Gunner (LWR)

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  Gunner

The Gunner class is a support fire specialist, capable of wielding the largest automatic weapons in XCOM's arsenal to either inflict heavy damage, or lock down and debuff hostiles.

Primary Weapon: Assault Rifles, Carbines, SAWs, LMGs.

Secondary Weapon: None.

Class-Limited items: SAWs, LMGs.

Attribute Growth: HP x2, Aim x2.

Abilities

Rank	Ability
Specialist	Suppression Suppression Suppress [Pinned if protected by cover, suppressive fire if not, no reaction fire, -35 aim, -35% mobility/ability range] targets. Breaks with suppressive fire if the target acts. Requires 2 ammo, and uses the 2nd ammo if the suppression breaks with suppressive fire. 1 turn cooldown. [Suppressive Fire deals 40% standard shot damage]
Lance Corporal	Will To Survive Will To Survive Increases DR of all cover to 60% but grants 10 less defense. For XCOM, grants Steadfast. Steadfast Steadfast Provides +2 armor HP, immunity to panic, and reduces injury times by 30%.		Sentinel Sentinel Fire an additional reaction shot and gain +20 defense during overwatch. Grants Opportunist. Opportunist Opportunist Reaction shots gain +10 aim and can critically hit.		Mayhem Mayhem Suppression damages enemies immediately with a round of suppressive fire. Suppressive Fire can cause bleeding.
Corporal	Double Tap Double Tap Shooting allows this unit to fire an extra shot if not out of ammo or targets. The extra shot gains +20 aim/crit if it's the same target. 1 turn cooldown after 2nd shot is used.		Ready For Anything Ready For Anything At the end of each turn, if this unit did not move and is not at risk of triggering reaction fire, overwatch activates. If this unit has not moved, reaction shots gain +10 aim.		Holo Rounds Holo Rounds Firing at a target holos them for 3 turns [Prevents stealth, incoming shots gain +10 aim and +10 penetration].
Sergeant	Regen Biofield Grit Grants +4 armor HP and %DR equal to a quarter of the % total HP lost.		Critical System Targeting Critical System Targeting Shots against autopsied mechanical units deal +20% damage and gain +20 penetration (+50% damage and +50 penetration if steadied). Does not work with Arc Weapons.		Penetrator Penetrator The primary weapon gains +15 penetration.
Tech Sergeant	Extra Conditioning Extra Conditioning Grants +2 armor HP and +0.6 mobility, and a 10% chance for all end-in-idle actions to cost 0 AP.
Gunnery Sergeant	Tenacious Defense Tenacious Defense Grants +2 armor HP. Grants +20 crit resistance when protected by cover.		Bring 'Em On Bring 'Em On This unit gains +0.5 damage on standard shots and incoming non-psionic attacks have a +5% graze chance for each enemy in sight.		Lock n' Load Lock n' Load Reloading any weapon costs only 1 AP and dashing automatically reloads the active weapon.
Master Sergeant	Kitted Kitted Grants a medikit and a smoke grenade. If this unit does not have a scope, it gains a generic scope (+10 aim). If this unit does not have a plating, it gains a generic plating (+2 armor HP).			Impact Impact Shots gain +10 penetration. Non-reaction shots disable their target's Overwatch and Reactive Targeting Sensors.

Tactical Advice

Role: Medium Range Offense / Focus Fire Support

The Gunner is mostly unchanged from vanilla. A major decision when building a Gunner is deciding if they will use a LMG or SAW-type weapon. SAW Gunners have more mobility and accuracy, while LMG Gunners are slow and inaccurate, but boast an improved AOE Suppression thanks to the weapon's Danger Zone and a deep pool of ammo to draw from.

Suppression is a powerful tool used to chip down exposed targets or pin down enemies behind cover to prevent dangerous flanks. Suppression also softens up priority targets by applying holo-targeting and shred effects on aliens. Besides this innate utility, they also have access to a large array of offensive and defensive options which gives them a lot of flexibility in their builds, with many viable combinations.

They enjoy the high power of their class weapons, granting them a sizable damage output that will put Shredder to good use. Gunners are however quite slow with no movement growth and heavy weaponry and thus are most at home in fights that don't require a lot of repositioning.

Sample Builds

Tank Gunner

The Tank Gunner mixes sturdiness with high damage in a threatening package. It is a rare example of a biological class with access to Grit and it is put to good use to endure an impressive amount of punishment that would leave most other tank builds long dead. Double Tap rounds out the offensive capabilities of the build with strong bursts of shredding damage that can crack open heavily armored enemies. Suppression remains a reliable utility option but an alert Commander will keep an eye on available ammo lest a crucial Double Tap opportunity be missed.

Will To Survive Will To Survive

Double Tap Double Tap Holo Rounds Holo Rounds

Critical System Targeting Critical System Targeting Regen Biofield Grit

Extra Conditioning Extra Conditioning

Tenacious Defense Tenacious Defense Bring 'Em On Bring 'Em On

Kitted Kitted

Recommended Weapons: SAWs
Recommended Equipment: Survivability-increasers, Aim-increasers.

Notes:

• The biggest choice for Gunner Tanks is their CPL perk. Double Tap gives strong burst damage potential from the big guns that Gunners carry, while Holo Rounds leans more into the support side of gunners and their Suppression's ability to spread Holo around.
• At SGT, Critical System Targeting pairs well with Double Tap for even more offensive power, while Grit might pair better with Holo Rounds, further increasing your tanking capabilities.
• At GSGT you can choose to sacrifice the crit resistance of Tenacious Defense for the offensive bonuses that Bring 'Em On provides.
• Like most Gunner builds, mobility tends to be a heavy concern; Walker Servos are a possible solution to the problem if necessary.

Overwatch Gunner

The Overwatch Gunner is an offensive build that utilizes the high damage of the SAW with Sentinel and Shredder to deliver hefty damage through reaction fire and lock down enemy movement. Ready for Anything grants more shred and uptime and flexibility as Gunner can chose to fire or reload and still overwatching as long as the Gunner does not move. For this reason, this build is most at home in heavy and protracted firefights where it can fire uninterrupted - racking up shredding damage to overwhelm the opposition. Pairing this build with another Overwatch class will wear down enemy battle lines at an alarming pace. Suppression - while still useful - is less optimal than on other builds. Late game the build works very well with flying armors giving Gunners extra mobility and much needed accuracy to hit for serious damage.

Sentinel Sentinel

Ready For Anything Ready For Anything Holo Rounds Holo Rounds

Regen Biofield Grit Critical System Targeting Critical System Targeting

Extra Conditioning Extra Conditioning

Bring 'Em On Bring 'Em On

Kitted Kitted

Recommended Weapons: SAWs
Recommended Equipment: Aim-increasers, Damage-increasers, Survivability-increasers.

Notes:

• The SGT perk in this build is very flexible:
  • Critical System Targeting combined with Flak ammo allow a high specialization against Mechs.
  • Grit gives a front-line soldier added survivability, which is always useful.
• Psionics and Gene Mods are both greatly appreciated on this build for the extra OW shot from Inner Fire and Enhanced Metabolism respectively. The Gunner's low will growth often means that Psi Gunners are quite rare, however.
• The LMG is an unconventional choice for this build due to the steep aim penalty. Sufficiently mitigated however (e.g Mind Merge + Holo Rounds or equipping multiple aim-increasers), the resulting damage will put most other offensive builds to shame.

Mayhem Gunner (Bullet Wizard)

The Mayhem Gunner build focuses on debuffing and crowd control through Suppression boosted by Holo Rounds and Shredder to allow other squad members to provide more accurate and damaging fire. With Mayhem and Danger Zone from the LMG, the Gunner can suppress and debuff entire groups of enemies, denting targets and pinning them down if in cover. The cooldown turn of Suppression can be put to good use by repositioning, reloading or simply using the unwieldy LMG to deliver a powerful albeit innaccurate (Burst is advised) shredding shot to a target. While slow, this build can fix that problem thanks to a great freedom in terms of equipment choices; many typical "shooter" items have a minimal impact on Mayhem Suppression.

Mayhem Mayhem

Holo Rounds Holo Rounds

Penetrator Penetrator Regen Biofield Grit

Extra Conditioning Extra Conditioning

Lock n' Load Lock n' Load

Impact Impact Kitted Kitted

Recommended Weapons: LMG
Recommended Equipment: Survivability-increasers, Mobility-increasers, Damage-increasers, Alloy Bipod, Utility.

Notes:

• The Alloy Bipod gives a unique flat bonus to Suppressive Fire damage; this can be nice if you happen to have extra item slots you aren't using for other things, but isn't necessary as you'll often have to reposition for effective Suppressions anyways.
• Penetrator adds a significant amount of damage through DR due to Mayhem's low damage early, but eventually the survivability of Grit may be more worthwhile as shred is not affected by DR, and even with Penetrator you may find your damage to be lacking against covered targets.
• This build is known to be very stat-independant; any rookie cursed by low stat totals that ends up in the Weapons supraclass is salvageable as a Mayhem Gunner.

See also

Long War Rebalance: Soldiers
Soldiers	Soldiers Assault Infantry Rocketeer Gunner Sniper Scout Medic Engineer
MEC	MEC Troopers Marauder Goliath Jaeger Shogun
Sub-classes and abilities	Officers Psionics Gene Mods S.H.I.V.s