Marvel’s Midnight Suns: How to apply mods to cards and abilities

A bit early on in Marvel’s Midnight Suns, you’ll be able to craft and upgrade your cards. Further onward, however, there’s a system that allows you to add more perks and characteristics. Here’s our Marvel’s Midnight Suns card mods guide to help you apply new effects to your abilities via the Crucible.

Note: For more information, check out our Marvel’s Midnight Suns guides and features hub. Likewise, you can take a look at our main guide regarding card collecting/acquisition.

Marvel’s Midnight Suns card mods guide – How to get new effects for your abilities via the Crucible

To be frank, I’m not actually sure when card mods are first unlocked in Marvel’s Midnight Suns. I remember just grinding side missions and getting rewards from Gamma Coils. Suddenly, I received a notification that a character received a modded card. It felt so random, so I’m uncertain if it’s tied to my character’s level or campaign progression.

What’s clear, however, are these tidbits:

• Modded cards have a star icon in the upper-left corner.
• You can get them randomly when you open Gamma Coils, as rewards from Hero Ops, or handed to you when you complete some Hero Requests.
• They provide nifty effects on top of the upgraded variants, and some of these can completely change the way you approach a fight. For instance, some cards may get the “Free” perk, which means they won’t use a Card Play. Others, meanwhile, give bonus Heroism or Redraws.

Screenshot by PC Invasion

The Crucible

Now, if you do wish to apply and reroll card mods in Marvel’s Midnight Suns, you’re going to need the Crucible. It requires the following:

• Complete six missions with Blade in the team.
• Advance to Research Level 6.
• Complete the Blood, Sweat, and Tears tech.
• Spend credits to construct the Crucible upgrade in the Yard.

Screenshot by PC Invasion

Applying and rerolling mods

Check out the Yard for the following functions:

• For unmodded cards – You must first obtain/craft a duplicate so you can get the upgraded variant. Only upgraded cards may have mods applied to them.
• For modded cards without an upgrade – You can choose the Upgrade Abilities option. This will turn the card into the upgraded variant. This action does not require a duplicate, though it’s quite costly in terms of Essences, too. You can see a comparison in the images below (i.e., the basic version versus the modded version of Lethal Pounce).

Now, as for applying card mods to your abilities in Marvel’s Midnight Suns, do take note that this is possible for everything, including legendaries. The downside, however, is that there seems to be a small selection pool of mods that can appear (up to three different options). You won’t get to see which options are available unless you go through with the action.

Likewise, when you first apply a mod, it will cost 10x Credits, a lot of Essence, and a Legendary Bllueprint (for Legendary Cards). Moreover, if you reroll the mod, it will still cost Credits, but only a smaller amount of Essence. Because there’s some randomness involved, and because you won’t know what you could possibly get, I suggest making a backup save so you don’t accidentally waste your resources.

At the very least, here’s what you’ll want to grab:

• If a card can have a “Free” mod, that’s easily a top-tier choice since it won’t use up your Card Plays. I know that Magik’s Reinforcement ability has this as a possible mod.
• Meanwhile, “Draw on KO” or “X effect on KO” is helpful if you have high damage abilities or those with the “Quick” perk already. One example is the Hunter’s Quick Slash, which can let you draw two cards on a single KO. Likewise, Ghost Rider’s Lash may have this, too, so there’s a chance you’d receive Hell Ride in your hand.
• Getting the “Gain X Redraws” trait is quite decent. If you manage to obtain this for Captain Marvel’s One Step Ahead, then you could have the ideal powers set up for Go Binary.
• It’s also possible to see the “X effect on Redraw” mod. You can choose this if you think a card won’t always be played the moment it becomes available. Nico Minoru’s abilities are good examples, since RNG might not be in your favor.

Marvel’s Midnight Suns is available via Steam.