How to Earn Mastery XP and Get Mastery Finishes & Flares

Marvel SNAP has finally introduced the highly anticipated Character Mastery feature, bringing a range of new flares and finishes to the game. However, not all players are thrilled with this addition, as many believe it’s another attempt by the developers to push microtransactions—something Marvel SNAP has faced criticism for in the past.

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While we’ll dive into the controversies surrounding Character Mastery and Mastery Caches later, let’s first break down what the feature is, how it works, how to use it, and what rewards it offers. Here’s everything you need to know about Character Mastery in Marvel SNAP.

What Is Character Mastery in Marvel SNAP?

Character Mastery is a new progression system for individual cards. As you level up on the Mastery bar, you unlock new flares, finishes, and reaction emojis. This system is card-specific, with each character having its own 30-level progression bar, which you fill by earning Mastery XP.

You can think of Character Mastery as similar to Marvel SNAP’s Collection Level. Upgrading cards will now boost your overall Collection Level while also earning XP for the specific character you’re upgrading. The key difference is that Mastery is purely cosmetic, whereas Collection Level impacts gameplay by unlocking new cards and resources.

How to Access Character Mastery

1. Go to your card collection.
2. Select a card.
3. Click “Mastery” at the top.

When you select a card in your collection, you’ll see its Character Mastery progression in the top-left corner. To view the full progression for that card, click the “Mastery” button at the top.

To quickly find cards that have progressed in the Character Mastery tracker and have collectible rewards, filter your cards by the new “Mastery” tag. This will display all rewarded characters, marked by a glowing diamond icon above them.

If you use the Mastery tag in reverse, you’ll see cards that can be decorated with Mastery flares and finishes.

How Do You Earn Character Mastery XP?

In Marvel SNAP, there are two ways to earn Mastery XP: acquiring new variants of cards and performing Infinity Splits. Each time you purchase or unlock a new card variant, you can earn between 25 and 250 Mastery XP, depending on the variant’s rarity. Additionally, every time you Split a card, you earn 15 Mastery XP.

To unlock all Mastery Caches for a character and max out its cosmetics, you’ll need to gather a total of 1,300 Mastery XP. To put that in perspective, you’d have to reach Infinity Split with the same card 87 times or collect five of its Ultimate Variants to collect that amount of XP.

The table below shows the details of Mastery XP distribution.

Mastery XP Earned Per Action

How to Equip Mastery Flares and Finishes

1. Select a card you’ve maxed out. (Maxing out a card means you’ve earned three total Infinity Splits on any three or one single Character, plus an additional Infinity Split on each new Character that you want to customize.)
2. Tap “Custom Card.”
3. Click the edit button next to “Make a Deck” (the pen icon).
4. Choose a cosmetic item from the Mastery flares or finishes to equip on the card.
5. Click “Save” to use this variant in decks.

Keep in mind that you can only equip one flare or finish at a time, not a combo of both. Also, any acquired flare or finish will only be available after you’ve unlocked the Costume Card feature, which is accessible once you hit Infinity Split at least once with that specific card.

What Are the Mastery Cache Rewards?

Character Mastery rewards you with Mastery Caches, loot boxes that contain new flares and finishes. Mastery Caches are divided into three tiers, with higher tiers offering rarer cosmetics. Each tier has eight levels, with each level providing a chance to unlock cosmetic rewards.

Why Fans Aren’t Happy with SNAP’s Character Mastery

• Fans were hoping the feature would allow mix-and-match card customization, but it doesn’t.
• The new flare and finishes make it harder to target desired outcomes from Infinity Splits.
• Some specific flares and finishes—like Banana—seem to appear more frequently than others.
• The Mastery XP progression favors pay-to-play players, pushing the purchase of new variants, which doesn’t align with how F2P players engage with Marvel SNAP.

Marvel SNAP fans are disappointed that Character Mastery isn’t what it was advertised. Before its release, players saw it as a way to customize cards by unlocking cosmetics to create unique variants. However, that turned out to be a misunderstanding.

The rewards from Character Mastery are added to your future Infinity Split pool, meaning they are random outcomes of Splits, which is why fans are frustrated. There’s no guaranteed way to get the desired finish and fare combo. Every time you Split a card, a new variant with your unlocked cosmetics is randomly generated, making a “God Split” nearly impossible.

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Released

October 30, 2024

Developer(s)

DeNA, Creatures Inc.