At the beginning of Borderlands 3, you’ve got to make a choice. And like so many RPGs, you’re going to do this choice basically blind. There are four characters to choose from, like in the rest of the game in the series, and while they all shoot the same guns and do the same basic things, they can wind up playing wildly different based on their active and passive skills. If you’re experienced with the series, you probably already know your way around some of these archetypes. If you’re new, however, there are some characters you’ll want to focus on more than others. So let’s get into some of the basics of the four characters you can choose from, and whether or not you’ll want to go with a particular character for your first run through.
FL4K: Right from the start, it was clear that this was the character geared towards solo players, but any character that’s geared towards solo players is also going to be a solid bet for beginners as well. FL4K’s defining quality is the ability to summon up a helpful animal buddy to go kill your enemies for you, and that’s going to be a lifesaver for anyone that prefers to not have all the fire focused on themselves. Pair that with some nice health regeneration and crit boosts, and you’ve got a winning combination. Let your pet take the bulk of the damage while you hang back at mid-range and finish things off. They’re a great option for solo players in the main campaign, and in high-level play, they can morph into a capable sniper.
FL4K will be no slouch for anyone that chooses him, but he’s an excellent choice for beginners and anyone that doesn’t like getting shot all that much.
Moze: Borderlands 3 is a game about guns, and Moze is a character that focuses in on guns. Choose her for a more straightforward experience with the possibility of bringing in some serious heat in the form of her signature mech. The Iron Bear is a beast of a mech that can deal serious damage and take just about as much. That makes Moze a capable tank character, and tanks are always friendly for beginners that would rather be able to absorb fire rather than dodge it. Having a big mech is a good way to get that done. Moze is easy to wrap your head around: she’s a fast gunfighter on foot that can bring in a big mech for extra destruction. The mech can be used in a number of different ways, but they’re all straightforward enough.
Choose Moze for a straightforward, exploding, lead-spewing experience, a good beginner choice. One of her apex abilities, bottomless mags, constantly regenerates ammo for her equipped weapon. Which is a godsend for anyone that hates dealing with ammo.
Zane: As a rule of thumb, skinny characters are for advanced players. I don’t make the rules! But that always seems to be the way: something about the visual language of a skinny character suggests finesse, and that usually correlates to skill. That’s what I would say to anyone who wants to play as Zane: this is a skill-based character with some very cool abilities, but can feel great to pull off. The Digi-Clone and SNTNL come with some of the benefits of FL4K’s beats, but they do require a bit more active management. He’s the only character that can use two active skills, but that means more to juggle. If you want to shoot stuff, stick with Moze. If you want to be a debonair operative that makes his opponents look silly, go with Zane.
I wouldn’t recommend Zane for beginning players, but advanced players will be able to manipulate his teleportation and grenade skills to bounce around the battlefield raining death wherever they go.
Amara: Amara is the Siren of Borderlands 3, a returning archetype that typically manifests as something like an area control/caster type. Amara goes about this a little bit differently, however, more like a battlemage than anything else. Her magical abilities manifest as big punching arms, and as a result, she’s a brawler-type character with a focus on area control and elemental damage. This is especially true of her Phaseslam tree, which gets bonus damage the closer she is to an opponent, but in general, she’s an offensive character that likes to move in and mix it up.
Brawler characters might feel like low-skill characters because of the sort of conceptual simplicity that comes along with punching stuff, but they can be very tricky to use effectively. That’s because getting in close means exposing yourself to danger, and you need to be both quick on your feet and constantly aware of the enemy’s position in order to fulfill your mad brawler fantasy and not just wind up shot.
