Thanos Stages Guide – Marvel Contest of Champions

Thanos Stages Guide - Marvel Contest of Champions

MARVEL Contest of Champions by Kabam

We’ve seen a couple of tips on Thanos around the web, but thought we’d share what we learned from completing uncollected today. This is a unique boss, so no doubt there will be plenty of questions on him. Similar to The Collector, Thanos progresses through “stages” during the fight, each granting The Mad Titan special abilities. The game info describes each stage and its abilities, but we wanted to explain them here in a more “plain English” way while offering some tips on how to handle each stage.  If you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment below.

Marvel Contest of Champions – Thanos Stages Guide

#1 Thanos

Genesis stage (under 95% health): Thanos gains “genesis aura” upon entering this stage and using SP1. This works similar to Mephisto’s burning aura and you take damage if you are too close. Stunning Thanos disables the aura for 3 seconds. Overall, this stage isn’t too hard.

Chaos stage (under 65% health): upon entering this stage and whenever Thanos uses SP2, player controls are backward. Yep, that means left is right and right is left. It only lasts 3 seconds though, so we recommend just waiting it out before fighting again. This wasn’t as difficult as we thought it would be – just takes focus. The thing to watch out for though is the switch back to normal controls. It mess you up if you are about to dodge or strike.

War stage (under 30% health): upon entering this stage and whenever SP3 is activated, Thanos becomes unstoppable for any attack except dash attacks. Intercepting a dash attack will remove the unstoppable buff. This stage is where it gets hard. Thanos instantly gains two bars of power at this stage and since his SP3 deals serious damage, you have to make the intercept if you want any hope of getting some hits in.

We found for this stage revives work better than heals. We would pop an L1 revive, get 10-15 hits in, die, and then repeat. Not the most heroic strategy, but hey, it got it done.

 #2 Thanos

Evolution stage (under 95% health): When this stage is entered and whenever SP1 is used, Thanos gains “evolution armor.” Two things happen here.

First, you will see a red-colored buff with a “bloodrop on a shield” symbol. This lasts 5 seconds and any attack on Thanos during that time causes bleed damage on you (a bleed immune is highly recommended for this stage).

Second, you will see another “shield” symbol buff which is either blue (“active”) or gray (“inactive”). If you hit Thanos when this buff is active, he will auto-block and regen 10% max health for each auto-blocked hit. Suffice to say, DO NOT hit him with this buff is active.

Nightmare stage (under 65% health): When this stage is entered, you degen 80% of your current health over 5 seconds. After the 5 seconds are up, you gain back all the health you degenerated. Notice though the word “current” and not “max.” For example, if you only have 1,000 health left, you will only degen 800 hp.

Also, when you are under the effect of the degen, Thanos can evade your attack and stun you (i.e. “mesmerise”). We avoided attacking (or being hit) while degening.

This degen effect is also activated when Thanos uses SP2. The attack itself launches 6 projectiles, 2 of which are unblockable. Thanks to another recent player, we know that the two projectiles with orange tails are the ones to avoid.

Thanos Stages Guide - Marvel Contest of Champions

Death stage (under 30% health): upon entering this stage and whenever SP3 is activated, Thanos gains “deathtouch.” While active, ANY hit from Thanos (including blocked hits) is an instant K.O. Like the first Thanos’s final stage, this buff can only be removed by intercepting the attack. Also, you get safeguard when removing this buff in this way, which will cap the damage you take from your next hit. Since Thanos’s SP3 is only one hit (it’s different from the first Thanos’s SP3), your strategy is going to be:

  1. intercept to (remove the buff and gain safeguard)
  2. Wait for Thanos’s SP3 to build (or attack if you are brave, just don’t get hit by anything! Even a blocked hit will remove your safeguard buff)
  3. Get hit by Thanos’s SP3 (You won’t take that much damage because of safeguard)
  4. Repeat

Another thing about this is that when this last stage is activated, you are put a fair distance from Thanos which makes the intercept easier. However, Kabam decided that after his SP3 animation, they would put you right in front of Thanos to be smashed. You have to be quick after the SP3 to evade back and get ready to intercept again.

Hope that helps some people out, or at least saves you a few heals and revives. Like we said before, we wouldn’t blow units on healing up to much. Most of the time, we were only going into the fights between 20-40% health.

There’s a lot to Thanos we didn’t mention. He has some other tricks up his sleeve (gauntlet?) which makes for a hectic fight. For this article, we wanted to focus on understanding the stages, since that is critical to beating the fight. Feel free to add any other tips, tricks, or good champs to use.


Thanks and credit to user psychem72 for help creating this guide.

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