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This will forever be a debate in Marvel Snap and card games in general : Should real money cards be great to justify their cost?
Of course, nobody wants to spend money on something useless, so the card needs to be somewhat good, or at least exciting to play with. However, if you go to the other extreme, to the point the card dictates the metagame, your community will feel like paying is the only way to compete.
Over the past seasons, most season pass cards failed to deliver enough for the community to feel most of them were worth their price. Yet, I feel like Shou-Lao might be worse for the game, as the domination of the Dragon is unparalleled. At the moment, the top three decks all run Shou-Lao, and the gap with the other decks is so wide I felt a Tier S but no Tier 2 was the best way to represent the current environment.
What other choice did I have with the worse of Shou-Lao three archetypes at 0.5 cubes per match and 64% win rate, while the closest performer is Bounce, sporting a 0.2 cube average and 52.5% Win rate. What I did was look for decks with little games under their belt. There, I found a few competitors, probably the ones representing Tier 2 contenders if they were to be played over hundreds of games.
The three decks in that group all sport disruptive tools designed to beat one of Shou-Lao builds. Cosmo against the On Reveal decks, Stardust to block Scarlet Spider, and Shadow King to remove the extra power.
Flexible Move or Ongoing are probably good enough on their own, but finding success at the moment requires targeting Shou-Lao specifically. Those archetypes just happen to present the right mix to include the cards necessary to do just that.
Now, one can only hope these specific builds spread and bring some diversity to the game.
Play Shou-Lao the Undying for a great win rate, counter it if you enjoy a snap and retreat oriented gameplay. If you pick another route, you are up for a challenging climb.
Happy Tier List, everyone!
| Tier | Deck |
|---|---|
| Trending | Disruptive On Reveal 0.75 Cube Average / 67% Win Rate / 100 Games |
| Trending | Flexible Move 0.80 Cube Average / 66% Win Rate / 90 Games |
| Trending | Small Ongoing 0.65 Cube Average / 64% Win Rate / 80 Games |
| Tier S | Shou-Lao Activates 1 Cube Average / 69% Win Rate |
| Tier 1 | Shou-Lao in Good Cards On Reveal 0.8 Cube Average / 67% Win Rate |
| Tier 1 | Shou-Lao in Small On Reveal 0.5 Cube Average / 64% Win Rate |
| Tier 3 | Bounce 0.2 Cube Average / 52.5% Win Rate |
| Tier 3 | Zombie Galacti 0.1 Cube Average / 51.5% Win Rate |
| Tier 3 | Discard & Destroy 0.05 Cube Average / 51.5% Win Rate |
| Tier 3 | Man-Spider Combo 0.3 Cube Average / 50% Win Rate |
Are you still chasing that elusive Infinite Rank? Here are the Top 5 performers in the ranks 80 to 99!
| Shou-Lao Activates | 0.8 Cube Average / 64% Win Rate |
| Power Combos & Living Tribunal | 0.7 Cube Average / 63.5% Win Rate |
| Shou-Lao & Zombies | 0.8 Cube Average / 63% Win Rate |
| War Machine Ramp | 0.35 Cube Average / 60% Win Rate |
| High Evolutionary | 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.
Trending
Disruptive On Reveal feels like a deck designed to counter first, which added strong cards in the remaining slots, while Flexible Move and Ongoing provided shells disruptive cards could be added to.
No matter the route, these three decks are designed to beat Shou-Lao, especially the Activate build, the most popular one at the moment.
Stardust is the key to block Scarlet Spider without having to worry about the specifics of your opponent’s turn. Otherwise, Cosmo will try to snipe Shou-Lao the undying, while Deafening Chord can turn off Maverick.
When things goes according to plan, these deck should be able to snap relatively early, hopefully getting two cubes from that match-up. If disruption doesn’t happen, it is better to just give up a cube and move on to the next match.
Disruptive On Reveal
den
Performance: 0.75 Cube Average / 67% Win Rate / 100 Games
Flexible Move
den
Performance: 0.80 Cube Average / 66% Win Rate / 90 Games
Ongoing
den
Performance: 0.65 Cube Average / 64% Win Rate / 80 Games
Tier S
Shou-Lao Activates
den
Performance: 1 Cube Average / 69% Win Rate
This type of performance typically happens over 50 games or so. A deck goes on a hot streak, and manages to look absolutely bonkers over a reasonable, yet limited sample size. In this particular case, the featured build has 250 games recorded, while two variations with similar results sport 130 and 180 matches each. That is over 500 games with metrics well above the average Tier 1 deck in Marvel Snap.
The next balance updates needs to take care of this archetype, or Shou-Lao the Undying buffing Scarlet Spider is going to be the only relevant synergy in the competitive sphere.
Potential Additions
Cosmo or Super-Adaptoid could be in Copycat’s slot for a different type of way to edge the mirror match.
Nico Minoru battles America Chavez for that slot, and Cable sometimes becomes H.E.R.B.I.E or Lasher.
Tier 1
Good Cards On Reveal
den
Performance: 0.8 Cube Average / 67% Win Rate
The other deck worth being called best in the game, I guess this one isn’t as popular due to not being as new as the Activate build. Plus, the amount of points isn’t as impressive, making this Shou-Lao build not as flashy as the one above. However, for those looking for a more flexible build, mostly to incorporate some disruption, Good Cards On Reveal is your pick.
Potential Additions
Iceman is the flexible 1-cost, with Nico Minoru another popular inclusion in that slot. Otherwise, Stardust is the newly included card, but is necessary to contain the Scarlet Spider deck. As such, Shadow King or Quake are probably more likely swaps currently.
Small On Reveal
den
Performance: 0.5 Cube Average / 64% Win Rate
The results tell us the other On Reveal focused deck is stronger overall, but this one is more unique in how it plays. In the end, both looked at Werewolf By Night or Shou-Lao the Undying, and felt they were strong enough to build an entire deck around them.
Turn out, they are so good, you can actually build multiple decks.
Potential Additions
Iceman is the flexible card, with Elektra or Nico Minoru also vying for this spot. Viv Vision is the peculiar inclusion, but works well with Clea or Prowler. Marvel Boy can take that spot for those missing the former season pass, or consider Cosmo, Copycat.
Tier 3
Bounce is an anomaly, in the bad way consider the results of the other decks building around the current season pass card. As for the other three, they are the interesting enough decks of this metagame to see play, although their results clearly aren’t enough to represent competitive threats.
Hopefully, the counters to Shou-Lao gain momentum in the near future, allowing the archetypes without the card to progress, and keep the metagame relatively diverse.
Bounce
den
Performance: 0.2 Cube Average / 52.5% Win Rate
Zombie Galacti
den
Performance: 0.1 Cube Average / 51.5% Win Rate
Discard & Destroy
den
Performance: 0.05 Cube Average / 51.5% Win Rate
Man-Spider Combo
den
Performance: 0.3 Cube Average / 50% Win Rate
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 in order 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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