Summoners!

Here’s my guide for Act 7.1.4 “Usurp” in Marvel Contest of Champions.

General Thoughts:

The Act 7 design philosophy continues here and is quite entertaining. Somehow, the designers actually managed to create a fun Aspect of War path! Overall, I think Act 7.1.4 is defined by the Weapon X boss, which is the most challenging Act 7.1 Boss so far.

Best Champs: Archangel, Symbiote Supreme, Human Torch, Falcon, Warlock, Nick Fury, Darkhawk

Restrictions: 5 & 6-Star Champions Only

Global Nodes: Star Power, Adrenaline Rush, Hold The Line, Special Attack 3, +200% Attack & Health, +700% Health

Boss: Hela

Boss Notes:
+150% Attack
+500% Health
Rust & Run
Lazarus
Heavy Assault
Counterstrike
Enhanced Fury

The only real worry with this Boss is triggering Counterstrike and Hela going Unblockable. Any of the usual Mystic counters like Sorcerer Supreme, Doctor Doom, and Symbiote Supreme should do just fine here.

Boss: Juggernaut

Boss Notes:
+150% Attack
+500% Health
Caustic Temper
Rising Sun
Juke
Unblockable Specials

I really like the pairing of Rising Sun with Caustic Temper, as it allows any Poison-Immune champion to take the fight. I did quite well with Sentinel personally.

The trick here is to not stack 10+ Fury Buffs and trigger the degeneration, but you also want to take advantage of the Juke node to boost your damage from the Passive Fury effects.

You should alternate your combos in this manner: M-L-L-L-L, Heavy, M-L-L-L-M, Heavy. Work in specials as you can.

Boss: Weapon X

Boss Notes:
+150% Attack
+500% Health
Poison Vulnerability
Enhanced Bleed
Aggressive

Weapon X can easily cost you some revives if you aren’t careful. I do think Archangel is very effective in terms of doing big damage while also shutting off the Unstoppable Buff from neurotoxins. Warlock is another fantastic option, and Man-Thing can do quite well if he is ranked-up.

Lane 1 – Portal A, Left/Up – Hela Boss – Easy Path

Gate: None

Defenders: Hulk Ragnarok, Storm Pyramid X, Nick Fury, Jane Foster, Sentinel, The Champion

Nodes: Brute Force, Colorblind (Entire Path). Each defender has a Wrath node granting attackers with Class Advantage over the defender an attack bonus for the length of the fight.

Team: Sunspot (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 200), Nick Fury (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 1), Hyperion (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 73), Star-Lord (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 132), Symbiote Supreme (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 60)

Tips: This path is all about bringing in 5 attackers of different class types. You’ll need a strong mystic nullifier for The Champion and the Hela boss, and a Mutant for Nick Fury. I would also recommend a Cosmic for the Sentinel fight so it doesn’t take forever. You may want to consider Power Control or Taunt when selecting your team, as some of these defenders have long special animations or can turtle up, so you can take some damage from Brute Force if you aren’t careful.

There isn’t anything too tricky here. I went with the class advantage in all the fights that I could and used Star-Lord for Jane Foster since he is a heavy-hitter. Other than the usual pain of “Real” Nick Fury going Unblockable, there isn’t too much here that can trip you up.

Lane 2 – Portal A, Lower Paths – Hela Boss

Gate: None

Defenders: Kamala Khan, Stark Spider-Man, Proxima Midnight, Psylocke, Medusa, Red Skull

Nodes: Pressure Gauge 1, Mystic Focus, Rage, Mystic Wrath

Team: Morningstar (6-Star Rank 2 Sig 0), Doctor Doom (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 200), Mephisto (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 200), Symbiote Supreme (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 60), Guillotine (5-Star Rank 4 Sig 120)

Tips: Pressure Gauge is one of my least favorite nodes in MCOC, particularly in longer fights because you can get backed into a corner. The nodes benefit Mystic attackers on this path, so make sure to load up your best available options. You can charge your power bar by holding block, which will get you out of trouble.

Initially, I tried to get Morningstar ramped-up, but I got caught by Stark Spider-Man’s evade. I then switched to Doom. He’s great for this path, particularly because you can parry and “Doom-Slap” all fight long and stay at the same Pressure Gauge count, since he has a 1 hit heavy. I used Doom through the Proxima, Psylocke, and Medusa fights, and for about 80% of the Red Skull fight. I then finished Red Skull with Symbiote Supreme.

For the Hela boss I switched Guillotine with Venom to give Symbiote Supreme another synergy and got the solo. The only real risk in that Hela fight is the Counterstrike node and triggering her Unblockable at a bad time.

For additional options, I think Dragon Man and Sorcerer Supreme could be excellent for this path.

Lane 3 – Portal B, Upper Lanes – Weapon X Boss

Gate: None

Defenders: Iron Man, Heimdall, Iron Patriot, Black Panther Civil War, Civil Warrior, Superior Iron Man

Nodes: Arc Overload 2.2, Armored Assault, Boost Buff Armor Up 3, Critical Setup

Team: Doctor Doom (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 200), Symbiote Supreme (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 60), Archangel (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 80), Sentinel (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 157), Venom (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 40)

Tips: For this path you need to keep removing the defender’s Armor-Up buffs, otherwise they will go Unblockable.

The three Iron Man variants are the easy fights. If you have Symbiote Supreme, the fight is pretty much over once you get to your first SP3. After that you should be able to keep the opponent staggered the rest of the fight, so you’ll have Parry available to you. Note that because of increased Ability Accuracy, you likely won’t nullify the defender’s buffs at the top of the fight, so don’t think you can use a Parry to start things off. If you can get off an early intercept to get the power rotation and special baiting going you should be fine.

The three trickier fights are Heimdall, Black Panther Civil War, and Civil Warrior. Heimdall will generate more Armor-Up buffs than the Iron Men, so you need to take the fight a bit slower. Still, it’s not too tough. With Black Panther CW you need to play Parry-free for the most part. I did get caught baiting an SP1 once and died. As long as you can successfully bait specials, you’ll be fine.

Civil Warrior is actually the hardest fight here, because of a couple of abilities I didn’t know he had. Civil Warrior decreases the opponent’s Offensive Ability Accuracy by 15% per Armor-Up buff, and he has 15% Bleed and Poison Resistance per Armor-Up buff. Because of this, it was nearly impossible to get any big damage from Sentinel or Symbiote Supreme because their debuffs weren’t applying.

Thankfully, the Bleed and Poison resistance doesn’t apply to Cosmic Champions, so Venom wrecked him. I strongly advise you bring a Cosmic for this fight, with Medusa, Aarkus, and Venom being the top choices.

For Weapon X I tried out a few champions, but the plan going in was to use Archangel because of the Poison Vulnerability node. That proved to be the right choice has he melted Weapon X. While he didn’t prevent the Unblockable, he was able to keep Weapon X from going Unstoppable so I could intercept and counter the specials.

If you have a ranked Immortal Abomination or Man-Thing they should also be good for the Weapon X Boss.

Lane 4 – Portal B, Lower Paths – Weapon X Boss

Gate: None

Defenders: Captain America World War II, Iron Fist, Hulk, Captain Marvel, M.O.D.O.K., Unstoppable Colossus

Nodes: Aspect of War, Cage Rattler, Stun Vulnerability

Team: Falcon (6-Star Rank 2 Sig 20), Nick Fury (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 21), Void (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 200,) Killmonger (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 200), Archangel (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 80)

Tips: Aspect of War is one of my least favorite nodes in MCOC, but the Cage Rattler node, which grants Skill Attackers a 50% chance to stun the opponent when they hit into the defender’s block actually makes it a fair fight. I highly recommend you bring your best 2-3 Skill champions for this path.

I used Nick Fury for the first 3 fights, but Hulk caught me on an Intercept, launched an SP1, stunned me, and it was game over. I then switched over to Falcon and he was great. Not sure how much of that was Falcon or the 6-Star Boost Nodes but he worked great. I did use Killmonger for M.O.D.O.K., which was fine, but you can’t really punish the specials with Aspect of War so Killmonger’s True Strike wasn’t a factor. He still got the solo though.

In general, just look for openings to hit into the opponent’s block and play aggressive. Launch specials while the opponent is stunned for extra damage from Stun Vulnerability.

For Weapon X I switched out Falcon for my Rank 4 Man-Thing. Man-Thing, Archangel, and a pair of revives took down Weapon X. That fight is kind of a crap shoot because of the Unstoppable and Unblockable but those are two very good options.

Lane 5 – Portal C, Upper Lanes – Juggernaut Boss

Gate: None

Defenders: Mordo, Moon Knight, Thing, Deadpool, Rocket Raccoon, Thor

Nodes: Polka Dot Power, Bleed Immunity, Highly Flammable, Poison Vulnerability

Team: Darkhawk (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 200), Sunspot (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 200), Human Torch (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 21), Falcon (6-Star Rank 2 Sig 20), Hulk Ragnarok (6-Star Rank 2 Sig 0)

Tips: For this path you’re looking for champions that can spam Poison or Incinerate Debuffs. For me, Sunspot and Human Torch were the clear winners on my roster. I think you could also use Man-Thing, Immortal Abomination, Claire Voyant, or Doctor Voodoo to play into the Poison Vulnerability node.

I started off with Human Torch vs Mordo for class advantage. I did use Torch’s Pre-fight, which takes away the ability to gain power from Polka Dot Power but the fight still went just fine. I used Sunspot for the rest of the fights other than Thing. I did have to cycle in a SP3 a few times to stay in Flare State, but these were pretty standard Sunspot fights otherwise. For Thing I used Falcon, and even though he didn’t gain any power during the fight he still did great damage. I’m sure having a 6-Star for the Global Nodes helped. It’s really nice not having to worry about the Rock Stacks for most of the fight.

When I got to Juggernaut I switched out Sunspot for Sentinel, and then I used Hulk Ragnarok and Sentinel for the boss fight. I enjoyed Sentinel a bit more. It feels like Sentinel built for this fight. Since it’s a longer fight Sentinel gets to 100 Analysis, and you have to work in your Heavy anyway, so you don’t Degen, which lets you take advantage of the extended timer on the Heavy Shock. Throw in a handful of SP2s for the big Incinerate Damage and it’s all over.

Lane 6 – Portal C, Lower Paths – Easy Path

Gate: None

Defenders: Havok, Morningstar, Iceman, Abomination, Cyclops New Xavier School, Mysterio

Nodes: Energy Adoption: Ice – 2, Fortification, Fissure, Armor Break Immunity

Team: Warlock (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 0), Darkhawk (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 200), Nova (5-Star Rank 1 Sig 0), OG Vision (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 115), Hyperion (5-Star Rank 5 Sig 100)

Tips: Robots rule on this path! I really enjoyed this lane and the team construction that I was able to use. For this path you either need to bring Tech Champions with an Armor-Up Buff or naturally Coldsnap-Immune champions. You’ll also need a Bleed-Immune for Morningstar and a Poison-Immune for Abomination. Warlock is excellent for this path, as is Darkhawk with the Nova synergy.

Once you’ve picked the correct team, the fights aren’t difficult. I used Darkhawk for Havok, Morningstar, Abomination, and Cyclops (SP2-SP3-SP1-KO rotation) and then Warlock for Iceman and Mysterio.

The Juggernaut boss has Caustic Temper, but thanks to the Rising Sun node any champion can gain Fury Buffs. You just need them to be Poison-Immune. Other than that, it is just a stacked Juggernaut.

For other options for this lane, consider Civil Warrior, Hulkbuster, Red Skull, Guardian, Sasquatch, and Sabretooth.

Jump To:

Lizer – Two Weapon X Solo Options

Seatin – Aspect of War/Weapon X Path

Seatin – Immortal Hulk vs Life Transfer 7.1.4

Simula67 – Man-Thing Solo of Weapon X

Simula67 – Guillotine 2099 Solo of Juggernaut

Lizer – Two Hela Solo Options

RichTheMan – Complete Tips for 7.1.4

Jump To:
Act 7.1.1 – “Reboot” – So This Is Actually Fun
Act 7.1.2 – “Break Out” – Return of Archangel
Act 7.1.3 – “Recycle” – Blazing Along
Act 7.1.4 – “Usurp” – Weapon X
Act 7.1.5 – “Mashup” – They’re Back
Act 7.1.6 – “Remix” – Return of Ice Phoenix

-Dano357