Give me your commander rankings! List the commanders from best to worst. Interpret that any way you wish; personal opinion, a more objective power scale, versatility in mutators, IDC. Number them 1-however many commanders there are. Once I get enough entries, I’m going to aggregate it and make a master list that will settle once and for all which are the best commanders (ok that definitely won’t happen). But it will be fun, hopefully.
My rankings -
1 Swann
2 Zagara
3 Dehaka
4 Tychus
5 Alarak, with no C
6 Raynor
7 Stukov
8 HH
9 Nova
10 Zeratul
11 Mengsk
12 Karax
13 Abathur
14 Fenix
15 Kerrigan
16 Artanis
17 Vorazun
18 Stettman
The bottom 5ish are pretty equally disliked, but for the sake of making a list Stettman ended up on the bottom. Although I really do hate having to place stettalites.
This list are for my favorite commanders, not really a meta list, it’s more on how they are played than say power, easiness to play.
1-Mengsk
2-Stetmann
3-Karax
4-Vorazun
5-Swann
6-Alarak
7-Raynor
8-Artanis
9-Abathur
10-Fenix
11-Nova
12-Stukov
13-Kerrigan
14-Zagara
15-H&H
16-Dehaka
17-Tychus
18-Zeratul
The thing about the most disliked is that with the exception of H&H, commanders that have easier macro gets boring rather fast for me, I suppose this is also why players use them on mutations.
H&H is more on how fragile the army is until critical ammount of Horner units are out, calldowns are dope tho, reverse mag-nificent mutation ftw.
As for my top 5, they are tricky to play indeed, what I like about them is that when you have a plan they do amazing.
Mengsk has a use for each royal guard to the point you can use different comps every game.
Stetmann is currently the best support commander with the stetlites and Super Gary uses, he compensates the majority of weakness between all commanders.
Karax you abuse the map knowledge and once reached critical mass his units rarery ever dies.
Vorazun she’s pretty much based on abusing crowd control, dark pylon is amazing for defensive commanders.
Swann, well, FREE VESPENE, even with lazer build he’s strong but requires some good macro practice which is where he’s the most vulnerable.
That’s a perfectly fine reasoning! It’s exactly what I made my list based on, who I like to play
i love the reasons you gave (i was hoping the thread would dip in to this), but would you be able to do a 1-18? I can’t put it together if it’s not in the same format. Again, arrange your 18 however you want using whatever metric you want.
I find it difficult to rank commanders in this way because people play commanders differently, the map determines the strength of some commanders, many different variables make it difficult to rank the commanders in one list, and I do not have Nova, Han & Horner, and Tychus at level 15.
I’ll just mention my faves and least faves. everyone else is basically the same to me.
1 Fenix - I’ve always loved protoss, and Fenix is almost exactly what i think they should be. Hard to coordinate properly, but damn near unstoppable once you get it right. (He just needs more psionics - they’re a race of psychics for god’s sake). Love the (nearly) endless build variability, and sheer stomping power.
2 Mengsk - Despite some buggy hurdles, mengsk handles very nicely (imo). i love that everything is fast-paced, but consistent (as opposed to Dehaka, who’s micro/macro becomes nearly redundant at some point mid game). Love his raw pushing power and innovative use of older commander’s mechanics (multi build, unit drop, etc)
3 Stetmann/Aba - (Noticing the macro heavy style yet?) Love the lore premise, the build variability, and the endgame deathballs for both commanders.
16 Alarak - sorry to say that the hero unit is disappointing (considering that he’s the most powerful Toss in the known universe during the campaign), the army feels like a slow, sluggish excuse for a death ball that can’t really kill very much. Only good calldowns are the overcharge (which is the least in-character thing in his kit), and Empower me (which just makes Alarak into what i think he should be anyway)
17 Stukov - Very much dislike the new mech-heavy direction they took with him. I payed for an endless flood of already-dead bastards, not diamondbacks with IBS and giant frog tongues. Not terrible as a commander, but very much not what i want him to be.
18 Karax - gets my hate for stealing Purifier themes without being The True Purifier commander. And bc his design felt very awkward until recently - although the new update improved that quite a bit. Still dislike playing him though. I enjoy feeling impactful on the battlefield, and Karax never gives me that without a hell of a struggle.
my best commander is karax and he can use purifier beam which can really damage bases if you dont have much units. my 2nd favorite is zagara because she can spawn banelings and hunter killers. 3rd favorite is keriggan because of her abilities although she cant make banelings which sorta sucks. 4th is a tie because they are abathur and zeratul . abathur is similar to dehaka because you can get essence and make your units super op. note i never played zeratul but he is one of my favorite starcraft characters of all time. disadvantages. zagara lacks heavy units. zeratul is expensive. karax takes some time to make advanced units. kerragin has low advantage against huge waves of heavy units. so thats it.
Macro is you ability to build up your tech/production structures, achieve maximum saturation, upgrade, and max out on army. In simpler terms, managing resources efficiently so you don’t get supply blocked or have thousands of floating resources (before maxing out).
Throwing power out the window, this is my preference list:
Artanis
Mengsk
Zeratul
Fenix
Karax (his rework worked wonders on the fun front)
Zagara
Dehaka
Nova
Alarak
Tychus
Han and Horner
Abathur
Stetmann (would be a lot higher without stetlag)
Vorazun
Stukov
Kerrigan (worms get old)
Raynor (too similar to ladder Terran, minus mine camping which also gets old)
Swann (I just hate tankivac micro)
Now for my highly subjective take on power level:
Abathur (duh)
Zeratul
Tychus (though he does lack dps for some mutation setups)
Artanis (mostly on raw versatility and topbar power)
Nova
Fenix
Karax (only because to me speed is a small factor and response time a large one)
Raynor (Forgive me, LilArrin)
Dehaka
Mengsk (ESOs are niche, and his early game is depressing)
Swann
Kerrigan (WORMS!!! Oh yeah and maybe some units)
Alarak (far too brittle all around)
Vorazun (she’s getting rusty in modern co-op)
Han and Horner (slow early game into a not mind-breaking late game)
Stetmann (again, stetlag is a real problem)
Zagara (though I’m not amazing at her)
Stukov (sorry zombie man)
For the “power” list, it gets incredibly muddy past Mengsk. Pretty solid above that barring Tychus though, who I think I over rated. But it’s all subjective anyways.