Best Symbiote Spider-Man Decks in Marvel Snap

Not to be confused with Symbiote variants of the Spider-Man card, Symbiote Spider-Man joins Marvel Snap as the season pass card of The Amazing Spider-Season. Along with its new ability Activate, Symbiote Spider-Man looks like it will dramatically change how Marvel Snap plays.

How Symbiote Spider-Man Works in Marvel Snap

Symbiote Spider-Man is a 4-cost 6-power card with an ability that reads: Activate: Merge your lowest-Cost card here with this. Copy its text like it just revealed.

Check out our full explainer on the Activate mechanic for an in-depth look. In short, when you play a card with Activate and End Turn, the next turn you can press and hold on that card to trigger its ability. The Activate effect will resolve in the order it is triggered among playing cards and other abilities. Note that this cannot work if Symbiote Spider-Man is played on the final turn of the game. If there are two cards of the same power, Symbiote Spider-Man will randomly choose one.

Symbiote Spider-Man’s effect is insanely powerful, allowing it to merge with cards of any type to retrigger On Reveal effects while also merging with Ongoing and other passive effects. Think of Symbiote Spider-Man as a Hulkbuster mixed with an Odin, Grandmaster, or Absorbing Man.

He is, however, a 4-Cost card, so ramping him out early isn’t a terrible idea if you want to trigger a specific effect with them. 

Best Symbiote Spider-Man Decks in Marvel Snap

Later in The Amazing Spider-Season, Symbiote Spider-Man is going to gain a lot of synergy with cards like Scarlet Spider. However, right now he’s kind of on his own (along with old cards being reworked to have Activate effects). Therefore, these two decks are safe bets to slot him into if you want to make the most out of Symbiote Spider-Man. First, let’s look at a deck that maximizes his On Reveal potential:

• Echo
• Nightcrawler
• Ravonna Renslayer
• Jeff!
• Cassandra Nova
• Ironheart
• Wong
• Symbiote Spider-Man
• White Tiger
• Black Panther
• Namora
• Odin

Click here to copy this deck from Untapped.

The Series 5 cards in this deck are Ravonna Renslayer, Jeff!, Cassandra Nova, Symbiote Spider-Man, and Namora. Cassandra Nova is replaceable with Sage. You can also swap out Jeff! for a tech card like Shang-Chi or something a bit more spicy like Quake if you don’t have him.

The goal with this greedy deck is to either trigger Namora onto small, movable cards like Nightcrawler and Jeff! by playing them into lanes alone, thus scaling them dramatically. Typically, you’d want to play Namora into Wong to double up their gained power. Symbiote Spider-Man helps here because he can be activated on Namora if she is the lowest power card/only card in that lane, thus triggering her effect again, if you miss the Wong route.

The other line is to play Black Panther into an unactivated Symbiote Spider-Man, which wins a lane on its own as the duo will reach 28 total power once Black Panther’s effect is re-triggered. If that line doesn’t present itself, Symbiote Spider-Man also has synergy with the likes of Cassandra Nova and White Tiger, the latter of which can be triggered again in a Wong lane as it has one less power. This will output a total of four 8 Power tigers across the board.

Echo is a great tech card here as it blocks your Wong lane from Cosmo while also countering other high-rolling decks like The Living Tribunal. A final turn Odin is just a cherry on top.

The next deck is, believe it or not, Silver Surfer, which is also one of the strongest and most consistent archetypes over the last few months. Yes, Symbiote Spider-Man is a 4-Cost card. However, he has insane synergy with several cards in a Silver Surfer list.

• Nova
• Forge
• Cassandra Nova
• Brood
• Silver Surfer
• Killmonger
• Hope Summers
• Nocturne
• Sebastian Shaw
• Copycat
• Absorbing Man
• Symbiote Spider-Man

Click here to copy this list from Untapped.

This list is quite expensive with Cassandra Nova, Hope Summers, Nocturne, Sebastian Shaw, and Copycat being Series 5 cards. All of them except for Hope Summers and Sebastian Shaw can be replaced with 3-Cost cards of your preference, like Spider-Man or Polaris.

You’ve played against this deck, and you’ve likely played a version of it. The only significant change here is that Silver Surfer can be dropped on turn 5 into a lane with Symbiote Spider-Man, allowing you to retrigger Silver Surfer again on the final turn of the game. Symbiote Spider-Man also has great synergy with Sebastian Shaw. The two together will likely always win you a lane. 

Finally, Hope Summers still allows you to have an explosive Silver Surfer and Absorbing Man final turn; however, if you also have a Symbiote Spider-Man to activate in that lane with Silver Surfer, you can trigger the effect a total of three times. Insane, right?

Symbiote Spider-Man Counters in Marvel Snap

Activate cards currently do not have a direct counter; however, most players will be trying to retrigger On Reveal effects. Thus, good ol’ Cosmo comes in clutch if you manage to drop her into a lane with an unactivated Symbiote Spider-Man. Otherwise, cards like Shang-Chi and Shadow King will cut down the buffing effects you’ll likely see alongside Symbiote Spider-Man.

Who is Symbiote Spider-Man?

This is the easiest one of these I’ve had to write. Symbiote Spider-Man is Peter Parker when he first obtains the black suit, which is an alien lifeform that forms a symbiotic bond with its host. In the case of Parker, it enhanced Spider-Man’s abilities but also chipped away at his staunch moral code. Parker would later reject the symbiote by using sonic soundwaves, where it would later bond with Eddie Brock (and many more) to become Venom.

Is Symbiote Spider-Man Worth Buying the Season Pass For?

Most definitely. The season pass is the best value you can get in Marvel Snap, so if you have the 9.99 USD, you should definitely grab it along with Symbiote Spider-Man. The decks I listed above only scratch the surface of what a card like this is capable of, as more Activate cards are on their way that synergize with it well. Expect Symbiote Spider-Man to become a staple of the meta before long. Don’t be surprised if it gets nerfed.

Marvel Snap is available to play now.