Vanguards can be a particularly difficult kind of hero to counter in Marvel Rivals; they’ve got a lot of health, while some of them combine that with either damage mitigation, surprising damage, maneuverability, or a combination thereof.
The Thing is fairly unique in his tanking approach, making him a bit more of an enigma when it comes to figuring out how to counter him. It isn’t impossible, and one or two well-placed picks or timely plays can render him much less effective. But if left uncontested, a good thing can grind your team to a halt with his extremely high health and disruptive potential.
How To Counter The Thing
The thing with The Thing is that, in the right hands, his high health pool and his ability to completely disrupt a large portion of the enemy team at once can make him very difficult to proactively work against. So much of fighting The Thing is reactive; you’re trying to ensure what he’s doing doesn’t cause too much damage.
A lot of this is because he cannot be displaced like other characters. You can easily push The Thing back, or else impede his movement in many ways that are effective against other characters. If The Thing is combining with another Vanguard, one with movement potential that’s getting into your back line while The Thing punches you from the front, it can be a long match.
The key to fighting against The Thing is to keep the fight out of his preferred arena. His Yancy Street Charge is going to keep you from using your movement abilities to get out when it’s prudent; instead, keep damage on him from multiple different angles, all at a healthy range.
How To Counter The Thing As A Duelist
Duelists can have a tricky time with The Thing, and it’s going to depend greatly on which Duelist you choose when it comes to how effective you can be against him, at your ceiling.
In general, as a Duelist, you want to be as far away from The Thing as possible. It’ll keep him from essentially locking you into his range so he can punch you into pieces, and he’s a large enough target that staying on him should be easy. Fliers like Iron Man, Human Torch, and Storm can all cause significant problems for him.
The Thing also often plays in a tight-knit formation with allies, at least one other at a time, if not more. This amplifies that value of any area-of-effect (AoE) attack, particularly ranged AoE, which again, can be true for the fliers listed above, but also Squirrel Girl and Moon Knight.
- Characters like the Winter Soldier and Punisher can also be particularly effective against The Thing; they’re both capable of keeping a big distance and still dealing their maximum damage. They’ll want to maintain that distance as best they can, which is a bit easier for Winter Soldier.
As a bonus, The Thing is going to be effectively shielding teammates fairly often; The Winter Soldier’s ability to deal damage to enemies behind his target is going to ensure he’s damaging the target just behind The Thing regularly, which is often an opponent Strategist. If you can put that Strategist down, it’s going to put significantly more pressure on The Thing.
- While Moon Knight can be a big problem for The Thing, the opposite is also true. The Thing is often in close proximity to allies because of his shielding ability; Moon Knight can deal massive damage to all of them by simply aiming at The Thing. But, The Thing can negate Moon Knight’s movement abilities, making it imperative that Moon Knight keeps his distance.
- And as with most Vanguards, Wolverine is a good choice for making The Thing’s life a little bit more difficult. Wolverine deals more damage to enemies in relation to their maximum HP, The Thing has some of the highest possible HP values in the game, meaning Wolverine is going to deal quite a bit of damage against him.
Note that Wolverine will not be able to displace The Thing with his abilities like he can other characters; this will make The Thing a unique foe for Wolverine, requiring a little bit of a different style when playing against him. You won’t be able to press The Thing into situations where he has no backup, and instead are going to have to rely on backup, yourself.
How To Counter The Thing As A Vanguard
Countering The Thing as a Vanguard can be particularly difficult; for one, most Vanguards are going to already be in or near The Thing’s ideal range. For characters like Venom, Thor, and Captain America who rely on timely mobility abilities to get in and out of trouble, this can pose a significant problem.
But there are other Vanguards who excel when their opponent is in a predictable location.
- Peni Parker can make The Thing’s life problematic with her abilities blanketing areas that The Thing is either going to have to enter, or retreat into. Depending on the situation, they’ll force The Thing to either have to tank the damage, or keep out of a position that would otherwise be advantageous to him.
- Groot can use his walls to keep The Thing out of his ideal range, making him either move around the walls, or beat them down. Either way, it’s time before The Thing can do what he wants to do, and more time for your team to deal with him.
Combining Groot and Peni can force The Thing to move into pre-trapped kill-boxes. It’ll cost The Thing time to avoid these, and punish him severely if he doesn’t.
How To Counter The Thing As A Strategist
Most Strategists simply do not want to enter the same ring as The Thing, and are going to become a veritable punching bag if they try. For Strategists, the plan when approached by The Thing is to get out of the situation as quickly as possible. But because of The Thing’s ability to negate movement abilities, this can prove difficult.
For Strategists like Rocket who rely on crafty movement abilities to stay alive, The Thing can be a massive issue. Rockets should do everything in their power to use their movement abilities to get away from The Thing before the situation becomes an issue.
There are a few different ways to keep this from becoming as big of a problem as it otherwise would.
- If Loki is pressed by The Thing, he has a couple of things going for him. For one, his Regeneration Domain can do a lot to improve the odds of survival for allies who can’t get away. But further than that, Loki can swap places with one of his decoys, getting him away with little issue.
- While The Thing can’t be pushed packed or displaced in any way, it doesn’t stop him from being stalled altogether. Mantis can use one of her spores to cause The Thing to slumber, buying her and nearby allies time to scatter and engage The Thing from multiple angles.
- In a similar vein, Luna Snow can use her Absolute Zero ability to freeze The Thing in place, preventing an advance. Luna’s speed also allows her to get away from an approaching Thing much easier than other characters.
