Tales of Grimm Tier List: Best Units

Tales of Grimm Tier List: Best Units for Every Stage

The best units in Tales of Grimm as of 2026 are Pyre Warlock, Crimson Valkyrie, and Iron Sentinel for most accounts, with Deepwood Oracle as the top support pick and Frost Revenant as the strongest free-to-play carry. Each ranks well because of three measurable factors: how their damage scales as you invest, how much of the fight their ability stays active, and how many other units they make stronger.

This tier list sorts every commonly used unit by those three factors, notes which upgrade materials each one consumes to stay viable past mid-game, and flags where a unit quietly falls off. If you are deciding who to build next, start with the quick comparison below.

How Units Are Ranked

Three criteria decide placement, and all three are checked against the in-game stat screens and ability descriptions rather than feel:

• Damage scaling: how much a unit’s output grows per upgrade tier. Units with flat scaling (fixed damage per hit) cap early; units with percentage-of-attack or stacking scaling keep growing.
• Ability uptime: the share of a fight a unit’s skill is actually active. A skill with a 12-second duration and 20-second cooldown has 60% uptime; anything under 40% is usually a burst tool, not a carry.
• Team synergy: how many common team compositions the unit improves. A unit that only works in one niche lineup ranks below one that fits three.

Upgrade materials matter as much as the ranking. Every unit past tier 3 needs a unit-specific shard set plus one shared resource, so building three units from the same material family at once will stall your account.

Quick Comparison: Top Picks at a Glance

Uptime figures are calculated from the cooldown and duration listed on each unit’s ability description: uptime = duration ÷ cooldown. Treat them as planning estimates, not fixed stats, since gear with cooldown reduction shifts them upward.

Best Overall: Pyre Warlock

Pyre Warlock is the safest long-term investment for a main damage dealer. Its burn effect stacks each time it is reapplied, so damage keeps climbing across a long fight instead of flattening out. That stacking behavior is what separates it from burst-only carries who peak in the first ten seconds.

Ability uptime sits near 65% before gear, which is high for a pure DPS unit. Team synergy is broad: Pyre Warlock improves any team with a shielder or healer buying it time, and its burn damage counts separately from direct hits, so it pairs well with debuffers who increase damage taken.

Who it suits: accounts that already have a stable front line and want one carry to build around. Main trade-off: it needs Ember Sigils, a scarce material shared with two other high-tier units, so you cannot fully build Pyre Warlock and those units at the same time. Expect a slower upgrade curve than the ranking alone suggests.

Best Burst Pick: Crimson Valkyrie

Crimson Valkyrie wins short fights. Its ability front-loads a large critical hit, and with crit damage gear the number grows faster than almost any other unit’s at the same investment tier. In content that ends in under 30 seconds, it usually out-damages Pyre Warlock despite the lower uptime.

The catch is scaling type. Flat damage plus a crit multiplier means the unit depends on gear quality more than upgrade tier. Once your crit stats stop improving, so does the damage. In long boss fights the 45% uptime becomes a real weakness — roughly half the fight is spent on basic attacks.

Who it suits: players farming fast clears and arena-style content. Main trade-off: Bloodsteel Ingots are easier to farm than Ember Sigils, so the early build is cheap, but the unit needs continued gear investment to stay relevant into later stages rather than stopping at a comfortable tier.

Best Tank and Support Core: Iron Sentinel and Deepwood Oracle

Iron Sentinel is the highest-uptime unit on this list at roughly 80%, because its shield effect has a short cooldown relative to its duration. Its own damage is low and does not scale well, so never build it as a damage source — the value is the shield it puts on your carry.

Deepwood Oracle is the best support pick because its healing scales with the target’s maximum HP rather than its own attack. That means a low-investment Oracle still keeps a heavily built carry alive, which makes it the cheapest unit here to make functional. Verdant Runes are also among the more farmable materials.

Trade-off for both: they do not carry fights alone. On an account with weak damage units, building these two first just makes a durable losing team.

Best Free-to-Play Carry: Frost Revenant

Frost Revenant is the strongest unit you can build without banner pulls. Its damage scales as a percentage of attack and it applies a slow, which reduces incoming damage by delaying enemy actions — an indirect survivability boost that lets a budget team clear stages above its gear level.

Rime Fragments come from repeatable stages, so there is no material bottleneck. The ceiling is genuinely lower than Pyre Warlock’s: at equal investment tiers, expect Frost Revenant to fall roughly one tier behind in raw damage. For most free-to-play accounts that trade-off is worth it, because the unit reaches a usable state weeks earlier.

Thunder Marshal and the Mid-Tier

Thunder Marshal ranks mid-tier for one reason: its damage is flat and stops scaling, but its debuff raises damage taken by the whole team. In a composition with two strong damage dealers, that team-wide multiplier can add more total damage than upgrading either carry one tier. As a solo carry it is weak; as a force multiplier it is often correct.

Mid-tier units generally share a pattern — one strong trait, one hard cap. Before investing, check whether the unit’s ability description says “increases by X” (scales) or “deals X damage” (flat). Flat-scaling units are fine early and expensive to keep viable later.

Upgrade Material Planning: A Worked Example

Suppose you have enough resources to push one unit from tier 3 to tier 5. Here is the decision with numbers attached:

• Pyre Warlock tier 3→5 costs Ember Sigils, and each tier consumes a rising count — budget roughly 40% of your total sigil supply for the final tier alone.
• Pushing two units from tier 3 to tier 4 instead splits the same sigil supply and leaves both stuck below the tier-4 ability upgrade that changes their scaling.
• One unit at tier 5 with a completed ability usually outperforms two units at tier 4, because the tier-5 upgrade is where percentage scaling multipliers unlock.

The general rule: concentrate materials on one carry until its scaling upgrade is unlocked, then spread. Do not build three units from the same material family simultaneously — that is the most common account stall.

How to Choose Your Next Build

Match your situation to the pick rather than following the ranking blindly:

• New account, no premium units: build Frost Revenant first, then Deepwood Oracle for support. Both use farmable materials.
• Stable front line, need damage: Pyre Warlock if your fights run long, Crimson Valkyrie if they end fast.
• Dying too quickly: Iron Sentinel before any damage upgrade. Uptime near 80% means the shield is almost always active.
• Two carries already built: Thunder Marshal, to multiply both instead of upgrading one.
• Limited materials, one slot left: Deepwood Oracle — it is the cheapest unit here to make functional because its healing scales off the target, not itself.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who is the best unit in Tales of Grimm?

Pyre Warlock is the best overall pick for most accounts because its stacking burn damage keeps scaling and its ability uptime is high for a damage dealer. Frost Revenant is the best free-to-play option. The right answer depends on whether your fights run long or short.

What does ability uptime mean in this tier list?

Uptime is the share of a fight an ability is active, calculated as duration divided by cooldown. A skill active for 12 seconds on a 20-second cooldown has 60% uptime. Higher uptime means more consistent value; lower uptime means the unit is a burst tool.

Should I build Pyre Warlock or Crimson Valkyrie first?

Build Pyre Warlock if your fights last longer than about 30 seconds, since its damage grows over time. Build Crimson Valkyrie if you farm short stages and arenas, where its front-loaded critical hit ends fights before uptime matters. Long-term, Pyre Warlock scales better with upgrade tiers.

Which units are cheapest to keep viable into later stages?

Deepwood Oracle and Frost Revenant. Oracle’s healing scales with the target’s HP, so it stays useful with minimal investment, and its Verdant Runes are farmable. Frost Revenant’s Rime Fragments come from repeatable stages, removing the banner-material bottleneck entirely.

Why do some units fall off in later stages?

Units whose abilities deal flat damage stop improving once their upgrade tiers are capped, because the number does not grow with attack or gear. Units with percentage or stacking scaling keep climbing. Check whether the ability description says “increases by” versus “deals” before investing.

Can I build multiple top-tier units at once?

Not efficiently. Top-tier units often share scarce materials like Ember Sigils, and each tier costs more than the last. Concentrating on one unit until its scaling upgrade unlocks, then spreading, usually produces a stronger account than building several units evenly.