Guardian guide - beginner

There are only a few things a beginner can do with guardian without having a good grasp and execution of concepts like kiting, situation assessment and energy management. Guardian requires at least some of these skills regardless of the build you go for, and this is why it is both hard to play guardian for newbies, and hard to write a guide about itwithout explaining these principles.

Guardian is a lategame long-range ship that got builds that both thrive against tanks and squishier ships. Problems may arise when you face fleet that can deal with both builds you may potentially go for.

First, BattleGuardian, which is essentially a missile boat (like frigate) with strong anti-armor weaponry that gives hell to ships like dreadnought, while being more vulnerable to higher damage long-range ships (like frigate and overlord).

Then there is Minion or Brood Guardian, that specializes in spawning minions that will eventually grow out of control of the enemy team. These minions do great against squishy ships, but are both ineffective to armored ships and vulnerable to anti-light weaponry.

This guide will try to give you an insight of each build and some tips to use these efficiently.

Opening:

2 speed - 2 range - 1 acid spore (middle lane)

2 speed - 2 range - 1 laser (sidelane)

1 speed - corrosive acid - 1 energy - 1 laser - 1 health (any lane with a cloud in middle). Play this one in middle lane only if you have a tanky middle lane.

Your role is essentially kiting. You have 10 range, 1.5 speed, so you just dish out damage while staying safe. Spend your health to tank for your allies if needed, but don't get too low hp, especially if you're new, you'll eventually make a bad turn or get caught up.

BattleGuardian guide:

If there are many tanks, or at least a dreadnought that few of your allies can deal with, you want to go for this build. Whether you're side or middle lane doesn't change much, besides that you want to keep 1shot farm on side, and 2shot in middle.

You want to upgrade acid spore, speed, range if there are a few missile boats. You can get corrosive acid early if you have alot of ranged ships fighting alongside you. Else you want to wait until you go back with ~500+ minerals, so that you can buy corrosive acid, sufficient energy, and Decay. Decay grants you damage, speed, armor, and damage reduction for each time you use corrosive acid, independantly from who you use it on. But if you spend 16 seconds (acid duration) without using acid, you'll lose all stacks, making you suddenly much less threatening. Abilities that prevent you from doing that are the most hurtful: vortex, stasis, syphon; if you get hit by the 2 first ones, start writing your testament. Hopefully, you should have high enough range and speed for that to not happen without major mistake. Eventually, if there are no support to deal with enemy rockets, you'll want to buy dark swarm, so that you can use it to prevent enemy ships from firing at you, while not leaving a chance for enemy tanks to push you out of it, because then, you can't fire at these for a while.

Upgrade summary:

+1 speed

+1 range

+X spore

corrosive acid

energy

+1,2,3 corrosive acid upgrades

decay

+X spore/energy

+few health/armor as game goes on.

+more range/speed as game goes on.

Obviously, don't blindly follow this upgrade path. if you're playing against 2 frigates, you'll likely want to get more range earlier, if you're playing against a carrier, you'll want alot of lasers and decay earlier to enhance your laser damage and your resistances.

Swarm Guardian (sidelane):

This is generally good against non tanky ships, and has two ways to reach lategame depending on what you're facing. Against fast firing laser ships (which are often long range ones), you'll want to go scourges. Along with adrenal overload and few health upgrades, you'll be able to inflict massive sustained damage whenever you have enemies in sight. If enemy doesn't have great farm and/or laser attack speed, consider going corruptors. You need some health, few energy, and alot of corruptor upgrades. You want to wait to be full energy with adrenal overload ready to use again in order to spawn as many corruptors at once. Then most simple way to control them is to A-click command them to a forward area. Corruptors are good at fighting interceptors too, so long you spend some time and attention managing them. You want to invest more time in corruptors (and often get them to lv 15-25) than in scourges before transitionning to broodlords.

Then, when you have ~400 energy (scourges) or 500-600energy (corruptors), you want to get broodlords along with at least 5 upgrades. The more the better. If your broodlords are often dying, think about getting more range and posthumous mitosis. Then keep investing in energy and broodling upgrades, until your enemies eventually cannot hold your minions anymore.

Upgrade summary:

1shot lasers

adrenal overload

corruptors - or - scourges

some health and energy

corruptors or scourges upgrades

more corruptors and energy

broodlords

broodlords upgrades

broodlords upgrades - energy - range - posthumous mitosis

Wild Mutations: regardless of your build, you want to get this ultimate when you start seeing enemies survive because of the lack of moblity of your ship/minions. If it happens a couple times, this means it is probably a good time to get it. Remember though, as a swarm guardian, time will very most of times be your ally, so don't set yourself back by getting wild mutations too early and achieving nothing with it.