Avatar Star Gunner Newbie Guide

Avatar Star Gunner Newbie Guide by Yamazakura

I’ve noticed there is no guide for Gunner, so to maybe promote Gunner players, and as a temporary guide till something better comes along, I will provide some sort of guide from my experience….I’m still new but yeah, no guide for Gunner so…I’ll try my best.

Well to summarize it up. Gunners are actually…kinda fun to play. You’ve got a lot of options to use really here.

So lets move onto your arsenal

Gunner Weapons

The Machinegun:

Machineguns seems a bit weaker than the other weapons in the start, they have a lot of ammo but against Guardian rifles the gun seems like it fires out oranges. Specifically at first the machinegun is going to be outdone by a guardian’s rifle. But once you get Blitzkrieg, this thing does tend to be more dangerous.

Ideally you’re often going to use the machinegun the same way as a Guardian would use his rifle, but you’ll be swapping out for the bazooka every so often as soon as it reloads. I’ll explain this tactic later on how to make your machinegun look like it has a grenade launcher under its barrel.

Otherwise, in TDM, this thing is the weapon you’ll want along with the Bazooka. And in other modes, you may want to keep it around as well.

The Bazooka:

I call it Bazooka, might have another name though. The Bazooka does AoE Damage, if you have ever played Team Fortress 2 though, you’re gonna be sad at the ammo. It reloads fast, but waiting for it to reload makes it pretty bad as the weapon you want out all the time. Still this weapon does wonders. Don’t try rocket jumping either…

Apparently IcyAmiki is right, you can rocket jump, but while its not that strong, you can jump certain areas with it.

The bazooka can hit things from afar. It can disturb sniper nests, and disrupt Domination/King of the Hill Campers. It is also neat as a weapon you want to switch out every so often. Its definitely best to carry this along with the Machinegun.

The Shield:

You might want to use this whenever you walk in sniper hell areas. The Shield can deflect or soak up a lot of ranged fire. Knives can still get through though, explosive arrows, bazookas also tend to be annoying. If you use haste in tandem with the shield, it can really be fun.

In King of the Hill, Domination. A Gunner standing in position can be hard to dislodge, Especially since you don’t have to be afraid of snipers, usually an assassin will try to poison/stab you though. Other than that, you can pretend you are in that “300” movie.

The Grenade

Grenades are the “other” explosive. Bazooka however fills your explosives needs. You probably will want to use this only if you REALLY need to use it. And it can get over areas and is a great party gift for snipers/campers. Otherwise, the bazooka fills every other role, and it does more damage. (The Parabola at least does with 800+ dmg).

Skills

Shield

Casts an energy shield on oneself and nearby teammates to block off damage.

Defense: 600 HP

Duration : 10 sec

Cooldown : 23 sec
Shield is basically the first skill you’ll get. It gives you and a small AoE around you at least 600 extra hitpoints. This helps in firefights with many other classes. Its ideal to have one point in this because you don’t have any problem if you spam this along with haste. But its best to use it when you know you’ll be entering a hot area, as it has a semi-long cooldown.

(Tip by Merumeru)

Shield: X3 At LV5, it’ll add like 50% HP to everyone in range, which I think shouldn’t be underestimated during a crazy firefight

Haste

Increases the running speed of oneself and nearby teammates

Speed up : 5 meters per sec

Duration: 3 sec

Area of effect: 8 meters

Cooldown: 15 sec
This is a really neat skill. It only costs one point to invest in making you faster, so this should be at least a priority. If you plan to go “Knightly” on some random dude, you need haste to catch up. At level 1 this should be sufficient to allow you to bash someone in with your bat, if they backpedal. It also can be semi-used if you want to travel from place to place.

Haste is also useful when in Domination and King of the Hill, Haste your allies so they reach the areas faster. This can define Domination if you get a few seconds ahead capturing the two flags which belong to your team, and end up unable to capture the enemy’s.

Blitzkrieg

Improves the firing rate of machineguns. However as firing rate is increased, recoil rate is increased, which caused the accuracy to be reduced.

Shooting Speed Up : 10%

Accuracy Down 2%
DO NOT underestimate this skill. The reduction of 10% seems a bit negligible. At level 5, 25% I’d say your machinegun is 1/4 more faster and efficient. Since you have a lot of ammo, you want to spit out as much as you can.

It mows down assassins/guardians quite well, coupled with the bazooka, you may not even fear assassins anymore. Just spray and pray. But the machinegun’s accuracy reduces. Honestly I don’t see much of a difference.

Damage Converter

Damage will be converted to energy then stored. When energy is full, it shall release this energy to the surrounding enemy to inflict some damage should an enemy be near you.

Single Energy Stored: 3%

Released Damage: 300

Trigger Buildup: 3 meters

Area of Effect: 8 meters
I’m a bit skeptical of this skill, I used it for a bit, but I didn’t really survive long enough for it to build up. At most the buildup was around 33% before I flatined. I’m not sure either how it works, but I’ll probably have to study this later.

Tip by Thorminate

anyway i already try to lvl 5 the damage converter and i feel like im a suicide gunner bcos i need to go near to trigger the aoe dmg
the 100% charging can be increase by any dmg form of dmg (bullet/explosive/fall from high ground/poison)
like example bullet per hit like 150+dmg each increase charge by 5%(or 4%/3%)
when u fall (around 20 to 100+dmg based on height)and poison(like 100+dmg per second or i dunno)still increase 5% charging
in short u need like 20 times(more if u left it at lvl 1 to 4) to get hit by any form of dmg to reach 100%and when reach 100% charge u need to go near them to deal aoe dmg
…this wont be hard to charge up if ur hp/def/skill lvl are high

Perseverance

Reduce the damage that a gunner recieves. When the HP is below 50%. It will activate and regain HP until it is 50% again.

Damage Reduction: 3%

Awakened Heal: 40 HP per 2 sec
At MAX level, this regenerates 120 HP per 2 seconds, and the damage reduction is at 9%. It is a useful skill if you are alone or that guardian thinks you are healthy at 5% HP. But you could always look for a Healing Station.

You’ll probably have half of your encounters left with 50% HP or below, so its pretty good to get. I’d pick this over Blitzkrieg if you want to survive longer. Also it is passive, no button mashing required.

(Tip by Merumeru)Perseverance: XP It has a nice regen amount at LV5 and combined with healing items, you can stay alive longer, but when its your time to die, its just your time XD BUT the 9% damage reduction bonus is sweet and I think makes it worth it

Items and Equipment

Bazookas

Black Parabola:

Damage: 870
Critical: 8.0%
Range: 4.0m
Reloading: 3.9s

The Black parabola does a whopping 870 damage, at the interval of four seconds. Its 1.2 seconds slower than the Flying Fish and 1 second slower than the Angry Artillery. This weapon though can easily score kills, due to the fact people may not retreat unless their HP is around 1k below. Its a surprise if you take out 800 HP from an opponent and you finish them off with the machinegun. Problem is yeah, the reloading speed.  But you’ll be able to scare off snipers after you take out 1/3rd of their HP in a successful explosion.

Flying Fish:

Damage: 650
Critical: 8.0%
Range: 4.0m
Reloading: 2.8s

The flying fish is slightly more faster than both the Black Parabola and the Angry Artillery. Most likely you’ll get this as random loot from missions. Its pretty much the same as the Angry artillery, except with a better reloading speed and slightly better damage. Considering it is faster than the Black Parabola, you may just want to use this if you hate the 1 second delay.

Angry Artillery:

Damage: 630
Critical: 8.0%
Range: 4.0m
Reloading: 3.0s

Almost every other bazooka available is better than the Angry Artillery. But it is a staple bazooka if you don’t plan to get the Aerolite or get weapons from loot or chests. There isn’t much of a reason to upgrade your bazooka at the start unless you want to enhance it. The Angry Artillery still works even at 10+ levels, but if you can find an alternative consider using that instead.

Aerolite:

Damage: 790
Critical: 8.0%
Range: 4.0m
Reloading: 3.5s

Comes inbetween the Flying Fish and Black Parabola. The Aerolite seems to combine a bit of both. It compromises with 80 damage and 0.5 seconds from the Black Parabola, but its still the better choice if you want the best of both worlds. If you can’t get a Black Parabola, or like more speed, the Aerolite is easy to obtain and costs 25 medals.

Machineguns

DP:

Damage: 138
Critical: 8.0%
Firing: 93
Accuracy: 50
Ammunition: 100

The DP is your starter machinegun, its usable because well…its free…plus you’ll want to use it since you have no choice until level 2-.3. You’ll most likely switch to the Hatred Appeaser at level 3 once you get it though.

Tactics and Strategies (Random Notes)

I hope these things help. None of these are “ideal ways to play”, But useful if you want to try them out or see if it works for you.

Weapon Switching

First, you’ll want to get used to this simple technique, which I sort of found out because I do this usually in Team Fortress 2. Probably other players do this too.

Select two weapons and then go back to the first, when you press Q, your weapon will switch to the other. Use Bazooka as one and the “Machinegun” or “Shield” in the other, and quickswap and fire the bazooka and return to your main weapon.

Its pretty nasty. Sending a bazooka shell in a split second and then firing with your gun like nothing happened. Try this as a guardian too.

It is not advisable to do this if you are facing a sniper, they WILL hit you.

The funny thing is the bazooka reloads when empty even if you switch it out, so you really don’t need to use R for the bazooka when you switch back to your machine gun.

King of the Hill

A lot of players have been doing this, so credit goes to them. If you’ve noticed, sometimes there is a gunner sitting in the building and literally just acting like a total rock. But no matter how many times those sniper bullets pling, the thing still stands there. If you are one who likes to do this like me, you may neglect your points and K/D ratio, you may want to do this.

Just basically use a shield and a bazooka. Find the spot to capture and basically tank. Use your bazooka to shoot snipers or annoying guardians. Everything else you hit with your bat.

Assassins are the most likely things that will get you, because their knives can hurt real bad. Poison is useful to dislodge “Spartan-like” gunners too. But snipers and gunners may have a hard time removing you. Avoid arrows though….they are painful as they can toss you around a bit.

Remember though, you’re there to keep the place from being captured, hide behind pillars, just make sure the enemy does not have a chance to keep you away. As long as you stand in that little circle and fend off enemies, you make it easier for your team to win.

Skills

I’d say go with what is best, if you hate the machinegun, Blitzkrieg is never needed. Armor is always a useful skill, but adding it to level 5 may be wastefulThe other skills you’ll probably need to invest in to make them useful. You can probably add points to some skills temporarily then reset them when you have enough for a specific passive skill you feel will work.

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3 Responses

  1. bas says:

    if assasin try to hit you with a sniper rifle
    take out your melee weapons and use shield skill
    then fight melee with that assasin

  2. HabagatPH says:

    what are the best gems or bling bling for gunner?

  3. Cuby says:

    I like how much details you give for the bazookas. Can you do the same for MG and shield+wep too ?

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