I know a lot of people have built Blaze Dingo, but I’d be certain that I’m pretty much the only person who’s actually, seriously built the original Dingo. Yes, I mean it; I have, in fact, built the crazy redhead chef. Now, you may be asking me: “why did you build him?”

…Because I wanted to.

I have both Dingo and Blaze Dingo, and I’ve fully built and extensively used them both. Now, that’s not to say that I’m going to sing praises about them, or say they’re the best units ever. There’s a lot of stuff holding both units back, and we’ll be talking about the pros and cons of both. Yes, that’s right: this is a duo review! Each section will be split into two parts – one part for Dingo, and one for Blaze Dingo.

For the rest of this article, I’m going to refer to Blaze Dingo as Blingo, so it doesn’t get annoying.

With that said, let’s begin.

Introduction

Dingo

“A genius holding the power of inferno in his hands after swearing a compact with Malicus, the Lord of Fire, Dingo became a chef to make full use of his abilities. He sees all living creatures as potential ingredients.”

Class: Warrior

Element: Fire

In a nutshell, Dingo’s skillset is:

• S1: Has a 50% chance to inflict Bleed when maxed, 30% chance to activate his S2 after his S1. (Can also be soulburned for an extra turn)
• S2: Attacks all enemies, with a 100% chance (when maxed) to inflict Burn on enemies with Bleed on. Also heals himself proportional to the damage dealt
• S3: Dispels all debuffs off all allies, increases everyone’s Crit Chance for 2 turns, decreases everyone’s skill cooldown for 1 turn, grants himself an extra turn, AND decreases his s3’s cooldown every time an enemy dies

Blaze Dingo

“Originally far from what anyone would consider a normal Human, he is now a completely normal upstanding member of society. Every word out of his mouth is considerate and he has impeccable manners.”

Class: Soul Weaver

Element: Light

In a nutshell, Blingo’s skillset is:

• S1: Attacks an enemy, healing the ally with the lowest HP proportional to the damage dealt
• S2: Attacks all enemies, healing the ally with the lowest HP proportional to the damage dealt. Additionally, if he lands a critical hit on anyone, he’ll also trigger his S1 and attack a random enemy with it. (Still heals)
• S3: Grants Invincibility and Attack Buff on himself and a chosen ally, along with healing them both proportional to his ATK stat

Blingo also has an Exclusive Equipment, increasing his Defense from 7-14%. The benefits from the EE can be selected from one of the three:

• A critical hit on his S1 will dispel a debuff off of him and an ally. Still procs if his S2 triggers his s1
• Increases his Defense for 2 turns after using his S2
• Gives himself Greater ATK buff when using his s3

Analysis

Alright, listen, I’m going to be honest. Both Dingo and Blingo have flaws in their kit and stats that mean they aren’t the perfect units, and that there would be better alternatives to both. Dingo especially is considered to be a not-so-great unit, and I’m sure many people would be surprised that I’ve built him. But yes, I actually did – I built both Dingoes.

Dingo’s skillset is all about being a supportive unit, with some backup damage over time. However, he’s held back by his abysmal ATK stat – it’s unusually low for a Warrior, which also directly harms how much damage his Burn and Bleeds can do. Remember that both effects scale directly off of the caster’s Attack (vs. Poison, which is 5% of the enemy’s Max HP.) One of my other gripes about him is that his AI is very bad – when he starts the battle, his immediately priority is to hit his S3 and then trigger his s2. In other words, he cleanses and refreshes cooldown when no one’s debuffed or has their cooldowns up, and then uses his Burn skill when no one has Bleed.

However, I will say that Dingo’s s3 does have a very short cooldown – when skilled up, it’s 5 turns. The cooldown decrease applies to him, making it 4 turns, and then the extra turn makes it 3 turns. Finding places to use him can be difficult, but I’ve pulled it off over all this time.

Blingo, meanwhile, is very interesting. Even though he’s a Soul Weaver, his gimmick is his high damage output and the fact he heals based off of it. I think he’s one of the only Soul Weavers who deals damage to heal, actually. The only other unit I can think of whose role is similar is Guider Aither, and he’s a Mage unit.  However, he suffers from multiple things: His base stats are very low, especially his HP, and his ATK stat isn’t the best, either. However, I will say that it is decent for a Soul Weaver. He also has no cleanse in his base kit, and you need his s1 EE for it.

Blingo’s Exclusive Equipment is weirdly focused on his Defense. If you’ve noticed, the stat it enhances is his DEF, and his S2 buff also increases his Defense. He doesn’t scale off of his Defense for any of his skills – it’s essentially all in his ATK and Crit DMG – so I can’t help but ask: why?

Where to Use the Dingoes?

Now, I know I’ve just made both Dingoes sound pretty unappealing in the Analysis section, but they’re actually really decent units! Dingo may not be the #1 top-tier, “must pull for him immediately” unit, but if you’re playing pretty casually or want to mess with some niche heroes, then Dingo can be a very fun unit to use. Blingo has seen more usability than fire Dingo, though, and many people will build him instead.

Dingo

Dingo isn’t the best unit to use in PvE. You can’t put him in Wyvern (Non-Ice units are punished there), the Banshee Queen will eat him alive (fire against Ice), Caides Hunt is just a place that shouldn’t be farmed, and he’s never really seen in Azimanik Hunt – I don’t think he’s bad in it, but I’ve never tried it and there are other options – even with his S2.

This leaves him in one Hunt to use – Golem. A.K.A. another Hunt that no one really farms. I don’t know if he’s any good in Earth Expedition? I’ve never used him there, but I’ve also never heard anyone saying that he’s good there, so I don’t have any room to talk.

I’ve used him in my general Adventure team, lower-level Arena, Golem, and even some floors on Abyss! Seriously, Dingo’s cleanse saved my butt a lot in a few floors; he’d also refreshed some of my Tamarinne’s cooldown for her to hit her s3 faster as well. He did fall off at around Floor 90, though, and I haven’t used him since then; however I can attribute to him being a big reason as to why I even got past a lot of Abyss floors.

The point is, Dingo can be used, but you’d have to actively work at it. Once you do, though, he’s really fun to toy around with!

Blaze Dingo

Okay, Blaze Dingo can actually get a lot more usability. I’ve seen him used around a lot, but mostly in PVP. He’s a Light element unit, for starts, so he’s not really burdened by Hunt element disabilities. Granted, you still don’t want to take him into Wyvern Hunt; apart from a few units, bringing any non-Ice units in your team is considered to be a really bad idea.

Blingo is considered to be pretty good in Azimanik Hunt, though – Light versus dark, AoE attack on his s2, massive heals (especially with Daydream Joker), the list goes on. For me, I use Blingo in Banshee 13, Azimanik 13, my general Adventure team, and in Abyss as a backup damage dealer/healer. Blingo ended up being a source of damage in Abyss 90, so I’ll vouch for using him there.

A lot of people use him in Arena, actually; a lot more than people use Dingo in general. I think people do use Blingo + Ludwig teams, since Ludwig penetrates defense by a total 30% whenever he has Invincibility on. It also helps that Blingo gives Attack buff, giving more damage for Ludwig.

Builds

Dingo

The main stats that you’d want to aim for on Dingo’s right-side gear depends on what you’re going to build him for. You’ll always want his boots to be SPD, though. There are two ways that you could build him: Fast, high-HP cleanser or a backup damage dealer with cleanse. I’ve personally built him in the latter. Dingo’s not really a unit used be a ton of people, so no one’s managed to gather up enough info to make a one-size-fits-all build.

However, with the damage build, I’ve found out that this stat-set works pretty nicely:

• 3,500 ATK
• 250-300% Crit Damage
• Anywhere from 50-100% Crit Rate
• 190 Speed
• At least 65% Effectiveness

I can’t say anything about the fast cleansing build, because I’ve never tried it before.

The bare minimum Crit Rate may sound like a terrible idea, but you need to remember that Dingo puts Crit Rate buff on all of his teammates with his s3, including himself. The Crit Rate buff gives you an extra 50% C.Rate, meaning that as long as you have at least 50% Crit Rate on everyone (including Dingo), they’ll be guaranteed to make crits. Here’s a brief run-down of a couple builds that you could use Dingo on:

Attack (or Destruction)/Crit – The optimal Dingo build. You can use the free Attack set on him, or (once you get stronger), Destruction instead of Attack. Right-side gear would be ATK%/CRIT DMG%/SPD. Aim for the damage build stats I’ve just mentioned.

Speed/Hit – I’ve seen only a few Dingoes built like this, but this is more along the lines of the tanky, fast-cleanse Dingo build (which still isn’t really recommended). The right-side gear for him would be about HP%/Effectiveness%/SPD with this.

Blaze Dingo

Blaze Dingo has a lot more info on him than Dingo does, but he’s very stat-hungry. With Blingo, you pretty much need just about every stat except Effectiveness (and maybe Effect Resistance) on him. As I’ve already mentioned, Blingo’s base stats are pretty low, especially his HP, so all those stats are necessary. I’ve looked around at a bunch of Blingo builds, and I’ve figured out that the optimal Blingo stats are about:

• 9000-10,000 HP
• 3,000 ATK
• 300%+ Critical Damage
• 95%-100% Critical Rate
• 190 Speed

For his Exclusive Equipment, either his S1 dispel or his Greater Attack S3 is optimal, though I’d recommend the dispel.

These are two sets to use for him:

Destruction/Crit – The optimal Blaze Dingo build. You’ll want to aim for the stats that I’ve mentioned up above. Destruction and Crit will make it easier to get the Crit DMG and Crit Rate. Right-side gear would be ATK%/CRIT DMG%/SPD.  Remember to give him HP, too!

Attack/Crit – However, I’ve also noticed that there’s another build you can use for him in early-game, where you ignore his Crit Damage and crank up his ATK and Speed. You basically want to get him at 100% Crit Rate (so he triggers his S2 into his S1 and applies his S1 Exclusive Equipment cleanse), as much ATK as possible, and about 170-180 Speed. Now, I’d like to admit that’s not the most optimal Blingo build; however, it did pull me through early game, and you should change Blingo’s build to the optimal stats as soon as you can. ATK/Crit Rate%/SPD. Make sure to swap Crit Rate with Crit DMG% as soon as you can, though.

Artifacts

Dingo

El’s Fist – Yes, I know, “haha big gauntlet man gets big gauntlet artifact.” But this seriously does work on him! He gets faster and stronger as his HP goes lower, meaning that his Burns and Bleeds do more damage, and he can get to cleanse more with his s3! I used El’s Fist on him for the longest time, before I got a Junkyard Dog to put on Dingo. It worked really well on him, too, so I can give this the personal Sara Seal of Approval™.

Junkyard Dog – [LIMITED ARTIFACT] Okay, listen, maybe this isn’t the best Artifact to use on him? My line of thought was that, because it makes people Burn on their S1, there is a chance for Dingo to land both the Bleed and Burn.  Now, does it enhance his s2 in any way, shape or form? No. But it is an extra Burn, so who knows? If only Torn Sleeve were Warrior-exclusive.

Creation & Destruction – I read somewhere once that Dingo may be the only unit who can use Creation & Destruction without absolutely relying on it in his kit (therefore making how he plays rely on the RNG aspect of the artifact, which would cause him to be either absolutely broken or useless). As such, I say he can be pretty fun on it!

Blaze Dingo

It’s worth noting that Blingo is one of the only Soul Weaver units as of this writing who would benefit more from damage-based artifacts than actual Soul Weaver artifacts.

Daydream Joker – Daydream Joker is literally one of the best artifacts for Blingo if you’re using him in PVE. Daydream Joker will increase his damage by a ton, since he deals more damage based off of the enemy’s Max HP. Considering how most PVE bosses have a ton of HP… well, you can see where this is going. It’s important to note, though, that a few PVE zones now have gimmicks that block damage based off of enemy Max HP, and this artifact scales way better off of Blingo’s Crit Damage, so you may not get the best results without Crit DMG%.

Portrait of the Saviors – [LIMITED ARTIFACT] Basically the Daydream Joker recommendation, but used more for PVP builds.

Other Soul Weaver artifacts, like Wondrous Potion Vial or Celestine can work on him, but I’d seriously recommend Daydream Joker or Portrait of the Saviors.

Should You Build?

Now, the answer for both of the Dingoes is a lot more complicated than an instant “yes” or “no.” For Dingo, I really wouldn’t recommend building him unless you either have a specific niche for him to shine in, you really like him, or are late-game and want a new toy to build. However, I can and will say that he’s very fun to play with, and has filled a few spots that I’m sure that a Soul Weaver could, but I don’t care; he’s fun.

As for Blingo, he sees a lot more usability than Dingo, but a lot of people still don’t consider him to be a very top-tier unit. He can be used in a bunch of different places, but I will admit that there are better units than him. Despite that, if you like either of the Dingoes enough to build them, then I say go for it! Half the fun of the game is building the units that not a lot of people look at, and getting use out of them. I hope this article helped you out, and in the meantime, I’m Sara Ann, and I’ll see you in the next article!