Mafia 3: Rivals – 8 Tips, Hints and Strategies to Win Street Brawls

Anurag Ghosh
Mafia III Rivals Guide
(Last Updated On: November 25, 2022)

Mafia 3: Rivals is turn-based RPG developed by Cat Daddy Games. It lets you build your own gang, fight rival gang members for loot and cash and expand your crime syndicate.

You will have to equip characters with the right weapons and accessories and purchase fronts to make them stronger. Characters have unique abilities that will help you draw more blood from enemies and survive a street fight. The game has lots of swearing with the F-bomb dropped every after few sentences and is for those who love gangster games. Here are a few tips, hints and strategies that will help new players create their own deadly gang and win street fights:

1. Focus on Attacking the Weakest Rival Gang Member

Attack the weakest character in battle. Tap all rival gang members one by one and see which character is the weakest of them all. You can easily identify one by looking at your gang members’ portrait pics at the bottom of the screen. If more than one crew mate has an up arrow over them, it suggests that they are pretty stronger than the selected enemy and can substantially reduce his HP.

Mafia III Rivals Guide

Now if you want him dead early, use all characters, including the ones whose classes are stronger than him, to attack the weak gang member. Do remember that fewer the enemies, easier it will be for you to defeat them before they finish off your team. And eliminating a rival gang member in first turn can be a good way to start off a battle. The screenshot below shoes that at least three members in my gang are stronger than a rival crew mate. Instructing all members to attack the enemy will definitely decrease his HP considerably and may even kill him in the first turn:

2. Eliminate Hearts Character before It’s Too Late

Each character belongs to a class, which is symbolized by a playing card suit. And each class offers a special trait. Spades characters are meat shields. Diamonds are versatile characters.

Hearts characters can be used to heal others once their Vengeance meter is full (the meter fills every time a character takes damage from a rival gang member or deals damage to an enemy). They can heal any character in a crew, including themselves. Eliminating a Hearts character will ensure that he or one of his pals don’t recover in case their health is down. You don’t want to see someone, especially a tanky character, on the brink of death get healed by a Hearts character, don’t you?

3. Have Characters that Can Lend Their Ability to Others in Your Crew

Characters that grant their ability to others for a certain number of turns can be of immense help in battle. Look for characters that provide attack boost to crewmates for 3 turns/counter ability for 3 turns, Dodge ability to a crewmate for a certain number of turns, 15 percent Defense to crewmate for 3 turns/ Taunt for a turn etc. Assemble a band consisting of a healer, and at least one crew member who lends his ability to his crewmembers.

Character Page

4. Experiment with Different Team Compositions

Once you have unlocked a good number of characters, you can start experimenting with different crew compositions. At first you will be able to create two entirely different teams, but as you progress another crew slot will unlock. When you have unlocked several Mafia 3: Rivals characters, you can decide what characters would you like to include in your crew.

You could go for an all tank crew (characters that belong to the spade class are quite “tanky” ) or assemble a team consisting of a healer, at least 1 or 2 characters that lend their ability to their crewmembers and a leader character who provides leader bonus to crew. Play a level with Crew 1 and replay the same with Crew 2 to test how both teams fare in battle and then choose the one that received less casualties.

5. Duplicate Accessories Can be used to Upgrade Guns

Whether you are replaying older levels or playing a new level, you will earn accessories like dog-tags, vests, bottles etc after winning a level. You can equip an accessory to a character to increase his stats. But many times, you will receive the same items. Make good use of duplicate items by sacrificing them for weapon upgrades. Use them to upgrade guns.

6. How to Get Weapons

Equip all characters with assault rifles/shotguns/pistols. Fist fights are good, but having all crewmates equipped with better weapons will surely help you beat enemies faster. Weapons are not easy to get, so you will have to win Crew vs. Crew battles to get one. Once all characters have been equipped with assault rifles, upgrade those weapons by sacrificing duplicate accessories.

7. Setup Fronts and Upgrade Floors to Improve Overall Team Stats

Setting up fronts improves your crew stats. You will need deeds, plus a few items to acquire a floor and then choose an upgrade to boost stats of all members of your crew. Once an upgrade is unlocked, you will need to choose one perk out of two to improve your crew. You can switch to another perk any time after battle.

Keep unlocking upgrades to get more perks and choose the best perk from each upgrade before battle.
Deeds are hard to get. Before attempting a battle, tap “Loot” to have a look at possible rewards you will be getting after winning it. Some battles will reward deeds, but you may have to play them several times to get one.

Upgrade Floors

Unlocking a front requires two more items besides Deeds. Items could be cash, stolen goods, d**gs and blood. You must have a certain amount of two items and Deed before you can unlock a front. You can get these items by winning campaign battles, opening free supply crates and winning Crew vs. Crew battles.

Unlocking an upgrade also requires items like common/uncommon keys, dr**gs, blood, cash and stolen goods. You can get these from free supply crates, campaign battles and crew vs. crew battles. Look for another free crate from “The Dealer”. You will have to watch a short video to get it. The Dealer usually appears after collecting the first free crate.

8. Star Up To Make Your Characters More Powerful

Starring up a character not only increases all stats of a character, but also raises his level cap and changes his appearance. To star up, you will need a duplicate character and items like cash, dr**gs, stolen goods and blood. You can also use promotions to star up your character. Look for “2 Star Promotion” or “3 Star Promotion” rewards in Crew vs. Crew battles.

1 comment

Comments are closed.