Blood Hunt is the vampire-themed PvE mode that arrived with Marvel Rivals Season 7.5, pitting a squad of six heroes against hordes of bloodsuckers and four major bosses across escalating difficulty tiers. It borrows the co-op structure of the earlier Zombies mode but layers on a looter-shooter style loadout system with gear drops, trait trees, and an Arcana progression path.
How to launch Blood Hunt
The mode sits inside the standard matchmaking flow rather than the arcade hub. Once you reach the main menu, head to the Playlist button, open the Rivalry tab, and select the Blood Hunt icon. From there, you can pick your difficulty and queue solo or with a team of up to four.
Only six heroes are playable in the mode: The Punisher, Squirrel Girl, Thor, Moon Knight, Jeff the Land Shark, and Blade. Each has a kit tuned specifically for the PvE encounter, so your competitive builds do not carry over.
Gear, traits, and Arcana progression
Every hero has four gear slots, and enemies drop equipment with five rarity tiers. The slot determines what the item does, while rarity governs how strong the bonuses are.
| Slot | Effect |
|---|---|
| Weapon | Raises damage output |
| Armor | Adds health and damage resistance |
| Accessory | Grants bonuses like Critical Rate and Block Rate |
| Exclusive | Character-specific gear that strengthens signature abilities |
Alongside gear, the Traits tab acts as a skill tree. You earn Trait points by leveling up in the mode, and each hero has one General tree plus two ability-specific trees. Blade, for example, has separate trees for Purging Bladedance and Silver Soulbreaker, while The Punisher's trees feed into his primary attacks.
Arcana is the slower, heavier layer of progression. Points accrue at a reduced rate and feed into four scrolls, two of which unlock at the Normal tier and two that gate behind clearing Nightmare 70.
| Scroll | Unlock | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| Scroll of Conquest | Normal Difficulty | Boosts total damage output |
| Scroll of Immortality | Normal Difficulty | Increases health |
| Scroll of Blessing | Clear Nightmare 70 | Unlocks at higher difficulty |
| Scroll of Midas | Clear Nightmare 70 | Unlocks at higher difficulty |
The Forge menu handles recycling. Scrap unwanted gear into Uru Shards, then spend those shards to craft new pieces for a specific hero and slot. The higher your character level, the better the odds of rolling Epic or Legendary gear. A Jeff at level 32, for instance, has noticeably stronger crafting odds than a freshly unlocked hero. The information icon on the crafting screen shows the exact probabilities.
Difficulty tiers and boss roster
Difficulty gates which bosses can appear in a run. Normal is the entry point, and Nightmare only opens after you have cleared the three standard tiers.
| Difficulty | Bosses in rotation |
|---|---|
| Normal | Capwolf |
| Hard | Capwolf, Ratatoskr |
| Extreme | Capwolf, Ratatoskr, Dracula, Kingpin (challenges required) |
| Nightmare | Capwolf, Ratatoskr, Dracula, Kingpin |
Standard enemy types include regular Vampires, Exploding Vampires, Grunts (the tankier variant), Crawling Vampires, and Human Bats. Expect mixed waves between phases, with density rising sharply on Extreme and above.
Unlocking the hidden Kingpin fight
On Extreme difficulty, Kingpin only appears if your team clears three hidden objectives across specific phases. Miss any one of them and the run ends with Dracula as the final boss. On Nightmare, Kingpin spawns automatically.
| Phase | Objective | Time limit |
|---|---|---|
| Phase 4 (Bridge) | Destroy the dome-shaped barrier at the end of the Bridge | 90 seconds |
| Phase 7 (Ruins) | Find and destroy the red flower-like Bloodclot Buds | None |
| Phase 12 (Dracula's Castle entrance) | Destroy the Blood Crystals to break the magic circle | 120 seconds |
The Phase 4 and Phase 12 objectives are the tight ones. Split the team so that while two or three players focus fire on the barrier or crystals, the rest keep vampires off them. Bloodclot Buds in Phase 7 have no timer, but they can be easy to walk past if you rush the objective.
Beating Kingpin
Kingpin is a high-health damage sponge rather than a mechanically complex fight. He has a short movelist, but two attacks matter. His Cane strike briefly immobilizes anyone it connects with, and his leaping AoE explosion deals heavy burst damage to anyone caught in the landing zone.
Hold a medium-to-long range and stay spread out so the leap cannot tag multiple players. There are no damage phases, shields, or puzzle mechanics tied to the encounter, so consistent DPS wins the fight. Blade, The Punisher, and Squirrel Girl output the cleanest sustained damage if you are building around the hidden boss.
All Blood Hunt rewards
There is no free skin tied to the mode. Everything else lives in the Achievements tab, except the Kingpin Dethroned Trophy Accessory, which shows up in the Overview menu once you collect enough shards.
| Requirement | Reward |
|---|---|
| Clear Normal for the first time | 100 Units, King in Exile Gallery Card |
| Clear Hard for the first time | 100 Unstable Molecules, Squirrel Gone Wild Gallery Card |
| Clear Extreme for the first time | 100 Units, Hunting Season Gallery Card |
| Defeat the hidden boss in Extreme | Kingpin Dethroned Accessory, Animal Instinct Gallery Card |
| Clear Nightmare 5+ | Bawling Bloodsucker Mood |
| Clear Nightmare 10+ | 100 Units |
| Clear Nightmare 15+ | Grim Harvest Mood |
| Clear Nightmare 20+ | 100 Unstable Molecules, 10 Kingpin Trophy Shards |
| Clear Nightmare 25+ | Feral Fangs Mood |
| Clear Nightmare 30+ | 100 Units |
| Clear Nightmare 35+ | Awooo! Mood |
| Clear Nightmare 40+ | 100 Unstable Molecules, 10 Kingpin Trophy Shards |
| Clear Nightmare 45+ | Catching Z's Mood |
| Clear Nightmare 50+ | 100 Units |
| Clear Nightmare 55+ | Royal Disdain Mood |
| Clear Nightmare 60+ | 100 Unstable Molecules, 10 Kingpin Trophy Shards |
| Clear Nightmare 65+ | Black and Blue Mood |
| Clear Nightmare 70+ | 100 Units |
| Clear Nightmare 80+ | 10 Kingpin Trophy Shards |
| Clear Nightmare 100+ | Bane of all Evil Title, 10 Kingpin Trophy Shards |
| Clear Nightmare 120+ | 10 Kingpin Trophy Shards |
| Collect 100 Kingpin Dethroned Trophy Shards | Kingpin Dethroned Trophy Accessory |
Enemy-count milestones layer on top of the difficulty rewards, so passive farming during Nightmare climbs pays off twice.
| Enemies defeated | Reward |
|---|---|
| 5,000 | 100 Unstable Molecules, Sweet Revenge Gallery Card |
| 10,000 | 100 Units, Fall of the Kingpin Gallery Card |
| 15,000 | Dracula's Demise Spray |
| 20,000 | 100 Unstable Molecules |
| 30,000 | 100 Units |
| 40,000 | Blood Hunt Nameplate |
Each hero also has a personal emoji and title tied to Nightmare milestones. You unlock the emoji at Nightmare 40+ and the title at Nightmare 70+ on that specific character.
| Hero | Nightmare 40+ emoji | Nightmare 70+ title |
|---|---|---|
| The Punisher | Vampiric Vengeance | Fearless Executioner |
| Squirrel Girl | Back Off, Bloodsucker! | Ravenous Rodent |
| Thor | Missed Me! | Purifying Thunder |
| Moon Knight | Blood Moon Knight | Midnight Mercenary |
| Blade | Blood and Thorns | Daywalking Duelist |
| Jeff the Land Shark | Count Jeffula | Jeff the Night Shark |
How long the mode sticks around
Blood Hunt is not permanent. It runs through July 30, 2026, at 09:00 UTC, which lines up with the typical seasonal window for Marvel Rivals limited events. If you want the Bane of all Evil title or the golden Kingpin Trophy Accessory, those Nightmare 100+ and 100-shard thresholds are the longest grinds, so it is worth starting them early rather than saving the climb for the final weeks.