How to Play Guild Idle

A complete beginner-to-endgame tour of every system — generated from the live game data for patch 0.6.5. New and just want the first hour? Start with the Getting Started checklist.

1. The Basics — Your First Run

Guild Idle is a free browser auto-battler idle RPG. Your heroes fight on their own — your job is to recruit, equip and specialise them, then send parties into dungeons for gold, experience and loot.

Open the Heroes tab and hire your first Warrior — the first recruit is free. Back in the Battle view, create a party, drop the hero into a slot, pick The Crypt (the starting dungeon, free to enter) and press Dispatch. Dispatching rolls that run's Dungeon Challenges — toggle them on or off, then go.

A run plays out floor by floor (The Crypt has 10) and ends with the dungeon's boss. Gold, XP and item drops are banked as enemies die; winning adds the dungeon's clear bonus (multiplied by your active affixes), and a wipe still keeps everything earned on the floors you cleared.

2. The Idle Loop

Guild Idle is built around a compounding loop. Runs continue while the tab is open, and when you're away the game simulates a capped window of offline progress (extendable in the Honor Store) so there is always something to collect when you return.

1. Dispatch parties on dungeon runs.
2. Collect gold, loot and XP automatically.
3. Spend gold on new heroes and the 14 Guild Upgrades.
4. Equip better gear, allocate ability-score points, spend skill points.
5. Push harder dungeons and stronger affixes for bigger rewards.

Guild Upgrades are permanent account-wide bonuses — gold income, XP gain, flat HP/ATK/DEF, sell price and more — and are the best use of early gold because they compound over every future run.

3. Hero Classes

There are 14 hero classes. Only the Warrior is free to recruit; 4 more unlock for gold, and 9 advanced classes are gated behind clearing specific dungeons or Honor / Glory purchases. Full stat tables, abilities and gear priorities live in the class reference; the tier list ranks every subclass from simulation data.

Every hero has seven ability scores — Strength, Vitality, Toughness, Intelligence, Spirit, Agility and Dexterity — that are converted into combat stats (HP, ATK, DEF, Ability Power, crit, attack speed…) at the start of each run. Each level-up grants ability-score points to allocate (2 per level, 3 on every 5th) and skill points for the skill tree. How each score converts is on the ability scores page.

4. Dungeons

There are 9 dungeons, each with its own enemy pool, boss and loot table, plus the endless The Eternal Strife and 4 raids. Higher-tier dungeons roll deadlier (and more rewarding) affixes.

Each dungeon also has a rare elite that occasionally spawns mid-run; killing it has a 2% chance to drop that dungeon's exclusive item. Per-dungeon enemy stats, loot tables and drop rates are on the dungeon pages.

5. Dungeon Affixes

Every dispatch rolls up to three affixes (shown in-game as Dungeon Challenges). Each one makes enemies tougher and multiplies the run's rewards; multiple affixes compound. You can toggle each one before the party leaves — running two instead of three is fine and still pays for the ones you keep. Exact numbers and strategy per affix are on the affix reference.

Tier 1 Affixes

Rolled in: The Crypt, Whispering Forest.

Tier 2 Affixes

Rolled in: Thorncastle, Volcanic Depths, Sunken Citadel.

Tier 3 Affixes

Rolled in: Astral Plane, Void Sanctum, The Blood Colosseum, The Eternal Warfront, The Eternal Strife.

6. Subclasses (Level 10)

At level 10 a hero chooses a subclass — a permanent specialisation that adds ability-score bonuses, swaps the class ability for a variant and unlocks a passive. There are 30 subclasses across the 14 classes. The choice is permanent unless you use a rare Scroll of Divergence consumable. Every subclass has its own page in the subclass reference, and How to Unlock Subclasses recommends one per class.

7. Skill Trees

Every hero has a skill tree of 119 nodes in themed clusters. Heroes earn one skill point per level up to 34, then one every 5th level. Nodes need an adjacent allocated node first, and 37 Keystones deep in the clusters change how a hero functions — usually with a trade-off.

Points can be fully reset with a Scroll of Forgetting consumable. The skill tree guide documents every node and keystone with routing advice, and each class has a build guide with a recommended path.

8. Bounty Board

The Bounties tab lists contracts — 107 in total across 16 combat, 16 exploration, 32 collection, 43 prestige — that pay gold, items, consumables and other rewards when their condition is met. Repeatable bounties reset after a cooldown; milestone bounties complete once.

They are one of the best early income sources and several reward consumables you cannot farm otherwise. The full list with conditions is in the bounty reference.

9. The Codex

The Codex tracks every item you have discovered per dungeon. Each dungeon has 4 milestones — 30% Auto-Run, 50% +10% Rarity, 70% +10% Gold, 100% Title — and global bonuses stack on top as your overall completion climbs. The 100% title is granted to every hero and, where a dungeon has one, its raid unlocks at the same point.

10. Eternal Strife

The Eternal Strife is the endless mode: floors scale without end and heroes who fall are promoted to the Beyond roster rather than lost. Kills pay no gold or XP — instead every new floor beyond your record awards Honor, spent in the Honor Store on level-cap raises, longer offline progress, advanced classes and the Bloodline Forge.

Difficulty tiers, the floor-scaling formula and record-push strategy are on the Eternal Strife page; Glory & Honor Farming covers what to buy first. Deep pushes are ranked on the Leaderboard.

11. Beyond Colosseum

Beyond Colosseum is asynchronous PvP: heroes promoted to the Beyond fight snapshots of other players' heroes in 1v1, 3v3 and 5v5 brackets, each with its own ELO (everyone starts at 1200; the first 5 matches of a season are placement matches with a larger swing). Wins earn Glory for the Glory Shop.

Fights resolve server-side at the strength your hero had when last uploaded, so you climb even while offline. Brackets, ELO, seasons and roster slots are on the Colosseum page; standings are on the Leaderboard.

12. Tips & Strategies

Looking for deeper strategy? The wiki has a build guide for every class, party composition templates and an endgame guide.

Early Game

• Buy Guild Upgrades early — income and XP bonuses compound over every run that follows.
• Get a healer as soon as you can afford one (the Cleric costs 1,000 gold); a healer in the party is the biggest consistency jump in the first dungeons.
• Enable the HP/DEF affixes from the start — the reward multiplier is free money for a party that isn't dying.
• Spend ability-score points as you earn them; the hero sheet's allocate all button dumps them into one score.

Mid Game

• Pick subclasses the moment heroes hit level 10 and start routing skill points toward a keystone.
• Clear the dungeons that gate advanced classes (the class table above lists each requirement) — they open the strongest team compositions.
• Work the Bounties tab actively; several mid-game bounties reward consumables you can't farm.
• Hunt rare elites for exclusive drops, and complete each dungeon's Codex — every 100% unlocks a title (and, for some dungeons, a raid).

Late Game & Endgame

• Push The Eternal Strife until you wall, spend the Honor, then push again — the level-cap upgrades must be bought before a hero is hired.
• Tier 3 affixes (Infernal, Void-Touched, Apex Predators, World-Ender) are the best reward-per-run once a party survives them.
• Turn capped heroes into Legacy Items with the Bloodline Forge — a level-50 forge is a permanent, any-hero accessory.
• Keep the Beyond roster uploaded to the Colosseum — ELO accrues while you focus on other content.

Have a question not covered here? Visit the Contact page, or join the community on Discord or Reddit. See the Changelog for the latest updates and patch notes.