MODOK Guide and Best Decks: Everything You Need to Know - Marvel Snap Zone (2024)

Welcome to our new series of Marvel Snap guides, where we feature a Series 4 or 5 card and analyze how to use it. The goal is to give you a tutorial on how to use the card most effectively in an everchanging meta, as well as help you decide if the card is worth the tokens or if you should pick it up during a Spotlight Cache week!

We will aim to revise this guide each time it becomes featured in a Spotlight Cache. If the card becomes rebalanced or the meta has changed a lot, please let us know in the comments and we will look to update it based on demand!

Please note: Gladiator on June 4th has been swapped with MODOK on June 18th. The database will be updated after the June 4th patch.

Series 4 cards can be purchased for 3,000 Collector’s Tokens from the Token Shop initially as a Weekly Spotlight card, or opened as one of the featured cards in the Spotlight Caches that are found every 120 Levels on the Collection Level Track after Collection Level 500 (until the next new card releases the following week).

Who is MODOK?

MODOK is an acronym for Mechanized Organism Designed Only for Killing. While his origins can change, his initial story is based on an AIM employee, George Tarleton, who gets experimental surgery in order to become more intelligent. While successfully becoming smarter, he becomes disfigured and grows a massive head while only having a weak body. He uses a levitation chair to mobilize himself.

To utilize his incredible intelligence, AIM fits him with a headband that allows him to focus his energy into a “mind beam”. This not only creates energy blasts, but allows him to communicate telepathically, create shields, and even gain control over others!

Quantumania Spoilers: In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, MODOK takes a different origin story. MODOK‘s origin is that he is actually Yellowjacket from Ant-Man 1. When he gets shrunk down from having his suit tampered with, his body becomes disfigured and he is trapped in the quantum realm. In this time, he is assisted by Kang and becomes reborn as MODOK.

In a different adaptation, MODOK also has an animated adult show on Hulu!

How to Use MODOK

MODOK is typically a setup for your finisher. You want to discard your entire hand to ensure you hit the target you want, clear your hand for Dracula, or set up for a Hela top deck. You typically want to play him on turn 5, but some decks can play him on turn 4 (Corvus Ramp) or turn 6 (Morbius + Miek Power boosts). Discard decks that was a way to make decks more consistent typically gravitate towards MODOK since he guarantees a predictable outcome.

Best Synergies

MODOK logically synergizes well with his fellow discard cards. Hela works great to revive all of the cards he discards. With each card you discard, Morbius and Miek grow. So the large discard volume works great to add a lot of Power late game.

By playing MODOK behind Invisible Woman, you can set up for a Hela play without discarding your Hela! It also protects your Morbius from entering Shang-Chi range as easily!

A more niche synergy is with Strong Guy! Since he wants to have an empty hand, MODOK can discard it all on the final turn to ensure Strong Guy properly triggers.

Helicarrier fills your hand with random cards. MODOK allows you to either maximize your draw by discarding cards beforehand, or makes sure you draw a card by discarding your remaining (old) hand after the cards are drawn.

Meta Competitive Deck

This Discard deck leans on the many discarding synergies MODOK has. Morbius and Miek can snowball Power, Strong Guy can trigger with an near empty hand, and Dracula can trigger effectively with only Apocalypse in hand. While a good draw may render MODOK unneeded, he provides a consistency to this deck that sets up for a strong turn 5 or a finisher for turn 6.

Fun Off-Meta Deck

This casino deck throws caution to the wind and let’s Lady Luck take the wheel. With both Loki and Helicarrier, your gameplan could change every game. MODOK plays a few roles here: He discards targets for Hela, he ensures Helicarrier gets discarded so Morbius, The Collector, and Miek grow, and he ensures important targets like Proxima Midnight get discarded. The deck itself is a bit weak on cards that can discard, so MODOK also helps provide consistent discards.

Weaknesses and Things to Avoid

As an On Reveal, he naturally struggles against Cosmo. With current Ongoing decks, Cosmo and Jean Grey together can force your MODOK to be useless.

While she is uncommon in the meta, Supergiant interferes with MODOK by not allowing his trigger on turn 5. This can stop a Hela follow-up since MODOK would reveal after Hela.

Closing Thoughts

MODOK is the backbone for most Discard decks. While the current Hela lists don’t always run him and use Blink instead, he is still plenty viable, especially in Apocalypse decks. If you aren’t a Discard deck fan, you can easily pass on MODOK and not need him for anything else. If you enjoy the archetype though, he is a very strong card that will most certainly enhance your collection.

Is MODOK worth using 3K Collector’s Tokens?