What the heck is with Guardian's Gate?

[[SDS]Kabosutra]

I've tried running it solo and also with a group of 2 and 4. I'm not sure if I am supposed to be focusing the outposts so that I can add defending NPC's, chasing the Guardians down so they don't make it back to the portal, or rushing to the end of the map ASAP. I find that by around 10 minutes in, I become too overwhelmed with the large red enemies with the large swords as they seem to have a snaring effect that holds me in place while the elementals just keep slamming me with projectiles. If I build for more single target damage, I find that the weapons favor targeting the spawning smaller red warriors rather than the tower, and if I build for more general aoe melee I take too long breaking the towers and also being able to destroy the red ogres. If i decide to try and push through the groups around that 10 minute mark, I get caught up with the big ones snaring me and then I fall. I am building heavy with the knight's set and lifesteal as well as regen. I can tank almost everything until I get held in place and I find that I can't always kill them and the next one before it walks on top of me as well and I am permastunned. I am running the automaton (Level 180 so far, for the 18% extra absorb) with the steam lance as well as the Discharger electric aoe to keep enemies weak and CC'd. Are there any tips you guys have for me to finally make it through this map? I am level 4 and have multiple weapons around level 20 that I have been running. Most of my survivability and combat related passives are max'd out as well. Appreciate any help y'all can provide! Thanks again to the dev for making this addictive game, I am just really struggling with this map.

[Deamonbound]

It is one of the most difficult maps in the game, so bear that in mind.
For the character and loadout:
I'd recommend using Isaac (knight) at lvl 200 for max stat bonuses.
Aura: Max Health, Damage Absorption, Extra Projectile and Aura Base Bonus
Armor: 'knight set'.
Artifacts: Fan, Fang, Sentinel Star, Salt Stone, Vitality, Feather and Hourglass.
Weapons: TangleBow, Longbow, Sickles, Glaive and either Crossbow or Blunderbuss.
Pet I'd recommend either using the brown bear or any gargoyle maxed
Try to also bring shock immunity potions for the later wave with the shock puddles

So first off you want to get brimstone and purchase a runaway/dog from the goblin as soon as possible to dig up some extra brimstone.
Then you want to make a mad dash for the towers.
Hire as many archers at defeated ones as possible for those pesky Guardians.
Remember you can use the defeated towers with the knights on them to quick travel back to the base if you have brimstone to spare.
Some of the knights you can hire at the start are also pretty good.

Steer clear of those big guys with the swords, they can stun you so be wary of them, the tangle bow can hold them in place to make things easier.
You can also run back to the archers you hired at the towers to back you up if you have trouble.

If you still can't beat it I sadly only advise you to either head back to the Sunken Caverns for Red Crystals to get Red Marbles for the 30% on your weapons.
Or head over to the discord and ask for some help ingame from the community.
Best of luck beating Guardian's Gate

[Amrehlu]

Follower build.
Just make sure to add in a source of wet and shock in your weapons for slowing the guardians. Also don't chase them the whole way. Beat on them a bit, then let them go, and use the fast travel to go back to base and then travel with the other fast travel doors to the next area and wait for it to get their, beat it up with help from the defenders you should've maxxed out at every location and repeat. They should be dead before they ever reach the main base, BUT if you have super bad luck your summons might just ignore them the whole time.

If you have a friend that plays with you, both of you should go follower build, but one of you should focus their weapons (aside form slime ball of course) on single-target stuff like the bows. Their job is to do their best to focus the guardians as the pass through each base. The minions deal with most of the normal enemies and you just need to try to keep them electrocuted as much as possible so your priority target ally can do more work per base location.

The biggest issue is the RNG on brimstone drops. They can really screw you over if they just decide to not drop. You want to maintain a decent pace of clearing the forts out, but a dry spell on brimstone can doom a run 50-10 minutes after the dry spell.

Sticking around the main base until about the first guardian arrives and dies is what my and a friend do, I think it is about 9 minutes and 45-ish seconds? During that time you should be maxxing out the archers and grabbing as many soldier to follow you as you can before leaving.

Ignore the dogs, they're are a waste and you shouldn't be taking the time to go running off in random directions for dirt piles to dig. The RNG screwing you + the extra time waste of extra running around just isn't worth it at all.

Voodoo Doll, Decay, Dynamite, Slime Ball, Coil Staff, (Wet Weapon) is basically the best loadout in the game, in general. Coil Staff can be changed out for Discharger if you prefer that; the upside if you have more direct control over who you're shocking the downside is that it is close range and will contribute less damage and utility in general.

Really just try to have Decay, Slimeball, (Shock weapon), (Wet weapon) and the other slots are flex, but I still highly recommend Dynamite no matter what. It always performs well.

for armor, if you have the full follower set and fusion item, THAT, but if you lack that then Knight Set. If you have killed enough Guardians in attempts to have gotten the entire Limitbreak set that is a good option too if you use a character's limitbreak primary. The character with Decay as their primary is insane. Decay alone, with nothing else can do like 20-40k dps on him while in limitbreak.

That's a lot of info, hopefully even just a little bit of it here or there is helpful. Most stuff is technically viable to win with, but this sort of setup is what we found to be most effective. The level is pretty challenging even with a good setup, so many losses are expected, just keep make small adjustments, try to notice what you were falling short on and edit what you're doing to make up for those shortfalls (we found at one point we just weren't killing the towers themselves fast enough and after fiddling with loadouts manage to start killing them much faster, for example).

[[SDS]Kabosutra]

Thanks for all of the info guys, we were able to pull it off today with some of the guidance from both of you. Cheers!

[Abmis]

Guardian's Gate now blocks players from joining after 5 minutes. We've had a few complaints about players joining late and causing the price of hired units to increase. This usually resulted in defeat.