Second Dinner Q&A Roundup — July 9th

The latest answers from Second Dinner from Discord for the week of July 9th, 2024.

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Welcome to a latest Marvel SNAP developer update roundup! In this article we will share some of the most popular questions by the community that Second Dinner answered on the official Discord, including questions around the hot new card Arishem and the upcoming new features such as Deadpool Diner and Alliances.
Keep reading to find the answers to these questions— and many more— below.
 

Will Arishem be a "Big Bad"?

Q: And bonus question: Will there be other "Big Bads" or has the team moved away from that?
Stephen: No more big bads. The spotlight system removed the need for cards in that category.
 

Availability and Exclusivity of Borders

Q: Are you able to share where you have landed generally on how borders will be provisioned in the game (at least for now)?
Stephen: Some borders will be in the shop and some will be exclusive to events/promotions. They will sometimes be exclusives and sometimes not. For example, the neon green and silver metallic ones from the login bonus are not exclusive. There is a new matte and distressed border style that will debut in Diner. They will not be exclusive to Diner but will be only available from events/bundles/promos. We are still experimenting with how many border consumables to give at once and will keep iterating there. No plans to allow them to be removed once applied at this time. If it becomes an issue we can consider it down the road.
 

Is Mockingbird a 5/9 because she's 5'9"?

Q: Mockingbird is canonically 5 feet and 9 inches tall. Coincidentally, her card in Marvel Snap costs 5 and has 9 Power. Are these two things related, or is this a coincidence?
Glenn: Total coincidence. She was 5/8 to start, actually.
 

Card Generators

Q: Can cards like Shanna produce duplicates of the same card? Can Arishem produce duplicates in your deck? Will Arishem put duplicates of your original deck in, so you could have two ofs, randomly?
Glenn: I don’t believe either of these cards can produce duplicates within the generation effect, though both can hit cards already in your starting deck. However, I’m not looking at the code on vacation.
 

The Designs for the Base Cards

Q: How are the base designs for cards chosen? e.g. Arishem has the 6-eyed design that resembles how he’s been depicted recently while, Loki doesn’t have a modern design even though he came out during the 2nd season of Loki tv show
Glenn: We discuss each character individually and decide what we want to do. For example, Ravonna is a lesser-known character for non-comics fans. However, her MCU presence had a higher profile thanks to the Loki show, which our season was also synced with. So we went with that version for the base.
 

Alliance Question

Q: Some details about the Alliances (Clans) are already known, but not everything. What is the maximum number of letters a Clan abbreviation can have?
KentErik: Three.
 

Alliances and Impersonation

Q: With the upcoming Alliances feature, there may be the opportunity for individuals to impersonate the Alliance of a content creator or well known play group. Is Second Dinner allowing for multiple Alliances to have the same name? Or are name claims first come, first serve? What is Second Dinner's policy regarding impersonation of known groups (if such a policy exists)?
Bella: 2 alliances cannot have the exact same designation.
 

What happens if Arishem proves to be too strong?

Q: I love Arishem’s design, but after spending a whole day playing and facing him I wonder how would you guys nerf him if he proves too dominant. I don't see that many options to balance Arishem. The only thing I can think of is him shoving more cards into the deck in order to make him less reliable. I would love to hear the thoughts of the devs on topics such as this.
Glenn: Before we release cards, we talk about the potential future dials. Increasing the card quantity and/or reducing the card quality are the first ones we’d use here. (Not that I see cause to turn them, nor am I checking right now.)
 
Q: I knew he was hyped up (justifiably so, he’s the most fun I’ve had with the game and the new meta he’s made is super interesting) but it’s wild how many people are playing him. Did the devs expect this?
Addison: Basically the entire QA team was saving keys for Arishem week
Glenn: He has surpassed our expectations, but we did expect something on the order of High Evolutionary’s release from a play rate perspective. We don’t make balance decisions based on the first 5 days or so of a card, since there are a lot of unique variables at play. Generally, we like to see 2 weeks of data before even considering any action.
 

Spotlight variants

Q: It was said a few months ago that old spotlight variants will be available in June. Now that June has come and gone, are they to be expected any time soon?
Stephen: They are available 12 months after they were initially available. The first spotlight cache was in July last year. The first three spotlight variants should become available soon.
 

Deadpool’s Diner Duration (Rewards)

Q: Given that Deadpool’s Diner will only be available for two weeks do you feel like that’s enough time to get the Cassandra Nova variant for most people?
KentErik: I feel like it’s enough time to get the base version of Cassandra Nova.
Stephen: Based off all of our playtesting it is achievable within two weeks with moderate engagement levels.
 

Question about Copycat

Q: Will Copycat show both players the card that has its text stolen when she is drawn?
Nada: No, when she is drawn she will only show to the player that drew her. The opponent will be able to see what ability she has after she is played.
 
If you are still hungry for more answers, or you have questions of your own, feel free to visit the team-answers channel in the official Discord and be part of the conversation.
Some of these questions and answers may have been edited for clarity and brevity.