Anime Defenders Guide: Your Ultimate Starter Tips and Tricks

Embarking on your adventure in Anime Defenders? This guide is designed to provide you with all the essential information you need to kickstart your journey and become a formidable defender. We’ll cover everything from initial steps to understanding units and game modes, ensuring you’re well-equipped to face any challenge.

Getting Started in Anime Defenders

Navigating a new game can be overwhelming, but focusing on a few key actions will set you up for success in Anime Defenders.

Join the Discord Community

Your first port of call should be the official Anime Defenders Discord server. This vibrant community is an invaluable resource for staying updated with game news, banner updates, and connecting with fellow players. It’s the perfect place to ask questions, seek advice, and even find teammates for cooperative quests. The Discord is especially useful for banner information, which updates frequently.

Prioritize Quests

Quests are your gateway to valuable rewards and progression in Anime Defenders. Before diving into gameplay, always check your quest log. Completing quests efficiently can significantly accelerate your early game progress. Here’s a breakdown of quest types and tips:

Daily Quests & Weekly Quests: Aim to complete at least 5 quests daily to unlock these reward tiers. These offer consistent resources and gems.
Challenge Quests: These reset hourly. Focus on completing Story Mode chapters to unlock more Challenge quests.
Hall of Mirrors Quests: Don’t worry about these initially. They are more relevant for later stages of the game.
Multiplayer Quests: If you need help with these, the Discord “MATCHMAKING” category is your best friend. Use the /create command to form a team or join existing lobbies.
Playtime Quests: Simply staying active in the game fulfills these passively, rewarding you for your time spent playing.
Summoning Quests: Save your Gems specifically for banners that offer valuable units to maximize your summoning efficiency.
Infinite Quests: These require map unlocks. As you progress and unlock more maps, attempt these quests. If you find them challenging, don’t hesitate to ask for assistance in the Discord community.

By strategically tackling quests, you’ll accumulate essential resources and gems, crucial for summoning powerful units.

Understand Banners and Summoning

Banners are your primary method for acquiring new units (towers) in Anime Defenders. Understanding how banners work is crucial for efficient resource management.

Gem Management: Save your Gems! Only summon on banners that offer units that are truly worth your resources.
Pity System: Anime Defenders features a pity system. Every summon contributes to your pity counter, even across different banners. This guarantees that you will eventually obtain high-rarity units over time, rewarding consistent gem farming.
Banner Updates: Banners refresh frequently, approximately every hour. The “banner-updates” channel on the game’s Discord is the fastest way to know what units are currently available.
Potions: While potions exist to increase summoning luck, they are generally not essential for beginners. Focus on smart gem usage first.
Secret Units: Each banner may contain a secret unit, which is exceptionally powerful but has an extremely low pull rate. Don’t rely on obtaining these early on.
Mythic Focus: For beginners, prioritize summoning Mythic units. These are the most impactful units in the early to mid-game and will significantly boost your team’s strength. Aim for Mythic pity (20,000 gems) as a long-term goal, and Legendary pity (2,500 gems) as a shorter-term goal.

Understanding the banner system and focusing on Mythic units will give you a significant advantage in building a strong team early in Anime Defenders.

Essential Units for Beginners

Choosing the right units can be the difference between struggling and succeeding in Anime Defenders. Let’s break down some of the best units across different rarities to aim for when summoning.

Understanding Unit Rarities

Units in Anime Defenders are categorized by rarity, which generally reflects their power and difficulty to obtain. The primary rarities you’ll encounter are Epic, Legendary, and Mythic. Mythic units are generally the strongest and most sought after, followed by Legendaries, and then Epics, which are more common and serve as solid early-game options.

Top Epic Units

These units are easier to obtain and can be very helpful in the early stages of the game.

The Beast: A great starting unit, easily obtainable and effective in early Story Mode maps. The Beast offers full Area of Effect (AOE) damage and impressive range. Consider using up to 5 of these in your setup initially.
Bloomer: A must-have farming unit. Bloomer significantly increases your resource gain, essential for faster tower upgrades. Bloomer is effective in all modes, especially wave-based modes like 15-wave challenges. Limit yourself to 3 Bloomers in your team composition.

Top Legendary Units

Legendary units offer a significant step up in power compared to Epics and can carry you through a substantial portion of the game.

Pink Rockstar: An essential Farm/Buff unit. Pink Rockstar is invaluable in any game mode, especially those beyond 15 waves like Raids and Infinite mode. It buffs damage by 20.4% and provides excellent income. You only need 1 Pink Rockstar per setup.
Chief of Lava: A solid starter damage dealer. Chief of Lava has good range, multi-hit and burn damage, and excels on Hill maps. It’s effective for clearing early Story Mode maps. Up to 4 Chiefs of Lava can be used in a team.
Purple Demon Berserker: Another strong early damage option. Purple Demon Berserker offers solid damage, large circle AOE, and a low Special Point Ability (SPA) cost, making it ideal for the initial waves of battles. Limit to 3 Purple Demon Berserkers.
Sword Grandmaster (Strongest Swordsman): One of the best Legendary damage dealers. Sword Grandmaster boasts good range, high damage, and multi-hit capabilities. It’s particularly effective against bosses and shielded enemies. You can deploy up to 5 Sword Grandmasters.
Chief of Ice: A decent support unit for beginners. Chief of Ice provides freeze, slowing down enemies with full AOE coverage. While it’s a viable support option, consider it as supplementary rather than core to your team. Up to 4 Chiefs of Ice can be used.

Top Mythic Units

Mythic units are the pinnacle of unit rarity obtainable from banners and are game-changers, especially for new players.

Flame Dragon King: Considered the top-tier starter Mythic. Flame Dragon King is exceptional in any mode, acting as a hybrid unit (attacking both ground and air), with meta burn damage, excellent multi-hit, and high Damage Per Second (DPS). It can solo Story Mode and Raids and is relatively cheap to deploy. Aim to evolve Flame Dragon King quickly. Limit to 4.
Ice Dragon: A meta support freeze hybrid unit. Ice Dragon is versatile in any mode, offering good damage, range, and large AOE. Its freeze ability is crucial against bosses and regular enemies, preventing movement for 3 seconds with a 6-second cooldown. A valuable unit to summon. Limit to 3.
Fire Demon Ninja: A meta burn/hybrid unit, similar to Flame Dragon King. Fire Demon Ninja has slightly lower burn damage (15% less) but boasts the highest AOE in the game when evolved. Excellent in Story Mode and Raids. While very strong, prioritize Flame Dragon King if you have to choose. If you have one, prioritize other Mythics before getting the other. Limit to 3.
Curse Prince: A meta bleed and good starter/hybrid unit. Curse Prince is effective in any mode and applies burn in later upgrades. While Bear King (a raid unit) is a stronger bleed option, Curse Prince provides excellent damage, range, and great AOE. It synergizes well with Flame Dragon King or Fire Demon Ninja to increase overall DPS. Can solo Story Mode and likely Raids. Limit to 3.
Pink Demon Witch: A meta support, farm, and stun unit. Pink Demon Witch requires strategic use. Its Soul Capture ability (full AOE) can capture souls from up to 10 enemies, slowing them and generating Yen. With a 30-second cooldown, it’s the strongest slow in the game. Coordinate with teammates to maximize its farming potential. Limit to 1.

These are some of the best units you can aim for from banners. While other units can be good, focusing on these will provide the strongest foundation for your Anime Defenders journey.

Gameplay Progression

Understanding the optimal progression path will ensure you’re making the most of your time in Anime Defenders.

Story Mode First

Start with Story Mode. This is the most accessible game mode for beginners. Playing through Story Mode will help you:

Learn basic game mechanics.
Unlock new maps and game features.
Complete early quests for rewards.
Familiarize yourself with different enemy types.

If you find Story Mode challenging, especially on Hard difficulty early on, consider seeking help from stronger players on Discord or focusing on summoning better units before pushing further.

Exploring Game Modes

As you progress through Story Mode, you’ll unlock various other game modes. Take the time to explore each as they become available:

Trade: Engage in trading with other players to acquire units or resources you need.
Tower of Eternity: Test your endurance and unit strength in this challenge mode.
Raids: Participate in Raids for high-level rewards and unique unit drops. Raids often require coordinated team play.
Hall of Mirrors: A more complex game mode, best explored after you have a solid understanding of the game’s fundamentals and a stronger unit roster.

Don’t hesitate to ask questions about these modes in the Discord “Support” category as you unlock them.

Conclusion

This guide provides a solid foundation for starting your adventure in Anime Defenders. By prioritizing quests, understanding banners, aiming for key units, and progressing through Story Mode, you’ll be well on your way to building a powerful team and enjoying all that Anime Defenders has to offer. Remember to utilize the Discord community for further assistance and to stay updated on the latest game developments. Good luck, Defender!