Characters

Guides

If you've played AFK Arena, you will see a lot of familiar faces in AFK Journey, but the character system has quite a lot of differences between the games.

Summary

  • Characters belong to one of 6 factions:
    Maulers
    Maulers
    Lightbearers
    Lightbearers
    Wilders
    Wilders
    Graveborn
    Graveborn
    Celestial
    Celestial
    Hypogean
    Hypogean
    ,
    • Celestial
      Celestial
      Hypogean
      Hypogean
      are the 'Angel / Devil' faction of the game and they are harder to obtain and ascend,
  • Characters belong to one of 6 classes:
    Mage
    Mage
    Marksman
    Marksman
    Rogue
    Rogue
    Support
    Support
    Tank
    Tank
    Warrior
    Warrior,
  • Characters in this game are split into
    A-Level
    A-Level
    and two
    S-Level
    S-Level
    ,
    • A-Level
      A-Level
      characters are easier to obtain from gacha and also cost less in various shops compared to
      S-Level
      S-Level
      ones,
    • But this doesn't make them weaker - among the
      A-Level
      A-Level
      characters you can actually find some of the best characters in the game,
    • Both
      A-Level
      A-Level
      and
      S-Level
      S-Level
      can be ascended to the highest tier (Supreme +),
  • The fodder system has been removed and instead, you just need dupes of the character you want to ascend or Acorns (faction-tied currency that you get from shops and pulls),
  • Each character has 3 skills which will automatically level up whenever they reach the required level,
  • A character needs to reach the Legendary+ tier to unlock Hero Focus that gives them bonus to one of their stats or gives a brand new effect,
  • A character needs to reach the Mythic+ tier to unlock Exclusive Weapon which gives them a new passive skill (that can be upgraded up by leveling the EX Weapon),
  • A character needs to reach the Supreme+ tier to unlock Skill Enhancement that give an additional effect to one of the their skills,
  • Characters don't need to be equipped with gear anymore, as the system has been replaced by Class-based Equipment system - you simply gather gear that the Class can wear and every character within the Class will automatically wear it in the battle,
  • Thanks to the Resonating Hall, you just need to level 5 characters and automatically every other character on your account will be leveled up to the lowest level among those 5 - no need to reset characters or switch them around with limited spots like in AFK Arena,
  • Also at any point, you can change the top 5 characters in the Resonating Hall by simply dragging them around.

Factions

Here's some more information about each of the 8 available factions.

Lightbearers
Lightbearers

The Lightbearers are heroes who serve in the name of Dura. They mainly fight with Hypogeans, Maulers, and Graveborns. Their main goal is to restore the land of Esperia from evil.

Example heroes:

Rowan
Rarity S
Support
Rowan
Vala
Rarity S
Rogue
Vala
Lucius
Rarity A
Tank
Lucius
Mauler
Maulers

The Maulers are a warrior culture who believe strength is everything, with the worth of something or someone judged by might and usability. Though some have fought for the Hypogeans according to some Peaks of Time stories, this is relatively rare and as a whole are still fighting on the side of Dura.

Example heroes:

Brutus
Rarity S
Warrior
Brutus
Smokey & Meerky
Rarity S
Support
Smokey & Meerky
Kruger
Rarity A
Warrior
Kruger
Satrana
Rarity A
Mage
Satrana
Wilder
Wilders

The Wilders hold a magical connection with the forest and with Yggdrasil, which is often exhibited in their skills. It is said that Dura planted Yggdrasil, and left the spring of life as a parting gift to the Wilders.

Example heroes:

Eironn
Rarity S
Rogue
Eironn
Hewynn
Rarity S
Support
Hewynn
Arden
Rarity A
Mage
Arden
Parisa
Rarity A
Mage
Parisa
Graveborn
Graveborn

The Graveborn are heroes who serve in death, revived as the Undead, and who seek immortality through dark arts and necromancy. It is not confirmed however if the Graveborn serve the Hypogeans.

Example heroes:

Cecia
Rarity S
Marksman
Cecia
Thoran
Rarity S
Tank
Thoran
Silvina
Rarity A
Rogue
Silvina
Niru
Rarity A
Support
Niru
Celestial
Celestials

The Celestials are a main faction in AFK Arena, and also in Journey. Their main goal is to destroy the Hypogeans and any remaining Darkness plaguing Esperia.

Example heroes:

Dionel
Rarity S
Marksman
Dionel
Scarlita
Rarity S
Warrior
Scarlita
Hypogean
Hypogeans

The Hypogeans are the main villains of AFK Arena, and maybe they serve the same role in Journey. Their main goal is to destroy any of Dura's creations by spreading evil all across Esperia.

Example heroes:

Berial
Rarity S
Rogue
Berial
Reinier
Rarity S
Support
Reinier

Archetypes

The class categorizations only loosely define what kinds of abilities the characters will have. Tanks for example, are usually durable front liners designed to take a brunt of the damage, but there are a lot of categories also within the classes themselves.

DPS / Damage Dealer

These heroes focus on outputting high amounts of single-target or AoE damage. Their kit is usually based around just this, but some DPS heroes also provide other things such as Crowd Control or sustain.

Example heroes:

Valen
Rarity A
Warrior
Valen
Bryon
Rarity S
Marksman
Bryon
Cecia
Rarity S
Marksman
Cecia
Seth
Rarity A
Rogue
Seth
Specialist

Heroes in this category are often damage dealers who have a great portion of their kit dedicated to gimmicks like Crowd Control, debuffs, buffs or other Support. They are sometimes interchangeable with DPS.

Example heroes:

Eironn
Rarity S
Rogue
Eironn
Kruger
Rarity A
Warrior
Kruger
Lyca
Rarity A
Marksman
Lyca
Carolina
Rarity S
Mage
Carolina
Support

The heroes in this role are centered around keeping the team alive and powerful through a combination of healing, buffing and other defensive gimmicks.

Example heroes:

Rowan
Rarity S
Support
Rowan
Smokey & Meerky
Rarity S
Support
Smokey & Meerky
Hewynn
Rarity S
Support
Hewynn
Niru
Rarity A
Support
Niru
Tank

Heroes belonging to this role are durable frontliners built to take a brunt of the incoming damage and enemy aggro. With a combination of sustain, defensive buffing and crowd control they ensure the safety of their fragile backline.

Example heroes:

Thoran
Rarity S
Tank
Thoran
Brutus
Rarity S
Warrior
Brutus
Lucius
Rarity A
Tank
Lucius
Lumont
Rarity S
Tank
Lumont

If you want to check all characters that are available in the game, go here:

Equipment

Guides

Characters in AFK Journey don't need to equip gear anymore, as the system has been replaced by Class-based Equipment system - you simply gather gear that the Class can wear and every character within the Class will automatically wear it in the battle. This makes gear management not only much easier to handle, but also it allows you to try different characters and easily swap them before the battle when you need their specific skillset.

To find out the best priority of equipment upgrades for each class and more information about the Equipment, check our other guide:

Exclusive Equipment

Guides

When you upgrade a character to their Mythic+ tier, their Exclusive Item becomes available to unlock and upgrade. This Exclusive Item grants a set of stats tailored towards the character it is for and unlocks a 4th ability in their kit (known as an EX or Exclusive Skill).

EX LevelsNew passive?Stone (total)
EX+1 to EX+5Yes
150x
Tidal Essence
Tidal Essence
EX+6 to EX+10Yes
75x
Temporal Essence
Temporal Essence
EX+11 to EX+15Yes
200x
Temporal Essence
Temporal Essence
EX+16 to EX+20No
125x
Twilight Essence
Twilight Essence
EX+21 to EX+25No
500x
Twilight Essence
Twilight Essence

Leveling up

Before 240
  • To level up a character you will need
    Gold
    Gold
    and
    Experience
    Experience
    - both can be obtained from AFK Stages and as various rewards,
  • Still, every 10 levels, on top of
    Gold
    Gold
    and
    Experience
    Experience
    you will also need
    Essence
    Essence
    . And Essence will usually be the material you will lack the most and you will have to 'idle' for hours (and later days) to obtain enough of it to push a character through the level 10 upgrade.
Post 240

This system changes once you reach the 240 level cap on your top 5 characters and now instead of leveling them, you will level the Resonance Hall. And the level cap will increase by 5 for every Supreme+ character you posses. You will also need only

Essence
Essence
moving forward and on top of that you will obtain
Diamonds
Diamonds
every time you level past level 300.

Ascension

In AFK Journey the concept of fodder has been removed and the whole Ascension system has been simplified. Now, to ascend a character you either need to gather their dupes or faction-tied Acorns (which can be obtained from various shops or from pulling). The table below shows all the currently available tiers in the game and the requirements to reach them.

To learn more about the Ascension system, check this guide: