Peni Parker Has Turned Into the New Hawkeye, Terrorizing Vanguards and Duelists Alike in Marvel Rivals

Season 1 of Marvel Rivals is well underway and players have started to gravitate towards certain characters and form the meta. The game has a lot of duelists so there are a lot of good ones, but one Vanguard character has been a menace in competitive, and it’s Peni Parker.

Peni Parker has quickly become one of the most feared characters in the game in Season 1. Her abilities don’t fit the traditional tank role and it has made her a nightmare for Duelists and even other Vanguards. With players getting one shot left and right by her traps and mines, we might be seeing another Hawkeye situation.

Unlike other Vanguards who rely on shields or sheer durability, Peni Parker’s playstyle revolves around setting up traps and denying enemy movement. Her Bionic Spider-Nest drone is a major issue for opponents because it releases mines that either slow or outright delete you in some cases. This makes her particularly powerful in objective-based game modes where choke points and tight corridors become death traps.

How do I deal with this goddamn cockroach woman?
byu/BonanzaBitch inmarvelrivals

The Marvel Rivals community has been vocal about how difficult it is to deal with Peni Parker. On Reddit, players have shared their frustrations about her seemingly endless traps. One player even went so far as to call her a “goddamn cockroach woman.” A lot of players agree that she’s one of the stronger tanks in the meta because of how hard she is to deal with.

In a way, she has become the new Hawkeye of the current meta. When Marvel Rivals was first released, Hawkeye was a menace because of his very high damage output with few drawbacks. He quickly became the most annoying and meta character of Season 0 and received some nerfs in Season 1. So if Peni Parker continues to one-shot us every game, we might be looking at some nerfs soon.

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byu/BonanzaBitch from discussion
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The worst part about going against Peni Parker is that she’s just one of those characters that players can’t play against. Think of Loki or Namor for example, you’ll see that people rarely destroy Loki’s clones or Namor’s turrets. The same thing happens with Peni Parker where players just ignore her traps and pay the price.

She isn’t the be-all and end-all of the meta though. There are ways to play against Peni Parker, but they require coordination and awareness. Mobile heroes like Iron Man and Squirrel Girl can dodge her webs and mines and knockback abilities such as Winter Soldier’s hook, or Invisible Woman’s pull can push or pull her away from her traps and reduce her healing.

Marvel Rivals is still just in its first season, so balance adjustments are inevitable, and Peni Parker is a prime candidate for changes. Many players believe that her ability to lock down areas without much counterplay makes her a little too strong. NetEase has also restrained in making drastic balance changes to make sure that players always have variety over a strict meta.

Balancing the characters and meta is a big part of the job for ages like this and we’ve already seen it before with Apex Legends, Overwatch, and other games. NetEase has definitely decided on a more laid-back approach and we’ll have to wait and see how it affects the game in the long term.