The most competitive loadouts

Overview

Here I’m gonna try to compile a concise list of all the best, most competitive loadouts in the game with logical reasoning and numbers to back them up.If you don’t wanna be bored with the specifics then just skip right to the merc in question.

Weapon Characteristics

This is a summary of the strengths and weaknesses of all weapons in the game.
They’re based on the stats of each weapon (which can be found in my weapon stat spreadsheet[docs.google.com]) and testing for the things that cannot be mined through the game.

+ Means positive characteristic
± Means neutral characteristic (something that is both good and bad)
– Means negative characteristic
I try to keep the number of signs consistent with how much that characteristic matters compared to the rest in that weapon category. These characteristics are only compared to other weapons in the same category; for example saying “+ Long range” on Ahnuhld doesn’t mean that it has long range compared to SMGs or Sniper Rifles, only compared to other Shotguns.

• Spread – How far your bullets can stray from the center of your crosshair.
• Starting Spread – The base-level of spread of a weapon before firing it.
• Bloom = SPB = Spread Per Bullet – Spread added when shooting.
• Recoil – How much your crosshair/aim will move when firing.
• Re-fire – Time between shots. Mainly relevant for weapons with high damage per shot.
• TTK = Time To Kill – The time it takes for a weapon to kill assuming average accuracy, average headshot percentage and average range.
• DPS = Damage Per Second – Sustained damage output.
• DPM = Damage Per Magazine – The total amount of damage a weapon can deal before reloading (damage per bullet multiplied by bullets per magazine).
• RPM = Rounds Per Minute – The number of rounds/shots fired per minute.

Sub-Machine Guns (SMGs)

Hochfir

++ Very low bloom
± Low average recoil, but high recoil variance
– High TTK

One of the most accurate weapons in the game; Good weapon.

KEK-10

++ Low TTK
– High starting spread

Average in a lot of respects, but high damage output (low TTK) makes it a strong weapon even with just decent spread control.

Crotzni

+++ Very low TTK
– High recoil
– High bloom
– High starting spread

Powerful, but hard to control, both in terms of recoil and spread.

SMG-9

+ Low starting spread
+ Low average recoil
— High TTK

Jack of all trades, master of none.

Blishlok

+ High damage per magazine
+ Low starting spread
± High average recoil, but low recoil variance
— Very high TTK

Easy to control, but performs sub-par.

Assault Rifles + Machine Guns

Hurtsall 2k

+ Low bloom
– Low average recoil, but very high recoil variance

Strong weapon, competes with M4A1 for best automatic assault rifle.

Timik

+ Low starting spread
+ Low bloom
+ Low TTK
– High average recoil
– Poor sight (covers aiming-area)

Very similar to and slightly outperformed by M4A1.

M4A1

+ Low starting spread
+ Low bloom
+ Low recoil

Easy to use and one of the most accurate weapons in the game.

SHAR-C

+ Low starting spread
– High recoil

Solid, but unremarkable.

MK46

+ Low TTK
± Very high damage per magazine, but very long reload
– Slow movement speed
– Low average recoil, but very high recoil variance
— Very high starting spread

A lot of downsides with few upsides. A pretty bad weapon.

K121

++ Very low TTK
+ Low starting spread
± Very high damage per magazine, but very long reload
– High recoil
– High bloom
– Slow movement speed

Can be quite strong in the right hands, but hard to use effectively.

BR-16

+ High damage per burst
+ Low starting spread
– High bloom
— Very high TTK

Dealing a lot of damage per mouse-click allows for higher accuracy than automatic weapons if good trigger dicipline is practiced, which in turn generally results in lower TTK with that higher accuracy. But with pathetic overall damage output the TTK is unlikely to be any better than that of other assault rifles.

Stark

+ High damage per burst
+ Low starting spread
– High bloom
— Very high TTK

Higher spread and lower DPM than BR-16, but higher damage per burst. They perform roughly identical.

Dreiss

+ Low TTK
+ Low starting spread
— Extremely high bloom

Strong in terms of killing power, but very hard to use, especially with bloom having been nerfed to ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. Bloom is now literally twice that of most assault rifles. Still kind of usable with good timing and trigger dicipline though.

Sniper Rifles

Grandeur

++ Can be used in hip-fire
+ High DPM
± Very fast re-fire, but very low damage per shot
– Poor sights (no scope)
– Extremely high bloom (only accurate for 2-3 shots in hip-fire)

I recommend enabling the “Crosshair Dot When Aiming” option to help with aiming down the sights.

PDP-70

± Fast re-fire, but low damage per shot
– High recoil

More damage per shot than Grandeur, but also longer re-fire time. Has fallen out of favor after repeated nerfs.

MoA

++ Can one-shot most mercs
– Very low DPS
– Slow re-fire

Being able to one-shot headshot enemies is a huge deal. It literally means instant TTK; doesn’t get any better than that. The downside is pathetic sustained damage, making missed shots highly punishing.

FEL-IX

+++ Can one-shot all but one merc
– Very low DPS
– Awkward cocking and reload animations
— Very slow re-fire

Like MoA, but even slower and one-shot-ier. One-shots all but one merc, but at the cost of very, very slow re-fire.

Shotguns

Worth noting about shotgun spread is that unlike for normal weapons it’s not random; it will always form the same pattern, so it’s not exclusively bad.

Ahnuhld

+ Long range
+ High DPM
± Low spread
– Low DPS
– High recoil
– Long reload
– Low damage per shell

While the range is substantially longer than the other two shotguns that’s generally not why you use shotguns. And with the disadvantages to the core usage scenarios of shotguns I’m having trouble seeing how this can compete with the other two.

Hollunds

+ High DPM
+ High DPS
+ Low recoil
± Medium spread

I’m not a much of a shotgun user, but seemingly the strongest of the 3 due to having the high damage output of Remburg, with slightly better range and one extra shell (has almost as high DPM as Ahnuhld, even with one shell less).

Remburg

+ High damage per shell
+ High DPS
± High spread
– Short range

Very strong in point-blank, but falls off hard.

Machine Pistols

Machine pistols are generally better than pistols because they are automatic (meaning top DPS can be achieved by just holding down the button), have much higher damage per clip and lower spread. This is mainly relevant for mercs that have both options for secondary weapons (i.e: you’ll always want a machine pistol instead of a pistol if you have the choice).

Empire-9

+ High DPM
– High damage falloff
– High starting spread
– Very high recoil variance

By far the worst machine pistol at range.

Ryburn

+ Long falloff range
+ Low TTK
± Low starting spread, but high bloom
± Low recoil variance, but high average recoil

Easily the strongest machine pistol.

Tølen

+ Low(er) damage falloff (small difference compared to MP400)
– High TTK
– No ADS zoom

Lacking zoom on ADS (Aim Down Sights, zoom = lowering of FoV) is a very minor issue since all machine pistols are bad at long range anyway.

MP400

+ Low starting spread
-Low DPM

Pretty average after the nerf.

Pistols

Hoigat .244

+++ Extremely high DPM
– High bloom
– High starting spread
— High TTK

Pretty lackluster.

M9

++ Very high DPM
+ Low recoil

Strong and reliable. Other pistols have trouble competing.

Arevarov

++ Very high DPM
++ Low starting spread
+ Low bloom
– High recoil
— High TTK

A bit lackluster.

Selbstadt .40

+ High DPM

Kind of like M9, but slightly worse.

Caulden

++ Low starting spread
– High recoil variance
— High bloom

Caulden and DE perform very similarly.

DE .50

++ Low starting spread
— High bloom

Main difference compared to Caulden is higher damage per shot, but with slightly higher spread.

Simeon .357

++ High damage per shot
++ Low starting spread
– Long reload time
— Very low DPS
— Very high bloom

The amount of burst damage the revolvers can put out is pretty scary, but with the very high bloom their performance is a bit inconsistent. The best usage scenarios are close-range and peeking in and out of cover.

S&W .40

++ High damage per shot
++ Low starting spread
– High recoil
– Long reload time
— Very low DPS
— Very high bloom

Very similar performance to Simeon, just more RNG (spread&recoil) and/or waiting in return for 4 extra damage per shot.

Melee

Hit-boxes/hit-arcs roughly means how easy a weapon is to hit something with.
It’s generally not worth picking a loadout based on the melee weapon, but sometimes, when all other aspects of two loadouts seem of equal value the melee weapon can be a tie-breaker.

Beckhill

+ Low TTK

Kills fast AND doesn’t reduce movement speed. Easily one of the best melee weapons in the game.

Stiletto

– High TTK light attack

A bit weak, but at least it doesn’t reduce movement speed.

Cricket Bat

+ Good hit-boxes
+ Long range
– Reduces movement speed

Arguably the second-strongest after the Katana, but also reduces movement speed.

Katana

+ Can one-shot 90HP mercs and 100HP mercs with Chopper
+ Very low TTK light attack
+ Long range
– Reduces movement speed

The strongest melee weapon, at the cost of movement speed.

Kukri

± Low TTK light attack, but high TTK heavy attack
– Weird hit-boxes
– Reduces movement speed

Nothing special, very middle of the road.

Axe

+ Low TTK heavy attacks
± Low TTK light attacks vs 90&100HP enemies, but high TTK vs 110HP
– Weird hit-boxes
– Reduces movement speed

Hitboxes got ♥♥♥♥♥♥ in a patch.

Batons

+ Can one-shot 90HP mercs and 100HP mercs with Chopper
– Reduces movement speed
– Doesn’t snare enemy on hit
— Very high TTK

Hot garbage. Kills the slowest of all melee weapons in the game, on average.
Only melee weapon in the game that doesn’t snare (slow) enemy movement speed when it hits. This has got to be a developer oversight.

Ulu

— Very high TTK

Trash. Batons still hold the spot of worst melee weapon in the game, but this isn’t too far off.

Weapon Codes

All weapons have a short codename that is part of the loadout name. This makes it easy to see which weapons are part of a loadout just from the name of it.
I will be referring to all loadouts by the weapon codes.

The loadout names consist of one or two letters, a number from 1-9 and another number from 1-5. The letters indicate primary weapon, first number is secondary and last number is melee. Sparks is an exception as she is the only merc that uses what is normally a secondary weapon as her primary weapon.
Let’s start by listing the weapons that use letters:

Pistols and machine pistols:

Melee weapons:

It seems that melee number 6 might be for merc-specific weapons, weapons that other mercs won’t be able to get.

Perks

It’s hard to rank perks as different mercs have wildly different use of them, so I will just be listing a few perks that stand out, either as great or as useless.

Perks you want

Bigger Blast/Explodydendron and Drilled are so universally good because they are the closest things there are for perks in terms of increasing damage. While Unshakeable is the closest thing there is to extra health. Amplifying healing ties into that too as it’s a way to increase health.
Those are the general patterns for the strongest perks; something that always is useful.

Extra Supplies varies wildly in power since it only affects support abilities (not airstrikes/lasers/abilities that deal damage). This generally makes it very strong on medics, but weak/mediocre on fire support (ammo-giving) mercs.

Broken perks

Quick Slash only affects the light attack of a melee weapon, it has no effect on the heavy slash. It’s also only 15%, not 25% like the tooltip says.

I’ve gotten reports that Steady doesn’t work on Guardian’s drone and that Extender doesn’t properly scale her visuals (but the hitbox AKA the important part is scaled properly), but I have not confirmed these myself, so don’t treat that info like fact.

Confirmed working perks

Bigger Blast on Nader
Bomb Squad
Chopper
Cool
Drilled
Double Time
Enigma
Explodydendron on everybody except Thunder
Extra Supplies
Fail Safe
Flying Pig
Guardian Angel (at least the signaling part, haven’t tested damage reduction part)
Lock On for Proxy and

Fletcher Lock On and Quick Draw test from Dirtybomb

Looter
Mechanic
Nitros on Rhino
Potent Packs on Aura, Sparks and Sawbonez
Spares
Spotter (wonky on Aimee, but technically works)
Steady on Bushwhacker
Tough
Quick Eye
Quick Draw
Quick Charge on Sparks

Untested perks

Ammo Reach, Recharge, Explodydendron on Thunder, Focus, Healing Reach, Lock On for Bushwhacker, Potent Packs on Phoenix, Springy, Untrackable

1st Edition Loadouts Worth Keeping

These are 1st Edition loadouts that I recommend saving due to the second edition changing them for the worse or simply to something different.
Bronze isn’t too important, but if you have a loadout in Silver or higher you should take utmost care not to trade up/in something good.

Must Keep

Arty S72

Explodydendron, Focus, Tough replaced with Quick Eye, Guardian Angel, Unshakeable.

Fletcher BL33

Empire-9 -> Tølen, Bat -> Beckhill, Flying Pig -> Drilled. Very similar in power to the 2nd gen version; still one of the best.

Phoenix CR71

Quick Draw and Potent Packs. 2nd Edition re-made it into an exact copy of C72, the only difference being the main weapon.. (this has got to be an error on SD’s part)

Sawbonez CR42

Potent Packs -> Spares, Focus -> Quick Draw. Slightly better than the 2nd Edition; still one of the top loadouts.

Vassili P13

Focus -> Enigma. Pretty much a straight downgrade; 2nd Edition is worse.

Recommended

Bushwhacker C82

Looter -> Bomb Squad. Drilled -> Quick Draw. Stiletto -> Bat. 1st Edition is better. Good loadout; worth keeping.

Fragger B61

Spares -> Explodydendron. Like Spares? Keep it.

Fragger M93

S&W -> DE. Sneaky -> Guardian Angel. Explodydendron -> Quick Draw. Good loadout. First Edition is slightly better.

Kira B83

Bomb Squad -> Double Time. Mechanic -> Enigma. Bat -> Katana. 1st Edition is better.

Phoenix C41

Cool -> Double Time, Extra Supplies -> Potent Packs. For those that don’t like Double Time this is an obvious keep.

Phoenix CR43

Cool -> Double Time, Drilled -> Spares.

Redeye P41

M9 -> Caulden, Quick Slash -> Guardian Angel. M9 is a substantially better secondary, more than enough to outweigh the slightly worse perk.

Aimee

F82

Bomb Squad is decent to good. Quick Eye is amazing with a scoped rifle; it helps a lot with mobility. Guardian Angel is decent. Also has the most reliable secondary, which can go a long way since her primary is useless in close quarters.

G85

Quick Eye is amazing. Enigma is decent. Spares is good.

P81

Spotter only affects detection radius, not debilitation radius and since it doesn’t cover a full circle (like Vassili’s sensor) the effective area increase is substantially lower. As such I’d only rate it as a decent perk. Bomb Squad is decent to good. Quick Eye is amazing.

Flying Pig is decent to good. Drilled is great. Spotter is decent.

Spares, Quick Draw and Flying Pig.

Arty

B81

Drilled is amazing, especially on a merc that literally generates ammo. Chopper does get you over one damage breakpoint of 90 with your heavy attack, but 90HP mercs are rare in serious play, so the added damage is mostly pointless. Explodydendron is great.

D43 (2nd Edition)

Unshakeable is amazing. Explodydendron is great. Tough is great.

S41 (2nd Edition)

Focus is good. Drilled is amazing. Extra Supplies is merely decent since it only applies to your ammo packs, not your airstrikes.

S72 (1st Edition)

The buffs to Caulden and Tough made this loadout a lot better. Explodydendron is great. Focus is good. Tough is great.

Unshakeable.

Drilled and Quick Eye.

Unshakeable and Quick Eye.

Aura

BL41

Get Up is great. Double Time is meh. Extra supplies is amazing since your only ability is a support ability and a very powerful ability at that.

BL72

Springy is decent. Potent Packs is amazing. Makes a large difference for survivability when fighting on top of the healing station. Drilled is always great, but Aura’s squishiness means that periodic shooting generally is the way to engage, and faster reloading doesn’t help a lot with that.

H71

The “mega-station” loadout. Potent Packs is amazing. Bomb Squad is decent to good. Extra Supplies is amazing. Two really strong support perks on one card is a recipe for greatness.

All Aura’s other second edition loadouts are decent, with the exception of H43 due to a complete lack of support perks.
R73 also deserves a bit of special mention for standing slightly above the other decent loadouts.

Bushwhacker

C41

Focus is good. Lock On is amazing; it effectively increases the damage output of your turret and makes it harder to take out without taking damage. Spares is great as it not only increases maximum ammo capacity (which would be garbage on its own), but also increases the ammo you spawn with by 1 magazine.

All Bushwhacker’s 2nd Edition loadouts are decent.

Drilled and Spares is a great combo.

C82 (1st Edition)

Looter is decent. Drilled is fantastic. Guardian Angel is good for engineers as they often have their noses buried in the EV or other objectives.

Best secondary, Quick Draw and Unshakeable.

Fletcher

A31

You can reload cancel shotguns by firing, which along with the new R-to-cancel for Empire-9 makes Double Time a decent perk. Lock On is great;

Fletcher Lock On and Quick Draw test from Dirtybomb

. Tough is great.

BL32

Machine Pistol, good perks. Fail Safe is decent due to Fletcher’s close-range fighting style. Springy is decent. Lock On is great;

Fletcher Lock On and Quick Draw test from Dirtybomb

.

BL21 (2nd Edition)/BL33 (1st Edition)

Both have Quick Draw (amazing) and Tough(great). BL21 has Drilled as the last perk, which is great, while BL33 has Flying Pig, which is decent to good. BL21 has a slight edge.

H33 (2nd Edition)

Quick Draw speeds up not only your weapon switching speed, but also your ability to activate bombs by about

Fletcher Lock On and Quick Draw test from Dirtybomb

. The big thing being that you get your weapons out a full 33ms earlier after throwing/detonating; pretty amazing. Springy is decent. Unshakeable is amazing, especially on a merc with explosive damage.

Amazing perks. If not for H33 outclassing it slightly it might have been one of the top loadouts.

Fragger

B93 (2nd Edition)

Unshakeable is amazing on slow, bulky mercs and even better when they themselves have explosive damage. Tough and Quick Eye are good. The Bat can be seen as a slight hindrance due to slowing you down a bit, but overall this loadout is just great.

K51 (2nd Edition)

Drilled is incredible with the long reload of K121. It cuts the reload from 3.5s to 2.8s. Almost an entire second. Then you also have two other good perks: Tough and Focus.

M62 (2nd Edition)

Chopper is decent due to reaching the magical 40 damage threshold with Stiletto. Unshakeable is amazing. Explodydenron helps an already strong ability really shine. 1st Edition has Cool instead of Chopper, making a slightly worse loadout.

All Fragger’s other second edition loadouts are decent.

Quick Draw and Spares.

Focus and Explodydenron.

Guardian

HU52

Recharge is great; it speeds up the cooldown for both of her abilities, not just one (like Extra Supplies would). Her revive is her only way of healing, making Get Up a very good perk. Focus is good.

HU73

Spares is good; Hurtsall munches through ammo pretty quickly. Unshakeable is amazing. Quick Draw is great as it speeds up not only your weapon switching, but also your Drone deployment.

M72

Get Up is amazing. Steady isn’t as good as on most other deployables since the drone is more reactive than proactive, but it’s still a solid perk that could buy you a little extra time when your drone is under fire. Spares is good.

M103

Drilled, while not as spectacular as on fire support mercs is still at least great. Focus is good. Quick Eye is good.

T102

Quick Draw is great as it speeds up not only your weapon switching, but also your Drone deployment. Recharge is great. Drilled is great.

HU106 stands out as being sub-par, but all of Guardians other loadouts are decent.

Hunter

396

Tough is great. His scope is an integral part of his character, making Quick Eye amazing. Recharge is decent at best since his EMP isn’t in dire need of cooldown reduction.

Of note for Hunter is that ammo and reload buffing perks are pretty meh when your main weapon has infinite ammo.
So Drilled and Spares are significantly worse than they are on most other mercs.

466

For an entirely aim-focused merc Focus is good. Quick Eye is amazing. Quick Slash is meh.

Unshakeable, sadly Double Time tho.

Javelin

B45

Tough is good. Drilled is amazing, especially on fire supports. Recharge is amazing with a strong offensive ability, with the minor plus of making it harder for you to run out of ammo (your self-supply has a cooldown).

B86

Bigger Blast is amazing. It’s so very good to augment your ability to clear rooms. Focus is good. Quick Draw is great for speeding up your switching to and from the rocket launcher.

D81

Focus is good. Quick Eye is great with Dreiss due to the poor accuracy with hipfire. Drilled is amazing on fire supports.

SH41

Drilled is amazing on fire supports. Bomb Squad is decent to good. Unshakeable is amazing, especially on a merc with explosive damage.

All Javelin’s loadouts are at least decent, but the ones below stand slightly above the rest.

Recharge and Quick Draw

Recharge and Focus.

Kira

B72 (2nd Edition)

Great perks. Untrackable is decent. Unshakeable is great; it may not be as amazing as it is on beefier mercs, but it does allow you to survive direct hits with Fletcher stickies you otherwise would die to. Drilled is amazing, especially on fire supports.

D44 (2nd Edition)

Great perks for making your laser stronger. Explodydendron is great. Untrackable is decent. Quick Draw is great as it not only helps with weapon switching, but also helps controlling the laser.

S81 (1st AND 2nd Edition)

Both have Drilled, which is amazing. 1st has Untrackable and Mechanic, while 2nd has Enigma and Bomb Squad. Both have a very similar power level.

M9 and Explodydendron.

Quick Draw.

Quick Eye, Unshakeable, Focus.

Drilled.

Quick Draw, Focus.

Nader

CR81

Good secondary, great perks. Bigger Blast is amazing. Agumenting Naders ability to area clear and deny is a very big deal. Fail Safe is decent. Quick Eye is good.

KE43 (2nd Edition)

Best secondary, good perks. Bigger Blast is amazing. Enigma is meh. Focus is good.

SM41

Best secondary, great perks. Bigger Blast is amazing. Springy is decent to meh. Unshakeable is amazing, especially when Nader herself has explosive damage. It’s far better than Fail Safe as it also reduces enemy explosive damage.

For Unshakeable and Quick Draw.

Drilled, Quick Draw, Focus make a really good offensive combination. Maybe even good enough to compare with the Bigger Blast loadouts.

Phantom

C94 (2nd Edition)

Undercover is amazing. Focus is good. Chopper allows you to kill 100HP enemies in one shot. It’s slightly better than normal due to Phantom’s cloak. Melee is not a strategy that will work consistently against competent players, but still a decent perk and fun for shenanigans.

CR54 (2nd Edition)

Drilled is amazing. Unshakeable is amazing. Spares is great. Spares and Drilled is a pretty great combo.

CR94 (2nd Edition)

Undercover is amazing. Mechanic is good; it could allow for some interesting objective play that wouldn’t be possible without a cloak. Bomb Squad is merely decent as you already disable deployables with your cloak.

Unshakeable.

Drilled.

Phoenix

C41 (1st AND 2nd Edition)

Both have Quick Draw, which is great due to not only speeding up weapon switching but also speeding up your heals. 1st Edition has Cool (meh) and Extra Supplies (great), while 2nd Edition has Double Time (meh) and Potent Packs (amazing). I’d say 2nd Edition has a slight edge if you don’t have a problem with Double Time since Potent Packs is better than Extra Supplies; it means less charging for the same heal or more health for the same charge.

CR71 (1st Edition)

Bomb Squad is decent to good. Potent Packs is amazing. Quick Draw is great. Caulden is also much less of a detriment now with repeated buffs.

KE81

Untrackable is decent. Extra Supplies is great. Potent Packs is amazing. Having two perks that buff healing makes them multiply the effect of each other, making this loadout stand out as really strong.

Extra Supplies

Potent Packs

3 good perks, very strong loadout.

Proxy

H11 (2nd Edition)

Best secondary in the game and Drilled makes for a pretty good loadout. Enigma can be of decent use due to Proxy’s inherent value in being undetected when flanking. Flying Pig fits Proxy’s playstyle very well; it’s overall good.

KE21 (2nd Edition)

Not as good as KE53 in the perk department, but has a machine pistol, which is so much better than DE. Fail Safe is decent due to usefulness during “nuclear pizza” plays. Lock On is great. It makes dodging your mines around corners much harder. Chopper is meh.

R13 (2nd Edition)

For MP400. Quick Slash is meh. Bomb Squad is decent to good. Fail Safe is decent.

MP400.

Amazing perks only held back by an awful secondary.

Good secondary and Lock On.

Redeye

D45 (2nd Edition)

Best secondary and solid perks. Looter is meh. Grenades, turrets and mines are very hard to see while using IR Goggles, so Bomb Squad is really good on Red Eye. Quick Eye, while not quite as amazing as on scoped rifles is still quite good since Dreiss is effective at long range.

G41 (2nd Edition)

Drilled and Spares is great combo. Add to that the best secondary weapon and you’ve got a great loadout. Quick Slash is decent.

G52 (2nd Edition)

For the Quick Eye addicts out there. Guardian Angel is decent. Focus is good.

P55 (2nd Edition)

Want to spend as much time scoped in as possible? Then this is the loadout for you! Drilled and Quick Eye are a crazy good combo. Untrackable is decent.

Best secondary and good perks; Bomb Squad and Quick Draw.

None of Redeye’s other 2nd Edition loadouts are bad (except for D51), but D72 stands out as clear cut above the others.

Rhino

R93

The two best perks available to Rhino in one loadout. His ability is also a weapon, which makes weapons less important. Nitros is just amazing and borderline integral to Rhino as a merc. Quick Slash is meh. Unshakeable is incredible. Slow mercs have problems with explosives and Rhino is as slow as they get. The problems with explosives are especially bad when running the Aura+Rhino combo, making Unshakeable even better.

A92 (2nd Edition)

Quick Draw is good. Guardian Angel is solid as it helps trucking Rhino’s fat ass out of airstrike landing zones. Nitros is amazing.

For Unshakeable. Focus is good. Tough is decent.

Nitros.

For Unshakeable. Quick Draw is good. Tough is decent.

Sawbonez

BL71 (1st AND 2nd Edition)

Two of the strongest sets of perks available to Sawbonez. Both have Potent Packs, which is great and Spares, which is good. 1st Edition has Unshakeable, which is amazing. 2nd Edition has Extra Supplies which also is amazing. Take your pick, support or durability, both are great.

CR42 (1st Edition)

Strong offensive loadout. Drilled is great. Focus is good. Potent Packs is great. 2nd Edition has Quick Draw (great) and Spares (good) instead of Focus/Potent Packs. 1st Edition is slightly better simply due to Potent Packs being such a great offensive perk; speeding up your slow self-heal.

CR81 (2nd Edition)

Extra Supplies is Sawbonez’s best support perk. It reduces the need for Get Up due to your ability to throw medkits at teammates that are getting up and outdoes Potent Packs because the limiting factor for Sawbonez’s heal (when healing others) usually is the cooldown, rather than the time it takes to heal. Bomb Squad is decent to good. Unshakeable is amazing.

SM72

Great support perks. Get Up is great. Extra Supplies is amazing. 2nd Edition has Untrackable, while 1st Edition has Chopper, 2nd Edition is slightly better.

All Sawbonez’s 2nd Edition loadouts are decent with the exception of BL82.

Strong offensive perks.

Skyhammer

B53 (2nd Edition)

Drilled is amazing. Quick Eye is good. Bomb Squad is decent to good. This is the “shooty-shooty” loadout, while B91 fills a more ability-focused role.

B91 (2nd Edition)

Extra Supplies is merely decent as it only affects your Ammo Packs. Explodydendron is great. Quick Draw is great.

M92

Guardian Angel is decent to good. Explodydendron is great. Drilled is amazing on a fire support like Skyhammer due to infinite ammo.

T61 (2nd Edition)

Explodydendron is great. Quick Eye is merely decent due to the poor sight on Timik. Focus is good.

Unshakeable.

Quick Draw.

Sparks

143 (2nd Edition)

Quick Charge helps boost both offensive and supportive capabilities. Focus helps keeping your revives on point under fire. Get Up is incredible; Sparks is the only medic with a long range revive, and Get Up allows you to abuse the crap out of that. Slightly worse perks than the other two, but it’s close and 143 makes up for it with better weapons.

282

The core Get Up and Quick Charge, with Unshakeable to make surviving explosives easier. The nerf to Fletcher’s stickies really brought Unshakeable into focus on Sparks since she can now survive even direct sticks.

383

Core Get Up + Quick Charge with Potent Packs to bump up her heals to 30 from 25 and her on-hit heals to 66 from 55.

All Sparks’ 2nd Edition loadouts are decent, except for 273 and 342, which are a bit sub-par.

Stoker

M55 (2nd Edition)

Tough is good. Quick Draw is great as it also speeds up your molotov throws. Unshakeable is amazing.

M61

Flying Pig is decent to good. Mechanic is decent. Drilled is amazing on fire support mercs due to their ability to generate ammo.

S95

Quick Eye is great since Stark has very high bloom. Drilled is an amazing perk on fire support mercs. Mechanic is decent.

T91 (2nd Edition)

Unshakeable is amazing. Bomb Squad is decent to good. Quick Eye is good.

For Drilled.

Thunder

MA42

Best secondary and great perks. Drilled is amazing with the ridiculously long reload of MK46. Spares is also fantastic considering the humongous 935 damage per magazine (most primaries have ~500). Good luck running out of ammo. Tough is good.

S92 (2nd Edition)

Looter is meh. Unshakeable is incredible, especially on a merc as beefy as Thunder. Drilled is great.

T45

Best secondary, incredible perks. Quick Draw is great as it speeds up grenade throwing along with the increase to weapon switching speed. Spares is good. Unshakable is amazing.

Unshakeable is just incredible on Thunder.

Very close to S92 in power, surpassing it in specific scenarios, but generally being slightly worse. Explodydendron is not as great on Thunder as it is on other mercs as half the grenade effect (the flash) isn’t limited by radius.

Turtle

KE92

Steady is arguably Turtle’s best perk due to simply strengthening the ability that makes him worth playing. While Extender in comparison is more along the lines of adding utility. Unshakeable is amazing, especially with the weakness to explosives that the shield has. Quick Slash is meh.

C52 is Turtle’s only bad loadout, the rest are all good, but the ones below stand slightly above the rest.

C63

Steady and Focus.

Drilled and Spares.

Steady and Tough.

Vassili

MO11

Spares is great as it not only increases the maximum by, but also spawns you with an extra magazine. Bomb Squad is decent to good. Focus is pretty good for a merc based entirely on aiming shots.

MO22 (2nd Edition)

Tough is great since you’ll often be taking suppressive fire away from medics. Quick Eye is amazing with scoped rifles. Double Time is meh. You also get a good secondary on top of that.

P13 (1st Edition)

Spares is great. Spotter is good. Focus is great.
The 2nd Edition replaces Focus with Enigma, resulting in a worse loadout.

P21 (2nd Edition)

Bomb Squad is decent to good. Quick Eye is incredible with scoped rifles. Drilled is great. And a good secondary to top it off.

Quick Eye alone makes this decent, despite the subpar secondary.

Solid.