The Dark Sorceress
Marvel's most powerful evil sorceress is finally coming to Snap where she's drawing on her powers of necromancy and reality manipulation to bring forth a new archetype.
Morgan Le Fay is a half-faerie, one-time apprentice of Merlin who later sought to overthrow him and take control of Avalon and Camelot.
Morgan Le Fay boasts an impressive list of enemies. She's a long-standing foe of Doctor Strange and Spider-Woman. Doctor Doom travelled back in time to learn sorcery from her and ended up her lover (who she later traveled to the future to kill as a child). She messed with Wolverine before he was Wolverine, raised Atlantis to the surface against Namor’s will, and has routinely faced down entire teams of Avengers.
She can shape-shift, time travel, raise armies of the dead, and has proven to be essentially unkillable. The only reason heroes ever come out on top is by trickery or because they find a way to let her have her way.
Le Fay’s Familiars
There are a variety of cards that synergize with Morgan Le Fay, from destruction and discard triggers to the types of cards we want to bring back to cards that specially benefit from bringing cards back to hand.
Destroyers
Killmonger is easily the most promising card here. He can destroy a lot at once and 1-Cost cards will be easier to play out later. There could be some interesting combinations with Venom like eating an early Death or Mockingbird and bringing it back with additional power. Misery is also going to find her way into a lot of Morgan Le Fay builds since she'll allow us to repeat cheap On Reveals up to three times. Lady Deathstrike also works well with the kind of inexpensive cards we're trying to bring back and replay.
Discarders
Discard feels a little more awkward with Le Fay. Something like discarding an Iron Man with Silver Samurai sounds great, but it's an awkward play line and hard to build a strategy around. I'm skeptical that she can be a part of some kind of Hela or Khonshu strategy, however the concept of Morgan Le Fay as Corvus Glaive insurance is attractive. Knowing we always have some way to recover important cards might be something to build around. Bullseye seems the most promising to me. You can use him on turn 4 or 5 to chuck some affliction at the opponent and immediately return them to hand with Morgan Le Fay. It's tight curve-wise, so we'll have to build alternate play lines into any Bullseye/Le Fay deck
Direct Synergy
Collector is a big winner, not just with Morgan Le Fay, but with several of the other cards releasing this month. Kahhori is an underrated payoff for a full hand and there are some solid ways to integrate her into Le Fay decks. Devil Dinosaur may feel a bit like a fossil at 5-Cost, but there are some fun ways to build a budget Le Fay deck with Dino as a payoff.
Other Promising Partners
Nico Minoru seems made to work with Le Fay since she can destroy or she can function as a growable 1-Cost. Anytime we're destroying things Firehair and Elixir are worth a look. Because Le Fay costs 4, our window to replay what we've brought back is tight. Black Swan might alleviate this tension while Hit Monkey can take advantage of a deluge of cheaper cards. Daken is another interesting piece to me. Many lists are playing Frigga to get a second Daken that produces an additional shard. With Le Fay we might be able to generate extra shards in a similar way. Last, I regret to inform you Thanos and his stones have a lot of natural synergy with Morgan Le Fay as well.
Building with Morgan Le Fay
Rather than just jump into the decks, I'm going to first walk through the iterative process involved with building around a new card that potentially demands its own new archetype. I'm most intrigued by builds that include both Killmonger and Bullseye.
The Ol' Lift & Slam
This initial concept with Morgan Le Fay looks solid. The idea is to disrupt the opponent with pesky 1-Cost cards, kill them with Killmonger, bring them back with Morgan Le Fay to pump Collector, and then play out a bunch of buffed 1-Cost cards on the last turn. Alternatively, we can launch a bunch of 1-Cost cards at our opponent, bring them back with Morgan Le Fay, and then play them out. There is also a fun play line of bringing everything back, buffing what's on board with Kahhori, and then shooting them at our opponent with Bullseye. Bullseye and Killmonger act as two alternate paths, but there are also situations when you'll use both.
Lift & Slam 2
We can also try different 1-Cost cards. I like the idea of Uncle Ben’s disruption and that he leaves a body on the board if you use Killmonger. It may prove necessary to include raw power in the form of Hydra Bob, Titania or Ant-Man.
Misery Slam
Fire Witches
I also want to experiment with cards like Misery, Grandmaster, and Firehair to see if the deck is stronger with additional instances of the various On Reveals in the deck.
Swan Slam
Swan Slam Carnage
Finally, I want to see if there is space for cards like Black Swan and Hit Monkey. One of my main concerns for a potential Morgan Le Fay archetype is the relatively low power output for jumping through so many hoops. Bullseye may prove too high a hurdle and we can try out some other ways to repeat our cards like Falcon or the other bouncers.
I'm not sure what build I'll end up with at the end of the first day, but I believe it will involve some combination of the above cards after finding the correct axis between power and consistency.
ScoSco’s Day One Morgan Le Fay Decks
In addition to the process described above, I'll be trying out these builds. Bounce seems very promising and there are multiple potential ways to incorporate Morgan Le Fay with Thanos. There's also a budget deck with a single series 3 card (which could easily be replaced).
Round Monkey
Death Witches
Otherworld Titan
Smidge
DakFay
Budget Dino Le Fay
Variants
Final Thoughts
Morgan Le Fay has a lot of potential. 4/7 with a buff to other cards of 3 is pretty big! However, there is a chance she'll be overshadowed by the other powerful cards this season, including Merlin who comes out the same day. New archetypes always have a chance to fall short of the power levels required to succeed in a given meta. Furthermore, I don't think she's going to have wide utility as a resurrection card—you’ll need to build around her to have success. Decks that necessitate their own archetype are perfect for players who enjoy the process of innovating and brewing new concepts, but are easy skips for those uninterested in the specific new mechanic or whose main goal is just to play whatever deck can win the most. We won't know immediately if there is a competitively powerful Le Fay archetype, but if you're interested in being a part of the process of finding out, she's worth your time and resources.