TL;DR
Mewgenics has 14 classes, and a cat's class comes from the collar it wears. You pick the collar when you start an adventure. Five collars are yours from the beginning: Collarless, Fighter, Hunter, Mage, and Tank. The other nine unlock one at a time. Clear an adventure location for the first time, talk to Butch, and he hands you that location's collar. Each class applies a fixed set of modifiers to your cat's seven base stats, so the collar you choose decides where that cat is strong before a single battle starts.
How the collar system works
Every class in Mewgenics is a collar. No collar means the cat is Collarless, the default state, with zero stat modifiers and access to the basic ability pool only. Equip one of the other 13 collars and the cat takes on that class for the run, shifting its seven base stats: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Charisma, Speed, and Luck.
You choose the collar at the start of an adventure. The five base collars are available right away. The nine unlockable ones are tied to specific adventure locations. Beat a location for the first time, then talk to Butch, and he gives you the collar that location is keyed to. There is no shop and no grind toward a currency. The unlock is the clear.
Two numbers matter when you compare classes. One is the single biggest stat bonus, which tells you what a class is best at. The other is the net stat shift, the sum of all a class's modifiers, which tells you how much raw stat budget it carries. Most classes land at net +2. A few push higher, a couple sit lower, and two carry no flat modifiers at all because their value lives in a special mechanic instead.
Base classes (5)
These ship with every save. They cover the four combat fundamentals plus the blank-slate option.
| Class | Stat modifiers | Net | Role |
|---|---|---|---|
| Collarless | none | 0 | Default, widest ability pool |
| Fighter | STR +2, SPD +1, INT -1 | +2 | Melee damage |
| Hunter | DEX +3, LCK +2, CON -1, SPD -2 | +2 | Ranged crit and traps |
| Mage | INT +2, CHA +2, STR -1, CON -1 | +2 | Elemental AoE |
| Tank | CON +4, DEX -1, INT -1 | +2 | Frontline defender |
Collarless is the strongest of the no-stat options. It carries no stat modifiers, but it has the largest ability pool in the game at 109 abilities, including the "Path of the X" moves that copy what other classes do. If you want flexibility over specialization, the no-collar cat keeps every door open.
Fighter and Mage are the two starters most players reach for first. Fighter stacks STR and a point of SPD for straightforward melee output. Mage trades durability for INT and CHA, hitting groups with elemental damage. That CHA bonus does double duty, since Charisma feeds breeding compatibility back at the house. For a deeper look at which of these to grab first, see our best starter classes guide.
Hunter owns the highest single DEX bonus among the base five at +3, paired with LCK +2 for crit-heavy ranged play. The cost is mobility, with SPD -2, so a Hunter wants to set up and let traps and range do the work rather than chase.
Tank carries the biggest single Constitution bonus in the entire game, CON +4. Nothing else comes close on a base collar. Put a Tank in front, soak the hits, and build the rest of your team behind it.
Unlockable classes (9)
Each of these comes from clearing one adventure location. The table maps every collar to its unlock so you know exactly where to go.
| Class | Unlock location | Stat modifiers | Net |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cleric | Alley | CHA +2, CON +2, SPD -1, DEX -1 | +2 |
| Thief | Sewers | SPD +4, LCK +1, STR -1, CON -1 | +3 |
| Necromancer | Boneyard | CON +2, CHA +1, STR -2 | +1 |
| Tinkerer | Bunker | INT +4, LCK -1, CHA -1 | +2 |
| Butcher | Core | CON +3, STR +2, SPD -2 | +3 |
| Druid | Crater | CHA +3, LCK +1, CON -2 | +2 |
| Psychic | Moon | INT +1, CHA +1, SPD +1, CON -1 | +2 |
| Monk | Lab | INT +2, CHA +2, STR -1, DEX -1 | +2 |
| Jester | Rift | none | 0 |
Cleric is the support healer, unlocked by clearing the Alley. Its Holy basic action works at melee range, dealing Holy damage to enemies and Holy healing to allies, both scaled off the user's Strength. The item:cleric-ranged-medic ability converts that into a ranged tool that scales off Dexterity instead. The class supports several playstyles, from a pure Mass Healer to a Paladin or Holy Damage build to the debuff-leaning Hexer.
Thief comes from the Sewers and runs on speed. SPD +4 is the largest Speed bonus in the game, built around backstabs and stealth. A Thief moves first, hits a soft target from behind, and is gone before the counter lands.
Necromancer, unlocked at the Boneyard, is the long-game class. It summons from corpses and leeches off the field, so its power climbs as a fight drags on. The net is only +1, the lowest of any unlockable, because the payoff is in the mechanic rather than the stat sheet.
Tinkerer clears out of the Bunker with INT +4, the highest Intelligence bonus in the game. It is the gadget class, dropping persistent turrets and piloting mech suits. High INT plus standing hardware makes it a control-and-area class that keeps pressure up without the cat itself being in danger.
Butcher comes from the Core and hits like a freight train. CON +3 and STR +2 give it a net +3, one of the two highest in the game, and its kit leans into hook pulls and self-heal-on-damage moves like item:butcher-consume and item:butcher-chomp. It drags enemies in and gets healthier the more it brawls.
Build: 64c00c70Druid, unlocked at the Crater, is the Charisma summoner. CHA +3 powers its animal summons, and Sing buffs lift the whole team. The tradeoff is CON -2, the steepest Constitution penalty in the game, so a Druid stays out of the front line and lets its summons absorb the damage.
Psychic drops from the Moon and bends the battlefield. Its Psychic Pull basic action has infinite range, deals 2 base damage, and drags the target toward your cat, which sets up gravity-driven plays no other class can run. It is also the only class that starts every battle with +5 mana, so it comes online faster than anything else.
Monk unlocks at the Lab and refuses to pick a lane. It switches between a melee stance and a ranged stance mid-fight, with both forms scaling off INT and CHA. The dual-stance design rewards players who read the board and flip forms to match the moment.
Jester is the wildcard, earned at the Rift. It carries no flat stat modifiers, net 0, but it is not a weak class. It gets a +1 reroll on level-up stat gains, random stat gains as it levels, and a basic attack pulled at random from another class's starting attack at the beginning of each run. Six class-exclusive abilities round it out. The Jester trades a predictable stat budget for variance and the chance to roll above curve.
Picking a class by stat
If you already know which stat you want to stack, the highest specialized bonuses point straight at a class. Tank wins Constitution at +4, with Butcher right behind at +3. Tinkerer takes Intelligence at +4. Thief takes Speed at +4. Druid leads Charisma at +3, and Hunter leads Dexterity at +3 among the base collars. Strength tops out at +2, shared by Fighter and Butcher.
Net budget tells the other half of the story. Butcher and Thief carry the most raw stats at +3 each. Necromancer sits at +1 by design, banking on its scaling. Collarless and Jester both run at 0, leaning entirely on the ability pool and the reroll mechanic respectively rather than the stat line. For how these classes stack up in practice, see our class tier list.
Because class modifiers stack on top of a cat's inherited stats, the collar you equip changes the math on everything that follows: combat output, survivability, and which inherited stats actually matter. If you want to understand how those inherited stats pass down, our stat inheritance guide breaks it down. Run the numbers on your own cat before you commit a collar, and the right class for that bloodline tends to pick itself.