-This is a work in progress, please plan your insults accordingly-

Basically, nothing in Battleborn is set in stone. I know I know, pretty basic and obvious stuff there, but I'm putting it here as a disclaimer.

Anyone with the proper skills and knowledge can turn the tide of a fight, but there are some bare bones things I need to explain first.

1. Ranged characters generally suck in close quarters engagements.
Why? Since often these characters have low health, limited magazines or other restrictions on firing their weapons, and as well as falling into the territory of the Melee oriented cast.

2. There are exceptions to every rule of Battleborn. For example, Ghalt does more damage up close with his shotguns and with the last few rounds, but isn't a melee based character.

3. Melee characters often have some ways of dealing with ranged fighters, often through abilities or personal quirks. Some of these quirks are Galilea and Boldur's Shields as well as Ghalt and Shayne+Aurox's pull abilities. "GET OVER HERE!!!!" Must be shouted whenever these abilities are used, or their effectiveness is halved.

4. Knowing your enemy and what they are capable of is basic intellect, If you have time, simply go through the command center and review all Battleborn abilites and passives while planning how to fight against, alongside, or as said character. Passives can do alot in the heat of battle, like Ambra's Overshield when she gets close to death.

5. Know your own character's limitations and plan accordingly. Why charge bloody ISIC in Turret Mode in the middle of an open field when you can make him come to you. Or one of his friends. Doesn't matter really, as long as you know what you can do.

6. I lost track of where I was going, but... Practice. Alot. You'll find quirks of your own in certain locations on the maps or in fight senarios and can use that knowledge to surprise your foes and team in various ways.

Basically, Oscar Mike is a Harasser. What do I mean by that? Small children everywhere fear his presence, since he will bully them into submission; and then shoot them for being casuals.

Oscar Mike starts off pretty bare bones, only good for shooting weak and feeble minions while Heroically leading the charge from the back and while moving in the opposite direction.

His frag grenades are where its at though, get the Incendiary Upgrade to do 720 damage in 6 seconds, so while that Pissed Offed Rath is busy introducing you to his "USA", or Unwanted Suppository Applicator, he's getting a ♥♥♥♥ ton of damage while you're still shooting him, on top of the original damage from the frag grenade!

However, don't try to engage Battleborn alone and in close quarters. I shouldn't have to say that he doesn't whip out a knife and go Crocodile Dun-Dee on people. As far as on the receiving end of his pummelings, I've only been consistantly killed by Oscar Mike through his stacking abilities; or as a finishing blow after an ally had given me a solid whooping, mostly through his abilities.

If a player can get consistant critical hits on nearly any Battleborn he fights, Oscar Mike can go from being someone that just announces his presence by pecking away at your shields, to someone that can seriously threaten you once you let your guard down. Shield piercing attacks can really raise your blood pressure if you just finished a lengthy fight and are harboring low health behind a shield.

Also that stealth cloak ability, remember that anyone who sees you cloak will probably lead their attacks in the direction of your travel, and they can and will hit you. Look for the speed upgrade, it might save you from a Melee based character's beatdown. You can use it as a last resort, but against people who know the map and know where you're going; I'd have to say that cloaking will most likely be a roll of the dice. You might get away and dodge a Grab N Pull move, or you might not and get pummeled.

Basically, the Heavy if he were not Russian and fancied being a lumberjack. He's a really nice guy, but at the same time a huge sissy.


He is a simple class with very little creative thinking when it comes to his abilities. One's a simple dash forwards that takes care of his speed issues, the second's simply a minigun upgrade, and the ultimate is just a Tank Need Moar Armour effect.

Leveling up with Montana is more prolonged, since in the early game he lacks the ability to consistantly put down enemy Battleborn and needs to spend so much time on bots to kill them off. If anything he's good as a router or distraction for other Battleborn, the sight of him with a healer usually results in a brief exchanging of blows before the enemy either gets reinforcements or tries to retreat after losing most of his/her health.

If specced for building Minigun Heat, he'll have higher regen and do more damage, but at the cost of losing some of his tankiness. Now if you had a dedicated healer you'd last much longer but by yourself your regen wouldn't be able to match the burning damage from the Minigun overheating and incoming fire from enemies.

So basically, with a healer; he's amazing and hard to bring down. Alone? He's kinda an obstacle. A walking mountain of man-flesh that shoots bb's the size of a man's fist. He isn't really dangerous by himself unless he catches you up close or in the open, he just becomes a tedious adversary.

My personal experience has been where if you're killed by a Montana, usually you've been taking a few hits by other sources and he just happens to finish you off. I've tried chasing down Raths, Orendis', and Miko's but I've never been able to repeatedly kill them. It takes way to long and by the time I get close they've retreated back into friendly terriory and either got the turrets to help them or reinforcements. My minigun at those times were just barely hitting the max heat, and thus I couldn't put enough firepower out to stand a chance or in half of the situations to finish off the enemy I originally chased.

Basically, a flying chicken man thing that shoots rockets at people. Given the situation the universe has found itself in, that isn't all that surprising... Come to think of it... Also has an accent which I won't spoil but one that simply reinforces the idea that he's secretly part chicken. Explains why the Colonel's been sneaking around his door.


His ability to Glide is rather interesting, but unfortunately it loses its appeal rather quickly once people start looking to the skies. Also the fact that you can't use any abilities save the "Jump" one in the air without falling to the ground sort of ruins it.

His homing rockets are a treat, but I've never been able to consistantly score kills with it. Most of the time it's because people often retreat when they're marked and the speed of the rockets just isn't fast enough to catch them and usually careen into the geography. The flight of the rockets themselves is what in my opinion makes him a difficult class to play as. They move rather slowly, to the point where anyone with the inclination to dodge can do so if fighting at a distance. Add the rather lacking blast radius of the rockets, and you've got a slow firing, slow moving and small target primary weapon. Rockets usually do around 200 damage on a crit, good luck hitting repeated ones on someone like Marquis and Thorn, or bloody Orendi.

If he had better rocket speed and larger blast radius at the start, he'd be more... easy to use. Not saying he'd suddenly start rolling people early game left and right since he won't; but a Benedict player will almost never 1v1 someone unless he quickly stacks his abilities and chains them successfully or he picks off an injured or distracted player in the heat of a battle.

You might say, well Cute Kitty, HOW DO YOU KNOW?
My answer would be, look at my six rules at the beginning, #2. There's always an exception. All I'm giving is my personal experience that every time I'd gone face to face with a Benedict, he was never the majority damage dealer nor the sole opponent. A slippery one to be sure, but he lacks the finess of say Orendi and Thorn, but puts out single target damage at a slower rate than Thorn and lacks the supporting abilities. Plus, according to the lore he's kind of an a**hole to Toby; they were former friends!

This right there is my main squeeze, Galilea. Take all the techno-sorcery and ballistics you want, but our dangerous girl here brings in Dark Magic.

She's a Knight with visible outbursts of corruption at her very core, and fights her foes up close with a Greatsword and her trusty Greatshield. Which is fine, since she's a great Battleborn. She fights almost exclusively at melee, with only her Shield Throw ability and one upgrade to engage targets at a distance. Through the beta, she was called overpowered and was nerfed; but I still mained her throughout the beta and won several games with her. Good news for everyone though, the damage she does through skills and health regenerated is GREATER than what her beta build was.

Her passive is intriguing, through the output of damage Galilea sends out small localized AOE effect where she damages enemies for 20 damage at the start to 44 at level 10, AND steals their health. To put this into perspective, a Galilea with max corruption is rather difficult to bring down if she hides amongst a crowd of minions; since she absorbs health and deals damage from all those minions around her. Up close and personal, Galilea is difficult to engage on even terms, simply because her passive AOE effect is unlike any other Battleborn at this time. Through upgrading she can build corruption by blocking, meaning that an injured Galilea can simply put up her shield and tank 1000 damage while draining/damaging her opponents; providing that they are melee oriented and are currently smacking away at her. Ranged Battleborn have nothing to fear from Corruption directly unless Galilea closes the distance, due to the small radius of the AOE effect. Also corruption builds through damage dealt and skill usage, so Galilea's like a snowball. The longer in action she is the stronger the corruption will be, but the effect ends a short time after the final blow is struck.

Her Shield Throw, half of her bread with half of her butter, gives Galilea one of two means of ranged damage. It also stuns those it hits for 2 seconds, moves rather fast, can be upgraded to bounce between enemies after a successful hit at reduced damage, inflict other debuffs, and finally has the option to automatically return to Galilea on a successful hit AND reduce its cooldown by 5 seconds! By debuffs I refer to Wounding opponents, denying them the ability to receive healing from any source for five seconds. The Shield Throw can also buff Galilea, increasing health regeneration, movement speed, the ability to reflect incoming projectiles and increase the damage of the skill itself. An upgrade which buffs the damage of sword strikes when the shield is missing is optional, but one that only comes into play when you miss the Shield Throw. You can still block with the sword, but it barely reduces incoming damage while slowing you down.

Desecrate: The other half of her bread and half of her butter, gives her the Territorial title in the command center. A temporary zone is put down on the ground for 8 seconds, increasing damage done to all targets within the area. This can be upgraded with: The Wounding effect, dealing damage over time, healing allies, slowing enemies, speeding up Galilea and finally a duration increase. Properly built, a Galilea can make a small zone VERY hard to breach for the enemy, since within that Desecrate field Galilea usually has max corruption. This results in the stacking of debuffs, DOT, and friendly buffs all within a small zone and for a short time.

Abyssal Form: Galilea's Ultimate. Deals 125 damage over 4 seconds, regenerates 250 health, and greatly reduces incoming damage. By itself it doesn't seem like that good of an ultimate, good luck trying to kill someone while using it. However Abyssal Form grants a Galilea the unique ability to retreat from combat without worrying about incoming abilites or status effects. So far, I do not know if a stun or pull will knock Galilea out of her ultimate. She sinks into the ground while performing the ultimate, meaning enemies have to aim directly at their feet to damage her. It can also be used as an initiator, slipping in from an alcove next to an enemy. The opponent is suddenly taking damage, but often forgets to look down. Then Galilea sprouts up from the earth, at full corruption to promptly begin the beatdown. You can increase the radius of the ultimate, but it does so little damage in only 4 seconds I don't believe it to be worth more than the auto corruption upgrade.

BEST NEWS OF ALL: Corruption and Abyssal Form STACK!!! Amazing! So you're healing off the ultimate, dealing damage from two different sources, and stealing health from nearby opponents!

Meet Ghalt, de facto leader of all the Battleborn but the Rogues, who follow Renya if they want to. Generally speaking, Renya kinda lets Ghalt do the management part of the job; but he gets pissed from time to time and shoots something.

Ghalt is perhaps the hardest to unlock, get either level 40 in the command center or beat all advanced missions with a silver score or better. He fights exclusively at short to medium range, and his abilities are geared towards knocking enemies out of their formation and hampering their attacks. His double barreled Revolver Shotguns do impressive damage at close range, but can be upgraded for much longer range; with Tactical Shells as a passive, meaning he does bonus damage for the last 4 shots in his cylinder. Closing in on Ghalt is tricky, especially if he sees you coming. He'll just plink the first 4 shots into you and then blast you away with his tactical shells. He doesn't get anything by holding fire until you close in, his true power is in his final rounds and by god he'll use it.

Ghalt's first ability is the Hook, which basically functions like Scorpion's Spear in Mortal Kombat. He hits you with it, yanks you towards him; and sets you up for a combo with his Shrapnel Trap or his Tactical Shells, or both. He really doesn't care how you die, as long as you die. At the beginning it does nothing but pull enemies, but can be upgraded with the following: Increased AOE which allows for easier hooks, Dealing 133 damage on impact, Faster Speed and Range, DOT at 360 total damage at the start, Faster Cooldown and Increase Damage by 15% for 5 seconds. The hook can be a powerful tool, but not as a primary damage dealer. Ghalt's shotguns take that role.

Ghalt's second ability is ScrapTrap; a device that stuns those who run into it then detonates for 133 damage at level 1. Upgrades include the ability for traps to cloak, Deal DOT damage, Fire 3 child explosives, doubles health of the trap, increases the AOE radius, and reduces the trigger delay. It has tremendous synergy with the Hook, and is the middle piece for Ghalt's famous 3 type combo. He plants a trap, hooks an enemy into it, and then blasts them while they're stunned. Since it is a stationary object, Ghalt needs to plan ahead on where he wants to place them. Setting them in high traffic areas is a great idea if you plan on roaming, or setting them up in chokepoints and luring enemies to them is only two suggestions for this ability.

Ghalt's Ultimate is Dual Wielding: His shotguns start on fire and he can blast away with infinite ammunition until the 10 seconds are up or he's knocked out of the ability through a stun or knock up. He doubles his damage output, but only fires one shotgun at a time, his main bonus is infinite rounds. Depending on what final upgrades Ghalt chooses, he can either set enemies on fire with his rounds or add stacking speed boosts for every enemy hit up to maximum of a 25% speed boost.

Ghalt sounds like he's build for close quarters, but he's on a fine line. He doesn't have the health to engage in brawls like Rath, Galilea, or Phoebe but he does most of his damage at close range. A classification of him would as a Shotgunner, obviously, and Shotgunners excel in short range combat, but not hand to hand. He can upgrade his shotgun as well, giving himself more pellets in each shell to increase the spread, replacing his buckshot with solid slugs, gain 15% more damage from his Tactical Shells, or Slow enemies for 2 seconds with his Tactical Shells. This makes getting away from a Ghalt tricky, especially if you're sprinting directly away from him and he's got Slugs. You may be extending the gap, but he won't lose DPS with slugs and can just shoot you in the back. With Solid Slugs, A Ghalt doesn't need to close in on you as much, and can even outsnipe a Marquis with little effort.

Fighting a Ghalt usually relies on a few things. First. Ghalt has low health, if you can get your team to focus fire on him; he'll often be forced back. Second. Ghalt has limited crowd control capabilities, so gank him. Third. Ghalt often wins against melee characters with his knockback melee attack while shooting them, but will hardly win a fight against a melee fighter face to face. Fourth. Ghalt relies on fighting on his terms like several other Battleborn, and like said Battleborn a monkey wrench in the gears; (Or Orendi, she's crazy enough to do that) will knock him off balance. His shotguns are his pride and joy, but against a determined Rath or Boldur he cannot stand his ground. A Ghalt with Solid Slugs will often stick even further back behind the front lines, calmly allowing the melee characters and tanks to stay in the front. He doesn't move fast and is a big target, so map knowledge is key for him as well as his enemies.

Holy balls of chaotic fire, I love Orendi. Not because she's the Battleborn version of Tiny Tina w/ the same voice acter; but simply because of the abilities she has. Also surprise Para Shifts REALLY knock some people off their game, especially if used at the right moment.

Thanks to her abilites, she can easily demolish a small group of bots or seriously injure enemy players; especially if she isn't dealt with right away. Her nullify ability makes her a difficult target to keep up with as a Melee character without abilities, and can be used by clever players (Mostly Soldiers and Demos from TF2) to simply harass opponents while sending down Fire Pillars. DOT with Fire Pillars is practically a must, since it only stacks on more damage on top of the already high Pillar damage. Sure, you can spam 2 at a time, but one's alot weaker and requires even further foresight and predicting power.

If the last sentence of the previous paragraph intrigues you, by all means try it out. However the DOT is in my opinion the better of the two simply because: Even if you miss the main shot, the enemy still took some damage and is likely changing their strategy on the fly. Perhaps they're going to charge you and run straight into your Nullify, which basically resets the original senario.

Her Ultimate is basically a hand held nuke wave. What I mean by that is that the range is surprisingly far, has a large cone of effect, and hits like a truck falling from the sky. It is not unheard of an Orendi stealing multiple kills by "Shifting" into an ongoing melee and obliterating her opponents. Unfortunately, the shields for ISIC, Boldur, and Galilea have the potential to block her Paradigm Shift.

A situation where she'd excel in? As additional support. Sure once you're comfortable with her you can simply go 1 on 1 or even 1 on 3 like I did once, but to me she benefits more from a teammate being a distraction than anything. She's also a harasser, meaning most of her tricks can be done from a distance where flight is always a possibility. If an enemy purses, Nullify and stack additional abilities to put the pain on while blasting away with her basic attacks.

I like calling her Bait and Tackle. Simply because she appears immediately as a squishy character, which she is... but has the ability to turn what was a game of cat and mouse into who on the enemy team wishes to die first once she decides to turn about and actually make a stand.

To be fully honest, I'm glad that she leads from the front.

Reyna is perhaps my most favourite support character in Battleborn thus far, and I've only played 7 matches with her in total. While her pistol isn't the best weapon for 1 on 1 encounters, It does a large amount of chip damage in a short amount of time. WAIT, You might say. Those two things don't go together, but in this case you're wrong. By chip damage I mean that when you fight her, you aren't suddenly gonna lose around 200 or so hp in the blink of an eye. If you do, there's probably a Marquis or Thorn sitting somewhere plinking away at you and convincing themselves that they're helping.

No, by chip damage she's like Oscar Mike or Montana: She does little damage with her primary, but has a high rate of fire which attempts to compensate for the pitiful damage. Bloody Orendi's basic attacks outdamage Reyna's.

Her true magic lies in her Gauntlet, which lets you mark enemies to be seen through walls and have them take additional damage, and even slow them down yourself if they're bolting. It also can mean life or death for allies, since it bestows an overshield upon them in under a second and can be upgraded to regen health, clear status effects, and restore shields. The gauntlet also gives you the overshield, making it easy to buff a teammate who's too far behind enemy lines, (The range is actually surprisingly long) and then fall back with the boosted shields.
(Basically, use them as tough bait to cover your escape)

If a friendly Montana with max shields just got stripped and the enemy is pushing, Reyna's Overshield can easily slap them in the face with disappointment as their hard work suddenly gets reversed.

BUT!!! She's a support character, not intended to stand on the front lines and tank damage. You need quality tanks and damage dealers to make up for your own lack of firepower and to take advantage of your Mark-For-Death ability. A Reyna and Ambra or Renya and Miko would probably be a dream team, Miko handling AOE healing effects while Reyna's burst shielding can save doomed allies.

In my opinion Reyna is better than Miko, simply because her loadout is better and more suited to actual combat. Miko is mostly passive, Her/Its' potential shines when paired with tanky characters and individuals who just need constant heals. If her Mushroom Ultimate actually started slapping people with its roots then I'd reconsider, but so far the Mushroom is best left for healing purposes only and stuck in a corner out of sight where the slow effect can catch people unawares.

Back to Reyna. Her Ultimate is a GODSEND when it comes to Incursion, Capture and Story Missions. A field that knocks back immediate attackers but doesn't keep them out in addition to stopping all projectiles? You can easily lock down your own sentry turret if the enemy stripped the shields, give a giant middle finger to sniper characters as you take away what they were born to do, and make reviving or supporting teammates during a push a breeze.

In conclusion, purge the mutant fungus, and hail the Rogue Commander, not the one from XCOM though; that person has been known to save scum.

Basically, Shayne's a pretty tough cookie. Her melee attacks are fast and surprisingly damaging with shocking range to boot, all of this compiles into someone that is difficult to slip away from, especially when she decides to send out her Djinn and drag your sorry ass back to her. Or she'll simply hit you with a stealth attack then proceed to mimic a colonoscopy with Edward Scissorhands.

The only real downside to fighting as her is the fact that Aurox is huge. REALLY HUGE. So big that even if you've got a Montana in the way, the enemy will still see your ethreal buddy. So basically the ability to blend in with the crowd of minions or whatnot is gone, unless you use stealth strike. Also since the combo is so large, sniper characters such as Thorn and Marquis will positively expel various fluids at a high rate of speed when they see you enter the battlefield.
(What kind of fluids? I won't say, that ruins the fun!)

Also, her abilities have rather high cooldowns as a balancing act, which means you as Shayne have got to plan ahead. Do you save your Fetch ability for later and just charge the enemy, or do you begin combat with the fetch, and hope to body-block and beat-down your opponent before they get away. It's your call.

One final observation. Shayne and Aurox appear threatening. Think about it, a huge lumbering shape with claws that moves faster than you'd like? I've seen whole fights go from a 2 versus 2, to a 2 versus me when I show up while ignoring the other players they were just previously fighting. In other words, Shayne and Aurox are targeted more than other characters simply because of how they look. You will be surprised how quickly the enemy team starts to focus fire on you if you're leading the push or are busy killing one of their friends, moreso that usual.
This even applies to the no-man's land in the beginning of matches. If you run out into the open, chances are you'll be the priority target despite there being a friendly Rath or Marquis already engaging the enemy.

A penguin with a serious attitude when it comes to feeling bad for others while expressing his inner psychopath. He also has severe self confidence issues, with his constant apologizing to others for killing them; even though he'll still steal all their valuables after the dust settles.

Toby is first and foremost, not really a tank character. Yes he's got a damn battle mech, but its more shakey and flimsy than Donald Trump's hairstyle on a windy day. He can go down rather quickly from concentrated fire, but his place is further back from the front lines. As his page in the command section suggests, he's a territorial fighter; relying on his AOE Arc Mines and Force Field to keep his foes back. Now the Force Field doesn't stop people from pushing through, but it provides some nasty benefits if left standing for too long.

If Toby isn't a tank, then what is he? A sniper really. A more passive aggressive one to top it off. His railgun does pitiful damage with rapid fire, and does max damage upon being charged. The projectiles are not hitscan, meaning they have travel times and can be avoided. His Force Field however speeds up the rounds if Toby fires through the shield, making them pretty much if not completely hitscan. His mech contains charges that upon jumping into the air, Toby can quickly launch himself in any direction using one of the charges. This makes him a slippery opponent to beat down as a melee character, as he carries three of the charges initially and they have no cooldown. He just has to jump with every usage, so get used to Bunny Hopping Mechs.

His Arc Mine: Dealing a base damage of 80 AOE per second, and later exploding for 133 damage, then 202 AOE damage and an explosion of 245; Arc Mine is what gives Toby his primary method of crowd control, or CC. With upgrades to the AOE radius and damage as possible outcomes, and coming with the options of Slowing, Stunning, or Vortex (gravitational pulling) enemies; this ability becomes a multi-tool, capable of specialization.

Toby's Force Field: A tremendous battlefield utility. It blocks 510 incoming damage at the start, can be upgraded to increase speed of any ally passing through it and to provide a combination of healing and attack speed increase. It can also be upgraded to increase the shield's length or maximum health. Its true potential lies in its effect on Toby's Railgun. Shooting a round through the shield speeds it up, and with upgrades can get 25% more damage or split the single round into 3. Basically, Toby is called Territorial because of this ability in my opinion. He needs to plant this thing down to seriously improve his combat performance and team support efficiency. Warning, it only blocks 510 damage and therefore really squishy for a defensive tool, for example an upgraded ShadowFire Pillar can oneshot this thing.

Toby's Ultimate / Core Discharge: Basically a death laser, a 2-3 second charging period before putting out all of its damage over 6 seconds of constant focused-light death.
Benefits: It is really cool to use and to see, it has no range from what I can tell, and can be upgraded with slowing effects or modified into a three shot blaster.

Negatives: It has a rather long charging period, no panic deployments for this thing. It slows you down while being used, and requires that you have a clear line of sight to the target at all times. Bodies of minions can stop the laser, since it doesn't penetrate multiple targets, and thus a smart opponent can simply hide behind a pack of minions or perhaps an Elite Bot and wait it out. About that clear line of sight thing being necessary? Yeah, they can see you too. You get no damage reduction nor anything side from the possible slowing effects of the laser; meaning that the enemy can simply rush you and knock you out of the ultimate with an ability or kill you outright due to Toby's low health.

Conclusion: Fight with Toby at a distance, preferably with his Force Field up and Arc Mine deployed as a deterrent. If all else fails you have his boost charges, so jump up and launch yourself away from attackers. His Railgun is his life blood, don't rely on his basic melee attack and keep away from Melee Battleborn.

Fighting against Toby? Rush him. Harass him as he tries to set up a firing position. His low health means that he's a prime target for assassin characters and single shot Ultimates. Don't forget about his Boost Charges, since they're easily used to gain distance from you and if he's determined to bunny hop his way away from you, you likely won't be able to stop him short of stunning him or killing him. Watch his behavior with his Force Field, depending on where he deploys it and the behavior of himself and enemy Battleborn; you can easily tell what upgrades he chose. If he's camping directly behind the shield, hit him a few times if you can and watch his Health Bar; he might be running a health regen setup and trying to stay aggressive at a distance.

Whiskey Foxtrot is an older model clone soldier with a talent for scrounging, and especially killing. He utilizes three different tools on the battlefield: his rifle, underbarreled scrap cannon, and sticky bomb launcher.

First and foremost, Foxtrot is not a frontline fighter. In fact, use him as you would Oscar Mike, standing further back behind the mobs while dealing damage. His rifle fires in 3 round bursts initially, so you can't panic-unload like Oscar Mike can if you get ambushed; and you lack any sort of stealth device, therefore you're seen until the geography makes it otherwise. You also have limited anti group capabilities, only your sticky grenade and scrap cannon have the potential to hit multiple targets in one go.

Whiskey's Ultimate in my opinion is rather lack luster. After a small charging period he switches on a fully automatic mode and starts with a 75 round magazine. It does no additional damage or have any other effect, save for an upgrade that allows for either 100 rounds in one go or the ability to ignore shields completely. The later seems useful at least, however I don't know if Galilea, Boldur, and ISIC's shields can stop the rounds or not. Something like that would really make fighting these guys easier, but would give way towards complaining and griefing of all sorts.

His Sticky Grenade is pretty self explanatory. It does however have a surprisingly long range and a low arc, and has the potential for slowdown, triple fire, DOT, damage increase, and cooldown reduction through upgrades.

His Scrap Cannon serves three roles. 1. It's basically a shotgun firing metal shards at people, which if it doesn't kill them, the Tetanus will. 2. It can knock back nearby enemies, allowing for amusing environmental kills and diminishing the effect of ultimates. Good luck getting a Deathwind on him when he just keeps sending you 10 feet back. 3. It can knock YOU backwards. It's like Orendi's Nullfiy, doing damage while knocking both yourself and your enemies away in the opposite directions. Nothing like making some personal space eh?

His passive is rather useful for someone like himself. His Attack Damage is increased by 25% for 10 seconds every kill, meaning that he's great for destroying minions and once he's done with that; popping his ultimate and turning it loose on enemy Battleborn with a flurry of shield ignoring rapid fire!

A space vampire with swords, luckily he's got more personality than his Twilight cousins; especially after he killed them off in disgust. Fortunately for all of surviving intelligent life, he's one that doesn't sparkle in the sunlight; but simply gets angrier.

His abilities are rather easy to understand, he's mostly a direct fighter. His heal on damage passive kinda reinforces this, but I have seen ranged Raths before. It was not pretty for anyone.

Generally speaking, he revolves around rushing people. His Crossblade attack can easily hit a whole line of enemies, and can be upgraded to return at half damage. This move even goes through Geography, so if you see a wounded enemy fleeing as they turn the corner; shoot Crossblade through the map itself for a chance to finish people off.

His Smash attack is great for knocking enemies out of their ultimates, namely ISIC and other Raths. It can also be modified to increase the damage of Crossblade immediately afterwards or to reduce cooldown by number of enemies killed. Its damage is pitiful for a skill, but its knockup effect is what makes it unique.

His ultimate basically turns him into a DoomTop. Get near him and he'll work his magic. Knock him back, knocking him up (not like that), stunning him or simply running away makes his Ultimate a joke. If you're in a cluster of enemy minions and he gets Deathwind out while right on top of you, you'll probably die unless your skills come in or he runs out of charge; or even if you simply kill a minion to make a breach and run away.

In my experience, he's a rather difficult character to properly play as in a competitive environment. While he's unlocked right out of the gate and requires at first glance little intelligence to play, advanced players have said that knowing when to push and when to retreat is half the battle. Stacking abilities is also a key component of his strategies, alongside with other battleborn; but with him it is special. He needs to stack his abilities simply because he lacks Heavy Pokes, or moves that deal large amounts of damage in 1 or 2 hits.

With support, Rath is difficult to beat down. By himself acting as an assassin, he can easily pick off weak Battleborn in one on one engagments; yet if he takes on a whole group of Battleborn his regen and damage output won't quite make it, minus his ultimate.

In conclusion, Rath is fun but those who choose him need to realize that they can't always rely on his two abilities to consistantly fight, and plan accordingly. For example, don't use CrossBlade on an enemy with full health and shields. They'll hardly notice the Crossblade attack and you've just marked yourself with a 15+ second cooldown so that if you do get the upper hand, the enemy can easily run away knowing you can't touch them once they get out of your melee range.

Thanks to from Dead Rocky

Caldarius is one of more cliche style characters, basically a warrior in a suit of powerarmor using a jetpack, TMP, and wrist mounted energy blades to dispatch his foes. However just because he shares similarities with tons of other characters from other videogames, doesn't make him any less lethal.

Caldarius is a highly mobile skirmisher, meaning that he doesn't last long in extended engagements. I'll compare him to Phoebe, both have their own niche in which they excell, but pull them out of that zone and they won't be as effective. Caldarius definitely has more in the maneuvering department than Phoebe, but he is of a bigger bulk. Unfortunately for Caldarius players, his style of fighting rarely changes, resulting in enemy players becoming used to his tactics and learning to play accordingly.

Caldarius utilizes his thrusters for most of his playstyle, factoring in his passive thrusters that allows for double jumps and rapid retreating/advancing, his Ultimate, and one of his skills. The only thing that doesn't require his thrusters is his Flashbang Ability. Caldarius fights with his Tactical Machine Pistol and Wrist Mounted Energy Blades, so he is similar to Mellka in terms of standard combat. Caldarius should strive to initiate combat then rapidly retreat or to flank opponents to finish off wounded enemies. Caldarius's greatest nemesis would be tightly nit enemy Battleborn and Thumper Turrets, seriously, F**K Thumper Turrets. Slowdown is a death sentence to Caldarius, since so much of his fighting style is dependent on mobility.

Caldarius's first ability is Gravitic Burst, basically a forward lunge with knockback dealing 134 damage at the start. It can be upgraded to immediately reload Caldarius's TMP, increase melee attack speed, launch yourself backwards on impact, greater pushback, greater damage and finally greater dashing distance. This allows Caldarius the potential to knock fleeing foes back into the guns of your allies, especially if you managed to flank the enemy to appear behind them.
I witnessed one of the greatest Involuntary Movement plays in the history of Battleborn. I, Caldarius, Managed to flank an enemy Orendi in Overgrowth. I appeared from the bunker and Burst'd the fleeing Orendi back into the center by the Lightning Turret. A friendly Shayne+Aurox then Fetch'd her even further back towards the small wall with the window, THEN a friendly Ghalt appeared and Hook'd her EVEN FURTHER back towards the curve in the dirt road leading towards our sentry. Needless to say, she died. And we all gathered round and taunted her.

Caldarius's second ability is the Flashbang Grenade. It's not a grenade like Oscar Mike's or Whiskey Foxtrot, where it has an arc and a short fuse; but rather Caldarius's ability is like a grenade launcher, firing an exploding projectile that detonates on impact right out of the gate. It even gives you your range of effect before firing, and hits for 134 damage at the start. Flashbang can be upgraded with the following: Bleed Damage, Triple Shot, MIRV/Child Grenades, Reduce Cooldown, Phasing or Non Collision and finally Increased Radius. It is a tool that Caldarius can use to blind enemies when he's retreating, set them up for a combo attack with Gravitic Burst or Aerial Assault, or to pave the way for an ally to step in and finish what you started.

Caldarius's Ultimate: Aerial Assault. He launches himself up into the air, then sights his target and divebombs them with incredible force dealing 334 damage. Its pretty simple, and a great way to make sure that fleeing Miko doesn't get far. It has two upgrades, one Reduced Cooldown and the other drops a frag grenade at the start of the ultimate that deals mild AOE and DOT damage.

Caldarius fights with his TMP and Energy Blades, so anything from close quarters to short range is his domain. As Caldarius, know this and plan accordingly. Against Caldarius, your best bet is to debuff him and possibly administer stun. He's great at running away, though he'll claim that he is a professional at rapidly regrouping.

Ambra, a Flaming Not-Egyptian mage with a major attraction towards celestial bodies. Sounds like a Ra supporter.

Anyways, Ambra is or was in quite a pickle. She was nerfed three times over the course up to the games release, and now stands as as fast moving support with a I-Can't-Miss Staff and the ability to drop meteorites onto things that displease her. What displeases Ambra? Literally everything but herself. Go on, she'll insult you no matter what you do. Her Staff does pitiful damage, but returns 30% of that damage as life steal. She functions like Kleese's tazer, good for packing on the damage to a fleeing foe with team support and hopefully stealing kills. Unlike Kleese, when Ambra nears death her inner hatred towards all things not her is channeled into an Overshield with 300 hitpoints, by nearing death it's 20% max HP. This usually gives Ambra the vigor she needs to bolt or to delay the inevitable. One thing to keep in mind is that Ambra has no reliable method of dealing with Ranged Battleborn outside her predictable Ultimate, she's stuck in close to medium range with little health and fickle abilities.

Ambra's first ability is what her insane pyro-psychotic mind entails, a small sun simply chilling around that does two purposes: First is dealing 40 damage a second at level 1 to enemies within it's radius and the second is healing 33 points to allies. Ambra can put up 2 at a time, and usually utilizes them for harassing enemies or supporting teammates. They don't last long mind you, and therefore shouldn't be relied on as constant source of support like Kleese's Energy Rifts and Miko's Ultimate. Sunspot can be upgraded as: Make Enemies Take More Damage, Stronger Health Regen, Self-Destructing Sun Mines, Larger Radius and Revealing Cloaked Enemies, Lower Cooldown and finally Increased Health. These Sunspots can be popped right next to each other for a small temporary healing hub for allies or dropped in the middle of a swarm of minions to tag them all. On an interesting note, most players I've seen tend to ignore the Sunspots even if they're taking damage from them. Don't take this for granted though, plant them out of sight or in the middle of a melee to give some active support for allies.

Ambra's second ability is Solar Wind. Basically, Ambra turns on a cloaked electric fan that blows hot air towards her foes. At level 1 it deals 80 damage a second, and can be upgraded with the following: Applying a DOT of 121 over 3 seconds, Pushing Away Enemies, Moar Damage according to range, Faster Cooldown, Greater Radius and finally 15% Moar Damage. This ability tends to be Ambra's primary means of crowd control. If a Rath is hitting on Ambra, she'll pop an upgraded Solar Wind to push him away. It could also be Ambra's answer to Minion Swarms, but the only method of keeping melee characters away from her would have to be replaced with the need to get CLOSER to her opponents.

Ambra's Ultimate: Extinction Event. She calls down a fiery Meteor from the Gods who just ate bad tacos, and after a short period of pushing and swearing; slams a "Thing" into the ground. After the intial impact, a DOT effect of 5 seconds is left behind, the pitiful embers of a grand piece of space crap. Its only upgrades are: A 2 second Stun or +3 Second Duration for the DOT effect. The best choice is pretty obvious. This thing ain't no Blight Field or Oscar Mike Incendiary Grenade.

Retreating should aways be in an Ambra's mind. You lack damage output and as a Support Character, you shouldn't be the one leading the charge. If you're the only supporter on your team, once the enemy knows where you are you're the highest priorty target. You can heal out of the gate like Miko, a tremendous advantage over Kleese; who needs to wait till level 5 before unlocking his healing chair. Unlike Kleese or Miko, you lack a sustained high output healing option. No damaged team can camp around your sunspots and expect there to always healing coming forth, and you probably won't be able to heal individuals currently under fire with much success. Your best bet is to find a team that manages to avoid near death situations and is constantly gaining ground. Once your team starts to falter, your Sunspots may not be enough to sustain them while under fire and your push/cohesion falls apart.

A bull in a china shop, smashing your fancy crap.

Attikus is a simple brawler, nothing more. He gains charges by killing things which eventually leads to special effects to his abilities, which in turn makes his strategies change. He is a tanky character, but one that suffers from the Montana syndrome, people automatically want to shoot him first.

In the early game he suffers from slow attack speed, slow movement speed, and a large profile but at the cost of heavy punches. Around 100 damage per punch I believe at level 1. However his skills lie in brawling. Specificially large groups of weak opponents, which he builds his charge meter off of and can then use for advanced pieces of his abilities.

As EnormousSnake says, Attikus revolves around tanking. His primary tool and method in achieving that purpose is through lifestealing. His gimmick in battle is through building charges by means of killing things. He can carry a maximum of 5 charges, and can be upgraded to have increasingly powerful buffs that depend on the number of charges; and once five charges are obtained can deploy buffed versions of his normal abilities.

His first move, Pounce, is what gives Attikus his much needed speed. He moves rather fast during the pounce and can put himself in a position to either corner his foes or to bodyblock them. It does 67 damage at the start and knocks back enemies. When charged it does an additional 100 damage to shields. Pounce can deal more damage at the area of impact, trigger rapid shield regen, grant temporary lifesteal on all attacks, slow enemies, cooldown reset on major enemy kill, area of effect and damage increase. It is a great initiator, punisher for retreating enemies, and for leaping onto the battlements of say, Overgrowth and introducing your surprised enemies to your FISTS. Furiously Invasive Sexual Tapping Service.

His second ability, Hedronic Arc, is something rather unique. It serves as a buff to Attikus, giving his attacks a mild DOT effect for 8 seconds. Fully charged it acts like a cloak, enemies nearby suffer its effects without actively being fisted by you, Attikus. It can be upgraded with: Life Steal, 30% Damage Debuff, Faster Movement, Greater damage to shields, Longer DOT Effect and Chain Arcing. This serves Attikus best when used in combination with his other abilities, giving Attikus greater damage output for a short time with debuffs on top of his OTHER ability debuffs.

His ultimate, Hedronic Eruption, is basically the combination of a three year old in a temper tantrum combined with the likes of anime. Repeatedly slamming the ground to form shockwaves that deal 84 damage initially. Fully charged, it gives Attikus the ability to juggle live humans and other living beings for around 4 seconds without a possiblity of the victims escaping. Properly utilized and prepared for, Attikus can initiate a Team Wipe; giving his allies the time to stack damaging DOT abilities and even Ultimates. Hedronic Eruption has the following upgrades: powerful DOT affect of 240 damage over 2 seconds or a duration increase, meaning that with every enemy killed grants an additional 2 seconds up to a max of 10 seconds.

Fighting Attikus can be tricky, especially if you can't put out more damage than what he can heal from or are unable to outheal his attacks. Other than that, treat him like a Shayne and Aurox, a bigger and more disgusting and less attractive Shayne and Aurox. Both have big models, fight in close range, have debuffs, and are annoying in each of their own right.

Coming Soon

Phoebe puts high class arrogance and internal psychotic bloodlust together in a fancy package.

Specializing in blitzkrieg tactics, she doesn't do heavy damage in simple hits, but rather relies on small but fast attacks. Even her ability blade rush does so little damage it is hard to be used as a primary damage dealer, which it's not. Instead, her potential lies in her debuffs and Ultimate. I'll explain why later on.

First of her abilities is the Phasegate, where after a brief warmup she teleports towards where she selects and deals a short burst of AOE damage. This is often the Key to her potential, phasegate allows for a 6 second speed debuff for opponents and a speed boost for yourself, which can for a basic ability rub crap all over a Rath and Attikus's day. The two Battleborn I just mentioned rely on attack speed to put out most of their damage, and being slowed for 6 seconds means a lot in terms of their damage output minus abilities.

The Slowdown and Self-Speed Boost in addition to the increase of basic attack speed and increased melee damage of Phoebe allows for a truly dangerous opponent. She is considered advanced due to the reliance on her buffs and debuffs, which in themselves must be used wisely. A squishy character such as Thorn or Marquis will likely flee upon engaging a Phoebe in close quarters. Phoebe's Phasegate gives her the unique ability among Battleborn to hunt down and kill such squishy characters. If fighting a tank, Phasegate is a godsend for retreating or initializing combat; especially if you have support.

Now, why did I spill the salt about Blade Rush? Because at the start it does 34 damage a piece, which is terrible. At level 10 I believe it hits around 70 damage per Rapier. It also comes at a 20 second cooldown with gear, has the tendancy to miss targets, moves rather slowly, and carries in of itself only the ability to partially punch through shields, lower its own cooldown by 2 seconds, and to mark n silence those it hits. Combine this with pitiful damage even when built around the skill, and this ability is best used for the absolute finishing blow or simple usage of Phoebe's only form of ranged attack.

Of course you may chose which ability you prefer, as is your right; however most of Phoebe's Blade Rush upgrades conflict with Phasegate, what I consider to be Phoebe's Bread and Butter.

Her ultimate is the Steel Rain version of Oscar Mike's Airstrike with benefits. First of all it hits EVERYTHING within its radius continously, something that the Airstrike doesn't enjoy due to random falling explosives and the slow movement of said explosives, and serves as a panic button when retreating or a wonderful straight upgrade when pushing a group of opponents. Now that was a long sentence, but I insist that her Cascade/Ultimate is deadly when paired with an upgraded Phasegate.

An enemy sees a Phoebe approaching and is made helpless as she warps forwards, slows down everyone in the radius, calls down her ultimate while poking your jimmies with her rapier. This can result in a HUGE amount of damage within the span of 6-8 seconds to a large number of opponents, and almost always a kill against squishy Battleborn. The benefits are even greater when she catches opponents by surprise, and makes her a perfect assassin.

Ways to counter a Phoebe is this: Healers and Support. A healer is the bane of Phoebe simply because Phoebe relies on light but fast attacks, and most healing is done over time. This results in diminishing returns for the healer, but the extension of an engagement for Phoebe. Someone like Ambra or Renya are what I consider absolute hard support based counters for Phoebe. Ambra's sunspots do two tasks at once leaving her to act on her own, while Renya's overshield can put a temporary stop to all of Phoebe's hard work. Both extend the time of contact, which for an assassin in general is incredibly dangerous. Reinforcements of any kind, such as a friendly Melee or Ranged Battleborn or even minions, can destroy a Phoebe or force her to retreat, since she is herself squishy.

Marquis: A gentleman, presumed scholar, and total d**k. However, he is OUR special little d**k.

Marquis immediately appeals to those who fancy themselves to be rich, entitled to everything in the world, and being a huge coward but a sociopath at the same time. If anything, Marquis is a true high class gunslinger, but should rather be considered an Urban Hunter; going about on expeditions into the heart of the slums of various cities and hunting down the various fabled Hobos of Legend. With the perception of an uncaring egocentric douchenozzle combined with the air of a butler to a deranged girl genius, Marquis sets up his own stand among the Battleborn and promptly keeps others away with a sharp metal stick of a significant value. Or he might just shoot them, he's wishy washy.

Marquis is a Gentlebot, therefore the concept of beating others to death is distasteful to him. Why get your thousand dollar gloves over your million dollar metal arm? No, leave that to the hobos, Jenneritt, UPR, Rogues, and finally the Eldrid. He'll just snipe them from afar, content to admire the blood splatter from a distance rather than up close. His weapons are such that a fine scholar and proper gentleman wouldn't dare be caught dead without; his personal mechnical sniper rifle with double barrelled pistol stock. The first is when he is relaxing on his porch, the second is for when a Hobo gets too close for his liking; which to be fully honest is rather far away.

His beloved rifle, Bindlebane, comes with a variety of upgrades. These include little things like: A variable scope, decrease in recoil, increase in both reload and attack speed and base damage. It also provides the ability to improve Marquis's passive, Eins, Zwei, Die. This passive grants 50% bonus damage on the same target on the third hit, allowing Marquis to strip shields of a fleeing but injured foe and to punch the last bits of breath and or life from their corpse before having it cremated and the ashes used to pelt hobos. This passive can be upgraded to trigger on the 2nd shot rather than the third, or increase its bonus damage to a glorious 75% increase! For instance, dealing 200 damage a round; on the third round with this upgrade you'll hit around 350 damage.

Marquis utilizes two different Gentlemanly things, His hat and his pocketwatch. His hat spawns exploding mechanical owls and laze on and divebomb targets like they're going out of style; and his clock grants him the ability to set up a zone or shut one down. His owls can be upgraded to cloak, phase through the environment to always guarentee a hit provide that it isn't shot down, to have two shots rather than just one, increase damage, boost casting range and finally to provide a powerful AOE on impact. His stopwatch grants him the ability to slow down enemies, speed up allies, boost the slowdown effect on enemies, add a DOT effect, increase the radius of the bubble, increase duration and to increase casting distance.

His ultimate is the ultimate in Mechanical Killing Efficency; firing a powerful charged blast that can be upgraded into two separate shots or one piercing round that goes through anything it hits. This super increases damage the longer that its deployed, so trying to snipe with it is an encouraged activity.

Marquis has gotten some flak recently for his abilities. Many claim that his high speed, thin body, and extremely high damage output combined with an insane distance of engagement plus the ability to take the wind out of melee character's sails through Temporal Distortion results in an unbalanced fighter. He does do incredible damage properly built, capable of taking out a maxed out Montana in around 4-5 shots to the head. If anything, I'd say your best bet is to pressure him constantly. If he puts out his bubble you're likely screwed if he decides, and he will, to shoot you while you are helpless before him. Sneak attacks or highly damaging assaults are his weakness, in addition to flanking. Against a Rath or Galilea, a Marquis crumples extremely fast if he can't escape.

This old and decrepit man on an advanced hover chair that costs more than fifteen of your life's salaries; serves as an advisor to the Battleborn on their missions, and a powerful support option in matches.

Kleese is first off, old, therefore he is brittle. In simpler terms it means that it doesn't take a lot to beat him back into his coffin or send him scurrying back to his retirement home. Kleese attempts to counter the rigors of age with kinetic barrier technology, or shields. His "BattleThrone" or hover chair makes him a huge target, almost as wide around as Montana's shoulders. His critical hit zone is smack dab in the middle of his body, right next to the rotting mass of flesh that is Kleese's heart.
He also is rather bulky in controls, don't expect him to compete with Miko and Thorn in a battle of who's more slippery. Combine this all with low health, slightly above average shields, and pitiful attacks and abilities in terms of direct damage; and we have ourselves a Kleese.

But Kleese isn't geared for combat. He is support pure and simple. If a Kleese on your team is the one pushing the lanes or leading charges, your support branch is doomed. If ANYONE, even Orendi, decides to stop swatting flies and swat Kleese, He'll go down faster than my mother will, according to twelve year olds in XBOX Live.

Kleese has two attacks, an wrist mounted energy blaster and chair mounted Tazers. Both do pitiful damage, at average 40 or so damage per hit; and only serve as a last resort or at least an attempt to pick off a weakened opponent and steal the kill for Taunting rights. The Blaster can miss, the Tazers do not. They, the Tazers, lock on to a target and deal constant damage as long as the subject is within sight and less than 10 feet away. If an enemy gets that close, you're often doomed unless you skedaddle. He can however upgrade his Battle Chair to perform increased damage for certain actions, such as: 25% increased Tazer Damage, +1 Tazer Target, Chair Slam, More Chair Energy, Self Destruct on Death, Moar Shields, and finally Heal 120 hp per second.

Kleese's first and perhaps the most important ability is Energy Rift. This deploys a permanent building on the ground that every 3 seconds gives off an energy pulse, this restores 83 shields to all friendly units in the area while doing 83 damage to enemies within the building's radius. To put this into perspective, a gaggle of three of these suckers will make a hostile Melee Battleborn's day go sour really quick, especially if they're targeting an ally cowering by your Rifts. Every 3 seconds your ally gets around 200 shields and the enemy takes around 200 damage, if all three rifts are online and nearby. Energy Rift can be upgraded with: 50% bonus damage to shields, Rift Linkage, Exploding Rifts, +1 Energy Rift bringing the total to 4, Plus 500 Health to each building, and finally 33% faster Energy Pulse. A network of Rifts gives bonuses to each rift involved, if four Rifts are included, each Rift gives off 4x the output. Perfect for establishing a forward operating base away from friendly Sentries and Turrets.

Kleese's second ability is Energy Mortars. At level 1, it fires six mortars in a row at a target dealing 22 damage per hit plus bonus damage to shields. If you hit all six mortars, congratuations! You just did 130 damage to somebody! You aren't useless, almost! No, the point of energy Mortars is basically to give Kleese something resembling crowd control. Energy Mortars can be upgraded in the following ways: 22 friendly shields restored on hit, Slowdown, Stripping Shields but Boosting Damage, Triggers Unstable Rifts, +4 Mortars, Instant Shield Recharge on hit (Good Luck) and Simultaneous Firing. This ability is only good for supporting teammates. Pepper that rushing Galilea to hopefully save your fleeing Oscar Mike, or pepper that A-Hole Rath trying to steal your fancy chair. Running away should always be an option, and usually the preferred option. Kleese isn't like Miko, he can't take a ton of incoming damage and still survive; and unlike Miko, Kleese doesn't go to players instead players go to him, especially with Don't Call It A Heal Chair activated.

Kleese's Ultimate, if you can call it that, is Black Hole. After a short delay a powerful rift in the fabric of reality is opened, and nearby enemies are Pulled into it and dealt 334 damage. That's Kleese's strongest attack. The only upgrades to Black Hole are: Grant nearby teammates an overshield worth 225 OR cause all nearby Energy Rifts to become unstable and explode. The idea of planting 40 some seconds of Energy Rifts only to blow it up while hoping that the enemy doesn't do one of the three things below is ludicrous.

A. Destroy the Rifts.
B. Run away before the Rifts explode.
C. Simply kill you outright before the "bomb" goes off.

If anything, Kleese should just be an additional source of damage during a teamwide focus fire on a target, If ANY melee character decides to charge Kleese, even with a full network of Rifts and Slowing Energy Mortars at his disposal, Kleese will likely have to retreat. Knowing an Exit Strategy is key, just like Ambra or Deande. Don't try to hover above a melee character, they still can hit you in addition to your own limited movement speed. If you're stuck hovering or being juggled, you're doomed. Your pitiful shields and laughable health cannot do anything to protect you from a concentrated assault. Late game, things only get worse for you as the enemy grows stronger and develops more abilities. Silencing Kleese during a brawl is useful to keep him from popping Energy Rifts to block your path or Slowing you down through Energy Mortars; but doesn't stop what any Kleese should focus on, his Tazers and Hover function. Remember, Tazers can follow an opponent further than when they can originally lock on, so don't be surprised by taking damage even when running away from a Kleese.

ISIC, the absolute sociopath of all the Battleborn thus far; operates under a unique basis. That basis is that he isn't actually alive, but instead is an Artifical Intelligence. Therefore, killing his machine form isn't actually doing anything, since he's built several thousands of these combat mechs. But since this is Battleborn, anything is possible.

ISIC functions as a mobile tank, with three forms of defensive energy tools and a self-charging plasma caster. If in a good strategic point, ISIC can active turret mode, providing tremendous damage output in the form of Plasma Bolts and Cannon Blasts. ISIC however deals most of his damage through continuous application of said energy projectiles, and therefore performs his best by being supported by his team or by knowing when to retreat.

ISIC's first ability is Rotating Wards, energy barriers that orbit ISIC for 8 seconds that can absorb incoming ranged damage per each piece of the grid out of a total of 5. Overcharging ISIC's plasma caster before the activation of this ability increases the amount of damage absorbed slightly. Rotating Wards can be upgraded by the following: Faster Shield Regen when Activated, Reflect Incoming Projectiles, Condensing Energy Orbs, Increased Ward Strength, Extended Duration by 6 Seconds and Reduce Cooldown when ability ends based on how many wards survived.

Reflecting Projectiles is perhaps the greatest way to give the middle finger to ranged characters, especially highly aggressive and stupid ranged characters. A Thorn that continues to shoot at you with these babies will suddenly find out what her arrows feel like on the inside, and Caldarius will probably kill himself with his own TMP fire. Rotating Wards even blocks some Abilities and Ultimates! A Reyna's Target Marking ability might bounce away and strike one of her teammates, or even hit Reyna herself. If you're paying very close attention to her, or a friendly Marquis is; nothing makes the world brighter than having Reyna suddenly marked for death. Also, Rotating Wards can deflect Galilea's Shield Throw. Nothing like seeing an attacking Galilea stun herself with her own shield. Now I have yet to confirm this, but I believe that Rotating Wards can also deflect Thorn's Wrath Of The Wild.

Condensing Orbs are for the ISIC unit that is dealing with a large amount of in-your-face opponents, and would kindly ask them to back the hell up. Each ward deals around 130 damage and since there's five of the suckers; that's around 650 damage just sitting around you. Combine this with Plasma Dash for major nuking, or huge outputs of damage in under a second.

ISIC's second ability is his Plasma Dash. It allows ISIC to wreath himself in energy and tele-dash to a target location. Anyone caught in the way is either blown to nasty, greasy bits or is simply knocked to the side. Where they can still fight for the meantime but will eventually die of cancer. It can be used both as an attack and a positioning tool. Will be rather hard for that Smash-loving Rath to get you if you're perched up somewhere he can't reach. Plasma Dash can be upgraded with the following: 60% Shield Penetration, 2 Second Stun, Amplify Damage based on number of struck enemies, Reduced Cooldown, Speed and Max Range and finally Area Of Effect or Travel.

Word of advice though, ISIC's Dash does not make you invincible. You can be stunned, slowed down, grabbed, knocked back and even killed Mid-Dash. If that Rath or Galilea really wants to stop you, they can. Try not to be predictable with it, if you see the enemy's avatar go into the "ready" pose don't use Dash unless you're sure they won't hit you with it.

ISIC's Ultimate, Turret Mode, is what makes him a more annoying and dangerous opponent. Sitting up somewhere safe from the prying hands and claws of say: Galilea, Rath, Attikus, Kelvin, and Boldur to name a few; ISIC can rain high powered death down on his foes, and is fully capable of soloing an enemy Sentry in Incursion. It can be upgraded with the following: Deploying Energy Aegis to block incoming damage from the front or Firing Two Missiles at every enemy hit with the Cannon shot.

Coming to slap your **** in the ring soon!

Originally, I hated Thorn with a passion. She was always a thorn in my side, pardon the pun, no matter what Battleborn I ran with.

After playing with her for about 10 minutes, I decided to redo my original assessment. While her bow takes some getting used to, I found that her abilities are geared more towards my style of play.

She specializes in ranged combat, obviously, but she utilizes her bow and two forms of nature magic to fight. Her bow can be charged to inflict a "Cursed" effect, which futher boosts damage dealt to targets on continued hits from both skills and charged arrows.

Her three abilities, Volley, Blight, and Wrath of the Wild, provide Thorn with a surprising amount of crowd control functionality. Properly upgraded, Thorn can deal a huge amount of damage and debuffs to small areas on the map, making her a wonderful addition to a team in almost any situation. Almost. First and upfront, if a Thorn player can't aim or adjust to her arrow travel time; that's it she's screwed. If a Thorn player constantly rushes the enemy, thats it she's screwed. Thorn fights on her own terms like most Battleborn, but unlike most Battleborn she relies on geography to do most of her damage. Geography, you might say. Why that? She's a sniper after all, anyone can shoot on the ground, but she needs a handy overview of the battlefield at all times to survey important targets or to harass minion clusters.

Her Volley ability comes with several benefits: 1. It does max damage at close range, around 250ish, it is after all a simultaneous launching of arrows that spread out. It can also be augmented with the following: Life steal, penetration, Auto-Cursing, increased damage, moar arrows and finally cooldown reduction. You trade moar arrows, bringing your potential burst damage to 420-ish minus gear values at the cost of not cursing enemies on impact. This in of itself is a minor concern, it all depends on how much you value Thorn's passive, Cursing.

Her next ability, Blight, deals a small AOE effect on the ground which damages enemies for 60 damage for 6 seconds at the start, and can be augmented with the following: Slowing, Self Speed Buff, Self-Curse Buff, Damage, Duration and Cast Distance. This allows her to lock down a minion cluster with ease and to lace chokepoints for incoming hostiles.

Her Ultimate is my favourite thus far, Wrath of the Wild. It launches an energy bomb that deals 500ish damage at the start, and with upgrades and gear can put out over 750 damage in an instant. At level 10, an upgrade allows the Wrath Ball to bounce after first impact up to 5 times but dealing less damage with every hit or to deploy a Blight field after impact. The Blight field carries all of its buffs and debuffs as the standalone ability, therefore it makes quite a hotzone for a short period of time.

Thorn is squishy, there is no denying that. However her innate health regeneration, high speed and small frame makes her a difficult target to get rid of out in the open. She can easily run away and on the map Overgrowth, an upgrade to her jumping height allows her to perch almost anywhere; especially the enemy's own battlements without going around through the chokepoint like nearly every other Battleborn.

Boldur, a deliberate pun in regards to a large piece of solidified and cooled magma; is a fearsome opponent in his own right. If you want something hard to kill and low to the ground, Boldur is your tree-dwarf.

Boldur is classified as an Eldrid Defender, called a Complex Tank Brawler. His signature tools of the trade are an ancient Runic Axe and an Ekkuni Greatshield that was formerly a Guardian's Codpiece. He starts each game at just below 2000 hitpoints, plus the thousand points belonging to his shield; bringing the absolute total damage required to kill him at around 3000. Thats at level 1. With upgrades, Boldur can tank an additional thousand damage with his shield, bringing that total to 4 thousand. Best of all, his passive, Rage, further reduced damage taken by 35% and can be upgraded to 50% damage reduction through a mutation. Needless to say, if a Boldur decides to stand his ground, it'll take quite a pummeling to bring him down.

Boldur is slow moving, fitting as a dwarf. However, this does not mean that anyone with the ability to speed walk a free getaway. When Boldur loses his Axe, usually through the process of throwing it at you, his movement speed is increased by 30% immediately. His unarmed combo which consists of a series of three blows can be upgraded to slow his foes with every strike. Basically, this turtle brings the hare down to his level, and promptly can beat them into submission.

Boldur's First Ability is BoldurDash, where Boldur launches himself forwards and rams his enemies, knocking them back. For a melee fighter, doesn't the idea of an enemy gaining distance sound terrible? Normally it is, however with Knockback, if the afflicted enemy hits anything that counts as an obstruction: The environment, minions, and even other Battleborn; they are stunned. This gives Boldur the chance he needs to promptly beat some mules. A word of caution though, if both Boldur and a hostile Montana collide while both are in their charges; Montana will always win. It makes no sense to me, but it does. Even if Boldur charges first he'll still lose. BoldurDash can be upgraded with the following: Generate Overshield, Activates Rage, Passthrough and Knockups, Increased Damage, Greater Distance and finally Reduced Cooldown. This is Boldur's Multi-Situational Swiss Army Knife, capable of allowing for a fast retreat or quick initiation. Also for punishing fleeing foes. Congrats you ran while slowed about 10 feet, now you're slammed against a wall and getting fisted, or hacked until you die.

Boldur's Second Abilty is his Axe Throw. While pretty self explanatory, it does deal decent damage. A second perk to this ability is to trigger Boldur's Unarmed Bonus features, such as faster movement speed and slowing punches. Upon striking a target with the axe and upon retrieving it, Axe Throw's Cooldown is reduced by 20%. It can be utilized as an Initiator to combat, to punish fleeing foes, or to harass lone Battleborn. It can be upgraded with the following Helix Choices: Return on Hit, Bleed Damage on Hit, Slowdown, Damage and Grant Stackable Health Bonuses on Kills. For this last one, killing a foe grants 144 hitpoints to Boldur's max health pool; and can stack a total of five times. With a potential 720 hitpoints sitting there it is a tempting choice. However the stacks are lost upon death, and therefore are only useful if your teamwork is consistant and you manage to stay alive. All it takes is a surprise attack by some high damage Battleborn or a gank and you're done unless someone comes to your rescue.

Boldur's Ultimate, Runes of Power, are truly a game changer. Boldur actives ancient runes on his Axe and Shield, which grants additional benefits and alters Boldur's other Abilities in different ways. Upon activating Runes of Power, Boldur's Melee Damage increases by 18%, and 50% of all damage blocked by his shield is returned as health as long as the Shield's Rune is active. His Axe Throw ability boosts the Axe's Damage and causes it to explode, giving Boldur some measure of AOE. His BoldurDash does additional 25% damage and triggers a DOT effect. A Mutation for Boldur allows him to replenish his health based on how many active Runes he has upon using his Ultimate again. If one Rune is gone, it'll be 50% Max HP, if both runes are still active, it's 100% HP. This only Doubles if not Triples' Boldur's survivability, and promptly relieves itself upon thirsty foes. Nothing like whittling him down only to have him right back to full health. It's a fight you probably won't win.
His other Upgrades for the Ultimate are: +2% Damage for every 100 health Boldur has or Shield Mastery, granting Boldur the Ability to tank infinitely as long as his Shield Rune Is activated. Personally, I've tanked the combined efforts of five enemy Battleborn for over 10 seconds with this ability, and only lost because a Montana used his LumberJack Charge. So, more damage upon starting a fight fresh or with a healer, the ability to literally take anything side from a knockback, stun, or pull all while healing from it, or finally through the mutation the ability to suddenly health huge portions of your health. Take your pick.

One final series of advice text, Boldur is not the end all character. He, unlike Rath or Phoebe, has no method of engaging enemies consistantly from a distance without using his Axe Throw. Pheobe has True Strike and Rath has his Spinning Blade thing, but Boldur needs to be up in your face to attack you. Granted, both his standard abilities give him the opportunity to do so but that only leaves him with fewer options should you decide to retreat. Changing the subject, a Boldur with a pocket healer is borderline unkillable. He'll tank either a thousand or two thousand damage with his shield while being healed then jump back into the fray. A level 10 Boldur with Shield Mastery and a Pocket is Unkillable. Period. As long as he wants to be. As far as I'm concerned, Runes of Power last through Silence effects, meaning that just because a Rath or Galilea used their ace on him doesn't mean he he'll die. The only counters are Knockups, Stuns, Pulls, or Alani's stupid Geyser Binding.

Our friendly neighborhood Ice Monster. If you look closely, you can see actual skeletal remains embedded within Kelvin's body. Fun facts for the day.

Kelvin is a brawler, plain and simple. He has no shield, since he's Eldrid, and instead relies on over 2000 hp at the beginning to survive. His skills are unique, not focused entirely on dealing damage but instead on battlefield control. His ultimate itself is more of a tool rather than a technique to be used on the battlefield. He is the closest to a pure melee fighter, even moreso that Rath. Kelvin has absolutely no form of attack outside his ultimate that is considered ranged. His tools are simply punching things with his fists.

His first ability is Sublimate: The ability to transform momentarily into a floating white ball of J**z or perhaps ice crystals. I gave two possibilities since they both stun on contact and both will slow you down properly utilized. I don't believe that Kelvin does any damage in this form directly, rather applying a 3 second stun or a three second slowdown effect to anyone that he hits. This gives him the abilitiy to escape unharmed from combat, enter combat with a huge advantage should he stun his target towards the end of his sublimate charge, and lock down a lane for a few seconds.
I personally use this as a multi-tool. Your movement speed is faster in this mode than I believe anyone else's sprint speed allowing for ninja shard grabs, it makes you temporarily invincible and therefore you can serve as a scout or anti-minion supporter. Best of all, if you have an aggressive team that pushes with you and learns/knows when you're planning to use Sublimate and when you'll hit/stun the enemy; you can easily push lanes and capture/destroy points and sentries. Miko, good luck running away when you're already getting your ass kicked and now you're stunned for 3 seconds.

His next ability, Chomp, is not designed around max damage to enemy targets, but rather for a snowball effect. Upon killing an enemy with this move, Kelvin gains a permanent increase to his own health! If left alone with minions for long enough, you could be fighting a Kelvin with over 4000 hp! Granted he'll still have to run up and perform a colonoscopy with his right claw, but still, +4000 hp! Good luck taking him down by yourself! Now I personally don't know the mathematics behind the max health multiply for Chomp, so I wait to use the ability until my enemy's almost dead to save time and brainpower.

His ultimate gives him the ability to shut down a lane for 7 seconds, by way of blocking off an incoming hostile, group of minions, and even projectiles. It stuns enemies on contact, so chasing a fleeing foe into a narrow hallway and then Ice Walling the far corner effectively traps your prey.

Kelvin is a brawler, he's not designed for fancy moves and cutting edge techniques; rather his place on the battlefield is as a meatshield. He can increase his max health outside of gear and levelups, so left unchecked he'll become a smaller and more cool version of those Outcast Thralls.

Bringing the rock party to you soon, with grenades and poison included!

Growing off of dead stuff, sprouting in a bathtub near you soon!

Alani is a relatively new addition to the Eldrid ranks as of 5/20-something/2016, and she brings in her own style. She's pegged as a healer and a controller, so fans of the likes of Ghalt and Miko should rejoice. Her attacks do surprising damage for a so called "Healer," but then again since the existance of prenerf Miko and Galilea the developer's words haven't been the most trustworthy. Her abilities are truly unique, no other character has a Knock-Up Stun combo in the same ability like she does; and no other character can put down such a large area of various effects. Her Ultimate is a bit like Ambra's, It does a sudden spike of damage followed by an AOE and has the potential for status effects upon upgrading.

But here we are, at the beginning. Alani possesses the means of crowd controlling, single target selection, and healing. Her secondary attack will heal herself for half the maximum output if she doesn't have a healing target. (Think Reyna's Shield Booster only minus the need to have a target.)
Her attacks do have finite range like Orendi's, but she boasts a faster attack speed and I daresay more damage.

Alani has a unique passive, called Osmosis. Basically, the more she hits you with her attacks the stronger her heal will become should she decide to use it. A helix option allows for greater healing through Osmosis, and a Level 5 Mutation unlock gives stronger bonuses to Osmosis Healing but decreases a non-stacked heal.

A word about her basic attacks though. An upgrade for her helix tree allows for her to reduce her Cooldowns by half a second for EVERY SUCCESSFUL HIT, including her Ultimate. This means that once she gets going, unless you can focus fire on her quickly she'll keep knocking you back, immobilizing you, and buffing her allies at the same time in a very short time frame.

Her First Ability: Riptide, totally unlike the horrible Dead Island "Sequel," is simply fun. She sends forth a series of waves that cover an long stretch of ground. (Think Rath's upgraded Smash attack.") This water immediately Speeds up allies and Pushes back opponents. Upgrades for this ability are: Healing Over Time, Slow On Hit, Forward Movement, Generate Osmosis Stacks over Time, Increased Duration of Water and finally Distance. A level 4 mutation unlocked at level 3 allows for Riptide to leave a DOT effect in place. This ability has great potential, nothing like taking on a lane with this. Slap on a few status effects and this puppy can change the battleground REAL quick. With the Helix Upgrade at Level 3, an accurate Alani can spam these things out with roughly an 8 second gap in between.

Her Second Ability: Geyser, defies the laws of physics as it summons enough water pressure regardless of the environment to knock up enemies standing near or directly above its position. Not only does it knock your foes into the air, effectively canceling their ultimates, (ISIC and Rath for example) But it also "binds" them in the air. It's basically a Stun that holds you up in the air for anyone to see and to slap. And that's right out of the gate. Upgrades are as follows: Heal Allies Upon Bursting, Standard Attack Projectiles Richochet Between Bound Targets, 30% Bonus Damage to One Target Plus 30% of All Damage to Same Target Effects Nearby Enemies, Generate One Osmosis Stack On Hit, 25% Larger Radius and 30% Faster Detonation. WOW, that's alot.

Her Ultimate, Emergence, is every fisherman's nightmare. A giant undead fish, oh sorry... a "dragon", bursts up from the grave dealing a small burst of damage followed by a greater AOE effect. It can be upgraded with a 5 second slow and healing allies at 150 health per second. Pop this sucker into an ongoing brawl and watch the tide turn. Sorry, bad pun.