New players ยท first class choice
Which Class Should You Play First
What all six classes actually do, which weapons they carry, how forgiving each one is at low level, and how solo and squad play change the answer.
Which class to choose first
Mercenary, if you have no strong preference. One week after release that is still the near-unanimous recommendation from experienced players, and the reason has less to do with power than with information. Every class starts from the same published level-1 baseline: 100 Attack, 50 Defense, 618 Maximum Health and 120 Max Stagger. What separates them is which weapons they may hold and which skills those weapons own. The Mercenary's two kits are the most different from each other: Sword and Shield, which has an innate Block, and the Hammer, which has Assault Hammer. You get to learn two different answers to "something is swinging at me" without rerolling anything.
Even inside that recommendation there is an argument worth knowing about. Most written beginner advice points at Sword and Shield because blocking is forgiving; the most-cited player-written starter guide argues for the Hammer instead, on the grounds that a dash with no cooldown and heavy close-range damage covers more mistakes than good parry timing does. Both camps are describing the same character, and you can test both in one evening.
If you already know you dislike standing inside melee range, none of this binds you. Read the six profiles in the class database and pick the fighting distance you want to defend, then work backwards to the weapon.
What the shared baselines tell you, and what they hide
Because the published level-1 numbers are identical across all six classes, most of the "which class is tankier" conversation answers the wrong question. Everybody starts with the same health pool, the same Defense, the same Max Stagger of 120 and Stagger Recovery Speed of 5, the same Dodge Recovery Speed of 20 and the same three Springhorn charges. Maximum Energy is 100 with a recovery speed of 10 for every class except the Seer, whose energy bar is not displayed at all. Durability differences come from gear, gems and how a class avoids damage, not from a hidden stat block.
Two published values do differ, and both are worth reading before you build. Critical Damage is 40% on the Sorcerer, 35% on the Mercenary, Shadowstrix, Seer and Withered Knight, and 25% on the Blackarrow. The Blackarrow has the lowest figure in the game, which matters if you were planning to build a bow around critical hits. Max Dodge splits into two groups: 350 for the Mercenary, Shadowstrix, Withered Knight and a Blasphemer Seer, and 250 for the Sorcerer, Blackarrow and Reverent Seer.
The classes with the smaller dodge pool are the ones that want to be far away, which is a design statement: on a Sorcerer, repeated dodging is not your escape plan and positioning is. Understanding how dodge charges and stagger work changes your class choice more than any tier list will.
Mercenary: built to stand in front of things
The Mercenary is designed for head-on fighting rather than agility, and its two weapons split that job cleanly. Sword and Shield builds Blade Edge over five hits and spends it on Impalement, so its damage comes from staying in contact long enough to bank the stacks. The Hammer trades that bookkeeping for weight. Both share the same skill ladder: Hammer Dash, Hammer Spin, Shield Dash and Whirling Cut at level 1, Skullcrusher and Stonebreaker Slash at 4, Earthshaker and Shield Slam at 7, and Warhammer Sling at 10.
Common practice among Mercenary players is to carry both weapons and swap mid-fight: close the gap with Sword and Shield, then switch to the Hammer once the target has nowhere to go. That works because weapon swapping is a normal action, but be careful about assuming it is free in build terms. Damage from weapon-specific skills and talents only applies while you are holding the matching weapon, as explained in how weapons decide your skills.
The Mercenary's recommended affix list reads exactly like its design: Unyielding, Stoic, Bulwark, Tenacious and Iron Helmet on the defensive side, Valor, Wrath, Strife, Smiting and Focused on the offensive. If you want to see what those effects are before committing gems to them, the affix and gem reference lists all four gem families and every affix in each pool.
Withered Knight: the widest weapon spread and the loudest argument
The Withered Knight is the exiled Rose Knight of Gaenaria, and its combat loop is mechanical rather than thematic: Light Strikes apply Wither, Heavy Strikes consume it. Everything you do is either building that resource or spending it, which makes the class unusually readable for a new player. Its two weapon families are the Greatsword and Polearm and Shield, and its skills unlock across Radiant Retribution, Breakthrough Charge, Spear Barrage and Javelin Thrust at level 1, Breaker Shield Bash at 3, Parry and Rainbow Piercer at 4, Withering Mark and Sacred Bulwark at 7, and Thorn Guide and Intervene at 10.
Polearm and Shield arrived with the launch patch, bringing six new skills, a ranged rescue for downed teammates and two core paths, Quick Shield Bash and Enhanced Shield Bash. It is also the only thing the developers have touched with a balance pass since release, so it is the part of the class most likely to move again.
One thing to settle before you invest: you cannot hold both weapon specializations at once. Greatsword Specialization, Endless Flow and Polearm and Shield Specialization form a single three-way exclusive choice in the talent trees, which you can confirm yourself in the talent planner. Spreading points across both branches is legal; holding two specializations is not. As of 2026-08-05 the community view is that the Withered Knight underperforms against skilled opponents while being perfectly effective below that level, but that opinion is one week old and predates any serious balance work.
Shadowstrix: the class solo players keep landing on
Shadowstrix carries the Dagger and Dual Blades. The two weapons share Poison Crow Mark and Crow Storm and then diverge, with Flash Stride and Inspiring Impale also available from level 1, Spinning Slash and Shadow Strike at 4, Phantom Shift at 7 and Smoke Bomb at 10. The signature trick is not a skill at all: with daggers equipped, a simultaneous Light and Heavy Strike enters Stealth. Its innate actions are Shadow Wheel Slash on the Dagger and Pursuit Strike on Dual Blades.
The reason so many solo players end up here is not that Shadowstrix kills fastest. It is that a run only pays out if you leave, and this is the class best equipped to leave a fight it does not want. Combined with a Max Dodge of 350, it forgives the specific mistake solo players make most often: walking into a squad. That is community consensus as of 2026-08-05 rather than a published claim, and it says more about how extraction is scored than about raw class strength.
Seer: the only healer, and two very different characters
The Seer is the only class that can heal other players, which makes it close to mandatory in a trio according to most squad players, and it is really two classes wearing one name. The Catalyst carries 13 equippable skills built around runes, shields and support; Punishment Rune, Burst Rune, Wind Surge, Healing Art and Psionic Shield at level 1, growing through Healing Rune and Shelter Rune at 3 up to Stealth Rune at 10. The Mace carries 9 and plays as a melee brawler, starting with Shapeshift, Thorn Sigil, Rune: Drain and Rune: Corruption.
Those two halves are the Reverent and Blasphemer paths, and you switch between them from the Skills panel, a control many players never find. The split runs deep enough to change a published stat: a Blasphemer Seer has 350 Max Dodge, a Reverent Seer 250. A developer has stated plainly that Mace and Catalyst sit in separate talent branches and cannot both be used within one run, so treat the choice as a real fork rather than a stance swap. Community practice is that Blasphemer with the Mace is the solo Seer and Reverent with the Catalyst is the squad Seer.
Two details save new Seers a lot of confusion. Reverent shields do not stack, so layering them on the same target wastes casts. And the Seer owns the only mutually exclusive skill pairs in the game: Healing Rune cannot be equipped with Shelter Rune, and Healing Art cannot be equipped with Psionic Shield. Both restrictions, and every skill's unlock level, are visible before you commit a point.
Sorcerer and Blackarrow: one weapon each, whatever the store page says
The store page claims all six classes carry two weapon stances. That is not accurate at launch. The Sorcerer holds only the Staff and the Blackarrow only the Bow; their second weapons have been announced but are not yet playable. The Blackarrow's two published combat paths, Bow and Javelin, are paths within the class rather than a second weapon family, and the Sorcerer's class tip frames its own fork as Stardust Magic versus Elemental Magic.
The Staff is nonetheless the deepest weapon in the game with 22 equippable skills, running from Meteor Charm, Star Shock, Rockblast, Fire Bolt, Deep Freeze, Thunderstorm Sigil, Windcraft and Phantom Step at level 1 all the way to Mistwalk at 10 and Cryptic Ward at 12. The Sorcerer is explicitly a glass cannon, is widely considered the hardest class to play well, and has one mechanic new players should know about: its skills can fast-cast without channelling when Energy is empty, still recovering Energy in the process. That is an intentional desperation option, not a bug.
The Blackarrow is narrower and more specific. Its seven Bow skills are Scattershot and Rapid Arrows at 1, Frostblight Bomb at 2, Sky Piercer at 5, Predator's Senses at 7, Impact Grenade at 9 and Shadow Step at 10. They sit alongside a separate arrow system. You may equip up to three arrow types, with Archer Arrows built for damage and Hunter Arrows for utility, and new special arrows unlock at levels 1, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8 and 10.
How much your choice binds you
Less than it feels like, and more than is comfortable. Talents and skills can be changed freely between runs at no cost, so nothing you pick at level 3 is permanent. Weapon paths inside a class are equally reversible. What is expensive is changing class outright, which happens at a specific camp NPC and has requirements worth reading before you get attached to a character; changing class and running alts covers what carries over and what does not.
Party size matters more than most tier lists admit. Hallowgrove can be played solo; Brandrgarde is trio-gated, which means part of the main quest chain is closed to solo players regardless of class. In a trio, a Seer changes what everyone else can afford to do. Playing alone, the sharpest observation in the community is that solo combat is hard-counter based: you cannot see the opposing class before you commit, so spending your limited skill choices on an answer to one class leaves you exposed to another.
Where to start
Open the class database, pick the two classes whose fighting distance appeals to you, and compare their weapon skill lists side by side in the weapon and skill browser before you spend anything. Both are free to read and both use the same unlock levels the game does, so you can see exactly what your first ten levels will hand you.
Then play three cheap runs on each. Not one; three, because the first run of any class is a control problem rather than a class impression. If you find yourself dying the same way twice, the problem is usually the combat layer rather than the class, and reading it properly is cheaper than rerolling.