Lost Ark Gunslinger Guide (Builds, Engravings, and Tips)

Gunslinger Class Guide – Lost Ark

Gunslinger is a stylish and flashy class that plays at an adrenaline-pumping fast pace. If you like to press a lot of buttons and feel like a badass while doing it then Gunslinger is for you.

They are defined by their versatile damage-dealing capabilities that sports flexible range and extremely high mobility at the cost of some of the worst health and defense in the game.

Gunslinger is different from most classes since it can use its identity at any time to switch guns from their handguns to their shotgun and rifle.

Each gun has a unique set of skills which gives Gunslingers access to a total of 16 skills to use on-demand instead of the normal 8.

Handgun skills have the most utility and mobility at a medium range. Shotguns skills have great damage, stagger, and AoEe but have the shortest range. Rifle skills have the highest range as well as exceptional damage when the target is below 50% health.

So if you’re looking for – a class that presses a lot of buttons and looks flashy while doing it then Gunslinger is for you. If you’re planning to level this class, please, read our Gunslinger leveling guide.

Comparisons to other classes

The closest gunner to Gunslinger’s playstyle is her male counterpart, Deadeye. They share the same identity, the ability to swap guns, but Deadeye is more reliant on being close to their opponent to deal damage while Gunslinger has much more range.

Compared to Artillerist, Gunslinger plays completely differently. Artillerist is slow, delayed, and deliberate with high survivability whereas Gunslinger is fast paced, immediate impact, mobile and has low health and defense.

Hawkeye is closer to Gunslinger than Artillerist but Hawkeye is more a true ranged class whereas Gunslinger you can be much more flexible since your guns all have different ranges.

If you’re interested in how Gunslinger performs in current meta, we highly encourage you to take a look at our Lost Ark tier list article, where you can find information for both PvE and PvP.

Class Mechanics

Gunslingers do not have an identity meter like other classes. Instead, they can use their identity to switch between three weapons which are the handgun, shotgun, and rifle. The three weapons have different strengths and weaknesses:

Handguns are your default weapon which lets you use 8 skills. Handgun skills contain the most utility and mobility out of all the guns but still have some damage.
Shotgun is your highest damage weapon but has the shortest range. Unlike your handgun, you can only use 4 skills at a time.
Rifle is your longest range weapon that has skills that do more damage when the target is below half hp. Like the shotgun, you can only use 4 skills at a time.

PvE

Gunslinger uses their handgun skills to debuff the enemy then swap to their shotgun or rifle to cast a few skills and then repeat the process.

Timing and position are critical to Gunslingers because their damage skills lock them in place for a decent amount of time.

PvP

Gunslingers are fragile in PVP but have a ton of mobility, super armor, and great damaging combos. It’s a very punishing class to start learning but is incredibly rewarding once you put in the work.

You’ll use your engage tools aggressively to catch people with stagger before you combo into your hard disables or use your long range skills to catch enemies and assist teammates.

You need to be most careful as a Gunslinger when you don’t have your roll. You die quickly so without an escape you’re very vulnerable.

Core Abilities

AT02 Grenade

Your hard crowd control, freeze. With quick cast time and speed, it can be used in combos or to peel for your teammates.

Somersault Shot

Push Immunity super armor on a low cooldown mobility spell. This is a great tool for disengaging, baiting, or even extending combos.

Quickstep

Your hard stagger engage tool that has super armor. Very flexible and can be used to try to escape as well if needed.

Catastrophe

Main damage ability that has super armor to make it safer to use in 3v3 combos. Can also be held down defensively to extend the super armor.

Perfect Shot

High damage ability that can force opponent’s get up from a large range. Also a great followup skill to your allies cc or for picking off low HP opponent’s.

Awakening Abilities

As with all classes the Gunslinger has access to two awakening abilities.

Eye of Twilight

Turn your back and mark the closest target for extra damage. After a time, deal damage to one enemy, extra damage if it’s the marked target. This is a bit unreliable to land in 3v3s unless the target is knocked down or hard CC’d. Good in 1v1.

High-Caliber HE Bullet

Jump backwards and shoot a high-powered bullet that explodes on impact. This awakening has a faster animation as well as aoe damage which makes it more consistent overall in a 3v3 environment.

Most people use High-Caliber HE Bullet because of its faster speed and ease of use compared to Eye of Twilight.

Advanced Class Engravings

Every Lost Ark class has access to engravings that will focus your playstyle in one particular direction. For Gunslingers you will choose between Time to Hunt and Peacemaker.

Peacemaker

From Maxroll.gg

This engraving gives you a buff for a short time whenever you switch weapons. Switching to handgun gives attack speed, shotgun gains extra crit rate, and rifle gains bonus damage when the target is below 50% HP. The buffs have a limited duration so you need to be constantly switching between guns to get full value.
Peacemaker is the harder engraving to use but you’ll be rewarded with high damage if you can learn to smoothly swap between weapons.

Time to Hunt

From Maxroll.gg

This engraving completely removes your ability to use your shotgun and gives your handgun and rifle skills extra crit rate.
This means you’ll have fewer skills to worry about which makes this engraving particularly easier to play than Peacemaker. Also, handgun skills don’t keep you standing in place as much as shotgun skills which allow for a more mobile gameplay experience.
Because your class engraving gives so much crit, you can focus on swiftness for more cooldown to make up for the amount of skills you miss from losing your shotgun.

Build

Peacemaker is overwhelmingly the most popular build while Time to Hunt is viewed as the hipster build.

Peacemaker Build

Build from lostarkive.com

Here are some of the skill explanations and tripods you will take (Make sure you have 4 points in every skill and then max them out in the following order:

Sharpshooter
- 3-3-1
- Main DPS shotgun skill. Has a long animation and the last hit does the most damage. Make sure you’re in a safe spot before using this skill.
Target Down
- 1-1-1
- Main DPS rifle skill. Use after Weakness Exposure skill. Has a long animation with the last hit dealing the most damage. Make sure you’re in a safe spot before using this skill. Prioritize when raid is below 50% for bonus damage.
Focused Shot
- 2-3-1
- Main DPS rifle skill. Use after Weakness Exposure skill. When you achieve higher attack speed and Galewind runes, switch the last tripod to Final Blow.
Dual Buckshot
- 1-2-1
- Shotgun DPS skill. Use after Weakness Exposure skill.
Perfect Shot
- 2-3-2
- Rifle DPS skill. Casting skill that needs to be released in the perfect zone to deal damage. Prioritize when raid is below 50% for bonus damage.
Shotgun Rapidfire
- 2-1-2
- Shotgun DPS skill. Use after Weakness Exposure skill.
Spiral Tracker
- 2-0-0
- Grants Weakness Exposure debuff to enemy for +10% crit rate. Use at the start of your rotation.
Peacekeeper
- 2-0-0
- Your counter. Tripod gives a dash making it easier to land.

Stat Priority

Prioritize Crit while maintaining high Swiftness.
Crit is your main stat but high Swiftness is needed to speed up the animation of your shotgun and rifle skills.

Runes

Galewind runes on your primary damage skills.
Rage rune on Quick Step can give a large attack speed buff with Life Absorption tripod.
Bleed rune on Spiral Tracker will maintain your party synergy as well as permanent uptime on bleed.

Engravings

Peacemaker 1 is very high value for only 1 engraving level
Hit Master 3 works with your shotgun skills and rifle skills because of the In a Tight Spot tripods.
Adrenaline is easy to keep up 100% of the time because of your low cooldown handgun skills like Dexterous Shot and Spiral Tracker.
Grudge and Cursed Doll lvl 3 make great skills once you are an advanced player and can slot them in

Gems

Prioritize Damage and Cooldown on main DPS skills
Everything else is a bonus.

Time to Hunt Build