Expedition 33 Character Tier List (Thank You Update 1.5.3)
Every party member ranked for Act 3 endgame and Expert mode
What tier placement means when parry runs in real time
Expedition 33 is a turn-based JRPG where the defense layer runs in real time. You pick an attack from a menu, the enemy queues a response, and you parry every hit in the incoming chain like a Soulslike. Placements below rate both layers: menu-turn ceiling (skill damage, buff coverage, burst) and defense-layer floor (how much the build collapses when the player eats hits). Rankings target Act 3 endgame on Expert. Sources: game8, Fextralife, gamerant, thegamer, maxroll.
S Tier
entity:maelle
Mechanic. Four-stance system with free stance swap (1 AP cost, 1 AP returned). Defensive takes -50% damage and returns AP on Parry or Dodge. Offensive deals +50% at the cost of +50% damage taken. Virtuose triples damage on the next action.
Signature build. entity:stendhal One-Shot. entity:medalum's level 20 passive opens the fight in Virtuose. Apply Burn from a teammate, entity:swift-stride into Virtuose, Stendhal the marked target. Stendhal is single-hit Void, so the full multiplier chain (Virtuose, entity:augmented-first-strike, Glass Canon, entity:critical-burn, entity:empowering-attack, entity:rewarding-mark, entity:painted-power) compresses into one number. Billion-damage casts are reported late game. Act 3 attributes: Agility 99, Defense 81.
Ceiling and floor. Ceiling is the highest single-hit number in the game. Floor is a squishy frame that applies Defenseless to herself after Stendhal and depends on parry uptime. A Maelle who eats hits dies fast.
entity:monoco
Mechanic. Bestial Wheel. Nine positions cycle through five masks (Caster, Agile, Balanced, Heavy, Almighty). Skills tie to masks; casting while the pointer aligns gives bonus damage or duration. Almighty Mask is the universal buff position. The wheel rotates between turns, so reading the upcoming state is part of every action choice.
Signature build. Bestial Wheel Spin. entity:monocaro weapon. Around 50 Nevron skills available, six selected from the unlocked pool. Each drops from a foot-icon enemy with Monoco in the party. Pictos lean Speed and damage amplifiers; attributes Agility and Defense.
Ceiling and floor. Ceiling is the most flexible DPS in the party because the skill pool covers DPS, breaker, support, and hybrid. Floor is the farm gate. game8 tags him "high investment, high returns"; the A-versus-S split depends on whether the rater assumes a fully-farmed pool.
A Tier
entity:verso
Verso runs A with a clean S-tier ceiling when parry is consistent. Perfection Rank (D, C, B, A, S) multiplies all skill damage. Dealing damage, parrying, and dodging raise rank; taking damage costs 1 rank per enemy turn (capped at 1 loss). entity:dualiso's level 4 passive grants an extra turn after a basic attack, doubling his rank-building speed. Base stats on Act 2 join are the highest in the party (Attack 666, Crit 14% per Fextralife). game8 rates Verso A because holding S rank requires parrying nearly every hit; sources assuming clean parry rate him S. Verso at D is one of the weakest DPS characters in the game.
entity:sciel
Sciel runs A with S-tier burst windows inside Twilight. Sun and Moon charges come from skills that apply and consume Foretell (a stacking debuff capped at 10). At turn start with at least 1 Sun and 1 Moon, Sciel enters Twilight for 2 turns: Foretell cap rises to 20, application doubles, damage gains +25% per consumed charge stacking multiplicatively. entity:charnon guarantees crits inside Twilight.
The A rating reflects 2 to 3 turns of setup before the burst opens. In long Act 3 encounters, entity:twilight-dance chains produce single-target burst rivaling Stendhal. Sciel is also the only true party-wide support: entity:all-set covers the team in Shell, Rush, and entity:powerful-gustave in one cast, entity:intervention grants party AP at zero setup, entity:dark-cleansing strips enemy buffs for free. Paired with Lune's entity:mayhem, her Intervention combo runs the most efficient AP economy in the game.
B Tier
Lune
Lune's B is an early-game rating, not a ceiling rating. The five-element Stain system (Ice, Fire, Lightning, Earth, Light) generates colored Stains with some skills and consumes them with others. Light Stain substitutes for any element. Mayhem generates Stains without spending a turn; without it, the rotation stalls.
The ceiling is entity:scaverim at weapon level 20: the passive generates Dark Stains, each granting +50% skill damage, stacking. Polished Scaverim Lune approaches Maelle output. entity:kralim at level 10 enables entity:elemental-genesis spam for 9999 x 8 AOE, the best trash-clear before Painted Power.
entity:gustave
Gustave's B is structural. He is Act 1 only, permanently locked out from Act 2 including NG+, and unspent skill points and farmed pictos do not transfer. entity:overcharge (stack 10 charges via basic attacks and entity:lumiere-assault, dump for high lightning damage that can Break targets) works cleanly for Act 1. entity:lanceram is his consensus top weapon at 3713 Power, Physical, build-agnostic because Gustave's weapons have no passives. game8 runs Vitality + Agility.
The single most important build-planning fact for Gustave: do not spend rare upgrade materials on him. Build cheaply, let him carry Act 1, pivot every farmed resource to Maelle, Lune, and whoever joins at Act 2.
Party Composition by Tier
- Maelle + Lune + Sciel. Strongest Act 2-3 default. Maelle DPS, Lune sub-DPS with elemental flex, Sciel buffs and Twilight burst.
- Maelle + Verso + Monoco. Triple-DPS for Expert clears once Verso and Monoco are leveled. No support; the team clears before sustain matters.
- Maelle + Sciel + Verso. Stendhal's compressed multiplier stack with All Set buffs feeding in, Verso's parry pressure taking enemy turns off the board.
- entity:solo-maelle. entity:lonewolf + entity:solo-fighter for +50% alone, entity:second-chance for a revive. Only with high parry competence.
FAQ
What's the best Expedition 33 character?
Maelle. She tops the single-hit damage ceiling (billion-damage Stendhal with Painted Power and Medalum), scales from Act 1, and has four-stance rotation for mid-fight adaptation. The Stendhal One-Shot ranks S on every English-language tier list. Her weakness is squishiness, offset by parry competence.
Is Gustave still worth leveling?
Only for Act 1, and only cheaply. Gustave is permanently locked out from Act 2 including NG+. Skill points and farmed pictos do not transfer. Play him with Lanceram and the game8 Vitality + Agility build, but do not spend rare upgrade materials. Anything invested past Act 1 is wasted.
Can Maelle solo the game?
Yes, with Solo Maelle: Solo Fighter (1 Lumina Point for +50% damage alone) plus Lonewolf, Medalum for the Virtuose opener, Painted Power for the cap break, Second Chance, entity:dodger. Top-tier single-character DPS with zero margin for parry mistakes. A Maelle who cannot reliably parry dies fast to any boss that chains attacks.
Which character benefits most from Painted Power?
Maelle. Painted Power removes the 9999 damage cap, and Stendhal's single-hit design compresses the full multiplier chain into one number. Without it, Stendhal caps at 9999 and gives up most of its ceiling. Every billion-damage build assumes Painted Power.
Verso vs Monoco, who's better?
Depends on playstyle. Monoco has the higher paper ceiling (50 Nevron skills, mask-synergy wheel, flexible role coverage) but gates it behind foot-icon farm. Verso has the lower floor (one missed parry costs a rank) but needs no farm beyond leveling Dualiso. game8 ranks both on the S-A border, Monoco slightly higher because a fully-farmed Monoco beats a parry-variable Verso.