Marvel Rivals Season 9 Vanguard Team-Ups: The Complete Guide to the New Tank Meta
If you thought holding the frontline in Marvel Rivals was chaotic before, wait until you see what happens when Hulk starts throwing Wolverine across the map.
The old Team-Up system is dead and buried. You no longer have to wait for arbitrary seasonal rotations or beg your stubborn teammates to pick a specific partner hero just so you can use your kit. Season 9 hands every single hero exactly two Team-Up abilities. For the Vanguard roster, that means 26 brand new ways to ruin the enemy's day. NetEase is treating these like core kit components now, meaning they'll get balanced via regular patches instead of the calendar.
How the New Team-Up System Actually Works
Before you lock in an ability just because it sounds cool, you need to understand the new rules of engagement. You pick one ability to equip, and you can swap it freely in the spawn room.
The biggest game changer is that you don't need the partner hero on your team anymore. If you equip an ability, you get the base version of it no matter what. If your team happens to run the partner hero, you get an enhanced effect on top of it. Do not fall into the trap of picking an ability purely because someone locked in your partner hero. Pick the base ability that fits your immediate needs, and treat the enhanced effect as a lucky bonus. If you're solo queuing, you're better off relying on yourself anyway.
Every Vanguard Team-Up Ability in Season 9
There are 13 Vanguards in the game right now, which leaves you with a lot of reading to do if you want to know what's about to hit you in ranked. I consolidated every single base and enhanced effect into one place so you know exactly what you're dealing with.
Which Vanguard Team-Ups Actually Matter?
Not all of these 26 abilities are created equal. After looking at the raw data, a few of these combinations are going to completely dictate the pace of your matches.
Thor's Ragnarok Rebirth is genuinely ridiculous on paper. A tank that refuses to go back to the lobby upon taking fatal damage and instead generates a massive pool of bonus health is going to stall out entire pushes. If you pair that with his Divine Armory option for mobility, you essentially have two completely distinct playstyles for one character. You get one ability built entirely around survivability, and another built for aggressive repositioning.
Magneto's Magnetic Resonance gives him a clone that perfectly mimics his movements and ability casts. If you're trying to hold a choke point, doubling your visual clutter and threat area is invaluable on maps where he already dominates. If you need raw damage instead, Metallic Chaos lets you fire off sweeping projectiles to clear space.
Then there's The Thing. His Unbreakable Forces ability turns missing health into regenerating psionic armor. If you're tired of getting focused down, that's your survival ticket in a dive-heavy meta. If you want to punch things with fire instead, Two-In-One is right there, adding massive sweeping damage to his kit.
Picking the Right Ability for Your Match
Before you waste a whole round struggling to make an ability work, look at your team composition. The choice between your two abilities usually boils down to whether you're playing a coordinated strategy or surviving on an island.
Support-heavy abilities like Groot's Wild Wall or Rogue's Mr. & Mrs. X rely on your team actually standing near you. If you're playing with randoms who scatter like roaches the second a fight starts, those abilities are useless. In those situations, you need self-sufficient picks. Hulk's Gamma Fastball gives you crowd control immunity, and Venom's Blood Leech drains enemy health to keep you alive. You don't need anyone else to make those work, and they reward individual skill over hoping your support line notices you.
Take Peni Parker as a prime example. You have to choose between Vibranium Mech, which buffs your personal defense, and Rocket Network, which drops shields for the team. If you're getting melted every time you step out of cover, take the mech. If your team is winning fights but bleeding out to chip damage between engagements, set up the network.
Vanguards naturally fall into two jobs: holding space or diving the backline. Anchor tanks like Doctor Strange and Magneto thrive with sustained value abilities like Maelstrom or clones. Dive tanks like Captain America and Angela need burst options to extend their threat windows, like Cap's lightning shield throws or Angela's spear dash. Hulk is the rare exception who can do both depending on whether you pick Savage Slam for the dive or Gamma Fastball for holding your ground.
