What to do with Archangel, Horseman of Death
We already have a Warren Worthington III card in Snap as Angel, but if you're a 90s kid, you're probably more familiar with his darker identity, Archangel. Angel was twisted into the Archangel after having his feathery wings replaced with techno-organic metal ones. Angel was never able to make a major meta impact on Marvel Snap. Will his successor do any better? Join me on my quest to find a home for this card! Here's everything I'm excited to try with Archangel, Horseman of Death.
How Valuable is the Effect?
When Archangel revives a card, he grants it an 4 extra Power. Add that to the 3 Power Archangel provides himself and that makes him a 2 Energy play for 7 Power. A 2/7 with an Objective that is not exactly trivial or splashable is… not great these days. If you are just using Archangel to give a revived card +4, he is not worth it. You need to be further leveraging the effect for Archangel to be worthwhile.
How to Leverage the Effect
There are a few ways we can get more value than 2/7 out of Archangel. This card will hinge on how powerful these methods prove.
Repeat an On Reveal
If our revived card has a powerful On Reveal, we can get it to go off again when it is revived. Let's take a look at some of the top On Reveal revival candidates.
The question Archangel asks of the player is all about balancing value and consistency. We can reliably Destroy and revive cards like Silver Sable and Nico, but is the juice worth the squeeze? It would be awesome to be able to revive a Black Panther or a Foom, but how realistic is that? In the end, the middle of the Cost spectrum might be the sweet spot.
Cards that Benefit from a Buff
Archangel hands out a buff. There are plenty of cards that can further leverage or magnify a buff. The trick is destroying these, reviving them, and still managing to have enough time to benefit from that buff. Timing is one of the reasons I'm not especially high on Archangel – there are quite a few fun turn 6 plays that aren't possible because the Objective goes off after everything else.
Artificial Targeting
Archangel lacks any kind of targeting. But you can target what he revives by either repeating what you destroy or including cards that don't enter your destroyed pool in your 4 destructions. I don't believe Archangel has a place in Deadpool Destroy decks, but X-23 and Wolverine might be must-inclusions in any Archangel deck that is trying to revive a specific target. Still, I think one of the biggest issues with Archangel is that he'll be living on 50-75% situations a lot of the time. Those odds aren't good enough in the current era of optimized Marvel Snap.
Can He Find a Home?
The Deadpool-based Destroy lists don't need this card. Too many of your Destroy targets don't enter the destroyed cards pool, meaning you would basically be playing Archangel as a 2/7 to bring back a Moira or something – not nearly good enough to elbow his way into what is already a very tight archetype. So what does that leave us with? Other archetypes that destroy cards include Dormammu, Morgan Le Fay, Phoenix Force, Nimrod, Galactus, Mill, and a variety of Misery builds. Will he engender any brand new archetypes?
Potential Archangel Homes
Death Dorm
Dormammu is one of the homes I've seen proposed for Archangel. But here's the problem: Archangel is a card that wants to revive impactful bodies, but Dormammu wants to get cheap bodies out fast. The best Dormammu decks play an early Martyr to add beef to your Dormammu, but that's not the kind of target Archangel wants. Moira is one of the best cards in Dormammu and she also doesn't mesh well with Archangel.
Is Dormammu our Archangel home? No.
Death Lord
Another approach to Archangel is to try to destroy high-value targets multiple times. The issue with this deck is that it feels like we're going to rely on the Ice Cube as our fourth destruction too often and also pray for lucky X-23 bounces. There's a little to much variance here for my taste, but the ceiling is certainly there.
Is Star-Lord/Foom our Archangel home? Maybe.
Spider Zola
Another deck that tries to destroy high-value targets, this deck would love to revive a big card at Archangel's location at the end. Once again, the issue is fitting enough Destroy triggers in the deck for Archangel to feel worthwhile. This deck depends heavily on hitting multiple cards with Venom, which may be unrealistic on a consistent basis.
Is Spider-Zola our Archangel home? No.
Galactus Nimrod
Archangel is appealing after a successful Galactus. Galactus will often get us to the requisite number of destructions, and Archangel can be played on turn 6 for unexpected value. Still, the timing can be awkward and it's hard not to feel the deck slot would be better spent on Jennifer Kale or another ramp card.
Is Galactus Nimrod our Archangel home? Maybe.
MLFront
One deck that rarely struggles to get enough death triggers is Morgan Le Fay. Are the revival targets impactful enough? Not really. You could certainly get a high-roll out of the right Nico variation and getting to your goal early enough could give you an extra Iceman or Spider-Ham to trigger, but it's hard to pack this deck with valuable Archangel revival targets. You could also go in a more Rocket Raccoon/Silver Sable Power gain direction, but I'm skeptical of Archangel's value in that type of build as well.
Is Morgan Le Fay our Archangel home? Maybe.
Mill 'n' Kill
Misery can make sure we get enough destructions, the revivals are impactful, and there's solid snowball potential. This is a deck that wants to race toward the Objective as fast as possible to get benefit from the revival – which will be tricky. Is this the home? I think as much as there is a home, this is it. Archangel serves multiple purposes, has multiple payoffs, and serves to further the win condition of the deck. Still, this isn't a deck that has historically been strong (despite the dopamine hit of performing a lot of game actions), so if this is his best home, that doesn't bode too well.
Is Mill our Archangel home? Yes!
3-Cost Revival
Repeatedly destroying lower-cost high-value targets may be the way to go with Archangel. Zola can make for some crazy plays here, where he sets off Firehair while also providing the last destructions for our Archangel Objective. There will be a lot of play lines that involve taking some risky 50/50s, so be careful with your placement and take informed risks.
Is Firehair Revival our Archangel home? Yes!
Nimrod Repeater
The goal here is to get one extra destruction on the last turn, with the help of either Archangel or Firelord. Bringing back a second Venom can ensure our board is fully flush with 'Rods.
Is All-In Nimrod our Archangel home? Yes!
Is He Worth It?
The only way this card is worth your Tokens is as a deck-building puzzle. Surprisingly, I am a lot higher on this card after actually coming up with builds, but I started very low. While there is definitely the chance someone will crack the puzzle and come up with a winning use for this card, it will still be niche and probably very replaceable. If you've got a genius idea you are dying to try, definitely grab him. If you're unsure or are looking for cards that feel essential to own, give him a pass.
If you'd like to follow me further along in the quest to find a home for wayward Warren Worthington III, consider joining up as a supporter. Below the paywall you'll find a lot more decks and further analysis of this card! I went a little harder on digging into all of the potential uses for this card than he probably deserves! You get the benefit of the extra time I spent though!!!
