If you’ve spent even a few hours grinding missions, farming materials, or tackling boss fights in Nexon’s looter shooter, you’ve probably asked yourself who is the best character in The First Descendant at some point. The cast is packed with 20+ unique playable fighters, each with their own ability kits, roles, and niche use cases, so picking the right one for your playstyle can make the difference between breezing through a Void Intercept Battle and wiping three times before you even get to the final boss phase. I’ve put 120+ hours into the game across solo, 2-player, and 4-player co-op runs, and I’ve tested every single character at all difficulty tiers to narrow down the top picks for every scenario.
Who Is the Best Character in The First Descendant for New Players?
If you’re wondering who is the best character in The First Descendant that you can unlock within your first 5 hours of play, Viessa is the answer. New players don’t need the most complex, high-skill cap character to have fun and clear content efficiently. You want a character with straightforward abilities, good survivability, and enough damage to carry you through the first 20 hours of story and side missions without needing to grind for rare mods to make them viable. Viessa is the top pick for new players by a wide margin for a few key reasons. Her ice-based abilities let you slow and freeze entire groups of enemies at once, so you don’t have to worry about being swarmed by low-tier mobs while you’re still learning map layouts and mission mechanics. She also has a passive that boosts her movement speed when she’s near frozen enemies, so you can traverse large open maps far faster than most other starter characters. You don’t need to min-max her mod loadout to make her work either; even basic, common mods will let her clear level 30 content with ease. If you prefer a more offensive playstyle, Gley is a solid second pick for new players, with high base health and life steal on her primary attacks that makes it hard to die even if you’re still getting used to dodge rolls.
Top Character Picks for Solo Endgame Content
A lot of players ask who is the best character in The First Descendant for solo play when they first hit endgame, and Ajax is the unanimous answer among veteran players. Solo endgame content throws a lot at you: high damage boss attacks, swarms of add mobs, tight time limits, and no teammates to pick you up if you go down. You need a character that balances high damage, solid survivability, and utility to handle every scenario without relying on other players. Ajax is the undisputed best choice for solo endgame runs, and it’s not even close. His shield ability lets him absorb up to 75% of incoming damage for 8 seconds, and it recharges in just 12 seconds, so you’re almost never without protection. His ultimate ability deals AoE damage that scales with his maximum shield value, so you can build him entirely for survivability and still melt boss health bars in seconds. I’ve used him to clear every level 50 Void Intercept Battle on hard mode solo, and I rarely drop below 50% health during runs, even when I make mistakes. The only real downside to Ajax is that he’s slower than more mobile characters, so you’ll want to pair him with a movement speed mod if you’re running missions that require a lot of traversal. If you don’t have Ajax unlocked yet, Lepic is a great alternative with high burst damage and self-healing that works well for solo play.
Best Characters for 4-Player Co-Op Missions
If you’re playing with friends and trying to figure out who is the best character in The First Descendant for your team composition, sticking to core roles will make every mission far easier. Co-op missions have very different requirements than solo play, because you’re working with a team that will have dedicated damage, support, and tank roles. The best co-op characters fill a clear niche that makes the entire team stronger, rather than just performing well on their own. I’ve broken down the top picks by role below:
- Support: Valby – Valby’s healing aura can restore up to 30% of all nearby teammates’ health per second, and her ultimate gives the entire team a 40% damage boost for 10 seconds. She’s the only support character that can keep a full team alive through the hardest boss attacks without needing to spam healing items.
- Damage Dealer: Freyna – Freyna has the highest sustained DPS in the entire game when built correctly, thanks to her poison damage over time effects that stack infinitely on boss enemies. She can melt a level 50 boss’s health bar in less than 2 minutes when paired with a support’s damage boost, which is faster than any other character in the game.
- Tank: Ajax – Ajax’s shield can be extended to cover all nearby teammates, so he can block incoming boss attacks for the entire team while damage dealers focus on dealing damage. His taunt ability also draws all enemy aggro to him, so squishy damage and support characters don’t have to worry about being targeted.
How to Pick the Right Character for Your Playstyle
At the end of the day, the “best” character for you might not be the one that tops tier lists, if it doesn’t fit the way you like to play games. You don’t have to force yourself to play a tank character if you hate being front and center taking damage, just because it’s considered meta. Before you invest time and resources into leveling a character, test them out in the game’s practice mode first to get a feel for their ability cooldowns, play pace, and general feel. If you like fast, chaotic gameplay where you’re zipping around the map and clearing mobs fast, pick a high mobility character like Bunny or Viessa. If you prefer to play a support role and help your team succeed, Valby is the obvious choice. If you like to take your time and deal massive single target damage to bosses, Freyna or Lepic will be a better fit. You don’t have to stick to one character either; I keep 4 different characters max level on my account for different mission types and team compositions, so I can swap whenever I want to switch up my playstyle.
There’s no one-size-fits-all answer to who is the best character in The First Descendant, because the right pick depends on your experience level, whether you’re playing solo or co-op, and what kind of gameplay you enjoy most. The picks we’ve covered above are the most consistent, high-performing options across all game modes, and they’re a great starting point if you’re not sure who to level next. Don’t be afraid to experiment with less popular characters too, some of the game’s most underrated fighters have incredibly strong niche builds that can outperform meta picks if you build them correctly.