Marvel RivalsMarvel Rivals Iron Fist Character Guide

Combining the power of Shou-Lao and his mastery of martial arts, Iron Fist punches and kicks his way through his enemies. With the ability to leap through the air, run on walls, and heal himself, Lin Lie is a lone warrior who doesn’t need to play next to his team.

Instead, he thrives on flanks, playing way behind enemy lines and jumping in and out of fights whenever the opportunity presents itself.

Even though he is a melee hero, his aerial mechanics allow him to challenge the fliers. He may not always be able to secure the elim, but as long as he creates chaos and stays alive, he’s an invaluable asset to any team.

The core of his kit is easy to use, but executing his gameplan against high level opponents takes the discipline and skill only those who trained in K’un Lun can achieve. 

Find out where Iron Fist ranks in our Marvel Rivals tier list.

TLDR

How to Play As

• Go second. Don’t initiate the fight but wait for the rest of your team to attack first. Otherwise, the entire enemy team will instantly delete you.
• Generate Bonus Health from Harmony Recovery before engaging on the enemy Vanguards.
• Run around and look for isolated targets since Iron Fist has the advantage in most 1v1 situations. 

How to Play Against

• Stop attacking when you see his parry glow. If he doesn’t generate Bonus Health he is a sitting duck.
• Position near your teammates. His damage is pretty slow, and can’t win a fight against multiple enemies.
• Use stuns after his Dragon’s Defense. The Bonus Health is temporary so if you see him parry, you know he can’t block. Stun and wait out his Bonus Health, then finish him off. 

Strengths

Good at diving enemies without invincible escape abilities

The auto-dashing mechanic of his primary fire makes Iron Fist good at fighting enemies who don't have an invincible escape tool. Even against enemies like Iron Man or Moon Knight who have movement abilities, Iron Fist easily stays in melee range.

Easy to use and understand gameplan

As long as you can hold primary fire and look in the general direction of your target enemy, you can use Iron Fist. He has a simple gameplay loop of meditating, attacking, parrying, empowered attacking, then using Kick to get out alive and do it all again.

Advantage in most 1v1 duels

Other than a few specific counters, Iron Fist has advantageous matchups in every 1v1. When he can find isolated targets, his movement plus Bonus Health basically guarantees him the KO.

Weaknesses

Low damage per second

If the target Iron Fist is attacking gets healed by a single Strategist, they will most likely survive his attack. The damage of his non-empowered punches and kicks is too low to KO someone receiving healing before they KO him.

Needs to perfectly time parry, or he dies

He can only hold Parry for a maximum of one second and if he misses it, he's not staying alive. An Iron Fist who activates Dragon’s Defense when no one is attacking might as well go AFK until he gets respawned.

Power level drops considerably the higher you climb

Lin Lie is a menace in the metal ranks but is viewed as a throw pick at the highest ranks. The higher you climb, the easier it will be for enemies to track his movement and bait out his parry.

Primary Fire: Jeet Kune Do

Tips for Jeet Kune Do

Auto dashes to the target with the green circle

• Great for chasing down retreating enemies
• Good against fliers since you’ll stay in the air and constantly dash to them.

Reduces Dragon’s Defense cooldown.

• Every single hit you land of Jeet Kune Do decreases the 15-second CD by one and a half seconds. Keep an eye on your parry CD so you don't miss out on maximizing its use frequency.

(Primary Fire) Yat Jee Chung Kuen

Tips for Yat Jee Chung Kuen

• Dash is nearly twice as long as non-empowered primary fire. So you can be much farther away.

Not as good against fliers

• You only dash in between the flurry of punches, so tracking fliers is inconsistent.

Stay really close to your target

• At point-blank range you don’t need to dash and can perform an endless flurry of punches.

Q Living Chi

Tips for Living Chi

Install Super

• All your moves are empowered, you are damage boosted, and your primary fire and Kick have double their normal range.

Dragon Defense becomes a 3-second cooldown.

• Use your parry as soon as you start taking damage because the enemy will start focusing you after hearing you shout, “气贯长虹!”
• Blocking just before your ult ends will carry over your empowered punches after the duration runs out.

Always target the Strategists

• The damage is pretty high but it can still be out-healed. Using your ult to attack a Strategist will either force out a defensive ult or get you the KO.

SHIFT K'un-Lun Kic

Tips for K'un-Lun Kic

Aim to the right

• To be more consistent with landing the kick, aim slightly to the right of the enemy's body.

Not an initiation attack

• The damage of the second kick of K’un-Lun scales up inversely with the enemy's current health. At 50% health or lower, your kick will inflict maximum damage, so save until the enemy is at low health.

Save for disengaging

• Ty to attack without using Kick. instead, use it as an escape tool since it’s your fastest burst of movement, and often the only way to reliably get out of a fight alive.

E Harmony Recovery

Tips for Harmony Recovery

Use before a fight

• You should always be giving yourself an extra 150HP of Bonus Health before entering a fight.
• Engage quickly to maintain maximum Bonus Health before it decays

Escape to safety first

• The very long animation of this ability means you can never use it in front of the enemy. Get to a safe position before activating so you can get back to full 450HP.
• Iron Fist floats wherever he activates Harmony Recovery, so you can also jump and kick to a high position where the enemies won’t see you and use it there.

SPACE Crane Leap

Tips for Crane Leap

• Super fast cooldown, but they only refresh when grounded or while wall running
• Iron Fist’s primary form of movement, so use it liberally for chasing, escaping, or just getting from one place to another.

Secondary Fire: Dragon's Defense

Tips for Secondary Fire: Dragon's Defense

The most important ability and the easiest ability to waste

• With a base cooldown of 15s and a duration of just 1s, using Dragon’s Defense property is the number one objective of any Iron Fist user.

Use reactively

• While certain abilities need to be parried by prediction (ex: Mantis Sleep), most of the time you'll want to use Dragon's Defense in reaction to the enemy's attacks.
• Wait until an enemy is already attacking you to activate Dragons Defense or you run the risk of the one second duration ending without actually blocking any damage and generating the crucially needed Bonus Health.

Watch cooldown reduction

• Don’t forget to check how soon you will have parry available again so you can determine whether you can keep attacking or need to retreat.

SPACE: Wall Runner

Tips for SPACE: Wall Runner

Wall run as much as possible

• Wall running is 50% faster than walking, so you should try to be always wall running and never walking.
• When chasing or repositioning, alternate between wall running and Crane Leaping to keep moving while refreshing Leaps.
• Become evasive by wall running around pillars

Passive: Chi Absorption

Tips for Chi Absorption

Notice Bonus Health

• Every time you score an assist or KO, you get 50HP Bonus Health to help keep you alive and in the fight longer.

Team-Up: Dragon's Chill (Passive)

Tips for Dragon's Chill (Passive)

• It gives Luna a new knockback and AoE healing ability. Luna gets picked very frequently and is a meta Strategist. Remind the Luna player of their unique ability as most won’t be used to playing with it.

Team Comp Synergies

Team Comp Example

• Vanguards: Venom, Doctor Strange
• Duelists: Iron Fist, Wolverine
• Strategists: Luna Snow, Invisible Woman

Hero Synergies

Vanguards: Venom

Venom is a perfect Vanguard to initiate a fight, use up a ton of the enemy's resources, and make room for Iron Fist to join the fight right after him. Both of them have the same goal in mind: go for a deep dive and either get KO or take up the enemy Strategist’s attention and resources so their teammates can score a KO.

Duelists: Wolverine

If Iron Fist goes second, then Wolverine goes third. Neither of these Heroes want to be the first person the enemy sees. While they both lie in wait the other four members of their team just need to grab the enemy team's attention. If Wolverine snatches a Vanguard while Iron Fist is harassing the backline, there is zero chance the Vanguard survives.

Running these two Duelists together pushes your team's game plan to an extreme end and requires a decent amount of coordination. When executed properly, though, it is extremely difficult for the enemy to counter.

Strategists: Luna Snow

Because Iron Fist will constantly be going in and out of his team's LoS, the only Strategist who can provide him with consistent healing is Luna Snow. On top of that, Luna gets her extra Team-Up ability which notably increases her self survivability. Combo Fate of Both Worlds aggressively with your ultimate and delete the enemy team one by one.