Units Tier List

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The following tables are the unofficial Dead Ahead: Zombie Warfare units tier list. It was compiled by wiki staff, with extra input from our Discord members.

The purpose of these lists is to give an insight on how well each individual unit works when compared to their alternatives. It doesn't takes team powers into account, and only considers unlock requirements when it's actually relevant. Because of this, when it comes to choosing what unit to buy, it's best to refer to strategy guides, or consult pages of each individual unit.

The main criteria of ranking units are based on:

• General performance during gameplay;
• How well they perform without buffs;
• The part of the game at which a unit becomes available (early missions, late stages, etc.);
• Reliance on upgrades and/or special abilities.

The list is always open for updates. They can be caused by significant nerfs/buffs, gameplay changes, or sudden discoveries made by community members. Bugs and glitches, however, don't affect tiering.

The tier list focuses on performance in regular missions only. Due to gameplay differences in events, they all require specific units that are chosen without taking these ranks into account.

There are no rankings provided for Skirmish, and no plans to ever make a tier list for it. This is due to units in PvP heavily relying on multiple intertwined parameters, those being: deck formations, team powers, overly dominant meta options, and a need for potentially unorthodox item builds. Those factors prevent units from being properly evaluated without causing overcomplications.

Tiers Explanation

• S – All around good units with little to no flaws. They work in every team, and there are almost no reasons to use anyone instead of them.
• A – Solid units who can prove useful throughout the entire game, but still have some flaws or are outclassed by S tiers.
• B – Decent units who can be used for a large portion of the game, but tend to have downsides that bring their potential down.
• C – Units who are only consistently useful in specific sections of the game. They often have something great to offer but it might require extra effort to use effectively, or is tied to special abilities.
• D – Units who aren't strong enough to be used for missions completion, but are not entirely unplayable. Most of the time, they require to be maxed out to give any meaningful results.
• E – Units who have only very niche uses, and even then get outclassed most of the time.
• F – Units in this category are considered borderline useless. There's no point in using them for campaign progression, and even casual replays, due to their impracticality and major flaws.

The leftmost unit is considered the top of its tier. Respectively, the rightmost is considered the bottom of its tier.

Rankings

S
A
B
C
D
E
F

SABCDEF

Unit	Notes
Turret	Turret's very high DPS and ability to be placed virtually anywhere make it a very efficient stationary unit for both offense and defense. While it has long preparation time and high rage cost, its damage output makes it a near-essential rage ability to use throughout later stages of the game.
Red Barrel	A direct upgrade to Empty Barrel, Red Barrel is a very versatile unit, as it can be used in a variety of ways thanks to its high health, ability to manually detonate, and leaving behind a fire pool upon destruction. While it might not have anywhere close to the drop damage as its empty predecessor and slightly higher rage cost, its better protective capabilities and overall higher damage output cannot be overstated.
Private Rodriguez	Being a direct upgrade of his younger brother, Private Rodriguez is a notable step up from Redneck, providing overall greater damage output, and invaluable support in form of knockback. Being a spam unit makes all these advantages shine even brighter for Private, as he is able to enable strong pushes on enemies for dirt cheap, aiding his teammates a lot. There's little reason to use any other fighter over him.
Rogue	Even without considering that he is a direct upgrade of Jailer, Rogue's extremely high base damage makes him one of the best burst units in the game. Not only that, it's possible for him to temporarily stunlock units, should he get lucky with his strikes. He is only held back by his moderate courage cost and preparation time, which become downsides in certain situations most other fighters prove to be of greater help in. It doesn't help that he also has the lowest base agility in the game, meaning you need to properly balance his stats to achieve tolerable results. But regardless, if you are willing to commit to him, Rogue's best qualities will prove invaluable in combat.

Unit	Notes
Sonya	While Sonya is far from the best shooter when it comes to raw firepower, she manages to be one of the best options in the entire class, as she is easily one of the most versatile ranged units in the whole game. The source of this are Sonya's great generalistic stats: she has high health for a ranged unit, fast movement speed, a good attack pattern with swift reloading, and her critical melee hits knock enemies back, saving her life more often than not. Even though the last part requires to boost Sonya's crit. chance, this proves to be a blessing in disguise, as using crit. builds boosts her offensive abilities even further. Sonya's only problem is that she has mere 60 base agility, which means that it's impossible to achieve her highest potential in terms of stats without making a sacrifice to her reliability.
Carlos	Carlos can be safely used throughout almost the entire game, as he has one of the highest damage outputs among all shooters, thanks to his shooting pattern and very long firing period. The latter is especially notable, as it means that Carlos is capable of simultaneously dealing loads of damage to a single target and provide a level of crowd control. His low courage cost also contributes to his easy playability. Unfortunately, Carlos' low health and lack of defensive skills hinder his performance in later parts of the game. His long reload time can also screw him over in some cases, usually because of his aforementioned non-existent protection.
Mechanic	The main source of appreciation for Mechanic lies in his unique perk. Since he can knock enemies back, and his sledgehammer is a guaranteed critical with an extra multiplier, he can be used as either a burst damager, or an extra source of push force. Both approaches provide valuable aid to Mechanic's teammates, although their usefulness varies from mission to mission. The unit is also held back by his moderate preparation time, which can prove to be a major hindrance, to the point that you are better off using a different fighter.
Paramedic Nancy	The reason Nancy is praised so highly is because her ability to revive units has proven to be that great. It's very resource efficient, as for a cost of 30 courage Paramedic is capable of reviving units worth much more than that in total, and do it instantaneously, allowing players not to worry about the cooldowns, and act like nothing had happened. She can also ensure that some of them won't die right after revival, however that can be a drawback, since Nancy locks onto a single injured unit and might ignore anyone who faints at that time. Her lightning attack during transformation into E.M.T. is also a double-edged sword, since it can damage friendly units too, wasting all work she's just done. Overall, Nancy's "white mage" design makes her an incredibly powerful support unit, but she still has her significant drawbacks, and so is far from a perfect unit.
Ranger	Ranger can be considered a quicker alternative to Policeman Diaz – he doesn't have as much health and lacks any meaningful protective perks, but he compensates for that by having notably higher movement speed and a more reasonable courage cost. Those simple upsides have proven to make him a much more versatile option, being consistently good at all things a shotgunner should excel in, while not suffering from the class' downsides too much. While he and Diaz can be both considered versatile ranged units, Ranger still has a little edge over the cop through his better ability to respond to critical situations. Ranger's SA also proves invaluable in end-game missions, as it enables a supportive role on him through the ability to apply knockback from a distance.
Policeman Diaz	Policeman Diaz is among the tankiest units in the entire game, thanks to his very large health pool for a ranged unit and a uniquely high level of melee resistance. Since almost all zombies rely on melee attacks, this allows Policeman to come out alive out of almost every encounter, sans a few very extreme situations. Unfortunately, Diaz hulking health is all there really is to him, as the universal downsides of shotgunners massively curb his potential for greatness; not to mention his hefty courage cost, which often makes him a poor choice for most mid-game missions. Regardless of that, he is still capable of showing a consistently good performance, as long as your are willing to work around his downsides. His SA proves especially strong, as it manages to both improve Diaz' movement speed, and meaningfully increase his DPS.

Unit	Notes
Redneck	Even though he is the very first unit in the game, Redneck has a surprisingly high potential as he is a great spam unit, having very short preparation time and decent damage output. Although he is fairly reliable, at some point his lack of abilities and resistances will become harder to ignore. However, it's still realistic to complete the entire campaign with him always being a part of your team, thanks to his spammability making him a good meat shielder and a quick responder to critical situations – all feats that are valuable during the last stretches of the game.
Jailer	Jailer is a solid unit thanks to his very low courage cost and useful stun perk, being able to deal with some enemies without much support. Even though he is impressive in theory, in practice he can't deal with large hordes of enemies, and his medium preparation time does not allow him to be the most ideal spam melee unit since he can't stay alive for too long in case his perk lets him down. It's possible to achieve great results with Jailer, but most of the time it's better to treat him as a supportive unit rather than the main fighter of the deck.
Cashier	Thanks to having notably high melee damage, Cashier excels as a burst unit – a specialization which becomes even stronger with his special ability that sets his crit. damage to 300%. He also benefits from good base health, becoming able to tank Charged Zombies faster than any other fighter does. Unfortunately, players realistically can't see these advantages in practice as Cashier only starts to truly shine when he is maxed out. He is rarely useful before reaching the last two stages because of his very slow attack speed, which doesn't allows him to properly handle multiple threats at a time. Another great issue of his is that he has no perks, meaning all he has to offer is high damage, which is not enough against huge, fast moving swarms of zombies that are so common throughout the game. He can demonstrate a truly impressive performance in certain end-game missions, but those are basically the only places where he is allowed to shine.
Berserker	When used outside of his team synergies, Berserker acts mainly as a sink for excess rage, and helps with capitalizing on pushes or securing defense when courage isn't available. Thanks to his high health and very fast attack rate, he can assist in handling both runners and tanks, while often managing to compensate for his cost. Despite all those upsides, his evaluation in rage tends to act as a double-edged sword: if blood points accumulate rather slowly in some missions, chance are that Berserker will act more like a ballast, unless his cost is greatly discounted. This is especially true for end-game stages, where Berserker's utility comes down almost exclusively to extreme responses and last-time pushes.
Lester	Since Lester is identical to Farmer in terms of virtually everything, he has the same pros and cons as his year-round available predecessor. However, his DPS is slightly higher as he has a noticeably faster firing speed and reload time. This proves to be a game changer in combination with his special ability, especially in later missions where high DPS is very important. If you manage to compensate for his low health, Lester's damage output will prove to be handy.
Grenadier	Grenadier is praised for his simple yet powerful ability to throw a high damage grenade since it's very efficient for clearing out large swarms of weaker zombies that make up the majority of enemies in most early missions. Grenadier is also capable of standing up for himself thanks to his good melee damage, fast attack speed, and high base health. Still, it must be pointed out that most praise for him comes from his grenade being a crutch for early-to-mid game. Just like the majority of other damagers, he becomes quite inefficient starting from stage 7 and will need to be replaced with another unit. It doesn't help that his grenade gets rendered useless against end-game threats.

Unit	Notes
Swat	If Specops can be compared to Sonya in their shared upsides, Swat can be compared to Specops in their shared downsides: their base preparation time is long, the courage cost is medium-high, and they have bad accuracy and a mediocre attack pattern. It doesn't gets better with Swat also suffering from low health. And yet, despite all these glaring issues, Swat can be an alright unit if you invest into him, since he moves very fast, has a quick reload, and his bullets can cause Undead corpses to burn. However, these marginal upsides pale in comparison to his special ability, which is way too generous with the amount of damage it provides for Swat, should you opt out from upgrading damage normally in favor of giving him items with high charisma. With this ability unlocked, Swat serves as a viable single hit-oriented alternative to other shooters, which is worth running on average.
Medkit	Medkit is a great support tool to use thanks to its ability to heal human units within its radius, helping to keep them on their feet. Its healing effect can also help mitigate damage caused by fire or poison, with the latter being possible to outright remove once Medkit's SA is unlocked. While it can be helpful in nearly any mission, it requires a massive investment into its levels, as otherwise the offered percentage is just too low for most units. In general, it's unlikely for Medkit to offer any game-changing aid before it reaches level 20+, making it more of an end-game item than a truly versatile option.
Generator	Generator is a useful stationary unit, helping players to progress during any mission it's used in with its ability to spawn courage packs. Thanks to its extremely high health, it can be used as a strong shield for blocking enemies too. Unfortunately, these advantages are traded off by Generator's very long preparation time and very high rage cost. Chances are, it might not even see much use during a mission if it can be completed relatively fast, or if other rage abilities are higher in priority of use. In general, Generator's upsides only truly get to shine after entering the end-game, since missions start taking much longer to complete, and require much more resource to finish, which, thankfully, Generator is able to provide.
Drone	It's hard to give Drone a proper overview because its performance depends entirely on the wave layouts of whatever mission you are trying to use it in – sometimes it carries, sometimes it does nothing at all. If evaluated on average, Drone displays plainly acceptable performance, although it tends to lean towards mediocrity because of its restrictive preparation time and rage cost. It's also worth mentioning that Drone's explosion barely does anything. Its real appeal lies in the ability to distract and block enemies, which is exceptionally useful for stopping pushes and grouping massive hoardes into one pile that's easy to focus fire. But as already mentioned above, even that isn't always helpful.
Empty Barrel	Empty Barrel is a moderately versatile item that can be used for both offense and defense. While its health is pretty low, it still works well as a temporary obstacle. Its drop damage can easily destroy weak enemies or just deal a considerable amount of damage to tankier threats. While Red Barrel certainly outshines it because of its higher health and damage output, Empty Barrel's lesser price makes it easier to use during missions where rage meter builds up rather slowly. Admittedly, it only works during early-to-mid game, but it performs well enough to be kept in your deck up until the end of stage 3. Past that, it only ever proves relevant with its SA unlocked, and even then its uses come down strictly to killing Charged Zombies, and doing risky finishing moves against certain threats.
Red Hood	Out of all offense-oriented heavies, Red Hood proves to be the most practical option, thanks to his various perks that allow to keep enemies at bay, while his high crit. rate and reasonable attack speed ensure that RH is still able to pack a punch. Red Hood's SA is especially notable, as it allows him to attract zombies' attention, preventing them from getting too close to the bus. Even his poison resistance—a perk that's only relevant against toxic fog—turns out to be a major boon, given that RH is the rare melee unit that possesses it. But despite all these strengths, Red Hood still suffers from heavyweights fundamental issues, those being sluggish movement speed and very high courage cost. Because of those cons, he ends up being more of a powerful specialist than a genuinely versatile unit, which limits his usefulness in the long run.
Dr. Kane	The reasoning behind Dr. Kane's ranking comes down to two factors: him being a great support, and struggling as a shooter. Kane's enemy debuff, despite being tied to RNG, proves to be a helpful bonus in just about any mission, especially ones full of sturdy enemies. He can make some difficult missions much easier to beat, but that comes at a cost of him being a support – although Kane has a solid damage output, he has problems with handling his gun well, and lacks proper close-quarters protection. The worst part, however, is his crippling courage cost, which makes it impossible to effectively use Kane as a sole ranged unit, since his other downsides make him do poorly as a proper bus defender. At the end of the day, his core appeal ends up lying in his ability alone. Without it, he would easily be the worst shooter in the game.
Saw	As he stands, Saw functions best as a damage support, capable of providing large bursts of damage against single tanky threats. With the right setup, he can help his team completely stomp all enemies and then clear the barricade just as fast. The problem is that this is all the appeal he has without team synergies taken into account. The irony is that Saw's gimmicky crit is the very reason he struggles against anyone who isn't a slow tank, since it takes time to wind up and each blow is delivered with a delay. Such polarizing aspects are the main reason Saw fails to be versatile and is best used as a specialist, which, sadly, harms his overall potential.
Specops	Theoretically, Specops can be considered a slight upgrade to Sonya, given that he shares the same stats as her while also possessing many powerful perks and resistances, allowing him to provide both great support and serve as a primary source of damage. His close combat abilities are a step up from hers as well since every melee attack causes knockback. Unfortunately, he is held back by a number of issues, with the worst one being his worse accuracy and slow firing speed, which lead to a significant decrease in DPS; deploying him closer to enemies to circumvent that will usually put his own life at greater risk. It doesn't gets better with the fact that the very ability to be deployed anywhere is very situational, and in practice shows to make Specops less playable, because it takes him a few seconds to land, making his "real" preparation time longer than advertised. Specops' only saving grace is in his health and guaranteed melee knockback, which allow to use him in a sort of supportive role for a second ranged unit. If used on his own, he proves to be lackluster.
Agents	Being created specifically for the gimmick of "preparing" the battlefield by clearing it out of idle fragile enemies, Agents excel exclusively at that, and even then during early-to-mid game only due to later zombies being way too sturdy. While their whole design gives them a promising image of a unit comparable in strength to any of the shooters, they don't live up to it due to inconsistent firing speed, and tendency to use melee attacks too early. It doesn't help that there's simply better options for resolving the "clogged pathway" issue than trying to use Agents with their subpar single hit damage ...And yet, should you unlock their special, most of the above issues become resolved, since it makes Agents provide a non-committal access to a team power, increasing their performance as supports on both ends of the spectrum. The only problem is deciding whether the road to it is worth walking.
Dr. Norman	Doctor Norman's main appeal lies in his ability to slow down enemies while dealing true damage to them. He proves to be a useful option against tanks and some quick enemies, being able to dispatch them himself, or at least making them easier to hit by other units. Despite his great potential, Norman suffers from having very slow movement speed, dangerous on-death explosion, and an unreliable attack pattern which hinders his DPS. Depending on a mission, he might act more like a support than a proper attacker even against enemies he is theoretically best applied against.
Flamethrower	Flamethrower is yet another extreme example of a special ability doing lots of heavy lifting. By preventing him from becoming irrelevant in missions with fire resistant enemies, Flamethrower manages to prove himself as an unexpected counter to said threats, managing to deal even with such behemoths as Double-headed Zombies and Escapee. The problem is that Flamer's reliance on this perk is this big, as without it he rarely proves better than most shooters, courtesy of his short attack range, sluggish movement speed, very high courage cost, and dangerously low health. It's not impossible to use him before he is maxed out, but it's far from an optimal approach.
Farmer	Farmer's low courage cost for a ranged unit, fast preparation time, and high crowd control make him a decent choice for a big portion of the game's missions. Sadly, his long reload time and slow movement speed prevent him from being able to properly handle certain types of waves, while also not allowing him to react to extreme situations. It doesn't help that his low health curbs his effectiveness in end-game stages. Although, in case you decide to unlock his special ability, he can continue being useful at least in a role of damage support, as the double-shot ability provides a massive increase to his burst damaging potential.
Gunslinger	Gunslinger's main appeal lies in his courage cost that is uniquely low for a ranged unit. Such cheap price makes Gunslinger a non-committal unit, allowing to use him somewhat carelessly while focusing attention on other members of the team. At the same time, if he is used as a sole ranged unit, such low cost makes Gunslinger a great tag along for fighters, allowing to spam them with ease while still being protected from a distance. The only problem is that this low cost is practically all there is to Gunslinger, as otherwise he is a rather poor shooter whose slow movement speed makes it difficult for him to respond to crtiical situations.
Sheriff Charlotte	Like with any sniper, Sheriff Charlotte's main appeal lies in her ability to deal massive burst damage from a distance. This is useful for both picking off incoming enemies, and for dealing with tanks from a safe distance. Charlotte's appeal also lies in her fast movement speed, as it makes her able to react to certain threats quick enough. The only problem is that Charlotte is held down by her class' universal downsides, specifically: low health, slow firing speed, and crutching on the Hunter set. The last two bits make her an overall odd choice for progression, since players will have access to more versatile ranged units by the time Hunter becomes accessible, meanwhile slow fire rate makes Charlotte fare poorly against speedy end-game threats. That being said, it's not impossible to achieve consistently good results while bringing Charlotte along. The question is whether you can afford to commit to her.
Sniper Polina	Polina's situation is largely similar to Charlotte's, since they both fulfill the same niche. However, Polina's versatility isn't as adequate due to her extremely slow movement speed. While she has much higher damage potential and a lower courage cost, these upsides are offset by her inability to be anything more than a complimentary unit.
Pepper	Pepper can be considered yet another unit who manages to shine only during final stretches of the game. In general, it never feels like she does enough in early-to-mid stages, since her overall damage is low, and her protective abilities don't matter as much before much tankier aggressive zombies start appearing. Inversely, she proves to be a solid option for the end-game portion, given that you are ready to invest into her SA which does half of the heavy lifting by granting easy access to the inspiration buff. With enough upgrades, Pepper turns out to be a good tag-along for shotgunners, helping to compensate for their downsides while offering a layer of protection through her kicks. Before that, it's best to not bother.
Builder Abby	Abby's design as a single-use burst damager ends up being both her appeal, and the ultimate downfall. While she is capable of destroying big hordes or multiple massive tanks all by herself, it's hard to ignore Abby's massive cost when she is realistically gonna stay on field for just 15 seconds thanks to her very low health and non-existent melee capabilities. It doesn't help that she turns into a downscaled Insectoid after her death. In the end, Abby is best used in teams that can somehow improve her machine gun, or get the most out of it as is.
Austin	When it comes to proper mission completion, Austin can prove to be surprisingly useful. Thanks to his high movement speed, adequate stats, and good handling of his fast-firing gun, he acts as an all around good shooter. Austin's only problem lies in a single major downside: his insane rage cost. Because of how extreme it is, it's effectively impossible to use Austin for anything other than damage support. This issue is especially bad in end-game since it's very hostile to ranged units, as a result amplifying the need of a massive commitment. It's safe to say that Austin is viable for progression, but his applications come down to mid-game stages only.

Unit	Notes
Carol	Like most units built around skirmish, Carol's performance in regular missions ends up being questionable. Since ping-ponging is rarely an option there, and her regular attack speed is merely moderate, she isn't able to perform much better than any other fighter due to lacking potential for both extreme damage, and meat-shielding. It's possible to have success by using Carol as a sort of burst damager, especially with her special unlocked, but she'll still be only this useful in the long run.
Cap	Cap's ability to constantly provide his teammates with inspiration makes him a notable support, as it has potential to speed up mission completion by improving all units' behavior stats and movement speed. The perk becomes even more notable with his SA unlocked, allowing to repurpose Cap as a support for ranged units who have small magazines. But while this has its own theoretically powerful applications, in practice Cap fails at pulling them off. This is because he himself has very poor stats for a ranged unit, lacking in health, DPS, and self-defense perks, as well as having a very high courage cost. In most cases, Cap can only be safely sent out by the time his abilities aren't as relevant anymore, making the impact of his aid questionable. There are rare situations where his support is meaningful, but outside of those he can come off as a dead weight.
Light Soldier	Although Light Soldier is the biggest victim of late character syndrome in DA:ZW, becoming available when damagers are simply not a useful class anymore, he can still display some impressive performance thanks to his very high health and damage, and solid attack and movement speed, coupled with acceptable crit. rate. In a way, he can be seen as a direct upgrade of Builder, who already proves to be one of the better damagers in the game, only really missing out on a few criticals.
Glenn	Glenn's unique revival perk allows him to be used as a special spam unit since he can take on several big hits and still keep fighting some time after getting knocked down, while dishing out acceptable damage thanks to his fast attack speed. While his potential is fairly promising, Glenn requires proper investment into his upgrades, as he feels inefficient at his lower levels, mostly because of his medium courage cost which could be used for sending out more spammable units that can do double the damage at a shorter period of time, and maybe even provide knockback. It gets even worse with three final stages having a large presence of zombies who completely nullify his ability, making him just a more expensive spam unit in majority of end-game missions.
Builder	Acting as a reference point for all other damagers, Builder doesn't have anything spectacular to offer, being a merely serviceable option for earlier parts of the game, and a somewhat usable one through latter portions of it. Fortunately for him, this ends up being a blessing in disguise, as he doesn't have any major downsides that end up neutering his strengths. His only issues come from universal struggles of damagers, at least when they are compared to more versatile fighters.
Juggernaut	Despite many promising aspects of Juggernaut, such as extremely high health and moderate prep. time, he, like most heavyweights, suffers from being too slow: he has very high courage cost, his attack and movement speed leave wishing for the best, and his explosive slam takes a while to wind up. Speaking of Jugger's signature attack, it can surely cause serious damage and weaken swarms, but the blow's struggle with waves of fast enemies really hurts its image. By being tied to critical chance, it acts as an unreliable blessing, which either leads to overkills, or makes it come into play when it's unnecessary or too late for it. Had there been more consistency to Jugger's special, he might've been perceived as overall more useful.
Nitrogen	Nitrogen is unfortunate in that the most common mission designs actively work against it. It rarely manages to aid the player in a meaningful way because it's usually easier to use explosives or fire pools against incoming hordes than try to slow them down. Nitrogen also suffers from very long preparation time, inconvenient way of reactivating its ability, and the fact that it can affect friendly units. Its only saving grace is a few specific cases which manage to abuse Nitrogen's AoE ranged and extended stunning time, especially in relation to tanky enemies of end game stages. These cases are notable enough to warrant Nitrogen from being seen as entirely irrelevant.
Turbo	Turbo can be perceived as a lowkey contradictive sidegrade to Guard. She is much faster, costs less courage, has increased attack reach, and a uniquely astronomical knockback. But she pays for all that with even worse DPS due to very slow charging of the crit swing. As a result, she becomes a gimmicky unit who is best used in just as specific decks that can compensate for her downsides, or in certain missions where her main gimmick can truly shine.
Guard	Despite such useful quirks as very fast movement speed and high crit. rate, Guards ends up being one of the lesser useful damagers for two key reasons: slow attack speed, and high courage cost. While the latter is crippling for obvious reasons, the former ends up being a dealbreaker when Guard is compared to other units in his class, who tend to have better DPS or are simply cheaper to send out, not being a major commitment. His ability to act as a swift instant responder is pretty much all of his current appeal.
Firefighter	Firefighter's unique combination of poison, fire, and explosion resistances make him a unique specialist unit for completing missions with zombies who utilize said damage types. Even though he has solid stats, he isn't all that great during missions with other regular enemies and just behaves like any other basic melee unit, and quite a mediocre one because of his slow attack speed and lack of knockback. There's really no reason to use him if he has nothing to counter.
Maria	Maria is yet another support who only proves playable because of her passive aid. Once her special ability is unlocked, she serves as a solid tag-along for shooters, overall improving their offensive performance. Her performance as a ranged unit, however, leaves wishing for the best. Mainly, her double-targeting AI serves merely as a gimmick in practice, rarely being genuinely helpful, and sometimes even putting Maria in danger, should some zombie get too close. Her kick isn't very good at defense either, as it comes with an unnecessary delay at the end, allowing a pushed zombies to cross the gap again. The final nail in the coffin is Maria's high courage cost, which makes her difficult to use even as a secondary unit. The combination of these issues ends up making Maria barely usable, at least until her special is unlocked.
Andrea	When compared to her fellow snipers, Andrea fails to be nearly as useful, mainly due to the fact that she deals noticeably less damage and her range being concerningly short. The latter issue is especially bad, since it makes Andrea fare worse in certain scenarios that other snipers would either be able to survive, or prevent from happening in the first place. She isn't unusable, and the bursts she provides are still appreciated, but the fact that her alternatives are able to do the same job that much better, there isn't any real reason to stick to Andrea outside of her teams.

Unit	Notes
Molotov	When judging Molotov, it's hard to ignore the elephant in a room in a form of Red Barrel which outclasses the cocktail in just about everything. However, even without any comparisons, Molotov's performance leaves wishing for the best. It's unable to deal much damage to enemies since its fire pool lasts for a fixed, short period, its preparation time is unjustly long, and the rage cost is too high, considering the little impact Molotov makes. Without resorting to Patriots, there's not much reason to use Molotov even in scenarios where rage is plentiful, as it just can't do much. The only thing that it excels at is efficient corpse burning, as its AoE circle allows to make more precise shots – an element that RB sorely lacks. It's also a bit of a crutch for players who struggle with timing RB blasts against hordes of fast enemies, but getting the hang of that trick is just another part of the game's learning process, which also manifests through Grenadier's signature throw – another thing that can outclass Molotov.
Dr. Miller	When evaluated purely as a ranged unit, Dr. Miller is not a bad option. He is semi-expendable, having low courage cost and relatively fast preparation time, meanwhile his handgun fires swiftly and has a large ammo pool. Unfortunately, all of these upsides are overshadowed by serious issues that come with Miller's unique aspect – his landmine. The most glaring one is that the explosive's ability to hurt friendly units ends up making it a very risky tool to use, as it's capable of one-shotting Miller's teammates at low-to-mid levels, and significantly crippling them at higher ends. At the same time, it rarely does enough damage to deal with larger swarms of zombies, while being outright underpowered in end-game, only really shining against Charged Zombies. The fact that Miller has to carry the mine himself is also a problem, as it means he can't properly respond to critical situations. Overall, unless the aforementioned issues end up resolved, Miller is unlikely to ever shine.
Chopper	In the game's modern state, using Chopper feels a bit similar to using an average Damager. He can use his tankiness to prevent similarly massive enemies from advancing further, while being able to put his guaranteed knockback to good use by keeping some swifter enemies in check. The problem is that there's only so many missions in the game where all of these upsides are actually relevant, with the rest of it being actively hostile against Chopper's design as a slow glacier. You can have fun with him, but only so often, and even then he gets outclassed by units who simply cost less courage, or are swifter than him in one way or another.
Soldier	Soldier's situation is effectively the same as Chopper's. Regardless, he still tends to be a worse option than the hulking canadian, due to having higher courage cost and his knockback being tied to criticals.
Lionheart	Lionheart is one of those heavyweights who is centered around his offensive capabilities, rather than fulfilling a job of a tank. This would've been tolerable had Lion been good at his intended role. He has guaranteed knockback, and a relatively fast attack speed for a heavy, but his upsides end there. His key gimmick, the gas spill, deals miserable damage that doesn't scale with his level, and only creates an obstacle for Lion's teammates. Its only application is to burn corpses but it's far from an efficient way of doing that. His SA isn't much better, as it's heavily restricted by being tied to the aforementioned gas spill. It doesn't help that it's virtually temporary, and is not applicable against majority of end-game threats. Additionally, Lion's lack of extended reach and knockback resistance highlight his problem of having as much health as an average damager. All in all, there's not a lot to appreciate about Lionheart, as the only meaningful thing he can offer is knockback.

Unit	Notes
Welder	Being the only unit with direct barricade targeting and the ability to repair the bus and other objects, Welder might appear as a useful support with great potential. While that's technically true, he has too many disadvantages that seriously hinder it: extremely low base health, insanely long base preparation time of a full minute and a half, and the highest rage cost in the entire game are the main reasons he is just not worthy of being used outside of team synergies.
Medic	Medic's failure lies in many serious problems that are all closely related to each other. Having one of the worst damage outputs among all ranged units in the game and no offensive survivability skills, she heavy relies on her teammates for protection. However, she can't even aid them well with her medkit, as Medic's AI is very quirky and realistically only ever drops it when she finds a single damaged unit before entering a hot spot, and basically never does it again as she can't interrupt her shooting. To make matters worse, she has a very short attack range which unintentionally makes her ignore her teammates. As a result, this leads to Medic not being able to protect either other units, or herself in any way. Suffice to say, she does worse than not enough for her extreme courage cost.
Willy	Willy's shield, stun gun, and his ability to ignore all resistances and knock enemies back make him look like a solid unit for dealing with tanky and/or bullet resistant enemies. While Willy is promising, he is held back by lots of problems: very short attack range, low damage, slow movement speed, extremely high courage cost (which also nullifies his fast preparation time), slow firing speed, and the fact that in practice electricity is no better than melee damage – all hinder his potential to the ground. In addition, Willy tends to begin using his shield bash way too early, often resulting in his death that otherwise could've been easily avoided. There are practically no missions in the game where he proves consistently useful.
Queen	Queen can be viewed as Grenadier with a more potent grenade ability and degraded stats. Her grenade launcher can fire many more grenades and her special ability allows her to create fire pools with them, but Queen's relatively low stats for a melee unit with slow attack speed make her inferior when it comes to close combat. It only gets worse with her very high rage cost. Because of it, Queen's ability shows to be a winmore in practice, since by the time you get to play her majority of enemies are already dealt with. There's also a problem of realistically never wanting to use Queen over other expensive rage abilities, like Generator, and her dying way too fast for such high price. In the end, the sole reason to use Queen is in case player wants to mess around with her grenades in some missions. There's really no reason to risk using her for completion, even with team powers taken into account.