Master of the Turkish Delights
This time around, the season pass card is a classic Marvel villain: Baron Zemo. He was a quintessential Captain America foe in the 1980s, had a star turn in the late 1990s, and made a splash in the MCU. What kind of impact will he have in Marvel Snap?
Biography
Helmut Zemo is the 13th Baron Zemo. His father was Baron Heinrich Zemo, a Nazi scientist and enemy of Captain America. Helmut blames Captain America for his father's death and first becomes a villain named the Phoenix. Later, known as simply Baron Zemo, he spent time allied with Arnim Zola and Red Skull. Ultimately, he became the leader of the super-villain team, the Masters of Evil. In 1997, when most of Earth's superheroes were missing, a new hero named Citizen V appeared with a new team, the Thunderbolts. In one of the most shocking reveals in late 90s comics, Citizen V was revealed as Baron Zemo and the Thunderbolts as the Masters of Evil. Ironically, several of the Thunderbolts had become accustomed to being heroes and ended up betraying Zemo. After being exposed, Zemo rededicated himself to villainy and the cause of Hydra.
The Card
Baron Zemo is an interesting card. He has a novel mechanic and is the first card we've seen that uses the term ‘recruit,’ meaning to steal an opponent's card and put it into play. He costs three energy, but will become more effective the later he is played since your odds of recruiting a powerful card will increase as the game goes on. He can be played as just a solid information-gathering 3-cost, or he could potentially lead to large power swings on the final turns, subject to a good deal of luck.
Key Synergies
Zemo doesn't have direct synergy with very many cards, but the partners he does have are quite powerful. At a basic level, Zemo recruiting a card is a downside compared to simply having more power because he takes up an extra board space. Luckily, that card will provide a discount for Mockingbird and help Dazzler achieve her bonus. I think Mockingbird, in particular, will make a great partner for Zemo and I've included her in most of the lists you'll find later in this article. She is such a powerful card that she elevates Zemo’s prospects considerably.
Additionally, there are a handful of other cards that also remove resources from your opponent's deck. Will ‘mill’ actually become a viable strategy in Marvel Snap?
The first is Yondu. In the recent balance change notes, Zemo was all but called out by name as the reason for the change to Yondu from destroying the top card to destroying the lowest-cost card. Second Dinner implies that by removing a low-cost card from your opponent's deck, you're increasing the quality of hits for Baron Zemo. I'm still skeptical of Yondu because, after all, if you're improving the hits for your Zemo, you're simultaneously improving your opponent’s draws. If Yondu is good with Zemo, it will be because we have reached a critical mass of deck destruction, not because of his recent change.
The other ways to ‘mill’ your opponent's deck (an old TCG term originally from Magic, meaning to remove cards from your opponent’s deck) are much better cards on their own than Yondu. Gladiator has a good amount of power, which has led him to see a decent amount of play since his release. Cable was recently changed to 2-3, and I've been impressed with him in my own testing. He has probably been underplayed. Zemo will likely reverse that. If a mill strategy takes off, Maximus will be a powerful card. Getting six power for two energy is great if there's no downside due to your opponent having no more cards to draw. If the goal is to make sure our opponent has nothing to draw on later turns, then technically, Baron Mordo can assist with that. You could get lucky and make an important card cost more. I'll experiment with Mordo for at least a few games, but I am mostly mentioning him here just to be thorough. Also, keep in mind that Second Dinner likes to buff cards thematically. I wouldn't be shocked if long-awaited Captain America and Baron Mordo buffs had been saved for Zemo's season, as they both have light synergy with him already.
The Deck Thinning Conundrum
Is ‘milling’ even good in Marvel Snap? If you use Yondu to destroy your opponent’s lowest-cost card, you're just making it more likely that they'll draw a higher-cost card that they need. In a normal game of Marvel Snap, a player ends the game with 3 cards left in their deck. So, in order to cost your opponent a draw, you have to mill at least four cards. Otherwise, besides a slight information advantage, there's no difference between the cards you destroyed being unavailable because you destroyed them and them being unavailable because they were just in the bottom three cards of your opponent's deck. That said, Zemo may be the card that finally makes ‘mill’ viable. Cards like Wong, Grandmaster, and Absorbing Man can help remove enough cards from an opponent's deck to be harmful. The question now is how reliably we can do that and how much it ends up harming them. I think the ‘additional card' aspect to Zemo (i.e., his synergy with Mockingbird and Dazzler) is the safer bet for powerful decks, but don't sleep on mill; if it's strong, it's likely to be annoyingly strong.
ScoSco's Day One Baron Zemo Decks
Z Mill
This is a good starting point for finding out how powerful Zemo is. If you play a sequence of Yondu, Cable, Zemo, and Absorbing Man, your opponent will have an empty deck after turn 5 and you can hopefully finish them off from there. We can iterate on this list with cards like Grandmaster and Hope Summers.
Hand and Foot
This deck doesn't just try to affect your opponent’s deck. It simultaneously attacks their hand. Doctor Octopus will become incredibly strong if mill strategies take off since he can easily clear your opponent’s hand, leaving your opponent with no options.
Modern Good Cards
This will likely be the first deck I try. It pairs Zemo with tried-and-true ‘good cards’, with Mockingbird at the center.
A to Z
I love how Valkyrie synergizes with Dazzler and Ant-Man. Valkyrie can help us clean up any bad Zemo hits like The Hood or Mystique, and Cage means we can only make those hits better and not worse. This deck can pull off some huge point swings on turn 6.
Surfer Big Z
If Zemo is going to work with Surfer, it will be a later play. Playing Zemo, Surfer, and another card on the final turn sounds extremely strong. This list is one way to go, leaning into Dazzler and Mockingbird, but you could also try a power Surfer list with Gladiator at its core.
Sera Ze
Zemo is the type of card you want to play off-curve. In other words, you want to play him later than turn three to get the most impact. Sera is one of the best ways to have strong later turns. I've included Wong to get the most out of repeated mill effects (or Hazmat if things align), but you could also shove Zemo into a more conventional Sera control shell, Sera Hit-Monkey, or Sera Surfer deck.
Z Pack
Many of the cards that synergize with Zemo also synergize with Loki. While I expect this list to be strong, it doesn't lean too hard into the God of Mischief. You could even cut him for Devil Dinosaur or She-Hulk if you're feeling frisky or don't have him.
Gallery
Zemo is launching with his base card, a cool season pass variant, and a very nice Marko Djurdjevc fur trim variant. Hopefully, we will get more variants in the future that reference the amazing coat Zemo wore in The Falcon and The Winter Soldier.
Conclusion
Baron Zemo has enough inherent power to be a playable card, whether or not any mill strategy proves viable. If he weren't a season pass card, I might not recommend picking him up unless you want to try mill or already have Mockingbird. However, he is the season pass card, and the season pass is regularly the best value in all of Marvel Snap. If you're going to spend any money at all on the game this month, it should be on the season pass. Zemo is a nice, moderately powered season pass card as a bonus.