Guardians of the Galaxy: Combat and commanding the team Guardians of the Galaxy guide, walkthrough

This page of the Guardians of the Galaxy game guide contains tips on winning battles and commanding your team in skirmishes.

Last update: 26 November 2021

This page of the Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy game guide contains tips and tricks on how to carry out and win combat encounters. You will learn about the most important attacks in the game, how to counter enemy actions and how to lead your team by giving orders to the other Guardians of the Galaxy.

• How to control the Star-Lord during battles
• Abilities of the main character and the rest of the team
• Elements and the enemy stagger bar
• Skills and special attacks
• Reviving fallen characters

How to control the Star-Lord during battles

The Star-Lord is the only playable character in the game and you don't have to learn the different abilities of the remaining Guardians of the Galaxy. The most important things to remember during any fight are:

1. Use blasters as your main method of attacking opponents. They don't use up ammunition, but instead they gradually heat up and require cooling. At the beginning of the game, you should unlock the Rapid Reload perk, which works similarly to perfect reloads in Gears of War. Try to press the reload button at the perfect time to speed up the process.
2. Running and dodging. Dodging is especially important against opponents who charge at you or launch powerful ranged attacks. Some enemy attacks are also indicated by red exclamation marks. There is no stamina bar in the game, so you can run without restrictions.
3. The melee combat option. It's only useful in specific situations, for example, when the opponent had been staggered or pulled by the wind. Keep in mind that enemies can protect themselves against your attacks and that you may need to press an additional button to avoid their counter.

Abilities of the main character and the rest of the team

You can command the Guardians of the Galaxy by manually activating their abilities. This is done from the drop-down menu, where they can be selected - you need to hold down L1/LB and there will be a slight slowdown while you're making your selection.

By default, each character has 1 ability, but you can buy more with ability points, which are obtained each time you gather enough XP and level up. The exceptions are mega abilities - you will automatically unlock them in the later stages of the campaign. They are activated just like all the others.

Never activate an ability randomly. Each ability has its own unique use and can aid you, for example, in staggering your enemies, performing area attacks or dealing large amounts of damage to single targets. Abilities have a cooldown and you won't have to wait long before you can reactivate them. This doesn't apply to mega abilities.

Elements and the enemy stagger bar

When it comes to combat, it's important to note that opponents have Stagger Bars. They are separate from their health bars. This mechanic is simple - using certain types of attacks can increase the stagger bar. Once it fills up completely, the enemy will be weakened for some time - this gives you an excellent opportunity to activate your strong abilities to lower their health points as much as possible. This tactic is critical against more elite enemies, who don't take much damage from normal attacks.

There are two main ways you can increase the stagger bars:

1. Using the correct character abilities - Some of them specialise in staggering, for example Drax's starting ability - Destroyer. You can read about ability specializations in their descriptions.
2. Using the correct elements - Elemental icons may appear next to the health bars of some enemies, for example, the lightning icon may indicate that the opponent is weak to lightning. Unfortunately, you need to unlock the elements first - this happens automatically as you progress through the main story.

Skills and special attacks

You can also make use of various other techniques to help you win battles. Here are the most important ones:

Huddle - These are activated by pressing L1 R1/LB RB once you have been informed that everyone is ready to huddle. Your task is to motivate the Guardians to fight - watch the attitude of the team members and the captions appearing behind their backs. The dialog option you select should reflect their feelings or get the team to focus on winning the battle. You're not penalized in any way for failing the Huddle. It will always revive your fallen comrades. Additionally, selecting correct options gives a temporary damage boost to the entire team (only Star-Lord gets one if you fail).

Environmental objects- In some areas, you will encounter interactive items that the characters can use to perform unique attacks. These include boulders to be thrown by Drax or ropes attached to explosives, which can be cut by Gamora. You can target such objects and command particular team members to interact with them.

Call to Action and Flair attacks - Both of these types of special attacks become available when the opponent is already seriously wounded. Depending on the type of attack, you will need to press one or two buttons. These attacks have a 100% chance of success and can seriously weaken your enemies or at least make them faster to dispatch.

Reviving fallen characters

When fighting, keep in mind that the Guardians of the Galaxy are not indestructible and they can fall on the battlefield. Fortunately, this doesn't automatically have to result in a loss, because you will get the chance to save them. There are two main ways to revive the characters:

1. The obvious solution is to run up to your kneeling team members and hold the interact button to revive them. Don't do this if a nearby opponent or boss is just about to launch a strong attack, because it will interrupt the revival process.
2. The less obvious option involves using Groot's mega ability, which allows you to revive all fallen team members (including the Star-Lord, if necessary). Unfortunately, this ability is unlocked at the beginning of Chapter 14 and you will only have the chance to use it in the final 3 missions of the game.