Marvel Rivals, a free-to-play 6v6 hero shooter, features a pretty wide roster of Marvel characters to play as. While the selection of Strategists, the support heroes focused on healing and buffing teammates, is fairly slight at only seven heroes now, Marvel Rivals will be getting lots of new heroes in the future. These heroes are ranked based on the range of usability for their abilities, potential healing output, and general benefits they bring to the game when used. While our Marvel Rivals support heroes tier list is ranked,, there really aren’t any characters on the roster that are completely unplayable due to balancing in the game’s current state.
7. Rocket Raccoon
Rocket Raccoon has a few positive aspects to him, but fairly low healing and damage output keeps him at the bottom of the list. His respawn machine can be pretty clutch, bringing back a teammate who dies in range, but the shields it produces feel odd, since you want to hide it out of sight so it doesn’t get destroyed. Rocket having a small hit box also lets him escape danger easier than other supports.
That said, Rocket’s healing orbs move pretty slowly and can also bounce unpredictably, making healing with them at range harder than it needs to be. His machine gun damage is pretty low too, making it hard to defend yourself, something that most other supports are better at. Rocket Raccoon’s ultimate provides a nice damage buff, but the stationary aspect makes it a bit more situational than other support ultimates.
6. Jeff the Land Shark
Jeff the Land Shark is the cutest Strategist on the roster, but his simple abilities hold him back from being higher on the list. The water spray healing has far better accuracy at a distance than it should, but the healing rate is a little low, resulting in you spending a lot of time spraying down a single teammate. The healing bubbles are great and offer a nice movement buff, but a long cooldown on the charges means you are constantly at risk of dropping them somewhere, having the fight move, and being caught waiting on cooldown timers.
Jeff has three things going in his favor though: His water splash shots deal pretty good damage, making it possible to defend yourself from any overachieving Duelists. Jeff’s submerge ability allows for a speedy escape, self-healing, and a smaller hitbox without a cooldown. Finally, Jeff’s ultimate, even if you can’t get to a ledge for the insta-kill, still lets you remove enemy players–potentially even a full team–from the fight temporarily, which is a huge advantage.
5. Loki
There is a lot to like about Loki, but the ability management aspect requires a lot of knowledge and skill to successfully pull off without a big enough payoff. Loki can heal by shooting teammates with his staff, and he can also place decoys around, which will also shoot. His other healing ability creates a field around him and his decoys, offering a ton of healing temporarily. Loki can switch places with his decoys, letting him get out of danger and he can even make a decoy while going invisible.
The management here is a bit of a pain, as it involves regularly placing new decoys and keeping track of which ones have been taken out. This is time not spent doing damage or healing, and is pretty overwhelming for new players. In terms of healing, he doesn’t offer as much as the upper half of this list and certainly requires more skill than those heroes. HIs ultimate is pretty great, letting him switch into another hero in the lobby and immediately use their ultimate, but you need to see that hero to make the swap, making it a bit more situational than it could’ve been.
4. Cloak and Dagger
Cloak and Dagger are a ton of fun to play and offer a wide range of abilities, making them an excellent support to use. Dagger handles healing, throwing auto-tracking daggers that can heal or do damage, depending on who you hit. The healing and damage is fairly low, but you can use her Veil of Lightforce to grant bonus healing effects and her AoE healing ability creates a nice bubble that heals a ton.
Cloak is focused on dealing damage and applying debuffs to enemies. His Terror Cape limits enemy vision and makes them take more damage. His main attack is a beam that deals quick tick damage, offering slightly more damage than Cloak’s main attack. His dark teleportation makes him and nearby teammates invisible, but it’s pretty short and really only gives you a brief moment of safety. Their ultimate places darkness on the map that heals teammates and damages enemies, making it great for contesting an objective. Cloak and Dagger’s main shortcoming is that you have to swap between them to either heal or deal damage, when some of the best Strategists can do both at all times.
3. Adam Warlock
Adam Warlock has pretty good healing capabilities, deals a surprising amount of damage, and can revive the whole team with his ultimate. To start, his main attack deals 55 damage and can crit, which is pretty good for a Strategist, even if it has a short damage fall off range. For healing, he does have to rely on his abilities, but he has two and both do a ton of healing. The big one is the Soul Bond, which connects Adam Warlock and all nearby teammates, providing healing over time and splitting damage taken.
His other healing ability is a link to a single teammate, but it provides healing for both Adam Warlock and his ally. It has two charges on a six-second cooldown, so it can be used pretty regularly. Adam’s passive cocoon ability lets him revive after death, which is a great setup for his ultimate ability, which resurrects all dead teammates in range. It also lasts an additional 10 seconds, letting any teammates who weren’t dead but die after activation to also get resurrected.
2. Luna Snow
Luna Snow has a powerful primary attack that heals and does damage depending on who you hit. The three round-burst heals 60 total health or deals 60 total damage, and that’s without hitting a headshot. Her Ice Arts buff increases the amount of healing or damage those shots do while providing some self-healing on each shot, giving her some nice sustainability. She can freeze enemies temporarily, great for any diving enemies, and her skating passive gives her an advantageous–dare we say Lucio-like–movement speed and jump height boost.
Luna Snow’s greatest asset is her ultimate ability, which has her dance, creating an AoE around her that can either heal or provide a damage buff, letting you swap freely. The healing output is ridiculous, making both Luna and her teammates invulnerable to anything except the most powerful attacks in the game, and the damage buff is nothing to sneeze at either.
1. Mantis
Mantis takes the top spot due to her incredibly high skill ceiling. She can give either a healing-over-time or damage buff to a teammate at the cost of one of her four orbs. She can also give a self-boost at the cost of a single orb, and using an orb applies self-healing. This might sound limiting, but the orbs are on a short cooldown and you can instantly refill a charge by hitting a headshot with her primary fire, which deals 50 base damage and has no fall-off range.
This means you will always have orbs if you consistently hit headshots. Always having orbs means you can constantly have your self-buff active and apply buffs to your teammates consistently, making Mantis very powerful in the right hands. Her ultimate is a slightly weaker version of Luna Snow’s, applying healing over time and a movement speed boost, with extra healing converted into bonus health. As if all that wasn’t enough, she also moves faster at full health, making the walk back from spawn a little quicker, so you can get back to healing.