Marvel Snap Decks (May 2024): The Best Discard Decks

Deck archetypes are unique deck types where the cards assembled have special abilities that work symbiotically and cater to a specific playstyle. Some of the standard deck archetypes, like On Reveal, Ongoing, and Destroy, are commonly known within the community, but Discard decks can gain maximum power while playing cards to disrupt their opponent's game plans.

Discard decks can control our hands consistently by utilizing cards that synergize with each other, especially for crucial cards like Apocalypse, Dracula, Hela, and Swarm. Control their hand and the game as we've detailed some of the best Discard decks, highlighting key cards and strategies for Marvel Snap.

What Is The Meta Game In Marvel Snap?

Before delving into the best Discard meta decks, we need to understand what the meta is and how decks are considered "meta" in Marvel Snap. The term "meta" can often be misused within the community, but players still in Pool 1 or 2 shouldn't worry too much about it until they begin entering Pool 3 and higher.

The meta game changes almost frequently due to the patch and OTA updates that occur per season, as these updates either buff or nerf cards. Some certain decks and strategies have consistently remained in the meta game due to the effectiveness of cards and strategies employed and have balanced strengths and weaknesses to ensure victory for players.

Players are advised to understand the current meta well, which will help with deck building and invite unique ideas to produce new decks and potential archetypes for victories.

Marvel Snap Best Discard Decks (May 2024): Standard Apocalypse Discard

The Standard Discard has seen some various since Marvel Snap's release, but since then, there have been a couple of effective cards released, like Black Knight, Daiken, Miek, M.O.D.O.K., Stature, and Silver Samurai, that have bolstered this deck's prowess as of February 2024. But as a simple deck that allows players to customize effective cards, we've kept to one of the original Discard decks from content creator DenHearthstone, which includes a combo of general and targeted Discard cards.

The key cards in this deck are Blade, Colleen Wing, Hell Cow, and Lady Sif, which targets Apocalypse specifically to generate more power for Apocalypse. Okoye, Nakia, and Moon Girl will be the supporting cards for this deck specifically to give more power to cards in their hand and deck while duplicating their hand to charge up The Collector.

Alternatively, players could swap out cards for Moon Girl for Helicarrier or Loki and Hell Cow for M.O.D.O.K., which discards all cards in their hand. Likewise, if they need another targeted Discard card, they can include Black Bolt or Moon Knight, which can pay off for players if they have Stature in their deck.

Marvel Snap Best Discard Decks (May 2024): Hela Lockjaw

Moving on to the best-performing Discard meta decks, Hela Lockjaw has seemingly triumphed over Hela Tribunal, in which Dracula, Hela, and Lockjaw are the key cards. Hela was first positioned to be a dangerous card to play when synergized with other Discard cards, allowing Dracula Discard to gain momentum in the meta.

Much like the Standard Discard deck, it has seen significant changes, especially with new cards being added, like The Living Tribunal and Black Knight, which allows for some unique deck combinations. The primary strategy is to have high-powered cards on the board when playing Hela while distributing power with Lockjaw, Jubilee, and Dracula, but players must discard a card to trigger Black Knight's ability to add the Ebony Blade to their hand, which gains the discarded card's power.

This can be achieved with Blade and Lady Sif, which target a high-cost card (Magneto, Giganto, The Infinaut, or Death) from which Ebony Blade gains power. However, it's weak to counter cards like Alioth, Cosmo, and Leech, meaning players must gain priority on a specific location so that they can safely play Lockjaw or Jubilee, and with the right strategy, Dracula may claim Ebony Blade's power to round out the battle.

Marvel Snap Best Discard Decks (May 2024): Miek Dracula Discard

As we've mentioned, this specific deck, Dracula Discard, took priority in the meta before it became safe to use the Hela Tribunal or Hela Lockjaw decks. This deck is relatively straightforward as it consists of low-cost cards like Miek, Blade, Wolverine, Swarm, and Colleen Wing, which should set up players early by discarding cards that will prevent Dracula from gaining their power; however, be sure to flood the location with Swarm before laying down M.O.D.O.K. or risk getting an underpowered Dracula when the match ends.

Some unique deck variations for Dracula Discard include The Collector, Daiken, Helicarrier, America Chavez, Silver Samurai, X-23, Moon Knight, Stature, Wong, and Miek. This allows players to experiment with these cards to find that sweet spot and a deck complimenting their playstyle.

While the classic Dracula Discard deck can still power players up the pools, with Miek recently added to Marvel Snap, this card is a natural addition to this deck and one we're focusing on, which has seen success in Friendly and Conquest battles. The key cards for this deck are the vampiric duo of Morbius and Dracula, with Miek, which, when playing the discarding cards, will buff their power for an epic final turn.

Miek gains one power for every card discarded and moves to a random location and can gain power pretty fast with Blade, Colleen Wing, Lady Sif, and M.O.D.O.K. However, if they don't manage to get M.O.D.O.K. to their hand, it still gains an adequate amount of power, and with Swarm and Apocalypse in the mix, players will always need cards in their hand to discard them.

Marvel Snap Best Discard Decks (May 2024): Sera Knight Discard

At launch, Black Knight was relatively underpowered and largely overlooked for Discard decks, but with a nerf post-launch, it unlocked the card's massive potential. As such, it has been stable in Hela Lockjaw, but it rose out of Hela's grasp into its sub-archetype, utilizing cards to reduce their costs while aiming for specific cards to buff the Ebony Blade's power.

Black Knight is supported by Zabu and Sera, crucial tech cards aimed at reducing cards' cost allowing players to play Ms Marvel and Ghost Rider to ensure the Ebony Blade accumilates the power it needs. This helps create the ideal Black Knight combo early, which sets up Lady Sif to discard either Magneto, The Infinaut, or any other high-powered card added, like Skaar, Death, or Apocalypse.

Ultimately, players are to ensure that Magneto and The Infinault are the primary targets to discard unless they need to disrupt or counter their opponent's power by moving their cards with Magneto. This can be achieved by playing Ghost Rider, which grants them access to the card early if discarded, especially when reduced by Sera, which, in turn, will make The Infinault the sole target to discard.

Marvel Snap Best Discard Decks (May 2024): StatureHawk (Good Cards Stature/Darkhawk)

Another deck that's slowly climbing through the meta centers on two specific cards, Stature and Darkhawk, which pair well with Black Bolt. The aim is for the opponent to accumulate cards for Darkhawk's power to climb, which can be done by adding Korg and Rockslide, which adds Rocks to their deck.

Black Bolt will then target the opponent's lowest cost card, which, if Korg or Rockslide are played, will target a Rock, which allows them to play Stature on the next turn. This deck is well-supported with Zabu and Iron Lad, in which Zabu reduces four-cost cards by one, enabling players to play disruptive cards like Shang-Chi or Enchantress, which can be held off playing until the later rounds.

Zabu also allows players to play Darkhawk and Iron Lad early, and Iron Lad opens up the game for players to strategize their next play. Lastly, the last two slots can be filled by flexible cards that aren't disruptive and give players some room to strategize, like Jeff the Baby Land Shark, which can be moved on the last few turns. Vision, Silk, and Miles Morales can also fill this slot just as well.

Marvel Snap Best Discard Decks (May 2024): Corvus Ramp

Unsurprisingly, the Black Order season gave players multiple cards that have strengthened the Discard meta with new takes on the Hela Discard, Good Cards, and Ramp archetypes. The Corvus Ramp has slowly been gaining momentum on the meta, and for good reasons: it has become a more viable option than Electro without limiting plays.

How Corvus Glaive plays is that the card's ability will discard two random cards from their hand to gain +1 energy, which should players have Odin in the deck. It can trigger this ability once more or if played on the Kamar-Taj location; however, there has been some chatter that it will target Hela if she enters their hand; it can still be played on Turn 3 if this isn't the case.

Nevertheless, most of this deck still feels and plays like a Ramp deck; however, the inclusion of Corvus Glaive makes it a cheaper card than Hellcow and less restrictive than Electro. Instead of trying to lower the costs of core cards to make them playable, Glaive will give players additional energy to play these cards as early as possible, like She-Hulk, Magneto, The Infinaut, and Death, but if discarded, Hela will bring them onto the board.

For more Marvel Snap news, be sure to check out our dedicated section or take a look at some of our Guides & Tutorials just below: