Before you pick your character you need to keep in mid that the first weapon you pick up will always be the same. The first weapon will be the top weapon on the Character select screen.

Before the first round starts, look for characters with Gauntlets, Bow, and Scythe. These are the newest AI put into the game, and by far the best. Stay away from playing against these if possible. You might also want to look for characters with high defense stats, these will be harder to kill. Here is a list of characters sorted from lowest to highest defense:

1. Thatch
2. Ada
3. Ember
4. Jhala
5. Cassidy
6. Lord Vraxx
7. Hattori
8. Koji
9. Mirage
10. Bodvar
11. Gnash
12. Scarlet
13. Brynn
14. Asuri
15. Diana
16. Wu Shang
17. Orion
18. Lucien
19. Teros
20. Azoth
21. Val
22. Ragnir
23. Cross
24. Sentinel
25. Ulgrim
26. Kor
27. Queen Nai
28. Sir Roland
29. Barraza

Getting one of these characters wont ruin a run, but it is nice to fight against low defense.