Best Combat Pals in Palworld 1.0: Full S-Tier and A-Tier List

Five Pals define the current combat meta in Palworld 1.0: Jetragon, Xenolord, Necromus, Paladius, and Frostallion. Among Pals you can actually get without raiding, Jormuntide Ignis and Blazamut Ryu hit hardest. None of them guarantees a win by itself, though. Combat is built around nine elements that counter each other, so the Pals worth catching first are the ones that cover a hole in your current squad rather than whichever one has the biggest number on its stat card.

This guide breaks down the strongest combat Pals by tier, shows you the best pick for each element, and covers the partner skills and passives that decide whether a Pal punches above or below its rank.

S-Tier: The Pals That Carry Endgame Fights

These are the Pals that carry you through raids, towers, and the final boss.

Jetragon leads the pack as the fastest flyer in the game and the go-to aerial nuke. Its Aerial Missile partner skill delivers homing damage from range, though it can’t stun bosses, so you’ll want a stunner alongside it.

Xenolord comes from the raid boss system and offers the highest damage ceiling in the game through Meteor Wings and its Omega Laser skill.

Necromus and Paladius are a matched pair found together in the Desiccated Desert. Necromus outruns every other ground mount and hits just as hard in melee, and Paladius sits alongside it as a Neutral-type bruiser that isn’t weak to anything on the type chart.

Frostallion is your answer once Dragon-type enemies start showing up everywhere in the late game. Riding it converts your attacks to Ice through its Ice Steed skill, and the Noct variant offers the same trick with Dark damage instead.

Jormuntide Ignis tops the non-legendary Fire lineup. Beyond its raw attack, it gets a damage bonus specifically against enemies that are already burning, and it pulls double duty as one of the best Kindling workers you can staff at a base.

Shadowbeak closes out the S-tier list as the pick that asks the least of you. Its Dark Laser and boosted Dark damage do the work without any timing tricks or setup requirements.

Anubis earns its slot by being good at two jobs at once. Its dodge-and-slam combo, Sidestep into a heavy Ground Smash, makes it a dependable melee fighter, and the same body doubles as one of the best crafters you can put to work at your base.

A-Tier: Easier to Catch, Still Hits Hard

A-tier Pals are far easier to obtain than the legendaries and close the gap with the right passives.

Orserk stands out for its Ferocious Thunder Dragon partner skill, which stacks a 5% attack and defense boost per bullet landed, up to 30 stacks. Pair it with any ranged weapon and a DPS Pal, and your damage output climbs fast.

Suzaku and Faleris both bring strong Fire coverage in the air, with Faleris doubling as a Kindling worker and boosting Ice-Pal item drops through its Scorching Predator skill.

Grizzbolt gives you a high-HP Electric bruiser that’s simple to acquire early, while Bastigor is the most accessible Ice tank outside the legendaries thanks to its high HP pool.

Neptilius is the strongest new water Pal from 1.0. It hits hard against Fire enemies and doubles as the best water mount in the game.

Solenne isn’t ranked on the general tier lists, but it’s worth building around for one reason: it carries the highest Handiwork level of any Pal in the game and buffs your own attack while it sits in your party, as long as every other Pal with you is a different species. The size of that buff varies by source. One breakdown puts it at a flat 80%, while another ties it to Solenne’s own star rank, starting around 30% and climbing to 80% once Solenne is fully starred up. Either way, the requirement is the same: keep your party made up of unique species.

Best Combat Pal for Every Element

Because element decides so much of your damage output, the smartest way to build a roster is one strong Pal per type.

You won’t field all nine at the same time, and you don’t need to. What matters is having a counter on hand when a fight calls for it, an Ice Pal you can send out against Dragons, a Dark Pal for the crowds of Neutral enemies. Switch your active Pal to whatever answers the enemy in front of you, and fights that would otherwise drag on end quickly instead.

What a Partner Skill Actually Does in a Fight

Two Pals with identical stats can perform completely differently in a fight once you factor in what their partner skill actually does.

Take mobility as an example. Necromus and Paladius both come with a dash attack built into their signature moves, Twin Spears on one and Spear Thrust on the other, which lets you close distance on a boss instead of chasing it on foot. Anubis works the same way from a different angle: it has a sidestep to dodge incoming hits, then answers back with a heavy ground-pound attack of its own.

Elemental conversion is the other big category. Ride Frostallion or Frostallion Noct and your regular mounted attacks stop being neutral damage and start counting as Ice or Dark instead, which matters a lot against enemies weak to those types. Jetragon works differently again: its missile barrage hits from range and tracks targets on its own, but it won’t interrupt or stagger a boss the way a melee stun would, so it performs best paired with something that can.

Not every partner skill exists to deal damage, either. Faleris boosts how many items drop from Ice-type kills, which makes it worth keeping around even outside of tough fights, more as a farming shortcut than a combat pick.

Passives Beat Tier Rank

A Pal’s tier ranking tells you its potential, not what it’s actually hitting for in your save file. Two players can catch the same S-tier legendary and get very different results out of it depending on what passives ended up on that Pal.

Attack-boosting passives are where most of that gap comes from. Load a Pal up with Legend, Musclehead, and Ferocious, and a mid-tier body can start outperforming a legendary that never got the same treatment. Legend is the one worth chasing hardest, since it can be passed to offspring by breeding with a Legendary Pal, which means you can move it onto whichever body you actually want to fight with instead of settling for whatever creature happens to carry it naturally.

Update 1.0 gave you two more ways to push a Pal past its base numbers. Radiant Gems feed into an Awakening system that raises stats directly, no breeding required, and Mutations occasionally produce stronger variant eggs with better rolls than the standard version of that species.

Put simply, a Pal you already own and have bred well can outperform a fresh legendary catch. It’s usually worth spending time on the roster you have before chasing a new spawn point.

Where to Catch the Top Combat Pals

Most S-tier Pals come from specific spawns, raid fights, or breeding combinations rather than random encounters.

Jetragon spawns as a field boss at Mount Obsidian in the volcanic west. Bring an Ice-focused party and heat-resistant armor before you engage. Frostallion appears at the frozen lake in the Astral Mountains, so gear up with Fire Pals and cold-resistant armor instead. Necromus and Paladius spawn together in the Desiccated Desert and fight best at night, where Astegon can handle both at once.

Shadowbeak spawns at Wildlife Sanctuary No. 3, though you’ll need to wait out its spawn timer. Anubis can be fought as a desert field boss, but breeding a Vanwyrm with a Cinnamoth is the easier route if you’d rather skip the encounter. Xenolord and Bellanoir Libero only come from the raid boss system, so farming raids is the only path to either one.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

Prioritize covering your type gaps over stacking more S-tier bodies of the same element. A Dragon counter or a Neutral counter does more for your roster than a sixth Fire Pal.

If Jetragon is your main damage dealer, don’t take it into a boss fight without backup. Its missile barrage hits hard but doesn’t stagger anything, so bring along a Pal that can interrupt the boss while Jetragon keeps the pressure on. When you’re deciding between chasing a new legendary or improving what you already have, lean toward improving what you have first, since a few good passives close the gap faster than most new catches do. And don’t assume your strongest fighter belongs at your base. Combat stats and work stats are separate systems in Palworld, so a Pal built to fight often has mediocre base job stats, and staffing your base with your best fighters just wastes their combat potential. Play Now!

Frequently Asked Questions

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