Valve’s as-yet-unreleased Deadlock has been hitting new heights thanks to the Old Gods, New Blood update. Alongside new content, visual and map polishing, and quality-of-life changes, this update introduced the fast-paced 4v4 mode, Street Brawl.

Street Brawl, Deadlock’s casual mode, is exactly what the game needed to onboard new players and retain burnt-out veterans with a stress-free mode. This modified version of Deadlock is all-fights with no filler, even including its exclusive hero balancing just for this ruleset.

Our Deadlock character tier list is only for the standard mode of the game. For a game mode with different rules and goals to win, this is a definitive ranking of the Deadlock hero tier list for Street Brawl in 2026.

Deadlock Street Brawl tier list explained

Our Deadlock Street Brawl ranking is based on personal gameplay conducted during the current closed beta test, supplemented with data from third-party tracking sites. Heroes who are currently strong and overtuned will have a natural advantage in Street Brawl, but there are those who thrive within this one-late fight.

The best characters in Deadlock’s Street Brawl are those with impactful ultimates, who excel in teamfights, safely clear waves, and can sustain or heal up their teammates to prolong the battle. Another important trait is that they aren’t reliant on specific item builds, as they need to adapt to the random equipment and the occasional Deadlock Street Brawl legendary item.

On the contrary, heroes that are built for isolated fights or duelists will hardly find an opportunity in this mode. These are general rules to Street Brawl, but individual tuning and mastery still matter the most.

Deadlock Street Brawl tier list criteria 

This Deadlock Street Brawl tier list will use the reliable SABC tier system. S-Tier characters are the defining and essential characters for the mode. All the way down to C-Tier, where these characters should be avoided for the mode.

• S-Tier: The undisputed best heroes in Street Brawl. These characters form the backbone of the team and have a high impact throughout all rounds of the game.
• A-Tier: Strong pick. These characters are great, reliable picks for the mode.
• B-Tier: Good for specialists. Players who are comfortable with these characters can find some success, but need to work harder and smarter than the tiers above.
• C-Tier: Niche picks that have a hard time in this mode. Deadlock’s Street Brawl is a good mode to test out heroes in a live setting, but other than that reason, these heroes should be avoided.

Deadlock Street Brawl tier list in brief

In summary, the best heroes for Street Brawl Deadlock are Paige, Graves, and Victor. Their consistently high win rates are due to their kits, playstyle, and Street Brawl builds being perfect for the mode.

S-Tier

Graves is one of the newest heroes to arrive with the update, and her kit is already ideally suited to Deadlock’s Street Brawl. Focused on area denial, her abilities are perfect for breaking up the already tight space of the single lane through the use of Grasping Hands to cc and Jar of Dead for damage.

Graves’ ultimate, Borrowed Decree, can easily win the first two rounds on her own. Once deployed, the tombstone will pressure the enemy defenders and Guardians with a wave of exploding zombies.

Paige’s zone-control abilities excel in the clumped-up, tight teamfights present in Street Brawl. She’s a solid backliner who can control the fight with a lingering damage zone, reliable barriers for her frontliners, and a cc tool that can catch out overextended enemies. The one-lane battleground also means that her global ultimate will get the full empowered effect based on distance, which can guarantee a teamfight.

Victor is already a problematic character in a standard game of Deadlock, yet his weak early-mid game was controlled through macro play. But in Street Brawl, he gets stronger with items every round, and there isn’t anything teams can do about that. The enhanced and legendary items in Street Brawl also make him an even bigger threat in this mode.

A-Tier

Street Brawl highlights the importance of the roles in Deadlock, even if they aren’t formally assigned or categorised. Some of the best heroes in Deadlock’s Street Brawl are frontliners and initiators. Without them, there will be no one to decisively start the fight or hold back the heroes from approaching the Guardian or Walker.

If you’re looking for Deadlock Street Brawl tips, it’s a good idea to put time into heroes like Lash, Dynamo, Billy, Shiv, and Mo & Krill. Balance tuning may move the Street Brawl tier list around, but heroes who can take the heat or set up their team will always be relevant.

Ivy, Lady Geist, and McGinnis share the same strength, where they can shove waves quickly with their abilities. This is an important win condition for Street Brawl, as the ultimate goal of each round is to take out the opposing Guardian or Walker.

B-Tier

The Street Brawl B-tier is home to characters that are devastating with specialists who truly understand the strengths of their characters. Much like standard Deadlock, many of these characters in this tier are powerful but have skewed win rates due to their difficulty and complexity. 

Street Brawl is the ideal place to live-test these heroes, as long as you mentally prepare to lose a few fights because of a bad Kelvin ult, whiffing Sinclair’s weird skillshots, or mismanaging Mina’s cooldowns and immediately blowing up from her low health pool.

Characters like Haze, Drifter, and Calico are known for their single-target damage, but good players know exactly when to break away from the main fight to chase down the backline. For example, Drifter’s ultimate can block out vision for the team, which lets him dive into the more fragile targets.

Then the other category of heroes here are those that need a cohesive item path, which means they aren’t the most reliable heroes when dealing with Street Brawls items. Heroes like Yamato, Infernus, and Wraith are hindered in this mode because of it. 

C-Tier

The C-tier heroes in Deadlock’s Street Brawl are characters who are undertuned in the current patch or whose kits just don’t work well within the game modes’ ruleset.

Doorman is one of the best MOBA characters ever created, yet his tricky kit doesn’t have the space to shine in Street Brawl. With the whole team grouped up, he’ll have a miserable time looking for opportunities to use his signature door portal and his ultimate. 

Likewise, this is also the reason why heroes like Vyper, Paradox, and Holliday aren’t doing their best work in Street Brawl. These heroes have kits for roaming and pouncing on a target, or duelling isolated targets.

Vindicta and Mirage suffer the most from the randomised items in Street Brawl. These heroes have a specific build path that mixes both gun and spirit damage, which isn’t guaranteed in the mode. Additionally, these heroes don’t have the full potential of their ultimate, as Vindicta can’t gain bonus souls on execute, while Mirage doesn’t have a reason to teleport.

How to play Deadlock

The introduction of Deadlock’s Street Brawl mode makes it the perfect time to jump in. As the game is still in an invite-only phase, you’ll need to ask a Steam friend for an invite.

If you don’t know anyone playing in the closed beta, you can find helpful people on the Deadlock invite megathread and Deadlock Discord for invites.

Conclusion

Deadlock’s Street Brawl rule set shakes up the usual tier list from the standard mode. The emphasis on grouped up teamfighting and sieging means you’ll need heroes like Graves or Paige for your backline, and heroes like Abrams and Victor to soak up the damage.

Remember that this is considered a casual mode, which means this is the best time for practice and experimenting against real players. Use Street Brawl to shake off the fear of fighting; gain confidence as a player and in mastering your hero, before jumping into the standard mode.

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