Doctor Strange

Detailed Character Guide

Doctor Strange is on of Rival's premiere Vanguard characters. His abilities offer a range of options for tanking, flanking, and disruption. In this guide, we will start with an overview of his abilities for new players. If you already know the basics of the character, skip down to the next section where we will cover tips and tricks to improve your performance with him. Finally, at the end of the guide we will give you breakdown for if Doctor Strange is the right character for you!

Basic Ability Guide (For Beginners)

You can find a bulleted list of the character's abilities in game under their character tab. This portion of the guide will cover the same info, as well as some extra information and tips that the game doesn't clearly outline. If you already have a basic grasp of the character, skip to the next section for more advanced tips.

Doctor Strange is very easy to pick up at a base level, but he has a very high skill curve. His Shield of the Seraphim starts with 800 damage is can block. It will only regenerate when it is lowered, and it regenerates for 80 hp per second, giving it 10 seconds to fully recharge. This will be your central focus point of the character. While it blocks enemy damage, your team can shoot through it still! This makes him the best Vanguard to protect a wide range of the battlefield without locking out your team (like Groot).

Your primary attack is Daggers of Denak. It has a relatively slow fire rate, and a slow reload rate. It does decent damage though, and using it empowers your secondary attack. It has a significant damage drop-off, so you want to focus on closer range battles. At a longer range, your higher hp wont matter to characters who deal high damage at range.

With each hit of the Daggers, you begin to charge your ability Maelstrom of Madness thanks to his passive ability. Each time you sucessfully hit an enemy with a dagger, you gain "dark magic". It will continue to build up to 100 maximum. Once Strange is at 100 Dark Magic, he becomes cursed and not be able to be healed. To remove your Dark Magik, you can use Maelstrom to purge it, which deals a burst of damage in a 8 meter radius of him. Building up Dark Magik can give you a tool to protect against close attackers, but you can't hold it for too long without risking the anti-heal curse. Dark Magic does automatically degenerate, but you need to stop landing hits for that to happen.

Strange also has his Cloak of Levitation ability. This allows him to quickly soar into the air and hover for a few seconds. You can use this to make a quick escape or reposition yourself. You can alternate between your shield and attacking while floating.

His final ability is his famous portal, known in Rivals as Pentagram of Farallah. Upon activation, you move into a "portal mode" where you leave your character behind and fly the camera around to place the portals. Nobody can see your camera placing the portals, but Strange's body is still vulnerable to attack wherever you first activated the ability. The shield will default auto place the first portal in front of you, but you can cancel it's placement so you can manually place both portals where you would like. When both portals are active, they act exactly like you would hope. Jumping through a portal will send you to the other side, and you can shoot through it without issues. It does have a very long 3 Minute cooldown, so use this strategically!

For Doctor Strange's ultimate, he uses his Eye of Agamotto. This is a single blast that radiates in a 10 meter radius around him. Any enemies his by the blast will have their soul removed from their body for 3 seconds, which immobilizes them and leaves them vulnerable to damage. You want to use this ability in coordination with your team for kills, or as a last ditch effort to stall your opponents.

Tips and Tricks for Gameplay (Advanced)

Since your primary attack fires slowly, you can alternate each shot with a melee attack! This is only useful in close quarters, but that extra damage can make the difference in the outcome of a fight.

You don't have to constantly hold up your shield. You can raise and drop it quickly without penalty, so lower it when possible so it can recharge hp. Of course if your team is under immense pressure, keep that shield up to protect them. If you are blocking and an enemy is at the end of their magazine, lower the shield and pressure them with your daggers, melee, and maelstrom.

Doctor Strange is a tank, not a DPS, so use him to support the team. If you walk off chasing someone for a kill, the team loses a valuable shield that can help them survive and secure kills. Be mindful of your positioning and stay with the team as much as possible.

Your shield can block ultimate abilities, so don't default to run away when you see one. Raise the shield and brace for impact. It could save your team from a wipe! Furthermore, you get aggressive with the shield too. Using your levitation, you can fly up and block ultimates like Hela and Iron Man by getting in their face and holding the shield.

Pay close attention to your dark magic and use it often. Once you start mixing melee hits with the Daggers, your dark magic will start to climb quickly. It is best used as a mix up option for melee, or as a combo string (Dagger, melee, maelstrom).

Everyone loves a fun portal highlight, but don't go for highlights if you are trying to be competitive. That long recharge means you could lock yourself out of an invaluable tool when you need it most.

Portals are best used to surprise the enemy team by circumventing their defenses. It takes time to place the portal, so if you intend to make a push with the portal, warn your team. You can simply type "portal" in team chat and most teammates will wait for you before running in. Portals have a surprise factor, so coordinating with your team will lead to more success.

You can also use your portal offensively. If the enemy team has an open portal, you can negate it by covering it with your own portal. That way any enemy who jumps through their own portal will also have to go through yours. This technique isn't easy and will take practice. If you predict an opposing Strange is opening a portal, you can also place one of yours at a cliff and a second one under the enemy strange. This will make him fall to his death and cancel his portal, which forces a 3 minute cooldown.

If you are near death and have no healer around, practice this quick escape combo: Levitate to launch in the air, aim your shield down to block damage, move to the closest med kit or cover you can find. It sounds obvious, but way too many players ignore the benefits of retreating over death.

Similarly, if you are the only ally on point, fall back if you are under pressure. It takes much less time to regroup than to respawn and run back to point. Even if you have 1 or 2 teammates with you, you can lead the team to a successful regroup. A full team push will always be more successful than 2 alternating small (split) teams. If your healers are running back to point to assist you, give them allies to actually heal when theu get there.

Is Doctor Strange For You?

Doctor Strange is for the more patient player. You can't rush in alone and you have to balance pushing and retreating with your team. He best abilities require teamwork to be successful. He doesn't require a lot of practice to use, but you will need to practice and learn the best times to use his abilities. The long recharge times make misusing them more punishing.

If you aren't great at aiming or managing fast cooldown abilities, Doctor Strange might be for you. His low focus on DPS means you don't have to worry as much about landing your shots consistently. His slow cooldowns mean you don't have to constantly manage them to be successful.

If you are a player that wants to secure kills, attack the back line, and stay mobile, Doctor Strange isn't the right character for you. If you want a Vanguard that fits this mold though, check out our Venom guide!

Base Stats

HEALTH	650
MOVEMENT SPEED	6 m/s

Abilities

Daggers of Denak

KEY
CASTING	Five-round delayed hit projectiles
PROJECTILE SPEED	60 m/s
DAMAGE	18
DAMAGE FALLOFF	Falloff begins at 10m, decreasing to 62.5% at 20m
FIRE RATE	5.56 rounds per second, with a 0.03-second interval between every two rounds
AMMO	8 (1 dagger per release)
CRITICAL HIT	No

Eye of Agamotto

KEY	Q
CASTING	Single-cast spell field that surrounds the caster
RANGE	10m spherical radius
DAMAGE	60
SOUL SEPARATION DURATION	3s
ENERGY COST	3400

Cloak of Levitation

KEY	SHIFT
CASTING	Instant Cast
DASH DISTANCE	8m
FREE-FLIGHT DURATION	6s
COOLDOWN	15s

Maelstrom of Madness

KEY	E
CASTING	Single-cast spell field that surrounds the caster
RANGE	8m spherical radius
DAMAGE	Each point of Dark Magic deals 1.3 damage
COOLDOWN	8s

Pentagram of Farallah

KEY	F
CASTING	Multi-segment release
DURATION	20s
COOLDOWN	180s

Shield of the Seraphim

KEY
CASTING	Channeled
MAXIMUM SHIELD VALUE	800
RECOVERY SPEED	80/s
DELAYED RECOVERY AFTER RELEASE	1s
COOLDOWN AFTER DESTROYED	3s

Price of Magic

KEY	Passive
ANTI-HEAL ACTIVATION DELAY AT PEAK DARK MAGIC	3s
ANTI-HEAL DURATION	2s
GENERATE DARK MAGIC	Daggers of Denak: Each hit generates 3.5 Dark Magic. When using the V key, every enemy hit generates 10 Dark Magic

Team-Ups

Gamma Maelstrom

KEY	E
CASTING	Single-cast spell field that surrounds the caster
RANGE	10m spherical radius
DAMAGE	Each point of Dark Magic deals 1.4 damage
COOLDOWN	8s
SPECIAL EFFECT	At peak Dark Magic, you will no longer be subject to Anti-Heal

Costumes

Default

Sorcerer Supreme of the Galaxy

God of Magic

Lore

Respected surgeon Stephen Strange was forced to seek a different path when his hands were injured in a terrible accident. Devoting himself to the mystic arts, Strange became this dimension's first line of defense against supernatural threats — the Sorcerer Supreme.

Sensing a massive temporal disturbance, Doctor Strange performed an arcane ritual to protect his reality. The spell failed, and Strange and his Sanctum Sanctorum became trapped within the Mirror Dimension. Lost in the timestream, Strange uses his mystic mastery to free himself for short spans of time in order to join the fight.