The Simple Guardian

[Karna5]

I am a pure PVM (player versus monster) player. I have no interest at all in PVP, so everything I say below is intended for PVM and leans heavily to the mostly solo player. They're also my own opinions, based on around 9800 hours of playing BDO with most of it attended.

Guild or Solo:
When I was new in BDO I thought guilds would be like in other games (Red Dead Online, Ultima Online, Grand Theft Auto Online, etc.) in which you can have your own guild but also join the guilds of other players, or you can have one character be the GM of your own guild and another character be in somebody else' guild. So I made my own guild and later found out that you cannot be in your own guild and also somebody else' guild.

If you join a large guild, you get easy access to group content with persistent friends, and you can more easily make the silver which would allow you to buy high end gear on the Central Market. Group content in BDO also lets you gain levels faster.

This said, you can still progress fine as a solo player. It takes longer, but it's still fun. You don't have to buy everything off the central market. You can harvest your own materials, make your own gear, train your own horses, make your own top end horse equipment, etcetera.

Gear Upgrades:
For instance, recently I was trying to figure out how to get more points of DP (defense points) so I could fight stronger monsters. I had a TET helmet with Caphra level 4, but I also had the materials necessary to make my own blackstar helmet. And I determined I could fairly eaisly get a few more defense points if made a TET blackstar helmet (which sells for about ten billion on the central market if you buy it instead of make it). TET blackstar equipment is the approximate equivalent of PEN boss gear.

So I started the blackstar helmet quest which is kinda fun, and then I started enhancing. And the same day as I started the quest I found myself with my own free TET blackstar helmet. I used all materials I gathered myself or got from monster drops. And just like that it bumped my gear score enough to go to tougher areas.

I've made all my own weapons and armor and even most of my own jewelry on my main characters. Sometimes I make the equipment quickly and painlessly. Sometimes I fail and fail and fail until I run out of enhancement materials and need to save up for days, weeks or months until I finally succeed. But eventually I always succeed. And while I'm building up enhancement materials I play any way I want, hunt monsters, explore, gather, explore, train horses, explore, explore :)

So you can buy stuff on the central market if you're rich and in a hurry, or you can make your own either for free or sometimes half the price it costs to buy it.

The Simple Awakened Guardian:
The main feature of the awakened Guardian is she's kind of slow. She can run fast in a forward direction, but her lateral dodges are more like slow rolls which she cannot chain.

If you're fighting a monster which needs a lot of dodging (like the Griffon rift boss), you're much better using forward sprinting which you can sustain than lateral dodges which then leave you standing there recovering from a roll. Here's an example of a battle in which my Guardian uses forward sprinting for dodging. Notice how fast she runs forward while in combat. It's a simple battle, so you don't need to watch it to the end unless you want.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_f2nU2SBuU

Notice also she tries to exclusively use attacks with forward guard or super armor. When fighting monsters who can knock you down, any attack which lacks forward guard or super armor will make it more likely you get knocked down while you're attacking.

When fighting groups of tough monsters, however, it's okay to use the lateral dodge because you're not trying to completely avoid getting hit. You're just trying not to get overrun. So you can attack, do a side roll to get to the other side of the group and then attack again while the monsters are reorienting. Against hard monsters, remember to avoid attacks which don't have forward guard or super armor. Tough monsters will almost certainly clobber you if you use unprotected attacks. Unprotected attacks are only safe for easy monsters.

Skill Addons:
A lot of YouTube tutorials and probably a lot of people you meet will tell you to put addons which increase your damage output. This is actually pretty good advice if you are in a guild and/or mostly hunt monsters cooperatively with other players, and it's also okay advice if you only fight easy monsters which you can kill in one hit.

However, the solo player Guardian who likes to fight hard monsters is better served having as much life leech as possible. I put life leech skill addons for the following spells:

God Incinerator - this is one of the best super armor combat heal spells for the awakened guardian, and by adding life leech addons it becomes even better.

Searing Fang - this is a staple super armor area attack, and by adding life leech skill addon it gives constant mini-heals while you fight

Cleansing Flame - this is staple fast and directional cone attack, and if you add life leech to this as well you got constant mini-heals

Infernal Nemesis - this is another of the awakened Guardian big heals, and by adding life leech addon to it the healing is even better

Against hard monsters I try to alternate between Searing Fang and Cleansing Flame. If I get hurt more than their skill addon mini-heals repair I mix in God Incinerator for bigger heals. If I get super hurt, I mix in both God Incinerator and Infernal Nemesis as much as possible until I'm caught up on the heals (using Searing Fang during cool down because of its great super armor protection and additional mini-heals from the addons).

The following is a short film I made today of fighting groups of monsters which are very difficult for my character, so she uses the roll to avoid getting overrun, the super armor staple attacks (Searing Fang and Cleansing Flame), and then the god incinerator and sometimes infernal nemesis for extra healing.

https://youtu.be/HH1X9PGcoIU

Kutum/Blackstar Shield vs Nouver Shield on Guardian
Most websites and tutorials claim that the Kutum (or Blackstar) shield is better than Nouver. I have tested extensively with both against the same tough monsters, and I find the extra resistances which Nouver offers superior to the Kutum or Blackstar on a Guardian.

The reasoning most people give for Kutum being better is that it has higher AP against monsters and penetrates resistances slightly better, and that's true. However, they overlook the fact that Nouver has +10% on all resistances, and for a Guardian who takes toe to toe beatings while fighting, more resistance against knockdown, stun, and other crowd effects is of more value than doing a little more damage per second.

I find that on a Guardian she is more tanky with Nouver than with Kutum. For this reason my Guardian exclusively uses Nouver in hard PVM battles.

If your Guardian is in a guild or mostly joins cooperative group PVM, then your Guardian can minimize how much she goes toe to toe with monsters and may prefer Kutum. But the solo Guardian has to assume she's going to get hit a lot, and the higher her resistances the better she can stay on her feet.

[Dhansak]

Thank you for this Karna5 - it gives me a huge amount of food for thought. Nice work!

I am just at the stage with my Guardian where I am considering doing a skill reset so I can trim my pre-awakened skill allocations and put more into awakened skills. I plan to do this after graduation from the season - still ploughing on to get there re season goals - almost there though.

Will keep your info close to hand for when the time comes - cheers!

[dollars202]

Ahh, the thing you are overlooking is cheap crystals to avoid knowdowns so you can use the kutum. at higher grind spots 261AP and above you'll find the kutum is superior in almost every way. the goal is to get 261 kutum as a guardian and the better grind spots will open up to you. at 269AP kutum you will find orcs a great place for guardians, just make sure you got anti-knockdown crystals. Remember, you can use cheap crystals for it so when lag happens you only lose a few million instead of 10s of millions.

[Kelset]

You make nice points in your post but i have to say Kutum is better than Nouver in PvE by a long shot. BS even better.
You don't need that 10% resistances if you build your character properly with the right gems that give u more resistances in the end, plus the lower AP makes you take more damage time wise (you take longer to kill mobs) that is absolutely not necessary since you can face tank and get full life all the time (also guardian scales very well with defence and movement speed)
But again, face tanking with the guardian in pve is wrong, it's one of the characters that actually has almost 100% time back attack (if you know how to play awa properly).
I saw your video and you use around 10% of the guardian moves for combat and damage output. Plus you don't finish some combos.
If you get more into her moveset and understand that your shift+q isn't actually your main damage output you'll find her even more enjoyable to play and more efficient.
A proper use of evading combos and restoring health when out of immediate damage (you don't want to heal and do damage trading) is useful.

Awakened guardian is fast (not the fastest), but not slow, you're basically everywhere at the same time and has a lot of AoE output and hits like a train, practice more different combinations and cancels and you'll see what I'm talking about.

Some variations I recorded as an example: https://youtu.be/Z5XFNLqZwfA
And I didn't even use most of the moves I normally do when I chain pull, it's just for a quick example of things you can do.

I don't use health pots, you don't need them with the guardian in PvE. Also i have lower stats than you. 275 ap and 325 dp but still getting half the damage you do even when unbuffed and I kill mobs faster (If i had your DP i would be 100% life all the time there at Saunil's where I'm not even supposed to grind given my stats but I solo Turos so I gave it a shot)
Lock the evasion basic ability (the roll), it's gonna get you killed and it's worthless for every class.

Lateral sidestep and forward and backwards evasions (backward evasion during awakening is awesome) with the guardian are perfectly chainable, they are actually one of her main sources of chaining and switching and debuffing while doing damage.

As a general tip for everyone , stop reading guides about how to use a character and develop your own style and practice move-sets, you'll make it better and have the knowledge of your class tailored on your experience, not someone else's, and most importantly, READ THE SKILL TOOLTIPS, all of them.
After 2000 hours of guardian combat I still find some combos or new cancels I can exploit I never used before and happens just by practicing (and this makes grinding way less boring :) )

[Karna5]

Originally posted by Kelset:

*Words I can't read yet. Please forgive me*
*Delightful Video*

Hi, Kelset. I don't know if you're still there, and I was hoping my vision would have healed enough by now to properly read your post, but I estimate I'm still at least several days away (almost certainly less than two weeks).

However, I watched you film anyway, and you sparked a delightfl contrast in style which I'd like to discuss if you don't mind.

For about ten years, mostly in the 1980s, modern fencing was a huge part of my life. I thought, dreamed, practiced, analyzed, and incorporated fencing into nearly all aspects of life as well as many other martial arts which I very much enjoyed. My maestros and peers were from all over the world, champions from Germany, Sweden, Russia, Hungary, Australia, Italy, France and, of course, the United States.

I soon gravitated to the Epee which, if you're familiar with it, is the duelist's weapon. The main aspects of epee is anywhere that bleeds is a target, and there is no artificial right of way Simultaneous attacks are permitted, and stop attacksare permitted.

My main Maestro for the first many years was an elder Hungarian, ver strict, very old style, very elegant. He used to say I should be like a sniper, attacking ocne and then retreating before I can be hit back. He taught me this way to fight, and I found it was a style which worked not just in fencing but in real life melee combat. The whole point was to never get hit, and I loved that.

Around that time, however, one of my peers was from an "American" school of thought which was attack attack attack attack attack rapidly and brutally with almost no thought to concern over getting hit. He was an Olympic champion, and I dueled him many times a week for years. Perhaps I could have done as most of my peers did and travelled around the world to compete in major tournaments, but the truth is I didn't care about ranking and titles and competition. I just loved the battle and getting good and dueling for fun. Even during the 3 1/2 years I did AIkido I always wore a white belt regardless of my rank, and I stopped testing after a year or two because, as I said, I only liked the battle, not the rank or title.

You hmay have noticed (it's probably in your words I can't read yet) that I deliberately don't use follow up flows on some of my attacks against super hard monsters that can knock me down or hurt me. FOr instance, I do not use the flow on shift_F attacks because, in my play style and experience, when I get most badly clobbered and take the most damage, it's from using that flow.

Instead I do the shift-F and immediately dodge around to attack from another side safely.

In other words, my style is the old Hungarian duelist "sniper" style of avoiding getting hit at all costs.

What's neat from your film, however, is I see in you the "American" attack attack attack style many of my U.S. peers followed.

I will never fight your style, and you will never fight my style, not because one is better or worse than the other but because the whole philosophy is different.

And I love that. I honor you for sharing your different philosophy in this thread and thank you for it. *bows*

[ou may notice I put quotes around American and try to specify U.S. because to me America is north, south and central America, not just he U.S., and North America also includes Mexico and Canada. But that's just me, as someonw who was born in Argentina and was taught growing up that Argentina is also America, especially to immigrants from Russia in the early 1900swho decided to go to America and chose Argentina as a destination.]