The First Descendant Tier List: The Best Descendants Right Now
The strongest Descendants in Season 4 — what each one does, when to pick them, and the tier logic that survives every balance patch.
The First Descendant has 36 Descendants and Ultimate Descendants, and the meta shifts with every patch. The tier list below reflects the current Season 4 state — but the reasoning matters more than the ranking, because the ranking changes and the reasoning does not.
What makes a Descendant strong
Four qualities, in order:
1. Damage that scales. The Descendant has to be able to clear the hardest content, which means the damage has to keep up with the enemy health pools. Flashy skills with bad scaling drop fast.
2. Survivability or self-sufficiency. In four-player co-op, the team covers your weaknesses. Solo, you need to survive alone. The strongest picks do both.
3. Build flexibility. A Descendant that works with many mod combinations survives balance changes. One that needs one specific build breaks when that build is touched.
4. Usefulness in every mode. The best Descendants are good in the open world, in Onslaught, in the Mega Dungeon, and in Trials. The specialists are strong in one and mediocre elsewhere.
The current top tier
These are the picks that win in Season 4, with the reasons:
Raven — the newest Descendant (August 2026), and the strongest in the current meta. Instant repositioning plus a shotgun playstyle that rewards aggressive, close-range builds. She clears the Onslaught stages and the Mega Dungeon faster than almost anything else. If you have her, play her.
Valby — the community’s S-tier pick after her recent buffs. Her area control and damage combination covers the open world better than any specialist, and her build is forgiving.
Freyna — the poison debuffer, reworked again in the October patch. Her damage-over-time build is one of the highest in the game when it lands, and the rework gave her more scaling options. The build is demanding, but the payoff is top-tier.
Hailey (and Ultimate Hailey) — the September 2026 Ultimate release. Her damage ceiling is among the highest, and her Ultimate form fixed the weaknesses that held the normal version back.
Enzo — the burst damage dealer. Simple to build, strong in every mode, and his damage does not depend on a specific debuff landing first. The reliable pick.
Bunny — the electric mascot, and still one of the best characters in the game years after release. Fast, mobile, and her damage scales into endgame without a complicated setup.
The strong tier
Lepic — the fire AoE specialist. Great at clearing groups, strong in the open world, slightly behind the top tier in the hardest single-target fights.
Gley — solid across the board, easy to build, and a good early pick.
Blair — strong with the right build, more demanding than the top tier.
Viessa — the chill debuffer. Her value is team utility — the slow and the debuffs help everyone. Slightly less solo damage than the pure dealers.
Ajax — the tank. Not a damage leader, but the most forgiving character in the game and genuinely strong in co-op where his defense covers the team.
Serena — strong with specific weapon pairings; the recent buffs made her viable again.
Ultimate versions of the above — every Ultimate is a strict upgrade, but the material and time cost is enormous. Only pursue the Ultimates of characters you already love.
The tier logic that survives patches
When the next balance patch lands, re-evaluate with these questions:
Does the damage scale into endgame? If a Descendant’s damage falls off at high levels, the patch only made it worse.
Does the build need one specific mod? If yes, any nerf to that mod is a nerf to the character.
Is the character useful in every mode? The hardest content rotates; the specialists swing in and out of the meta.
What did the last patch change? The characters the developers keep buffing are the ones they want in the meta. The characters untouched for two seasons are usually untouched for a reason.
What to actually play
The honest advice: the difference between the top tier and the strong tier is smaller than the tier lists suggest. The best character in the game is the one you enjoy enough to build properly.
If you are new: Bunny, Enzo, or Valby. All three are strong, forgiving, and easy to build.
If you have Raven: Play Raven. She is the current meta for a reason.
If you love a “low tier” character: Build them anyway. A well-built favorite beats a badly-built meta pick, and the game is not hard enough to require the absolute best.
The one thing to remember
Tier lists are snapshots; the qualities that make a Descendant strong are permanent. Scalable damage, self-sufficiency, build flexibility, and usefulness in every mode. Learn to see those four things and you will never need a tier list again.