The S Tier

Cream of the crop, the best of the best; these Advanced Classes excel at what they do, be it DPS or team Support. While some other Classes are capable of achieving somewhat comparable results, the S-Tier Classes are just a league above them. If you're looking for the Best Lost Ark Classes, this is it. 

Bard not only offers a unique music-inspired aesthetic but can also give you the feeling of being the centerpiece of any team. She is great at supporting her teammates via a plethora of beneficial spells that include shields, heals, and buffs. Her main strong point is the ability to keep her teammates alive via potent burst heals - the feat at which the Paladin falls a bit behind. She can reduce the group's damage taken and increase everyone's attack speed. Also, while She's much less durable than the Paladin, She offers a solid ranged damage potential and nice mobility in return. Her abilities make her the most-wanted Class in any group. She is also more versatile than the Paladin, thanks to the ranged nature of her spells. If you were to look at the statistics to determine the Best Lost Ark Support Classes, she would be at the top and so she lands in our S Tier. 

Our Lost Ark Bard Builds: 

• Bard Raid Support Build - A great support-oriented build that excels at any type of end-game group content. It offers amazing healing capabilities, a range of powerful utility spells, and surprisingly high damage output. Its skill-ceiling is quite high, however, and you'll need to have good situational awareness as well as solid encounter knowledge to unlock its true potential. 

Gunlancer is the tankiest of Lost Ark Classes, however, defenses are not his only strong point. This heavily-armored melee fighter wields a massive shield and a Gunlance, which is a melee weapon with a gun built into it - a nice bit of unique flavor right there. He can soak up most of the incoming damage and taunt enemies, interrupting their abilities and forcing them to focus on him. Moreover, He can surround His whole team with a powerful shield and cleanse everyone in his group if needed. Offensively, he can easily pull his weight in most encounters and the only thing that he lacks is mobility (but that's not too much of an issue). He lands in our S Tier because He can easily play the support role in any group and is actually considered one of the Best Lost Ark Support Classes as well as one of the most reliable Damage Dealers! 

Our Lost Ark Gunlancer Builds:

• Combat Readiness Gunlancer Build for Raiding/PvE - A powerful PvE build that embraces Gunlancer's amazing survivability and cranks it up to 11. Surprisingly, this extremely tanky build can also compete for high places on DPS charts! 
• Lone Knight Gunlancer Build for Raiding/PvE - An alternative Gunlancer setup that forgoes some of His defensive capabilities in favor of a more consistent DPS. Thanks to the Lone Knight Engraving, This build offers high Crit Chance and increased Crit Damage. 

Gunslinger is definitely one of the most versatile Lost Ark Classes. She offers great mobility (which compensates for her below-average defense), very competitive DPS, and very solid team synergies (She's one of the most synergistic Classes, actually). While in combat, She utilizes a total of three ranged weapons: a pistol, a shotgun, and a rifle, and swaps between them as needed - weapon switching is a big part of Her gameplay. Having to manage three weapon types instead of one rises Gunslinger's skill ceiling considerably. However, if you are skilled enough to master it, you will be able to unlock Gunslinger's true offensive potential that's simply unmatched by any other DPS Class. In competent hands, Gunslinger definitely becomes one of the best Lost Ark DPS Classes, and thus She lands in our S Tier. 

Our Lost Ark Gunslinger Builds:

• Time to Hunt Gunslinger PvE/Raid Build - A Gunslinger build that forgoes the use of the Shotgun in favor of improving the Rifle and the Handgun skills. It boasts a considerable range, great mobility, and a somewhat simplified playstyle (for a Gunslinger, that is). 
• Peacemaker Gunslinger PvE/Raid Build - A Gunslinger build that makes full use of all three of Her weapons. While quite tricky to play, because of the effective range and positional requirement differences between the guns, it offers an unbelievably high damage potential and a very captivating playstyle. 

Our Lost Ark Berserker Builds:

• Mayhem Berserker for PvE and Raiding - A Berserker Build with which you'll be constantly on the edge as your HP will be limited to 25% of its Total (you'll also receive damage resistance buff, so it's going to be manageable). In return, you'll also be capable of staying in the Berserker's Burst Mode pretty much indefinitely which will result in meaty DPS numbers. 
• Berserker's Technique Berserker Build - A bit more tame setup that utilizes a builder-spender rotation and offers extremely high burst damage with its increased Crit Damage but also feels somewhat sluggish while outside of its burst window. Berserker's Technique Berserker has two distinct combat phases: a Burst Phase which everyone loves, and a build-up phase in which you work for your next Burst Phase. 

The A Tier

Advanced Classes, that landed in this Tier, are great performers and can easily compete for the top spots on any Lost Ark PvE Tier List, especially if they were to receive some minor kit adjustments. As it stands, the following Classes have fallen just a bit short of the "S" Tier. The situation may easily change, however, as the differences are surprisingly minor and even the slightest balance changes can potentially shake things up. If you're looking for solid alternatives to the S-rated Classes, remember that these are still some of the Best Lost Ark Classes out there and thus are definitely worth your attention. 

Wardancer is a versatile melee DPS that employs fist weapons in combat. Unlike some other, more selfish, Classes, She brings potent team synergies to the table - her massive +18% Crit Chance buff, paired with the extra movement and attack speed that she provides, opens up a world of possibilities when it comes to her team's burst damage potential. In fact, she offers the best group utility of all dedicated DPS classes available in Lost Ark! Other than that, she can do competitive Damage and move relatively quickly (that will, however, depend on the stat build somewhat). On the other hand, she's rather squishy and relies on positioning quite heavily. All in all, Wardancer falls a bit short of the S Tier because of her below-average defenses, problematic positional requirements on most skills, and stat-dependant mobility. It's still one of the Best Lost Ark Classes, though. 

Our Lost Ark Wardancer Builds

• First Intention Wardancer PvE/Raiding Build - A very powerful offensively-focused build that offers great DPS and even greater Burst Damage, thanks to the utilization of the First Intention Engraving. If its Back Attack requirements and mana thirstiness don't scare you, you'll definitely have fun with it. 
• Esoteric Skill Enhancement Wardancer PvE/Raiding Build - A build that embraces Wardancer's Esoteric Skills and uses them to deal unbelievably high damage. It also offers strong team synergies but lacks a bit in the mobility department. 

Paladin, just like Bard, is a support class, but he offers a completely different playstyle and has a bit different set of strengths and weaknesses. He offers a solid mix of melee and medium-range offensive skills that allow him to damage his enemies from a relatively safe distance, but His range is nowhere near as good as Bard's. His defenses, on the other hand, are much more formidable - He can withstand much more punishment than the Bard can. His Healing, while very potent, is much less bursty than Bard's. When it comes to offensive buffs, Paladin offers as good of a boost as the Bard does. All in all, we feel like Paladin's maximum potential is a bit lower than Bard's. Because of this, and the fact that we don't want both dedicated Lost Ark Support Classes in the S Tier, we've decided to place Paladin in the A Tier. 

Our Lost Ark Paladin Builds

• Paladin Support Build for PvE and Raiding - A build that excels at keeping its teammates alive, via shields, Heal over Time effects, and damage reduction buffs, while also boosting their offensive capabilities. Thanks to the high uptime of its buffs, this Paladin Build works especially well with classes focused on sustained DPS. 

Sorceress channels the power of the elements through hell staff to unleash death and destruction upon her enemies. As a caster, She does not take hits very well and must rely on her mobility to stay alive. Depending on the chosen Engraving, She can either be a Sustained DPS specialist or a Burst Damage Monster. If you go for the first path, you'll become one of the most reliable DPS Classes out there and you'll also benefit from increased mobility. If the second path sounds better for you, we can assure you that your Burst Damage potential, with a Sorceress, will be tremendous (if you manage to time everything correctly, and land all the hits, of course). The only things that hold us back from placing her in the S Tier are her squishiness and rather long animation locks when using the Igniter build (which has higher potential but is also much more difficult to master in the end-game where bosses become increasingly more mobile and thus hard to hit). 

Our Lost Ark Sorceress Builds

• Igniter Sorceress PvE/Raiding Build - A very aggressive Sorceress build focused around the Igniter Engraving. It offers extremely high Burst Damage, a considerable range on its spells, good Weak Point damage, and great versatility thanks to the lack of position-based spells. To balance things out, the build's mobility is rather limited. 
• Reflux Sorceress PvE/Raiding Build - An extremely versatile Sorceress build that offers high sustained DPS and an engaging play style. It does not rely on the Identity Gauge for doing its damage. Instead, it can utilize it to boost its mobility when needed. Sadly, it lacks burst damage, especially when compared to the Igniter variant. 

Destroyer can be considered as one of the Lost Ark Tank Classes, as He is a true dreadnaught that lumbers through the battlefield clad in heavy armor, obliterating everything on its path. He is the second most durable Class in the game, only losing to a Gunlancer in this department. He also has access to the Taunt spell and a range of "ok" support skills that make him a solid teammate. His damage-dealing capabilities are among the best of them and He's top 1 when it comes to dealing Stagger Damage. Where Destroyer lacks is definitely mobility, as He is one of the least mobile Lost Ark Classes and His animation locks can sometimes be painfully lengthy. Overall, we can safely say that He is very strong, but won't suit everyone's playstyle, because of how sluggish he feels at times, and thus He lands in the A Tier. 

Our Lost Ark Destroyer Builds

• Destroyer Build for Raiding and PvE - A versatile PvE-centered Destroyer Build that gives you quite a lot of customization options and allows you to tailor it to your liking. It offers unparalleled survivability, the best in the game stagger damage, and solid team utility that includes a Taunting skill. 

The B Tier

The last Tier on our List is dedicated to Lost Ark Advanced Classes that are outshined by the others or simply lack something that would make them really "click". Now, please note that the following three Classes are still perfectly viable* for all types of content. They are just not "the best Lost Ark Classes" as of right now. 

*In the current days, many players mix up the word "viable" with the word "optimal" which makes them think that only the strongest Classes are worth playing in MMOs. They are wrong. In Lost Ark, every Advanced Class is perfectly viable for every type of end-game content. Moreover, it often brings a unique flavor and playstyle. You can play any Advanced Class you want and stay competitive, for as long as you understand the mechanics and don't make too many mistakes. 

Coming Soon!

END NOTE

Remember that although we have tried to stay as neutral as possible when compiling this list, there might still be some biased opinions involved. If your personal experience/opinion about certain Lost Ark Advanced Classes varies from the one pictured on our list, don't hesitate to let us know. We will take another look into it, re-think our ranking, and maybe even adjust the list based on your suggestions. Also, please do note that this is an early version of our guide, and we will be happy to receive constructive criticism, that will help us improve it, so leave your suggestions in the comments section below.