Gunbreaker Tank Rotation, Openers, and Abilities — Endwalker 6.55

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. Gunbreaker is a textbook example of a builder and spender class, and uses GCD weaponskills to do both.

Four 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.

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
• Two usages of Rough Divide, if not used for mobility purposes
• All usages of Continuation allowed

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

• The Gnashing Fang combo:
  1. Gnashing Fang;
  2. Savage Claw;
  3. Wicked Talon;
• Sonic Break
• Double Down
• Three usages of Burst Strike
• Solid Barrel

Due to the buff lasting 20 seconds, you will not get the final Hypervelocity inside. It is possible to use Gnashing Fang before you activate No Mercy for an additional Burst Strike inside the buff instead in certain situations.

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

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.

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. Rough Divide should be saved for No Mercy, but it is much more important to use it for mobility purposes if needed.

In multi-target situations, replace the Solid Barrel combo with the Demon Slaughter combo at two 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 three 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.

• Optionally, use Sprint before the pull to reach the boss faster if you do not need it for the first minute of an encounter.

If your internet connection is poor and you are unable to double-weave abilities in between weaponskills without clipping (delaying your next GCD), you can opt to use a single-weave opener. Keep in mind this will be a net DPS loss, and there is no way getting around having to use one double-weave here.

• Optionally use Sprint before the pull to reach the boss faster if you do not need it for a minute.

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 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.
• Heart of Corundum is your active 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.
• Superbolide is your invulnerability cooldown. After a small delay, your HP is reduced to 1 and you become impervious to essentially all attacks. This can be difficult to use in a non-coordinated setting, but shines in an environment where you are able to get most of your health bar taken, use it, and heal up over the 10 second duration naturally with Aurora or Heart of Corundum's heal effect.
• 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.