What to do with Thanos Fractured Frontier
Our new Thanos card is not only the Season Pass Card, but also the standard bearer for the brand new mechanic, Quick Draw. There is a lot going on with this card and a lot to learn, so saddle up for a long ride! Here is everything I'm looking forward to trying with Thanos: Fractured Frontier.
How Does He Actually Work
Quickdraw: Thanos grants all of your cards Quickdraw. If you play them the turn you draw them, Thanos will load another shot. This means the first turn they are in your hand and you are able to play them, so cards like Crystal, Time Stone, and Adam Warlock won't interfere – you'll still be able to get the effect if you're using these cards. In fact, they'll be crucial in giving Thanos FF decks options.
Thanos loads the shots into the chamber randomly, but (based on datamines) they always fire in order. The order is shown on the revolver cylinder they're loaded into in the animation. One aspect that I feel is being overlooked is that Thanos loads one shot at the beginning of the game. You get one for free! This means getting to 5-6 shots by the time you deploy Thanos is totally doable!
Shot Order:
- Space shot
- Reality shot
- Time shot
- Mind shot
- Power shot
- Soul shot
When To Shoot
Generally, a big centerpiece combo package like this is best held until the last turn in order to maximize cube equity and minimize risk of opposing tech. However, the dev team has built this new big bad knowing that the game tends to favor this type of strategy and has made him much more valuable to play out on Turn 5 (or earlier!). Several of the shots work best to set you up for a big final turn, rather than Thanos himself being the final payoff.
Key Synergies
The two most critical aspects of making any Thanos FF deck work is ensuring that you can immediately play the cards you draw and that you draw into Thanos himself. Quicksilver and Domino guarantee us playable cards on the first two turns. Cards like Crystal and Adam Warlock play nice with Quickdraw and give us flexible options to choose which cards we want to play and allow us to potentially load more than one shot in a single turn! Namorita can help make our draws easier to play, while Jubilee is a reward for playing off the top of our deck – a lot of the synergy groundwork for this card was actually laid in the seasons leading up to him! Beast is just one example of a card that can allow us to get added value out of the cheap cards Thanos FF necessitates, while Blink is the perfect way to ensure we actually end up getting the main payoff to our deck and can swap out those lower-Cost cards for him.
Leaning Into the Stones
None of the shots are especially powerful, but when taken as a whole, there is a high ceiling on Thanos' output. Reality Shot is the most exploitable shot and could be the center of some shenanigans-y combos, while Time Shot feels like the most generically powerful, assuming you can get to it in time to get value from it.
Space Shot
Definitely best if fired by Turn 5, Space Shot isn't something we'll generally build around, but is a desirable effect. Most of the ways to abuse this effect, like Professor X, cost too much, but it will be great for location mitigation.
Reality Shot
Whenever something in this game says "lowest" we always know we can exploit it by having something be the only one. Copying a Quicksilver is still 2 free Power, but what about a copy of Gambit Horseman of Death? Or Jubilee Silver Surfer? A Second Wiccan? This is the shot for all of you dreamers out there! There are some seriously cracked things this shot can do.
Time Shot
This is the shot to build-around. A lot of the other shots will just be incidental benefit, but this is the one you're hoping to hit each game to set up an unstoppable final turn. Tech or Power, that is the question.
Mind Shot
See, proof that Jubilee Silver Surfer and Namorita were seeded into the game in anticipation of Thanos FF. It's unfortunate that (according to Datamines) this shot goes off after Time Shot, but perhaps the reverse order felt too Powerful. This can work well with other Quickdraw effects like that of Jane Foster.
Power Shot
It might seem vanilla, but this shot is crucial to the Power ceiling of this deck. It makes Thanos more valuable as a 5-Cost play and you're going to be happy when you see this one. The downside is that whenever we play Thanos on Turn 5, he's now vulnerable to Shadow King or Shang Chi.
Soul Shot
This shot feels a lot worse on Turn 5 than Turn 6, but so much of the other things we're trying to accomplish rely on playing Thanos on Turn 5. Still, you will have situations when the "weakest" enemy card will only be the weakest by virtue of being alone! Elektra could be a good way to improve the value of this shot, while this could improve the value of Gambit HoD. It's hard to see a package with enough destruction that we can use a Destroy payoff like Death, but Fenris Wolf could be an interesting consideration.
Scosco's Day One Thanos FF Decks
Wiccan TFF
Killer Thanos FF
Zoo-383
Shadowlands FF
Thanos Thanos
Final Thoughts
Thanos is an undeniably powerful card, but one that the developers have slapped with a powerful restrictor plate. The card is designed towards Turn 5 rather than Turn 6, the shots can't be reloaded or reused, and none of the shots are individually game-breaking. I think a lot of creators and players may be underestimating how hard it will be to load 4+ shots and how harshly working towards that will restrict deck-building. I suspect Thanos FF will be just fine, but he's also not the kind of card that players are going to find some unbeatable combo with. That's a solid place for a season pass to exist and he really feels like the product of a lot of learning about the power levels of Season Pass cards in Snap.
Paid Supporters will find a couple more fun Thanos FF decks below! We are hugely grateful for all of the support we receive!
