Table of Contents
This isn’t a fascinating metagame to be honest. The situation is very similar to what we saw last month, with Iron Hand replacing Move at the top of the competitive metagame. However, while the rest of the metagame was gunning for the top archetype, running the likes of Mercury, Scream and Shadow King to defeat Human Torch, there isn’t much interaction this time around.
First, it is more difficult to counter Iron Hand compared to Move. Victoria Hand can stay in hand, the deck is excellent at hiding its true potential until the final turns, and can play reactively, or interact with the locations if proactive development isn’t an option.
The other difference is the cards releasing this season, which mostly focused on bringing more points to certain synergies. Unfortunately, although Destroy, Discard and the few decks Chamber became a staple in improved, they still lack the most important factor in a Marvel Snap deck : Unpredictability.
When Iron Hand draws the nuts, you typically don’t know until turn five, and a good player will find a way to keep you in the game still. When Discard or Destroy draws perfectly, they have to snap on turn three at the latest, in hope to get two cubes out of it.
That ability to snap later limits your cube losses, as you have time to figure how good your opponent’s draw is, or whether they might run counter cards. Plus, you also improve the odds of them staying in the game as the opponent is more invested in the game.
With that in mind, the proper approach to this metagame is to find a synergy you enjoy and become a stellar pilot. If none particularly appeals to you, just pick Iron Hand.
Happy Tier List, everyone!
| Tier | Deck |
|---|---|
| Tier 1 | Iron Hand 0.6 Cube Average / 63% Win Rate |
| Tier 1 | On Reveal Disrupt 0.5 Cube Average / 61.5% Win Rate |
| Tier 1 | War Machine Ramp 0.5 Cube Average / 60% Win Rate |
| Tier 2 | Galactus Ramp 0.25 Cube Average / 57% Win Rate |
| Tier 2 | Weapon H Discard 0.3 Cube Average / 55% Win Rate |
| Tier 2 | On Reveal Destroy 0.35 Cube Average / 52.5% Win Rate |
| Tier 3 | Weapon X Destroy 0.2 Cube Average / 55% Win Rate |
| Tier 3 | Zombified On Reveal Destroy 0.1 Cube Average / 53.5% Win Rate |
Are you still chasing that elusive Infinite Rank? Here are the Top 5 performers in the ranks 80 to 99!
| Hand Discard | 0.6 Cube Average / 65% Win Rate |
| Wiccan Rocks | 0.5 Cube Average / 61.5% Win Rate |
| Hela Discard | 0.45 Cube Average / 60% Win Rate |
| Chamber Ramp | 0.5 Cube Average / 59.5% Win Rate |
| Wiccan Hand | 0.5 Cube Average / 59.5% Win Rate |
Here is my usual annoying advice because I’m a coach and I like to think this helps people: Focus on controlling the stakes of each game and building trust in both your deck and your decision making abilities. Once you feel confident, feel free to take more risks. Reaching Infinite is all about understanding the process of grinding cubes. Also, constantly changing your deck limits your ability to learn the game fundamentals, as you are always focused on learning how to pilot the new deck.
Tier 1
Iron Hand
Performance: 0.6 Cube Average / 63% Win Rate
Iron Hand has been the best flexible archetype for a long time, but there was always a synergy able to top it points wise. With most of those synergies nerfed over time, Victoria Hand now represent a fantastic way to get points, while it retains the ability to run counter cards for the other popular synergies.
Presently, there aren’t enough strong archetypes in the game, so Iron Hand is basically untouchable, except if you decide to ignore every other deck and target it specifically.
Potential Additions
Armor is Quake when there isn’t much Destroy around, while America Chavez and Agony trade spots as the fourth 1-cost.
On Reveal Disrupt
den
Performance: 0.5 Cube Average / 61.5% Win Rate
Werewolf By Night is one of the few cards in the game able to develop enough points to have the rest of your deck focus on other areas. Unfortunately, it also means your deck is much weaker when the 3-cost does not show up on time.
The 61.5% Win Rate tells us this build is quite consistent, and can win without Werewolf By Night. However, I would still not risk an early snap if the main source of points was not around. Wait for your disruptive card to take out a key opposing piece, and scare them away with a snap to build that win rate.
Potential Additions
Except for Werewolf By Night and Merlin, plenty of cards can be included in the build. The best direction seems to be a disruption heavy build, but the key is to find the right balance based on your play-style and popular opponents.
Armor instead of Quake for Destroy would be my first swap.
War Machine Ramp
den
Performance: 0.5 Cube Average / 60% Win Rate
The nerf to War Machine mostly kicked Storm out of the picture, but didn’t impact the Ramp archetype that much. Instead, after a first tailored around growing Chamber to stupid amounts, both Ramp builds have merged.
Finding Electro or Luna Snow will be key, as even Jubilee has been taken out of the build. When you get a 2-cost into either, this deck is a menace. Otherwise, take the 1-cube loss and move on.
Potential Additions
Legion remains a strong standalone 5-cost, but does not synergize with the deck any more, while Enchantress is nothing but a solid 5-cost counter card. Vision and Sersi make sense as potential replacements.
Iron Patriot could replace a missing Valentina.
Tier 2
Galactus Ramp
den
Performance: 0.25 Cube Average / 57% Win Rate
As we exit Tier 1, we can immediately see a massive gap in terms of performances, largely due to the deck we’ll cover from now on being either unreliable, or very predictable.
Galactus Ramp isn’t predictable, since most people will assume they are against a regular Ramp deck when against it. However, compared to War Machine Ramp, this one packs situational 6-costs, meaning snapping when we find our early cards isn’t as reliable.
Potential Additions
Death and Alioth only make sense when Galactus lands, so these two can go if you want to build a more reliable list.
Weapon H Discard
Performance: 0.3 Cube Average / 55% Win Rate
A deck perfectly fitting the intro, Discard can develop plenty of points, and does not have to worry about Dracula getting shut off any more.
When the stars align, this deck is only weak to a counter card on Morbius, or a deck able to develop even more points. Unfortunately, the stars only bring two cubes, while their absence often costs a lot more.
Discard doesn’t need more points, it needs flexibility or ways to interact with the opponent.
Potential Additions
Dracula, Colonel America or Swarm see play in other lists. It feels like the perfect balance is the deck you will play the best.
On Reveal Destroy
den
Performance: 0.35 Cube Average / 52.5% Win Rate
One of the few archetypes on this list relying on catching the opponent off guard, which it seems to do pretty well based on its cube average. However, the deck lacks the reliability to make it into the higher tier.
A solid pick for those who enjoy a snap and retreat focused gameplay. Be careful however, you will rarely beat destroy if they find Knull, as you will power it to a million points.
Potential Additions
Elixir is probably the most situational card in the deck if you wanted to run something else instead.
Tier 3
Weapon X Destroy
den
Performance: 0.2 Cube Average / 55% Win Rate
Adding Knull to the mix greatly helped this deck be more menacing in the points department. Without it, the deck relied too heavily on
Now, the deck needs to improve its cube average and the season pass card’s featured deck has a shot at becoming a decent Tier 2.
Potential Additions
Shanna and Uncle Ben provide move destroy targets.
Zombified On Reveal Destroy
den
Performance: 0.1 Cube Average / 53.5% Win Rate
Shadow King is among the few competitive counter cards left, and completely shuts down this deck. Plus, the regular On Reveal Destroy looks to be better to catch the opponent off guard.
The slightly better win rate shows the Horde synergy is a valid direction, but the cube average indicates being more reliable is only worth if you can snap confidently.
Potential Additions
Grand Master or Absorbing Man make sense with both synergies in the deck. Elixir would be the swap for either.
That’s it for this week! To reach out, find me on the Marvel Snap Zone community Discord, or shoot me a direct message (@den_ccg) for specific stuff or coaching.
Good Game Everyone.
Disclaimer and Tier Explanations
In order to be featured here, a deck needs to represent at least 1% of the current environment and have a positive Cube Average in the Ranked mode. Win Rate is also taken into consideration, and it can greatly impact the ranking of a deck, particularly when several archetypes (or different builds of the same deck) have a similar Cube Average but big Win Rate discrepancies. The Marvel Snap mechanics do, however, push players to maximize cubes gained rather than win every single game.
In order to create this chart, den is using data from our Marvel Snap Tracker, as well as other available data online and his own expertise and opinion of respected players. If a deck showed great performances with a very limited presence in the meta, you can find it in the Silent Performers section. That section highlights decks with an excellent Win Rate, but too little of a sample size to be representative of their real strength.
Decks not good enough to be considered contenders but with a good representation will be ranked in Tier 3 in our chart. See those builds as decks that are good to know about, as you should face them when playing Marvel Snap. However, unless the meta changes or a new variation of the build emerges, these decks are a notch below the dominant ones in Tier 1 and Tier 2.
Silent Performer: Decks with a very little presence in the meta that still showcase a Cube Average and Win Rate worthy of a Tier 2 deck (or better). Oftentimes, these can be archetypes with some nice game play that have been left unchecked in the current environment, or decks on the rise that found a few good match ups to abuse.
Tier 1: Tier 1 represents decks with all the upsides we would be looking for to rack up Cubes. They have good match ups in the current meta, offer different play patterns during a match, and often have the ability for explosive or surprising turns. These should be decks worth investing into to climb for the coming week.
Tier 2: Tier 2 are very good decks but with a weakness holding them back – either not being as reliable in its draws as Tier 1 decks, countered by another popular deck, or still being a work in progress as you read this. A good pilot could probably take these and have the same results as with a Tier 1 deck, but their play patterns are more difficult to enact compared to the tier above.
Tier 3: This tier is made of decks that have a pervasive issue compared to Tier 1 or Tier 2 decks. Usually, Tier 3 will be a mix of decks on the rise that don’t have much data, old archetypes on the decline, decks that require substantial experience and/or knowledge to pilot properly, powerful decks that aren’t well positioned, or niche decks.
Budget: Decks that consist only of cards in Pool 1 and 2 that are still capable of competing with an experienced pilot in a similar Collection Level, Rank, and MMR range. See our matchmaking guide for more details.
Meta stats and analytics directly from our Marvel Snap Tracker can also be found here.
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