Marvel Rivals Leaks: The Hood, Skins & Season 9.5 Lore

NetEase dumped a fresh batch of Marvel Rivals leaks and the headline is simple. The Hood is confirmed as a Vanguard arriving in Season 9.5 on August 7, 2026, the new Thieves Convoy map is already live, and the lore just quietly set up two more seasons of gods getting murdered. If you only read one paragraph today, this is the one.

Leaked Skins Worth Caring About

The datamine is not subtle about who is getting dressed up next. Luna Snow is confirmed for a Van Dyne styled skin, continuing the brand's habit of putting every character in a blazer eventually.

• Luna Snow receives a Van Dyne fashion skin that is unannounced but sitting in the files waiting for its debut.
• Cyclops and Phoenix both have Hellfire Gala themed skins filed away, likely leftover wedding or gala content rather than anything brand new.
• A mural on the new map depicts Phoenix, Wolverine, and Cyclops in their classic comic suits, which the internet has decided means classic skins are coming even though nobody confirmed it.

Datamined Marvel Rivals skins have a track record of showing up months before release, so treat the timeline as a suggestion rather than a promise.

The Hood Finally Gets a Cell and a Cage

The Hood Marvel Rivals fans have been begging for is now sitting, quite literally, in a jail cell on the new map. Lore explains he stole the Tablet of Death and Entropy, had a change of heart, and handed it back, so the heroes locked him up anyway because trust is apparently earned slowly.

Multiple outlets now confirm he is the newest Marvel Rivals new hero, officially a Marvel Rivals Vanguard, which breaks the usual duelist rotation and gives the tank roster its first true gunslinger.

The in game model already shows an enhanced version of his guns, suggesting an overheat that empowers rather than punishes, closer to a damage buff than a cooldown penalty.

The Thieves Convoy map is stuffed with shortcuts, and half of them exist purely to make Jeff mains insufferable.

• Sand tornadoes scattered around the map act as slow elevators that lift players between levels.
• A launch pad after the first checkpoint fires you out the top of a pyramid and drops you through a tunnel with a hidden health pack before spitting you back above your starting point.
• You cannot place deployables inside that tunnel, so an Elsa wall trap is out, but ambush setups at the exit like Rocket Raccoon mines still work fine.
• A separate sand pit lets you jump off what looks like the map's edge, only to slide down and get launched right back onto the battlefield.

The map's real trick is that it barely has chokepoints, which means brute forcing a single lane rarely works and shot callers who ignore the side routes will lose fights they should have won.

Beyond the map, the Blood Hunt PvE mode got extended with a nightmare difficulty cap raised to 300, a new grind for 100 free units per hero, and expanded gear leveling so excess experience converts into crafting shards instead of vanishing into nothing.

The Lore Nobody Was Ready For

The Marvel Rivals lore engine on the new map revolves around Apocalypse's faith harvesting device, now being used to either restore or finish off the weakened god Khonshu. Depending on which side wins the match, the cinematic changes entirely.

If the attackers succeed, Khonshu gets his godhood back just in time to die anyway, killed by none other than Gorr the God Butcher, who has already been confirmed to have killed Apocalypse with the All Black Necrosword. Gorr is widely expected to become playable in Season 10.

If the defenders win instead, The Hood tries handing the tablet to Khonshu and gets it stolen mid handoff by Doom 2099, who then kicks him out of the scene entirely. That version lines up with the wider canon, since Doom 2099 needs both the Tablet of Death and the Tablet of Life to pull his mother's soul out of Mephisto's grip.

Present day Doom already holds the Tablet of Life and Time after trading Black Cat freedom for the Thieves Guild in exchange for it, meaning both Dooms now need each other for the first time in the story, which is either touching or a disaster depending on which Doom you ask.

Final Word

Between a jailed supervillain waiting for his tank debut, a new map built like a theme park ride, and a plot where two versions of the same egomaniac have to cooperate, this season of Marvel Rivals leaks is doing more work than most Marvel movies manage in two hours.