This guide will use the Tomb of Annihilation formation. We'll be building my current formation from scratch based entirely on the state of my game. This guide is meant to detail the thought process of formation building, rather than an actual formation suggestion.

Important terminology to know;

Loose vs. Tight Refers to the available placement options for a champion. Loose champions have several slots they can be placed in to full effect, while Tight champions may only provide full effectiveness in one formation slot. For example, Calliope is a Loose placement because her buff affects the entire column in front of her, so she can go anywhere in the column behind. Meanwhile Nayeli is a Tight placement champion because she has to go in the front line to have full affect, and there's only one slot in the front of this formation.

Self Serving Refers to buffs that affect only the champions that provide them. For example, Bruenor's "Inspired" ability is self serving because it only buffs his own damage, while his "Rally" ability isn't, because it affects the entire column.

ToA is shorthand for "Tomb of Annihilation"

You'll see tier lists. You'll see review videos. You'll see spreadsheets and Discord channels on the "best" characters. Take all of them with a grain of salt. People will always tell you that this or that is the "best" champ but there's so many ways to be good in this game that it never tells the full story. Whenever someone talks about a "best" champ, there's always a caveat.

For example, people will always say that Artemis is the best DPS - and numbers-wise he absolutely is. The problem is that he requires a very specific lineup of supports and very detailed formation building to function properly. If you don't do it right, he's mediocre at best.

People will tell you that Briv is the best tank, and it's true - except that tanking in and of itself isn't very useful, and Briv is a garbage buffer.

People will say that Briv is the best speed champ, and this is also true - but he needs literal thousands of iLevels to reach a usable state and has to be restacked after every use so he will continue to function.

People will say that Spurt is the best buffer, and they aren't wrong, but Spurt is only good because they scale the best with iLevels, a fact which only matters once you have thousands to throw around.

People will say that Commodore Krux is the best buffer, but he requires you to complete a lot of a difficult campaign to reach full potential, and before you do there are better and easier to use options in that slot.

So when someone tells you "You should use X, they're the best", remember that being the "best" at something doesn't make them a good option for you.

I get that reading and memorizing the abilities of all 100+ characters in the game is daunting and borders on unreasonable, but don't be one of those people who just hurls ten random champions into the formation in random places and expects it to work, then comes to the Discord asking for formation suggestions with a formation containing D'hani and Jamilah with half the buffs in the formation going nowhere. You'd be surprised how often that happens.

Read the abilities of your champions. Understand which ones do what and how. You don't have to remember every stack source or total buff percentage, but remember what spaces in the formation they affect, or what stats they require. If you can't remember them all (which again, is perfectly fine) then check their abilities again before you use them. Early game especially, your formation matters a lot, and putting random champions in random spots isn't going to get you very far.

The end goal of any formation is to have 1 DPS champ being affected by every possible ability from your other 9 support champs. That doesn't necessarily mean you'll only have one champ in your formation with the DPS role, but you'll want to make sure that any other DPS champs also have support abilities.

Which DPS you choose is up to you. Don't feel pressured to pick the "best" DPS champ. People push to the zone cap with what could be called the worst DPS champs, so as long as you have some patience you'll be good. Pick one you like, preferably one you can support. For example, I'm not choosing Arkhan since I don't have many buffers who can specifically affect the columns ahead of them, so Arkhan can't be buffed by every slot. I barely have any tanks to support Jamilah, and the low frontline space means most of those will be wasted due to not getting their tanking ability.

As a reminder, ToA's formation looks like this;

For this formation I'll use Asharra. Asharra revolves around having a fair amount of specific racial groups for bond abilities. Paragon of Kir Sabal (hereafter referred to as just "Paragon") is a keystone in Asharra's formation prowess. The goal is to have a total of three bonds affecting Asharra; the base effect of Potpourri, then two more from Paragon (this allows Asharra to double dip on the first bond's effects).

I happen to have decent mixes of champions to support Asharra's bonds, and she also has the advantage of being affected by the "Focus on the Core" major blessing, although that's only a few zones at best.

Before we even place Asharra, we need to know where. We can't just stick her in any slot, in fact it's usually better to not place a champion unless you know where they can be, just so you don't discount potential options because your formation isn't shuffled right.

Our campaign blessings are the first thing to consider. ToA has blessings that buff the edge of the formation, the top slot in each column, and the entire back column. This means that the most optimal slot is the top left, in the back. Unfortunately I don't have any tanks with formation abilities that reach that far (well, I do, but they're Knox and Evelyn, who share Asharra's slot).

Blessings are secondary to champion buffs, and it's important to not shoehorn sub-par champions into the formation to take advantage of a 400% buff when most champs can contribute 10 times that much. So all we care about is the top slot in each column, since there won't be any shoehorning for that.

That still leaves us three potential spaces (well, two really) which isn't quite enough to go on. We'll need to tighten up the formation before we do something like stick Asharra in the back column and end up having to reshuffle the entire formation later.

Tanks are a core part of any formation. They massively boost your survivability due to being the only champ type that receives health buffs. Having a decent tank is the first good step, almost as important as choosing a core DPS. While having at least one tank in your formation is vital, you don't need to fill the front line with tanks. One is usually enough, even for the wider formations like Avernus. This brings up a rule of thumb; don't fill your formation with tanks just because the front line is big.

At first it looks like I have a lot of options, everyone from Sentry to Walnut to Briv. But all of that choice is rendered moot by one simple factor; my champion roster. Arkhan and Jamilah are both out the window due to being 100% self-serving, and because they're the only ones in their respective slots, that means I have to use every one of the first 10 slots. This means my only option for tank is Nayeli in slot 3, because she's the only one in her slot. Theoretically I could put her elsewhere, and that's certainly a choice, but I'm not exactly desperate for non-tank champions in my other slots anyway and Nayeli would have a drastic drop in efficiency when not on the front line (like most tanks).


There's only one frontline space in this formation, so that's where she goes. Since her buff only affects the single column behind her we also now know where Asharra goes; right behind her in the top slot of the second column.

Next we look for obvious choices. An obvious choice can be a lack of options, a champ that's super powerful compared to everyone else in their seat, or a champ that fills a requirement for another champ's formation ability.

We still have one of these clear obvious choices; Celeste is the only champ in her slot, and there's only one slot left she can go in that has her healing affect the tank line. Fortunately it doesn't matter where in the column she is, so we don't need to worry about conflicts with the blessings. That means our formation now looks like this;


Not too bad so far. We still have some room for adjacency buffs, but it's looking pretty tight up there.

Tyril is our second-to-last easy choice, being the last champion we're using that is the only one in his slot. We're of course picking moonbeam, since bear form is useless to us. That means we want to minimize his adjacency. He'll go in either the top or bottom slot of the back column. Let's shove him in there for now.


You can still place champions if there's multiple slots they could go in, it's just important to remember who can be moved and where. This can get overwhelming if you're juggling 10 slots at a time, which is why I'd recommend taking it one step at a time and minimizing your potential options before you place.

Last on the "only in slot" roster is Makos, who currently only shares his slot with Drizzt, who is self-serving (apart from his minor gold find buff). He can go anywhere not adjacent to our DPS, so lets stick him in the back column.


Makos has a buff that only applies if he's not on the edge. This is impossible though, as most formations only have one slot that applies, which is of course adjacent to 70% of the other slots in the formation. That's why I tend to drop him for Sword Coast adventures.

And conveniently enough, we've already reached a Paragon breakpoint; we have *three Potpourri champions in the formation just from slotting in our given champions. Additional Potpourri champions are always welcome, but no longer vital.

*Note that since this guide's creation, Asharra has been nerfed to require 4 champs per bond, not 3. While I have reformatted this guide since then (which is in part why you're reading this) I will not be changing the text itself. Just keep in mind that the exact steps are outdated.

Now we start getting to the harder parts. We have a lot of choices here, but some of them are made easy. I don't have enough half-bloods or exotics to reach the Paragon breakpoint for the second round of bonds, so our only second-bond option is Short Folk. That means we're on the lookout for the Kobolds and halflings in my roster.


Deekin is our next easy choice, both because he contributes to Short Folk and his only swap Bruenor can't fit into our formation (primarily because the front is so tight there's no room to move someone else into Aashara's column). Deekin buffs adjacency, so we put him next to Aashara.


Deekin also has a speed buff, which makes him extra useful. It's also worth noting that Deekin's second buff, Troubadour Troupe, buffs the formation multiplicatively for every bard we put in. So we're also on the lookout for bards. We're running out of slots though, and reaching the second Paragon breakpoint is more important, so it will mostly be a secondary concern.

Freely is another shoe-in for our formation, mostly because I strongly dislike the way Minsc's buff works. Most campaigns have a mix of three different kinds of enemies, so at best Minsc is only useful one third of the time, and that's if the enemy types correspond to his potential buffs!

But Freely is also a perfect storm; He's a halfling which contributes to Short Folk, and he's a bard which contributes to Troubadour Troupe. He's also a fairly strong debuffer to boot, with gold find, stun, and attack speed built in. He also has a favor gain boost, but it's rather small and requires a fair amount of favor already to really get going. It's not bad though!


Freely has no placement requirements, so we'll put him in the back row. He's great for this formation because he contributes to every global buff we've got going. The extremely generous range on his Cutting Words buff also still reaches the front there. Isn't he perfect?

Wanna see me do it again?

Now we turn to bench slot 8, a highly competetive slot with some highly competetive choices. Of the 5 champions I have in this slot though, one stands out. Hew Mann.

S/He's not going to get much of a bonus from Hello, Fellow Humans (even with the spec that changes the target race since our formation is so mixed), but s/he is another Kobold, and a bard, so another perfect fit that also causes us to reach the Paragon breakpoint. Now Aashara has all three bonds we need.

Hew Mann has different effects based on where he is in the formation. Let's put him in the back for the DPS buff, which still reaches Asharra.


Now we've hit our most important milestone. Almost all of our champions are working at maximum efficiency. We still have two slots to play with, so lets see what we can come up with.

Lets take a short stop at bench slot 4 for a new take on decision making. In this slot we have Jarlaxle and Sentry, who don't have a place in our formation. Jarlaxle has a mostly gold-find and self-serving buffset, and while gold find is cool it rarely makes up for the stages you could push with another support. Sentry has no place in our current formation without some major shuffling due to requiring the front column. We could push everyone back a row and stick sentry in the front, but then Nayeli isn't working at 100% efficiency. We have better options than that, like Stoki and Baeloth, who don't require any formation shuffling. Baeloth is a beast of a buffer, with 3 total formation-buffing abilities, while Stoki has an infinitely stacking buff to the edge of the formation (which is where Aashara is), and contributes to the short folk bond.

At first they both seem like good picks, and it can be hard to choose, but then you notice that Stoki is relatively poorly equipped, meanwhile Baeloth is utterly decked out in two shinies and two epics thanks to all that money I threw at CNE (Sorry not sorry, red panda skin was worth it). He's also got two more formation buffs, and also has gold find, just like if not better than Stoki's.

So it's Baeloth for the formation. He affects the whole formation and everyone in front of him with his major buffs, but it's important to note that a large portion of his stacking and damage benefit comes from his Cause for Celebration ability, which affects the column in front of and behind him. This means we can place him in column 3 and he'll affect both our primary DPS and the largest possible number of champions, though that doesn't matter since the only one getting kills will be Asharra.


And then there was one.

I've saved the hardest for last. Briv isn't in consideration here because there's no space for him, but Calliope and Quillek make a close race.

They both contribute to Troubadour Troupe because they're both bards, they both have similar equipment qualities (though Calliope edges this out a little), they both contribute survivability (though Quillek more so), they both can easily fit into our formation.

Ultimately Quillek wins out for one reason; He contributes to Potpourri while Calliope doesn't. This doesn't really matter because we're already past the Paragon breakpoint, but it's still an edge over Calliope. That combined with a better ultimate (which is only ever a minor consideration) decides this close race.

It's worth noting that Quillek wants to be adjacent to our DPS, but adjacent to as few other champions as possible. Putting him in the formation as it is - in the middle slot - would be sub-optimal. Fortunately Deekin can shift down one to give Quillek a better boost.

So in the end our formation looks like this;

But there's one last thing; we don't need all this DPS back here. Thanks to our divine favor we outscale the enemies for a long time. That means the most valuable thing for early in a run is speed, so...

Hew Mann goes in front to contribute his speed buff until the formation stalls for the first time, after which he'll swap back with Nayeli for full DPS.

This is a tactic far easier than building a full formation from scratch. Once you've got a decent formation, every time you get a new champion you look over your formation, what the new champion contributes, and who is the weakest link in your current formation, to see if your new champion could fit into your formation.

I'll demonstrate with my newest recruit; Avren.

First, I need to go through each champion in my formation and see who needs to stay. Freely, Deekin, and Hew Mann are all locked in to supporting the Short Folk bond, Nayeli is the only tank that could support this formation (all the others are locked behind tight choices, except maybe bear Tyril, but his bear form buff doesn't fully support Aashara), and I'm personally a fan of the massive buff Baeloth provides with his Djinn.

Since Avren is in slot 11, a previously unused slot, I don't need to worry about mandatory conflicts due to multiple champions in the same bench slot, so I pretty much have free reign over whoever's left.

My next step is to open Asharra's character sheet, go to the "incoming buffs" section and keep track of the weakest incoming buff. Makos stands out as he lags behind compared to the other buffers in the formation, who all have buffs that are about 50% more potent. Makos contributes to the Potpourri bond, but we have one extra so we can afford to drop him. That means out goes Makos and in goes Avren.
Of course just slapping him in Makos' slot isn't potentially optimized. Avren provides bigger buffs if we maximize adjacency, so we want him next to as many people as possible. Unfortunately we already have three champions that require adjacency, so we can't move him into the center spot, which is adjacent to Aashara.

This isn't all bad; now I know that I'm on the lookout for someone who doesn't need to be adjacent, but still doesn't drop us below either of the Paragon Breakpoints. A replacement for Celeste is the most likely candidate here since we won't have to worry about the bonds. That means I'm on the lookout for a slot 2, 9, or 12 (since those are the slots I'm not using or up for replacement) support character that doesn't require adjacency and prefers the back column. I now have a target for my next time gate.

There you have it. To summarize, when picking champions it's best to work from the most restricted bench slots to the least, like a logic puzzle, taking into consideration the buffs of everyone and where they can go. The only thing wrong with this formation is how tight the front 3 columns are. Pretty much nothing can move.

A lot of this easy decision making will fade away as you get even more champions in every slot, but hopefully by then you'll have a better grasp on who you like and who you don't. Even then, it's still worth considering gear and placement restrictions. If all else fails, just count the number of damage-boosting abilities your choices have. The absolute value of each buff isn't vital, though comparing the numbers can still be helpful.

I hope my rambling helped you outline the process for building a formation from scratch, or if not, yell at me in the comments (quietly) and tell me what I did wrong.

Ultimately it's not worth losing sleep over getting a "100% optimal" formation. Just put stuff together until you find something that works.

If you're evolving your formation, it might be helpful to go back and rebuild from scratch every few champions. This could help you find better formations you didn't see before since you were only considering one champion at a time. When doing this it can be helpful to try and run variants with your current formation, to see who tends to work with everything and which ones throw a lot of wrenches into potential backup plans, so you can phase out the champions that give you the most trouble.