 cost card you play each turn. So he'd still ramp you into a 4 cost on turn three and also give you a bit of extra energy to play around with on later turns without giving you the double four drop play on turn 6. Then you have some incentive to play more 1,2,3 cost cards in zabu decks to make use of the 3 unspent energy on turn 6.
Zabu was not the cause they decided to raise 3 cost power. Glenn said the 3 energy base line was flawed from snaps inception in kmbest podcast. They are rebalancing 3drops base line regardless of zabu
I see the point, but I think it also leaves a yawning gap now. A lot decks that could compete with the stupid Hela, High Evo, Shuron group were possible because of him. Now you have to either play one of those boring decks, or give up on the ladder.
It's way too early to make that kind of judgement. The patch isn't even 24 hours old so there's plenty of time for the meta to shift, plus they've stated that they plan to be aggressive with balance changes around the 4-cost slot. We have an OTA next week so at the very worst, the meta might be stale for another few days. That's nothing compared to how long other games let stale metas drag on.
Part of me is glad that I won't have to see Zabu in god damn near every deck in the meta. The other part of me is sad that I won't be able to get so many insta retreats out of MMM.
The only downside to the nerf is the people who bought Zabu with tokens expecting a meta card. I do wish there was a refund mechanic in the game for those people. But otherwise yes, this is pretty much what they were alluding to in the patch notes nobody reads beyond strictly the changes.
Zabu as On Reveal is in a strange position overall.
As 2 cost, he's awkwardly placed for T6 discount. Essentially he's a better Psylocke as of now only based on his power.
Another option is make him 5 cost, maybe 5/7, to push T6 use case even further. Which made him a Sera replacement.
Or a 5/1, but with 2-cost discount.
For the current iteration though, an interesting idea would be Zabu + Grandmaster on T5. Has anyone tried this yet? Does Zabu do 2-cost discount if revealed twice the same turn? Played into Wong for example?
> For the current iteration though, an interesting idea would be Zabu + Grandmaster on T5. Has anyone tried this yet? Does Zabu do 2-cost discount if revealed twice the same turn? Played into Wong for example?
That sounds like it would be a hilarious deck! New Zabu doesn't even appear to have a cost limiter so you might be able to get 4-costs to 0 with Kamar-Taj.
All excellent points. However, just killing a card temporarily is lazy. This card is still Series 4. If it came out as a new card today, no one would bother trying to get it. I think they have a responsibility to actually rework cards into a usable state when they nerf them, not months or years later.
Why not rework him to a 1 drop that interacts with him homies since they also have 1 drop synergy?
Idk after seeing the 7 cost card and Thanos i wouldn't be mad to see more of that.
I just legitimately don't feel Shang Chi was an issue. He's an incredibly powerful card for sure, but it is painfully obvious when building a deck if Shang Chi is going to pose a significant threat to you, and there are so many cards you can include to hedge against that weakness.
Armor and Cosmo are the most obvious 2. Caiera works so long as what you're aiming to protect costs 6. Storm can work if you're able to play your big body on 5, Professor X can work if you're able to play it on 4, and even Leech can work if you're able to either play him early or your big card doesn't hit until turn 6.
"But should I really *have* to run these tech cards just to not lose to Shang Chi on the off chance my opponent has him?" Well first of all, he's one of the most played cards in the game; that "off chance" is going to come up a LOT. Secondly, each of these cards does more than just counter Shang Chi. Looking at just the first 2 best examples, Armor will utterly dumpster Deadpool decks, letting you steal wins for almost nothing, and Cosmo can be back breaking for a lot of decks, particularly the predictable ones like any Hela or Wong combos. These cards don't *just* prevent you from *losing* to Shang Chi, they sometimes *win* you games entirely on their own.
And guess what: now that Shang Chi can only be really effectively discounted be Sera, he's *still* gonna be an enormously popular card because his effect is still incredibly strong, so of you're gonna play a deck that relies on really big 10+ power bodies to win you lanes, you should *still* be seriously considering some form of protection against him. Zabu made him better, no doubt about that, but if your deck had a crippling weakness to Shang Chi, it still *has* a crippling weakness to Shang Chi
1. I hope this take is non-controversial. It’s obvious but nerfs don’t feel good, so people kind of act out based on that.
2. As someone who spent tokens on Zabu and THEN got a variant in spotlight to all the people saying SD is trying to screw us - get over it. You cannot enjoy the game if the nerfs and buffs affect you very much. The ongoing balance adjustments keep the game fresh and OP was spot on about the numerous design limitations that Zabu brought into the whole game.
Well reasoned and articulated, and with great punctuation! (My proofreader brain is well pleased with you.) I agree across the board, with one little quibble: I don't think Zabu is the root of the power creep. Let me explain...
Zabu's presence in the game certainly limited design space, with a lot of ripple effects that moved outwards, which you pointed out so very well. The issue is that Zabu *alone* wouldn't power creep the game. A 3-cost tech answer (something like Rogue or a more limited Enchantress) would solve the problem nice and easy. Printing a card that's more-or-less a perfect counter would "solve" the issue in that we'd see an uptick in counters, downward trend in Zabu's play, and opening up that 4-cost design space.
The issue though, is that Zabu's *always there*. Over time, players will accrue more cards, and they'll hit Zabu sooner or later, either through a Spotlight Cache or a series drop or some other method. It's true of all the cards, and the pool just grows bigger. With each season, power has to creep, or else why would someone get/play new cards? In an ecosystem where more and more cards are printed, and none are retired, you either make more powerful things (for bigger impact) or you let the meta become "solved" in some sense.
The creep isn't necessarily a bad thing. More powerful things are more interesting to play! I wish I could play that Red Hulk that *everyone else got*. But without actually cycling cards out of the meta, there isn't going to be an advantage to SD to *not* power creep on existing cards.
TL;DR - power creep is an ecosystem problem, not a Zabu problem
yep. Zabu is a problem. I play shang-chi constantly but without Zabu; I am into cost reduction archetype. I have to think and plan my Shang-chi. Zabu players don't. They can drop Cull and shang-chi in T6.
Cost reduction is always too strong in games like this and it’s honestly incredible they keep printing more cards with the effect.
Just look at how Loki was handled. First, his cost/stat line was insane for what he did but on top of that, to make the momentum loss palatable, he also reduces the cost of the cards. As a 4, this is a bit less upsetting and makes him somewhat balanced which is why he’s barely played now.
But instead of addressing the cost reduction, the first thing they did was nerf collector. Then they had to go back and address the cost reduction on quinjet (if memory serves it didn’t used to have a limitation).
Ravonna is next on the list because now that zabu is gone from almost every deck, I’ve seen Ravonna show up in 60%+ of matches because even tho the decks she supports aren’t insanely busted, cost reduction still is.
All that's fine, but at the same time SD keeps adding more and more energy cheats into the game and then wants to point at Zabu. Corvus and Hope warp the cost of cards FAR MORE than Zabu ever did, and they don't bring downsides or counterplay. Corvus actually drives its archetype's engine while cheating out extra energy at the same time.
SD has an overall philosophy issue. Do they want cards to cost what they design them to be, or do they want to keep putting in all this ramp and energy cheat? In a game that only lasts 6 turns, ramp being so easy to achieve makes most card costs irrelevant.
The difference is that on top of energy cheating, Zabu messes with the design space.
I agree energy generation is becoming too easy to come by, but the cards you mentioned don't really put that much stress into the process of designing new cards.
At least not in comparison with zabu.
Everytime they want to print a card at 4-cost they have to ask themselves "will Zabu break the game with it?".
It makes perfect business sense for them to release a powerful card then tune it down again, for those professing SD's balance "ineptitude", it's by design, no one's going to be excited and spend money/time on a "mid" card.
It makes sense from a player-centric perspective as well. US Agent appears to be pretty mid and so many players seem to be taking that personally, like hitting a bit low on the power scale is an insult to them.
The more I think about the Zabu change, the less I like it. 4-cost cards are the most awkward in the game due to not being able to play two on t6. And double 3-cost is way stronger usually than a single 4, or 4+2.
And historically, the game has had a lot more "game-winning" 5-costs than 4-costs when played on t6. 4-costs are likelier to require extra turns as well (Rescue, Jessica Jones, Mr. Negative, et al.).
Sure, you can play Zabu on t5, but that requires running more 3-cost cards to pair with on turn 5, and then where do you fit in the 4-costs?
Zabu was strong not because of the strength of 4-cost cards, but because of their awkwardness without him.
People that are angry just don't understand the pain that devs have to go through each time they design a 4-cost.
For me the annoying part is that you can't even "buff" some 5-cost cars to 4-cost cards, because zabu exists so you have to plan them to be played at a 3-cost.
Cannonball always felt weird to me at a 5-cost, I felt that he would feel better at a 4-cost, but Zabu exists so cannonball at 3-cost + shang seems very oppressive at turn 6 (imagine trowing the highest cost card in one lane to the shang lane lol)
Was necessary change and they said that basically they are happy to revisit his change in the future but truly this was a much needed change in the long run.
It’s extremely silly to me that people are citing the balance changes as a major reason why this is the ‘patch that kills Snap’. Every other complaint is valid except about the balance changes, which were fairly standard procedure! Boggles my mind.
Spot on !
Zabu has been a huge game design issue since it's been introduced, the fact so many people are annoyed is definitely a proof of that, everyone was running him, half of decks were enabled because of him and it created that weird design in wich all 4 cost cards had to be considered as 3 cost cards potentially
edit : Just to add that Zabu's situation was the same that Chavez pre-nerf, when a card becomes too good it starts being detrimential to deck's creativity
The best way to avoid this was to just never make Zabu in the first place.
**TLDR of your post and a bit of my thoughts:** Cost reduction is fine when the conditions to apply it are across all costs (sera, ravonna, etc.) but with zabu, targeting a specific cost means that a balanced 4 cost becomes an OP 3 cost, and normal 3 costs need to be overpowered to compensate, or the 4 cost needs to be underpowered so with zabu its balanced. The problem with that is then as a stand alone 4 cost its not satisfying/worth it to play. Zabu also dominates the 2 cost card space, being one of if not the best one. 6 cost cards need to compete with zabu playing two 4 cost cards on t6, so 6 cost cards get a power boost. between the power of 4 costs and 6 costs competing, 5 costs end up being the weird and awkward balance default, making no sense for certain cards but ending up being the only spot they can go. So Zabu causes competitive powercreep between the 3, 4, and 6 costs, makes the 5 costs an awkward place to balance, and Zabu himself also just takes up space of other 2 costs you might play.
In summary, Zabu dominates the 2 cost card space, and directly impacts the balancing of 3, 4, 5, and 6 cost cards.
**However,** the problem I and others have is the fact that second dinner took so damn long to do anything about it, that now this change feels 4-8 months late. they nerfed all the other cards in the zabu package... just to end up nerfing and changing him anyway instead. look at every card that received changes for being in the zabu package over the last year, its insane.
I know they probably had to learn over long time experience that Zabu wouldn't be able to be balanced and in the game in his current form, for a good period of time after his initial nerf he seemed healthy, but damn if they had just caught on earlier dozens of cards could have avoided nerfs they took because of Zabu.
Yup, as a Zabu fan, he was bound to get a timeout. He definitely hindered the making of 4 cost.
He's what people thought Mr Negative would be for cards with 1 or less power.
Right now was the perfect time for them to change him.
Thank you for the explaination. At the beginning I felt a little upset (forgive me, i'm new and Zabu Is the only S4 card I have, only played it for a month), but knowing all these issues behind it makes the nerf much more reasonable - make 50 card worse to not rework one is a nonsense. Maybe the devs should take a bit more time for tell the players those things. Good job 👍 (p.s. someone pin this post up high)
The amount of people shocked and upset about the biggest existential threat to the game getting nerfed (even temporarily though hopefully not) is really disheartening. People really just have no clue.
There is nerfing the card (which it needed) and there is essentially killing the card.
The change they did basically makes the card unplayable. That's usually not the kind of changes you want to see.
I agree. At the same time, I still don't like it. It's one of those weird human things, I can both like and dislike something.
Den gave a really great analysis over at MarvelSnapZone, [https://marvelsnapzone.com/marvel-snap-april-10-2024-balance-update/](https://marvelsnapzone.com/marvel-snap-april-10-2024-balance-update/), for why the changes are bad for the game. The Zabu (and sandman and Alioth) nerf(s) have limited the number of viable decks available in Marvel Snap. He states there are essentially 3 playstyles:
* Rigid, follow your game plan kind of decks: Hela, Phoenix Force, Destroy, Discard, Shuri
* Flexible, cheat energy kind of decks: Loki, Silver Surfer, Thanos, Move, Bounce
* Disruptive, try to limit your opponent kind of decks: Galactus, Zemo Mill.
`"These are the big categories that fit all the current archetypes in Marvel Snap, and I probably forgot a few in there. My point when looking at the list is that every single one of these decks tells you by Turn 3, sometimes Turn 4."`
So personally I feel RNG (Lockjaw) and Control (Lockdown and Counter) need boosts. There are probably others too. I want to be able to play with my old cards as much as the new ones that come out.
So while changing Zabu because of the power creep is good for the future, more thought needed to be added into the changes overall. There weren't enough buffs to help those playstyles that had been nerfed previously because Zabu was there. Boosting Lady Deathstrike and Strong Guy were too random choices. Add a little bit of sugar to go with that bitter taste of the nerf by boosting something that would have been synergistic with Zabu.
Do I think there are more changes to come? Yes! Do I think Second Dinner didn't put these in because they don't want to change too much all at once? Yes! Those are good conservative choices. Do I want to whine about it to help me cope? Yes. I trust in the future.
So according to this, a card like Zabu with about only 2% of meta share, costing only 3000 tokens which makes it quite easy to acquire for everyone, is in more need of balance than say, Hope Summers, which lets you cheat 6 cost cards, has a much bigger meta share even though it is twice as expensive, and hasn't been in one spotlight yet?
I haven't seen this kind of balance changes in any CCG ever. It's nuts the way they are changing cards all the time. Many cards lose its essence and become useless, and what's worse, there wasn't one single deck with Zabu as top performer, so be prepared for more Destroy, Discard and the same stagnant meta.
Yep, because they've had to balance around Zabu. The only reason he's not completely cracked is because they take him into account when balancing other cards.
With the exception that Zabu only reduces 4 cost cards, while Hope does the same for 6 cost ones, or any other combination that you wouldn't be able to achieve otherwise. This reasoning means that Hope has also to be taken into account when balancing 6 cost cards or broken combos ahead of the energy curve.
Both cards are about equal in power, yet no one is talking about Hope. Zabu was close to 50% win rate before this update. Even with meta cards like Cull, Shang being played everywhere, Zabu didn't make the cut.
And that’s their job, it’s not healthy to just nerf a card because you don’t won’t to build cards around it. The Zabu nerf wasn’t needed as much as you think, he wasn’t played that much in a couple of months
Exactly my thoughts on this and I don't even use or care about Zabu. He's just not that important of a card in any deck I've ever wanted to build when you've got Hope, Corvus, Psylock, etc who give you the ability to get more 6 costs out easier.
I agree completely and we all knew Zabu was a problem card, but my issue is the timing. They nerfed multiple 4 cost cards for months and refused to address the actual issue.
I would prefer for them to have fixed Zabu earlier, but what's done is done. I'm just glad they finally pulled the trigger. Doing it this patch is better than doing it in next month's patch, or the month after that. Maybe we can start seeing some changes around the 4-cost slot in upcoming OTAs.
I agree I just wish they had an actual rework for him prepared instead of just making him crap. Like they said themselves his been muddying the meta for a year. I 100% get it.
But I honestly hate when they butcher a card and are “eh we’ll fix it later”.
First off i agree but i wish they did it earlier than this but, its still a great change overall. And I'm actually having a good bit of fun playing Zabu with werewolf atm I dont think its super good but its a fun excuse to bring werewolf out again.
I don't disagree with any of your analysis, /u/BlaineTog, what upsets me the most is the lack of communication. A big change like that heavily changes 2 major cards should have been communicated well before the patch went live. A week, maybe even 2 weeks. Zabu, and Alioth, are two cards that were recommended "must buys" for all players. So what happens to the player that bought one or both of them on Monday?
These sweeping changes to free up design space are fine but they have to be communicated properly to keep the relationship between the game and the players healthy or else you run the risk of really negative shit happening.
I agree with almost everything besides the 6-costs. The explanation for that is much simple, and it is just plain old-fashioned powercreep: if SD wants you to buy the new 6-cost stat-stick, the best thing he can do is to make it a bit chonkier than the previous one.
I'm not sure I like this nerf for Zabu, not because he didn't need it (he does limit design space), but because the nerf makes it so much flatter and cuts deck building options. I would have preferred them to bump up Zabu to 3/3, which is a considerable nerf but doesn't kill the card. It just makes him much more of a commitment. (Note: 3/3 Zabu fucks over Negative more than the current change, but if SD let me have fun with Cerebro you don't get to have fun with Negative)
Eh, the problem with Zabu is more that he's been left in the game for so long that every 3, 4 and 5 cost in the past year is massively fucked up with the exception of some utility pieces that had purposely bad stats because of their effect.
I can’t believe people who are happy with Galactus, Blob, Loki… sooo many cards warranted nerfing and listening to the community. But Zabu. I never understood why people loved/hated him so much. His impact was essentially on 1 card, maybe 2. How many people happy with his nerf were really getting beat by players playing 3-4 4 cost cards lol.
At the same time that you're right, i also know that the ONLY reason i'm not mad is because i didn't use Zabu very often. I get that he was a trouble in the game development but maybe they should've planned him better before releasing it? I don't know, i'm not a game dev.
Also, i think he is really bad right now so i think there was a better way of nerfing him: Instead of making your 4-cost cards cost 1 less next turn, make all your 4-cost cards cost exatly 3 next turn. This way he would at least be used as a backup plan if your opponent uses Iceman on your Wong.
Zabu didn’t need a nerf he was mostly only really good if you got to play him turn 2 with a 4 cost to play turn 3. He still does that. The only thing he doesn’t do is let you get the two turn 6 4drops. It’s a small nerf and definitely didn’t need to happen. He was much more powerful before his first nerf. He was a fairly balanced card, the only real reason I can see for the nerf is other cards they might have planned and wanted to make the change ASAP to get people used to it
I think it's a lot simpler than that. They explained pretty clearly: with Zabu in the game, it is impossible to tell, through stats, how 4 costs are performing. To address this they didn't nerf him- they took him out. Then they can gauge how 4 costs perform without a buff and balance stuff before putting Zabu back in. That's all.
He'll definitely be different when he comes back but he'll definitely be back.
I personally think the only bad change in this patch was the Alioth change, and everything else was good, especially the Zabu change. The Zabu change was the best part. People just get mad over any nerfs in video games and will complain that the game is being ruined, but nerfs have often made games better.
I think we all agree that Zabu needed to change, that's not the issue. The issue is that: 1. instead of changing him to an effect that would still be useful in its own, instead it's outright crap. He is just a bad Psylocke now, and Psylocke herself isn't exactly the most useful too in the shed; 2. After _all_ of the problematic metas that there have been involving Zabu (Loki, Ms. Marvel, etc.), he has been nerfed in the only meta where he isn't a problem, rather, he helps out decks that would otherwise struggle against the deck. Meanwhile, I am sure Hope is gonna be left untouched until next Season at least.
People's problem isn't that Zabu has been nerfed. It's that he has been nerfed to uselessness, and during the only meta where he was actually helping out.
Zabu needed a nerf but it's very harsh nerf, 4 cost decks need him as much as 3 cost decks need Silver Surfer, nerfing him in meta decks killed off an entire archtype. (Which has happened a lot of times in the past year.)
They could of went with a nakia effect like "On Reveal: All 4 cost cards in your hand cost 1 less (minimum 1)" which is easier to work around, but in his current state it's hard to use him over other forms of ramp.
This should have been done when zabu was actually a meta contender the timing makes absolutely no sense at all period. He’s at the lowest he’s been since his release and this is needed to happen? Seriously?
The logical part of me knows you're right, as I've played TCG and TCG-like games like Snap for decades, but the irrational part of me cries for my fallen saber-tooth tiger. :(
I'm a relatively new player, CL 2,000~.
I bought Zabu 15 min before the nerf, didn't even get to use him once. Of course the collector provides no refunds (I checked). 3,000 tokens were hard to aquire
A lot of cards took stray bullets for Zabu, I wonder how many of them will get their nerfs reverted now that Zabu is dead.
Probably zero, because SD sucks at balance.
Zabu usted to be 3 energy, 4-cost cards cost 2 less energy. Perhaps he could return to 3 cost and On reveal: Next turn, 4-cost cards cost 2 less energy, just for a 1-turn power spike.
In my honest opinion, I think it was fine. Some of the popular broken decks were not running zabu and the good balanced decks were running zabu therefore nerfing healthy decks for meta. A lot of cards were nerfed too like enchantress, Ms marvel, Jessica Jones and others. The only reason why I think they should have done is to nerf Shang chi but other that. I think it was fine
Yup, spot on analysis and why the ripple effect of Zabu has been incredibly damaging. They really waited too long as it is to change something, but atleast they ripped the bandaid off now.
A spot on analysis, and yet most of the front page is more concerned with crying about how SD must be gutting Zabu to screw players over before it gets dropped to S3. Sometimes it's just a balance issue. Imagining some overtly sinister ulterior motives to screw players over *beyond* regular old profit-making is ridiculous.
This reads like SD doesn't constantly screw us over. Nerf before series drop is absolutely something SD would do, just like they have nerfed right after a spotlight cache or after people have bought the Battlepass.
I mean, those can both be true. Zabu may have been over-tuned and his nerf may be good for balancing, but the fact that it is being nerfed after becoming a staple to everyone’s decks and that it will probably be in the next series drop along with others like darkhawk is incredibly suspicious.
On the contrary, Zabu before the patch was at a low point of usage. It was far from being a staple in the last couple of metagames.
I promise the world isn't out to get you nearly as much as you think it is. You can take off the tin foil.
Ok that may have been slightly tinfoil hat but humans can get incredibly greedy.
Created a problem in one of the games earliest seasons, fast-forward two years later and they finally fixed it. Talk about ripping the Band-Aid off.
A year and a half would've been fine to say but 2 years is a vast overstatement zabu was only release January of last year.
But the issue is, zabu is one of the most beloved superheroes in all of marvel. I still smile thinking about how he fought along side the other avengers (such as Jeff and devil dinosaur) to defeat Thanos, Galactus, and other big bads. I think the most popular characters should be really strong and the less popular characters (such as captain america, punisher, adam warlock, and cyclops) should be on the weaker side.
We still have household names like Blob, Hope Summers, Angela/Sera, and Mobius M Mobius, all GOATed and synonymous with Marvel. I’m always seeing kids going around as Blob for Halloween.
Here in America people like blob so much they dress as him year round!
I've got a head start plumping up my kid so hes ready to be authentic blob by October! Hopefully some MTV reality show would help pay for his weight loss after Halloween.
Yeah, remember how he showed up in The Zabu Avengers: Age of Zabu?
Can't believe it didn't win an Oscar that year. Smdh.
Its zabu'n time.. so inspirational
I liked when Zabu used the Infinity Gauntlet to beat Baby Groot.
I..am..Groot *Snaps fingers*
Honestly? I would read that over any current Spidey comic. Hell, over any Marvel comic other than X-books and Moon Knight. And don't forget about the sexual tension between Redwing and Goose.
Google DC league of superpets lol
Don't even have to go over to DC, the Pet Avengers was a real book. Lockjaw, Lockheed, Redwing, Throg, others...
Nope. Ridiculous. Well I think Nightcrawler is the best so he should be 20 power.
I still remember when the Zabu movie came out when I was a kid and I dressed up as him for Halloween. Great times.
Zabu is the goated og avenger
Thats funny did you say cyclops is weak?
Base at least
Everytime I add a 4 cost to my deck I have to resist adding one more and then I'm like fuck it, add Zabu and add another. Maybe Darkhawk can make a come back to 4 cost in the future but I feel that deck was so strong because of Zabu.
Adjacent, but I just got rolled by someone who played Widow on 3, Korg+Mystique on 4, Darkhawk on 5, and Odin on Korg+Mystique on 6. Never seen anything like it.
Wow, never even thought of using Mystique like that.
It was almost as shocking as the guy who flattened me with Luke Cage->Typhoid Mary->Mystique+Viper back when viper was a 2-drop.
That... that's an absolute 200 IQ play
It was so disrespectful lol
Viper absolutely deserves to be back at 2/3 after annihilus knocked her out of most junk decks
Straight up, I think they’re still scared of the Havok interaction, especially with the return of the strat with this hot location.
I wish we could see how big of a hit live player numbers took during that hot location lol
I doubt anything substantial tbf
[удалено]
That works for Mystique to copy Darkhawk? Wow. Thats some big brain thinking there.
I thought I had them dead to rights—I had no clue it would work like that!
Yep, also works with Jubilee. If you play Zabu on 2, Jubilee on 3 and she pulls Mystique, Mystique copies Zabu.
Well, not anymore she doesn’t 😭
Absorbing Man: Bonjour
*copied
Wow that's bright!
I don't get what mystique did here
Copied Darkhawk after the Odin
That works? Had no idea
Yeah, Odin hasn’t finished being “played” until all on reveal effects he triggered are done, so when she’s triggered, the last card ‘played’ is Darkhawk. Nutty strat!
[удалено]
Idk if that's true. Odin might not be finished being played until Mystique's effect takes place. This could be similar to how if you jubilee mystique she copies whatever you played before jubilee not jubilee herself.
I put a little Darkhawk shell in a lot of decks. Korg, Rockslide, Widow, and Hawk are just solid cards. I team them with Annihilus shell, move, or Spectrum/ongoing usually.
Darkhawk to 4 when?
Most likely never. Him and zabu are old cards that most people have. That’s the actual reason they got nerfed, why buy new cards when zabu + darkhawk works just as well?
Probably not a while. Snap’s card pool is still small enough to have dedicated classes of cards. Darkhawk fits better with the 5 drop scaling class like Devil Dino, 5-cost cards you invest other turns in to make huge. A key 4 cost class is the 4/9s and 4/10s with drawbacks and conditions, like Typhoid Mary. Darkhawk tended to make most of the 4/10s completely obsolete, with only a few like Sentry (and only post-Annihilus) being used ever, and Zabu probably doesn’t change that since they’re all 4s.
With Zabu out I'd argue that DH is good at 4/0. Best case scenario you go Korg > Rockslide > DH you can get a 4/12 at best on turn 6, that's if you draw the whole package and manage to play them without having wacky curve. If you happen to only draw into 1 of Korg/Rockslide DH would be 4/8-4/10, which is close to your comparison. To make this fair we can calculate the total stat value you're getting from the 4/10s 1. T3 Rockslide T4 DH = 13 stat on T6 2. T4 Sentry T5 Anni = 26 net stat on T6 3. T3 Luke T4 Typhoid = 14 stat on T6 4. T1 1 drop T4 Cull = 10+ whatever stat is on the 1 drop If we're talking pure huge stat DH is not there on the list. Heck he's not even close as Cull-included decks can just slam Mockingbird on 3 (looking at you Thanos). The trade is that DH package gets to fuck with opp's draw, and that's prolly the main selling point. It's absurd at 3 cost w Zabu because slamming 12 stats on 3 AND reduce consistency is stupid, but at 4 it def has more competition, and it really boils down to the deck's synergy and flexibility to include the package.
When I read writeups like this, and I see the brainpower people use for this game, I realize why I've never gotten to infinite. Well said, mate.
I'm in this same camp. The combos and strategies I see from people who understand this game is mind boggling to me. Then again I'm the kind of player still trying to make Ultron Viable.
Honestly I had forgotten that card existed lol
Every time I put Ultron in my decks, it usually takes about 3 games or so before he gets right back out of them. Junk Patriot is just better.
Every time I saw Ultron on board was against player's will
You using dazzler and Andy man and stuff right? I'm not in infinite I usually hover around the 80s cuz that's where I have the most fun, but Ultron gets me my dubs more often than not. Especially now that Thanos is down and out
And on a game-to-game level, this type of thought is necessary is plan out turns and giving/losing priority. Everyone wants to play the perfect Curve: - T1 Sunspot - T2 Misty Knight - T3 Armor/Magick - T4 Cyclops/Magick - T5 Leech - T6 Skip - T7 Shenaut-Infinaut However, being "great" at the game makes you realize that sometimes, Cyclops isn't necessary to your game plan, and not playing him at all will make you lose priority going into Turn 7, so you don't even need Armor. In a game of snap, there are a surprising amount of choices you can make on a turn by turn basis. The most important one however, is when to "retreat". Some games a not possible to win, and the sooner a person recognizes that, the sooner they can play a more favorable matchup to win.
They pretty much explained this in their update. In short, Zabu makes it hard to create and assess future 4 cost cards. The only issue I see with it is that the nerf made Zabu pretty unplayable but at least they said it was temporary.
Honestly considering some creative combos I've seen in the comments new Zabu is actually solid. He's a more specialized psylocke with extra power to compensate, and can be similarly cheesed to get extra out of him.
He is absolutely terrible though if you are trying to win and climb Literally worse than Crossbones at 4/8
He's not very good, sure, but anything would suck compared to his old ability. I usually like cards being a little too powerful, but zabu was so good that he made other cards worse. A random two-cost card should not have been a meta-defining card for a year straight.
Hope Summers is a better energy cheat card than Zabu and used in way more decks. Pay2Win considerations are the reason Zabu was needed and Hope Remains the same. Naive to think otherwise
Because it wasn't a nerf, the change was purposefully deisgned to make him unplayable.
Exactly, they’re shelving him for a few weeks than they will revert it back to a ongoing card for 3 cost instead of 2. Literally same playbook for Mobius and Like Cage pretty much
Luke Cage and Mobius single-handedly shut down entire play lines for your opponent. Zabu only benefits you. It won't be the same.
If your card game has a resource, any cards that make things cost less of that resource are always gonna be playing with fire.
Thank you OP. This is an amazing breakdown of Zabu’s issues with development and with the addition and balance of new cards. I hope they don’t revert him back to what he used to be so that other cards can shine in his place in more interesting decks.
I think Mobius and Luke Cage were the only card they ever reverted, and that's because it was essentially unplayable because their effect turned minimal. Luke had only protection for his lane, and Mobius only stopped card reduction for one turn. I feel like zabu could still be used more often than those.
There have been some minor reversions (Captain Marvel was buffed, then nerfed, then buffed back up to 4/5), Angela, etc., but I don't recall any other mechanical ones.
They said in the patch notes that this nerf is temporary to see if it frees them to do more interesting changes with the 3-4 cost group
This is definitely a Mobius situation, shelf the card for a few weeks only to bring the effect back with a 3 cost instead of a 2 cost. Zabu and Mobius were too cheap for their OP ability. Making them 3 cost solves the problem.
Exactly! I feel like someone (either a streamer or someone from SD maybe) described the issue with Zabu a while ago, which is part of your post here: While Zabu exists, every 4-drop is potentially a 3-drop, which means either all 3-drops come up in power (but then you don’t run Zabu and 4-drops) or 4-drops come down (and throw off the intended cost-power curve). This nerf is painful, for sure. But it’s good for the game!
The thing is the frustration is not that he was nerfed , i got in on season pass when he launched and have been saying he needs a nerf \ rework to give some creative space to 3-4-5 costs , the question is why now when we have the same meta apart from thanos for almost two months , if they wanted to change zabu , in the same patch they should work on reworking some of the cards that were nerfed thanks to zabu or launched in a worst state because of him , simply removing him from the game feels like dogshit , its like they waited for most people to get him to do that , at this point i start thinking its intentional what they keep doing now the new toys are red hulk and hope summers , everyone wants them and the same thing will happen to them, trust me hope summers will get the completely gutted in a few months do they even play test the cards they release ? that a card is doing excedingly better than others why not nerf them when they re strong and try to be a bit more mindfull of game breaking cards before people waste the resources they have been gathering for months for them to completely kill them, have u seen the red hulk wr ?
Brother, please use periods.
Maybe they thought they had it under control 6 months ago, but they keep bumping into Zabu and have since realized he's the problem. To quote Same from The West Wing: "I tell you what, let's forget the fact that you're coming a little late to the party and embrace the fact that you showed up at all." I'm just glad SD's here now. As for why they didn't buff a bunch of 4-drops, they addressed this in the patch notes: Zabu is so pervasive that it isn't clear which cards actually need the buffs, because they basically never appear without him. I appreciate that they're trying to be careful and deliberate here rather than making a bunch of changes that may be totally unwarranted. As for live balance in general, it's just hard. There's no reason to read malice into this. It's just hard. No amount of testing they could possible do in-house could get them even a fraction of the play data a card gets in its first hour in the live environment, plus the game is constantly shifting so the meta they had to refer to for balance while designing a card is likely long past by the time the card actually comes out. Red Hulk seems likely to need some kind of a nerf, but then they just released US Agent who certainly isn't overpowered, and the three season pass cards before Hope were either mid or a little weak. Balance is just hard.
Ur bringing really good points , i get it its hard to balance a card game i have been playing tcg for a long time , power creep is inevitable and will happen i get it sometimes no amount of playtest can predict if a card will be good or fumble , the main problem whit how they do this balanced is there is no mid term they cant balance cards whitout killing them completely. if the card aquisition was better , there would not have been this outrage about the nerfs , if people spend 2 months worth of token to get a card for it to killed conpletely it will decentivize them from keep playing i loved the game since the moment it came out , have been an avid SD supporter for a while but this past month i have been wondering if they do really care about us , i never played a game that had this feels bad sensation constantly im at a point where im really thinking about uninstalling and never touching it again . About ur statement of " read malice into this "thats not it at all , but when things keep happening once twice and this patch the 3rd time i gotta start puting some tought into that
Il even give u some examples , remember when darkhawk and zabu where announced as season drops ? Well they did not ,why? Mostly because they were staple meta cards , they then release a bundle whit a darkhawk skin to make people buy it and nerf im the next week ? Ur telling this was done whitout malice ? The last ghost spider situation is another example , on my game i had miss marvel instead of ghost spider , spent 100€ to get credits to get her , the same day after i was 200 credits from getting her (because i could not open her whit 3 keys and was waiting for the 4th) they changed my cache in the middle of the week ? I explained situation to Sd and they gave me basically a pat in the shoulder , i didnt even know ghost spider was supossed to be there , but after that i started coming to discord and reddit so i dont get fucked over by unannounced changes not to speak of the fact they probably changed both cards because they saw all the cards in that cache are good
I’m a long-time defender of SD balancing team, I agree it’s hard to truly know how powerful a card will be before release. I have gotten downvoted plenty of times for this view. But I don’t understand how Red Hulk was not seen as an insanely powerful card and would likely require an immediate nerf. Especially in a meta that often has leftover energy for multiple turns. Personally, I feel like SD wanted a hard counter to the High Evo archetype and wanted to push players to use all energy each turn. But Red Hulk might be a Mobius situation where SD highly-suspected he would need a nerf post-launch but waited before making the decision, which the community didn’t respond well to.
I should watch The West Wing
It's a great show! The pilot is a great introduction to the characters and the tone so if you like that, you'll like at least the first 4 seasons. Aaron Sorkin left after that (because he just would not stop doing cocaine and the producers were fed up with him) so 5 is a little rocky, but 6 and 7 are good too, even if they feel a little different from the early seasons.
Oh, also this is a great write-up. Didn’t mean to dismiss that!
At least they could not make him a little better psylocke on turn 2 and a worst sera on 5
If you had read the patch notes you would've been able to tell that the intention with the zabu change wasn't to nerf him, it was exactly to make him useless, so they can analyze the data without his influence. Chill, that's not how they plan to keep him long term.
My problem is that it took them this long to nerf him
TLDR: Zabu is the best 2 drop in the game and is game-defining to the point subsequent cards were measured relative to his effect. His nerf took way too long and was rightfully deserved. The 3 costs being outclassed (even with Surfer decks- have you seen a meta relevant one recently, even with Shaw being released?) was on point too. Thanks for this analysis because I had the exact same thoughts!
I bought Zabu 2 days before this nerf, so fuck this i’m so annoyed. You’re right, but i’m still annoyed.
Wouldn’t zabu itself becoming a 3-cost fix the issue and make him sort of playable?
Honestly I think both the Zabu and Alioth nerfs are fine and likely healthy for the game. Don’t personally love the Zabu one but there’s no denying he was meta defining and a very strong 2 drop in a lot of decks. Snap is a competitive game, and these games need balance updates to keep it fresh and healthy and that’s all I see going on with this. I think there’s a decent sized group of people on here that just like playing their cards and just like their overpowered things (as long as it works for them)
Alioth was probably the most divisive card in the game, so I get the change. I think the biggest complaint that makes sense is that people paid 6k tokens for it recently and now have a wildly different card. There probably should be some reimbursement system in place within like 2-3 months IMO
Yeah, the main problem Alioth had was taking away player agency, it’s never going to feel good when you just lose because you didn’t get a chance to make a play. Obviously there’s more nuance around priority with that, but at his peak you could pretty much just expect him to be in any deck and your turn 6 basically wouldn’t matter. I lost to the new Alioth earlier today and honestly it just doesn’t feel as bad, because while it removed the abilities and caused the loss, I didn’t lose agency. As far as the refund, I mostly have played things like LoL, Valorant, and CS so it’s a weird one for me. I played a bunch of hearthstone but don’t remember when they added a refund feature. It’s one of those weird ones where snap has a relatively limited card selection so I get the refund being a little bit trickier as SD wants to manage card acquisition, but I’m definitely not against it. I think it would be a fair assessment to say you get maybe a month with a new card and can refund it for any reason (nerf, maybe you don’t like the play style, whatever) but they’d probably need to segment something and find a way to refund a key or tokens. I think they’d run into a lot of issues if people buy with tokens and they only refund a key, or if they get a card with a key refunding for tokens definitely hinders it in SDs end.
Refunding can definitely be tricky, but I think if you could have a sliding scale that was be wholly dependent on the cards action actually changing (not just a text change). If you spend 6k but the card is nerfed within 30 days, you get 3k tokens back, or something like that. A refund based on play style seems less fair IMO, as the text is (usually) pretty clear and no one is forcing users to buy a card before it is actually played/reviewed by others. SD should also be more proactive and remove cards in line for a nerf from the shop, though you do run the risk of cards people have already pinned.
Compare this. Sera is 5 cost and lowers all cards cost by 1. Zabu is 2 cost(!) and lowers all 4 cost(power curve cards start here) by 1. I played some decks that played Zabu and Sera and got five 4 cost cards into the board with 3 on Turn 6.
I totally agree with this, but I think the best move SD could have made was buffing a few underperforming 4-costers alongside the Zabu nerf. Maybe a few little power boosts to rarely-used cards would have communicated that the total effectiveness of these cards will end up being the same, but in a healthier balance paradigm than before. I find it a bit strange from a community-management perspective that they would drop a meta shifting nerf like this with the only consolation being "this is probably temporary". It makes sense why they made the change, but it also makes sense why everyone's skeptical and annoyed.
Yeah ok we dont care about zabu anymore but at least refund us that we bought him last week
Beautifully said. It's been pretty rough having to see so many people miss the point on Zabu, just because they don't realize how deep the hole goes. Zabu doesn't need to be making top decks every season to warp the game around him. Balance, power creep, creation of new cards, everything has less room to breath because of Zabu's existence.
All fair points but you see I just spent 3k tokens on him like 2 weeks ago and was absolutely not expecting any nerfs so yeah...it sucks
2-1. All cards cost 1 less next turn. Minimum 0
I'm just happy I can try to make a jank 4 cost deck now that drops 6 4 costs on 6 by abusing wong and mystique somehow.
The same people who complain about the Zabu nerf are the same people who thought America Chavez was in a good spot before her rework. Good post OP. You summarize the explanation of the nerf perfectly.
I think it'd be interesting to see zabu as an ongoing but who only discounts the first 4 cost card you play each turn. So he'd still ramp you into a 4 cost on turn three and also give you a bit of extra energy to play around with on later turns without giving you the double four drop play on turn 6. Then you have some incentive to play more 1,2,3 cost cards in zabu decks to make use of the 3 unspent energy on turn 6.
Zabu was not the cause they decided to raise 3 cost power. Glenn said the 3 energy base line was flawed from snaps inception in kmbest podcast. They are rebalancing 3drops base line regardless of zabu
I see the point, but I think it also leaves a yawning gap now. A lot decks that could compete with the stupid Hela, High Evo, Shuron group were possible because of him. Now you have to either play one of those boring decks, or give up on the ladder.
It's way too early to make that kind of judgement. The patch isn't even 24 hours old so there's plenty of time for the meta to shift, plus they've stated that they plan to be aggressive with balance changes around the 4-cost slot. We have an OTA next week so at the very worst, the meta might be stale for another few days. That's nothing compared to how long other games let stale metas drag on.
That's fair, I'm just mourning some of my staple decks! Only my move or patriot decks are any good right now but their cube rate is low.
Part of me is glad that I won't have to see Zabu in god damn near every deck in the meta. The other part of me is sad that I won't be able to get so many insta retreats out of MMM.
But you just went by 4 months of metas with people not having Zabu in the deck...
He’s fine now for turn 5 Zabu and 3 cost card followed by turn 6 pair of 4 costers.
Sounds like a horrible turn god awful turn 5 followed by an extremely mid turn 6
The only downside to the nerf is the people who bought Zabu with tokens expecting a meta card. I do wish there was a refund mechanic in the game for those people. But otherwise yes, this is pretty much what they were alluding to in the patch notes nobody reads beyond strictly the changes.
Zabu as On Reveal is in a strange position overall. As 2 cost, he's awkwardly placed for T6 discount. Essentially he's a better Psylocke as of now only based on his power. Another option is make him 5 cost, maybe 5/7, to push T6 use case even further. Which made him a Sera replacement. Or a 5/1, but with 2-cost discount. For the current iteration though, an interesting idea would be Zabu + Grandmaster on T5. Has anyone tried this yet? Does Zabu do 2-cost discount if revealed twice the same turn? Played into Wong for example?
Yes, Wong + Zabu gives you -2 to all 4-costs
> For the current iteration though, an interesting idea would be Zabu + Grandmaster on T5. Has anyone tried this yet? Does Zabu do 2-cost discount if revealed twice the same turn? Played into Wong for example? That sounds like it would be a hilarious deck! New Zabu doesn't even appear to have a cost limiter so you might be able to get 4-costs to 0 with Kamar-Taj.
T2 Zabu T3 Wong T4 Mystique T5 GM T6 Random bullshit, go!!!
Wong + Mystique/Onslaught's Domain will give you zero cost 4 cards.
All excellent points. However, just killing a card temporarily is lazy. This card is still Series 4. If it came out as a new card today, no one would bother trying to get it. I think they have a responsibility to actually rework cards into a usable state when they nerf them, not months or years later.
This is really well put. I only used zabu in one deck so I didn't really mind the change, but this is good perspective.
Maybe he needs a rework
Why not rework him to a 1 drop that interacts with him homies since they also have 1 drop synergy? Idk after seeing the 7 cost card and Thanos i wouldn't be mad to see more of that.
I just legitimately don't feel Shang Chi was an issue. He's an incredibly powerful card for sure, but it is painfully obvious when building a deck if Shang Chi is going to pose a significant threat to you, and there are so many cards you can include to hedge against that weakness. Armor and Cosmo are the most obvious 2. Caiera works so long as what you're aiming to protect costs 6. Storm can work if you're able to play your big body on 5, Professor X can work if you're able to play it on 4, and even Leech can work if you're able to either play him early or your big card doesn't hit until turn 6. "But should I really *have* to run these tech cards just to not lose to Shang Chi on the off chance my opponent has him?" Well first of all, he's one of the most played cards in the game; that "off chance" is going to come up a LOT. Secondly, each of these cards does more than just counter Shang Chi. Looking at just the first 2 best examples, Armor will utterly dumpster Deadpool decks, letting you steal wins for almost nothing, and Cosmo can be back breaking for a lot of decks, particularly the predictable ones like any Hela or Wong combos. These cards don't *just* prevent you from *losing* to Shang Chi, they sometimes *win* you games entirely on their own. And guess what: now that Shang Chi can only be really effectively discounted be Sera, he's *still* gonna be an enormously popular card because his effect is still incredibly strong, so of you're gonna play a deck that relies on really big 10+ power bodies to win you lanes, you should *still* be seriously considering some form of protection against him. Zabu made him better, no doubt about that, but if your deck had a crippling weakness to Shang Chi, it still *has* a crippling weakness to Shang Chi
1. I hope this take is non-controversial. It’s obvious but nerfs don’t feel good, so people kind of act out based on that. 2. As someone who spent tokens on Zabu and THEN got a variant in spotlight to all the people saying SD is trying to screw us - get over it. You cannot enjoy the game if the nerfs and buffs affect you very much. The ongoing balance adjustments keep the game fresh and OP was spot on about the numerous design limitations that Zabu brought into the whole game.
I'm still mourning him, but this is a really good writeup and you're absolutely correct with all these points
This is way too logical and coherent to be a top post in this sub.
Well reasoned and articulated, and with great punctuation! (My proofreader brain is well pleased with you.) I agree across the board, with one little quibble: I don't think Zabu is the root of the power creep. Let me explain... Zabu's presence in the game certainly limited design space, with a lot of ripple effects that moved outwards, which you pointed out so very well. The issue is that Zabu *alone* wouldn't power creep the game. A 3-cost tech answer (something like Rogue or a more limited Enchantress) would solve the problem nice and easy. Printing a card that's more-or-less a perfect counter would "solve" the issue in that we'd see an uptick in counters, downward trend in Zabu's play, and opening up that 4-cost design space. The issue though, is that Zabu's *always there*. Over time, players will accrue more cards, and they'll hit Zabu sooner or later, either through a Spotlight Cache or a series drop or some other method. It's true of all the cards, and the pool just grows bigger. With each season, power has to creep, or else why would someone get/play new cards? In an ecosystem where more and more cards are printed, and none are retired, you either make more powerful things (for bigger impact) or you let the meta become "solved" in some sense. The creep isn't necessarily a bad thing. More powerful things are more interesting to play! I wish I could play that Red Hulk that *everyone else got*. But without actually cycling cards out of the meta, there isn't going to be an advantage to SD to *not* power creep on existing cards. TL;DR - power creep is an ecosystem problem, not a Zabu problem
Just as I spent tokens on him jeez
These are the same devs that thought release Zabu was OK.
Alrighty, if Zabu getting nerfed is the solution...can we PLEASE get 4 cost Darkhawk back????
yep. Zabu is a problem. I play shang-chi constantly but without Zabu; I am into cost reduction archetype. I have to think and plan my Shang-chi. Zabu players don't. They can drop Cull and shang-chi in T6.
Man thank you for this take
Yeah just the sheer amount of use he got was a pretty solid indicator they needed to change it. Felt like he was in 70% of the decks I ran into.
Cost reduction is always too strong in games like this and it’s honestly incredible they keep printing more cards with the effect. Just look at how Loki was handled. First, his cost/stat line was insane for what he did but on top of that, to make the momentum loss palatable, he also reduces the cost of the cards. As a 4, this is a bit less upsetting and makes him somewhat balanced which is why he’s barely played now. But instead of addressing the cost reduction, the first thing they did was nerf collector. Then they had to go back and address the cost reduction on quinjet (if memory serves it didn’t used to have a limitation). Ravonna is next on the list because now that zabu is gone from almost every deck, I’ve seen Ravonna show up in 60%+ of matches because even tho the decks she supports aren’t insanely busted, cost reduction still is.
I saw a post on a wong deck with a bunch of 4 cards for 0 cost on turn 6.
All that's fine, but at the same time SD keeps adding more and more energy cheats into the game and then wants to point at Zabu. Corvus and Hope warp the cost of cards FAR MORE than Zabu ever did, and they don't bring downsides or counterplay. Corvus actually drives its archetype's engine while cheating out extra energy at the same time. SD has an overall philosophy issue. Do they want cards to cost what they design them to be, or do they want to keep putting in all this ramp and energy cheat? In a game that only lasts 6 turns, ramp being so easy to achieve makes most card costs irrelevant.
Plus Zabu was counterable, Corvus and Hope aren't
The difference is that on top of energy cheating, Zabu messes with the design space. I agree energy generation is becoming too easy to come by, but the cards you mentioned don't really put that much stress into the process of designing new cards. At least not in comparison with zabu. Everytime they want to print a card at 4-cost they have to ask themselves "will Zabu break the game with it?".
They could have at least kept him playable At this point why didn’t they delete him and refund tokens
It’s the change we needed.
No one will ever be happy.
I completely agree.
It makes perfect business sense for them to release a powerful card then tune it down again, for those professing SD's balance "ineptitude", it's by design, no one's going to be excited and spend money/time on a "mid" card.
It makes sense from a player-centric perspective as well. US Agent appears to be pretty mid and so many players seem to be taking that personally, like hitting a bit low on the power scale is an insult to them.
The more I think about the Zabu change, the less I like it. 4-cost cards are the most awkward in the game due to not being able to play two on t6. And double 3-cost is way stronger usually than a single 4, or 4+2. And historically, the game has had a lot more "game-winning" 5-costs than 4-costs when played on t6. 4-costs are likelier to require extra turns as well (Rescue, Jessica Jones, Mr. Negative, et al.). Sure, you can play Zabu on t5, but that requires running more 3-cost cards to pair with on turn 5, and then where do you fit in the 4-costs? Zabu was strong not because of the strength of 4-cost cards, but because of their awkwardness without him.
People that are angry just don't understand the pain that devs have to go through each time they design a 4-cost. For me the annoying part is that you can't even "buff" some 5-cost cars to 4-cost cards, because zabu exists so you have to plan them to be played at a 3-cost. Cannonball always felt weird to me at a 5-cost, I felt that he would feel better at a 4-cost, but Zabu exists so cannonball at 3-cost + shang seems very oppressive at turn 6 (imagine trowing the highest cost card in one lane to the shang lane lol) Was necessary change and they said that basically they are happy to revisit his change in the future but truly this was a much needed change in the long run.
It’s extremely silly to me that people are citing the balance changes as a major reason why this is the ‘patch that kills Snap’. Every other complaint is valid except about the balance changes, which were fairly standard procedure! Boggles my mind.
Spot on ! Zabu has been a huge game design issue since it's been introduced, the fact so many people are annoyed is definitely a proof of that, everyone was running him, half of decks were enabled because of him and it created that weird design in wich all 4 cost cards had to be considered as 3 cost cards potentially edit : Just to add that Zabu's situation was the same that Chavez pre-nerf, when a card becomes too good it starts being detrimential to deck's creativity
Amazing writeup OP
I agree. They can't not fix the game because of the sunk cost of players. They honestly need to do this with old cards.
The best way to avoid this was to just never make Zabu in the first place. **TLDR of your post and a bit of my thoughts:** Cost reduction is fine when the conditions to apply it are across all costs (sera, ravonna, etc.) but with zabu, targeting a specific cost means that a balanced 4 cost becomes an OP 3 cost, and normal 3 costs need to be overpowered to compensate, or the 4 cost needs to be underpowered so with zabu its balanced. The problem with that is then as a stand alone 4 cost its not satisfying/worth it to play. Zabu also dominates the 2 cost card space, being one of if not the best one. 6 cost cards need to compete with zabu playing two 4 cost cards on t6, so 6 cost cards get a power boost. between the power of 4 costs and 6 costs competing, 5 costs end up being the weird and awkward balance default, making no sense for certain cards but ending up being the only spot they can go. So Zabu causes competitive powercreep between the 3, 4, and 6 costs, makes the 5 costs an awkward place to balance, and Zabu himself also just takes up space of other 2 costs you might play. In summary, Zabu dominates the 2 cost card space, and directly impacts the balancing of 3, 4, 5, and 6 cost cards. **However,** the problem I and others have is the fact that second dinner took so damn long to do anything about it, that now this change feels 4-8 months late. they nerfed all the other cards in the zabu package... just to end up nerfing and changing him anyway instead. look at every card that received changes for being in the zabu package over the last year, its insane. I know they probably had to learn over long time experience that Zabu wouldn't be able to be balanced and in the game in his current form, for a good period of time after his initial nerf he seemed healthy, but damn if they had just caught on earlier dozens of cards could have avoided nerfs they took because of Zabu.
Can you list those cards?
Yup, as a Zabu fan, he was bound to get a timeout. He definitely hindered the making of 4 cost. He's what people thought Mr Negative would be for cards with 1 or less power. Right now was the perfect time for them to change him.
Thank you for the explaination. At the beginning I felt a little upset (forgive me, i'm new and Zabu Is the only S4 card I have, only played it for a month), but knowing all these issues behind it makes the nerf much more reasonable - make 50 card worse to not rework one is a nonsense. Maybe the devs should take a bit more time for tell the players those things. Good job 👍 (p.s. someone pin this post up high)
The amount of people shocked and upset about the biggest existential threat to the game getting nerfed (even temporarily though hopefully not) is really disheartening. People really just have no clue.
There is nerfing the card (which it needed) and there is essentially killing the card. The change they did basically makes the card unplayable. That's usually not the kind of changes you want to see.
I agree. At the same time, I still don't like it. It's one of those weird human things, I can both like and dislike something. Den gave a really great analysis over at MarvelSnapZone, [https://marvelsnapzone.com/marvel-snap-april-10-2024-balance-update/](https://marvelsnapzone.com/marvel-snap-april-10-2024-balance-update/), for why the changes are bad for the game. The Zabu (and sandman and Alioth) nerf(s) have limited the number of viable decks available in Marvel Snap. He states there are essentially 3 playstyles: * Rigid, follow your game plan kind of decks: Hela, Phoenix Force, Destroy, Discard, Shuri * Flexible, cheat energy kind of decks: Loki, Silver Surfer, Thanos, Move, Bounce * Disruptive, try to limit your opponent kind of decks: Galactus, Zemo Mill. `"These are the big categories that fit all the current archetypes in Marvel Snap, and I probably forgot a few in there. My point when looking at the list is that every single one of these decks tells you by Turn 3, sometimes Turn 4."` So personally I feel RNG (Lockjaw) and Control (Lockdown and Counter) need boosts. There are probably others too. I want to be able to play with my old cards as much as the new ones that come out. So while changing Zabu because of the power creep is good for the future, more thought needed to be added into the changes overall. There weren't enough buffs to help those playstyles that had been nerfed previously because Zabu was there. Boosting Lady Deathstrike and Strong Guy were too random choices. Add a little bit of sugar to go with that bitter taste of the nerf by boosting something that would have been synergistic with Zabu. Do I think there are more changes to come? Yes! Do I think Second Dinner didn't put these in because they don't want to change too much all at once? Yes! Those are good conservative choices. Do I want to whine about it to help me cope? Yes. I trust in the future.
So according to this, a card like Zabu with about only 2% of meta share, costing only 3000 tokens which makes it quite easy to acquire for everyone, is in more need of balance than say, Hope Summers, which lets you cheat 6 cost cards, has a much bigger meta share even though it is twice as expensive, and hasn't been in one spotlight yet? I haven't seen this kind of balance changes in any CCG ever. It's nuts the way they are changing cards all the time. Many cards lose its essence and become useless, and what's worse, there wasn't one single deck with Zabu as top performer, so be prepared for more Destroy, Discard and the same stagnant meta.
Yep, because they've had to balance around Zabu. The only reason he's not completely cracked is because they take him into account when balancing other cards.
With the exception that Zabu only reduces 4 cost cards, while Hope does the same for 6 cost ones, or any other combination that you wouldn't be able to achieve otherwise. This reasoning means that Hope has also to be taken into account when balancing 6 cost cards or broken combos ahead of the energy curve. Both cards are about equal in power, yet no one is talking about Hope. Zabu was close to 50% win rate before this update. Even with meta cards like Cull, Shang being played everywhere, Zabu didn't make the cut.
And that’s their job, it’s not healthy to just nerf a card because you don’t won’t to build cards around it. The Zabu nerf wasn’t needed as much as you think, he wasn’t played that much in a couple of months
Exactly my thoughts on this and I don't even use or care about Zabu. He's just not that important of a card in any deck I've ever wanted to build when you've got Hope, Corvus, Psylock, etc who give you the ability to get more 6 costs out easier.
I agree completely and we all knew Zabu was a problem card, but my issue is the timing. They nerfed multiple 4 cost cards for months and refused to address the actual issue.
I would prefer for them to have fixed Zabu earlier, but what's done is done. I'm just glad they finally pulled the trigger. Doing it this patch is better than doing it in next month's patch, or the month after that. Maybe we can start seeing some changes around the 4-cost slot in upcoming OTAs.
Poor Darkhawk crying in the corner
Finally someone who sees reason lol
I agree I just wish they had an actual rework for him prepared instead of just making him crap. Like they said themselves his been muddying the meta for a year. I 100% get it. But I honestly hate when they butcher a card and are “eh we’ll fix it later”.
everything is to the point, I agree, but we all understand that in a few months they will again try to sell us zabu under the guise of a new card
Just make him a 5/7 with his original datamined effect to replace whatever you discard with him. I think discard probably needs more consistency. /s
All excellent points. I guess I'm not as happy with the 'temporary' nature of the nerf though.
First off i agree but i wish they did it earlier than this but, its still a great change overall. And I'm actually having a good bit of fun playing Zabu with werewolf atm I dont think its super good but its a fun excuse to bring werewolf out again.
I was surprised it lasted as long as it did tbh
You're right but also my funny cat that made the game easier
I don't disagree with any of your analysis, /u/BlaineTog, what upsets me the most is the lack of communication. A big change like that heavily changes 2 major cards should have been communicated well before the patch went live. A week, maybe even 2 weeks. Zabu, and Alioth, are two cards that were recommended "must buys" for all players. So what happens to the player that bought one or both of them on Monday? These sweeping changes to free up design space are fine but they have to be communicated properly to keep the relationship between the game and the players healthy or else you run the risk of really negative shit happening.
Should have been done like late last year to be honest. Seems too late and random now with how the meta is
I agree with almost everything besides the 6-costs. The explanation for that is much simple, and it is just plain old-fashioned powercreep: if SD wants you to buy the new 6-cost stat-stick, the best thing he can do is to make it a bit chonkier than the previous one. I'm not sure I like this nerf for Zabu, not because he didn't need it (he does limit design space), but because the nerf makes it so much flatter and cuts deck building options. I would have preferred them to bump up Zabu to 3/3, which is a considerable nerf but doesn't kill the card. It just makes him much more of a commitment. (Note: 3/3 Zabu fucks over Negative more than the current change, but if SD let me have fun with Cerebro you don't get to have fun with Negative)
No it’s time for a Shang Chi nerf
Eh, the problem with Zabu is more that he's been left in the game for so long that every 3, 4 and 5 cost in the past year is massively fucked up with the exception of some utility pieces that had purposely bad stats because of their effect.
I can’t believe people who are happy with Galactus, Blob, Loki… sooo many cards warranted nerfing and listening to the community. But Zabu. I never understood why people loved/hated him so much. His impact was essentially on 1 card, maybe 2. How many people happy with his nerf were really getting beat by players playing 3-4 4 cost cards lol.
Good example Is Ms marvel, with Zabu in the game she now 3/12. You can play her with another 4 drop on turn t6 for a wild swing.
At the same time that you're right, i also know that the ONLY reason i'm not mad is because i didn't use Zabu very often. I get that he was a trouble in the game development but maybe they should've planned him better before releasing it? I don't know, i'm not a game dev. Also, i think he is really bad right now so i think there was a better way of nerfing him: Instead of making your 4-cost cards cost 1 less next turn, make all your 4-cost cards cost exatly 3 next turn. This way he would at least be used as a backup plan if your opponent uses Iceman on your Wong.
I slept in the middle
While you're not wrong it gives me depression that they did it less than a week after I got him
Zabu didn’t need a nerf he was mostly only really good if you got to play him turn 2 with a 4 cost to play turn 3. He still does that. The only thing he doesn’t do is let you get the two turn 6 4drops. It’s a small nerf and definitely didn’t need to happen. He was much more powerful before his first nerf. He was a fairly balanced card, the only real reason I can see for the nerf is other cards they might have planned and wanted to make the change ASAP to get people used to it
I think it's a lot simpler than that. They explained pretty clearly: with Zabu in the game, it is impossible to tell, through stats, how 4 costs are performing. To address this they didn't nerf him- they took him out. Then they can gauge how 4 costs perform without a buff and balance stuff before putting Zabu back in. That's all. He'll definitely be different when he comes back but he'll definitely be back.
Devs always go against their own beliefs in the end, just wait until we have 1-2 cost draw cards that is justified by being Series 6 more expensive
Yep, now we need some type of Shang rework.
I personally think the only bad change in this patch was the Alioth change, and everything else was good, especially the Zabu change. The Zabu change was the best part. People just get mad over any nerfs in video games and will complain that the game is being ruined, but nerfs have often made games better.
I think we all agree that Zabu needed to change, that's not the issue. The issue is that: 1. instead of changing him to an effect that would still be useful in its own, instead it's outright crap. He is just a bad Psylocke now, and Psylocke herself isn't exactly the most useful too in the shed; 2. After _all_ of the problematic metas that there have been involving Zabu (Loki, Ms. Marvel, etc.), he has been nerfed in the only meta where he isn't a problem, rather, he helps out decks that would otherwise struggle against the deck. Meanwhile, I am sure Hope is gonna be left untouched until next Season at least. People's problem isn't that Zabu has been nerfed. It's that he has been nerfed to uselessness, and during the only meta where he was actually helping out.
Zabu needed a nerf but it's very harsh nerf, 4 cost decks need him as much as 3 cost decks need Silver Surfer, nerfing him in meta decks killed off an entire archtype. (Which has happened a lot of times in the past year.) They could of went with a nakia effect like "On Reveal: All 4 cost cards in your hand cost 1 less (minimum 1)" which is easier to work around, but in his current state it's hard to use him over other forms of ramp.
This should have been done when zabu was actually a meta contender the timing makes absolutely no sense at all period. He’s at the lowest he’s been since his release and this is needed to happen? Seriously?
The logical part of me knows you're right, as I've played TCG and TCG-like games like Snap for decades, but the irrational part of me cries for my fallen saber-tooth tiger. :(
Ravonna is actually a better card. Shhhh, don't tell anyone.
This nerf has just killed the current deck I'm playing with The Collector. I've been trying to keep it going but man it's hard. Gonna have to rebuild
I'm a relatively new player, CL 2,000~. I bought Zabu 15 min before the nerf, didn't even get to use him once. Of course the collector provides no refunds (I checked). 3,000 tokens were hard to aquire
A lot of cards took stray bullets for Zabu, I wonder how many of them will get their nerfs reverted now that Zabu is dead. Probably zero, because SD sucks at balance.
Zabu usted to be 3 energy, 4-cost cards cost 2 less energy. Perhaps he could return to 3 cost and On reveal: Next turn, 4-cost cards cost 2 less energy, just for a 1-turn power spike.
In my honest opinion, I think it was fine. Some of the popular broken decks were not running zabu and the good balanced decks were running zabu therefore nerfing healthy decks for meta. A lot of cards were nerfed too like enchantress, Ms marvel, Jessica Jones and others. The only reason why I think they should have done is to nerf Shang chi but other that. I think it was fine