With The First Descendant, a new loot shooter has launched on Steam, PlayStation, and Xbox on July 2, 2024. In this title from Nexon, you can choose from 14 different characters, all with unique abilities and play styles. But which class suits you best and what makes them stand out? We provide you with an overview.
What classes are available? Overall, The First Descendant has 14 different characters, but at the first start of the game, you can only choose one of three starting classes. With this, you will have to spend the prologue and the first hours of gameplay.
The first three characters are:
- Viessa
- Lepic
- Ajax
After the prologue, you can unlock or purchase 11 more classes. Upon the release of the shooter, the following characters will be available to you:
- Bunny
- Blair
- Yujin
- Freyna
- Jayber
- Gley
- Valby
- Kyle
- Sharen
- Enzo
- Eseimo
Here you can see an overview of all 14 characters:
Questions to Ask Yourself Before Choosing Your Class
What should you pay attention to in your choice? Shortly after the release of The First Descendant, it is difficult to say whether there are characters that are particularly strong or useful and must be unlocked before others. You should make your choice based on your play style and preferred role within a team.
It’s best to ask yourself a series of questions before selecting your character and then choose according to your answers.
- What role do you want to play: damage dealer, support, or tank?
- Do you want to deal damage primarily with your weapons or your abilities?
- Do you enjoy certain effects like ice, fire, or poison?
- Do you prefer close combat or ranged combat?
- Do you prefer consistent damage, damage over time (DoT), or area damage (AoE)?
- Do you want to deal damage yourself or use utilities like turrets and drones for that?
- Do you want to be as agile as possible and enjoy fast movement?
- Would you prefer to play a male or female character? (you cannot change the gender of a character!)
Not every character provides an answer to all these questions, but if a class satisfactorily answers the important questions for you, it’s likely a good choice for you.
After you have chosen your free starting character, you must unlock the other 13 classes or purchase them with “Caliber,” the paid in-game currency of The First Descendant. The choice of which character you level up/buy first is important, as otherwise you waste unnecessary time or, in the worst case, even real money.
The First Descendant – All Classes at a Glance
At the start of the game, you have three starting characters available: Viessa, Lepic, and Ajax. Here you can see what defines the three to help you decide which fits your play style.
Viessa:
- female
- Role: Debuffer (a more supportive play style)
- Ice attacks that can damage and freeze enemies
- Deals damage with a mix of her skills and firearms – enemies are first frozen and then eliminated with the firearms.
- Has an ability that increases her sprint speed and shield
- Strength: good for crowd control through freezing enemies
What play style is Viessa suitable for? Viessa is good if you want to help your team achieve crowd control. With her ice attacks, she limits the movements of enemies and thus supports the entire team.
Lepic:
- male
- primarily deals AoE damage by using grenades
- Damage comes more from abilities (grenades) than from firearms
- Role: Damage dealer
- Strength: easy to play
What play style is Lepic suitable for? Lepic is suitable for you if you want to start as a damage dealer and enjoy explosions and area damage. His play style is aggressive but beginner-friendly.
Ajax:
- male
- Role: Tank
- Creates barriers that protect you and your teammates from enemy attacks and reflect projectiles back at your enemies
- Stronger at close to medium range, as he has abilities that can stun or knock down enemies within a certain radius
What play style is Ajax suitable for? Ajax is a classic tank and is suitable for you if you like to draw the attention and fire of your enemies to yourself, thereby giving your teammates time and space. As Ajax excels primarily at close to medium range, he is good for players who like to dive right into the fray.
With your starting character, you can choose between support, damage dealer, or tank, deciding on freezing attacks, AoE damage, or protective barriers.
Support
Yujin
- male
- Role: Support / Healer
- Uses drones to heal team members
- Can grant buffs to teammates
- Strength: he is probably the best healer in the game right now
- Deals damage only with firearms
Enzo
- male
- Role: Support
- Supports allies nearby and increases their maximum ammo capacity
- Has drones that distribute ammunition to allies or deal damage to enemies (has an explosive drone and one that shoots at enemies)
- Useful in a team, but has little damage output solo
Damage Dealer
Bunny
- female
- Role: Damage dealer
- Uses electric attacks that deal continuous damage
- Has particularly fast movement
- Deals damage primarily through her abilities
Freyna
- female
- Role: Damage dealer
- Causes poison damage with her attacks, which then deals damage over time (DoT)
- As the skills can be quickly deployed and then cause DoT, she uses firearms a lot during combat
Blair
- male
- Role: Damage dealer
- Uses attacks that set enemies on fire and cause damage over time (DoT)
- Fights at relatively short range, as his fire attacks have limited range
- Damage through critical hits is increased when striking burning targets
Gley
- female
- Role: Damage dealer
- Causes damage only with firearms and not with abilities (has abilities that boost weapon damage)
- When she eliminates enemies, they drop “Life Spheres” that restore health points when picked up
- Increases her weapon damage by sacrificing part of her own health points and entering “Berserk mode”.
- Can partially restore her health points with an ability by dealing damage to enemies
Sharen
- female
- Damage dealer
- Melee fighter who uses electric attacks and can cloak herself (becomes completely invisible to enemies)
- Stealthily approaches enemies with her cloaking abilities and takes them out with assassin attacks
- Deals more damage when not being attacked by enemies
Jayber
- male
- Role: Damage dealer
- Primarily uses automated turrets in combat
- Has turrets that deal damage and turrets that heal allies (a very passive play style)
- Perfect for players who do not want to deal damage themselves but want to leave most of the work to the turrets
- Strength: also suitable for players with rather weak aim
Valby
- female
- Role: Damage dealer
- Uses water for her attacks and abilities
- Causes area damage (AoE) and damage over time (DoT) with her abilities
- Can liquefy her body, increasing her movement speed and defense (during this, she cannot use other abilities or jump)
Esiemo
- male
- Role: Damage dealer
- Primarily fights with bombs and mines
- Explosions from bombs and mines cause area damage (AoE)
Tank
Kyle
- male
- Role: Tank, who can deal damage
- Generates and manipulates magnetic fields in battle
- Has a dash that allows him to rush forward and deal damage
- Can create a magnetic shield in front of him
- Has an ability that allows him to fly temporarily, causing damage around his landing zone
The choice of which character to unlock first in The First Descendant is not so easy, and no one can make that decision for you. You need to decide how you want to play and what is important to you.
If you are currently considering unlocking a character with the paid in-game currency “Caliber,” you might want to wait a few days. Some players are reporting issues with the loot shooter’s cash shop, and the developer has also commented on it: The First Descendant: Real currency Caliber not received – Developer comments on cash shop issues
