Time to start some fights. Based off my experience (just a few hours) in Versus, here’s a tier list I’ve made. Discussion encouraged.
S Tier
- Handmaiden: Probably the best overcall class to pick. Her mobility is insane and she is hard to track with Gift of Ladrielle, along with her revive speed being incredibly quick. She also has access to a shield, allowing her to deny Gunners.
- Warrior Priest: While he doesn’t feel as powerful as he did in the alphas and betas, he is still incredibly annoying to fight and an overall defensive powerhouse, with the max HP buff and long-range shield being more than enough to make up for his lack of ranged weapon.
- Battle Wizard: For a similar reason to Handmaiden, she’s tough to pin down and can easily revive teammates with two flame dashes in and out, and durable with Fire Sword. With Volcanic Force, she’s very good at sniping. Would be SS tier with Lingering Flames.
- Ranger Veteran: People are really sleeping on the infinite ammo. Players are much harder to shoot than AI and ammo is harder to come by, so the ability to always have an answer to enemies is very powerful. Smoke bomb also gives him free reign to do whatever he wants forever.
A Tier
- Outcast Engineer: No longer S tier due to the nerfs to his free bombs and his ability to instant mow down any special at any range with Linked Compression Chamber, he’s still powerful, if clunky. If your team can play around him, he has a solution to every problem.
- Mercenary: He’s just generally good. On Yer Feet, Mates! is a great long-range revive option, but otherwise he has nothing particularly special or interesting. Access to a rifle for sniping, and a shield for Gunners.
- Foot Knight: I’d say he’s about on the same level as Mercenary, though significantly tankier and charge just ruins everything it hits. His defense buff is similar to Warrior Priest’s health buff, and probably ridiculous when stacked with it.
- Zealot: A real bruiser but not as powerful as he is in Adventure due to lack of Swift Slaying and reliable 6-stack Fiery Faith. You want to play him at high green health, you cannot keep a full health bar of temporary health. Still my favorite with Axe/Falchion and BoP, and Heart of Iron comes in handy in a pinch. Almost as mobile as Handmaiden with Flagellant’s Zeal.
- Waystalker: The neutering of Trueshot Volley’s autoaim means you have to actually play the game, but it’s stlil important to note that how good Waystalker is is entirely dependent on the skill of the player using her. If you can reliably hit headshots with a bow, you are a force to be reckoned with, but you do not have the absurd mobility that Handmaiden does.
- Pyromancer: She feels incredibly similar to Battle Wizard, but with less mobility and survivability, so I consider her generally weaker, even with The Burning Head’s superior autoaim to Trueshot Volley. Crits are not needed to snipe specialist players.
- Necromancer: Skeletons can mess with Skaven players sometimes, but her crowd control is still generally inferior to Battle Wizard’s Beam Staff/Bolt Staff/Fire Sword spam. Similar in power to Pyromancer, I’d say.
- Sister of the Thorn: Deepwood staff now has a lengthy cooldown when attempting to lift Skaven players, but it’s still an “I win” button for one fight every 40 or so seconds. Thorn Wall comes in handy sometimes for crowd management but the extra healing is less important when medkits always heal for 100% health and you aren’t generally going to find much healing or generate much THP.
B Tier
- Witch Hunter Captain: His insane headshot damage scaling just does not matter as much in Versus as it does in Cataclysm+, nor is his active ability that much better at killing things or providing defense than others. A worse Mercenary with inconsistent offense.
- Shade: Although pretty much impossible to find with a Concentration Potion, her boss-nuking capabilities very rarely come in handy in Versus, and a good team can shred a boss anyways. Versus is about moving as fast as possible and ignoring elites if you can, so being able to outright deny them is usually much better and much faster than specializing in killing them.
- Unchained: For a similar reason to Witch Hunter Captain, but also prone to exploding. She does have access to Beam Staff though, which gives her a versatile option at any range.
- Ironbreaker: I see him getting picked disproportionately often and I just don’t think he’s that good. Taking less damage is unimportant in a low-damage game mode where the far more dangerous thing is getting separated from your team against enemies that know how to exploit that. His taunt, if used improperly, can leave him unable to do anything but defend against incoming attacks, and Trollhammer/Drakefire weapons are slow and inefficient. He goes all in on defense, leaving little room for offense.
- Huntsman: Similarly to Waystalker, the effectiveness of this class is entirely dependent on the skill of the player using it, but compared to Kruber’s other potential options, you’re missing out on a lot of utility, which is why I have ranked it lower.
C Tier
- Slayer: The lack of access to ranged weapons (or, if you have the DLC, a rather mediocre one) puts him in the ground. He will have so much trouble with lots of ranged specialists and is doomed if he’s the last player alive, despite his impressive damage output.
- Grail Knight: See above re: lack of ranged weapons. Arguably a bit better due to having access to a shield but blocking Warpfire is unimportant when it’s easier to just shoot them while they’re burning you. Boss-nuking capabilities also arguably worse than Shade.
- Bounty Hunter: Going all-in on ranged combat leaves him in the unique position where he is utterly worthless if he’s expended all his ammunition, which he absolutely will. Locked and Loaded is pretty unnecessary for sniping specialist players, and you might miss it anyways. Only worth considering if you have a Ranger Veteran, but possible to force to work.
