Team Building

Team building is an important aspect of Legendary—while you are (mostly) free to use any combination of heroes you like in a team, building a team that consists of heroes whose Affinities and skills work well with each other is necessary if you want to do well in events, progress through game modes, and mount a credible defence in Guild Wars, among other things.

This article will give you some guidelines on how to build effective teams for most events and situations, as well as point out certain things that you should bear in mind when assembling your own teams.

Archetypes

Affinity

Historically, one of the most basic and best known guidelines to building an effective team starts with all five heroes on your team sharing the same Affinity (also known as a "mono team"). This allows your heroes to charge their Battle Skills at around the same rate and attack as a single, unified force.

Although matching gems of other Affinities on the board will mean that your heroes will do no damage, this is usually a non-issue in most situations due to the prevalence of heroes with gem spawning skills.

Event Skill

Event Skills give an event-restricted boost to specific heroes—beyond the events specified in the skill lore, these skills serve no purpose whatsoever. Of the six types of Event Skills in Legendary, the following three are usually brought up the most when assembling a team:

1. Bounty Hunter (B): Multiplies the number of trophies obtained from slain enemies during The Bounty Hunt.
2. Commander (C): Spawns a Commander Gem on the board during Commander events; when matched, the Commander Gem multiplies the amount of damage dealt by all Commander heroes on your team.
3. Slayer (S): Multiplies the amount of damage done by the hero during Slayer events.

Most heroes have at least one Event Skill, with some heroes having two or more Event Skills. Notably, all Legend heroes have the Bounty Hunter, Commander, and Slayer Event Skill boosts, so if you are lacking heroes to assemble for any of these events, any Legend heroes you have serve as decent backups.

Leader Skill

The hero in the middle of your team is called the Leader; this is indicated in-game on any screen where you can view your team, with said hero's card being placed above the other cards, and having a little "L" on the top-right corner of the card.

Having the right Leader is important, since only their Leader Skill will be active during play. The Leader Skill confers team-wide percentage bonuses to a select group of heroes, which means your team will typically much better if the Leader Skill applies to as many heroes in the team as possible. Hence, while it is important to structure your team around the Leader Skill, it is also equally important that you place the correct hero as your Leader.

Killer

Since the Generation 3.0 update, many new heroes possess a new passive trait, known as Killer. A hero with Killer gains a damage boost when certain enemies are present. Building a team focused on one Killer type may be useful if you are encountering enemies that will trigger it.

Relics

Similar to the Leader Skill, relics provide team-wide bonuses to specific heroes. In addition, some relics have additional bonuses (Power Gem spawn, damage reduction, etc.) that only trigger under the right conditions, such as if a specific hero is on the team.

Event/Mode-Specific Guidelines

The Bounty Hunt

Heroes with the Bounty Hunter event multiplier (B) should be placed on your team to maximise the number of trophies you get from each slain enemy. Having an entire team of fully-evolved heroes with the Bounty Hunter multiplier is essentially a requirement in order to collect bounty rewards with high trophy requirements.

Guild Wars

Attacking

If possible, the Leader of your team should be a Dragoon (D), and the rest of your team should comprise heroes whose Affinity is the same as the Dragoon's. A Dragoon's Leader Skill is unrivalled when attacking during Guild Wars, and because a majority of Dragoons are of the Defender-type, their immense HP stacks with their own Leader Skill, which can allow your team to survive some hits from the opposing Defender Team that you are incapable of taking if your team is led by a non-Dragoon hero.

Defending

It is important to note that opposing players will attack your GvG Defender Team from the left-most hero to the right-most hero, and heroes that have been killed will be skipped by subsequent attackers until the next game day. For this reason, Leader Skill bonuses do not apply.

Your GvG Defender Team should ideally consist of only Wardens (W). Wardens provide a considerably better defence compared to other heroes when they are placed as part of your GvG Defender Team. Furthermore, Wardens can be Ascended, giving them greater stats.

Hero classes can play a significant part of how you want to set up your GvG Defender Team. For instance, Defender heroes deal very little damage when attacking compared to Attacker heroes, which hit like a truck and can outright one-shot some attacking players, but Defenders are much more resilient and can absorb some hits that would annihilate Attacker heroes.

When defending, your heroes will use their Defender Skills to aid them. Most heroes have a Defender Skill that activates when they attack. A handful of heroes have "Birthright" Defender Skills, which automatically activate when they are confronted by the attacker, but only activate once. In addition, most Ascended Wardens have "Relentless" Defender Skills that activate every turn, regardless of whether they attack or not. Arranging your heroes based on their Defender Skill can mean the difference between your entire team being virtually untouchable, or just a full team of free kills.

You should equip your GvG Defender Team with Hammers, Mauls, or Cudgels. These relics are only applicable when defending during Guild Wars, and provide a much higher boost to your GvG Defender Team heroes compared to other relics. Hammers are a common drop in Vaults and event packs and rewards; with sufficient materials, Hammers can be upgraded into Mauls, and then into Cudgels.

Mauls and Cudgels target a specific hero Affinity, so you can consider forging a set of Mauls that target a single Affinity, and building your GvG Defender Team around the Mauls.

The historic GvG Defender Team meta was a full team of Wardens, all sharing the same Affinity, powered by Cudgels targeting said Affinity. This team setup frequently results in GvG Defender Teams having a total PWR of above 150,000, and serves as a powerful deterrent against weaker players, who would be dissuaded to even attack in the first place. With the addition of stronger, more resilient heroes following the New Dawn update, it is increasingly common to see dual-Affinity GvG Defender Teams at the highest echelons of Guild Wars, with said Affinities being complete opposites of each other (e.g. 2 Earth Wardens + 3 Fire Wardens, 3 Dark Wardens + 2 Light Wardens, etc.). While the addition of a second Affinity lowers the Defender Team's overall PWR, it also shuts down some attacks that would otherwise have no issues sweeping even the strongest mono teams.

Heavenly Spire

Each level in the Heavenly Spire restricts the type of heroes you can use; heroes that do not meet the criteria are disabled for the level, essentially being the same as an unused slot on your team. Therefore, it is important for you to read the hero criteria for each level and assemble your team accordingly.

The Proving Grounds

Protector bosses are weak to certain Killer types, and heroes with the Commander and Slayer Event Skills do increased damage on alternate weeks.

The TPG Store sells crates that may contain Gauntlets and Scrolls. Equipping these items can help to boost your team's damage output.

A very small number of heroes have Leader Skills that provide a stronger boost in The Proving Grounds.