Super MNC Gunner Guide

Super MNC Gunner Guide by catsakimbo

Credit to Zanarias for the structure of this guide.

There’s recently been more interest in gunner strategies. If you only have 10 seconds for a guide, holding both mouse buttons and tapping E is truthfully not the worst thing you can do. But we’re here to do even better! At the writing of this guide, I’ve played around 100 matches as gunner. I think I do pretty well, and am usually top in the server when I’m winning. But I have some bad matches too, so take this stuff with a grain of salt. It’s not an ultimate guide, but just my guide.

I. Overview
As a gunner, your job is to dump bullets and rockets into bots and people. You are absolutely awful at moving around or getting away, so your weakness is getting caught out of position. You can act as a turret and momentarily clear people out of an area, but these are secondary to your main role: damage dealing.

A Quick Note to New Players:
If you’re losing all the time because you’re dying a lot at the start and getting out-leveled, you’re doing it all wrong.

Take a step back, and on your next match try as hard as you can to never die once. Stay near turrets for protection, retreat before you even get to 1/2 health, avoid enemies at all costs. If you’re successful in having very little deaths but you still lose, you’re doing it RIGHT!

Now start pushing a little more and get a little riskier. You’re looking for the balance between being too aggressive, and too conservative—for gunner, this balance is much closer to conservative, so you need to start at that end.

II. Skill Order
“Gats Akimbo” or the min/max Build:
Level 1: Offense
Level 2: Rocket
Level 3: *save your points
Level 4: Offense + Rocket
Level 5: Defense
Level 6: Defense
Level 7: *save your points
Level 8: Offense + Rocket
Level 9: Defense
Level 10: Slam
Level 11: Slam
Level 12: Slam
Level 13: Deploy
Level 14: Deploy
Level 15: Deploy

This is the build I personally use, and it requires you to be very conservative for the first 5 levels. I’ll change it up if the other team seems extra coordinated and get defense earlier, because sometimes every bit of survivability helps against people who will gang up to kill you.

If there’s a tough annihilator fight on Loco Moco arena, I’ll get slam earlier to try to clear people off the platform. This isn’t as effective on the other maps (though you’ll get lucky on Spunky sometimes).

The theory of this build is that rockets and the gatling gun are our most powerful weapons, so upgrading them as early as possible is ideal. At level 4, you’re a “glass cannon” of sorts, and need to be careful not to die. If you’re doing well, you start getting defense before the first annihilator. Level 8 is the big jump where you get stage four rockets and double gatling at the same time. It’s a great feeling to get this sudden boost to your offense.

III. Endorsements and Products
Endorsements: As you know, these things are expensive, so I haven’t been able to afford my ideal build, let alone play around with other builds. At the start, just buy some cheap “regular” level endos to give you the slightest (probably imperceptible) boost. You’ll want to focus on Rate of Fire, Accuracy, Crit Rate/Damage, and Skill Regen. This may (and probably will) change as everyone gets to know the game better.

Products: The two I think are almost mandatory:

• Over Armor gives you more armor, obviously. Definitely handy for staying alive, and enabling you to push a bit more.
• Health Inverter provides a vampire type effect under 20% hp (damage done to others heals you). We usually have a steady stream of damage going out from our gatling gun, so this product is useful for staying alive in those close situations. Good product, but don’t rely on it.
• Crack shot gives you some amazing accuracy every now and then, even more than deploying. Damage still falls off at a distance, so mortars are still better at range, but Crack Shot makes the mid-range feel like close range while it’s active.
• Critical Amor adds 10% crit rate at max armor after level 10. I’ve tested this a bit, and it’s pretty hard to get max armor, let alone keep it late in the game while utilizing the crit rate. Don’t recommend.
• Critical Kill is probably the best kill product for gunners. Gives you (and friendlies near you) 10% crit boost for 10 seconds. Requires you to be having a good game already of course.
• Critically Late is hard to recommend because I put so much importance on leveling early, and this product doesn’t start adding to your crit rate until level 8+. In a lot of games, you’ll have already won or lost by this point, but it does give you an advantage for even games.

Which ones you take are up to personal preference and playstyle. If you feel like you’re on a good streak, go for a kill bonus product. We can take a good amount of damage, so juice products can be fun too, especially if you like buying juice more than buying bots.

The products that leave a bomb when you die are a bad idea for gunner. If you die a lot in the middle of a group of enemies, then you’re just a bad player who’s out of position and is feeding. For the most part you should be dying just on the outskirts of the action (and preferably not dying at all!). I’ll add some more to this section as I figure out products more (they’re still new as of this writing).

IV. Weapons and Skill Information
Gatling Gun: Huge clip, rapid fire gun that does little damage per bullet, but fires a ton of bullets. It takes time to spin up, but you can start spinning early or keep it spinning with right-click. If you know you’ll be shooting when you turn a corner, jump and then spin-up to get there quick and be ready to lay waste.

Mortar: Long range weapon that lobs explosives. The first two levels in offense split it into 2/3 shots, causing more damage after the split. I recommend offense first because the split helps you pepper the other team at the very start while keeping a safe distance.

Rocket: If you’ve been in a game with a gunner in it, you know why this is great. A homing rocket that deals a good spike of damage. Pretty much the only way to avoid it is to hide behind a wall (in which case you’re taking them out of the fight for a moment, which is a good thing in and of itself).

Slam: An area push back with some damage. More useful than you may give it credit for. It should rarely be used as an offensive tool, because you shouldn’t be that close to people. There are exceptions for people caught out of position near ledges of course, but primarily it’s our only means of escape. If someone is melee’ing you, use it to get them off you. Also extremely useful on Loco Moco for clearing enemies off the annihilator (it DOES cancel the buying animation—better than switching to grapple with the mortar!). It also stuns the larger bots.

Deploy: Personally the least useful skill. Use it when there is no risk of enemies getting close to you for a boost to armor and some increased crit rate/accuracy. If you mis-judge your positioning on this, an enemy will get behind you and punish you for it while you sooo slowly undeploy. Best used against bots who are attacking turrets, or during the chaos of a moneyball fight. Note that you can fire multiple rockets at once with this skill, one for each enemy you’re locked onto. Remember that you can go in/out of deploy quickly for a fast 250 armor.

It stops veterans from clawing you in the first place, and prevents you from being knocked back by anything (though you’ll still take damage from whatever would have knocked you). You are also protected from headshots, but be careful not to let snipers keeping firing at you, because they can still whittle you down quickly. Shoot at them to scare them off.

V. What to Do at Each Stage of the Game
This is for if you’re keeping up with the other team in terms of levels. If you’re getting outleveled, play as conservatively as possible (avoid all pros, shoot as many bots as possible to try to catch up).

a). Early Game (Levels 1-4)
If you’re using my skill suggestion above, you need to be extra careful not to die. Upgrading Offense at level 1 will give you split mortars: use this at the very start to barrage enemies from a distance. You won’t kill anyone, but you’ll be annoying: making them strafe around to avoid mortar shells. Once bots get in range of your gatling gun, you can pretty much put mortars away for the rest of the match (though remember it in cases where enemies are far away, and for using the secondary grapple on it when slam is on cooldown).

WATCH WHERE THE ENEMIES ARE. Do not let 2 or more of them get anywhere near you at this point in the game unless your teammates are right next to you. Even then you should be backing up and staying on the outside. Whether or not enemies are this aggressive, you need to be constantly shooting bots. If the map allows it, shoot at the other lane to “tap” those bots and get assist experience. If there’s a group of bots, you should make sure at least one bullet goes into every one of them. We have a lot of bullets; there’s no excuse not to tap everything you can. Pickup nearby coins and drops too!

b). Early-Mid game (Levels 5-7)
With defense, you’re getting a bit more hearty now and can try pushing forward. The first annihilator is around this time, so get up there around 30 seconds early to get in position. Teamwork is essential here, because if you’re the only one at the annihilator, you’re going to die. You’re slow and they have no reason not to chase you until you’re down. So remind your team to assist defense (hit V + 5).

c). Late-Mid game (Levels 8+)
You now have double gatling guns and rockets that recharge quickly and lock-on almost instantly. You’re a force to be reckoned with, and unless the other team is much higher level, you can mow most people down. Continue to stick with your team, but start pushing your advantage and get close enough to kill some people. As always, keep your head on a swivel to look for enemies behind you, and shoot any bot you see.

d). Late Game (Levels ~13-15).
It’s hard to give advice here. It’ll only get this far if it’s a close match, so figure out what’s making it a close match and try to fix it. Is their team killing your bots early and not letting them move up? Try to distract them. Is your team just not killing enough bots? Escort your bots more closely and push one lane up. You should feel really powerful now, but don’t go throwing your body against their team. The long respawn time here will end up losing you the game if you die a lot.

VI. Situational Tips
Tapping
As mentioned before, the gatling gun dumps a LOT of bullets. Get a bullet into every bot you see to get assists and level up quicker. If you’re facing off against an enemy and you’re waiting for them to peek out, you should still be shooting nearby bots. Challenge yourself to have the most bot kills on your team and you’ll be rewarded with a high level.

Ka-Claw Slam
Veterans can mess you up with ka-claw by pulling you out of position. If you’re clawed, slam immediately and you can interrupt it. If you’re slow to react, you’ll still slam the vet, giving you a chance to jump and jet your way to freedom away from his grapples.

Melee Slam
Similar to above, don’t forget about slam when someone is meleeing you. If they’re close, they’ll get knocked back. If they’re too far away and hopping around so the slam misses, you may be in trouble if they can close the gap. Do your best to back away while shooting them, and switch to mortar to grapple them when they get close.

Fuji Slam
Fuji’s will take down turrets very quickly. Use slam to stun them and stop them from shooting for a while. This works for the big jackbots too, but it’s preferable to use mortar grapple to damage them first.

Loco Moco Annihilator Defense
It’s like this map was made for us to defend the annihilator. Upgrade your slam earlier to knock everyone off the platform. If the annihilator is ready, you may have just enough time to take it right after slamming. If not, jet pack to one of the side pillars and deploy. Anyone on the annihilator platform is at the perfect range to mow down with your gatling gun and the fast cooldown on rockets will make it easy to kill anyone in front of you. Be ready to undeploy if someone sneaks up behind you.

Mortars
While your gatling gun is better, mortars have a longer range and do pretty well at a distance. Use them to take down turrets, kill far away bots safely, and in general, hit anything far away that you see. Use the grapple on enemies that are right on top of you when slam is on cooldown. Don’t forget about this long range tool, but make gatling gun your preference.

Jump Jets
Despite being so slow, your jetpack does give you a little maneuverability that other classes don’t have. Use it to cross small gaps and, and occasionally recover from being knocked off a ledge (rarely works, but always worth a try). It’s also great for getting away from enemies that rely on grappling. Get in the air when they’re near and shoot them from above.