Before you start: This guide ended up quite a bit longer than I would have liked, however I will put a disclaimer here that this guide does not go over the basic things the game tutorial teaches you. It also is not detailed enough to cover various unique mechanics later on in the game. Read the guides I linked, and maybe find some yourself too. It will help tremendously. If you’re in core trouble of needing more cores for link 5 and 4 star dolls on your first echelon, please ask for help at the links below this guide.

TL;DR – Keypoints, read this if the whole thing is too yarring:
Finish leveling your first ARSMG echelon to lv90 first. Focus everything on it before moving on to another echelon. Recommended formation is here
DO NOT SCRAP THE AR TEAM (Anti-rain)
5 stars dolls are expensive, not generally recommended early
Dummy linking is very important in this game
Prioritize using combat reports on your AR, then SMG
Remember to enhance your dolls using 2 star fodders
Craft SMG early, followed by RF and HG. See Factory and Resources for recommended recipes
You can rush through levels with friend echelons. You should clear chapter 5 ASAP. Video guide/Document guide
Earn your free gems, prioritize unlocking 6 echelons ASAP, followed by 4 dorms.
Prioritize Data Sim > Neural Sim > every other sim
Run your logistics
Learn to kite your dolls
When you unlock fairies, try to craft at the very least 3 fairies a week. Recommend 1-3 fairies a day if you play normally, 4-6 a day if you are more invested
Fairy room > Expedition room > Command room
Build your 2nd echelon (RFHG) after finishing your first echelon
Build your 0-2 echelon after finishing your RFHG echelon
Focus on Mod 2 M4 and AR-15
For which doll to use from now on, use this guide
Read some other guides

Chapter 1 through 6
Chapter 1 and 2 – Introduction

Objectives:

Set up a basic AR SMG team
Obtain M4A1 smoothly by the end of chapter 2
Basic game knowledge
Rushing through levels with friend echelons

Early map clear

The first 2 chapters are reasonably easy, with 2-6 being the choking point for some people. For these chapters, just using your 2 and 3 stars should be enough to clear.
It is important that you get through these maps quickly in order to obtain [AR]M4A1, a very important doll in both gameplay and lore-wise.

Formation

There are some highly recommended dolls you should obtain along the way to 2-6, they’re both cheap and reliable in both their role and rarity:

[AR]OTs-12 (lv.15, 2 links, reward from clearing mission 1-6)
[SMG]Sten Mk2 (Maintank), [SMG]Skorpion (Offtank)
[RF]M14 (first day login reward)
In Girls’ Frontline, the most fundamental mechanic that everyone should know is formation and unit synergy. For the purpose of this guide, we will only go over the most fundamental formation

AR/SMG F-formation:

AR/OTs-12Position 7	(Off Tank) SMGPosition 8	Position 9
(Buffer/HG) ARPosition 4	(Main Tank) SMGPosition 5	Position 6
AR/M14Position 1	Position 2	Position 3

AR/SMG Synergy:
- Why? T-Dolls have a buff aura around them in a formation. SMGs and ARs buff each other. SMGs are your tank and ARs are your DPS. An ARSMG team is recommended early game because they’re an all-rounder, good at clearing the majority of story maps.

Why F-formation?

As you can see in the picture above, the natural curve that the enemy follow suggests a higher degree of aggro at the top compared to the bottom. By using the F-formation, the offtank can help eliminate any threats to your dps up top (position 7)

F-formation also allows for greater maneuverability in the fight (kiting) while still (mostly) maximizing buff tiles.

Why not other gun types?
- For this first echelon, RF and HG can also fit into it; however, with M14 being an exception, RF should not be used in a general usage AR SMG team due to problems with synergy. HG is not recommended for your first echelon due to their tiles being tied to link count and having no access to T-exo till lv80, which limits their viability in the early game. See this for more information about equipment types.
- MG and SG should never be used in your first echelon due to their high-cost of obtaining and operating. Their reliance on good buffs and equipment is also a major limiting factor in the early game. Don’t be fooled by the CE number, it is generally meaningless.

Rushing through early levels with friend echelons

As you unlock new chapters, more logistic missions will be available to you, as well as the rewards from the progression system. It is recommended that you try to clear mission 3-6 ASAP. For how to rush through levels with friend echelons, see this video guide or this document.

Factory and resources

You should do 4 productions per day each for both Dolls and Equipments to obtain daily rewards.
While it varies between players for a safe level of minimum resources, due to the rate of grind and logistics situation, you should keep at least 1000 of each resource available at all times, along with a minimum of 3 contracts each for dolls and equipments at daily reset. This is to ensure smooth operation of the base and ensure you have enough resources to clear your dailies crafting missions.
You can find daily recipe rate in GFDB, or use recommended recipes in Recommended recipes>Recommended recipes*. The table below has some basic recipes that are commonly used. I recommend crafting for SMG if you want to start with a strong AR SMG team. You’re looking for [SMG]UMP45/UMP9/C-MS.

Type	Recipe	Type	Recipe
AR	97/404/404/97	MG	800/800/200/400
SMG	400/400/91/30	SG	8000/1000/8000/4000
RF	400/100/400/200	Fairy (Normal)	500/500/500/500
HG	131/131/131/131	Fairy (Para)	2000/500/2000/1000

– Normal crafts The recipe format is

– Heavy crafts Manpower/Ammo/Rations/Parts

Similar to doll crafting, equipment crafting recipes and also be obtained in the above-mentioned method. I recommend for all new players to craft using the HV recipe (50/250/150/150) and VFL recipe (210/80/150/80) as they have fairly high drop rate for HV and VFL (most commonly used eqs) and also cover all of the other equipment types.

Important notes:DO NOT TOUCH HEAVY PRODUCTIONS (yet)The rarity of a doll does not necessarily determine her worth, but a 5 stars doll will be a magnitude more expensive to raise.As your team is still going to change drastically until the end of chapter 3, you should try to minimize resource spending (mainly combat reports and cores) on these dolls for now. Don’t go crazy with the leveling just yet.Make sure to enhance your dolls. Leveling up only increases the maximum stats cap, enhancement raises your current stats. Use your 2 stars fodders for that.

Chapter 3 to 6:

Objectives:

Assemble your first echelon
What/When/How to level your dolls
Core management
Gems and Logistics
Learn important mechanics

Finalizing your first echelon

(Top DPS) SOPMOD IIPosition 7	(Off Tank) SkorpionPosition 8	Position 9
(Buffer) M4A1Position 4	(Main Tank) UMP45Position 5	Position 6
(Bottom DPS) AR-15Position 1	Position 2	Position 3

The above echelon is the ideal starting echelon, cheap and effective for dealing with various types of enemies. However, there are always more options available for you, as each and everyone differ in the way they play the game.
Top DPS (Position 7):
SOPMOD II: Good, comes for free with level and links. Is an upgrade over other options.

OTs-12: Cheap and effective at what she does. Free game reward. Is overshadowed by other free AR such as FNC and SOPMOD.
M4A1: She only goes here if you are using 2AR 1RF formation with M14

Priority: SOPMOD II>OTs-12 (Depends on M4’s position)

Buffer (Position 4):

//Keep M4 here, unless stated otherwise

AR15/FNC/OTs-12: Only if you’re using M4A1 at position 7.
Ribeyrolles/HG: Not recommended for beginners.

Bottom DPS (Position 1):

M14: Refer to this footnote
FNC/OTs-12: FNC is arguably the best 3 stars AR available, followed by OTs-12. Good if you want to save some cores.

Priority: ST AR-15>M14>FNC>OTs-12

Off Tank (Position 8):
PPS-43: If you’re new to the game, due to most other offtanks being either event-limited or is of a high rarity, she is the only other viable option that is available for this team along with Skorpion. She still performs really well in her role, beating out Skorpion in nade damage and carrying herself well into the late-game. Recommend to raise if obtained early (<lv50)

Priority: PPS-43>Skorpion

Main Tank (Position 5):

UMP45/C-MS: Along with RO635, they’re the most effective general purpose tank available on EN. For your first echelon, UMP45 beat out C-MS due to her much higher drop rate and lower core cost along with her excellent buff tiles.
RO635: A very good option to go for if you’re rushing through the game. Obtained at lv90 5 links by clearing mission 7-6.
UMP9: Overall similar stats to her older sister (UMP45), trading some of her HP for more EVA. A really good tank stats wise, but loses out due to flashbang having much higher initial CD and is useless vs bosses, along with RoF tiles being less favorable. Still an excellent tank, a very good choice for your first echelon.
Ingram: A direct upgrade over Sten, cheap and reliable, with good DMG tiles and Smoke skill. Excellent choice if you’re willing to spend a bit more cores and combat reports to get her up to level.
Sten: Pretty much identical stats wise to UMP45, lose out due to her disastrous buff tiles and a fairly misplaced skill. A very decent tank for first echelon.
MP5: If you don’t have any of the above by the time you get her (clearing mission 4-3), she is the next in line for the main tank slot in your echelon if you don’t want to spend your cores, combat reports, or time to level Sten. Serviceable, but less than ideal.
M45: Some people prefer her over Sten due to her smoke skill and a bit cheaper core-wise. Her eva is quite a bit lower than Sten, with same hp pool. Good for a 2 star.

Priority: UMP45/RO635>UMP9/C-MS>Ingram>Sten/M45>MP5

Leveling, combat reports, and cores:

Leveling with combat reports:
Do not waste resources on anyone outside of your first echelon yet. Focus entirely on your first team until lv90.

By clearing 5-6 and 4-4E, at this point you will have received 4609 combat reports. Leveling each doll to lv90 takes 659 combat reports. Factoring in the free levels and exp gained from grinding levels, you will have enough combat reports to level 8 dolls to lv90, with another free lv90 RO635, one of the best tanks in the game, when you clear 7-6.
I strongly suggest prioritizing your ARs’s level first, as they’re your DPS. More DPS means shorter fights, which leads to less damage having to be tanked by your frontline, increasing the overall survivability of the team.
Prioritize M4A1 to lv70 first, as she will unlock her 4th dummy link and HV equipment slot. After that, prioritize AR15 and SOP to level 80-90 to unlock their HV slot and 5th dummy link. For other DPS, such as M14 and FNC, combat report them to lv70 after M4A1, then continue to level M4A1 until lv90, then finish up other dolls.
For leveling SMG, important checkpoints are lv30, lv50, lv70, lv90 for their equipment slots and 4x/5x dummy link. Level them when you feel like your tanks are too weak to tank properly. Still prioritize your DPS.
Cores and dummy linking:
5 star doll should be sparsely used early on due their core cost for dummy linking is much higher than that of a 2/3/4 star. Other than the above stated dolls, few other 5 stars can be recommended here

Dummy linking allows your doll to have an extra copy of itself in battle, essentially multiplying the effectiveness of that doll. It also multiplies the EXP earned by the doll in battle by 1.5/2/2.5/3 times at 2/3/4/5x dummy link. Dummy linking unlocks at lv10/30/70/90 respectively.
Cores are also important for fairy crafting, one of the key game changers. Fairies only drop from heavy equipment craft, so ideally you should conserve some of your cores for them. Ideally, try to craft for them 3 to 6 times a day, or at the very least 3 times a week, all depending on the rate at which you grind.

Leveling with 4-3E:

This is where you will corpse drag your other teams until your 0-2 dragging echelon is completed. For normal leveling, see this.

Deploy main echelon on red circle, dummy echelon on black circle
Control main echelon to follow the arrows and capture command post on node [4]
Please watch out for the mortar on in battle. This problem and be eliminated entirely by moving the entire echelon 1 tile forward, or move the tank 1 tile forward.

4-3E is also a popular corpse dragging map, since the level is too easy compared to its exp reward.
The basic of corpse dragging is having 2 ARs for dps and one tank to tank damage. This method is for saving supplies while leveling.

To corpse drag, turn off auto-resupply option in the battle setting menu.
Set up 2 echelons, one with only one of the 2 dps, one with the whole leveling team with tank. Follow these steps:

Deploy solo DPS on black, main echelon on red.
Resupply solo DPS and clear the map normally with main echelon.
After the battle, switch the 2 DPS and repeat step 1.

Video example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPSIHrB1rXY

Note: If your DPS or tank is above level 90, do not place her in the first slot of the echelon because the leader gets extra exp.

Resource logistics and gems

Gem usage:Free-to-play/Best value: 6 Echelons > 4 Dorms > 8 echelons > QoL (Oath, doll slots, extra sim energy, good packages,…) / more dormsModerate Spending: 8 Echelons > 8 Dorms > 10 Echelons > QoL > 10 DormsWhale: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Earning gems:

You can earn 300 gems a month by logging in every day. Each week you can earn an additional 30 gems by sharing your profile to Facebook or Twitter, totalling to 420 gems a month.
If you want best-value, the monthly card is great (900 gems a month). Your first purchase of each individual gem pack also double in value, resetting every anniversary (~May).
S-ranking (gold medal) maps give gems from achievements, 10 gem for normal maps, 30 for emergency maps.
Logistics:
See this chart for logistic missions. You want to maximize your resource per hour, while paying attention to the time it takes for each logistic mission, all depending on the frequency of your logins.

You should use the old dolls that you have already leveled from the early game that is no longer used or the free leveled dolls you get from mission rewards, put them as team captain in slot 1 of each non-main echelon, then fill the rest with whatever dolls you don’t use.
You should save your gems for buying 6 Echelons asap, that way you can have 2 combat ready teams and 4 logistic teams at all times.
The faster you’re clearing the maps, the more logistic missions you can access, improving your supply income. See this section for how to rush through levels
Core management and retiring T-Dolls:

Always look up this chart when you’re about to retire a new doll.
Retiring 3/4/5 stars doll gives 1/3/5 cores respectively
If you’re running low on cores, S-ranking a map for the first time will reward you with some. On how to S-rank a map, see Gold Medal section in Combat Summary (Top left of the battle map), or consult a detailed guide: https://www.gflcorner.com/s-rank-guide-index/
If you’re running out of space, it’s ok to retire the Not Recommended dolls (link above), if you don’t have plans to use her. You can recover a doll through the index, with the core cost of 2x linking her. Remember to unlock the doll before retiring.

Equipment:

For a guide on which equipment is good for a T-doll, refer to DMesse’s guide: http://dmesse.egloos.com/3568959.

Battle control, kiting, and basic game mechanics:

Battle control and kiting:

In battle control is a very important part of this game, knowing how to control your dolls can make or break a lot of fights later on. Please read this for more info:
https://www.gflcorner.com/battle-controls/
Kiting: the most basic form of battle control, and the most important. It takes advantage of the time it takes for the enemy to stop moving and shoot (your t-dolls also have this time frame). By kiting, you simply move your dolls forth and back, stopping the enemy briefly before making them move again, which completely neutralize the damage potential.
Example: https://i.imgur.com/aqP7SEl.mp4
Other game mechanics:

Save scumming: Pause the battle and force quit the game to restart the fight in case something went horribly wrong.
Bossing: A lot of bosses have AoE skill shots, which require players to dodge out of the way. This is tied to battle control and is detrimental in facing bosses later on. They also have an attack pattern which you may need to learn by experiencing it yourself.

Fairy Crafting

Fairies will be unlocked at 60 unique mission clears.

Fairy is an important part of an echelon. By the time you reached this point in the guide, you should already have unlocked fairies.
You will start with Command Fairy when you craft your first heavy equipment, she is a very good fairy that primary serve as a buffing support for your echelon. You should use her for now.
If you’re low on core before your echelon is lv90, ignore the crafting, else, craft for fairies twice or thrice a day. After your first echelon hit 5 links, you can craft fairies based on your core income. High core, craft more, low core, craft less. ~200-400 cores in reserve is healthy, since you want enough to full link an echelon.
Fairy Crafting is in Equipment Heavy Production. Use the 500/500/500/500 with 1 Ticket 2 Cores Recipe (default) for crafting fairies.
Don’t calibrate fairy skill, you’re wasting tickets, just reroll; unless the fairy is already of a high level. Your DMG 1 Command already has one of the best talents, don’t touch it until 4-5 stars.
Read this for detailed explanations. You’ll need it

a
First echelon to lv90, what now?
2nd echelon
Doll Analysis:

Thanks to GFC, we have a comprehensive analysis document of the strength and weaknesses of the majority of dolls on EN server and is constantly being updated. It is one of the best resource documents available for the game, please refer to this when you decide to use a doll.

RFHG Echelon:

Thanks to GFC Omega, we now have a detailed RFHG guide. Here’s the basic points:

WA2000/Lee Enfield>K31>SVD/G28/M14>T5000>Springfield with any 2 of these dolls, you’ll have a decent RFHG echelon at your disposal. M14 and Springfield will probably earn a spot here due to M14 being very good for what she is, while Springfield come for free with lv 70 and 4 links.
Other than RF, HG are also in important part of the team. For starter, with your first RFHG echelon, you’d generally want 1 FP buffer, 1 RoF buffer, and 1 defensive hg. Refer to Doll Analysis for which HG to use. Note: A lot of the 2 and 3 star HG such as Astra, Makarov, PPK, Nagant are actually very good substitutes if you don’t have the standard 5 stars like Calico, Welrod, Grizzly,…

Other team building:

Other than ARSMG and RFHG, MGSG is also another type of standard formation, alongside others non-standard types like Exodia and enemy specific comps. As a new player, you should stick to these standard compositions for now before venturing into the world of theory crafting. Please read this guide for your team building needs: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1STNoii10S7cHSz573t39BWtKFEY0CFWqWMkas1472RE/edit

0-2 drag squad:

You want a 0-2 corpse drag team early in the game, since it allows you to level other dolls much more effectively compared to other maps. I recommend getting this team running at the very last before your 3rd echelon, but the sooner the better. It is priority after your first echelon hits 5 links, but while waiting to obtain the necessary dolls and equipments, a RFHG team can/should be raised as your 2nd echelon.
Level M16 and 2 of these dolls to lv90 by corpse dragging 4-3E, and skill level them according to this:

(AR15 Mod/G11/AN94 > FAL > K11/AK12/K2/G36 Mod > Sopmod > 416)

AR15 Mod: SL8 2 skills is workable. SL10 both if you can
G36 Mod: SL8 first skill. WIP for 2nd skill.
Fal/K11: SL10

Sopmod: SL9 (SL8 with fairies)
G11: SL9
K2/416/AN94/AK12: SL8

These requirements are aimed to be efficient, not a minimum requirement for 0-2. You can go lower or higher, it’s up to you to decide how efficient it is gonna be. This efficiency is also affected by formation buffs (doll buffers, fairy aura, ect…). The most important part will be M16 with +7 gold armor and T-Exo.

You want to have 2 sets of gold crit scope (VFL) and high velocity magazines (+7) for your 2 DPS, 1 gold T-Exo and 1 gold Armor (+7) for M16. (Need 10 armor)

This is the 0-2 corpse dragging team. While waiting for the required ARs and/or equipment to be crafted, you can level this team in 4-3E and skill level them.
Read this guide for extra information on how to corpse drag 0-2, but the basic is the same as 4-3E corpse dragging:

Spawn the leveling team at the command post
Start the map
Spawn the solo dps at the helipad to the left, then resupply.
Take the following route
Swap the dps in the beginning of next of next the attempt, then repeat steps above

Updated image will be added later

The linked guide above also contains corpse dragging with 2 ARs. Dragging solo with AR-15 is also possible; however, it is much less effective and requires full gold equips on her along with SL10.

Miscellaneous mechanics:
Expedition, fairies, command, and other rooms:

Expedition room:

Unlocks at commander lv20, this room is tremendously useful in gathering items such as combat reports, equipment enhancement pills, ect…
Pet types give unique perks, more information in the guides below. Generally, use dogs for bacon.
This document has a more detailed list of possible rewards
GFC’s expedition guide
Fairies room:
Unlock with fairies at 60 unique map clears, it is instrumental to your usage of fairies, as it provide higher fairy command cap, regeneration, as well as fairy exp bonuses.
Command room:
Where you make combat reports. Useful if you have spare batteries and is too lazy to level normally.
Others:

Pet room: where you get pets, upgrading it allows you to get a higher variety of pets. Not a priority early.
HOC room: Coming soon. Not yet on EN.

Priority: expedition room (console lv4, loot rack lv2) > fairy room lv3 > command room lv3 > expedition room (console lv8-9, loot rack lv3-6) > max fairy room > command room lv6-7 > rest (command, pet)

Simulation battle:

Data is one of the most limiting resources in this game. You should always run it when it is available. Prioritize intermediate data as it will get consumed the most.
Prioritize your DPS skill levels. Sl4/8 are good stopping points for most dolls. Sl8-10 takes more than twice the amount of data needed for Sl1-8. Save for advanced data for fairies/important dps dolls, you should aim for Sl10 if possible.
Run Neural Cloud Sim whenever Data sim is not open if you have unlocked it
Exp sim is a good way to allow your dolls to catch up to level (mainly logistic leader) early on, but with the new client, it has become obsolete with the amount of free combat reports you get
Pill Sim, has been obsolete, and will forever be. You get a lot from event crates and barely any use cases beside HOCs.
Defense Drill: too many energy per run, and you get the majority of your calib tickets from other sources anyway. Just run Neural Cloud, it is way more important

Mod 3 – Neural Upgrade:

Pretty much a limit-break mechanic. New max level is lv120.
You need cores and memory fragments from Neural Cloud to Mod a doll.
Unlock 2nd skill. Oath double exp earn post lv100, massive stats boost.
Try to work on M4 Mod ASAP.

Priority: M4 Mod 2 > AR-15 Mod 2 > M4 Mod 3 > AR-15 Mod 3

Night mission clearing:

HG is highly recommended/required for night missions, it provides node vision for your echelon.
All doll types receive a 90% accuracy debuff in night battle. AR, SMG, and HG can equip PEQ (Night goggles) to reduce is debuff by up to 100%.
A common misconception is that RFHG is for night battle. It should be rephrased that RFHG is for fighting against armored enemies with 0 eva. ARSMG is your go to vs normal non-armored enemies at night, where your RF wouldn’t hit anything with the acc debuff.

Spending your tokens:

There are always 2 running token gacha, radian and current gacha. Rolling radian is good for getting early furniture and fill up your dorms for battery generation, but later on, saving for normal gacha (wait for the one that you like is over all better with higher chance of a complete set for the set bonus, as well as your favorite skins)

Featured guides that you should read up on:

General tips and tricks:

Every so often there will be an event that requires you to clear all the boss battles from chapter 1 to chapter 6 daily. Try your best to participate since these events will have 5 stars equipments along with furniture, or a T-Doll. These equipment will really help you kick start early game so gun for those first.

If a level is too hard for you, abuse your friend echelons. On our Reddit and Discord, there are friend ID threads and rooms for you to friend with high-level players and help you out in the early game.

There is nothing to be ashamed about asking for help. If you’re stuck or need some opinions:

Visit GFL Reddit at: reddit.com/r/GirlsFrontline
Visit GFL Discord at: https://discord.gg/gfen

Post note:

This is a general starting guide, trying to help new players to be efficient with their start in GFL. Obviously, this does not cover outliners, like the case of what if someone already leveled X doll to Y level. For that, help rooms would be a much better place. New players should also refrain from deviating too much from the basics, but also learn to adapt to different situations, that is where Yuko’s document is good at. For everyone who read this guide, you should build a solid understanding of the game since it is impossible for any guide to handhold you through the entire game. Thanks for reading.

Any suggestion, please ping me on Discord @Shuvi#1220.

(Legends have it: If you write a guide and credit it as Ceia’s, you won’t be yelled at. So, I’m gonna credit this guide to Ceia now. Thanks for the guide Ceia)

//TODO:

Need uniform formating: In progress
TL;DR: Done
Finalize draft: Done
Finish miscellaneous section: Done
ADD HOC ROOM
Adding more mechanics if needed
Link to FAQ doc, RFHG doc if available in the future: Done
Add extended resources
Make a PDF

Girls Frontline First Echelon Guide

Featured guides that you should read up on:

General tips and tricks:

Post note:

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