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Marvel Rivals is about to get a new game mode named Ultron's Battle Matrix Protocol. If you've ever played Teamfight Tactics or Auto Chess, you'll feel the gameplay shown in the trailer is a bit familiar, but if you haven't played these games yet, don't worry, we will explain how this mode might work.
Keep in mind that this is based on the preview footage we saw in Dev Vision Vol 06, so we might miss some details and may have made some assumptions about how certain features work. The developers haven't explained everything yet, so some parts of our guide are our best guesses from what we could see in the video.
How Ultron's Battle Matrix Protocol Mode Works
When you jump into this mode, you'll be facing off against five other players. Each player gets to build a team of six different heroes from the Marvel Rivals roster, but the game doesn't have every single character available in this mode as of now.
The core gameplay looks somewhat like TFT. Your heroes fight automatically once the battle starts, but the strategy comes in how you set them up beforehand. Positioning matters a lot in this mode. You can place your support heroes in the back, tanks in the front, or split your duelists in different corners.
From what we could see in the preview, it seems like there are synergies on the left side of the screen, though the developers haven't explained exactly how these work yet. It's likely similar to other auto-battlers where having multiple heroes from the same group or with similar traits gives you certain bonuses. Maybe this system in Marvel Rivals will be more card-based/role-based, as the icons on the left match the card icons and also the role icons in the game.
The mode uses cards that enhance your heroes in different ways. These cards can boost attack speed, increase health, provide damage reduction, or something else (depending on the roles). After every round, you get a chance to choose one out of four cards. We are not sure, but your economy might depend on your streak, as a lot of auto chess battlers work in this way. We could also notice the "Change Hero" tab, so we might be able to change our draft mid-game. In the shop, you can see options such as Locked - we think that it might lock the shop for the next round, and it won't refresh.
We noticed there is a multiplier icon on the left, and there are multipliers that appear over heroes' heads. In one shot, Venom has x3 over his head, Mantis shows x1, Luna Snow has x2, and Ultron has x1, and on the left, the multiplier says x7 (which is the total of all these multipliers). The higher the multiplier, the stronger the hero becomes. Venom at x3 is huge. Hela at x2 shoots, splitting projectiles. Namor at x2 commands multiple turrets. We're not entirely sure how this system works yet, and will update this guide as soon as we have more information.
The round structure appears to follow the standard auto-battler format. You get preparation time between rounds to adjust your team, buy upgrades, and reposition heroes. This is when you spend your resources on cards and reposition heroes for the next battle (if needed).
From what we saw in the trailer, the HP system starts at 50 points. If you lose a round, you will lose points, but we're not sure how that will be calculated. In most auto-battlers, the damage you take depends on the number of characters the enemy has left alive when they beat you, the round level, and other factors. However, win or lose, you will move to the next round, where the cycle repeats till your HP falls to 0. The goal is to be the last player standing after everyone else has been eliminated.
Ultron's Battle Matrix Protocol Mode Release Date
Ultron's Battle Matrix Protocol mode launches on June 6th as part of the Season 2.5 update. Along with a new mode, Ultron joins the game as a playable hero. This mode is marked as a limited-time experimental mode, so it won't be around forever initially. However, if the mode receives positive community feedback, we might see it staying as a permanent mode.
We'll update this guide as soon as there's more information available about Ultron's Battle Matrix Protocol.
