Pixie Strikes Back
The season pass card, Hope Summers, isn't the only new card coming to Marvel Snap this week. We've also got a very cool card in Pixie. Pixie’s effect is undeniably powerful and unique. Pixie decks are likely to become their own archetype in the same vein as Mr. Negative decks. But will Pixie be able to compete in a crowded meta, or does she fall into the “just for fun” category?
Card Function
At her core, Pixie is an energy cheat. Pixie randomly shuffles the costs of the cards in your deck. Unlike her initial datamine, she only swaps the costs of cards that started in your deck. This will likely prevent her from becoming just another in a long line of Thanos tools, but we also lose any functionality with Mjolnir and Stormbreaker. Subterranea could have become fun! Also, cards of the same cost can swap with each other, meaning there is a chance your Wasp and Yellowjacket will swap with each other and stay at 0. You have about a 42% chance of being able to play Pixie on turn two, which leaves you with only four draws from your shuffled deck.
The random element of her design may hold Pixie down a bit, but there will also be some incredible power spikes.
Mobius M. Mobius
Any talk about Pixie has to start with everyone's favorite TVA agent and jet ski enthusiast. Pixie will swap the costs of the cards in your deck, but Mobius will prevent the cost of the smaller cards from increasing. For example, if you swap a Magneto and a Wasp, you'll end up with a 0/12 Magneto and a 6/1 Wasp. However, Mobius will prevent Wasp's cost from increasing, and both Wasp and Magneto will cost zero. I expect nearly every deck with Pixie to include Mobius and Pixie on turn 2 with Mobius on 3 will be a solid Snap condition. Because Mobius will be so common on day 1, you should expect to see many of his counters, Rogue and Enchantress.
Deck Construction Philosophy
There are a few ways to approach the construction of a Pixie deck. I think a relatively even distribution of very low-cost (0,1) and high-cost (mostly 6) cards will work, but I plan to try different ratios to see what works best. I think a deck with many low-cost cards and just a couple of high-impact, high-roll 6-cost cards could work well. There are endless great ideas for Pixie. You could make a destroy version to leverage a cheap Arnim Zola. A full casino version with Lockjaw and Hela also sounds fun. How about a move deck where you convert unused movers into a cheap Heimdall? The sky's the limit with Pixie, and I hope the community pushes the boundaries with her.
Primary Synergies
Cards with extreme costs are going to synergize best with Pixie. Wasp and Yellow jacket are our two zero cost cards. Jane Foster will benefit from grabbing the swapped cards out of our deck. Hit Monkey always shows up where many low-cost cards are being played. Also, start brainstorming which abilities on higher-cost cards feel most potent when divorced from their cost. Doctor Doom, Magneto, Alioth, Galactus, Vision, Iron Man, Arnim Zola, and Odin should come immediately to mind.
ScoSco's Day One Pixie Decks
High/Low Pixie
I expect the basic shape of most day-one Pixie decks to look like this. There are low and high costs, and you're hoping to swap them. We can incorporate cards like Lockjaw and Jane Foster, but let's start here.
Conservative Pixie
This is a more conservative build for Pixie. We can win without her, but we can crush when she high rolls.
Hope Pixie
We can incorporate the new season pass card to put Pixie into a ramp list. Ramp concepts can work well with Pixie since she is a different type of ramp.
Monkey Gone to Heaven
Pixie Dust
Pixie Pop
Here is a trio of related decks that explore Pixie in a bounce shell. These lists also notably don't use Mobius. I think it is important to explore whether or not Pixie needs Mobius to survive. These bounce concepts are built so that we don't need Mobius. The concept here is simple: we're playing a pretty regular bounce deck and allowing Pixie to occasionally high roll and grant us access to the types of cards that bounce doesn't generally have access to or room in its energy curve for. Many small cards here are fine to sacrifice to Pixie's whims because they aren't the type of cards we want to play late anyway. Work with what you get early and convert the cards hiding in the deck into better value.
Here Comes Your Man
The urge to build around Pixie is strong, but I think there is a good chance she works as a Plan B as well. This is just one example of a deck that can go ahead and execute its plan without her. Pixie can achieve two powerful things in this role. 1) She can squeeze extra value out of our last couple of draws by occasionally making them cheaper. 2) She allows us to shoot for a last chance Hail Mary when things are going badly for us (1-cost Shang?).
Thanos Anyway
Hear me out. I know the stones do not swap costs (probably because the interaction proved too powerful in internal testing). But Thanos can still get a lot out of Pixie. Playing Nico means we could draw a huge 1-cost card in games where we draw Mind Stone late. In the end, everything is a Thanos card.
Conclusion
Why are you playing Marvel Snap? Pixie is everything we should be playing the game for. She is weird, new, and fun. Like all of the most fun cards in Snap's history, she will lead to some hilarious moments. She's going to create an entirely new archetype. I'm not sure if that archetype will be top-tier competitive or not. Usually, I would only tell you to buy a card that was certain to be highly competitive. But Pixie is special. She is a fun deck-building and theory-crafting challenge. Just think about what those first 12 hours after Pixie comes out will be like (especially with mana queen Hope Summers coming out simultaneously). You want to be a part of that. Buy Pixie.
This awesome Stuart Immonen variant from the cover of Pixie Strikes Back #1 comes out the same day she's released.
Mobius is available at the same time, and you will need both him and Pixie for full effect. Spider-Ham is a good, underplayed card, so this is also a perfect chance to grab him if you don't own him yet.
