Season 9: The Mystery of Thebes // Dev Vision Vol. 19 | Marvel Rivals

Double G here.We're excited to welcome you all to Season 9 of Marvel Rebels.This time, let's first welcome Zhiyong to introduce some updates.

Hey Rebels, it's Zhiyong.I'm here to walk you through all the very exciting developments we're making on the balance team.Let's first tackle a pretty challenging topic, Black Widow.Looking at past seasons, her combat performance has indeed lacked competitiveness.We've tried a few adjustments here and there, but with little impact.The reason being there's a primary conflict we've never quite been able to resolve.

The long -range one -shot KO capability of her standard sniper rifle jettaposts against the counterplay experience for other heroes facing that capability.These two aspects are very hard to balance.Through many internal discussions, we've always opted to prioritize maintaining her established play experience for those that have grown to love her rather than completely redo her, and alienate those that love her established playstyle.However, the core issue then remains.So this time, we're attempting to rework her combat route and truly usher in a new glorious aura for the Black Widow.Here's a brief overview of our approach to these adjustments.

First, we've removed the ADS sniper mode from her standard state, and increase the fire rate of her primary attack.At the same time, we've moved the charged Electrical Plasma Blast from her original ultimate to be normally available, hitting enemies with the instilled damageapplies a slow effect.With this adjustment, on one hand, we no longer need to stress over the one -shot KO issue of a normal snipe, allowing us to implement responsible baseline stats.On the other hand, we hope this gives Black Widow more stable consistent DPS, raising her base damage floor, so more players can pick her up.Secondly, We've transformed her ultimate ability into her ADS sniper mode, which will last for a set duration or until a certain number of bullets are fired.

Again, prioritizing the counterplay experience, we still haven't given her the ability to one -shot on critical hits.However, as power compensation, we've drastically increased the hitbox -wise of her sniper bullets, and they can now pierce straight through enemies.Crucially, non -critical hits will also deal incredibly high damage, completely shedding any damage fall off at range.The ultimate goal here is to preserve that pure sniping experience for players who love it, while using the framework of an ultimate to grant it the immense devastating power it deserves.Finally, we've retained Black Widow's sprint and super jump, entirely removing their sniping restrictions.Her spinning kick will also stay, and we've introduced a brand new ability.

When Black Widow is airborne, she can launch toward the target location and slam her Widow's spiked gauntlets down, dealing AoE damage to nearby enemies.Our vision here is to make Black Widow's close quarters melee combos flow much more seamlessly, handing her some serious aggressive burst capabilities.Overall, we hope these adjustments will make Black Widow a highly competitive flanking duelist.You can experience all the details for yourself once the update goes live.Let's look forward to her performance in the new season.Now, let's chat about the dynamic changes to team up abilities in the new season.

Hulk infuses raging gamma energy into a massive metallic broadsword forged by Magneto, granting Magneto an all -new ability, Gamma Blade.Once activated, it can launch the colossal gamma -infused sword forward.Upon hitting the enemy or the environment, it triggers a chain of violent explosions, dealing massive damage to all enemies in the area.Hulk also infuses Gamma Energy into Jeff the Landshark's Dryful Splash.Upon activation, Jeff spits out a stream of glowing green Gamma Water.Continuously watering an ally with it will directly mutate them into a team -up Anchorman.

Wait a minute, I think I grabbed the wrong script.Let's try that again.Now, let's officially talk about epic evolution of team -up abilities.The team -up abilities brought an entirely new deeply Marvel gameplay experience to Marvel Rivals.Since launch, they've mostly received immense praise for all of you, especiallyduring the first year.

As we've continued to operate and update the game, we've always kept a close eye on the community's discussion regarding team -ups.Things like hoping certain farm team -ups stay around forever, wanting everyone to have an active team -up ability, Wishing Team Up sync up better with base abilities, and begging for Hawk and Clock and Dagger to not always just be in anchor job.During the Team Up update process each season, as the sheer number of abilities grew, our dev team gradually started feeling the strain.Some of the newer Team Ups started feeling a bit uninspired, existing just for the sake of ticking off an update box.Once we realized this, we decided it was time to absolutely revolutionize the team -up system.Now, every single hero will possess two completely independent team -up ability loadouts.

The ability granted by these loadouts vary.Some are entirely new stat -along abilities, while others replace an existing base ability.But either way, they will grant the hero a fresh, far more engaging combat experience.Players can pre -select one of these team -up loadouts outside the match based on their preferred playstyle and utilize it in -game.If a player wants to swap to their other team -up loadout mid -match, they can do so freely in the spawn room.Every team -up loadout will feature a base effect and an enhanced effect.

The base effect primarily dictates the fundamental form of the team -up ability, including theits controls, core mechanics, and visual presentation.This base effect will be active regardless of whether any team -up ability partner is on your team.The enhanced effect, on the other hand, mostly acts as a powerful buff to the base effect, though a few will offer additional ability variations.The enhanced effect requires the team -up member to be actively playing in the match to activate.Let's use an example to illustrate.

Hulk has two distinct team -up loadouts, and players can choose one of the following to use in battle.Inspired by Captain America's unyielding spirit, Hulk becomes an absolute immovable force in combat.This base effect adds a new active ability.When used directly, Hawk leaps straight up and violently slams the ground, dealing AoE damage to nearby enemies.He can also activate this ability mid -air during Incredible Leap, triggering the same ground slam effect upon landing.Following the slam, embodying Cap's never -surrender attitude, Hawk erupts in the face of adversity.

All his normal ability cooldowns are reduced based on his current remaining health.The lower his health drops, the greater the cooldown reduction.Hulk gets this ability and effect regardless of whether Captain America is actively on the team.Now, let's look at the enhanced effect.Building on the base effect, the slam deals even higher damage, while also breaking the enemy's will to fight, applying a debuff that increases the damage they take.This effect only activates if Captain America is on the team.

For his second loadout, Morphling's Rage awakens Hulk's inner violence, making him more aggressive in battle.This base effect adds a new active ability that, when used, sends Hulk into a furious state, instantly buffing his move speed and attack speed.It also adds a new passive ability where, upon jumping below a certain health threshold, Hulk enters an unstoppable state filled by sheer rage, granting him full CC immunity.Again, Hulk gets this ability and effect regardless of whether Wolverine is on the team.Now, for his enhanced effect, when Wolverine and Hulk are in the same line -up, Hulk can throw Wolverine forward.At the same time, Warframe triggers Berserker's Claw strike while Hulk enters the furious state.

This furious fastball special is completely independent of the base active ability, meaning Hulk effectively gets two chances to actively trigger his furious state.Again, this effect only activates if Warframe is on the team.Taking community feedback to heart, we comb through every single team -up ability released since launch.and Cherry picked the absolute most fun and engaging ones, retrofitting them into the new team art system structure.So, in Season 9, players will get to see the return of some classic team arts, such as Metallic Chaos and Ammo Overload.Of course,

we've also designed a ton of incredibly fun, entirely new team -up abilities.For example, Venom will receive the Cosmic Blessing of the Phoenix Force.He gains a new active ability that, when activated, lethes his symbiote Tendrils in Cosmic Phoenix Flames, swapping out his primary attack for a Fury Tendril clip that aggressively swipes the area in front of him.When Venom and Phoenix team up on the field, the Phoenix force that Venom wields is heavily buffed.Every hit from his Furious Whip will apply a spark stack to enemies, reach 3 stacks, and violently detonate dealing massive extra damage.For the sake of time, we won't showcase every single new team up here.

You can jump in and explore them all for yourself once Season 9 launches.Moving forward, We won't be constantly shuffling around and adding team -up combinations every single season like before.Instead, we will focus heavily on the macro performance of the team -up system as a whole, optimizing and balancing the ones that are underperformance.And of course, for any newly added heroes, we will deeply desire them to ensure they launch with completely farm and useful team -up loadouts.This team -up system update is easily the most massive overhaul we've done to the combat system since launch, and it's going to shake out the meta in unprecedented ways.Furthermore, the new team -up roster includes a good amount of

cross -role synergies.For example, some vanguards and theorists will be able to output healing, while some theorists and strategists can provide incredible survival utility.Strategists that traditionally lack burst healing will gain potent baseline healing capabilities, and strategists lacking aggressive utility will secure stronger initiation or peeling tools.The new team -up system radically shatters the established capability boundaries of the heroes, cracking team comp possibilities wide open.We can't wait to see what team compositions you make full of enhanced heroes and villains.Furthermore, the team -up anchor mechanic from the previous system has been completely scrapped in this update.

Alongside its corresponding flat numerical buffs, as a result, we will be slowly re -evaluating the raw strengths of those specific heroes as well as some others.We are stepping into Season 9 with an adjusted plan for Season 8 .5's dominant over -performance, like Sylops and Rocket Raccoon, while significantly buffing other performers like Thor, The Thing, Black Cat, and Storm, bringing their lethality and utility back up to par.Altogether, This balance pass touches roughly 80 % of our entire hero roster.Because the list of all these tweaks is so massive, I won't read them out here.You can dig into the hot numbers in the balance post releasing shortly after this video.Beyond tweaking the heroes themselves, Season 9 .0 introduces two massive global system changes.

First up, the brand -new team -up system inevitably introduces way more numerical variables into the mix.Team fights are going to be infinitely more chaotic and hyper -aggressive.We found in playtesting that this consistently led to ultimate abilities chaining together far too frequently and snowballing matches prematurely.So, after exhaustive testing, we've decided to further knob the overall energy acquisition rate for ultimate abilities.Post -nerf, the average time to earn an ultimate will feel nearly identical to how they play in recent patches.Secondly, we're adding an entirely new health mechanic to the game, regenerative shields.

Regenerative shields function under the exact same logic as base health.Any mechanic that calculates off -base health, like percentage -based healing or percentage -based damage, trades Regenerative Shoes exactly as if it were regular health.But here is the difference.If a hero managed to completely avoid taking damage for 5 solid seconds, their Regenerative Shoes will automatically kick in, rapidly recharging to full capacity over the next 5 seconds.For instance, if a hero has 300 regenerative shields, it will rebuild at 60 per second.If they have 150, it builds at 30 per second.

We are strictly adding regenerative shields to high -mobility heroes who excel at flanking and diving.This new health type massively buffs the baseline mistake forgiveness of these hyper -mobileduring solo or angle duels, significantly reducing the downtime before they can jump back into the fray.Simultaneously, this cuts down on the sheer number of teammates a strategist has to constantly monitor, heavily alleviating overall team healing pressure.Realistically speaking, Accurately predicting the exact meta strength of every team map combination with the addition of regenerative shields is going to be extremely challenging right out of the gate.Plus, the reactions generated by different team map synergies with new team compositions will undoubtedly perform entirely differently across various levels of play.

Therefore, The overarching philosophy for the Season 9 .0 patch is supporting a stable and smooth transition into this entirely new era of Marvel Rivals gameplay.As we plug into this radical new season, We will be constantly monitoring the moment -to -moment experience of the new team ups and checking the meta closely across all competitive brackets.If things break, we won't hesitate to step in with rapid hotfixes or patches.If you guys run into any rough spots, please give us your feedback ASAP.Plus, the upcoming mid -season finals will be played on the Season 9 patch.Featuring the brand new team -up system, we absolutely can't wait to see the incredible plays our pros are going to pull off.

Ignite the battle!

As you just saw, this summer, we are rolling out a truly massive new update.This isn't just about taking a few team -up shots.or adjusting the anchors.It's a systemic, full -roaster, ground -up rework that will bring an incredibly fresh and fun dynamic to combat.And of course, in Season 9, Black Widow will also receive a major rework.But that's not all.

A new season means highly anticipated new heroes.Grab your strength because Jupiter is bringing her explosive mutant energy to Marvel Rivals in season 9.Jupiter is a strategist, a lively manipulator of fireworks, who can control vibrant energy plasmoids in combat to heal her teammates, while simultaneously damaging and blinding enemies.And for the grand final, her ultimate ability unleashes a lethal dazzling firework show across a battlefield.This season, we are also turning our sights to the Collapsed timeline.As the very first mutant in the Collapsed timeline, Apocalypse personally witnessed the world burn to ashes in the crossfire of the War of the Gods.

In the eyes of this evolutionary arbiter, the species that needed to be killed was no longer frail humanity, but rather the very gods who had failed the mortals.However, just as Apocalypse was absorbing the fate of all deities, attempting to ascend to godhood and reshape the order of the collapsed universe, a mysterious assassin pierces his chest.When the heroes arrive in Thebes to investigate the death of Apocalypse, they hit a dead end, only for three deeply mysterious murders to occur sequentially entirely within their own realm.casting an even more impenetrable shadow over the entire incident.To dive into this mystery, we've prepared an interactive Death of Apocalypse detective minigame.We invite everyone to sift through the endless lies and uncover the one truth.

Our brand new convoy map DBS will officially go live following the update on July 23rd.Stay tuned.Following the update on July 30th, our brand new game mode, Path to Doomsday, Avengers Age of Ultron, will take everyone straight into Avengers Tower and Ultron's data space to battle Ultron and his mechanical army.At the same time, we'll be launching a series of events in the Times Square lobby, so look forward to that.In Season 9, verified college students will get access to a new location of 10 costumes and MVPs.We welcome all college students to verify their university email to unlock these exclusive benefits.

From July 29th to August 1st, the Marvel Rivals Ignite series mid -season finals will be taking over Los Angeles, USA.10 top teams from our 4 major global regions will battle it out on stage, competing for the very first World Championship title of the competitive year.We'd absolutely love for you all to come out and experience the hype life.For more ticketing details,please keep an eye on our social media channels.We have been holding our tongue on this version update for so long, and we couldn't be happier to finally talk about it.

We actually started planning our team up overhaul just under a year ago.Over the last few seasons, we've been closely following the community's discussions regarding team ups, and honestly, the pressure has been immense, especially over the past two seasons, right before recording every Dead Vision.Zhiyong and I would debate, should we just kiss the overhaul now?We thought dropping the news early might alleviate some of the pressure from the community, but every time, we ultimately decided not to.We wanted to be completely responsible, to only announce it once we had successfully built it, run the tests, and thoroughly verified the gameplay experience ourselves.That's always been our style.

So the time is now.Grab your friends and jump into what is easily the biggest update to Marvel Rivals since the game launched.Ignite the Battle!