Gunbreaker Tank Rotation, Openers, and Abilities — Dawntrail 7.1

The Gunbreaker rotation can be boiled down to a priority system. They aim to build cartridges using weaponskills or Bloodfest, and spend them inside their main damage buff, No Mercy. After using it, they will build up cartridges again. Other weaponskills and abilities will be used as soon as they are available so that they fit inside No Mercy.

Gunbreakers gain cartridges by finishing either the Solid Barrel combo for single-target, or the Demon Slaughter combo for multi-target. They expend cartridges using Gnashing Fang and Burst Strike for single-target, Fated Circle for multi-target, and Double Down for both. Three cartridges are also instantly generated every two minutes through the use of Bloodfest, which at level 100 also grants Ready to Reign, allowing the use of the Lion Heart combo. Gunbreaker is a textbook example of a builder and spender class, and uses GCD weaponskills to do both.

Five Gunbreaker weaponskills will change the Continuation button into a new ability and allow you to use it until you use any other weaponskill. This is a large portion of your damage and you should always use these when available. In addition, Gnashing Fang will turn into Savage Claw when used, and that will turn into Wicked Talon. Using any other combo weaponskill will break this combo. The following skills can allow successive rounds with your gunblade.

1. Gnashing Fang allows the usage of Jugular Rip;
2. Savage Claw allows the usage of Abdomen Tear;
3. Wicked Talon allows the usage of Eye Gouge;
4. Burst Strike allows the usage of Hypervelocity.
5. Fated Circle allows the usage of Fated Brand

Inside No Mercy, you should aim to use 9 GCD weaponskills and all of your abilities, though with some GCD tiers you will only be able to get 8. The order of which you use them depends on the opener you use. In every single window, you should use every one of your oGCD abilities.

• Blasting Zone
• Bow Shock
• All usages of Continuation allowed

As of Dawntrail, Trajectory replaces Rough Divide as our gap closer ability. This ability does not do damage, unlike Rough Divide, and therefore can be freely saved for movement instead of needing to ever use it for DPS.

Every even minute, you will ideally use these 9 weaponskills, using Bloodfest once you have 0 cartridges to gain 3 more and proc Ready to Reign.

• The Gnashing Fang combo:
  1. Gnashing Fang;
  2. Savage Claw;
  3. Wicked Talon;
• Sonic Break
• Double Down
• Burst Strike
• The Lion Heart combo:
  1. Reign of Beasts
  2. Noble Blood
  3. Lion Heart

Due to the No Mercy buff lasting 20 seconds, you will not be able to fit the Burst Strike in the buff if playing at 2.50 GCD speed. With the Lion Heart combo at level 100, we now have three extra Cartriges that we can freely spend outside of No Mercy as long as we retain a cartridge for Gnashing Fang and still enter the next No Mercy window with three cartridges.

Bloodfest has been changed to have a 2 minute cooldown in Patch 6.2. Always use it when available as long as you have 0 cartridges. If you have cartridges available and it is about to come off cooldown, expend those cartridges immediately.

As of Patch 7.1, Double Down now only costs one cartridge instead of two. This means that spending Burst Strike before entering a No Mercy window where Bloodfest will be used is now required to avoid delaying Bloodfest or overcapping on cartridges.

Every odd minute, Bloodfest is not available. You should aim to use these 9 weaponskills during No Mercy.

• The Gnashing Fang combo:
  1. Gnashing Fang;
  2. Savage Claw;
  3. Wicked Talon;
• Sonic Break
• Double Down
• Burst Strike
• Keen Edge
• Brutal Shell
• Solid Barrel

Due to the No Mercy buff lasting 20 seconds, you will not be able to fit the Burst Strike in the buff if playing at 2.50 GCD speed.

During the filler phase between usages of No Mercy, Gunbreakers need to build up their cartridges. They do this by using the Solid Barrel combo. In addition, the Gnashing Fang combo and Blasting Zone both have a 30 second cooldown, and should be used as soon as they are available. Pioritize building cartridges and only spend them if you would otherwise overcap, or on Gnashing Fang, in order to prep for the next No Mercy window.

In multi-target situations, replace the Solid Barrel combo with the Demon Slaughter combo against three or more targets. Burst Strike should be replaced with Fated Circle at two or more targets. Replace the Gnashing Fang combo with Fated Circle at four targets or more. All other aspects of the rotation stay the same.

During the opener, we aim to align our weaponskills and abilities under No Mercy as well as our party member's raid buffs. You will find that execution of buff windows after the opener will be similar to that of the opener.

This opener is intended for use on GCD speeds that can fit 9 GCDs inside of the No Mercy buff, and will be a loss to use if playing Gunbreaker at 2.50. Some abilities in this opener were moved around compared to the previously posted opener in order to align better with party buffs, which have been standardized to a target time of about X:06-X:07, at least on North American servers.

2.50 Gunbreaker rotation for Dawntrail can be found here.

Gunbreaker has a plethora of defensive cooldowns to utilize in order to mitigate damage taken. This will allow you to survive heavy incoming damage in the form of tank busters, and relieve the healing burden placed on your healers in periods of heavy consistent damage such as boss auto-attacks and dungeon trash packs. Mitigation is calculated multiplicatively (i.e. two 30% reductions will result in 49% damage taken) and it is better to rotate cooldowns rather than use them all at once.

• Rampart and Great Nebula are your bread and butter cooldowns. You will want to rotate these on tank busters, auto-attacks if tank busters will not occur before they are back up, and trash packs.
• Camouflage is the Gunbreaker's unique cooldown. It can be used similar to Rampart, and is extra effective against instances of physical damage due to the increased parry chance.
• Heart of Corundum is your short cooldown mitigation ability. It grants two 15% damage reductions as well as a heal if your HP drops below 50% or if the effect expires, whichever occurs first. You will use this early and often on anything from auto-attacks to tank busters, and it can be used on a co-tank in trials and raids if they are taking a tank buster.
• Aurora is a targeted heal over time effect you can place on yourself or any party member. Use this on yourself, your co-tank, or both (it has two charges!) after taking heavy damage, or to heal up while taking consistent midrange damage.
• Reprisal and Heart of Light are your raid mitigation abilities. Use the former against casted instances of heavy damage, and use the latter if you need to mitigate heavy raidwide magic damage. As of Patch 7.1, Heart of Light now also applies 5% physical damage mitigation to the party, instead of only applying 10% magic damage mitigation.
• Superbolide is your invulnerability cooldown. As of 7.1, this ability no longer sets your HP to 1, and the responsiveness was improved to apply nearly instantly. Now, if above 50% of your max HP, your HP will be set to 50% and you become impervious to most attacks. If you are below 50% HP, your HP will not change, and you still gain the invulnerability.
• In raids and trials, Superbolide should be used on multi-hit tankbusters or shared tankbusters in order to save cooldowns.
• Arm's Length is a useful mitigation ability for dungeons, as the applied Slow effect will greatly reduce your damage taken by trash mobs.
• Low Blow can also be used to Stun trash mobs. Stuns have diminishing effects, so if you have a White Mage in your party the mobs will likely be Stun Immune due to their Holy.