Marvel Snap has exploded onto the scene with some bite-sized card-battling action, and if you are familiar with card games, you might have recognized certain kinds of decks and game mechanics similar to other card games out there.
But whether you’re a veteran or new to card-battling games, Snap has its own meta-game and decks that work well when you’re trying to climb ranks and earn those precious cubes. In this guide, we’ve selected five different decks that are both accessible and competitive for newer players.
On Reveal
Snap has many cards with On Reveal effects, and some of them can be quite game-changing. You can get the best out of these when you combine them with the power of Odin, who can re-trigger any On Reveal effects on cards already played in the same location. This is one of the first decks for which Snap gives you a good range of tools and is one of the best early decks.
In the pool one version, this deck gives you many tools to gain power and create strong lanes by combining cards like Hawkeye, Angela, Wolfsbane, and Jessica Jones. White Tiger, followed by Odin, is a classic combo that drops lots of power onto the board.
When you reach pool two, you can take the deck in a different direction by using Jubilee to pull powerful cards like Infinaut from your deck straight to the board. Odin gives you a second chance to do this — just make sure you leave enough room in the Jubilee lane. This deck also brings Iceman and Scorpion in for early-game opponent disruption, a combo that will still be viable even at much higher collection levels.
Devil Dino
Devil Dinosaur is a very fun card that can reach incredible levels of power when you have a large hand. To do that, you must either have cards added to your hand from Locations or play other cards that add cards to your hand — and this deck includes cards that do just that.
In Pool One, we already have the tools we need to give Dino power with cards like Cable, Sentinel, White Queen, and, best of all, Moon Girl. Moon Girl does need some careful use, though, as if you fill your hand with cards, you will not draw anymore, so don’t use her until you already have Dino in hand.
The Pool Two version adds some more card generation in Agent 13 and another card that benefits from all the cards you will be adding to your hand — The Collector. He has the benefit of being an early game drop, so you can put him on the board and watch him power up as you add cards to feed Dino. You can continue to be very competitive with this strong deck into the higher ranks and enhance with Pool 3 cards like Arnim Zola, Leader, and Quinjet.
KaZoo
Zoo Decks are a popular archetype in many card games, based around flooding the board with low-cost minions and buffing them up to make them strong. Snap supports this playstyle very well for new players, with this deck featuring Ka-Zar. His Ongoing ability will give all of your 1-Cost cards +1 Power, so the bulk of this deck is filled with 1-Cost Cards that you can throw down.
Squirrel Girl is a key card here because she generates three one-drops for the price of one. An important point to remember is you do not necessarily need to play your 1-cost cards as soon as you are able. You can save up many of them for later turns once Ka-Zar or Blue Marvel is on the table to surprise your opponent with a burst of power.
Your Pool 2 version need not look much different, just subbing in some superior 1-drops in Sunspot and Iceman, who are both great early-game cards.
When you rise in collection level, you will encounter another similar Zoo deck based around using Patriot to buff cards without any abilities. This is an excellent deck to branch into if you enjoy the Zoo playstyle.
Discard
Discard is another popular archetype in card games, and it can be very effective in Marvel Snap. Discard can be harder for newer players at lower collection levels because some of its best cards are found in Series 3. But this list can still be very effective, and it will be very satisfying when you play a hugely buffed-up Apocalypse on board.
The general principle of our discard cards is that they have high power for their cost because of the drawback that we are throwing other cards away. When the card we discard is Apocalypse, that drawback is removed because we keep him and power him up. But discard decks are random by nature, and you will have games where you always seem to discard the wrong cards. As your collection grows, you will get more and more cards that solve that problem, but when starting out, we can help ourselves by including some card generation in the deck with Sentinel, Cable, and White Queen. The rest of the deck is made up of control tools.
When you reach Pool 2, you can add Morbius, who is a great early-game card that benefits from all your discards; and Swarm, which is a great asset in hand when discarding, as it will give you more 0-cost Swarms that you can play late in the game for surprise board swings.
Discard is a deck that gets better and better as you add cards from Pool 3, like Colleen Wing, Gambit, Ghost Rider, and Hela, and can be played at the highest competitive levels.
Move
This is probably the hardest of our starter decks to play, but it has great versatility and can reach surprising power levels. The essence of the deck is cards that activate special abilities when they are moved, either by location or, ideally, by your other cards. Cards that move require space to move into — so you often need to think very carefully about the order in which you play cards, trigger effects, and where everyone is going to end up.
The core cards that let you move other cards are Iron Fist, Doctor Strange, and Heimdall. These cause the instant movement of one or more cards. The main card that you want to move to begin with is Multiple Man, which has the unique effect of leaving a copy of himself behind. You can combo him with Hulkbuster to create a high-power card that you can move around the board while creating high-powered copies as he goes.
Once you reach pool 2, you can add Cloak, who allows movement of cards (by both players) the following turn, as well as Kraven, who gains power when either player’s cards move to his location, and Vulture, who gains power when he moves.
In Pool 3, you can add even more movement abilities with cards like Human Torch and Dagger and can play Miles Morales very cheaply the turn after any cards move. Move decks can be very strong and have some insane combo potential, but they definitely require some hard thinking and careful card placement.
