Unlocking the best Marvel's Wolverine Techniques as early as you can will noticeably boost your combat proficiency, making Logan more of a killing machine. The important thing to bear in mind is that you can unlock every Technique in a single playthrough of Marvel's Wolverine, but you with many of them being locked behind level requirements, you can only unlock the ones the game allows you to. Regardless, there are still some you should prioritize in this narrow system, from enhancing his leap attack and parry to a brutal flying knee and healing attack. These are the top Wolverine Techniques you should get first to be on your way to becoming the best there is.
Best Techniques to unlock in Wolverine
There are 36 Technique nodes to unlock in Marvel's Wolverine (40 if you include the additional Unstoppable Force Techniques in NG+), and you can unlock all of them in a single playthrough. To do so, you need to earn enough XP to reach Level 36 and spend your Technique Points - it's a completely different system to the Marvel's Wolverine Adaptations you can unlock.
Admittedly, levelling up that much isn't that easy, and it doesn't help that Techniques are locked behind level caps before they can even be unlocked, but you will at least have every Technique available by Level 29. For that reason, it's best to spend your Technique Points on the best you can get, then unlock any remaining until you get access to the next batch by levelling up – in short, don't save your Technique Points, but make sure you unlock the following as early as possible:
- Special Techniques:
- Tornado Spin (unlocked automatically): A powerful attack that hits multiple enemies and gets substantially better with each upgrade. Good in pretty much all combat encounters and is great for getting you out of a sticky situation where you're surrounded.
- Knee Breaker (Level 4): A staggering flying knee to the head that interrupts all enemy attacks and leaves the victim vulnerable to things like Healing Strike. Hugely useful in any fight when used at the right moment, especially in boss fights like the Marvel's Wolverine Omega Red fight.
- Relentless (Level 7): Gives you constant health regeneration at an increased rate for a short time, which can help you live through some devastating fights. It's good to quickly use as soon as your health gets low, particularly if you've not yet reached Rage Tier 2 and don't have Last Stand ready. If you're not taking enough damage to warrant using Relentless, you could swap it for Overwhelm instea
- Brutal Assault (Level 25): Dash to an enemy and viciously slash at them. Since it also breaks through all defenses, it's a very good single-target attack that can rip through weaker enemies and substantially weaken larger ones, especially when fully upgraded.
- Techniques:
- Savage Sprinter (Level 2): It's one of the first Techniques you can unlock and is worth doing and using when you can, especially early on. It's like a mini Tornado Spin that's great for opening a fight as you sprint at enemies and helps you build Rage.
- Stagger Leap (Level 2): Wolverine's leap attack on Triangle is an incredibly useful basic attack, and this makes it even better, adding some staggering power by charging it up.
- Healing Strike (Level 3): This is one of the most useful techniques in the whole game, letting you not only deal potentially lethal damage to a staggered enemy (especially if you use it to end a Barrage) but also instantly regenerate a chunk of health.
- Sprint Block (Level 3): A great early-game Technique that helps to reduce some incoming damage.
- Unblockable Ender (Level 11): A high-damage attack to round off your combos that also can't be blocked. Pairs well with Adaptations that add additional effects to Combo Enders.
- Advanced Parry (Level 17): Allows Wolverine to deflect multiple incoming melee attacks at once, making parrying a lot more useful in general. Pairs very well with the Extended Parry Adaptation.
- Staggered Throw (Level 17): Use this to throw staggered enemies into other enemies and potentially interrupting their attacks. It's also good for throwing enemies into walls and other hazards.
- Charged Helix Blast (Level 23): A strong ranged attack that hits a wide area in front of Wolverine and can therefore hit multiple enemies.
- Helix Combo (Level 23): Allows you to perform a second attack after using Helix Claws, dealing heavy damage. I've found that sometimes the initial Helix Claw attack can knock enemies so far away that the second attack doesn't actually hit, but it's good damage and ability to interrupt larger enemies mostly outweighs this.
- Helix Counter-Shot (Level 23): By the end of the game, there are lots of enemies with ranged attacks, so being able to dodge them and automatically retaliate with Wolverine's own ranged blast is very useful
Bear in mind that just because a Technique isn't mentioned on this list, doesn't mean it's not good. Most of them are at least slightly useful but there are some that I very rarely had a reason to use, either because they weren't as effective as existing abilities or because they're very niche. The best examples of this are any of the Stealth-related techniques. All of them are quite good but since stealth is completely optional, you can entirely ignore these Techniques if you aren't planning on being sneaky.
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