Best Dragon Quest XI characters

Jade leads the Dragon Quest XI ranking with 1268 ELO points over 19 duels, ahead of Erik at 1258 and Veronica at 1242.

The ranking's tightest race sits at the top, where Jade edges out Erik by just 10 points despite facing fewer duels. Veronica claims third with 1242 ELO after 29 duels, winning 59 percent of her matchups. Below the podium, a sharp divide appears: 65 ELO points separate Serena in fourth place from Rab in fifth, the largest gap across all positions. This split suggests the party's four top contenders form a tier apart from the rest. At the bottom, The Hero languishes in sixth with 1141 ELO despite being the protagonist, winning only 40 percent of duels. Sylvando trails at 1094 points with a 33 percent win rate. The community clearly favors companions over the silent lead, an unusual outcome that reveals player preference for characters with stronger personalities and more expressive dialogue. Erik's 56 percent win rate and Serena's 54 percent show consistent performance even as their ELO scores differ.

This ranking draws from 342 duels completed by 29 players across all 7 playable characters, updated on 12 October 2026. Head to the Dragon Quest XI TopList to cast your own votes and shift the standings. Each duel between two characters adjusts their scores, so your choices shape the hierarchy directly.

Updated on October 12, 2026

How this ranking is computed

Every duel won lifts a contender and every loss drops them, by an amount that depends on the opponent's strength: beating the leader is worth more than beating the last. It is an ELO, the same principle as in chess. Duels are not drawn at random — an adaptive entropy sort puts the least predictable match-ups first, which settles the ranking far faster than a full round robin. A worldwide ranking is only published past 30 completed plays. Known limit: a contender who has faced few opponents keeps an approximate score, and the bottom of the table moves more than the podium.

How our rankings are made →