Marvel Snap: Building The Best Deck For All Player Levels

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Meme Lord
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This guide is for building the best decks for beginner to advancing players. For the top level best meta decks in Marvel Snap see our page here on best decks in the game.

This guide is to help players make decks for competitive season rankings of all levels in Marvel Snap. From beginner (Starter Cards and Pool 1) to current top level meta (Pool 3 and Series 4/5), we are here to help create tips and walkthroughs on deck building in Marvel Snap. There is much to picking the right cards to play and making combos with decks in this card collecting game. So we will dive in. This guide will be updated regularly so be sure to check back and progress along as we level!

Trying to keep things as simple as possible when deck building in a game like Marvel Snap can be quite the challenge! So it is worth noting and giving a few tips now for deck building. Although the decks created and listed below fall into certain categories, it is worth mentioning many decks will cross over. Lets take the Devil Dinosaur deck for example. Devil Dinosaur is a very powerful card found in pool one, so, it makes a great starting deck to win and move up rank. However, as you progress in game and unlock more cards, you may add new cards to the deck, replacing lower tier cards as you play. So the Devil Dinosaur Deck may be a well beginner pool one deck, but there are more advanced decks for meta and later pools based on this character card.

Another important note is as you unlock cards in later pools, specially pool 3 and up, you may not have all the cards other players have making decks. Therefor more late/end game and meta style decks you find might not match your card collection. This helps make the game more interesting and deck building unique and competitive. So final tip here on deck building. Use this guide on how some cards combo and work well together. But use your own skills and collection to create the best deck for you!

Tip! In Marvel Snap there is a thing called Hot Locations. This means a certain location is extremely likely to show up each game. Choosing a deck, or certain cards to play can increase your chances to win. Such as a location that destroys cards, throw in Nova for a quick team boost on your other cards.

Best Decks In Marvel Snap List

Player Level Decks | Ability/Theme Decks | Character (Single/Combo) Decks

Deck lists are divided into 3 categories: Player Level (Card Pools), Abilities/Themes (Ongoing Deck, Control Deck, Cost Deck), and by character cards (Jubilee, Devil Dinosaur, Death/Wave). This is also separate from our top meta deck list.

Player Level (Collection Level/Pool Decks)

These decks are based on the player level and are great for getting started. These cards will be more beginner focused than the other deck lists such as Ability/Theme Decks and Character Decks. Use these decks to get more familiar with the game and advance your skills. As you progress it may become more a challenge to recreate every deck by exact card. So unlike the other deck lists, we will start more focused on the early beginning and intermediate level of play. The other deck lists will focus on more advanced decks and work up to meta decks.

Pool One Decks (Collection Level 1-24)

There are 72 cards included with starter cards (13), recruit season (5) collection start (8)and pool 1 (46). Beginner decks are available for all new players. They are great for getting to know all of the mechanics and tactics of the game. It is important to know as you move out of the early card pools, these decks won’t cut it. They can be edited and upgraded with new and better cards though. Although there are a few move, discard and destroy cards in the starter and pool one card collection, you won’t really see them work until later pools and series. Devil Dinosaur Deck and Ongoing Deck are some better decks for advancing in pool one.

Devil Dinosaur Deck (Pool 1/Beginner)

Devil Dinosaur Deck is a great beginner deck. Devil Dinosaur continues to be a power force to recognize, even with the current meta decks! It shows how one card can be the focus of any deck, and also has much room for improvement as you progress through the game and upgrade your collection. The Dino deck relies on keeping a full hand of cards, powering up Devil Dinosaur as a powerhouse to guarantee one location win. In early game this is done with draw cards such as Mantis, Cable, and if you get her early in pool 1, White Queen. Another reason this is a great starter deck is because many cards are easily replaced with others if missing, still containing much power.

Devil Dinosaur is easily countered by later pool cards Shang Chi and Enchantress. However he can be protected by using Armor or Cosmo. Armor and Cosmo are also early obtained cards that continue to hold value through the progression and game meta. Onslaught works well with other ongoing ability cards to ensure a second location win, or if you’re battling out for one big location, boosting Devil Dino for double damage. As mentioned, this is a more workable deck than most. Using other pool one cards such as Namor or Jessica Jones can help win other location lanes for a win.

Squirrel Army/Zoo Deck (Pool 1/Beginner)

Now we are going from a personal favorite deck, Devil Dino deck, to one of my least favorites popular decks, but it can work. The army/zoo style of the Squirrel Army deck works by dominating all lanes and filling them up. This is a great beginning deck to show how you can have two or more different strategies of play. If you think they may fight off your one cost cards, you can use Carnage to boost up damage on a single card. Also, instead of playing Kazar or Blue Marvel, Gamora may be used to solidify lane damage. It is important to have a one or two powerful higher cost cards to balance out this deck.

The Squirrel Army/Zoo deck doesn’t have as much play in changing cards like the previous and following decks. But, it does build experience by playing more on trying to read your opponent and their next move. It is more strategic, which can be more fun then a draw and play deck. White Tiger is a great swap in this deck, but stay away from solo lane cards such as Namor.

Tip! After some much trial, it seems obvious now that the card Angela is great for just about any army/zoo deck. Specially with move abilities like Nightcrawlers. Another great thing about using Angela with zoo decks is even if cards are destroyed she will keep her bonus.

Killmonger can be a huge threat to this deck. I often have Killmonger in deck in case of decks like this. That is why it is good to have an alternative plan when playing any one cost army decks.

Ongoing Deck (Pool 1/Beginner)

This is our first deck mentioned that works on abilities. Many decks are based off abilities such as ongoing, reveal, move, destroy, and discard. I’ve even built decks based on draw cards. Ongoing decks are full of well, ongoing cards, and wow do they work well together. There are many ongoing cards to choose from, but they have to work well together. Too many ongoing decks built have ongoing cards for the sake of it. Although Spectrum adds +2 power to all ongoing, you may not need some ongoing abilities like the Lizards or Red Skull. However, many consider Ebony Maw and Lizard great cards despite their damaging ongoing abilities. This is thanks to Spectrum buffing up all ongoing cards.

It is worth noting that from the first pool, there isn’t but one ongoing card that costs one energy to play, Ant-Man. And the two cost ongoing cards in pool one and below aren’t too impressive. So you may want to add some other cards that aren’t ongoing so you aren’t wasting turns. This deck has many options for upgrades and swapping cards. The ongoing deck also plays well in later game. If you enjoy this deck, just wait until later in game when you get Wong!

Reveal Deck (Pool 1/Beginner)

A reveal deck in early game seems almost useless without Odin. Lucky, he is part of the early collection and you will get him. Odin is a great last turn play but is predictable if all you are playing is On Reveal cards. Odin doubles all revealed effects, which benefits almost every card! Cable and sentinel are the only cards that don’t benefit from Odin.

The deck we have listed for example includes all On Reveal cards, but it isn’t necessary. You may want to change it up with some other valuable cards. One hard choice is using white Tiger or Spider-Woman. White Tiger allows you to move a 7 power tiger to an unplayable location, while Spider-Woman does a bit more damage to the opposing cards on location. You could play both, in case Odin isn’t really needed. But, Odin is already an 8 power cards himself.

Control/Balance Deck (Pool 1/Beginner)

More on this coming soon. But until then, here are some control cards to get started: Cosmo, Enchantress, Professor X, Scarlet Witch, Uatu The Watch, and possibly even Elektra. Tip! Don’t play Elektra first, wait till she is needed.

Control decks are great decks that give the player more planning and adapting plays. Control decks can be very fun, and last all the way up to meta. I’ve had many wins with control decks and still play them mostly. The control deck is one of the harder decks to build using starter and pool 1 cards. But it is definitely worth discussing, as it is important for understanding tactics and meta in game. Also, it can be really fun to play control decks.

The control deck is one deck that uses many of the meta cards. It’s great to play and be familiar with, as it has many counter and game changer cards. Some of these cards will stay in a control deck for a long time. Cosmos is always a good counter card for on reveal cards, just as Enchantress is great for countering ongoing cards. Armor counters destroy decks and destroy cards like Nova and Bucky Barnes. Elektra isn’t necessary and is easily replaced by Killmonger in later decks. Professor X can close out army decks and secure a lane you are winning. Professor X works well with Gamora too. Uatu is there just for that extra control of knowing what locations are coming, which can easily help win the game. This deck doesn’t seem like much, but can really improve your skills all around by playing and building on it.

Pool Two Decks (Collection Level 222-474)

There are 97 cards from previous collections(72) and from pool 2(25). These 25 new cards change much of the game play in a few ways. As you progress through pool 2 you will notice more of how many decks there are and how they work. Discard, move, and destroy decks are more playable with a few new cards like Vulture and Carnage. And there are more character card based decks thanks to cards like Apocalypse, Jubilee, and Infinaut. A couple of very important meta cards are introduced, Killmonger and Shang Chi. Some unique deck building and more challenging games start here. And Marvel Snap continues to do that from here on out!

Jubilee/Infinaut Deck (Pool 2/Intermediate)

Jubilee and Infinaut are two cards that are a game changer once unlocked. Decks can be built around these cards alone. Put these two together with some high level cards, and Sunspot to soak up the unspent energy on turn 5, (that is if Jubilee doesn’t summon Infinaut first!) and you got a pretty intimidating board presence. Odin is also a great card addition to this deck, increasing the free card play by Jubilee by one.

This deck really shows off the power of pool 2. For fun I even threw in Hobgoblin from pool 2. Quicksilver is added to control more of the draw since he is automatically added on turn one. You could do the same with adding American Chavez to the deck. Since she stays in your deck until turn 6, she has more a chance to be drawn with Jubilee. This also allows for a Infinaut play.

Discard/Apocalypse Deck (Pool 2/Intermediate)

Although discard ability cards exist in earlier pools, its not until pool 2 that you can really start building a playable discard deck. Pool 2 introduces Morbius and Swarm, who make a discard deck viable. Apocalypse is the big bad 6 cost. And Strong Guy finally makes sense as a card. Now those previous discards cards can really make a play.

The most challenging part of playing a discard deck is it relies heavily on drawing a good hand. Things can go bad easily, but its really nice when things play out. Trying to balance having cards to play and the right ones being discarded seem all about luck. Also, its nice to have a reason to build a deck that uses Wolverine.
See all discard cards here.

Control/Counter Deck (Pool 2/Intermediate)

This deck builds off of the pool 1 control deck. Much like the discard deck, the control deck really finds its power starting in pool 2. With great counter cards like Killmonger and Shang Chi, you can now get rid of those pesky 1 cost cards, and take out any cards with 9 or more power. Rhino can knock out any unwanted locations. And Iceman can annoy your opponent by raising card cost by one.

Although there are many options for creating a control deck with pool 2 cards, this deck goes a bit more of the annoying route for opponent. Leech destroys their abilities, Iceman raises cost, while Scorpion and Spider-Woman takes away their damage power.

Other cards that may be used in a control deck: Nova, Lizard, Professor X and/or Scarlet Witch.

Tip! Playing Uatu in the first couple turns and snapping can sometimes intimidate and scare off opponents.

Pool Three Decks (Collection Level 486-Up)

Pool Three introduces 74 new cards! This is when many more decks come into play, and players get way more closer to building decks based on the current game meta. Key cards for top meta decks like Aero, Death, Destroyer, Leader, and Gambit are introduced, along with many others. Also most players begin to build decks around the cards they unlock. Cards are more random in collection caches, and even series 4 and 5 cards can start dropping. However we will still focus on only using cards from pool 3 and before until we get into meta decks.

Destroy/Destroyer Deck (Pool 3)

The Destroyer deck focuses on either preparing to destroy all your cards in play, or protecting them with Armor, Cosmo, and Professor X. Usually you will end up doing a bit of both. This is a fun deck and one of the early meta plays. The Goblins, Hobgoblin and Green Goblin are great additions with Destroyer since the go to the opponents side. And, if they are sent back with Odin or somehow they will be destroyed as well. Bucky Barnes and Nova are great for Destroyer, or if you decide not to use his ability carnage can still gain their bonus affect. Destroyer deck, much like the Dino deck, is often countered and prepared for, but still has a good win rate.

Storm/Jessica Jones/Infinaut Deck (Pool 3)

This is a deck I have to brag about real quick! While testing many Pool 3 decks, I went across this deck. To give credit it was played by a player named Wardog2A. It doesn’t really matter what else was in the deck. I was beaten by three cards! Storm played on round 3, followed by Jessica Jones. That lane was won. Then no play on round 5, followed by Infinaut on round 6! It was a simple but affecting play. After all the thought put into some decks, it was nice to see a deck like this work. Good job Wardog2A! Another good card for this deck are Sunspot, as usual with Infinaut.

Leech Leader Deck (Pool 3)

Okay, now we are getting into the current meta for Marvel Snap as of December 2022, the Cosmic Power. Even though the Leech/Leader deck is a current top deck, it still relies heavily on cards from series 3 and under. The idea of this deck is to stop the late game big turn plans of your opponent by stopping their abilities with Leech on turn 5, then copying their cards with Leader on turn 6. This deck is turning the meta upside down and can be considered an anti-meta deck. So its good to be aware of. Other good cards for the Leach and Leader combo deck are Aero and Doctor Doom.

Cards to look out for when playing this deck are Red Skull, Infinaut, and Maw. These cards can counter the Leech/Leader combo. All these cards are very powerful but have a negative acting ability. Taking them away with Leech can give the other player an advantage. A Patriot deck is probably the number one counter deck for the Leader/Leech combo. Simply because most the cards in a Patriot deck already have no ability, but are buffed up by Patriot. Also, it hasn’t been tested yet but I could see a Mister Negative deck being a good counter to a Leach and Leader deck as well.
See more on this deck.

Noted Decks:
Agatha Deck
Dino P3 Deck
Gambit Deck
BAEro Deck
Patriot Deck

More decks are coming soon as we unlock new cards and test new decks. Hopefully we can get it done before Knull and Galactus destroys us all.

Once you get into Pool/Series 3 and build up your card collection, you can start focusing on more meta decks. Check out our page on the best meta decks here.