Marvel Rivals Season 1.5 Leak: Support Ult Nerfs We Needed

I don’t know about you, but by early 2025 I was completely tired of seeing a well-placed support ultimate erase every cool play my team made. Mantis, Luna Snow, Invisible Woman, and Cloak & Dagger all had the power to make their entire team effectively unkillable for what felt like forever. In higher ranks, entire games were won or lost based on when a support pressed Q. Honestly, could there be anything more frustrating than landing a perfect Magneto ult only to watch a Luna Snow dance through it? I didn’t think so.

When the Season 1.5 patch notes leaked, translated from Chinese and shared around social media, I felt that mix of excitement and fear. I’m writing this in 2026, but that leak still stands out as a turning point. Fans had been begging NetEase for support ult adjustments, and it looked like the developers were finally listening.

Why Support Ults Were Such a Problem

Let’s be real: support ultimates weren’t just strong, they were meta-defining. A single Luna Snow or Mantis ult could stall a fight so long that the objective timer became the real enemy. Invisible Woman could hide her whole team while healing them, and Cloak & Dagger could blanket an area with healing fog that made pushes feel impossible. Was it fun? For the support player, maybe. For everyone else, it was like slamming into a brick wall.

High-level players started planning entire team fights around support ult economy. If you burned your ult first, you lost. If you forced the enemy support ult too early, you won. That kind of narrow strategic loop gets exhausting fast.

What the Leaked Patch Notes Seemed to Change

The leaked notes, while partial, pointed to one clear goal: slow down those fight-stalling ultimates and reduce their raw healing value.

Almost every healer with an invincibility-style ult had their energy cost increased. That’s a simple but effective change. If the ult costs more, you can’t charge it as quickly. That means fewer team fights get frozen by a single button press.

Here’s a quick breakdown of what stood out to me:

Cloak & Dagger were definitely the headline. Their ultimate went from a near-guaranteed team fight win to something much more manageable.

Cloak & Dagger Mains, We Felt This One

I’ll admit, I play Cloak & Dagger, and reading the leak stung a little. The ultimate cost going from 3400 to 4000 is a big jump. The fog duration dropping to 8 seconds means you can’t just paint the point forever. And the dash healing no longer stacking? Ouch. That alone cuts the ultimate’s healing potential dramatically.

But here’s the thing: the reduced pause between dashes might actually be a sneaky buff. It makes Cloak & Dagger much harder to punish with burst damage ultimates like Magneto’s or Scarlet Witch’s. So while the raw healing goes down, the survivability during the ult could still feel decent. That’s a fair trade to me, because support players shouldn’t be static targets.

Does that mean Cloak & Dagger are dead? Not at all. It means you have to think more about positioning and timing instead of just dropping fog and afk healing.

Other Heroes in the Leak

The leak didn’t just hit supports. It also suggested meaningful buffs for several characters who needed love. Venom, Captain America, Iron Fist, and Adam Warlock were mentioned as receiving significant buffs. That’s a pretty exciting list.

• 🕷️ Venom needed better engage tools and survivability.

• 🇺🇸 Captain America needed more impact in brawls.

• 🥋 Iron Fist needed to not feel like a throw pick in higher ranks.

• ⚡ Adam Warlock needed a reason to be picked over other strategists.

Unfortunately, there was no info about Wolverine in the partial notes. That felt surprising, considering how much of a tank buster he was. Maybe NetEase had separate plans for him, or maybe the missing chunk of notes held the answer. We still don’t know for sure.

Should You Trust Leaks?

Honestly, I treat leaks like a half-translated comic book. The broad strokes are usually right, but the details can shift before an official release. These notes seemed legit because they directly addressed the exact complaints the community had been repeating for weeks. When a leak lines up that cleanly with player sentiment, it’s usually on the right track.

Still, until NetEase dropped the official Season 1.5 patch notes, nothing was guaranteed. The numbers could have changed. A hero could have been added or removed from the list. That’s why I didn’t immediately re-roll my entire hero pool.

Final Thoughts

Looking back from 2026, that Season 1.5 leak was a big moment for Marvel Rivals. It marked the start of NetEase taking support ult balance seriously. Were the nerfs perfect? No patch ever is. But the direction felt right. Support ultimates should reward good timing and positioning, not just exist as a 'press Q to win the team fight' button.

If you’re a support main, don’t panic. Learn the new timing, value mobility, and remember that a shorter but smarter ult can still swing a fight. If you’re a duelist or tank main, enjoy the breathing room. You might finally get to play the game during those big objective fights.

Do I still miss the old Cloak & Dagger ult sometimes? Maybe a little. But I’d rather play a game where multiple strategies work than one where every fight ends with four invincible bodies standing in a circle on the point.