PVP Meta Counter - updated 2/2026

Marvel Puzzle Quest MPQ General Discussion
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IMPACTFUL NOTES 2/2026

  • 6 stars are coming… and they are damn annoying.
  • Supports below are still off.

IMPACTFUL NOTES 11/25

  • Fantasticar, Frog and Arrow supports are temporarily removed from Pick2. Without FCar, Darkveil should be more carefully considered as guaranteeing team up is less likely.
  • Refreshment Cart support is currently “broken” and makes your entire team unable to be stunned by anything less than 3 turns. This renders Chasm completely useless.

I’m really not sure why we don’t have this thread already. I imagine new people might come to the forum for this specific info.

I spent a decent amount of time to type this out and format it, because I truly believe there is still a lot out there that people just aren’t aware of, or don’t have access to because of ascension. I only have like 10 characters ascended to 5, and yet I still find far more variety in PVP than there used to be (offense and defense), and I usually only lose if I’m testing something new or I rush in not paying attention to what I’m fighting.

Whether you believe it or not, Supports are also to your benefit, UNLESS, you don’t pay attention to them OR take the time to understand and level them. Fortunately, you only need a few and they only really need to be at rank 3.

DISCLAIMER:

I am not saying the game is balanced (characters or supports, neither are balanced), but I am saying, in my experience (and likely more than you know), there is far more variety out there now, both in what I’m fighting against AND what I can use against them. I also understand your potential perspective of not wanting to read and strategize for hours to get things done easier, so feel free to leave your comments about balance and supports at the door and try your best to positively contribute to meta counters for the greater good.

If New-ish, Maybe Start Here

If you just want to win in PVP on OFFENSE, below is a minimalist list for what you can get to start winning against most teams, and they can usually punch above 550 without needing to be equal or even high level (see pick 2 and pick 3 for specific teams).

Priority Characters

  1. Chasm5: Shuts down basically anything Polaris and Mthor (temporarily neutered by Refresh Cart).
  2. ShangChi5: Very simple glass cannon capable of quick infinites.
  3. Hawkeye1: Now the simplest infinite in the game, pairs well with a great many.
  4. Darkveil4 (un-ascended): IMO the best defensive character in the game, only Chasm and ORed pose a threat to him (if there is a Kang, be aware of sending yourself away).
    Electro5: By far the best option for stopping team damage (ORed / Juggernaut4).

Consider ASAP In order of rarity, not value

  • Moonstone2: Easy to get, cheap giant nukes.
  • IronMay3: Way too high ability AND match damage buff, ascend to 4 ASAP. Pair with higher damage characters like OmegaRed or match damage characters.
  • Namor3: Crazy match damage passive that hits random enemies (including invisible). Pair with high match damage characters like MBaku, Juggernaut etc.
  • Moonstone4: 2nd best turn 1 infinite. Great battery. 2 person stun.
  • Polaris4: Best SAP tile spam in the game. Pair with BetaRey5, Rocket4, MThor etc. Loves Lucky support to keep her full health.
  • OmegaRed5: Good health, healing and free passive huge team damage that can’t be stunned. Pair with IronMay, Chasm… (does well on most teams).
  • MightyThor5: Chaos in a character, destroys everything and generates AP in the process. All abilities are good. Use with Riri5, Polaris or anyone you want to destroy the board with.
  • Agatha5: Almost as cheap as abilities come. Easy infinites that can start very quickly / immediately. Decent passives also.
  • Fankie5 Lovely cheap green AOE, but needs good partners (May3, iHuk5 etc.). One of the best at speed PVE (but that’s not why we’re here!). Target a green starting support also: Atlantis, Yaro Fruit
  • Sammernaut: Sam5 w/ Juggy4, separate they are a liability, together, they are broken.

Consider ascending ASAP In order of rarity, not value

  • Spiderman1: Super simple cheap high damage abilities and always god boosted. Start with Pink AP
  • Namor3: Same as noted above.
  • Juggernaut4: 90% match damage defense, super high match damage and constant AOE
  • AgentCoulson4: Once ascended pairs with multiple people who can end the match right away via AP gain and countdowns.
  • MultipleMan4: Amazing at everything, I made an entire guide, check it out: https://forums.505go.com/discussion/92745/holy-ship-a-friday-multiman-guide/p1

Priority Supports

BE WARNED: FCar, Leapfrog, Thanoscopter and Eros are being removed from PVP for “balancing”, there is a good chance they are removed from this list when they return.

  1. Fantasticar (rank 3): Offensive madness on any hero with high match damage. On ShangChi, every match will fuel Darkveil to send your problems away. Or sometimes just end the match from the get go.
  2. Refreshment Cart (rank 1) - Super versatile AP gain for heroes AND villains.
  3. Krakoa (rank 3): Guaranteed starting AP on mutants (mutliple teams can use this to set the win right away). On Darkveil, you guarantee 7 yellow to start.
  4. Leapfrog (rank 3): Everyone will tell you this is the best support, though it is amazing, most of its value comes from defense, and the 3 above LOVE offense. If you know you are going to eat non team-damage big booms, frog is your guy. Be careful on offense as you can often end up with your desired frontline going invisible, exposing your squishy backline!
  • Consider next: Eros Arrow R3, Low Level AI R3, Lucky R3, Stepford Cuckoos R3, Omnipotence City R3, Implanted Bomb R5, Thanoscopter R5

Pick 2 Meta Counters

The info below is based off my experience in battle with these teams. Enemy teams are usually level 460 - 672. The counters at the top are (in my experience) more likely to come out of the fight healthy, to avoid health pack use, though I constantly mix up my teams looking for new and fun options.

Not all teams require specific supports, but the supports noted above are my main to mix and match. Read them, learn what they do so you are never caught with your pants down! My roster is also limited, though most of the characters noted below are 5star / ascended, some of them do not need to be (IE: Darkveil4, BlackKing4, Agatha3). The number after their name only denotes which variant / base level of the character, NOT what level it is ascended to (assume most are 5star).

“No Chasm” implies the enemy team is not using him. Those teams can still beat Chasm teams, but without Chasm, they basically come out uninjured.

Pick2 Team Basically Can’t Lose (no enemy Chasm)

  • (Don’t use against Frankie) Darkveil4 w/ Krakoa, Shangchi5 w/ Fantasticar (start with 1-2 team up for riskier teams): https://youtube.com/shorts/xzCholZiMjU
  • Hawkeye1 w/ starting pink AP support, ANY high level partner (infinite). Recommended: High match damage or cheap nuke: MBaku4, Onslaught, ShangChi, Yelena1, Moonstone2 etc.

Pick2 Basically Can’t Lose against Team Damage (no enemy Frankie)

Juggernaut4, SamWilson5

  • Electro5, Moonstone4: See above video for pick 2 team damage
  • Darkveil4, any hero: See above video for pick 2 can’t lose
  • Betsy4, Agatha3 (both ascended to 5)
  • MultiMan4, Coulson4
  • Electro5, Elektra5
  • Agatha3, LukeCage3
  • Agatha3, Karnak4: https://youtube.com/shorts/uzcSeAchhU0?si=-vN-B8c_6LQAkIyu
  • Polaris4, MThor5
  • Polaris4, BRB5
  • Electro5, Juggernaut4 (Your Juggy needs to be strong. Hit Sam 1st)
  • MBaku4, Kingpin5
  • Blob4, BlackKing4 / Gorr4
  • Juggernaut4, SamWilson5

Spiderman1 +AP boost

Mbaku4, Namor3

  • Darkveil4 w/ starting yellow support, Kang5 +2 team-up +1 all AP boost

Polaris4, MThor5
No one should be losing to this team if you have been around for the past year or so.

  • Darkveil4, any hero w/ Fantasticar: See above video for pick 2 can’t lose
  • Chasm5, anyone strong / good
  • MultiMan4, anyone? Coulson4 of course
  • SpiderMay5, Blob4
  • Juggernaught4, Namor3
  • Juggernaught4, Samwilson5
  • MBaku4, Namor3
  • BlackKing4, anyone?
  • Agatha3, BRB5
  • MThor5, Riri5
  • ImmortalHulk5, MoonDragon4
  • Gorr
  • Blob?

Frankie5, iHulk5

  • Hawkeye1 w/ starting pink AP support, ANY high level partner (infinite). Recommended: High match damage or cheap nuke: MBaku4, Onslaught, ShangChi, Yelena1, Moonstone2 etc.
  • Moonstone4 w/ any starting AP, any teammate that can start with yellow AP support, EX: Peni Parker, Vintage Shield (infinite). Recommended: High match damage or black nukes: Namor3, Yelena1, Electro5 etc. If Moonstone or Darkveil are ascended, consider Darkveil w/ Krakoa to guarantee yellow.
  • Multiman4 w/ Cuckoos, both other characters w/ starting AP supports. Recommended: Coulson, any strong Mutant w/ Krakoa.

Pick 3 Meta Counters

Pick3 Team Basically Can’t Lose

Pick3 Team Basically Can’t Lose (no enemy Chasm)

ORed5, Chasm5, May3
In my opinion, one of (if not the) most difficult team to counter and come out healthy as you are forced to eat a minimum of 1 boosted Red spore (it can hurt).

  • Electro5, ScarletWitch5, Wong5 (Wong heal to win with full health): https://www.youtube.com/shorts/Z7ReRjwOOdQ
  • Electro5, ScarletWitch5, ORed5
  • Electro5, Elektra5, ORed5
  • Polaris4, Goose5, ScarletWitch5
  • Electro5, ScarletWitch5, Hex235
  • Moonknight5 if May in the middle with no frog

MBaku4/Jugg4, Chasm5, Namor3
If this team is way higher level than you, I don’t recommend fighting them as they will accidentally kill you with a match 3. Luckily it’s really only a problem if Namor is ascended to 5, and those are still more rare. On top of being less (for me) it is also pretty new, so more research is being done.

Polaris4, MThor5, BetaReyBill5 or RocketGroot4
Your options are slightly more limited here since they are already 2 steps ahead by starting with the SAPs and charged tiles, so your easy bet is Chasm or Gorr, but others can definitely shut them down.

SamWilson5, Juggernaught4, Chasm5

Frankie5, IronMay3, MThor5

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Please remember, this is only for winning OFFENSIVELY in PVP, so lets keep our comments limited to that, and know this isn’t saying these are the best characters ever, for everything.

Please add your experiences for defeating the teams above or add other teams you think area annoying to fight against so we can strategize. I only put the ones I hear about from others or experience myself. Nothing else (in my experience) warranted help, IE: MThor Shang etc.

If you want more context on any, of course feel free to ask. I left a lot out assuming you have decent experience already and to save typing space.

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Great write up. I’ll just add this. This is my go to team to counter both omega red/may/chasm and jugg4/sam/chasm in sim:

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and Multiple Man and ascended coulson is the best basically can’t lose team in pick 2that I’ve found.

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I can help with a lot of this but my response will probably be a novel (promise I won’t get sidetracked into whatever!). I have a bunch of weird characters and weird supports that do stuff everyone forgets about. I’ll try to organize some thoughts and keep it concise.

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Thanks Bri, I think you helped out when I posted the initial topic for that team too! I added your team to the list.

If anyone has good options for MBaku4, Chasm5, Namor3, I would love to hear them, because this team is nasty as hell when ascended. I imagine Blob (or BKing) will be good for it, but I am about 30 levels out from ascending him and I don’t get a lot of chances to fight that team.

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I should also note I almost never use more than 1AP boost. If you are big on spending boosts, Agatha5 and Coulson/MultiMan definitely come out on top.

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Thankfully the AI is stupid playing Namor3. Sam (w/Eros)/4Asc5Juggs (w/ThanosCopter) /Chasm (w/Totem) can take this team out fairly regularly. Focus with M’baku out front first. Be certain to have Juggs’ colors match as much as possible for both the AOE and for Sam to create strikes but also for the board movement with ThanosCopter. Repeat. Eventually, there will be too many strikes out and it overwhelms the team.

The above team is also great for Defense. Still beatable, but I get way fewer retals in Sim than ever.

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The easiest way to beat the mbaku team is just mirror match. You don’t need mbaku either. Any big match damage characters work. I use p5 collosus since my ascended mbaku is still a baby.

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I’d add m’Thor to your list of priority characters – she just does so much – hits hard, counters so many characters, goes infinite super easily. I know she’s in the “next” section but she should probably be higher.

I’m not sure if Electro is the best at AoE defense anymore. The Juggernaut/Sam teams will overwhelm her passive pretty quick unless she’s really big. She can probably handle Omega Red, depending on how big he is, but she doesn’t bring much to the table offensively. I’d want to make sure I had something really powerful to do with all that yellow, and I’m not sure what that is right now.

5* Goose is probably the best right now. She blocks any AoE, takes no damage, and creates some strong strike tiles. I’d also look at Scarlet Witch (I’m really surprised she hasn’t made a comeback yet).

I would probably put Coulson on the ascend ASAP list. He can make a lot of infinite/never-lose combos happen. One of those is Multiple Man/Coulson. Another is Riri/Kang/Coulson – bring a green support and the other team never gets a turn.

I think it’s worth adding the +6 AP supports to your list, but I’m not sure what order I’d put them in. Maybe Tinkerer first?

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Oh, I group Fantasticar and Thanos Copter together (“the cascade supports”), so they should probably be 1 and 1a on your list, or something like that.

Copter is actually better in a lot of situations because it lasts longer than 4 turns. Having both is even better though, because everyone can use one of them, and occasionally you can run both at once.

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Nobody’s using it right now but there’s an infinite/beat-anything combo with Hobgoblin. Hobgoblin/Coulson/(Hawkeye or Kang) can win any fight, against any health pool. You just cast anything, then hammer Hobgoblin blue over and over until everybody is dead.

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Great write up!

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I tried the Multi-Man, Chasm, Coulson team and got absolutely destroyed in SHIELD Sim! It was versus Juggs/OR/Sam Wilson.

I will try some others but not a promising start!

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What’s the deal with Ascended 3a5 Punisher? That’s twice I’ve seen him today. This team is 550 M’Baku, 509 3a5 Namor and 459 3a5 Punisher. I haven’t fought it yet and probably won’t although I could try Lavaman Lee’s team but my Thanos Copter is only rank 2 so is a sad mini chopper. I guess the worst that can happen is I lose, so here goes.

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I won with a team of 463 4a5 Juggs w/Leapfrog, 446 5 Sam w/Eros arrow and 458 5 Goose w/Low level AI, no boosts.

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@dianetics said:

@DAZ0273 said:
What’s the deal with Ascended 3a5 Punisher? That’s twice I’ve seen him today. This team is 550 M’Baku, 509 3a5 Namor and 459 3a5 Punisher. I haven’t fought it yet and probably won’t although I could try Lavaman Lee’s team but my Thanos Copter is only rank 2 so is a sad mini chopper. I guess the worst that can happen is I lose, so here goes.

Punisher has an execute. I’m guessing that’s why people bring him.
I’m sure it is quite usefull against other M’Baku’s

Seems a lot of work to get Punisher when 5* DinoVenom has one too?

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Punisher had a 15wins quest associated with him, so I think that’s why you’re seeing him.

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Ah, fair enough that makes sense! I was scratching my head there!

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Against team damage, I like pairing 5Electro with 5Elektra. Electro reduces team damage and produces yellow, which Elektra uses to place trap tiles mitigating even more damage and make the enemy team implode on itself. Also does some tile stealing with Elektra (both passively and actively, strike tiles by default). It’s not viable against all teams, but I’ve used it successfully a lot.

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@entrailbucket
I didn’t add MThor to that specific list because she isn’t necessary for the minimal needs of winning. It’s not that she isn’t top tier (that’s why she is on that list), she just isn’t needed to beat, any team? She is one of my highest level characters but I never user her (unless with Riri for some fun). I could start to build in the tier list, but this thread was specifically tailored at winning PVP and as efficiently as possible (she is part of multiple teams on the list though).

I don’t know what to say about the electro comment, she doesn’t have the highest AOE defense when compared to someone like ascended Quake, but the yellow she gives you is also key to coming out of the fight healthy. As for Sam and Juggs; Electro with Juggs is the main team I use against them and by far my safest, I have never lost with it and rarely lose a noticeable amount of health, so perhaps something is going wrong there for you? I used her the entirety of Juggs god buff and she never died once, kill Sam first and it’s over. For context, my Electro is maybe 455 and enemy GodJug were usually over 550.

I agree about Thanoscopter, I put that one to rank 5 pretty fast, but there are 2 critical differences with copter and car: 1) Car gives you team up, combined with Darkveil, that’s it, you win and do so usually without losing much of any health (with ShangChi you come out full health). 2) Copter needs rank 5, and it will take newer players a loong time to get there. You could level up 3 other important Supports to 3 in the meantime.

Added Coulson because I do agree he is part of many teams that can win almost too quickly. I also added a blurb to each of them though so newer players know why.

Hobgoblin/Coulson/(Hawkeye or Kang): Will try this one out today, I remember seeing this one in his thread. Does it win right off the bat? I’m guessing it needs at least 5 starting AP?

@DeNappa
I added that team since I know it’s an option, I just never run it because Wong can heal the team full before ending the fight and I think his 60% reduction is a little more forgiving plus massive protect tiles. Who do you run as a third with Elektra?

@LavaManLee @BriMan2222
Thank you for the recommendations, I added them to the list for that team and will try them out more when I come across them in the wild.

@DAZ0273
You definitely could lose to that team if someone was missing:

  • Are your Coulson and MultiMan ascended?
  • Did you make sure to take Krakoa and perhaps some AP boost?
    My write up doesn’t have the step by step written in, but I tried to make sure the important parts were there. Any team with Chasm has the opportunity for something like Car or Copter to kill you, but if you go in prepared that should almost never happen.