The Best Risk Of Rain 2 Characters

Risk of Rain 2 is a roguelike third-person shooter that has a large amount of characters to choose from. The game puts a heavy focus on replayability, giving players the opportunity to experience Petrichor V with as many characters as possible, in as many different variations as possible.

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Every single playable Survivor in Risk of Rain 2 is pretty broken when they get the right items or in the hands of the proper player. However, some Survivors have a higher play percentage than others, and that is not because of certain Skin Mods. The difference in quality between the characters becomes especially evident when the player doesn't get universally good items.

Updated November 25, 2025 by Marc Santos: The Alloyed Collective DLC for Risk of Rain 2 added two new survivors to the game: Drifter and Operator. Both are excellent characters, and when compared to the broader cast, they easily take spots in the upper echelon. We've updated this list to include both Alloyed Collective characters and ranked them according to the other survivors.

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19 Chef

Unlock: Complete 'Order Up!' Achievement (Requires Seekers of the Storm DLC)

Possibly the worst character in Risk of Rain 2, it’s unclear who Chef was made for. To unlock Chef, players need to reach Reformed Altar, and sacrifice three items at the appropriate location, i.e., Cautious Slug, Bison Steak, and Infusion. This is fairly easy to accomplish with the Artifact of Command.

Chef’s arsenal certainly isn’t the best. The primary is underwhelming, the utility is decent, and both specials are even kind of good. However, where Chef fails is in its secondary ability, Sear. The main issue with the ability is the lack of range, though it can be somewhat mitigated if players use it in tandem with the utility ability, Roll. With the right items, it is certainly possible to use Chef to great effect, but this particular robot isn’t anyone’s first pick.

18 Commando

Unlock: Unlocked By Default

Commando is the 'Mario' of Risk of Rain 2, as he's the one that's unlocked by default, and the one with the most simple mechanics for beginners. A lot of people sleep on this Survivor, given that they're almost 'forced' to play as him for a while at first, and as a result, many players move on from the Commando and never look back.

However, that's a mistake, as the Commando is probably one of the best Survivors to show how absurd item scaling can get if players pick the right items. He absolutely takes a while to get going, as his starting damage is basically a light scratch against enemies, but the more on-hit items Commando gets, the more he'll start to skyrocket.

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17 Artificer

Unlock: Completing 'Pause' Challenge

Out of every playable character in Risk of Rain 2, Artificer probably has the lowest playrate for such a silly reason. Artificer is a Survivor that forces players (for the most part) to hover constantly and learn how to survive while moving around in the air. She has a vastly different general playstyle compared to all the other Survivors and is most accurately described as RoR 2's 'Mage' class.

But, if you spend just a few hours with Artificer and actually get into the flow of her gameplay loop, it's easy to see that she's actually a pretty strong Survivor. She has some of the best single target damage tools in the game, the ability to execute with her Ice Wall, some of the most maneuverability thanks to Ion Surge, and doesn't really ever have to worry about fall damage. However, to get to the realm of 'overpowered' with Artificer, it takes a lot of practice and the right items, which is why she ends up this low in the rankings.

16 REX

Unlock: Completing 'Power Plant' Challenge

Considering all the effort it takes to unlock REX, you might expect it to be a higher-ranked Survivor. Unfortunately, while REX has a ton of damage potential, CC tools, and unique abilities, it a bit too high of a risk for the reward it offers. Because a lot of REX's abilities use its health as a resource, players are constantly having to keep an eye on their health more than usual, and those who are trying to learn REX will be frustrated by the number of times they're caught at low health by a stray Pest or Wisp.

Additionally, thanks to constantly using its health, again as a resource, REX almost never has the 'one-shot' protection active that stops enemies from just instant-killing Survivors with a single attack. It's a bit of a shame considering how unique this Survivor is, and with the right build and the proper playstyle REX can put out more damage than most other Survivors, but the odds of that happening consistently are just very low on average.

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15 Mercenary

Unlock: Completing 'True Respite' Challenge

Considering how dangerous even a single hit can be from enemies on a difficulty like Monsoon, you might be surprised to discover that the melee class, Mercenary, is actually pretty great. For one, it's the Survivor that feels the best to get around with at the start of a run. Because the Mercenary has both the ability to double jump by default and multiple dashes, it's incredibly easy to get around the map without needing to rely on move speed items.

More than that, the Mercenary just has a good amount of damage (thanks to his Expose debuff) and a lot of iIframes to abuse to avoid damage. His default Special, Eviscerate, basically makes him immune to damage for about 2 entire seconds with each cast. And, even if players use his other Special, Slicing Winds, they can still rely on the I-frames from either Focused Assault or Blinding Assault to get them through most difficult encounters. All that said, he is still a melee class, and playing as the Mercenary comes with a lot more innate risk, but thanks to Survivors of the Void's new items such as Safer Spaces, it's now easier to play melee Survivors overall.

14 The Huntress

Unlock: Unlocked by Default

As another highly mobile Survivor like Mercenary, Huntress has all the utility of multiple dashes while also being able to primarily attack enemies from a decent range. Be aware, however, that the Huntress starts off with the lowest base health. Also, despite her in-game description, Huntress has some of the lowest damage output (at the start of a run) out of all the Survivors, and also has lower proc coefficients (on average) as well. So, she takes a while to get a really fun build going, similar to the Commando.

However, there's a reason that Huntress seems to have a lot more diehard fans than the Commando, and it's because once Huntress gets some Backup Mags and maybe a bit of Crit Chance, all of a sudden she feels so much stronger. Additionally, her Primary auto-locks onto enemies, giving players one less thing they have to focus on while running around desperately trying to survive.

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13 MUL-T

Unlock: Completing 'Verified' Challenge

The spiritual successor to the original Risk of Rain's HAN-D Survivor, MUL-T is another robotic automaton players can control. However, compared to HAN-D's melee playstyle in the 2013 Risk of Rain (as well as Risk of Rain Returns) MUL-T has four different ranged options. This character doesn't have a 'Secondary Ability' like all the other Survivors have, but instead, players can choose two different primaries to switch between (or use with Power Mode once it's unlocked).

These primaries include the Nailgun, Rebar Puncher, Scrap Launcher, and the Power Saw. Though, overall, double Nailguns do seem to be the 'meta' loadout for this character, as it turns them into an on-hit nightmare for any natives of Petrichor V. MUL-T has a lot of base health, a lot of little 'tricks' players can learn to optimize MUL-T's gameplay, and a Utility Skill that functions for both offense and defense. Their versatility is the primary reason MUL-T is ranked so highly, as it truly is the Survivor that no two people play the same way.

12 Acrid

Unlock: Completing 'To Be Left Alone' Challenge

Take this next ranking with a grain of salt, as we're admittedly an Acrid main, but this adorable little biohazard nightmare is one of the most reliable Survivors in both the original Risk of Rain and Risk of Rain 2. That's right, Acrid is the only Survivor that's the same 'person' between both games and in the time that passed between these two games, Acrid has really gotten comfortable on Petrichor V.

As a character, Acrid is pretty unique. His default playstyle revolves around using Poison to slowly get enemies to 1 HP, and then finish them off from there. There's a playstyle based around his Blight loadout and one that builds him as a melee tank revolving around his Ravenous Bite, but the Poison hit-and-run playstyle is the most popular. While this playstyle is, admittedly, boring compared to other Survivors, Acrid is one of the Survivors who have to worry about enemy scaling the least. His Poison will always deal 10 percent of the opponent's max HP over its 10-second duration, meaning that regardless of how much health a Teleporter Boss has, Acrid will always be able to deal decent damage.

11 False Son

Unlock: Complete 'Purified Freedom' Achievement (Requires Seekers of the Storm DLC)

A tricky survivor to unlock, the False Son requires some amount of RNG to obtain. He is a tanky melee character who scales along with his health, getting ability charges the higher his health bar goes. This makes certain items, such as Infusion and Bison Steak, more viable for this character than others.

False Son is a well-rounded character who has some good ranged options to go alongside his melee arsenal, making him a good choice in most situations. His passive ability makes it so that Lunar Spikes, his ranged ability, grant attack speed and armor when ready, and exhausting them gives movement speed and health regeneration boosts. As such, players should save their spikes for dicey situations where they need to quickly get away, and otherwise keep them in reserve for maximum damage output.

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10 The Captain

Unlock: Completing ‘Washed Away’ Challenge

Captain is one of the later characters added to Risk of Rain 2 and he also has a pretty unique loadout and playstyle. Instead of having a damage-based Special Ability, Captain instead has two 'Beacons' he can call down once per beacon, per stage. These beacons can heal, hack nearby interactables, trap enemies in an endless stun, or recharge the player's equipment, and a player's favorite beacon really just comes down to preference.

Outside of this, Captain also has a shotgun primary which can be charged to work both up close and at a medium range, and this gun fires 8 bullets with every shot making it great for triggering on-hit items. Finally, Captain can also call down Orbital Strikes from the UES Safe Travels ship orbiting Petrichor V, and he can even unlock the ability to call down the dreaded 'Diablo' Strike that deals 40,000 percent damage if it manages to hit its target. Captain requires a pretty skilled player in order to succeed, as his movement is some of the worst in the game. Thankfully, his passive Defensive Microbots do help out quite a bit, but it still takes some getting used to.