Best Gilgamesh Decks to Try on Day 1 and Strategy Guide

Season Pass cards typically receive the most hype in a new Marvel Snap season. Not only are they the most popular cards due to the Season Pass carrying other perks, they also have weekly challenges throughout the month to include the card in your decks for extra rewards. Also, the Season Pass card might be the only one certain players get all season long since it’s the only one outside the Spotlight Cache and Collector’s Tokens system.

As such, there is usually a lot of noise around the new Season Pass card, with many of us eager to find synergies and spicy new decks to play in the new season.

But with Gilgamesh? Well, there hasn’t been much so far.

Strengths and Weaknesses

Gilgamesh isn’t particularly difficult to activate, and it could easily represent one of the biggest 5-Cost cards in the game without requiring a super specific list of cards. All you need is a global buff in your deck and Gilgamesh will easily grow to the double digits. Here are a few of my ideas:

In addition to relying on one card to provide a massive boost to Gilgamesh, you can also add some targeted buffs. Marvel Snap has a ton of those to choose from:

Finally, I would also mention cards that are able to buff their own power, which will also count towards buffing Gilgamesh. Once again, there are plenty to chose from, and many of these are already very strong heading into the new season.

You get the idea: buffing Gilgamesh really isn’t a problem. The question we need to answer is how big does the card need to get to make it worthwhile? We already have a few cards that are able to reach [5/12], such as Gamora and Spider-Woman, and those are barely seeing play. As such, it seems like a minimum of +5 power is required for Gilgamesh to be a consideration.

Honestly, that doesn’t seem so difficult to accomplish, but we need to consider the sacrifices required to get there:

• How many cards with the ability to buff Gilgamesh do you have to play to reliably get to at least five on board with increased power?
• Which of the current strong standalone cards in Marvel Snap work well with Gilgamesh? Do you have to build a tailor-made deck for the new card to be successful?
• How telegraphed is your strategy going to be, and how easy is it for the opponent to count how much power your Gilgamesh will possess?

Overall, none of these questions are super limiting, and we have seen gimmick decks do very well in the past (especially if they could develop a lot of points). It seems like Gilgamesh might have that ability, and just Blue Marvel could be enough to make it a [5/15] or so.

The Verdict

Gilgamesh is a shiny new card with the potential to grow to insane numbers. However, it drives your deck into a certain direction, and it doesn’t feel like you’re able to go easy on the amount of buffs you have to include.

As such, I think Gilgamesh is good for those who enjoy very synergistic decks, those who aim at getting a specific combos, or those who like to follow certain play patterns. Otherwise, I expect it will suffer from comparison with the likes of Red Hulk, Hit Monkey, or even Sage when it comes to its power-to-cost ratio. Also, Gilgamesh joins a very competitive 5-Cost pool of card with Cannonball, Blink, and Annihilus (to name a few) already well established in the meta.

Pre-Release Score:

Patriot

Patriot feels like the most logical home for Gilgamesh since the strategy is already poised to leverage two global buffs over a large board.

After Ultron‘s buff, Patriot gained quite a lot of momentum and returned to be a competitive option. Plus, the deck is notorious for being a great bot farmer, which should make it appealing for grinding back to the Infinite rank early in the season.

You could also try a cheeky line of play with Invisible Woman hiding Gilgamesh so it only reveals once Ultron has been played. Then it will grow to an insane power with the Drones being buffed by Patriot and/or Blue Marvel.

Kazoo

Alongside Patriot, Kazoo is the other archetype with two global buffs naturally included (Ka-Zar and Blue Marvel). Here, Gilgamesh replaces Valkyrie, which tilts the deck toward even more points at the cost of abandoning its reactive ability. Still, if you can reliably get a [5/15] or more, there is an argument that the Season Pass card will win more lanes (and it doesn’t require you to manipulate priority either).

This is the second deck where you need little extra effort to include Gilgamesh and make it look good. Unfortunately, apart from Pixie blurring the play patterns a bit, this is once again a deck that you won’t be able to include much disruption or reactive cards in.

Similar to Patriot, you can also try an alternate Zoo list with the Thanos build:

On Reveal

Gilgamesh is an On Reveal card, and it just so happens that a fantastic On Reveal deck that is based on buffing the power of its cards is doing very well right now.

Honestly, I am not sure whether Gilgamesh will blend into the deck seamlessly, and you might just want to play Wolfsbane if you need another high power card in the deck. Still, it seemed silly not to test the synergy between Ironheart and the new card, which could open a new play pattern for the deck. It could be something as simple as: Ravonna Renslayer → Nocturne → Ironheart + Sage → Gilgamesh → Odin.

This isn’t as powerful as Wong bolstering all your abilities, but it still looks pretty decent with Sage and Gilgamesh each contesting a lane while Ironheart sends buffs across the board. Plus, you have some flexibility with Nocturne.

Taskmaster on Gilgamesh

I could have explored the possibility of playing Arnim Zola on Gilgamesh, but that limits the deck a lot since you would have to keep a lane cleared. That’s not the best way to play a ton of buffed cards. Instead, Taskmaster feels like an easier card to leverage, and we have either Supergiant or Invisible Woman to get the combo off.

In this deck, you’re simply looking to get as many buffed cards onto the board as possible before playing Supergiant → Taskmaster → Ant Man + Gilgamesh. Or, if you couldn’t find Supergiant, just play Ka-Zar into Gilgamesh and copy its power on Turn 6.

While I don’t think this deck will end up being as good as the others, it is at least more surprising, which is something I felt Gilgamesh was missing.

Variants

Closing Thoughts

Overall, I think the majority of players will enjoy Gilgamesh because it has the potential to be a card for every type of player. Those who are just getting started can play it in a Kazoo shell, while the more competitive players can try it in the On Reveal archetype. I expect it to receive a lot of praise early on due to the decks it fits in being great for beating bots on the way to the Infinite rank. However, I’m not sure Gilgamesh will be a long-lasting option; these types of cards tend to be replaced by the next high power card that becomes available.

I hope this breakdown helped you make a decision about Gilgamesh. It is the Season Pass card, so I expect many people to have it in their collection. Plus, it synergizes with lots of cards that you get early in you collection like Blue Marvel and Odin. It might not be super spicy, but it can appeal to everyone, and that might be the most important trait for a Season Pass card.

If you’d like to discuss the card more, feel free to join us on discord, or tag me on Twitter.

Good Game Everyone.