Guardian Class Guide

Introduction

The Guardian class is a female “Viking” class and is considered to be more of a tanky “bruiser” with her heavy melee skills. She uses a one-handed Battle Axe as her primary weapon and a Shield as her secondary weapon. At level 56, Guardian unlocks her awakening skills and a new awakening weapon, which is the Jordun (similar to a Halberd weapon). Her skills and animations are quite slow but you can really feel the power behind the swings of her axe. She can also block damage with her shield and after awakening, she can focus the holy flame of dragons to set her enemies ablaze. She has lots of buffs and debuffs which make her a great addition in large scale PVP.

Awakening VS Succession

Guardian Succession and Awakening can be unlocked after level 56 after speaking to the Black Spirit and completing the Awakening and Succession quests under the suggestions tab.

• The Awakening will unlock a completely new skill tree, which will be your primary skills from now on. The skills in the pre-awakening are mostly utility skills, and your main damage dealers will be your Awakening skills.
• The Succession skill kit enhances your battle axe skills instead and only has a few awakening skills.

Your awakening weapon still affects your succession damage and vice versa. For example, if you are using the Succession kit, then 30% of your Awakening AP is still applied to the damage of Succession skills, as well as the additional item stats on the awakening weapon, such as Human/Species Damage and Accuracy.

Guardian is considered to be in an “ok” state for PVE and fairly balanced between Succession and Awakening. She is a strong grinder early game and in mid-game spots because of her large AOE. However, she does fall off in certain end-game spots because of her long casting times.

Succession is also considered to be decent in PVP. She excels in group PVP when the focus isn’t on her and she is able to get all her damage out. For 1v1s, it really depends on the matchup.

Unfortunately, for Awakening, she is considered quite bad in PVP. Although she has large AOE and burst damage, she can do well against classes that don’t have a grab or know much about Guardian. But she has very long animations and is quite slow which makes her very predictable and easy to catch out. Someone who knows how to play against her can easily disable her with a grab at the correct time. That being said, she is also one of the easier classes to pick up with a lower skill floor and is a good starting class for new players.

Skill Builds

Since the skill point update in late 2022, you can obtain all skills for approximately 1,000 skill points. Focus on your main skills first, then level the passives. The Weight Training skill should be leveled last since it only gives you weight limit increase.

Protected Skills

It is important to read through your skills to understand which skills have protection and crowd control effects. Read through your skills carefully to get familiar with what each skill does. You can also filter the different effects in the Skill Window (K).

Locked Skills

To lock a skill, press the lock icon on the top of each skill icon in the skill window (K).

These are the Awakening skills I recommend locking to help prevent messing up combos during PVP.

• Evasion
• Merciless Kick
• Strike Down
• Beast Demolisher
• Juggernaut: Smite
• Fireborne Rupture

These are the Succession skills I recommend locking to help prevent messing up combos during PVP.

• Evasion
• Frigid Wind

Skill Enhancement (Rabam) Skills

Skill Enhancement skills can be obtained in the Skill Window (K) under the “Skill Enhancement” tab at the top. At levels 56, 57, and 58, you will have 2 different options to choose between. These skills have no skill points cost, but you have to have other skills leveled up to be able to take them.

Level 56 – [SHIFT + X]

• Merciless Smash– Requires [Strike Down III] and [Mountain Slam IV]
  • (Preferred Choice for Awakening)
• Pulverization– Requires [Strike Down III] and [Mutilation IV]
  • (Preferred Choice for Succession)

You can pick either of these Rabams. They are both quite situational and it’s entirely up to you between a super armor or frontal guard. Both skills give a down attack damage +5% buff for 10 seconds. Merciless Smash has super armor, while Pulverization has Frontal Guard. Pulverization is also usually preferred for players with succession because it flows better with the skill kit.

Level 57 – [SHIFT + Z]

• Omua’s Flame– Requires [Omua’s Glare] and [Axe Throw III]
• Omua’s Circle– Requires [Omua’s Glare] and [Black Blood Circle IV]
  • (Preferred Choice)

Omua’s Circle is usually the preferred choice out of the two. It provides you with a DP +20 buff for 10 seconds and also recovers 400 HP when used. The heal is not that strong and I would only recommend getting your level 57 rabam once you have your core build already because it will cost you a lot of points to get all the skills required for it.

Level 58 – [Quickslot Only]

• Sturdy Smite – Requires [Sturdy Step III] and [Juggernaut: Smite II]
• Mountain’s Echo – Requires [Sturdy Step III] and [Rockslide III]
  • (Preferred Choice)

I would recommend Mountain’s Echo. The skill has super armor during the entire skill and is useful for mobility.

Skill Add-ons

Below are some examples of PVE skill add-ons you can take.

If you would like example skill add-ons for other scenarios, please refer to the Class Discord and its resources.

I recommend experimenting with your add-ons and figuring out what is best for you because it really depends on your personal preference and how you play your class. If you’re simply not sure what to take then you can blindly follow the examples below and they will still be effective.

You can also check our Skill Add-on guide for a complete list of Skill Add-ons.

Weapons

Armor

For your armor, you will make a choice between Damage Reduction or Evasion gear. I recommend reading our guide about the two different DP stats if you want to learn what the two different stats do.

Generally, you are recommended to build Damage Reduction on Guardian.

Accessories

There are various different accessories in the game. At first, just focus on using the accessories that give you the highest AP in each slot.

There are also “free” accessories that all new players should get:

Accessory	How to obtain
Tuvala Accessories	Tuvala accessories are starter accessories obtained from the Season Server. Try to push up your accessories to PEN if possible, but if you don’t have much time to play Season, then focus on your Weapons and Armor first.
PEN Capotia Necklace	You can obtain a FREE PEN Capotia Accessory from the Season Servers Special Reward. For your first season, it is recommended to get the PEN Capotia Necklace because it gives the most AP. You then want to create another Season character in the next season to get the PEN Capotia Belt, and finally the PEN Capotia Ring or Earring.
PEN Ring of Crescent Guardian	You can obtain a PEN Ring of Crescent Guardian by completing Jetina’s PEN Accessory quests. These are daily quests that take a minimum of 45 days to complete. Every new and returning player should complete these as early as possible for a highly discounted PEN accessory.

Common Starter PVE accessories:

• TET Black Distortion Earrings or TET Narc Ear Accessory (PEN Capotia Earring)
• TET Basilisk’s Belt (or PEN Capotia Belt)
• TET Ring of Crescent Guardian
• TET Ogre Ring/Laytenn’s Necklace (or PEN Capotia Necklace).

Crystals

Below is an example starter Crystal build for PVE. Some of the crystals are expensive. You can obtain the Rebellious Crystal by completing the main story questline. For more example crystal builds, including an end-game PVE crystal build, and PVP Crystal builds, check our Crystal Preset Guide.

This is an example PVP Build for Guardians using Damage Reduction Armors and going full Human Damage (glass cannon). For more example crystal builds, check our Crystal Preset Guide or the Class Discord.

Artifacts and Lightstones

There are a few different viable choices for both Artifacts and Lightstone combos. Guardian is the “Melee Damage” type so you want to go for Melee Accuracy and Melee Damage for offensive artifacts.

For PVE Lighstones there are a few different options to min-max. For certain spots, you may want to use Species damage combos (eg. The Wild: Demihumans, The Wild: Kamaslyvia, The Wild: Humans). Species damage combos perform better if you are reaching the monster AP caps at a certain zone.

A more generic PVE combo is listed below that is recommended for your class and will work at any spot.

You can also find more information about Artifacts and Lightstones, and how to obtain them, in our guide. We also have a list of Best in slot Artifacts and Lightstones.

Useful Links/Credits

I highly recommend checking out the Guardian Class Discord for resources about your class. The class discords always have the most up-to-date information and tons of experienced players that can help with questions or gearing advice. I would like to give a shoutout to the Staff and Experienced players in the Guardian discord for all their hard work gathering resources. You can find some of their own guides below. I honestly cannot recommend enough to join the discord.

Useful links to check out:

• Official Guardian Forums
• Succession Guardian Text Guide by Pheteven
• Succession Guardian PVE by WooTheWinner
• Awakening Combos by AboAL38D7

PVP Montage Videos:

• Awakening Guardian PVP by Chief_EN
• Succession Guardian PVP by RacuTW
• Guardian PVP by Daruma Luna
• Succession Guardian Solare PVP by CurseOfDeath
• Guardian PVP by Kenan Anafarta
• Guardian PVP by Dashner
• Succession Guardian PVP by Kmendez

Credits Disclaimer: Since there are now 26 BDO classes, it is impossible for me to keep class guides fully maintained. My main class is Ranger and I don’t claim to be the best in any class. Therefore, I use resources and recommendations from the Class discords since (as all other players would agree) this is the best source. I also ask for advice from friends who are more experienced in the class. Where possible, I credit specific players for information such as Add-ons, and combos. However, sometimes there is no player mentioned as the original sharer. If there are any issues with credit or you would like certain information removed/changed, please reach out to me!