If you hate disruption cards like Debrii, Black Widow, and Green Goblin, you’ll want to stay away from Marvel Snap, as another disruption card is here in White Widow. But is she worth your resources? Let’s find out.
How White Widow Works in Marvel Snap
White Widow is one of the more complicated cards in Marvel Snap due to its wording and the fact that it is technically two cards that combine the abilities of Debrii, Black Widow, and Green Goblin. Her ability reads: “On Reveal: Add a Widow’s Kiss to your opponent’s side of this location.”
The Widow’s Kiss itself reads: Ongoing: This has -4 Power. Disable this ability if your side of this location is full.
The confusion comes from who the ‘your’ belongs to in the text of the Widow’s Kiss — you or your opponent. As the Widow’s Kiss is on your opponent’s side of the board, it refers to them, meaning that if they fill up the other 3 spots of the location if the Widow’s Kiss, it will become a 0 power card rather than -4.
Also, as its -4 is tied to an Ongoing effect, it can also be disabled by Enchantress to become a 0 power card. Even if the Widow’s Kiss becomes a 0 power card, it still has utility by forcing your opponent to play into that lane and taking up valuable space.
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If your opponent’s side of the board is already full, the Widow’s Kiss will not appear there. You can destroy a card on your opponent’s side of the board to reactivate Widow’s Kiss, such as sitting a card with Shang-Chi there.
Best White Widow Decks in Marvel Snap
Due to her rather unique effect, there isn’t currently a deck White Widow slides into naturally. That said, I believe there are two decks where she’ll shine: an emerging Cannonball control and a Darkhawk deck that pairs her with Black Widow.
Here’s the first list, which slots White Widow into a Cannonball control deck that has taken hold of the meta in the last week:
- Nebula
- Daredevil
- White Widow
- Jeff!
- Cosmo
- Baron Zemo
- Gladiator
- Shang-Chi
- Iron Lad
- Professor X
- Cannonball
- Red Hulk
This deck now has two cards that dictate where your opponent will want to play: Nebula and White Widow. Playing these two cards in separate locations will cause quite a headache for your opponent as they try to negate the power of both; in turn, you can then drop Professor X and Cannonball to great effect, especially if they fill the White Widow location so Cannonball destroys a card rather than pushes it elsewhere. Red Hulk is an alternative win condition to drop down in a lane if you’ve already won it with Cannonball.
If you don’t have Cannonball but want to pick up White Widow, you can also try pairing her with fellow assassin Black Widow in a Darkhawk control-style deck. Here’s the list:
- The Hood
- Korg
- White Widow
- Black Widow
- Red Guardian
- Rock Slide
- Shang-Chi
- Iron Lad
- Sentry
- Darkhawk
- Annihilus
- Red Hulk
You may wonder if there’s some anti-synergy here with Annihilus passing cards over to your opponent’s side of the board that may dilute the power of White Widow; however, most players play in the far right lane to negate the effect of Sentry’s void. This allows you to play White Widow left or middle to give your opponent a dilemma: negate White Widow’s effect or play right to counter an incoming Sentry. Either way, you’re controlling how they play the game.
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If the White Widow, Annihilus, and Sentry package doesn’t work out, playing the Korg, Rock Slide, Black Widow, and Darkhawk package followed by a high-powered Red Hulk is enough to win plenty of games.
White Widow Counters in Marvel Snap
White Widow’s initial ability is countered by Cosmo and the Widow’s Kiss itself is countered by Enchantress; however, it’s probably best to counter the style of decks that White Widow will find herself in rather than the card itself: namely, junk and control style decks. Three common archetypes stand out as White Widow counters: Annihilus decks that pass the Widow’s Kiss back to the opponent (or a Loki deck that steals an Annihilus to do the same), Destroy decks that can eat the Widow’s Kiss with Carnage, or Zoo decks that can simply buff the Widow’s Kiss with Blue Marvel and negate the -4 power.
Who is White Widow?
White Widow, much like Black Widow, is a former Soviet super assassin turned hero. Also known as Yelena Belova, White Widow at first idolized the Black Widow we all know and love — Natasha Romanova — and dedicated herself to surpassing her skill. They often fought against one another, though Romanova made it her personal mission to help Belova realize her government was using her. White Widow spent some time joining up with several insidious factions, such as Hydra and A.I.M., before setting off on her own and adopting the White Widow alias.
Is White Widow Worth Your Spotlight Cache Keys or Collector’s Tokens?
As clogging effects are immensely powerful in Marvel Snap, I would say that White Widow barely crosses the threshold of being worth your Spotlight Cache keys, if you have them available; however, I would argue against using 6000 Collector’s Tokens on her. She is at her core a 2 cost, 6 power card (like Maximus) that has the upside of controlling your opponent’s plays and taking up valuable space. She is, in essence, one of the better 2 cost cards in the game but requires a very specific application to make the most of her Widow’s Kiss.
