Welcome back to Meta Monday! With the start of the new season, the meta game has changed significantly from a week ago regarding how the decks are constructed and which tech cards are the most useful.
Pillar One: Agent Venom
Agent Venom has been featured on many decks starting this season as the newest season pass card. These lists have been at the top of the meta game in some form or fashion. While Agent Venom is not an archetype by himself but rather a card that helps boost stats of particular deck strategies, he is currently boosting three lists to the top of the meta game.
Agent Venom 1
Agent Venom 2
These are not the only decks that include Agent Venom, but he is incredibly popular. In fact, according to our statistics, he holds the #1 spot for won when drawn and played. That is pretty impressive for only being out a week. Either way, these decks are mainly stat decks trying to provide big numbers to two lanes while having some minimal interaction with an opponent. Mainly, the only interaction in these lists is Cosmo to help shut down any combo-type ideas coming from an opponent or to limit the counter tech cards that might appear, like Shang-Chi or Shadow King, to negate the power that is set up.
Agent Venom Bounce
The bounce decks that include Agent Venom could be a pillar by themselves, but I have lumped them in here because while Bounce was already good, Agent Venom has immensely boosted its possible power output. There are several versions, but most include the same key cards as those featured in the list above.
Pillar Two: Hela
Although she sustained a nerf, Hela has still been as dominant as ever over the last week. While not much has changed with Hela, she is well positioned in the current meta game because of the ease with which she can produce stats. As I said a couple of weeks ago, “For example, I could play a bounce deck and try to weave my Werewolf by night in and out of lanes while simultaneously bouncing back key pieces to get some big stats by turn six, or I could play maybe 4 cards total and deliver almost the same amount of stats with a lot less work. I would guess most players are going to pick the latter.” This is especially true post Infinite in the 70+ ranks, where she is still around 10% of the meta game.
Hela 1
There are other versions, but this main one has remained unchanged for a few weeks.
Pillar Three: Clog
With Hela in the format, Clog is inevitable to follow. While it performs well against many fair decks, this deck takes a big hit with both Cosmo and Bounce in the format, making it less popular. However, with the introduction of Scream, Move Clog is running around as a potential option that tries to accomplish the clog aspect while also gaining power.
Stock Clog
Scream Clog
Bounce Clog
Scream has been pretty popular, and the clog decks she is in can be frustrating for the opponent; however, unlike traditional or bounce clog decks, hers can sometimes be a little clunky. Either way, all three of these lists do well in the Hela matchup and the other fair decks at the moment against the Bounce decks and some of the Agent Venom decks that can sometimes struggle to produce enough power if they don’t get an early clogged lane for a guaranteed win.
Pillar Four: Arishem
While still not as popular as Arishem used to be, he is still almost 5-6% of the meta game regardless of your rank or pre/post infinite status. Arishem is incredibly versatile, with no one build being the best just due to the nature of the randomness of the deck. But some key cards appear in almost all versions.
Other than these cards, there are endless configurations that depend on what your meta looks like and what you want in your deck. This is the list I have been playing to some success, but again, it is not strictly the best since there are a lot of differences between the cards people like to play with.
Arishem
Meta Cards
With Agent Venom and Bounce running around pretty rampantly, Shadow King is a premium tech card that can negate much of Bounce's power on the final turn. However, fighting for priority can be a big deal with Shadow King, so you want to ensure you know that before trying to catch someone off guard.
As a potential Hela counter and nice protection for the big numbers that have been created, Cosmo has experienced a lot of play over the last week. Cosmo can also uniquely shut down Clog and other bounce decks when played correctly since a lot of bounce power comes from Onreveals on the final turns. If you can spare the space, running Cosmo in your list would probably be a good idea.
That is probably the main reason for the meta game that we are in. Agent Venom is a pure stat stick. Agent Venom already has 4 power himself but can add 4-power to the likes of Sage, Iron Man, Bishop, The Hood, and Mysterio. That is a potent package for major power output regardless of where you put it. Marvel Snap has always been a numbers game, and Agent Venom helps decks have a higher power output than they originally had.
Meta Health
This is always a weird section because many players equate Meta Health with the feeling they get when they play. With decks like Clog and Hela being significant players, feelings will inevitably feel bad for many games. However, I would like to define meta health from a numbers perspective. But, with the start of a new season, there are still some wrinkles. For example, if you have reached infinite, your meta-game is a lot more diverse than if you are pre-infinite. For me, that says post-infinite meta is pretty healthy. No one strategy is hindering other decks from performing well. While there are some slight feel-bad moments and warping because of Hela and Clog, these do not keep other archetypes like Move, Zoo, Destroy, Bounce, and others from thriving. On the other side, pre-infinite, Hela, and Clog decks jump up in popularity, with bounce trailing just slightly behind them. That makes the format feel much less open for those in the 70-99 range. Therefore, the pre-infinite meta is not healthy; hopefully, the OTA on Thursday will help fix that. What do you think of the current meta? If you reached infinite, have you noticed a difference? Let me know in the comments.