You've probably seen her. That tiny, green-tinted figure standing near the back of a chaotic fight, throwing glowing leaves and somehow out-dueling a Spider-Man who thought he had a free meal. Honestly, Mantis is the most misunderstood character in the current Marvel Rivals meta. Most players see "Strategist" and assume she's just a passive heal-bot. They sit in the back, spamming heals, and then wonder why their team lost the objective.
That's the first mistake. Mantis isn't a "healer" in the traditional sense. She is a resource-management powerhouse who functions more like a secondary DPS if you’re playing her correctly.
The Life Orb Economy
Everything about Mantis revolves around Life Orbs. This isn't a standard cooldown system. You have a pool of five orbs, and almost every useful thing she does—healing, buffing allies, or buffing herself—eats one. They recharge naturally every few seconds, but if you're just waiting for the timer, you're playing at 50% efficiency.
The "secret sauce" is her primary fire, Life Energy Blast.
It’s a projectile. No damage falloff. It hits for 50 damage on a body shot, but the real magic happens on a headshot. Land a crit, and you instantly regain a Life Orb. Think about that. If your aim is cracked, you have infinite resources. You can keep your team's damage boost up 100% of the time just by clicking heads. If you aren't shooting constantly, you aren't healing. It's a binary reality for Mantis mains.
Breaking Down the Kit
Kinda weirdly, her abilities don't have individual cooldowns (mostly). If you have the orbs, you can dump them all at once.
- Healing Flower (Right Click): This is her main sustain. It’s a mix of a 55 HP burst and a 20 HP/s heal-over-time (HoT) that lasts 8 seconds. You can’t stack the healing to make it "faster," but you can stack it to make it last longer—up to about 20 seconds.
- Allied Inspiration (E): She gives a teammate a 12% damage boost. It sounds small, but in a game where break-points matter, it turns "almost dead" into "back to spawn."
- Natural Anger (F): This is exactly like Allied Inspiration, but for her. She gets the same 12% boost. Never forget to pop this when a flanker jumps you.
- Spore Slumber (Shift): Her only real cooldown (15 seconds). She throws a spore that puts an enemy to sleep for 3.5 seconds. It’s an AoE, but it only affects the person closest to the impact.
Basically, the "Mantis loop" is: Shoot -> Crit -> Buff/Heal -> Repeat.
The Sleep Combo That Tilts Flankers
We have to talk about Spore Slumber. It is arguably the best self-peel in the game. When a Venom or Black Panther dives you, don't panic. You throw the spore at your feet.
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Once they’re asleep, an "illusion" of Mantis appears over them. If your teammates hit that illusion, the enemy wakes up. But here is the expert trick: you have a window where you can hit the enemy with two shots before they actually wake up and can move.
The pro combo? Natural Anger -> Spore Slumber -> Body Shot -> Headshot -> Headshot. Because of how the animation frames work, you can essentially delete a 250 HP hero before they even realize the sleep effect ended. It’s brutal. It’s honestly why high-level players are starting to fear a good Mantis more than a Hela.
Soul Resurgence: The Ultimate "No" Button
Her ultimate, Soul Resurgence, is a massive spherical zone of life energy. It does three things: massive healing over time (175 HP/s), a movement speed boost, and it converts "excess" healing into bonus health (shields).
Most people pop this too early. They see a teammate hit 50% health and panic.
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Don't.
The best way to use this is as a "counter-ult" or a "push-closer." If an enemy Star-Lord pops his ultimate, you pop yours. You essentially negate his entire impact. Also, if your team is at full health and you're pushing a point, the "over-healing" gives everyone a massive shield buffer that lets them play like maniacs for 8 seconds.
Nature's Favor and the Invisible Buffs
Mantis has two passives that most people ignore until they see a pro using them. Nature’s Favor gives her a movement speed boost (7.5m/s) as long as she hasn't taken damage for 3 seconds. It also makes it so whenever she consumes a Life Orb, she gets a small self-heal.
This means a Mantis who is constantly buffing her team is also constantly healing herself.
Then there’s the Team-Up Ability: Nature’s Soul. If you have an Adam Warlock on your team, Mantis gets a "cocooned revival." When she dies, she turns into a soul, flies around for 12 seconds, and can choose where to respawn. It’s basically a second life. In a competitive 6v6, that kind of sustain is game-breaking.
Real Strategy: When to Pick Her
Mantis excels in Dive Comps. She wants to be with heroes like Thor or Venom who go deep. Why? Because her damage boost and healing are "fire and forget." You click on your diving Vanguard once, and they have that buff for 8 seconds while they're out of your line of sight.
She struggles against heavy shields (like Magneto or Doctor Strange) because she can't get headshots through barriers. No headshots means no Life Orbs. No Life Orbs means you’re just a green lady standing in a field getting shot.
If the enemy team is playing "Bunker" (sitting behind shields), you might want to swap to someone like Luna Snow or Rocket Raccoon. But if the fight is messy and spread out? Mantis is queen.
To truly master Mantis, stop thinking like a healer. Start thinking like a hunter who happens to have a green thumb. Practice your projectile lead in the training room until you can hit the moving bots’ heads 80% of the time. Once you stop worrying about your orb count because you’re generating them faster than you can spend them, you’ve reached the "Master" level of Mantis play.
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Check your settings and make sure your sensitivity allows for quick 180-degree turns to catch those flankers with a sleep spore. Focus on keeping your Duelists buffed during their ultimate windows—a damage-boosted Punisher is a nightmare no one wants to face. Properly managing your distance from the front line while maintaining line-of-sight for your primary fire is the thin line between a win and a quick trip back to the spawn room.
Actionable Next Steps
- Jump into the Practice Range and test the "Spore Slumber" timing to see exactly how many shots you can land before the target regains control.
- Adjust your UI to make sure you can clearly see your Life Orb count at all times without looking away from your crosshair.
- Coordinate with your Adam Warlock (if you have one) to ensure you’re utilizing the cocoon revival in safe spots rather than in the middle of an enemy ultimate.