Top ten PVE 3*

24

Comments

  • jobob
    jobob Posts: 680 Critical Contributor
    Thanks for the advice, today I got Cyclops's red in big enchilada and I think I'll focus on fist, Cyclops and Switch combo. I like cages red but don't have his yellow yet.
    And I didn't know Cap was that good, I have all colors so I'll give him a try too.
    IMO, Cap doesn't move into top tier unless you pair him with IM40.

    SW, IF, IM40 are in their own class, because they will remain useful once you have fully transitioned to 4*,and then to 5*. I use them multiple times each PVE, but typically won't use another 3* or 4* other than essentials.
  • Vhailorx
    Vhailorx Posts: 6,085 Chairperson of the Boards
    Thanks for the advice, today I got Cyclops's red in big enchilada and I think I'll focus on fist, Cyclops and Switch combo. I like cages red but don't have his yellow yet.
    And I didn't know Cap was that good, I have all colors so I'll give him a try too.

    Cap doesn't really become awesome until he gets 5 covers in red or blue (and of course 5 in both is ideal). That is when he can overwrite just about any special tile and he becomes a board control beast. He is a bit slow to get going, but he is also very very efficient once he doesn start chucking shields. And he kicks **** in survival nodes!
  • TxMoose
    TxMoose Posts: 4,319 Chairperson of the Boards
    I'd only work on cap if you have im40 well covered. Cap takes too long to get his red going without the assistance of im40's yellow.
    depends on where you are in the game. early on in my 3* transition I used cap a ton in pve with mnmags and hood/loki and then later on, switch.
  • PeterGibbons316
    PeterGibbons316 Posts: 1,063
    Great thread, lots of good advice already, but I'll weigh in as well.....

    1. IM40
    2. SWitch
    3. LCap

    These top 3 are no-brainers for me. The first 2 for cheap AP generation, LCap for his ability to consistently stop goons while also providing sustained damage in his red.

    4. Falcon
    5. Blade
    6. Daken

    Falcon I think is an easy choice because redwing. I used this trio for trivial and all goon nodes for a long time - it's quick enough to get through most fights without taking too much damage.

    7. GSBW/KK - either or here, GSBW for speed, KK for sustainability/long grinds
    8. IF - works great with SWitch
    9. Cyclops/BP - either or here to pair with SWitch/IF, BP works well with IF/Falcon if you have him, Cyclops is a better standalone.
    10. Hood - his black really helps with all of the top 3 and his yellow can give you targeted CD destruction in a pinch.

    Honorable Mentions:
    Thor - great standalone, or you can pair with GSBW/KK and use his yellow to create even more green.
    Luke Cage - works well with IF and his red can keep match damage down
    CMags - He's great, he really is - but for PvE LCap is the stronger Y/R/B user. If you have CMags but can't manage to get LCap covers consider running CMags with IM40.
    Patch - He works really well with a lot of characters, but none of those characters made my list. Patch/OBW/LCap is a great PvE combo though.
    Friends of Patch (Daredevil, Hulk, Loki) - all make great duos with Patch and if you have covers for Patch and one or more of these guys you won't be disappointed with them (note: Loki's abilities don't scale with level, so for PvE a max covered, but low level Loki works just about as well as a champed one.)
  • hopper1979
    hopper1979 Posts: 565 Critical Contributor
    Since he specifically asked about PVE it is very simple to me, for PVE the point is sustainability without worrying about wasting health packs so I will focus more on healing and long term play. Some of these are not the best of the 3's but if you play correctly you should never need a heeling pack and can still get through everything fairly quickly.

    Group 1

    1. Rocket and Groot
    2. Patch
    3. Draken

    Tank with anybody switch when necessary, put out Groots blue and hit hard with Patches Red clean up with Draken if you need to finish somebody off

    Group 2

    1. KK
    2. Iron Fist
    3. Luke Cage

    This one is obvious and is better for the tougher nodes because higher damage output also a very solid PVP team for a 3-star roster

    Group 3

    1. IM40
    2. KK
    3. She Hulk

    Crazy control with this team spam She Hulks green and red, IM40 yellow all day long, also put 5 into blue not red and KK heals off the cheep casting and you can pop her green if necessary but majority should go to She Hulk. This group is also surprising good in PVP due to the control aspect of She Hulks green and how often you can cast it one IM-40 does his job.

    For pve you cannot go wrong with any of these teams.
  • jobob
    jobob Posts: 680 Critical Contributor
    hopper1979 wrote:
    Since he specifically asked about PVE it is very simple to me, for PVE the point is sustainability without worrying about wasting health packs so I will focus more on healing and long term play. Some of these are not the best of the 3's but if you play correctly you should never need a heeling pack and can still get through everything fairly quickly.

    Group 1

    1. Rocket and Groot
    2. Patch
    3. Draken
    Along the lines of sustainability, an excellent team is Patch, Daken, Loki... keep Loki low enough so that Daken and Patch tank all colors for him and you shouldn't have to worry about health packs. This is a great team because of Loki's cheap board rearrange, which lets you get to hard-to-reach countdown tiles, and it deals tons of damage once you put out Patch Green & Loki black.

    ...Another solid 3* PVE character that is not Top-10 normally, but is situationally very important is Storm. Until you have Quake with enough yellow covers, her ability to overwrite nearly an entire board of trap tiles can be critical against waves of caltrops-spamming ninjas.
  • OzarkBoatswain
    OzarkBoatswain Posts: 693 Critical Contributor
    Steve + IM40 + Hood as a slow but reliable team
    Kamala for survival nodes
    Falcon against goons
    Patch + Loki, Berserker + Trickery will usually win a match
    Iron Fist, he's basically a 4*
    Scarlet Witch, she's kind of broken, just like the comic book character. Sometimes she can kill tough teams by herself, other times she does nothing.
    Deadpool just for his insta-kill

    followed by Luke Cage as the best IF partner, and Cyclops for that damage
  • edotlee
    edotlee Posts: 3 Just Dropped In
    jobob wrote:
    Thanks for the advice, today I got Cyclops's red in big enchilada and I think I'll focus on fist, Cyclops and Switch combo. I like cages red but don't have his yellow yet.
    And I didn't know Cap was that good, I have all colors so I'll give him a try too.
    IMO, Cap doesn't move into top tier unless you pair him with IM40.

    SW, IF, IM40 are in their own class, because they will remain useful once you have fully transitioned to 4*,and then to 5*. I use them multiple times each PVE, but typically won't use another 3* or 4* other than essentials.

    I have to agree here. I'm currently in the 3* to 4* transition phase and I find myself turn to these three characters the most. I turn to Cage and Cyclops also when they are boosted.
  • johnmcclane
    johnmcclane Posts: 170
    DTStump wrote:
    Vhailorx wrote:
    HaywireII wrote:
    I would take Grey Suit Black Widow over Blade. Am I a crazy person?

    Not crazy. Gsbw is probably the second best board control character after lazy cap. All three of her powers have targeted tile destruction. She is slow, but add someone to generate purple (switch!) and she becomes much easier to use.

    Indeed, and if you complete the team with Hood, those triple goon nodes become super easy. You have:
    Switch blueflag.png for purpletile.png generation
    Hood blackflag.png to help with Switch blueflag.png
    Hood blueflag.png for AP generation
    GSBW purpleflag.png for greentile.png generation and targeted tile removal (TTR)
    GSBW redflag.png for TTR
    Switch greenflag.png as a desperation move to remove CDs
    GSBW greenflag.png as a nuke and TTR
    Hood yellowflag.png for high single-target damage and TTR
    Switch purpleflag.png as a second AOE in case you are too lazy to use GSBW or you just wanna stun the last goon.

    Basically all the powers are useful against goons (but you usually don't use Switch's active powers).
    That's the team I use for high-level PVE nodes icon_mrgreen.gif
    usually I don't get a scratch with them.
  • xzero4812
    xzero4812 Posts: 10
    Y hasn't anyone mentioned doc ock, he's like one king, especially when boosted
  • BlackSheep101
    BlackSheep101 Posts: 2,025 Chairperson of the Boards
    xzero4812 wrote:
    Y hasn't anyone mentioned doc ock, he's like one king, especially when boosted
    Doc isn't a PVE specialist, he's a special tile specialist. He and Squirrel Girl shine when the opposition is flooding the board with strike, protect and attack tiles, and otherwise kind of stink. If you have them when you need them, super, but if you have to choose who to develop, most other 3*s are more generally useful.
  • PeterGibbons316
    PeterGibbons316 Posts: 1,063
    xzero4812 wrote:
    Y hasn't anyone mentioned doc ock, he's like one king, especially when boosted
    Doc isn't a PVE specialist, he's a special tile specialist. He and Squirrel Girl shine when the opposition is flooding the board with strike, protect and attack tiles, and otherwise kind of stink. If you have them when you need them, super, but if you have to choose who to develop, most other 3*s are more generally useful.
    Also, his manipulation is random, and doesn't eliminate CD tiles which makes him much less valuable against PvE goons.
  • Lemminkäinen
    Lemminkäinen Posts: 378 Mover and Shaker
    Doesn't anyone else seriously rate the MoStorm, CMags, Loki team? I don't understand, they are massively powerful together. Not quite LCap+IM40 level but I'd say a solid second. For PvE, that is.
  • PeterGibbons316
    PeterGibbons316 Posts: 1,063
    Doesn't anyone else seriously rate the MoStorm, CMags, Loki team? I don't understand, they are massively powerful together. Not quite LCap+IM40 level but I'd say a solid second. For PvE, that is.
    Why would you think this team is "massively powerful?" MoStorm by herself is really not all that great because her powers kind of clash. If you fill the board with attack tiles, why would you want to pair it with an ability that randomly eliminates a large number of tiles? And neither Loki nor CMags compliments her. Loki fights her for black if you are fighting someone that creates strike/protect tiles, and CMags red should render MoStorm's yellow almost completely useless. Loki's passive will be a good accelerator, but it doesn't do anything against goons, and it discourages you from using your two biggest attacks (CMags red/blue) while his CDs are out because they shake the board and could cause cascades that eliminate your CDs.

    Feels like these are your first 3 maxed 3*s and so you use them together, but I'm not seeing a lot of synergy between them. Am I missing something?
  • DTStump
    DTStump Posts: 273 Mover and Shaker
    Doesn't anyone else seriously rate the MoStorm, CMags, Loki team? I don't understand, they are massively powerful together. Not quite LCap+IM40 level but I'd say a solid second. For PvE, that is.
    Why would you think this team is "massively powerful?" MoStorm by herself is really not all that great because her powers kind of clash. If you fill the board with attack tiles, why would you want to pair it with an ability that randomly eliminates a large number of tiles? And neither Loki nor CMags compliments her. Loki fights her for black if you are fighting someone that creates strike/protect tiles, and CMags red should render MoStorm's yellow almost completely useless. Loki's passive will be a good accelerator, but it doesn't do anything against goons, and it discourages you from using your two biggest attacks (CMags red/blue) while his CDs are out because they shake the board and could cause cascades that eliminate your CDs.

    Feels like these are your first 3 maxed 3*s and so you use them together, but I'm not seeing a lot of synergy between them. Am I missing something?

    Yes, I think you are missing something. The synergy is not obvious.

    The MO with this team is to take away one out of 7 colors (i.e. eliminate tutile.png ) and then shuffle, shuffle, shuffle. You have two powers (granted, they're redundant - Magneto redflag.png and Storm yellowflag.png ) that allow you to reduce the amount of tutile.png . After that, you have Magneto blueflag.png , Storm greenflag.png and Loki purpleflag.png to shuffle. By doing that with little to no tutile.png , you generate a LOT of cascades. These are usually enough to generate enough AP to repeat the process a few times every turn (and every time you use Magneto's death shuffle, you get closer to victory).

    Usually, you want to activate Mags redflag.png ASAP, then shuffle away (it's often easier to begin with Loki purpleflag.png ). Storm yellowflag.png gets rid of subsequent tutile.png entering the board due to cascades, until you accumulate more redflag.png ...

    Give it a try.
  • Lemminkäinen
    Lemminkäinen Posts: 378 Mover and Shaker
    Doesn't anyone else seriously rate the MoStorm, CMags, Loki team? I don't understand, they are massively powerful together. Not quite LCap+IM40 level but I'd say a solid second. For PvE, that is.
    Why would you think this team is "massively powerful?" MoStorm by herself is really not all that great because her powers kind of clash. If you fill the board with attack tiles, why would you want to pair it with an ability that randomly eliminates a large number of tiles? And neither Loki nor CMags compliments her. Loki fights her for black if you are fighting someone that creates strike/protect tiles, and CMags red should render MoStorm's yellow almost completely useless. Loki's passive will be a good accelerator, but it doesn't do anything against goons, and it discourages you from using your two biggest attacks (CMags red/blue) while his CDs are out because they shake the board and could cause cascades that eliminate your CDs.

    Feels like these are your first 3 maxed 3*s and so you use them together, but I'm not seeing a lot of synergy between them. Am I missing something?
    They certainly weren't nowhere near my first and I currently have a high-level OML and a couple of champed four-stars yet I still consider this team powerful. As DTStump noted, they are deceptively powerful when used correctly as the engine can just churn and churn. I often get a dozen power activations in between my moves.
  • BlackSheep101
    BlackSheep101 Posts: 2,025 Chairperson of the Boards
    They're cascade kings-lite. Nothing wrong with that, and you'll wreck the board repeatedly once they get moving. There's a reason xfw is the preferred third on that team since his black amps up the cascade machine (and hits very hard), but in 3* land these three will do the job. It'll just take longer to close out matches against high health enemies.
  • PeterGibbons316
    PeterGibbons316 Posts: 1,063
    DTStump wrote:
    Give it a try.
    I definitely will. Thanks!
  • jobob
    jobob Posts: 680 Critical Contributor
    Storm/Mags/Loki can definitely be a terror once you get them rolling...

    But as a counter-point... While I love building a synergistic team, in 3* land, I prefer to stay away from teams that really require all 3 characters to be effective. Especially when one of them has little offense on their own. You've got all 3 tanking colors, which means they are all at risk of going down, and all 3 will be whittled down somewhat while you gather the AP to get started.

    That's why someone like LCap is Top10... He can single-handedly win a match at the end after his teammates go down. Don't count Daredevil out on that front, either (though I wouldn't put him t10). People with board shake or who can generate their own AP, like IF, SWitch, KK, or Thor (all probably t10) can also help a lot by allowing you to survive a bad board.

    In 3* PVE... I really like having a healing tank to soak up damage and protect weaker characters. That's why I mentioned Patch/Daken/Loki... Your healers protect Loki (I forget what level he needs to stay at). Another combo I like is Groot & softcapped Beast. Groot takes all the damage and then heals. Beast has good green, mediocre blue, Groot has good blue, mediocre green... But Groot blue followed by Beast green = great.
  • cardoor
    cardoor Posts: 185 Tile Toppler
    Quicksilver - I am amazed no one mentioned him yet. His black is one of the most enjoyable abilities in the entire game. His green packs a punch for cheap and his blue is a nice team damage extra. Once championed he will feed Iceman covers too.

    Captain Marvel - It doesn't surprise that no one mentioned her. She is underrated IMO, but I can see that her offense is not as good as many others. Anytime you are having trouble with a particular node or especially against a team with high match damage (even as a result of strike or attack tiles) she will get you through it. Try to team her with Cyclops as long as she is higher lvl and she will tank all of his colors - it is a deadly and fast combo.