Best Ares Decks to Try on Day 1 and Strategy Guide

Ares is the last Series 5 card joining Marvel Snap for the January 2025 season, Dark Avengers. It is a 4-Cost, 6 Power card that reads: On Reveal: Compare the Power of the top 3 cards of both decks. If your total is higher, +6 Power.

Today, we will take a deeper look at the new card and, of course, the best decks to try it out in.

Spotlight Cache

Series 5 cards can be purchased for 6,000 Collector’s Tokens from the Token Shop initially as a Weekly Spotlight card, or opened as one of the featured cards in the Spotlight Caches that are found every 120 Levels on the Collection Level Track after Collection Level 500 (until the next new card releases the following week).

Spotlight Cache Week of January 28, 2025: Are Ares, Misery, and Ms. Marvel Worth It?

Strengths and Weaknesses

Compared to Victoria Hand, Moonstone, and Bullseye, Ares lacks an immediate link to an established synergy. Victoria Hand and Moonstone were immediately tied to Wiccan with the card generation mechanic, while Bullseye had Swarm and Scorn written all over it.

Of course, you could pair the new card with high power cards to guarantee winning the comparison, which would link Ares to Surtur and the 10 power cards that typically surround it.

Even though a raw [4/12] doesn’t exist at the moment, there are cards that represent that amount of power, such as Gwenpool and Galacta. Plus, the recent return of Control decks, such as Wiccan Control and Mill, are making Shang-Chi more popular, which a high power synergy would need to protect itself from. This already means Ares will require some very specific deckbuilding to function, which goes against the trend of flexible decks that we are seeing at the moment.

Indeed, unless your points potential if higher than Mister Negative (spoiler: it isn’t), you probably can’t build your deck solely around power. Even Move—a synergy that is able to develop a ton of power—includes some sort of disruption to gain an edge in certain match ups.

With all that said, Ares very likely needs to find more than Surtur to be successful, as that deck’s performance lately is far from enough to be considered competitive. To give you some perspective, the Surtur 10 Power archetype is averaging about a 51.5% Win Rate and 0.15 Cube Average at the moment in the Infinite Rank, and a terrible 48% Win Rate and 0.15 Cube Average in the ranks from 80 to 99.

While a [4/12] is a lot of power, I doubt Ares alone can help this archetype make a comeback. This means there has to be another landing spot for Ares if the card is to be considered a worthy purchase.

To keep things on the topic of synergies that can win Ares‘s On Reveal gamble and aren’t doing well at the moment, let’s take a look at the Darkhawk package.

If your opponent has just one Rock in their top three cards, the comparison basically becomes 3 vs. 2. Unfortunately, Darkhawk has no solid archetypes in this environment (apart from Stature Darkhawk, a deck that I struggle to see including Ares in due to Moon Knight being quite mandatory).

Another deck I considered is Mill since it should easily trigger Ares once the opponent’s deck is empty. That archetype is currently running Death, which tends to be cheaper than four energy and holds 12 power, thus making Ares somewhat obsolete. I’m not sure whether there really is a spot for Ares here, but it was some food for thought.

Fortunately, Ares isn’t just a big power stick. He is also a valuable source of information.

I’m reaching here because Ares pretty much looks like the weakest card of the season. Still, imagine you’re playing a deck with a solid power potential, the kind that is difficult to catch up to once you’re in the lead. On Turn 4, you play Ares, win the bet, and find out that your next three cards represent more power than your opponent’s next three cards. This tells you that the only way your opponent can come back is by assembling combos of cards to create more power, or counter what the points you’re building.

With this information, you’re able to switch to a more disruptive game plan with cards like Alioth and Cosmo. That’s an easy Snap right there. The challenge is finding a deck that is able to mix this power and disruption in the perfect balance. It also needs to be reliable enough to routinely take the lead in the first three turns, something that tends to be heavily based on who manages to win Iron Patriot‘s location.

Here’s a list of cards that are able to play to both aspects. They have enough power for Ares to consistently be a [4/12], and they’re also annoying to your opponents with their disruptive abilities.

Finally, here are a couple of cards that synergize well with Ares‘s ability. For example, Blink can swap Ares when you lose the comparison, while Grand Master can be an extra six power if you are confident you can win it again. Unfortunately, a lot of cards here are low power, which means they decrease your chances of winning the comparison.

The Verdict

Overall, I feel like Ares is the skip of the month. The 10 Power archetype has lost a ton of appeal lately because it’s often too simple to counter compared to cards that grant power all over the field (such as Galacta) and cards that enable energy cheating (such as Wiccan). Ares also requires you to build your deck in a very specific way to consistently win that bet. Indeed, even though a [4/12] is great, a [4/6] is terrible unless it has a fantastic ability attached to it.

I could picture several decks that might use Ares, but, in the end, I don’t expect it to stick anywhere in the long term. And I definitely don’t think it will be worth your Spotlight Keys or 6,000 Collector’s Tokens.

Pre-Release Score:

Ares Decks

Scream has turned to the Doctor Doom pair for help lately since the deck lacked some power to compete with the current meta. While I believe this is still a fine way to build the deck, the surprise factor has worn off, and several cards are able to punish Doctor Doom 2099 quite well (U.S. Agent, Bullseye, etc.).

Ares is basically just power on a stick, and I mentioned above that disruptive cards with enough power to help win the bet can benefit from the information you get from the comparison. As such, the new 4-Cost looks like it might be a decent fit in Scream Move.

Mill is currently doing great with the Destroy synergy as support, so I don’t see a reason to build it in another direction. However, if you fancy testing Ares in Mill, the card is probably best with Stature and Black Bolt (and you should probably cut The Hood from the deck). Then you’re at least guaranteed to get a [4/12] on the last turn when your opponent’s deck is empty.

Full disclosure: Wiccan is probably better than Ares in any deck where you have a good chance of spending all your energy in the first three turns.

This feels like a bad version of the current Wiccan Control deck. For the Darkhawk aficionados, this is probably as good as it gets if you want to play Stature Darkhawk due to Moon Knight interfering with Ares.

I doubt this will be good enough, but Surtur still remains an obvious synergy to test with Ares.

I have a bit more faith in an Arishem Surtur deck. It is more risky to hit Ares‘s condition, but the information you get about your power and your opponent’s power can be very valuable to plan your next turns.

I know the Infinity Stones are likely a bad inclusion for Ares, but you’re expecting to highroll with this kind of deck anyway.

Variants

Closing Thoughts

I completely missed Daken with Bullseye so I’m definitely fallible, and these are nothing but theorycraft ideas at the end of the day. Still, when I have to scrap so many ideas for a card, it is typically a sign that it needs a future release or a balance update to gain some appeal.

That is exactly how I would define Ares at the moment; it isn’t bad enough that I would say it’s a waste of resources, but I don’t see a deck that is both good enough for and in need of Ares at the moment.

Either you pick a solid archetype (where Ares is decent but not necessary) like Scream Move or Mill, or you hope Ares can revive a synergy that has fallen from grace (where Ares is unlikely to make a big enough impact), which I struggle to see happening considering how far behind the 10 Power archetype is at the moment.

I’m keeping my Spotlight Keys for the next season, but if you are hopeful that the Surtur deck will make a comeback and you’re willing to spend resources to find out, go for it!

I hope this review of the new card was helpful. Feel free to share your opinions and excitement about the card in the comments. You can find everyone on the Marvel Snap Zone team in our community discord to have a chat or ask any questions.

Good Game Everyone!