One Marvel Snap card change just killed some popular decks

Second Dinner implemented the latest major Marvel Snap patch today, May 16. It included a ton of new features and system changes coming to the game, as well as some buffs and nerfs. And one of the bigger changes is the rewording of Wave’s effect, which will affect a ton of meta cards and decks.

Wave’s original effect made all the costs of the cards in both players’ hands four regardless of their original costs once it was played. This meant cards with cost reduction effects could apply their abilities after Wave’s effect was resolved. Cards like She-Hulk and Death could go as low as becoming zero-cost with Wave’s help. Now, its effect will be applied after all the cost reduction effects, making the zero-cost She-Hulks and Deaths impossible to happen.

Wave’s new effect will now read as “On Reveal: All cards cost 4 until the end of next turn.” Developer Second Dinner justified this move, saying “Wave has been far too constraining.” The devs even admitted “this change kills a few decks.”

“In addition to a text update that clarifies when Wave’s effect begins, we’ve also made a rather large adjustment ‘under the hood,’” Second Dinner said. “Wave will now begin to apply after effects that reduce card costs, rather than before. That means She-Hulk, Death, etc. will always cost 4 while Wave is in effect. We don’t take lightly that this change kills a few decks, but Wave has been far too constraining on our ability to use cost reduction as a synergy reward in future designs. Leaning on Wave is just always better than dedicating your deck to the actual synergy—we’ve seen that with Death since both cards went live, and we’ll continue seeing it without this action.”

Two very popular meta decks, DeathWave and Death-Hulk, have now been completely taken out of play by the change to Wave. Those decks were built around playing both Death and She-Hulk after using Wave and are now no longer possible due to them now always costing four energy after Wave is played.

Related: Marvel Snap devs explain why the game’s most hated card won’t be nerfed

Other cards that were affected in the latest patch include Crystal, which now allows players to draw a card when it is played, Death, which has now a reduced cost of eight (from nine), and a text revision for White Queen. Kitty Pryde, on the other hand, will be released in the game as a free card, with its reworked ability that reads “When this returns to your hand, +2 Power. Returns at the start of each turn.”

A handful of changes are also coming to the game. This includes the reduction of required cubes to rank up from 10 to seven, separate cosmetics customization for each deck, new card series drops, a “flexible series release and drop,” and the upcoming Weekend Missions.