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Marvel’s Avengers Beginner’s Guide 2: Gear

Black Panther leaps into battle against AIM robots

Welcome to Marvel’s Avengers! This guide will help you understand everything about the game from the single-player experience to the massive multiplayer experience full of different missions, gear builds, and Heroes. If you’re ever confused about a specific term or feature, head to this guide. As the game changes over time, we’ll make sure to update it so this will always be the latest information available. This project is in collaboration with our wonderful community members from Twitter, Discord, and Reddit. If you have a tip you’d like to submit to be featured here, let us know on Discord!

If you’d rather watch videos, here are a few Beginner’s Guides from streamers and content creators:

Guide Directory

I. Campaigns & Operations, & Avenger’s Initiative  

II. Gear

III. Mission Types

IV. Heroes

Gear

Basics and Rarity

Gear is a large part of what constitutes a Hero’s combat prowess and is essential in building your Hero to play like you want them to play. There are 7 slots for gear: Melee, Ranged, Defense, Heroic, Minor Artifact #1, Minor Artifact #2, and Major Artifact. Each of these types of gear contains various stats, Perks, a Power Level, rarity, and upgrade potential.

All gear has a rarity to it denoted by the color of the tooltip:

  • Common (Gray)
  • Uncommon (Green)
  • Rare (Blue)
  • Epic (Purple)
  • Legendary (Gold)
  • Exotic (Red)

Overall, rarity affects stats and the amount of Perks each gear piece receives. There are also Named sets, which you can hunt for and have more expected stats versus random pieces. Let’s go over more specific intricacies of gear below.

For a guide on knowing what gear to equip, here’s an incredible video from revealingtoomuch – Ultimate Avengers Gear Guide: How To Decide What’s Good

Stats

If you have played the game before you may be aware that some things in Avengers are a little differently than other games, like Health being called Willpower & Stamina being Intrinsic, amongst many others, so I’ll be going over each stat and explaining its industry standard counterpart, but also what it affects when it comes to your moveset. Right, let’s dive into it!

  • MIGHT – Might in Avengers is usually commonly known as “Strength” and increasing this stat will increase your effectiveness with Melee Attacks which includes all Light Attacks of current Heroes as well as Heavy Attacks except those of Iron Man, Hawkeye and Kate Bishop. This stat is not subject to diminishing returns, which basically means if you want more melee damage you can just stack as much Might as you like and it’ll keep adding to your damage.
  • PRECISION – Precision in this game is essentially the “Ranged” stat, sometimes also referred to as Accuracy as well, but as there is no change to your actual accuracy “Ranged” is the one that makes the most sense. Increasing this stat improves the damage output of your ranged attacks making you more dangerous from a distance when using aimed Ranged Attacks or even some heavy attacks from Iron Man, Hawkeye & Kate Bishop.
  • PROFICIENCY – Proficiency is the combination of 2 stats that you might see in other games: Critical Chance & Perk Chance, which is exactly what you’d expect, critical attacks can double your damage when they land and Perk Chance is how often your gear Perks will activate.
  • VALOR – Valor in Avengers is also a combination of 2 things: Heroic Effectiveness and Critical Damage. Heroic Effectiveness governs your special abilities or Heroics. Since this stat increases both your Heroics and the critical damage, this stat is a general priority if you’re focusing on a high damage build. As with Proficiency, Valor scales Melee, Ranged & the Heroic rating but only directly affects the base damage of Heroics.
  • RESOLVE – Resolve encompasses 2 things as well, both your Max Willpower and Willpower Recovery. If you missed it earlier, Willpower in Marvel’s Avengers is Health, so if you find yourself being a little squishier than you’d like, focusing on Resolve might help!
  • RESILIENCE – Simply put, Resilience is Defense. Resilience increases your Armor % which in turn reduces the damage you take.
  • INTENSITY – Intensity covers both Stun & Status Meter Damage % and is basically how quickly can you fill the Stun meter that appears over an enemy’s head, which indicates that you can perform Takedowns on them or other Signature Attacks from specific Heroes. It also governs how quickly you can fill a Status meter to apply a Status effect on an enemy, which can have a variety of benefits depending on the Status you inflict, but also means you can trigger the Battery Effect even quicker. More on the Battery Effect below.

Thank you to @BobDuckNWeave for writing this section!

Here’s a tip from Discord user RerezzedF:

You may notice that some of the stats on current type of gear is fixed or rolls within a group of certain stats. Here’s a list of some possible stat rolls for existing gear currently (you may have old gear which don’t follow this pattern) that I’ve noticed with the help of the community.
2-3 stats out of the following:  

1) Hivemind/Storm/Tachyon – Slot 1-4: Might, Precision, Intensity, Valor  

2) Omega – Slot 1-4: Might, Precision, Resolve, Proficiency  

3) Named/Vibranium/Sonic/Jarvis Barrier Legendaries:

  • Slot1: Might, Proficiency, Resilience 
  • Slot2: Precision, Proficiency, Intensity 
  • Slot3: Resolve, Resilience, Intensity 
  • Slot4: Valor, Resolve, Precision
     

Perks

Perks are special effects on certain pieces of gear that will drastically alter and improve how your Hero plays depending on what you equip. Always think about what kind of build you want to go for, whether that’s the most damage or something as fun as sending enemies flying around you. Perks found on gear can be found for all Heroes or are Hero-specific.

The list of Perks on each piece of gear can be viewed on its tooltip. The amount of Perks on a piece of gear varies. Common gear has no Perks while Legendary gear has 3. In order to unlock some Perks, you must upgrade your piece of gear. Please look at our Upgrade Gear section above for a guide on how the system works.

Avengers Science Table has a growing list of all Perks that can be found on each Hero. Check them out!

 

Status Effects

Status Effects are broken down into two categories. These are positive and negative. The best way to think of this are warm colours and cold colours. By combining positive and negative status effects your damage is amplified more-so than it would be if just using one status effect by itself. (Thanks to @HighrulerLive for writing this section.)

Positive:

  • Cosmic 
    • The Cosmic Status Effect focuses on empowering heroes. While active, the Cosmic Status Effect will heal the hero a small percentage each time they hit an enemy.
    • Some Cosmic gear will also add Heroic and Intrinsic charge gain on top of healing.
  • Pym 
    • Pym Particles shrink enemies down to size. When the Pym Particle Status Effect is triggered, enemies shrink and their impact resistance and damage output are reduced.
  • Plasma 
    • Plasma ignites enemies in burning flames, doing continuous damage over time. While active, the Plasma Status Effect periodically triggers an area of effect (AOE) Plasma burst that damages the target and does Plasma damage to all enemies in range.
    • If a Plasma afflicted enemy is defeated, this triggers a larger AOE Plasma burst that also Staggers and Breaks Block on enemies in range.
  • Vibranium 
    • Vibranium has the ability to store energy and release it in a concentrated burst. The Vibranium Status Effect will trigger an area of effect (AOE) burst when an enemy is defeated or when the Vibranium Status Effect wears off.
    • The amount of damage done by the AOE builds up based on the amount of damage dealt to targets while the Status Effect was active.

Negative:

  • Gamma 
    • Gamma radiation poisons enemies, dealing damage over time. While afflicted with the Gamma Status Effect, enemies take damage and can spread Gamma poisoning to nearby enemies as well.
    • If a Gamma afflicted enemy is defeated, this triggers a Gamma explosion that Staggers and poisons enemies in range.
  • Cryo 
    • Cryo freezes and slows enemies, making them vulnerable to attack. While the Cryo Status Effect is active, the target’s movement and attacks are slowed.
    • If a Cryo afflicted enemy is defeated it triggers a Cryo explosion that also Staggers enemies nearby.
  • Shock 
    • The Shock Status Effect electrifies enemies, making them vulnerable to attack. While active, this Status Effect increases the chance of Critical Hits and all attacks deal extra damage.
  • Sonic 
    • The Sonic Status Effect pulls energy from afflicted targets. The hero will gain Heroic and Intrinsic energy while standing near an enemy with an active Sonic Status Effect.
       

Major Artifacts

Major Artifacts are a type of gear that have unique effects and Perks, which can all be activated and used in combat. On PlayStation, activating a Major Artifact is done by pressing L3+R3 together. Major Artifacts are also shared amongst all your Heroes, although they must be upgraded individually using Polychoron. While Major Artifacts don’t have a designated Power Level, they do add additional Power Levels to your total, which means it is well worth the upgrades, especially due to how important they can be in combat.

Here are a list of current Major Artifacts, their effects, and where you get them:

  • Sacred Norn Stone of Lethal Will 
    • Resolve of the Einherjar: % increased Critical Chance when the Damage Boost is active
    • Skuld’s Foresight: Increased duration of all Damage Buffs by 4 seconds
    • Tyr’s Offense: Activate for a Damage Boost (On PlayStation, activate using L3+R3)
    • LOCATION: Reassemble Campaign
  • Tactigon 
    • Routed: % increased damage on enemies affected by any status
    • Exploit: % increased status damage from all attacks
    • Quell: Activate to trigger an explosion that deals exploit damage on enemies affected by any status and increases all status against any unaffected enemies hit
    • LOCATION: Reassemble Campaign
  • Darkhold 
    • Axiom of Brutality: Activate to drain all Heroic energy to restore all Health
    • Eldritch Invocation: Activate when over 50% Willpower to drain Willpower to critical levels and charge all Heroics
    • Precept of Entropy: Activate at full Willpower and with a full Heroic meter to drain both sources to 50% and create a damage explosion
    • LOCATION: Complete the Reigning Supreme Mission Chain
  • Ring of Nibelung 
    • Bountiful: Increases amount restored by all orbs by 11%
    • Surplus: 1% Chance defeating enemies will produce a random orb of any type
    • Cornucopia: Activate to generate a random bounty of Regen Packs, Heroic Orbs, or Intrinsic Orbs
    • LOCATION: Complete all Heroic Mission Chains (Previously Iconic Mission Chains)
  • Vishanti Appendix XIII 
    • Subsistence of Shadows: % Increased Willpower Recovery Effectiveness while Invisible
    • Eclipsed Ambition: % Chance Melee Critical Attacks will extend the duration of active Invisibility abilities
    • Crytorryk Spell of Invisibility: Activate to conjure an obscuring illusion that triggers Invisibility
    • LOCATION: Complete the Taking AIM Operation
  • Void-Tech Transponder 
    • Particle Accelerator: Increases the amount of Particle damage dealt with any attack by 30%
    • Distress Signal: Activate to summon Hank Pym to attack enemies with Particle damage
    • Pym-Particle Ionizer: Increases the duration of active Particle status effects by 6 seconds
    • LOCATION: Complete the Future Imperfect Operation
  • Kimoyo Band 
    • Auxiliary Bead: Increases the amount of Vibranium damage dealth with any attack by 30%
    • Enhanced Bead: Increases the radius and damage of Vibranium status effect damage by 20%
    • Communication Bead: Activate to summon Okoye to attack enemies with Vibranium damage
    • LOCATION: Complete the War for Wakanda Operation

Upgrading and Currency

Upgrading Gear

This process and resources is currently being reworked later this year in 2021, but here is how it works now.

Only gear that is Uncommon or higher can be upgraded. Uncommon gear can be upgraded 3 times, Rare gear can be upgraded 5 times while Epic, Legendary, and Exotic gear can be upgraded 10 times. The bottom of the tooltip where it says “Next Boost” is how many times that particular piece of gear can be upgraded. Upgrading a piece of gear increases its Power Level and unlocks Perks.

At the bottom of each tooltip, it will tell you what resources you’ll need to upgrade that piece of gear. The lower Power Level gear requires resources such as Nanite, Nanotype, Catalyst, and Plasma. We suggest not upgrading gear until you have a piece that really speaks to you in the higher Power Levels. Here’s a list of all the resources that you may need and what they’re used to upgrade.

Resources and Currency

Fragments

  • Buy gear and trade-in resources at the vendor.
  • Acquired by dismantling, opening resource crates and chests.

Nanite, Nanotype, Catalyst, and Plasma

  • Used to upgrade various pieces of gear.
  • Acquired by destroying crates around maps, trading in your fragments at vendors and defeating enemies.

Uru

  • Used to upgrade your Minor Artifacts.
  • Acquired from mission completion (Drop Zones) and chests.

Upgrade Modules

  • Used to upgrade gear pieces that are Power Level 130+.
  • Acquired by missions, dismantling gear and chests (especially DNA chests).

Polychoron

  • Used to upgrade your Major Artifacts.
  • Acquired from various missions (OLT, Beating the Odds, Mega Hive) as well as the daily missions from the faction terminal.

DNA Key

  • Used to open DNA chests.
  • Acquired from Elite Villain Sectors, Flashback Villain Sectors and Villain Sectors.

Units

  • Can spend this at Chasity (the cosmetic vendor) in the Helicarrier.
  • Acquired from chests, the Challenge Card and Faction Rewards.

Credits

  • The currency you buy and earned in the Challenge Cards.
  • Used in the Marketplace.

Thank you to @HighrulerLive for providing the list of currency!

If you want a detailed breakdown of gear, including named sets, where to farm certain gear, and a list of Perks, head to the Avengers Science Table, managed by /u/frobones from Reddit.

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