Captain Britain: Decks & Tips for the New Card
One of the most long-awaited Marvel Comics characters is finally coming to Marvel Snap -- Captain Britain! Whether this is only Betsy or if we'll also get Brian Braddock variants remains to be seen (my guess is Brian will get his own card later), I'm psyched to get one of my favorite characters into the game, especially in this era of repeated characters.
The character is cool, but what about the actual Marvel Snap card? Here is everything I'm looking forward to trying with the new Captain Britain card!
The Problem with Betsy
Decks that like to slam 4+ Cost cards, don't tend to care much about discounts. They are usually happy to ramp into more Energy with something like Electro. The decks that do want discounts on expensive cards already have superior options like Majestic Wingbeat, Surge, Psylocke FF (lore accuracy points for Psylocke again stealing Betsy’s thunder).
One of the big winners of the season is Doom 2099, and Betsy doesn't fit there at all, unlike so many of her seasonal companions.
Unless a new deck emerges that especially cares about Captain Britain’s buff and has plenty of good options in the 4 to 5-Cost range, it's hard to see this card being strongly relevant – until she gets a buff of some sort. I've never been more confident that a card would get a quick buff.
Selfishly, I hope it happens because I want to play with this card and its variants.
Best Friends for Betsy
Zabu is key for Captain Marvel. Games where you open with Zabu into Captain Marvel into a 4-Cost will trick you into thinking she's better than she is. A boosted Isca or Jubilee SS on 3 will feel awfully powerful.
The Shape of a Betsy Deck
A Captain Britain deck needs to be able to play a 4-Cost cards as soon as possible and profitably play whatever gets discounted. Perhaps she'll shine best in a deck with a mix of 4s and 1s that it can discount to zero. The trick is finding 1-Costs that are impactful enough. Maybe she'll thrive best in a deck with a high-Cost combo that wouldn't otherwise be possible without discounts, or she could find her best home is in a "4-Cost tribal" deck that tries to play out as many powerful 4-Cost cards as it can with the help of Zabu. Of course, this would have sounded a lot better in a world where we didn't have a cards like Anti-Polar Magneto that can just plop them onto the board.
The question for this card is what kind of curve to build around it. We want a mix of costs so that we can discount cheaper cards (and potentially even get some 1 or 2-Cost to zero), but we do want to play enough 4-Cost that benefit from a buff and are useful mid-game.
Cost-Reduction Combos
Shiny Floor Show
If the discount hits either Kitty or SIM, you're laughing all the way to the bank. Unless you get a lucky Surge hit, this deck is likely to wait until Turn 4 to play a 4-Cost, but one or two discounts can still make an impact here.
Colorful Galacti
I think there's a chance that Captain Britain could muscle her way into a greedier Galacti deck over Jeff the Baby Dolphin. Again, this deck doesn't need Captain Britain, but she can contribute.
4-Cost Kindred
Get Zabu
Captain Britain lets us play lower-Power 4-Cost cards with minimal tempo loss. This deck is heavily reliant on an early Zabu.
Wiccan's Back
Ideally, discounts and extra Energy get us into a situation where we can play two 4-Costs or even Galactus First Steps plus a 4-Cost on the last turn.
Is She Worth It?
Unless you get every card or are especially enthusiastic about this character, you can safely skip this card. There is so much competition at the 2-Cost slot that you likely have a better option already in your collection. The effect isn't useless or anything – if you're a new player you can probably get a lot of use out of her! But there are other cards that do similar things as well or much better. There is a chance that a full Avalon deck comes together by the end of the season using this card, but she won't be irreplaceable even in that. Hold out for the inevitable buff.
Check out SnapComplete's data once enough games have accumulated to track how she's doing and find her best homes. As always, thanks to SnapComplete for card and deck art found in this article.
