Brawl Stars Character Analysis
A bottoms up approach on non-class based categorization of brawl stars characters and analyzing their impact on playstyles.
This article is structured as follows
• Classes definition.
• Classes have inconsistency?
• What are the recurring traits in 103 brawlers?
• Analysis of the single projectile, single line category
• How brawlers with the same base kit stats feel different?
• What does “single projectile” actually mean for playstyle?
• Have single projectile brawlers changed over the years?
• Appendix, Process and deep dive into Single projectile, single line.
Classes definition
The brawl stars characters have been grouped into 7 classes based on brawlers dominant characteristics such as.
“Damage dealers” and “Assassins” dealing high damage and higher movement speed.
“Marksmen” and “Tank” having high attack range and high health.
“Artillery”, “Controllers” and “Support” with the ability to shoot over obstacles, area of effect based attack and the ability to heal or buff other brawlers.
credit Supercell’s Brawl Stars classes definition
Classes have inconsistency?
Stats based
These categorization of the classes in the brawl stars are inconsistent purely from the perspective of base kit stats. One of the many examples are for instance the key characteristics of a marksmen is “Very Long” range. But you can see some damage dealers such as 8-Bit, Eve, Najia, R T, Rico and assassins such as Fang and Leon also having “Very Long” attack range.
These class definitions help in the game for representation of character abilities example “Leon” having very long attack range still has an assassin's traits which is a super attack “SMOKE BOMB” where he can be invisible for “6” secs ideally.
Mechanic based
Based on the example we can say these classes are defined by a combination of base kit stats and attack mechanics. But again the assassins class also have a variety of mechanics some have lob shot to jump over obstacles with “Mico”, wide and long range with multiple projectiles attack with “Leon”, area damage attack with “Gigi”, melee attack with “Edgar”, single projectile long range attack with “Stu”.
To find a consistent pattern, I analyzed all 103 brawlers individually and identified recurring characteristics through a bottom-up approach.
What are the recurring traits in 103 brawlers?
In this analysis my goal was to observable purely through gameplay (not menu text), stable regardless of balance patches changing numbers. I played all 103 brawlers and analyzed them carefully to arrive at distinct recurring characteristics which led to an attack mechanics based categorization.
The 7 categories identified are as shown on the below image
- Single projectile, attack fires one discrete projectile per shot, rewarding precision aim.
- Multi projectile, Single line, multiple bullets fired together along a single straight lane, hitting in sequence or simultaneously at any range.
- Multi projectile, Cone line, multiple bullets fired in a fanning pattern that widens with distance, rewarding close-range engagement.
- Melee Close Range, attack only has effect at point-blank distance, requiring the brawler to physically close the gap.
- Lob Shoot , attack arcs over obstacles and walls, trading flat-line accuracy for the ability to hit targets in cover.
- Movable Area, attack creates a damage zone that travels with player or can be repositioned, rather than detonating on first contact.
- Special, attack delivery doesn’t fit any standard physical pattern; the mechanic itself defines the category (e.g. dual-form, dash attacks, randomize super).
Analysis of the single projectile, single line category
We will focus on this category for this article. Two more key characteristics were observed on closer look in this category. First one being the attack “Attack line width” and second being the “Mechanic complexity”.
Attack line width
Each main attack falls into one of three width types, as shown below.
Mechanic Complexity
Main attacks can be further grouped into Simple, Moderate and Complex.
Simple attacks being a projectile traveling from brawler to the target or end of attack line range with the projectile being a primary damage.
Moderate is a simple attack with an additional damage mechanic.
Complex attack being the projectile has further additional mechanic on top of the moderate attack.
On checking the average base kit stats of the brawlers from the category of “single projectile, single line brawlers”. The complex attack in this context does not indicate that there is additional damage, instead the focus is on the utility of the attack such as returning projectiles, health collectibles, projectiles bouncing to other enemies etc.
How brawlers with the same base kit stats feel different?
Two brawlers which have identical on health, damage, and speed and still have completely different play experience. This is due to what their attack and Super actually do to the fight beyond dealing damage.
That’s the idea behind “Utility Score”, a way to measure a brawler’s impact separate from how hard they hit or how long they survive.
What does the utility score capture?
Whether a brawler’s kit affects more than a single point of damage. A lob shot that clears cover, an attack that hits multiple enemies at once, a Super that controls space or repositions the fight all of these add tactical value that a flat damage number doesn’t show.
A brawler whose Super is just a bigger version of their normal attack scores low here. A brawler whose Super changes what the opponent can do slows them, displaces them, denies an area scores high.
This is where the main attack mechanic complexity comes into play , complex mechanic gets higher utility score than the simple mechanic. Then the super is layered on top, does it add control or utility beyond raw damage, or is it simply more damage?
You can see the exact way i have arrived at the scoring in the appendix section at the end of this article.
Why utility score matters?
Stat comparisons alone tend to flatten the roster, many brawlers cluster into the same handful of health and damage tiers. Utility is the variable that explains the gap between “looks similar on paper” and “feels completely different in a match.” It’s also why Artillery, Support, and Controller-type should brawlers consistently score higher here their value was never meant to be measured in damage per hit, but in what their kit lets a team accomplish.
Utility on its own only tells half the story, though it explains what a brawler adds to a fight, not how it wins one. For that, the next piece is figuring out what actually separates an offensive brawler from a defensive one.
What does “single projectile” actually mean for playstyle?
Similiar to utility, the other factors influencing the gameplay tactics of a brawler is whether to take an offensive tactics or defensive.
This approach was inspired from this youtube video — MOBA Philosophy Balancing Offence, Defence & Control in Heroes & Itemization by Sylphin.
Offensive playstyle should support fast movement and higher damage, as you can be aggressive in chasing enemies and evading bullets, ideally damage dealers and assassins fit in this category. But they usually are balanced by lower health, lower attack range.
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Defensive playstyle should support keeping distance, or taking damage without dying quickly similar to tanks, marksmen. But they also are balanced by lower damage, reload and movement speed.
Based on a certain weighted average calculations on the health, attack damage, attack range, movement speed, reload speed. A normalized set of values were arrived at for ease of representation in this ternary graph.
As expected due to the higher weightage towards the defensive traits such as attack range and high health, the entire category of single projectile leans predominantly towards the defensive playstyle experience of these brawlers.
Key observation
Few notable exceptions of Angelo, Melodie, Gale and Bea who are crossing over towards the offensive tactics of the gameplay even though they might have defensive traits, could be a potential scope to nerf their attack damage, speed movement speed or reload speed.
Have single projectile brawlers changed over years?
There is no strong correlation based insights in YoY changes. However few key debatable observations are that the new brawlers that were released had more complex mechanics towards the last few years and also started leaning towards the agressive nature of the metrics. This can be understood better if the analysis is done for all 103 characters.
Thank you for reading
Appendix
Deep dive on each sub category
We can categorize these further and look closely into the below
1. Narrow attack line & simple mechanic
2. Narrow attack line & moderate mechanic
3. Narrow attack line & complex mechanic
4. Medium attack line & simple mechanic
5. Medium attack line & moderate mechanic
6. Medium attack line & complex mechanic
7. Heavy attack line & simple mechanic
8. Heavy attack line & moderate mechanic
9. Heavy attack line & complex mechanic
Lets go into each one.
Narrow attack line (simple, moderate and complex)
Narrow and simple
Narrow and moderate
Narrow and Complex
Medium attack line (simple, moderate and complex)
Medium and Simple
Medium and Moderate
Medium and Complex
Wide attack line (simple, moderate and complex)
Wide and simple
Wide and moderate
Wide and complex
Triangle Distribution
Framework inspiration from this youtube vide
