Cosmic Crucible – Season 6 Defensive Setup

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Intro

Choosing a defensive setup for Cosmic Crucible is not an easy task. We get Victory Points based on the number of turns we take to clear the Stage and your remaining Health. This practically means the best teams should be left for Offense and that you should pick your Defense from the teams that remain.

Basically, you have to leave 6-7 teams that can beat any Defensive option (depending on CC Season). Then you need to pick the best Defensive setups for each Stage from the rest of your roster.

The most viable strategy for Cosmic Crucible is to make sure that you can beat any enemy setup as fast as possible and without casualties. In other words, if there is a team that can be beaten only by the same team depending on stage rules, you should leave that team for offense.

Your Defense is meant to slow your enemy down and decrease their efficiency score. You won’t be able to win with Defense only, that’s why picking teams for Defense is always secondary, first and foremost you must make sure that you have strong Offensive options.

We will provide you with Defensive team suggestions for every Stage, that will follow those principles.

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Important – with every new Season or new Update, this page will be updated accordingly with the current defensive META.

Let’s begin!

Season 6

Season 6 will be shorter in comparison with previous seasons, it will last from February 9th until March 29th. As usual. we have a new set of Stage Rules and Global Rules. And we also retain the Exhausted Effect from last Season.

Exhausted will function similarly to how it does in War, where after each attack the defending characters will get a 20% decrease in their primary stats(Health, Damage, Focus, Resistance, Armor). Exhausted Effect can stack, so after two failed attempts the defending enemies will have their stats decreased by 40%. That should help minimize the situations where players are unable to complete any Stage. Cancelled attacks will not apply Exhausted.

Global Rules for this season will allow for Superior and Sinister characters to shine again since Symbiote characters will count as Superior and Sinister characters. A lot of Sinister characters rely on having 2 Superior characters for their kit to be fully unlocked and it will be much easier to build two or more good teams using Symbiotes and Superior/Sinister characters.

Stage Rules this time don’t seem to be too consequential, but they will add a little bit of variety nonetheless, with Stages 3 and 4 being potentially the toughest ones this Season.

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Quick Setups

If you don’t want to go in-depth here are 2 examples for Quick setups depending on your preference, for more detailed information or more alternatives simply scroll down.

Defense Heavy Setup:

  • Stage 1 – Infinity Watch
  • Stage 2 – Darkhold + Quicksilver [instead of Scarlet Witch]
  • Stage 3 – Superior Six
  • Stage 4 – Secret Defenders + Super Skrull (or Apocalypse) [instead of Doctor Strange]
  • Stage 5 – Gamma + Dormammu [instead of Abomination]
  • Stage 6 – X-Treme X-Men + Rogue [instead of Sunspot]
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Offense Heavy Setup

  • Stage 1 – Rebirth/Young Avengers
  • Stage 2 – Darkhold + Quicksilver [instead of Scarlet Witch]
  • Stage 3 – Infinity Watch
  • Stage 4 – X-Treme X-Men + Rogue [instead of Cyclops]
  • Stage 5 – P.E.G.A.S.U.S.
  • Stage 6 – Gamma

Our Current Setups

Below you’ll find the Defensive setups that we use, alongside the teams that will carry out the Offense.

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KanaMC; Level 96; TCP – 47 Million; League – Platinum II (Current) :

  • Stage 1: Vahl/Beta Ray/Dormammu/Valkyrie/Thor (1,40 mil)
  • Stage 2: Darkhold+Quicksilver (1,6 mil)
  • Stage 3: X-Treme X-Men + Rogue (1,7 mil)
  • Stage 4: Secret Defenders + Super Skrull (2 mil)
  • Stage 5: P.E.G.A.S.U.S. (1,35 mil)
  • Stage 6: Gamma (1.6 mil)

Teams that will carry out the Offense are:

  • Masters of Evil (1.5 mil)
  • New Warriors (Full) (1,4 mil)
  • Superior Six (1,3 mil)
  • Tangled Web (3 of them) (820K)
  • Eternals (2 of them) (670K)
  • Infinity Watch (1 mil)
  • Death Seed (1,45 mil)
  • Knowhere (1,45 mil)
  • Bifrost (1,45 mil)
  • Rebirth (1,35 mil)
  • Invaders (1,25 mil)
  • New Avengers (1 mil)
  • War Dogs (1 mil)
  • Young Avengers (960K)
  • Black Order (1 mil)
  • Undying (2 of them) (410K)
  • Underworld (820K)
  • Bionic Avengers (1 mil)
  • Secret Avengers (3 of them) (580K)
  • Plug-and-play characters: Apocalypse (510K), Omega Red (374K), Vulture (410K), Emma Frost (160K), Void Knight (170K), Venom (233K), Carnage (280K), Doctor Doom (285K), Vahl (506K), Nova (430K), Shang Chi (217K), Red Guardian (100k)…
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Kana(alt); Level 96; TCP – 31 Million; League – Gold II (Current) :

  • Stage 1: Black Order (800K)
  • Stage 2: Darkhold + Quicksilver (1,3 mil)
  • Stage 3: Infinity Watch (600K)
  • Stage 4: X-Treme X-Men + Rogue (930K)
  • Stage 5: P.E.G.A.S.U.S. (1,2 mil)
  • Stage 6: Gamma+Dormammu (1,2 mil)

Teams that will carry out the Offense are:

  • Secret Defenders (1.6 mil)
  • Masters of Evil (1 mil)
  • Superior Six (1 mil)
  • New Warriors (950K)
  • Death Seed (1.25 mil)
  • Bifrost (1.1 mil)
  • Eternals (2 of them) (470k)
  • Rebirth (870K)
  • Knowhere (800k)
  • Undying Trio (550K)
  • Plug-and-play characters: Apocalypse (452K), Void Knight (281K), Vahl (514K), Doctor Doom (190K), Vulture (365K), Spider-Weaver (321K), Venom (323K), Sabretooth (308K), Nova (223K) Emma Frost (101K), Squirrel Girl (165K), Silver Surfer (150K), Shang-Chi (140K), Mr Sinister (216K)
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Sandugp; Level 96; TCP – 36.5 Million; League – Platinum II (Current) :

  • Stage 1: X-Treme X-Men with Rogue instead of Sunspot (1.83mil)
  • Stage 2: Bifrost with Dormammu instead of Sylvie (1.52mil)
  • Stage 3: Secret Defenders with Super Skrull instead of Doctor Strange (2.26mil)
  • Stage 4: Rebirth (1.44mil)
  • Stage 5: P.E.G.A.S.U.S. (1,46 mil)
  • Stage 6: Gamma (1.53 mil)

Teams that will carry out the Offense are:

  • Superior Six (1.4mil)
  • Masters of Evil (1.45mil)
  • New Warriors (1.12mil)
  • Darkhold (1.51mil)
  • Death Seed (1.57mil)
  • Knowhere (1.42mil)
  • New Awenger (1.08mil)
  • Tangled Web duo (Weaver + 2099) (863K)
  • Eternals duo (428K)
  • Undying trio (273K)
  • Plug-and-play characters: Apocalypse (510K), Void Knight (336K), Doctor Doom (355K), Vulture (402K), Venom (233K), Emma Frost (116K), Squirrel Girl (185K), Kingpin (209K), Mister Negative (406K), Omega Red (435K), (Shang-Chi (216K), Black Widow (349K), Nick Fury (332K)
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Global Effects – Symbiotic Six

  • Defense and Offense Symbiote characters Count as Superior Six and Sinister Six

On Defense and Offense, Superior Six Characters:

  • On a successful attack, Barrier self for 15% of Max Health.
  • When Successfully attacked remove Revive Once from the attacker.
  • On Spawn, gain Defense Up.

On Defense, all Characters:

  • Gain +20% Health and +10% Damage.
  • After each completed attempt and when revived, gain a stack of Exhaust. Canceled combats will not add Exhaust.
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The Boost from Global Effects isn’t as big for Superior Six as it was last season, but this time it allows Symbiote characters to be considered as Sinister and Superior Six characters which opens up a lot of possibilities for both, Offensive and Defensive teams.

Superior Six (and Symbiote because of Global Rules) characters can still clear Revive Once from their enemies but this time they will do it only upon being successfully attacked, meaning that if someone with Revive Once on them attacks a Symbiote/Superior Six Character they will lose the Revive Once. If the attack missed the Revive will remain. This could be important so it’s best to remember.

And, as per usual, all Defensive teams get small boosts to their Health and Damage. And will receive Exhaust on subsequent attacks

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Stage 1 – Invulnerable

Stage Effects:

On Defense and Offense:

  • Raider and Skirmisher Characters Gain +200% extra Damage when under 50% health

This Stage follows the tradition of Stage 1 having an Iso-related buff, whereas it boosts characters based on their Iso and not their Traits or team affiliations. This is great because it means that, potentially, any character can be used here to some extent as long as you switch up his Iso class.

This time the Focus is on Raiders and Skirmishers and it will boost their Damage when they fall below 50% Max Health. This Stage won’t be as relevant as it was last season. The best Defense for this Stage would be a team comprised of Characters who can safely stay below 50% Max Health. That can be achieved by having Deathproofs on them often, or by having a lot of Drain or a Revive.

This Stage doesn’t have a team that would be a perfect fit, so you can use here any team that naturally has a lot of Raiders and Skirmishers.

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X-Treme X-Men

x treme

Characters left-to-right:

  • Sunspot
  • Nightcrawler
  • Gambit
  • Cyclops
  • Forge

X-Treme X-Men can be great in this room owing to them being a strong team and their key members – Gambit and Nightcrawler being natural Raiders. All of the positive effects X-Treme get on Spawn already make them a dangerous team and even without any Stage bonuses they can pose a threat.

Gambit and Nightcrawler also have mechanics that prevent them from dying quickly, meaning that they might spend more time under 50% Max Health which will trigger the Stage rules and add bonus damage to them. Gambit’s passive pings or his Ultimate with this bonus damage will be devastating and Nightcrawler’s Ultimate is also dangerous if you have a lot of Yellow/Red stars on him. You could also replace either Cyclops or Sunspot (whoever is the weakest) with Rogue which can make this team slightly better for defense.

X-Treme will fare well here, but there are a couple of other Stages where they might be better. Alternatively, you could use full Unlimited X-Men if your X-Treme X-Men are still low.

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Gamma/Gamma + Dormammu

cc def ultimate 32 stage 5 gamma

Characters left-to-right:

  • Brawn (Iso – Raider/Skirmisher)
  • Abomination/Dormammu (Iso – Raider)
  • She-Hulk (Iso – Skirmisher)
  • Red Hulk (Iso – Raider)
  • Hulk (Iso – Raider)

Gamma is one of those teams that can be decent on defense for any season so we are likely to keep seeing them for this and next seasons at least. Red Hulk as a Raider will do very well and if everything lines up he might use his Ultimate while having the bonus damage from the Stage rules which will hurt a lot.

You could also use Dormammu here instead of Abomination. Dormammu hides himself when he drops below 50% Max Health which will trigger the Stage rules, he also might use his Ultimate with the bonus damage applied too. Both these options can do well, but won’t be exceptional here so don’t expect them to stop anyone(unless they don’t know how to counter), merely slow them down.

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Bifrost+Dormammu+Hero Asgardians

vahl ha dorm

Characters left-to-right:

  • Vahl
  • Dormammu
  • Thor
  • Valkyrie
  • Beta Ray Bill

This is a great War Defensive team and it can serve you as an okay Crucible defensive team too. Valkyrie’s Passive will only trigger 50% of the time so it won’t be as effective as in War, but it can still work out in your favor and add more rng/stress to your opponent, especially if they underestimate this team.

Vahl is likely to be built up quite high because of DD VI so will be hard to eliminate and they might end up using their Ultimate when they are below 50% Health, which will deal a ton of damage. Dormammu and Vahl can revive, which will give Valkyrie even more opportunities to use her Passive successfully.

This won’t be a great defense team but it can still be good while allowing you to save stronger defensive options like X-Treme or Gamma for other Stages or Offense.

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Infinity Watch

31102022 marvel strike force best blitz teams infinity watch

Characters left-to-right:

  • Moondragon (Iso – Raider)
  • Phyla-Vell (Iso – Skirmisher)
  • Gamora (Iso – Raider)
  • Nebula (Iso – Raider/Skirmisher)
  • Adam Warlock (Raider/Skirmisher)

Infinity Watch is one of those teams that’s gonna keep showing up on Defense nearly every Crucible season since their Defense Up+Immunity+Safeguard combo on Spawn makes them very resilient. So it’s not a surprise that they can be pretty good on this Stage as well. They are natural at slowing down your enemy and ruining their efficiency score.

They won’t perform any miracles here and there is an even better Stage for them this season, but they still are a decent option.

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Alternatives

For lower Leagues or, if you prefer to go very heavy on the Offense you could use some other older teams that you won’t end up needing otherwise.

  • Undying Trio + Dormammu + 1
  • Young Avengers
  • Rebirth
  • Infestation
  • Knowhere
  • Bifrost
  • New Avengers/New Avengers + Nick Fury(instead of The Thing)

The Undying with Dormammu might work well because Iron Man Zombie will keep reviving and will often get the Stage Bonuses. Young Avengers and Infestation have a healthy balance of Raiders and Skirmishers so both can gain benefit from the Stage rules but not by much. The same goes for Knowhere and Bifrost, although Vahl and Nova are often used as a plug-and-play for Offense so you might want to save them. New Avengers full or with Fury can work well if Tigra is a Raider and is massive since she will slip into Stealth when she falls below 50%

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Stage 2 – Mystic Healthcare

On Defense and Offense, Mystic characters:

  • Gain +20% Drain per negative effect: Bleed, Offense Down, Trauma, or Disrupted.

To effectively exploit the rules of this stage you would have to use a team that is either fully or mostly comprised of Mystic Characters, or has a Mystic Protector.

Protectors are often the characters that end up having a lot of Negative Effects, and because of the Stage rules that could translate into the Protectors being able to fully heal themselves just by doing a Basic attack or a Counterattack. Absorbing Man or Beta Ray Bill might do well here, but Wong can excel because he also gets Safeguard if Strange (Heartless is present). This means that this could be a good room for Darkhold and Variations. Bifrost and Tangled Web + Eternals might also end up being good here.

Darkhold+

marvel strike force best teams darkhold 31102022 1

Characters left-to-right:

  • Agatha Harkness
  • Morgan Le Fay
  • Dr. Strange (Heartless)
  • Scarlet Witch / Quicksilver / Loki
  • Wong

Since this stage favors Mystic characters a team full of Mystic characters is bound to do well here. Darkhold often end up having a lot of Negative effects on them so getting all of the bonus Drain will increase their survivability. Wong as a Protector will also be hard to get through since he will have Taunt and Safeguard and with bonus drain(once he ends up having a lot of Negative effects) even his counterattacks will Heal him a lot.

That said, the Stage rules won’t change the Darkhold too much, so all counters that worked on them before should still function just maybe not as efficiently.

Scarlet Witch is the character to drop if you want to use Quicksilver or Loki, etc. You might also be tempted to use Apocalypse here but he is best left for Offense and he won’t benefit from this Stage so if you do intend to use him on Defense there are better options for him.

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Tangled Web + Eternals

marvel strike force teams tangled web + eternals 19012023 (1)

Characters left-to-right:

  • Spider-Man Noir
  • Sersi
  • Spider-Weaver
  • Ikaris
  • Spider-Man 2099

Nowadays this classic defense team might not be a very good defensive team for higher Crucible Leagues, but it might still do well in mid/lower Leagues and it is mostly Mystic so will benefit from the Stage Rules. It might also draw out the opponents New Warriors since they are an easy direct counter.

Alternatives

There are not a lot of good Mystic teams, you could still use Bifrost or even Black Order here as alternatives, but they simply won’t be as good as Darkhold. You could also treat this Stage as one that doesn’t have any Rules and you could just place here any strong Defensive team that you still have left and don’t intend to use anywhere else (X-Treme X-Men, Infinity Watch, Gamma, etc).

Ultimately it looks like the next new team Out Of Time will be the best fit here, but we are still at least a month away from everyone being released.

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Stage 3 – When It Rains

On Defense and Offense:

  • When a Positive Effect is applied to a Character, increase the duration of all positive effects on allies of that character by +1, up to a Max of 3. 
  • When a Negative Effect is applied to a character, increase the duration of all negative effects on allies of that character by +1, up to a Max of 3.

Any team that has a lot of Positive Effects on Spawn can be good as a defensive option for this Stage. Alternatively, a team that can apply a lot of Negative effects can also be very good here, as long as they get the chance to attack. Some of the best options include Superior Six, Infinity Watch, Darkhold, X-Treme X-Men, etc.

Superior Six+

superior

Characters left-to-right:

  • Lizard
  • Doctor Octopus
  • Kraven The Hunter
  • Green Goblin (Classic)
  • Spider-Slayer

Superior Six are incredibly strong in Crucible, and they also will Spawn with Safeguard and Offense Up, which will be extended to 3 Turns because of the Stage rules. This, accompanied by Green Goblin’s Charges that prevent them from getting Ability Block and Vulnerable applied to them will make them scary on Defense.

To make things even harder, you could use Super Skrull or Apocalypse here instead of Spider-Slayer. You will lose the Offense Up on Spawn but it will be worth it. Superior Six and Super Skrull is the best team that can be used here by far and countering them will be very challenging.

Superior Six should be left for Offense if you don’t have enough Offensive teams and you want to climb up to a new League.

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X-Treme X-Men+

x treme

Characters left-to-right:

  • Sunspot
  • Nightcrawler
  • Gambit
  • Cyclops
  • Forge

X-Treme are one of the newest teams and even though they are a Raid-centric team they are still very great pretty much everywhere, including and specifically this Stage. They gain a lot of Positive effects on Spawn and because of the Stage rules, they will end up having those effects for the duration of the whole fight. That will make them a go-to Defensive option for those who want to leave Superior Six for Offense.

Another way to improve this team a bit is to add Rogue (instead of Cyclops or Sunspot, whomever is weaker) Rogue will Spawn in Crucible with Safeguard and will apply that to Gambit too, which means that they will have Safeguard for the whole fight. Nightcrawler will also add Speed Bar to Rogue when he takes his turn so Rogue will Taunt even faster.

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Infinity Watch

26102022 marvel strike force best teams infinity watch

Characters left-to-right:

  • Gamora
  • Moondragon
  • Adam Warlock
  • Phyla-Vell
  • Nebula

The Stage rules will extend the Safeguard, Defense Up/Immunity of Infinity Watch up to 3 turns and they will end up having it for the rest of the fight, so they could be a good defensive option if you have them built up enough. It’s not better than the other options but it is a solid defense that can slow down your opponent if he doesn’t use the proper counters.

Alternatives

Darkhold Spawn with Safeguard and Defense Up so that will be extended too, meaning that they can work here if you don’t plan to use them for the previous Stage

Gamma can also throw a wrench into your opponent’s plans because Red Hulk will end up having Safeguard and Immunity for 3 Turns at least, and once he applies Trauma that will also be extended.

War Dogs get Speed Up on Spawn so that will be extended thanks to the Stage rule, this can make them slightly harder to kill but ultimately it won’t be too hard.

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Stage 4 – Spiritual Energy

On Defense and Offense:

  • Any time a character gains energy from an active ability, they gain +1 extra energy
  • When an enemy character dies, ally characters gain +1 ability energy.
  • Ultimate abilities cost +3 more ability energy.

2 factors can make a team good for this Stage – Having strong Special abilities or being able to provide Ability Energy with Active Skills(not from Passive Ability). And a team that can fit both criteria will be exceptional here.

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Super Skrull will likely be often here for good reason since his Special is very dangerous and his Basic also deals a lot of Damage. Some other notable plug-and-play characters that can end up being useful here are the ones who can provide Ability Energy on their Special or Basic, like – Jessica Jones, Captain America, Captain America (Sam) Shuri, and Star-Lord.

We are likely to end up with a lot of mixed teams that have either a Skrull or an energy battery character.

A team that can be perfect on Defense here is Superior Six since they have good Special abilities and once Doc Oc summons Shocker they will also have an energy battery. Secret Defenders can also be very good here, a strong Black Cat with her Special might end up eliminating an enemy on her first turn and Doctor Strange can be replaced with a plug-and-play who can provide Ability Energy.

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Secret Defenders+

image

Characters left-to-right:

  • Photon
  • Ghost Rider (Robbie)
  • Doctor Strange/Super Skrull/Apocalypse
  • Black Cat
  • Ms. Marvel (Hard Light)

This will be the Stage where Secret Defenders can perform best since their Special Abilities hit pretty hard, it is possible that after Black Cat, Photon, and Robbie used their Specials one or more enemies would be dead, which would trigger the Stage Rules and generate Ability Energy for the SD so they will be able to use Ultimates soon anyway. Ms. Marvel does have a downside since she won’t be able to Rewind someone early on, but her Special will still apply Taunt to herself.

This is also a perfect room to place Super Skrull (instead of Doctor Strange). Super Skrull has a very potent Special and his Basic is also very powerful, on top of him getting extra Speed Bar from his Passive often he will end up being not too far from using his Ultimate anyway too.

Apocalypse can also be a decent option to use here (instead of Strange). While his most fearsome Ability is his Ultimate, his Special will apply a couple of Safeguards and Immunity to 2 characters so this can keep your team protected long enough for them and Apocalypse to reach their Ultimates.

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X-Treme X-Men+

x treme

Characters left-to-right:

  • Sunspot
  • Nightcrawler
  • Gambit
  • Cyclops/Rogue
  • Forge

Will work well enough on this Stage as well because their Special Abilities are good and Sunspot will also provide Ability Energy for everyone so they will end up getting to their Ultimate fast.

Rogue will also be great here, but you will have to replace Cyclops, you shouldn’t drop Sunspot because he will provide that Ability Energy.

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Gamma+

cc def ultimate 32 stage 5 gamma 1

Characters left-to-right:

  • Brawn
  • Abomination/ Jessica Jones or Captain America
  • She-Hulk
  • Red Hulk
  • Hulk

Gamma team has fairly decent Special abilities and if you hit Red Hulk too much he will also gain Ability Energy so he will be able to use his Ultimate on the third turn, and teams that usually counter Gamma rely heavily on Ultimate Abilities so this Stage can prevent them from functioning correctly.

Although without being able to use their Ultimates quickly enough Gamma might just not have enough Damage to successfully defend. For that reason, you could replace Abomination with Captain America or Jessica Jones. Both Cap and Jess can use their Special Abilities on turn one to provide Ability Energy to their allies, although it is a little bit random who receives that energy. Jess will provide more Energy overall since she can also do that with her Basic attack so she might be a better option, but Captain America can also Taunt and buy some time. You could just use whomever of the two is strongest here.

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Alternatives

Superior Six rely mostly on their Ultimates so they won’t be great here immediately, but they can still be decent since once Doctor Octopus uses his Special he will summon Shocker and once Shocker uses his Special he will give out Ability Energy to everyone, so on their second turn Superior Six will finally be able to use their Ultimates.

Darkhold have some decent Special Abilities and teams that usually counter them have a reliance on their Ultimates, so Darkhold might end up being pretty decent here, occasionally.

Rebirth or War Dogs are much simpler options that you can use here if you want to have more for your Offense. Both have a character who can provide Ability Energy (Captain America and Shuri) so they won’t be hindered too much by the Stage Rules and could do an okay job defending

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Stage 5 – Robotic Double

On Defense and Offense, Tech characters:

  • Whenever a Tech character uses an Ultimate ability, Revive an ally Tech character at 100% Health.

There are only 2 teams that can be good for this Stage since the rules are restricted to Tech characters. Those will be Superior Six or P.E.G.A.S.U.S. Alternatively you could also use a mix of Sinister and Superior Tech characters or even Bionic Avengers, although the latter won’t end up doing much.

P.E.G.A.S.U.S.

pegasus

Characters left-to-right:

  • Rescue
  • Iron Man (Infinity War)
  • Kestrel
  • Darkhawk
  • Ironheart (MK II)

P.E.G.A.S.U.S. is one of the two teams that can be good here while relying on the Stage rules. They have their Ultimate Abilities ready on Spawn so if you manage to eliminate someone quickly, someone else will use their Ultimate and Revive them back up immediately. And this can happen continuously so they will have to be defeated all at once.

They won’t provide a perfect defense but they should fair better than they did in the previous Season. In lower leagues, they might net some defenses due to a surprise factor or a TCP difference but the most common counters will still work on them so using any strong defensive team that you have left might be better long-term.

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Alternatives

We can also make a Superior/Sinister mixed team that is comprised of only Tech characters. If we maintain the core of the Superior Six (Doctor Octopus and Green Goblin (Classic)) and add Vulture, Mysterio and either Spider-Slayer or Shocker, this team can be pretty dangerous. And they will now possess a Revive in their repertoire thanks to the Stage Rules.

Alternatively, a simpler team can be made while leaving Superior for Offense – Rhino, Mysterio, Vulture with Void Knight and Carnage can be one such alternative team. Symbiotes will ensure that Sinister characters have their kits fully functioning while also dealing some damage or applying Negative effects. This team is hardly better than P.E.G.A.S.U.S. but can be a decent option if you want to leave the latter for Offense. Since Rhino is not Tech you can replace him with Spider-Slayer but having a Protector is nice. The only downside is that Vulture and Mysterio can be very useful on Offense, that’s why this option is in the “alternatives” section.

Other than that, the only other viable Tech team would be Bionic Avengers, but they will hardly be any good here so it would be better to just use any other team and ignore the stage rules altogether and place Invaders, Bifrost, New Avengers, Infestation, Black Order or Young Avengers here.

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Stage 6 – Health Insurance

On Defense and Offense, All Characters:

  • On turn, characters remove all positive effects from self and heal +10% of Max Health for each positive effect removed.

For this Stage, the best Defensive team will be a team that either doesn’t rely on positive effects to be effective or that has Safeguard to prevent the removal of positive effects. Infinity Watch or Darkhold can be good here. Important to note, that the Stage will strip Positive effects at the beginning of the character’s turn, meaning that the character can Apply some Positive effects to himself for that and they will stay applied until the next time this character takes a turn.

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Darkhold+

marvel strike force best teams darkhold 31102022 1

Characters left-to-right:

  • Agatha Harkness
  • Morgan Le Fay
  • Dr. Strange (Heartless)
  • Scarlet Witch or Quicksilver or Apocalypse
  • Wong

Darkhold also has the mix of Heroes/Villains we want, the 3 core members – Morgan, Strange, and Agatha are Villains and have a lot of AoE attacks, while Wong and Scarlet Witch are heroes, but only Scarlet has one AoE attack. Wong will often be counterattacking which will help apply more debuffs. So utilizing Stage rules effectively with this team is possible and the team is formidable meaning they will defend the Stage well.

You could also replace Scarlet Witch with Quicksilver, he is also a hero and he will be taking a lot more turns than Scarlet so will apply more debuffs.

Infinity Watch

26102022 marvel strike force best teams infinity watch

Characters left-to-right:

  • Gamora
  • Moondragon
  • Adam Warlock
  • Phyla-Vell
  • Nebula

Infinity Watch can be okay here, but they gain Safeguard only for 1 turn so they can end up losing their buffs fairly quickly. They can regain Safeguard when they fall below 50% Health or when Adam uses his Ultimate, but there can be a window of opportunity between those things happening which will make the team slightly less effective than it can be on other stages. It’s still okay to use them here if you don’t have a better option.

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Gamma+

cc def ultimate 32 stage 5 gamma 1

Characters left-to-right:

  • Brawn
  • Abomination/ Dormammu
  • She-Hulk
  • Red Hulk
  • Hulk

Gamma can also stay on this Stage, they don’t rely on having that many positive effects anyway and because the offensive teams won’t be able to keep their positive effects too Gamma can end up dealing a lot of damage.

To mix things up you can also replace Abomination with Dormammu which will make Gamma even stronger.

X-Treme X-Men+

x treme

Characters left-to-right:

  • Sunspot
  • Nightcrawler
  • Gambit
  • Cyclops
  • Forge

You can use X-Treme X-Men with Rogue here, she will provide Safeguard to Gambit and herself, while Nightcrawler also will have Safeguard from his abilities, so they won’t be completely without buffs which can make them very dangerous considering that the attacking team won’t have positive effects stick, unless they have Safeguard.

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Unlimited X-Men(no Gambit)

unlim dorm

Characters left-to-right:

  • Rogue
  • Dormammu
  • Sunfire
  • Dazzler
  • Fantomex

Unlimited X-Men can be decent here even if you don’t use Gambit, they will gain Safeguard for 1 turn in Cosmic Crucible thanks to Rogue, so they can be used for this room to varying success. Once Rogue takes her first turn she will reapply Safeguard to herself as well as gain Taunt so she will still be able to provide her protection. Dormammu will be able to Revive and Heal, so this team can eat a lot of efficiency Points from your enemy attacks.

You could also use Gambit instead of Dormammu if he’s not tied up with X-Treme somewhere else.

Alternatives

Other than the teams mentioned above, there are not a lot of decent alternatives here, but you could go with Rebirth or Invaders if you have nothing else at all. Or any other decently sized team that you will not use anywhere else.

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Conclusion

Season 6, as well as Season 7, will be shorter than previous seasons (Season 6 is 49 Days) and because of that there will be no adjustments for Player Ranks between Seasons 6 & 7, but we will still experience a drop before Season 6 starts. This can be a good opportunity for everyone to climb as high as they can.

One of the most exciting parts about Season 6 is the Global Rule where Symbiote characters count as Superior and Sinister Six. This can be very beneficial for the Offense and we will likely end up using it quite often.

Stage Rules aren’t too intricate but will still offer a lot of challenging experiences. One of the main challenges could be the yet-to-be-released Out Of Time team, but it doesn’t look like they will get to see much of Season 6 due to release schedules. That said, Black Knight on his own can cause a lot of heartache, and getting through him won’t be easy (but at least it will be fun seeing all those failed attempts against your Black Knight).

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Season 7 might feature a ruleset that will favor the new Cabal team that is going to be released around the same time Season 7 starts. Considering all of that both seasons should be pretty fun, and once we have the Rules for Season 7 we will update this page with the best Defensive suggestions (Black Knight will surely be best on Defense)

We hope that our Defensive recommendation will serve you well and that Season 6 of Cosmic Crucible will challenging but also fulfilling!

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