Marvel Rivals has a bunch of different Team-Up Abilities that can improve the strength of a bunch of characters. While there aren't any abilities that actively hurt your team by having, but there are definitely stronger Team-Ups than others. To know which are the best Team-Ups to use, we will break down our take on team up rankings!
There are currently 23 different Team-Ups Abilities active in the game for Season 8.0 Some of them are passive and remain active as long as both team up characters stay selected. Other Team-Ups give a bonus ability that has an recharge timer like other abilities. There are no Team-Ups that are bad, so a low ranking doesn't mean it can't have beneficial outcomes in matches.
S Tier
B Tier
Season 8.5 Overview
This is a full Season 8.5 update to the tier list based on:
- The metagame at end of Season 8.0
- Balance adjustments for Season 8.5
- Changes to Team-Ups for Season 8.5
- New Season 8.5 Hero: Cyclops
C Tier
For arguably the worst Team-Up in the game, Bruce Banner and The Thing pair with Wolverine for Fastball Special. The only way to use this is for both Wolverine and Hulk or The Thing to both engage the ability, which means they both stop fighting. The payoff is simply throwing Wolverine with a lunge attack. It's the most complicated Team-Up with the worst payoff. No new abilities are unlocked and nothing enhanced. It's a Team-Up you will almost always ignore and never try to utilize.
Primal Flame got a massive nerf with season 8.5 by removing wolverine. Now all that remains is Phoenix and Black Widow, a pairing that never sees the light of day. In other words, I'm shocked this wasn't simply removed from the game.
Stars Aligned was introduced in Season 2.0. Now that Season 8.5 is underway, I can confidently say I have never seen this team-up used in any meaningful way. Captain America and Winter Soldier just don't have the same play zone, since Cap wants to be in your face and WS wants to pull you away from your team. The stat boosts for the characters are nice, but this team-up is more of a "oh nice I got a little extra hp this match" kind of thing. Very underwhelming to say the least.
Stark Protocol has been incredibly underwhelming, and is on track to be removed alongside the other forgettable team-ups. These characters just don't work well in most teams together, and even in ideal situations, the payoff isn't significant enough.
Planet X Pals suffers from the Jeff curse, seeing virtually no use since Groot's walls blocks off Jeff's healing and makes Rocket's healing harder. The "ride on Groot" portion of the team is pointless since you don't want your healer on the front lines. The stat boosts are nice here, but besides that, this is a close 2nd to Fastball Special.
Cosmic Cyclone doesn't make a lot of sense in the 7.0 meta. You don't want to run a mid tier healer with a low tier DPS for a mediocre team-up. Having Adam Warlock zip around to crop dust a bit of healing and speed is more risk than reward. Maybe this sees use when fliers are viable again, but for now this is the worst launch team-up we've seen since Stars Alligned.
B Tier
The Rocket Network team-up gets a noteworthy upgrade with Mister Fantastic joining the team. He's no replacement for Peni-Parker, but it does give him a new feature to toggle his inflated state in a cooldown, rather than being automatic. This should be a basic feature of the character, and I would guess this team-up is a trial run for a future buff. Star-Lord also gets a nice teleporter ability here, but it hasn't made much of an impact yet.
Season 8.0 introduces an alternate take on Planet-X Pals... Primal Punishment. This simply allows Punisher to ride on the back of Devil Dino, like Rocket and Jeff can ride groot. The only notable difference here is that Punisher is a DPS (not a healer) who actually belongs to be this close to the tank. Devil Dino is also such a big character, it does slightly obscure Punisher's hitbox at times. Basically, this team-up is fine, but you won't be using it very much.
While Blessing of the Kumiho gives Luna Snow a fun new ability, it still makes you play a rough healer in a comp with the new healer. Forcing specific healer combos has never worked before, and it isn't now. This would be C-Tier, but the anchor bonus it gives White Fox is valuable in itself. This team might be worth something next season when the devs inevitably shove a 3rd character into the team in an attempt to improve it.
Blade and Moon Knight's team-up, Blade of Khonshu, gives Blade a cool dash ability that furiously swings his sword and sending out crecent moons. It's a fine ability, but nothing crazy. It requires you to run 2 specific DPS in a comp that overlap in roles, so you won't often use it. When you do, it's nothing special besides a new move for a low tier character.
In theory, Chilling Assault is an amazing team-up. In reality, only Hawkeye is seeing play of these three characters. So similarly to Duality Dance, it never sees any meta relevance. If Luna Snow becomes a relevant healer again, this might be a more impressive team-up.
Rival's newest team-up is Bestial Hunt, which pairs together The Punisher and the new Duelist Daredevil. The team-up simply gives Punisher's existing grenade launcher a slight buff by temporarily blinding impacted opponents. Players typically use the grenade launcher for fast traversal, so it isn't getting a ton of usage. It has utility though in blinding opponents, so it's not quite C-Tier.
A Tier
The classic Gamma Charge is still holding firm, and adding The Thing to the mix! The biggest drawback of adding him is the necessity of running 2 specific tanks, which basically hard-locks your comp. High level play will rarely see this, but causal players will have a lot of fun with it!
The season 8.5 team-up added is Blast Slash, pairing Wolverine with Cyclops. While Cyclops is just the anchor, Wolverine gets a great new ability! He spins around rapidly to deal quick damage to any foe in his path. It's a great way to punish a tank that has no healer, or simply deal quick damage to anyone unfortunate enough to be in your path. If Cyclops was more than an anchor, this would easily be an S-Tier team-up.
Sword of Duality gives Hawkeye another arrow in his quiver that gives him healing (and anti-healing) shots when activated. It's pretty straitforward giving a DPS character an option to heal is a good thing (like Widow in Primal Flame).
Deep Wrath was formally S-Tier, but it quickly drops into A-Tier thanks to some heavy nerfs in season 6.0. In an attempt to make Namor more independent from team-ups, the devs hard nerfed this team to compensate. Unfortunately, the nerf is more intense than Namor's buffs, so the net result is a mid pairing that is significantly less impactful as before.
At long last, Thor has a fast mobility option thanks to Divine Armory! This team-up gives Angela a much needed HP boost, while giving Thor a throwable spear that he can leap to. It's a key piece of Thor's kit that makes him finally viable, so this team easily ranks A-Tier, even with Angela being a lower-tier tank.
Symbiote Shennanigans gives Jeff a solid extra healing option to make him more versatile. With Venom also surging in the meta, the team-up is natually happening quite a bit, which basically means a free buff to both characters (and Hela). Seeing as Hela is a must-have on your team, it's more likely you see this team in action. With that said, the team-up got nerfed a good bit in season 7.5, so it's much less potent than it previously was. For that reason, it's dropping to A-Tier.
S Tier
S Tier
Explosive Entanglement pairs Gambit and Magneto together to give Mag a version of his old pairing with Scarlet Witch. It's nothing flashy, but it is a boost to Magneto's offensive potential (even though he is already a S-Tier character). Season 5.5 also added Rogue to this team-up, which helps makes Rogue a top tier character!
The season 7.5 team-up added to Rivals is Lucky Loan. Besides giving Black Cat a slight damage increase as the anchor, this team gives White Fox a new healing ability that auto-targets in a radius around her! Not only that, but it gives Captain America an increase to his shield size, and allows him to reflect damage directly back where it came from with high accuracy. These are basically huge upgrades to these characters, so it's a clear S-Tier.
While it hasn't recieved any direct changes, Arcane Order is bumping up to S-Tier with season 6.0. Doctor Strange and Magik are seeing a spike in meta relevance, so the benefits of this team are significantly more relevant. The biggest draw here is giving Magik a way to tie down opponents close by so she can secure kills om dodgy opponents.
Vibrant Vitality was designed to introduce new healer comp/ pairing, and it's quite strong! Giving Groot a healing option, and expanding Loki's already strong healing lamp is an incredibly strong upgrade. The only downside here is running Mantis as your second healer, but high level play is actually showing great stats with Mantis (despite her lower playrate).
Now that the classic Fantastic Four team has been disbanded, Invisible Woman has partnered up with Doctor Strange for a wild new buff to Strange. Is basically makes his pre-existing good move an even better move! Considering both characters are top tier, this is basically letting you profit on picking good characters.
The new team-up in season 6.0 pairs Deadpool, Elsa Bloodstone, and Jeff together in Mr. Pools Interdimensional Toy Box. It gives Jeff a set of different abilities, changing based on which role Deadpool is currently using. With Deadpool being basically a permenant character in every game for the foreseeable future, Jeff gets a constant free ability that gives him more utility. Giving an S-Tier healer a consistent extra tool is an easy S-Tier team.
Wrap Up
That covers all of the current rankings for every Team-Up. It isn't currently clear if balance updates will buff or nerf Team-Ups. If there are changes, or new Team-Ups are released, we will update this list to a more up to date one.
