Dream Team?

This is a good place to start looking at Dream Teams.  Admittedly, it is limited to regular versions of heroes, no promos, and the the strategy behind choosing the backups might mean that the perfect "dream team" isn't the first five.  But it's a good start.

Parse AA Scholar OmnitronX Skyscraper. I like combo shenanigans decks. I would have Captain Cosmic in instead of Skyscraper except for Skinwalker and Iron Legacy. Setback would also be fun.

Best base game dream team is Legacy Wraith Tachyon Tempest Visionary. They can handle pretty much anything, and with promos get even more terrifying.

Legacy, Chrono-Ranger, Team Leader Tachyon, Tempest, The Scholar.

Pre-WotC, I took this team up against every villain in the app on advanced mode. I lost two games. They have weaknesses - no deck control, notably - but they hit hard out of the gate and build like crazy.

I would put TLT at the head of that team -- she doesn't do a ton of damage anyway, so it's better to get everyone that extra card draw first.

Mister Fixer, Sky-Scraper, Ra, and Parse.

I mostly just picked the first 4 heroes that came to mind, in order I thought of them. But I can still state their purpose.

Mister Fixer - He'd can fill in nearly every role I can think of. He's got reliable damage, great minion clear, tank for either the highest or lowest, shutting done non-hero target damage for a round, reducing damage dealt by a target, and cancelling out damage reduction.

Sky-Scraper - She'd be using villain damage enhancers against them, thanks to Compulsion Cannister. She'll also be handy for gaining the aid of environment targets. She's also got a reliable way to get Ongoing destruction and can help Mister Fixer get the desired Tool in play. Her wave clear is also quite handy, something she can assist Mister Fixer in, if there is something that might be a bit too difficult for him to handle alone. Oh, yes! She can also absorb damage on occasion.

Ra - He's here for the big targets, just all about burning everything to the ground. Making the heroes deal slightly more damage is also handy.

Parse - She may actually serve better being the first hero, thanks to her Critical Multiplier can insure the heroes can deal enough damage to take out bigger minions, not too mention how nicely it goes with Dual Crowbars. She also has Ongoing/Environment destruction as a power, which can be handy. The ability to make all hero target damage irreducible will be a great for very heavily DRed opponents. She can also help Ra with the damage while Mister Fixer and Sky-Scraper are getting ready for mass murder.

If you take Tempest out of that team you suggested you lose healing.

I have two favorite teams:

1.  (Before Vengeance came out):  Legacy, SSTachyon (or Team Leader), Omnitron-X, Tempest

Omnitron-X uses his base power to get Legacy up and running faster.  Legacy, Omnitron-X, and Tempest can tank damage and can heal.  Tachyon, Omnitron-X, and Tempest all deal damage.

2.  (After Vengeance):  Argent Adept, Scholar, Setback, Team Leader Tachyon

Scholar goes Mortal Form to Energy x2 and Solid to Liquid, plus Bring What You Need.

Argent Adept goes full "Give people powers and card plays" build. 

Setback goes for Cash Out, Looking Up or Surprise Fortune, and Turn of Events.

Tachyon just gives them all cards.

Nobody has mentioned the Prime Wardens yet? The five of then, especially their prime warden promos, synergize amazingly well together. I'd probably use regular Captain Cosmic, but if you like using powers, this is your team.

Not in this order, but here it is.

Nightmist: tank, deck manipulator, damage dealer, you name it. All around best for helping party survive.

wraith: infrared eyepiece is the main reason. But she also has great area damage at a high damage point.

Ra: he does such high damage even not being dependent on ongoings or equipment. If your stuff does get destroyed, he's still a dependable damage dealer

Omin-X: he has ongoing environment distraction, ongoing destruction, healing, area damage, and really helps the heroes get set up. Both him and wraith can act as a buffer too, when ongoing or equipment destruction comes knocking. They out out so much stuff, as long as it's not everything, you'll survive.

Legacy: damage buffs. Nuff said. I found out him and omni are great partners because of all the separate damage instances he does. Plus, great tank and can protect all other heroes. Add omnis healing, and your team is nigh invincible.

@arcanist My only problem with the prime wardens would be the "against any villain" clause, Captain Cosmic really doesn't work against Skinwalker because skinny just eats through your constructs for card plays first part of the game, and then repeatedly nukes them late game. Cosmic has the same issue with Iron Legacy. PW Cosmic might mitigate this, but I still think you'd have trouble making him work for those two fights.

Otherwise, sure, the Prime Wardens are awesome.

Basically, with Sentinels, a more difficult challenge might be, "who's your fifth string dream team, assuming the first four dream teams are all going to fail, and the world now hinges on the backup of the reinforcements to the replacements of the standbys of your dream team." So, mkae a dream team, set all those heroes aside, do it again, again, again, Who you're left with is who you have available. What're your odds?   

EDIT: probably should have said fourth string, what with cauldron and all, I keep forgetting that there are "only" 26 official heroes. Although, the question of who is on the bench for that last team would probably yield several different answers.

Right now, I would say it would involve AZ and Visionary... And let's add Mister Fixer and the Sentinels. If there is a fifth, it would Argent Adept.

Visonary's twist the ether is very useful to AZ, if you put it on the villain, or even better, on mister fixer. If Fixer has Dual Crow Bars and Twist, he can target first AZ to heal or let him do damage, then damage someone else. With Twist, you can "use" AZ set up multiple times in a round - and give him a lot to do with Coolant Blast.

The Sentinels : it's "because" of the totally awesome combo of hitting Mister Fixer with Wrythe's Blackout when he wears a Jack Handle. Especially if there is a lot of high hit point targets.

The Adept would help AZ set up faster.

Favorite to play:

Fanatic, Expatriette, Visionary, Tachyon.

Most powerful:

Expatriette, Mister Fixer, Sky-Scraper, Scholar, Tempest.

You get the DDA->Reclaim engine rolling and it is game over.  Unload, Scrapyard, and Monolith/Incursion every round for free?  

But don't you all know that Mr. Fixer is underpowered and needs to be fixed? 

What is DDA?

"Library" meaning "deck" ;).

I like it when I can get both copies of DDA out and just keep looping them every turn - play DDA, it goes to trash, next turn use other DDA to put first one on top of deck then draw it in Draw phase, turn after that use it to reclaim the other one back from the trash again, and so on ;). I've done this a couple of times and while it meant I didn't achieve masses of stuff from my own deck, it let everyone else put a load of random stuff into play, which is always good :D.

Best combo is AA and Scholar. Vernal Sonata, followed by Alacritous Subdominant to play DDA immediately = five pre-planned card plays instantly.

Team Leader Tachyon and Greatest Legacy, paired with Scholar or Haka.  TLT gives everyone cards, playing Fleet of Foot as much as possible.  Legacy plays Bolster Allies as much as possible, and gives his power use to TLT.  Finish it off with a big Know When To Turn Loose and/or a big Haka of Battle.

I expect a team consisting of TLT, Greatest Legacy, the Adept, and Captain Cosmic would be fairly ridiculous in terms of letting each other do stuff out of turn >:).

Just lost with my dream team, against a harsh setup.  Team Leader Tachyon, SkyScraper, Scholar, Greatest Legacy against AkashBhuta in the Final Wasteland (also wasn't so great in the Enclave of the Endlings!).

Team card draw! I like to pair TLT with heroes that can take great advantage of lots and lots of cards.

TLT, Scholar, Chrono-Ranger, NightMist, Haka

Admittedly, if I knew some of the more complex heroes more, I might find myself building something around extra power uses.

In reality, my actualy, oft-used 'dream team' has been:

Legacy, Mr. Fixer, Tempest, Ra/Fanatic, Haka

I pull this group out when I just feel like doing a ton of damage and then I tend to give myself a villain that creates lots of targets: Ennead, Apostate, and Voss, mostly commonly. I tend to use Ra against the Ennead, but Fanatic against other villains. I've had this group beat the Advanced Ennead while collectively being down only three HP.

Another build I've gone for is based around building up Unity as quickly as possible:

Legacy, TLT, Visionary, O-X, Unity

I've had some fun with what I like to call Team White Mage.

Greatest Legacy, Argent Adept, O-X, Tempest and Scholar.

All the damage gets funneled to either Legacy or Scholar, who then can spend four turns healing and dishing out damage and can focus his own turns on card draw.

Then there is team Guise:

PW Fanatic, Naturalist, DW Mr. Fixer, Guise, The Sentinels.

So many shenanigans.

KNYFE is definitely up there in terms of Heroes who benefit from extra card draw.

TLT Legacy Omni X Parse Knyfe

Draw gives options, a set up Legacy can handle basically everything, and Omni X helps him set up.  Parse handles deck control and ongoings, has Legacy to tank, and the damage boosts are nuts. Knyfe is most controversial. Agree is the best damage dealer for both huge hits AND multiple hits. Given the draw and damage boosts...

Nightmist TLT AG Legacy Scholar Tempest

Feed NM and Scholar cards. Get the Scholar cycle play going, or let Nightmare draw her deck with heals but keep hey HP high. Scholar can also go four form out of turn damaging monster.

TLT Dark Visionary A/Z Fixer Legacy

Dark Vis controls villain deck.  A/Z gets set up, Fixer handles swarms then Tire Iron to keep a/z going. All the legacy damage boosts. And Tachyon to make sure you see all the cards.

I really like Wraith or Sky in that team, but oh well.

Reminds me of one of AA's cards.. a Rhythm?

Anyway, I will use Leader Tach, Legacy, Devra, and any two of AA, Ra, Fanatic, and TronX. Usually Fanatic and AA or Ra, but DevratronX is fun.

Not statistically great or anything, just is super fun.

Any game with Team NightFlame, win or lose, is a good game.

Vernal Sonata, a one-shot. They work fantastically together, actually.

Thanks! I was in a game where I desperately wanted AA alive and I had 3 of those in hand (Also heals). Combining that with Holy Nova gave me the HP to power through.

The Adept is super-good at healing himself once he gets a few cards out - I can easily heal 6hp a turn when I'm set up, more if I play a Vernal Sonata and stuff :).

Yup, definitely had similar happen to me more than once...you just need to be able to survive long enough to get set up to the point where you can actually do that, though, which can be an issue depending on the game. Play with Captain Cosmic and/or Greatest Legacy and it can get pretty ridiculous, what with all those extra power uses you can get off them :D.

I sort of doubt there's any unbeatable hero team, but the team that's crushed the most for me is Legacy, TLT, Ra, Knyfe, CR.

It's not super fun but they do so much dmg so fast they can crush almost anything. When Challenge and Ultimate modes were released for the digital version I one won each Ultimate mode fight first try until Iron Legacy. Which frankly was expected.

Heres become my dream team

Legacy

TL Tach

GI Bunker or Parse

Scholar

Hunted Naturalist

Legacy for boosts, Tach for card draw. 
 

GI is for villains that have a lot of DR, and Parse is for villains you want to some Irreducible damage but woudl rather take the deck manipulation (Parse is singlehandly the reason on my 'All villains all modes' run I beak Akash on Advanced first try - extrasensory awareness rocks. - Both can do some respectable damage as well.

Scholar heals and tanks

Naturalist is a damage dealing nightmare if you can get one form out, which I love it to be Gazelle, both to keep him alive and to help neutralize most environments (Environmental Allies)

I've had a lot of sucess with this composition, that I affectionately call 'Team Lock-out'

Team leader Tachyon

Parse

Hunted Naturalist

The Sentinels

PW Argent Adept

Tachyon is mainly there to feed the other heroes cards so they can find the cards they need for the titular lockout, while also occasionally providing get-out-of-jail-free cards with hypersonic assault.

Parse provides villain deck manipulation with Extrasensory Awareness to prevent the villain from dirupting the set-up, and once the game has stabilised, can put out her critical multipliers and build up her damage until I can have her one shot the villain to fininsh the game.

the real lock pieces come with Naturalist and the sentinels though. With environmental allies, the naturalist can negate any danger in letting the environment build up, allowing you to enjoy any helpful effects while ignoring any enemies, or even letting them go after the villain instead. the hunted naturalist also allows you to do this while filtering through your deck faster and letting you do some damage with crocodile effects as well.

The sentinels on the other hand are there to negate any damage the villain and environment can put out. human shield allows you to redirect any damage to a hero target to mainstay, and with hid signature durasteel chains, and his own base power to give the sentinels 1 damage reduction you can have heroes ignore any instance of 2 or less damage. this gets even sillier with ways to give Mainstay even more damage reduction, such as with out of turn powers provided by sentinels tactics or by the fifth mamebr of the team: argent Adept.

The Argent Adept is there to provide additional support to the teamby giving them out of turn card plays and power uses. he can combo really well with the sentinels by using the bell to play the counterpoint bulwark and inventive preparation to not only boost Mainstay's damage reduction but aslo give them a card play to proc sentinels tactics and let mainstay use his power again - at this point, the heroes can ignore all instances of 4 damage or less from any source.

Team Leader Tachyon 

Legacy

Parse 

Chrono Ranger

Prime Wardens Tempest

If I had to switch one of them, I would take Hunted Naturalist instead of Chrono Ranger. 

I would probably take a 5-hero team even though it can make some games a lot more difficult. In this order: I would take PW Adept, Greatest Legacy, Scholar, Parse, and Wraith. Adept gives all the card plays, draws, ongoing/enviro destruction needed. He can also add pretty much anything to a team except deck control. Greatest Legacy amplifies Adept's usefullness and has some great cards like Take Down and Heroic Interception in an emergency. He can also tank hard-core and adds Insipiring Presence. Scholar is here to be invincible and add some nice damage while he does it. Parse is deck control, and she also has ongoing/environment removal. Critical Multiplier is always a welcome bonus. Wraith is here for damage. She has deck control in case Parse is being difficult. She also has Stun Bolt to reduce incoming damage, even it doesn't hurt the villain. And Throat Jab added in with Scholar's Offensive Transmutation as well as Legacy's aforementioned Interception? This team is built to live through anything that gets through Parse and Wraith. It lacks a bit of damage, but it can win any damage race thanks to Legacy and Scholar. Nightmist and Tempest are both great to have, I would be willing to replace Legacy with NM or Wraith with Tempest, but it isn't quite as ideal to me.

Mackcrockett's idea back in post 11 sounded fun. Who would your team if you made a dream team, set them aside, repeat 2-3 more times and then make a dream team with the remaining heroes? I'm not going to even try to go that far though; just something that caught my eye.

I think I have a new favorite team.  It's probably not the best team, and it's not great against some villains, but it's a whole lot of fun:

Argent Adept (been using PW, but Kvothe or Xtreme would probably be better), Greatest Legacy, Omnitron-X, KNYFE: Rogue Agent, Termi-Nation Unity

It's all about the bot army, which gets nuts fast.  Between Raptor-Bots and Powered Shockwave, the damage is pretty sick, and even if they all get wiped, you can build them up again pretty quickly.  Bee Bots and Volatile Parts clean up the loose ends.

I tried the same thing with Termi-Nation Absolute Zero, who also benefits from having an almost unbounded number of extra setup plays.  It worked... okay.  With that much extra stuff, especially with extra power uses before his turn granted by AA and GL, his main limitation is not building up so much damage that he kills himself instantly.  But I did manage to finish off Ultimate Citizen Dawn with everyone else dead and TNAZ still going strong.

My dream team consists of a giant sentient waffle (that's a potato waffle, not that sweet stuff Americans think of) who goes by the name of Super-Greg, An ambulatory carrot who can shrink to the size of a raisin (and is carrot sized normally), and a man who had toasters for hands, the breadinator if I remember correctly. His toaster projectile speed was based on how bad a pun he made.

I have no idea what I was thinking last night.

at first it started with the 4-Hero group of: Prime Wardens Haka(support and damage. plus if the enemy has any form minions or lesser-healthed beings, SAVAGE MANA! otherwise if there's a need for a decent heal on one person, Haka of Restoration through his power. makes him INVALUABLE), Parse(constant ongoing/environment destruction, deck manipulation, and crazy shenanigans involving discarding cards and allowing others to do more damage, it's SUPER impressive when a beaty-stick from Haka can hit close to triple digits, and only close to because i didn't keep going), America's Greatest Legacy(support, tanking, and letting other do a power is always amazing), and finally Freedom Five Tachyon(power of everyone draws a card? YES PLEASE! and that's on top of the crazy stuff she pulls off normally)

I'd left the 5th slot open just in case i wanted/needed something a bit different, but lately that slot has been getting filled with Prime Wardens Argent Adept. Though i have used various different Bunkers, Mister Fixer, or pretty much anyone else in that slot. 

Do you mean Freedom Six Tachyon?

YES! that would be the one. soo many characters, they get all muddled up in my brain-pan, ya know?

Well, I have a Shenanigans! dream team:

The Eternal Haka, America's Greatest Legacy, Team Leader Tachyon, Omnitron-X, Rogue Agent KNYFE.

Haka draws a card, discards a haka, and draws two cards (plus his card draw at end of turn and any draws from Dominion). Legacy lets Haka use his power if there's a haka in his hand, otherwise he gives it to Omnitron-X. Tachyon gives everyone card draw. Omnitron-X plays the top card of Haka's deck. KNYFE plays the bottom card of Haka's deck.

With a bit of luck, Haka draws eight or nine cards a round and plays two more out of his deck (which might let him draw more), and discards two. Whenever he turns up a Ground Pound, he plays it. The rest of the team plays defense for a few rounds and kills environment cards to give Haka even more draw. By the end of round 3 or 4, he has his entire deck in his hand and can Ground Pound for the rest of the game while Legacy heals people up just in case the enemy wipes every ongoing.

About the only thing that can stop the shenanigans is something to block power use before it gets going. 

This is a false statement.  It's not a true Shenanigan's dream team without Guise. 

A team I'm referring to as the Bottom Feeders.

Super Scientific Tachyon

KNYFE: Rogue Agent

Fugue State Parse

The Sentinels

This lets the Sentinels run the tables and just plow through their deck. Once you get the Signatures and Sentinels Tactics out (which will not take long), you're all but guaranteeing damage from them every turn, which means either A. Even more damage, B. boosting the Sentinels' damage reduction (ideal if you've also got Human Shield out), or C. healing like a mofo. (Sorry, Writhe, you kinda stink power-wise, but you're getting your due with Blackout).

For the other three, you can use their play phases to put out fires, or let KNYFE set up for a huge nuking turn down the line.

For added hilarity (even if it does break the bottom-of-deck theme), throw in Omnitron-X.

Argent Adept, Grandpa Legacy, TL Tachyon, Ra, & Scholar of the Infinite. Solid environment and ongoing protection without much reliance on equipment.

And if you know when to cut loose - with Imbued Fire, Flesh of the Sun God, and Inspiring Supertonic in play - you're dealing upwards of 90 points on a good round.

My pick for highest win rate 5 hero team would be - Scholar, TLT, Grandpa Legacy, Sentinels, Tempest

• Scholar for late game unbeatableness
• TLT and Legacy for fueling the team

• Sentinels and Tempest to deal with the villains early game

But I'd never actually want to play that team together as I prefer harder games. To answer the OPs question of which team I'd take against a random villain/environment if it were up to me, it would always be:

• 3-4 random heroes

I love all the heroes! How to choose?!

Hell, the healing alone would make that team damn near invincible. Two members with it built in, and one who is all but guaranteed to get reliable, large-scale healing out fast with TLT -- and who can get two power uses in a round thanks to Old Legs.

I tend to think probably my favorite team when I want to just break things wide open is to take the Freedom Five and replace Bunker with Tempest for more consistent AoE and healing.

There are very few villains that will win to a damage race on that scale.

Legacy with any 'instance of damage' heroes ususally makes a pretty solid demolition squad. Chrono-Ranger, Guise, XPW Cosmic and FV Tachyon can just belt out crazy damage in one round. Guise by himself can already do that pretty well, but watching FV Tachyon play 2 Lightspeeds and then move her entire Burst collection to the bottom of her deck was nuts. It can be 4 damage per Burst card just because of Legacy & CR.  

Along these lines, is there a reference that might help me organize my deck into types? damage dealers, tanks, healers, suport, etc?

I recently accidentally put together a team that was 4 support characters, and I was slaughtered! It was amazing how innefective I was even with a zillion cards. 

I definitely want to try out some of the teams suggested here!