A Guide for Guardians!
Guardians
An Overview
Guardians are special Units that can provide various boosts to your City and armies. The benefits they provide are different from those of Champion Units, which improve the statistics of only a certain number of Units.
The Bonuses given by a Guardian are calculated on top of other Unit-enhancing Bonuses, meaning that an upgraded Guardian can provide a huge boost to your army.
Your Guardians can never die. However, if a Guardian loses a battle, they may be stunned for a certain period of time. Any Guardians you acquire will remain in your collection forever, unless you decide to retire them.
Keeping Guardians at your City also gives you access to brand new PvE targets - Warlords. Battles against Warlords can yield Rewards that will benefit your City and army.
Guardian Parameters
The power of your Guardian, and the effectiveness of their Bonuses, depends on the following parameters:
1. Rarity Grade (I to V). Guardians are classified according to Rarity. Each Rarity is given a Grade. The higher a Guardian’s Rarity Grade, the more powerful they are and the more difficult they are to find.
2. Rank (1 to 6 Stars). In general, the higher the Rank of a Guardian, the more powerful their Bonuses will be. However, Guardians at the earlier Levels of a higher Rank are slightly weaker than those at the highest Level of the previous Rank, although they can be improved dramatically.
3. Level. Ranks are split into Levels. To increase your Guardian’s Level, you will need to earn Guardian XP. Higher Level Guardians are stronger than lower Level ones, but the maximum Level a Guardian can reach is limited by their Rank. This works as follows:
Rank I (★): Max Level of Guardian: 15
Rank II (★★): Max Level of Guardian: 20
Rank III (★★★): Max Level of Guardian: 25
Rank IV (★★★★): Max Level of Guardian: 30
Rank V (★★★★★): Max Level of Guardian: 30 (if Enlightened: 35)
Rank VI (★★★★★★): Max Level of Guardian: 30 (if Enlightened: 40)
Each time their Rank is improved, your Guardian’s Level is reset.
Naturally, a Level 15 Guardian with a Rank of 6 (i.e. a six-star Guardian) will be much stronger than a Level 15 Guardian with a Rank of 1 (one star). Please note that the above logic does not apply to battles with a Warlord.
4. Skill Level (0 to 5 per Skill). Upgrading Skills using Skill Stones will increase the power of a Guardian’s Bonuses. While you can decide to which Guardian to apply the Skill Stone, the Guardian Skill that will be upgraded is decided at random.
5. Enlightenment Level (0 to 5). This is represented by a number in the bottom right corner of your Guardian’s portrait. When Enlightened, the Guardian’s Rank Stars turn purple. There are five stages of Enlightenment and each one boosts all the Skills of your Guardian. A Guardian with the Rank of 5 or 6 can only reach their highest Level through Enlightenment.
Guardian Types
There are different Types of Guardians. The Type of Guardian you should use depends on the action you wish to take. For example, if you’re attacking an enemy City, a “City Offense” Type Guardian would be the logical choice.
Only Guardians that boost Resource Production, Spying, and City Defense can be activated in the “City” tab of the Guardian interface.
New currency - Emeralds
Emeralds are a new Premium Resource. You can use them to acquire Summoning Bonds, Guardian XP Boosts, and more. You can get Emeralds at the Bank and by upgrading Guardians to the maximum Level.
We have also planned Tournaments and Events that will give you the chance to get even more Emeralds.
Getting new Guardians
Once you’ve reached Level 40, you’ll receive a series of Quests. Once you’ve completed these Quests, you’ll receive your first Guardians.
You can also get new Guardians by using Summoning Bonds. Summoning Bonds are used to summon a random Guardian of a specified Rarity Grade. There are 3 varieties of Summoning Bonds: Basic, Epic, and Holy.
Basic Summoning Bonds allow you to summon a single, random Grade I, II, or III Guardian.
Epic Summoning Bonds allow you to summon a single, random Grade II, III, or IV Guardian.
Holy Summoning Bonds allow you to summon a single random Grade IV or V Guardian.
The Guardian you summon will have a Rank between 1 and 3:
- Rank 1 (one star) - will likely be summoned.
- Rank 2 (two stars) - will occasionally be summoned.
- Rank 3 (three stars) - will rarely be summoned.
Guardians of Rank 4 or higher cannot be summoned using Summoning Bonds, and can only be obtained by leveling your existing Guardians and ranking them up.
How to obtain Summoning Bonds:
From battles with Warlords
By acquiring them with Emeralds
By purchasing a Pack found in the “Guardian” tab of the Bank
Upgrading Guardians
You will need Guardian XP to level up your Guardians. Fighting Warlords with a Guardian will earn your Guardian XP. You can also retire unwanted Guardians to provide XP to a selected Guardian.
Fighting Warlords
Energy is the Resource that must be spent to fight Warlords. Each battle requires 10 Energy. The maximum amount you can have is 100 Energy. It takes five hours for your Energy to fully restore from 0, although you can recharge the full amount at any time in exchange for Emeralds.
There are 20 Levels of Warlords. In most cases you will maximize your rewards (Guardian XP, Summoning Bonds, and Energy) if you defeat a Warlord in a single attempt.
Each Warlord has a certain amount of Health Points (HP). In turn, each of your Guardians has their own Attack Power statistic. If the Guardian’s Attack Power is greater than the Warlord’s HP, the Guardian will defeat the Warlord. By doing this, you will earn Guardian XP for your Guardian will as well as any additional Reward that drops at random. This is why it is a good idea to pay close attention to a Warlord’s remaining HP and the Attack Power of your Guardian.
When fighting Warlords, only the Level of your Guardian is important.
A Level 15 Guardian of Grade III, Rank 6, will be just as effective as a Level 15 Guardian of Grade I, Rank 1.
When considering what Warlord Level will be suitable for your Guardian, follow this rule of thumb:
Suitable Warlord Level = Guardian Level divided by 2 (round up if necessary)
his means:
Level 1 Guardians should fight Level 1 Warlords
Level 2 Guardians should fight Level 1 Warlords
Level 3 Guardians should fight Level 2 Warlords
Level 4 Guardians should fight Level 2 Warlords
Level 5 Guardians should fight Level 3 Warlords
And so on.
Needing more than one battle to clear a Warlord location will result in you earning fewer Guardian XP.
For example:
If your Level 1 Guardian successfully fights a Level 1 Warlord (and defeats it), you will receive 789 Guardian XP.
If your Level 1 Guardian unsuccessfully fights a Level 20 Warlord, you will receive only 263 Guardian XP. Additionally, you will not receive a Reward for defeating the Warlord.
Pitting a high-Level Guardian against a low-Level Warlord will be similarly unprofitable, as the little XP you receive for the fight won’t be worth the Energy you spend.
Get the most out of the final strike
Send low-Level Guardians to deliver the coup de grâce to a weakened Warlord. If your Guardian’s Level is significantly less than the Level of the Warlord, the final strike will earn you a huge amount of Guardian XP.
The ideal scenario would see your Level 1 Guardian defeating a Level 20 Warlord.
Example:
Your Level 1 Guardian delivers the final strike to a Level 20 Warlord. Your Guardian then gets 9,223 Guardian XP and becomes a Level 10 Guardian - just like that.
You can engineer these situations reasonably easily. Simply calculate the difference between your high-Level Guardian’s Attack Power and a Level 20 Warlord’s HP so as not to defeat it in one go. Draw the fight out, then replace your high-Level Guardian with the lowest Level one you have.
For example:
You use a Level 38 Guardian (Attack Power 28,953) to fight a Level 20 Warlord (HP 31,948)
Once the Warlord’s HP is down to 2995, you bring in a Level 15 Guardian (Attack Power 2,508)
Once the Warlord’s HP is 487, you deliver the coup de grâce with a Level 1 Guardian so that Guardian gets upgraded to Level 10.
You can use this method to level up your weaker Guardians faster.
Upgrading Guardians by retiring unwanted Guardians
Retiring is the fastest way to upgrade Guardians, although it requires you to sacrifice other Guardians and your Resources (5,000 of more of each Resource). We recommend that you retire unneeded Guardians of Grade I or II in order to upgrade the Guardians you need. It’s also worth noting that Guardians disappear after being retired, so make absolutely sure you don’t need them before giving them the axe.
If you don’t have enough Guardians to spare, you can always summon some using Basic Summoning Bonds. Basic Summoning Bonds cost 10 Emeralds.
Ideally, you’re going to want to retire mainly Rank 1 Guardians, because you’ll probably need those higher-Rank Guardians eventually (see below).
Upgrading Your Guardian’s Rank
To increase a Guardian's Rank, you must retire other Guardians. The number of Guardians you need to retire is equal to your Guardian's current Rank. The retired Guardians must be of the same Rank as the Guardian you wish to upgrade, but can be of any Level or Grade.
For example:
To upgrade a Guardian from Rank 1 to Rank 2, you need to retire one Rank 1 Guardian.
To upgrade a Guardian from Rank 2 to Rank 3, you need to retire two Rank 2 Guardians.
To upgrade a Guardian from Rank 3 to Rank 4, you need to retire three Rank 3 Guardians.
And so on.
After their Rank is improved, your Guardian’s Level is reset. You must once again bring them up to the highest available Level in order to reach the next Rank.
If you don’t have enough Guardians of the corresponding Rank to retire, you will need to increase the Rank of those Guardians you plan to retire. Guardians of Rank 2 or 3 might be better kept as food and used to increase your higher-level Guardian’s Rank.
The Level of the Guardians you use for upgrading Ranks doesn’t matter.
Upgrading Guardian Skills
Most Guardians have a set of 4 Skills that affect one of the 4 Unit Types (exceptions are the Spying Type Guardian, which specifically improves Spying Units, and Resource Guardians, whose Skills affect Resource Production and Granary/Warehouse capacity).
To upgrade a Guardian’s Skill you will need to use a Skill Stone of a certain Grade. Initially, each Skill is Level 0, and the maximum Level they can reach is Level 5. That means that to upgrade all of a Guardian’s Skills to the maximum Level, you will need 20 Skill Stones.
Enlightenment
This is represented by a number in the bottom right of your Guardian’s portrait. There are 5 stages of Enlightenment, and each one boosts all the Skills of your Guardian. To enlighten a Guardian, you will need to retire another one of the same Grade and Type. The retired Guardian will disappear.
Example: You have a Guardian of the ‘City Defense’ Type. Their Rank is 4, their Level is 30, and their Grade is III. To enlighten this Guardian you will need another ‘City Defense’ Type Guardian of Grade III. Their Level and Rank do not matter.
Use duplicate Guardians to enhance your main Guardian.
Guardian Affinities
All Guardians have an Affinity - Earth, Water, or Fire. Each Affinity performs better against a certain other Affinity. Water beats Fire, Fire beats Earth, and Earth beats Water.
If you send Guardians of different Affinities to a location, a "Dominant Affinity" will be selected to represent your forces.
For battles at your City, you can choose which Affinity you wish to be dominant. At other locations, the Dominant Affinity will be the one represented by the most Guardians.
If your Dominant Affinity beats the enemy's Dominant Affinity, you will receive a 25% Bonus to your Guardian’s Skills.
For example, if the Guardian’s Skill power equals 10% and their Affinity wins, the total Skill power will be increased to 12.5%.
Activating Guardians
You can station up to 3 Guardians at your City to strengthen City Defense, or to improve Resource Production. Guardians of the following Types can be stationed at your City: City Defense, Spying, and Resources.
If the Guardian is active in your City, you will be able to do the following: rank or level them up, enlighten them or upgrade their skills. However, if the Guardian is en route to another location or is placed somewhere on the Map (for example Pantheon or Coalition Capital), you will need to return that Guardian to your City before you can perform any of the above actions.
There may be many Guardians in any given battle, but your army can only be represented by one Affinity in each. When 1 or more Guardians are activated at the City, you can choose a “Dominant Affinity”. If you do not choose a Dominant Affinity, deactivate the Guardian with the Dominant Affinity, or if this Guardian is stunned, the army defending your City will remain without any Affinity.
If your City is successfully attacked, the Guardians you had activated at the time will be left stunned. This is why it is preferable not to leave the City undefended.
PvP Battles
When deploying your Units on Offensive or Defensive missions, you can send Guardians whose Type fits the mission. This will boost the army’s combat statistics.
Up to 3 Guardians can be stationed at a City as Reinforcements. However, the Guardian with the most developed Skills will be the only one to affect the combat statistics of the Units alongside them. An exception is when one of the Guardians is of the City Defense Type and another is of the Spying Type - both Guardians will provide Bonuses in this case (the City Defense Guardian will boost Defensive Units, and the Spying Guardian will enhance Spying Units).
Sending Guardians to Sieges
You can use Guardians to assist you during Sieges. The Guardian will give Bonuses to the other Units sent alongside them, and if the Siege is successful, they will be stationed in the City as a Reinforcement. Please note that the Guardian won’t provide Bonuses to the Units defending the besieged City. For this, you will need to send a Guardian of Defense or Spying Types.
You can send up to 3 Guardians as Reinforcements for a besieged City. The Dominant Affinity will be the Affinity that the most Guardians at the besieged City have.
Stunned Guardians
If a Guardian loses a battle (not against a Warlord) they will be stunned. During this time they cannot be used or upgraded.
A Rank 1 Guardian will remain stunned for 1 day, a Rank 2 Guardian for 2 days, and so on up to a Rank 6 Guardian, which remains stunned for 6 days.
You can recover a stunned Guardian immediately using Emeralds, or by applying a special item to reduce the recovery time.
Thoughts?
If you still have questions or suggestions about the Guardian feature, leave a comment in this thread.
