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zlatoraindependent game guide
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A realistic first month in RAID: Shadow Legends

What to do on day one, what to build in week one, what a good first month actually looks like — and the five mistakes that cost new players the most time.

By Noah Cox, responsible editorPublished 21 September 2026Last reviewed 21 September 2026Independent guide — funded by partner links

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Commission does not buy coverage: the assessments, the criticism and the corrections on this site are written independently of the advertiser, as set out in our editorial policy. RAID: Shadow Legends is free to download and contains optional, chance-based in-app purchases.

What the first month actually feels like #

The first two weeks are generous: the campaign gives up rewards quickly, your champions visibly improve every session, and progress feels fast. Around the point where you start needing specific gear from dungeons, the pace changes sharply. Nothing has gone wrong when that happens — that is the real game beginning.

A circular diagram of five stages: spend energy, fight battles, collect resources, upgrade champions and gear, unlock harder content that costs more energy, with energy at the centre.
The loop you will be running for as long as you play. Energy, not skill, sets the daily ceiling. Original diagram produced for zlatora.online — not a product screenshot.

Day one: four things, in this order #

  1. Link your account. Create or connect a Plarium account before you do anything else. A guest account lives on one device, and losing it is the most avoidable disaster in the game.
  2. Play the campaign, not the shop. Push the early campaign chapters on the lowest difficulty. They are the cheapest source of experience, silver and fodder champions.
  3. Spend nothing. The starter offers will still be there in a week, and you will be far better placed to judge them.
  4. Read the summoning screen before using your free shards, so you see what the published chances actually are.
Do not rush the free shards

There is no hurry. A shard summoned on day one and a shard summoned on day ten behave identically, but on day ten you will know whether you needed a healer or a debuffer.

The first week: build one team properly #

Resist spreading resources across every champion you pull. Pick five and commit: one champion that can take hits, one that heals or shields, one that lowers enemy defence or attack, and two that do damage. If one champion covers two of those jobs, better.

Five cards labelled Damage, Debuffer, Buffer, Support and Defensive, each describing the job it does in a team, with a note that roles overlap.
Cover the jobs first. A balanced team of Rare champions clears content that an unbalanced team of Epics cannot. Original diagram produced for zlatora.online — not a product screenshot.

Also in week one:

  • Join an active clan. It is free, it takes two minutes, and clan boss chests are one of the best reward streams available to a new account.
  • Do the daily and weekly missions. They are the most energy-efficient rewards in the game.
  • Check affinity before each stage. Free, and it prevents a surprising number of losses.
  • Keep every champion for now. Storage is not your constraint yet, and faction coverage matters later.

Start with a linked account

Free to download on mobile, Windows and Mac — link the account before you play.

Get RAID: Shadow Legendspartner link

Partner link. Atom Agentura s.r.o. earns a commission if you install through this link. It costs you nothing extra. The game is free to download and contains optional in-app purchases.

The first month: gear, dungeons and one honest goal #

By the end of the first month a realistic account has a single well-geared team, a clan, a routine of daily missions, and a clear idea of which dungeon is holding it back. That is a good month. It will not have a top-rarity roster, and any guide implying otherwise is describing an account with money in it.

Set one goal: get one team strong enough to farm a mid-level dungeon reliably. Everything after that is downstream of gear, and gear comes from dungeons.

A hub-and-spoke diagram with the roster at the centre and six modes around it, each labelled with the resource it mainly pays out.
Pick the mode that pays what you are short of. In month one, that is almost always gear and upgrade material. Original diagram produced for zlatora.online — not a product screenshot.

Five mistakes that cost new players the most #

Playing as a guest

An unlinked account is tied to one device. Link it on day one.

Levelling twenty champions to fifteen

Five champions at a usable level beat twenty half-built ones. Commit resources.

Ignoring Speed

New players build attack and wonder why the enemy acts twice per round. Speed is the stat that compounds.

Building critical damage with low critical rate

Critical damage does nothing on a hit that is not critical.

Feeding away faction champions

Faction Wars needs a bench from every faction. Check the faction before you sacrifice.

Buying to chase one champion

The draw is random. Buying attempts does not buy outcomes, and this is where budgets die.

If you do decide to spend #

That is a legitimate choice and we are not going to moralise about it. Two pieces of practical advice: decide the monthly figure before you open the shop, and prefer the predictable purchases — energy, progression packs, subscription cards — over chance-based shard bundles, because the first category delivers a known quantity and the second delivers a lottery ticket. Our prices page sets out what is actually on sale.

Ready to start?

Free download, no purchase required to play the campaign.

Get RAID: Shadow Legendspartner link

Partner link. Atom Agentura s.r.o. earns a commission if you install through this link. It costs you nothing extra. The game is free to download and contains optional in-app purchases.

Sources

  1. Plarium Global Ltd — RAID: Shadow Legends official site — https://raidshadowlegends.com/
  2. Plarium support centre — game mechanics and affinity articles — https://raid-support.plarium.com/
  3. Apple App Store listing — size, minimum iOS version, age rating, in-app purchase list — https://apps.apple.com/us/app/raid-shadow-legends/id1371565796
  4. Steam store listing — Windows requirements, release date, purchase labelling — https://store.steampowered.com/app/2333480/RAID_Shadow_Legends/
  5. Wikipedia — RAID: Shadow Legends (release history, reception, marketing controversy) — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raid:_Shadow_Legends

Store listings and support pages were consulted on 21 September 2026. Live game figures change with each update: where this page and the publisher’s own information diverge, the publisher’s information prevails.