Here are the basic principles of APC (also known as chariot or truck) modifications you should know first:
- You can open the APC modification menu by:
- Pressing the green APC icon on the left side of your screen and pressing “Modify.”
- Selecting one of your Garages and pressing “Modify.”
- Each APC can be replaced only by one Unlocked Chariot.
- Each APC has slots for gear parts you can equip.
- Each APC has a certain amount of energy that limits what gear parts you can equip.
- Gear parts provide stat bonuses and a unique Skill or Effect.
Now let’s look at each gear part you can equip, different APC bodies, and which gear combinations are the best and why.
Here’s our Hero Gear guide if you want to learn more about that.
APC Components
There are four main component types that you can equip on your APC:
- Engine
- Weapon
- Armor
- Accessory
Jumping ahead, every special APC you unlock (repair) will allow you to have one additional (unique) component installed. Those will be covered in the “APC Types” section.
Some of the basic principles to know here:
- Each gear type (slot) features three different components you can choose from.
- You can see all the car parts through the modification menu or your inventory’s “Car Parts” tab.
- You can upgrade components, increasing the stat bonus provided by the component and their energy consumption.
- The component’s effect reaches level two (S) after you upgrade it to level seven (current maximum level).
All the standard components are listed below with their characteristics. I use slashes (“/”) to indicate the skill or stat information on different levels. For example, stats change at every level, so there are seven numbers for each (if the stat is blocked, I use a hyphen). For skills, there are two levels – the second is unlocked after you upgrade the part to level seven.
Engines
| Air-Cooled Engine | Super-Exhaust Engine | V-Shaped Engine | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Skill Effect | The Energy Cap of the APC +10%; Effect of Weapon APC gear skills + 15 / 25% | For every 50 energy the APC consumes, the effect of Armor APC gear skills increases by 1 / 1.2% | When combat starts, every for 50 unused energy Heroes LUK +1 and APC Weapon skill + 3 / 6%. If more than 25% of energy is unused, effects of all APC parts last + 1 round. |
| Stat 1 | |||
| Stat 2 | |||
| Stat 3 | |||
Weapons
| Flamethrower | High-Speed Turret | Portable Missile Launcher | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Skill Effect | When the battle begins, deals 40 / 60% WPN DMG to all the enemies, turning them into a burning state, dealing 15 / 25% TAC DMG each round for 2 rounds. | Deals 60 / 100% WPN DMG to an enemy at the beginning of each round. | Deals 40 / 55% WPN DMG to all enemies for every three rounds. Each cast follows an increased amount of damage by 20% |
| Energy | 200 / 250 / 300 / 350 / 400 / 500 / 600 | 160 / 200 / 240 / 280 / 320 / 400 / 480 | 240 / 300 / 360 / 420 / 480 / 600 / 720 |
| Stat 1 | |||
| Stat 2 | |||
| Stat 3 | |||
Armors
| Fence Puncher | Thorn Barrier | Alloy Bumper | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Skill Effect | Increases the DEF of all allies by + 3 / 5%. Increases the ATK of all allies by + 5 / 10% at the first round, lasting 1 round. | Increase the DEF of all allies by + 5 / 8%. Increase the ATK of all allies by + 2 / 3% | Provides all allies with + 6 / 10% DMG Mitigation and -50 Lucky Points |
| Energy | 180 / 225 / 270 / 315 / 360 / 450 / 540 | 200 / 250 / 300 / 350 / 400 / 500 / 600 | 240 / 300 / 360 / 420 / 480 / 600 / 720 |
| Stat 1 | |||
| Stat 2 | |||
| Stat 3 | |||
Accessories
| Blocking and Interfering System | Jet System | Car First Aid Kit | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Skill Effect | Deals -10 / 15% DMG Bonus to a random enemy for every two rounds, lasting 1 round. | When the battle begins, increases all allies' Lucky Points by + 15 / 20 and DEF by -5%, lasting 2 rounds. | At the beginning of the 3rd, 6th and 9th rounds, recovers some HP equal to 30 / 60% of the TAC ATK for the allied Hero with the lowest HP and removes Burning, Poisoned, and Bleeding statuses |
| Energy | 220 / 275 / 330 / 385 / 440 / 550 / 660 | 180 / 225 / 270 / 315 / 360 / 450 / 540 | 200 / 250 / 300 / 350 / 400 / 500 / 600 |
| Stat 1 | |||
| Stat 2 | |||
| Stat 3 | |||
How to Get Car Parts
As of now, there aren’t many ways to get APC parts:
- Compete in the Infinity Arena to get random parts of a random level and some Mortal Coins. The further you get in the arena, the better the rewards.
- Exchange Mortal Coins in the Trade Center (Desperado Shop). It doesn’t matter which one you choose – the 50-coin box or the 800-coin one – it takes 16 level-three parts to create one level-five part, and 16*50 = 800.
- Open these on Tuesdays for more duel points.
- Get a Random Advanced Part Kit at Desperado Shop for 350 diamonds. I believe this is not worth it unless you have heaps of spare diamonds you don’t know where to spend. The RNG here can be terrible.
- Buy the Armed Forces pack at the Supply Station (Weekly Special). However, it’s $100 for one level-five part, so I do not believe this is worth the money.
Upgrading APC Gear
You can access the interface for APC gear upgrading in three ways:
- Inventory → Car Parts → Choose the part → Level Up
- Press the green APC icon on the left side of your screen → Modify → Yellow icon with a gear and a wrench on the left → Tap the part slot → Tap the part to modify → Level Up
- Select one of your Garages → Modify → Yellow icon with a gear and a wrench on the left → Tap the part slot → Tap the part to modify → Level Up
To upgrade an APC gear part to the next level, you will need three parts of the same slot type and quality level. For instance, you will need three grey engines of any type to upgrade any other grey engine to a blue one.
Quick math for upgrading:
- To get one purple part, you will need four blue parts, which is 16 green parts, which is 64 grey parts.
- To get one orange part, you will need 4 purple parts, which is 16 blue parts, which is 64 green parts, which is 256 grey parts.
- To get one red part, you will need 4 orange parts, which is 16 purple parts, which is 64 blue parts, which is 256 green parts, which is 1024 grey parts.
- Finally, to get one gold part, you will need 4 red parts, which is 16 orange parts, which is 256 purple parts, which is 1024 blue parts, which is 4096 grey parts.
Let’s say you complete eight rounds of Infinity Arena every day. In this case, you will get 16 Mortal Coins every day and somewhere from 16 grey parts to eight green and eight blue parts daily. Let’s use grey parts as a unit to measure all other parts. This way, we can say that you will get somewhere from 16 to 160 grey parts, which is 88 grey parts daily on average, in a perfect universe. Under these conditions, you will get 480 Mortal Coins and 2650 grey parts a month. With those coins, you can buy nine blue parts of your choice, which translates to 144 grey parts. So, in a perfect universe, you will get 2794 grey parts a month.
You might be thinking, “Wow, I can get one gold part in two months. That’s not bad at all!” But you’re wrong. Don’t forget that you get parts of different types, randomly. Only the ones you buy in the Trade Center can be chosen by type. So, again, in a perfect universe, you will need four times that number (4096*4/2794 = ~5.8 months) to be certain that you will get one gold part for each slot. Again, this will be faster if you clear more than eight Infinite Arena levels daily.
There is also an option to Mass Upgrade all parts that can be upgraded.
When upgrading parts, I recommend the following:
- Mass upgrade only up to Rare quality until all your APCs have at least three Epic parts each.
- After the first Mass Upgrade, do another one instantly because there will be new options after the first one.
- Upgrade the engine first to get more energy for other parts.
- Once you get your main APC’s engine to epic, do the same for your other APCs, but once you have three Epic engines besides your main one, use them to upgrade your main APC’s engine further. Having your main APC with stronger parts is more important than distributing it evenly among all APCs.
- Do this on Tuesdays for more dule points.
APC Body Types
You can check your available APCs at the bottom of the modification factory. The workshops you switch between are basically your Garage 1, 2, and so on.
Or, you can go to the Event Center and find Armed Forces. Once there, press the yellow Repair button and press Go under one of the locked APC types. Then, press Repair once again.
To unlock any of the locked APC types, you will have to repair them fully with Chariot Components. You can get up to five Chariot Components daily by mopping up regular zombies (usually takes 40-50 zombies), and you can also buy them in packs ($10 for ten or $100 for 100).
| APC Name | Repair Cost \ Time to get for free | Base Energy |
|---|---|---|
| Regular APC | 0 \ 0 days | 800 |
| Plunderer | 100 \ 20 days | 1080 |
| Armed Chariot | 500 \ 100 days | 1080 |
| Iron Fist | 500 \ 100 days | 1080 |
| New World Protector | 800 \ 160 days | 1080 |
| Demon | 1000 \ 200 days | 1080 |
| Neon | 100 Rare Components \ ??? days | 1080 |
| Hero Rally | Obtainable during The Boys Event | 1080 |
Currently, there are eight APC body types that you can have:
Regular APC
Armed Chariot
Plunderer
Iron Fist
Update 1.318.001 added a new APC – New World Protector – that costs 800 parts to repair.
It has a unique accessory part – Potential Energy Barrier – that “Creates 1 energy barrier in each round for a random hero in your lineup, reducing damage taken from enemies’ next attack by 30%. A triggered barrier raises the hero’s next DMG dealt by 15%.”
I’ve seen it working decently versus lineups with Heytex in position one or two, but the shield must shield the hero who you don’t want to die from Heytex AND not be removed by any other attack. This seems pretty inconsistent to me. Also, if you want to use the damage buff that you receive after the shield drops, you will also have to be very lucky or use a four-hero lineup for better chances. This is a rare lineup to see, but the core idea is to have it on Heytex, who will then deal tons of damage.
In conclusion, New World Protector and Iron Fist are both good choices for slow lineups (focused on defense, not initiative), but the Iron Fist APC seems more consistent with its effects than NWP, which relies largely on random luck.
Later on, they added two more chariots: Demon and Neon. (The Neon Demon reference?)
Neon Chariot
Neon APC is a P2W garbage that can only be obtainable with real money ($1000 if paid without any gimmicks). Looks cool, though.
Demon Chariot
Demon Chariot is decent. It postpones the enemy’s skill usage by reducing their Focus. Good for a Casino lineup.
During The Boys Christmas event, you could obtain (essentially buy) another APC – Hero Rally.
Looks cool but is useless. This one, though, has The Boy’s skins (coatings) that (again) look cool but do nothing else. Its turret adds travel speed and destruction might, which is useful only maybe when you want to take a city a bit faster.
Unique Parts
| Unique Part | Slot | APC | Skill |
|---|---|---|---|
| Heavy Turret | Weapon | Armed Chariot | When the battle begins, deals 30 / 50% WPN DMG to all enemies and reduces their DEF by -10/15%, lasting 2 rounds. |
| Iron Barrier | Armor | Iron Fist | When the battle begins, provides all allies with +15 / 20 % DMG Mitigation that increases by -5% at the end of each round, lasting 3 rounds |
| Extra Large Trunk | Accessory | Plunderer | Lineup Gathering Speed + 15 / 30% and Load + 15 / 30% when gathering. |
| Potential Energy Barrier | Accessory | New World Protector | Creates 1 energy barrier in each round for a random hero in your Lineup, reducing damage taken from enemies' next attack by -30% / -50%. A triggered barrier raises the hero's next DMG (dealt) by +15%/+25% |
| Demon's Flame | Weapon | Demon | In round 1, applies the "Demon" status to all enemy targets for 2 rounds, making them take some DMG equal to 40 / 60% ATK each and their Focus reduced by 30 / 50%. |
| Neon Rear Wing | Weapon | Neon | At the beginning of a battle, makes all heroes in your lineup +10% Initiative (LUK), lasting 2 rounds. |
| The Boys Turret Module | Weapon | Hero Rally | Lineup's travel speed increases by 30% / ??? and destructive might be 20% / ???. |
In terms of stats, unique parts give the same number of stats as their regular counterparts.
It is debatable which one to unlock first, but most players go for the Plunderer first. You can get it in 20 days, and although its unique item does not have a combat skill, it will still give your heroes a decent number of stats.
As for the second one, it can depend on your lineup:
- If you have a lineup that turtles up and chips HP away slowly (AOE heroes and\or healer and shielder-based), Iron Fist should be your choice, as its item provides additional defensive stats and DMG mitigation.
- If you have a lineup that relies on dealing a lot of damage to one hero early on (Kelly, Galande, Blanche, etc.), repair the Armed Chariot to get more damage stats and lower the enemy’s DEF.
- Usually, your backline heroes will fire their skills in the third round and your frontline heroes – in the second if you have the Super Core set on one of your heroes. So, the Armed Chariot item’s debuff will not be as effective as you could have wished.
The Best Parts
Best Armor part: Thorn Barrier
- It provides two buffs that last during the whole battle without any drawbacks.
- Why not Fence Puncher? Because it provides only one buff that lasts during the whole battle, while the second one lasts only two rounds. It might be worth testing if you have a Super Core set in your lineup and if you are using the Ripper gear set.
- Why not Alloy Bumper? Provides a decent DMG Mitigation buff but with the cost of -50 LUK to every hero, which is a lot and ensures your heroes will attack after your enemy’s heroes. It is worth using if you’re not investing in LUK at all (in terms of statue points and gear) and if you’re sure your lineup can survive the first skill usage sequence of an enemy’s lineup and, in its turn, kill at least one hero on the enemy’s side during your first skill usage. Also, it requires a lot of energy.
Best Weapon part: Portable Missile Launcher
In short: Battles don’t usually last longer than nine rounds. With that in mind, here’s the raw damage of the three standard weapons for nine rounds:
- Portable Missile Launcher – 1.456 * WPN DMG per enemy hero.
- Maximum Possible Damage in Nine Rounds: 7.28 * WPN DMG.
- Flamethrower – 0.4 * WPN DMG + 0.3 * TAC DMG per enemy hero.
- Maximum Possible Damage in Nine Rounds: 2 * WPN DMG + 1.5 * TAC DMG.
- High-Speed Turret – 5.4 * WPN DMG to only one hero.
- Maximum Possible Damage in Nine Rounds: 5.4 * WPN DMG
Longer Explanation:
- The Portable Missile Launcher provides the most damage during a battle. It fires every three rounds, so it can fire up to eight times during a battle, but usually, the battle won’t last for this long. Each consecutive time it fires, it is followed by a 20% increase from its previous damage. Also, we assume that WPN DMG here is the cumulative WPN DMG of all heroes in your lineup, so it will benefit you more if your lineup consists of STR heroes.
- Let’s do some math:
- Let’s assume that your cumulative WPN DMG is X.
- You deal 0.4*X to every hero every third round, so you will deal 0.4*X*5 = 2*X damage overall during the first time it fires.
- Then, your damage also increases by 20% for each consecutive attack. Assuming that at least one enemy hero is alive, they will receive this amount of damage during all 25 rounds (8 attacks):
- 0.4*X on the first attack
- 0.48*X on the second attack
- 0.576*X on the third attack
- 0.6912*X on the fourth attack
- 0.82944*X on the fifth attack
- 0.995328*X on the sixth attack
- 1.1943936*X on the seventh attack
- 1.43327232*X on the eighth attack
- Total possible damage = ~ 6.6 * WPN DMG per hero
- Total possible damage in six rounds = 0.88 * WPN DMG per hero
- Let’s do some math:
- Why not the Flamethrower? Because its damage is too low. Assuming WPN DMG is X and TAC DMG is Y, let’s do some math here:
- In the first round, you deal 0.4 * X damage to each hero, which is 0.4*5*X = 2*X of total damage.
- Then, you deal 0.15*Y twice, which is 0.15*5*2*Y = 1.5*Y damage.
- In total, you will deal 2*WPN DMG + 1.5*TAC DMG.
- I don’t know if Kobayakawa’s fifth skill affects the 1.5*TAC DMG, might be worth testing.
- Why not the High-Speed Turret? Assuming WPN DMG is X, let’s do some math again:
- You deal 0.6*X damage to an enemy hero each round.
- Note: Although you may assume that “a hero” means “a random hero,” it is not random. It always starts with the upper front hero, then the lower front hero, then the upper back, and down.
- In 25 rounds, it is possible to deal 0.6*25*X = 15 * X total damage.
- In 6 rounds, you will deal 0.6*6*X = 3.6*X total damage.
Best Accessory part: Car First Aid Kit
- It can do a decent amount of healing and also targets the lowest HP hero. It will be the most effective in a TAC ATK-based lineup.
- Why not the Jet System? With the Jet System, you will benefit only in very specific builds (discussed further), so overall, it is not good. Plus, it also lowers your DEF for the first two rounds.
- Why not the Blocking and Interfering System? It is not bad, but it can be inconsistent and land its debuff on tanks and healers.
As for engines, please read the next section.
APC Gear Combinations
The build you use depends on the engine you choose.
Unfortunately, you won’t be able to have all the best parts at level seven in one APC because you won’t have enough energy.
To figure out what parts you can use not to go over the energy level, you can use the APC Energy Calculator below.
Build one (Defensive \ Consistent \ Slow lineups)
Building around the Super-Exhaust Engine:
- Its skill buffs your APC armor skill by 1% for each 50 energy used. So, it is best to use it with the Iron Fist APC, as it has two armor slots.
- Let’s assume your engine is at level six, and you use 1850+ energy. In this case, the effect of APC Armor skills will be boosted by 1850/50 = 37%.
- The unique Iron Barrier part of the Iron Fist APC provides +15% of DMG mitigation to all allies. If we assume that the engine bonus affects just the number, it will result in a 15+15*0.37 = 20.55 (%) boost of DMG mitigation to all allies. It will decrease by 5% during the first three rounds, so it will still be +5.55% DMG Mitigation during the last round.
- The best standard Armor here will be the Thorn Barrier. With the Super-Exhaust engine, this armor will provide a 5+5*0.37 = 6.85 (%) DEF bonus t all heroes and a 2+2*0.37 = 2.74 (5) ATK bonus to all heroes.
- And as for the accessory, I think the First Aid Kit is the best option.
- And the best weapon here would be the Portable Missile Launcher.
Build two (Offensive \ Consistent \ Slower lineups)
Building around the Air-Cooled Engine:
- Its skill buffs your APC weapon skill by 15%. Also, it provides 10% more energy than other engines. Best used with the Armed Chariot APC, as it has two weapon slots.
- The unique Heavy Turret part of the Armed Chariot deals 30% WPN damage to all enemy heroes, so that becomes 30+30*0.15 = 34.5 (%) WPN DMG.
- It also reduces enemy heroes’ DEF by 10% for two rounds, but I don’t know if the engine buff affects that. If it does, that will be 10+10*0.15 = 11.5 (%) of DEF reduction.
- The best weapon part here is the Portable Missile Launcher.
- In nine rounds, it can deal 1.456*WPN DMG per enemy hero. With the engine buff, it becomes 1.456+1.456*0.15*WPN DMG = 1.6744 * WPN DMG per hero.
- But if your lineup is mainly based on TAC ATK heroes, consider using the Flamethrower.
- As for other parts, it is the same – Thorn Barrier for the armor slot and First Aid Kit for the accessory slot.
Build three (Offensive \ Fast High LUK lineups )
Building around the V-Shaped Engine:
- It does a lot of stuff:
- +1 LUK and +3% to the weapon skill effect for every 50 energy you don’t use
- If more than 25% of energy is available, all skills of your parts last for one more round.
- If you want to use this engine, you want to kill at least one enemy hero during the first skill usage round, which limits your lineup to single-hero damage dealers like Kelly, Rebecca, Galande, Blanche, etc.
- It also suggests that you need to invest all your statue points in LUK and use +LUK gear.
- The bad thing about this engine is that it incentivizes not upgrading your parts to the maximum to have spare energy.
- Assuming your engine is at level six and you’re using non-regular APC, you will have 1890 energy available.
- In this case, for the second effect to be active, you can’t use more than 1890-1890*0.25 = 1417 of your total energy.
- This means that with a level six engine, you will have to keep your other parts at level four (maximum).
- That means you will have fewer stats and smaller bonuses from these parts.
- Let’s imagine that you want to leverage this second effect of the engine. In this case, you will want to use those parts that have round-lasting skills:
- Heavy Turret (so you will ideally need the Armed Chariot APC).
- Flamethrower – + 0.15*TAC DMG per enemy hero.
- Fence Puncher – +6% ATK for all heroes for another round.
- As for accessories, you have two options:
- Jet System – will give you +15 LUK for another round at the price of -5% DEF. Go for this one if you still don’t have enough LUK to go first.
- Blocking and Interfering System – a random enemy will have -10% for another round.
- With those parts (with the interfering system), you can have your engine at level six and all other parts at level four to activate the second effect. That will require 1400 energy, which leaves you with 1890-1400 = 490 energy. That gives + 490/50 = 9 LUK to each hero and + 27% for weapon skills.
- If you keep the parts at level three, you will get 690 spare energy. That results in + 14 LUK to each hero and + 42% for weapon skills.
- This is what most whales do because, basically, the first one to use their skills wins.
- This works well with either Armed Chariot or Demon APCs.
APC Energy Calculator
Below is a calculator that lets you see how much energy you will need to run parts combinations at different levels. Just choose the parts you’re using and their levels, and the calculator will show you the energy used and if it is over your available energy.
| Slot | Preview | Name | Level |
|---|---|---|---|
| Engine |  |
||
| Weapon |  |
||
| Armor |  |
||
| Accessory |  |
||
| Unique Part |  |
||
| APC Type |  |
|
|
| Energy Consumption: | |||
| Available Energy: | |||
|
Main Hero Stat (STR or INT):
LUK:
AGI:
VIT:
DEF:
ATK:
HP:
TAC DMG:
WPN DMG:
WPN DMG Mitigation:
TAC DMG Mitigation:
|
10
10
10
10
2.00%
2.00%
2.00%
0
0
0
0
|
||