SWTOR 7.7 Mercenary Best Solo Builds

This guide explains the best builds for Mercenary DPS disciplines that are optimized to perform extremely well in solo content.

These builds enable you to have a far more enjoyable experience fighting trash mobs than you would with a sustained DPS build since you’ll be utilizing effects designed specifically for use against trash mobs!

Why solo builds are worth using in SWTOR

For almost the entirety of SWTOR’s history, fighting trash wasn’t fun because the combat system didn’t support it. Trash mob encounters rarely last more than a few seconds while boss fights and PvP typically last at least a few minutes, requiring you to make use of far more abilities!

In solo content, you’re mostly fighting trash mobs that have so little health that the majority of enemies won’t be able to survive for more than 2-3 abilities and you often can’t even get through a whole rotation before that combat encounter is over.

Stronger single enemies like elites (golds) where you would be able to stretch your rotational legs are rare enough that you can trivialize them with proper use of offensive cooldowns (OCDs) so even they don’t always survive a full rotation cycle.

I believe this disconnect was responsible for making skipping trash via stealth and cheese such a popular approach to playing PvE in SWTOR. BioWare clearly understood this and (mostly) solved it by introducing extremely powerful new ability tree buffs and legendary implants that synergize with existing tactical items.

These ridiculously potent effects form the basis of the solo builds and are able to exist without causing (too many) balance issues in group content because they are short-lived and only reliably trigger off of combat events that are fairly unique to and common when fighting trash mobs.

Arsenal Mercenary Solo Build

In this section, I’ll be covering the ability tree build and solo ability priority for Arsenal Mercenary. Please refer to the 7.0 Arsenal Mercenary PvE Guide if you want more detailed information, especially on topics pertaining to gearing, abilities, and ability tree choices.

Arsenal Solo Content Ability Tree Build

Build Essentials:

Triple Trace
Thermonuclear Fusion
Chaff Flare
Energy Rebounder
Kolto Surge
Trauma Regulators
Overcharged Cells Implant
Concentrated Fire Implant
Gyroscopic Stabilizers Tactical

With this build, you’ll be able to fire loads of missiles at everyone while having a substantial amount of survivability and mobility. The damage and multi-target potential of your missiles is dependent on whether or not the enemies are affected by your Heat Signature debuff.

Heat Signature can be applied by Tracer Missile (which will hit up to 3 targets with Triple Trace) and spread with Fusion Missile. Heatseeker Missiles and Death from Above deal more damage to targets affected by your Heat Signature and Heatseeker Missiles fires additional weaker missiles at secondary targets affected by your Heat Signature.

Arsenal is a bit better suited to regular missions as opposed to heroics and FPs because its damage output is a bit lower than that of Innovative Ordnance’s, but is more front-loaded.

How to use this build

This is the general rotation you’ll be using your abilities in against each group of trash in order to maximize your damage output. You are slightly limited by ability cooldowns being too long, though you should be able to do this against most groups of trash.

1. Tracer Missile (pre-cast)
2. Supercharged Gas (if available)
3. Power Surge (if available and using Fusion Missile)
4. Fusion Missile (if needed to spread Heat Signature)
5. Tracer Missile (only if Fusion Missile is not instant)
6. Heatseeker Missiles (against highest HP target)
7. Death from Above (AoE)
8. Priming Shot (finisher)
9. Blazing Bolts (finisher)
10. Tracer Missile (for procs)
11. Rail Shot (finisher)
12. Blazing Bolts (finisher)

The main idea here is to start by applying Heat Signature to everything and then use the abilities that benefit from Heat Signature being applied and deal damage to multiple targets.

Tracer Missile with Triple Trace is enough for groups of trash that have 3 enemies or fewer, but sometimes you need to include Fusion Missile to spread it to everything, especially if there are more than 3 targets. The travel time on Fusion Missile is long, so Heat Signature won’t be spread by the time you can fire Heatseeker Missiles unless you use Power Surge to make it instant or do another attack in between Fusion Missile and Heatseeker Missiles.

After you’ve done Heatseeker Missiles or if that ability is on cooldown, you can use Death from Above, which will be enough to finish off most Standard and Weak enemies. The only things left standing will be stronger enemies or those that didn’t get hit by everything.

You can finish those enemies off with Priming Shot, Blazing Bolts, and Rail Shot. Make sure to only use Rail Shot only when you have 4+ stacks of the Tracer Lock proc. If you don’t think 4 stacks will be enough to take it out, use a Tracer Missile first to build the 5th stack. If you used Supercharged Gas earlier and you have obtained the Concentrated Fire legendary implant, your Rail Shot will autocrit.

Innovative Ordnance Mercenary Solo Build

In this section, I’ll be covering the ability tree build and solo ability priority for Innovative Ordnance (IO) Mercenary. Please refer to the 7.0 Innovative Ordnance Mercenary PvE Guide if you want more detailed information, especially on topics pertaining to gearing, abilities, and ability tree choices.

Innovative Ordnance Solo Content Ability Tree Build

Build Essentials:

Eruptive Flames
Heavy Shrapnel
Chaff Flare
Energy Rebounder
Kolto Surge
Trauma Regulators
Overcharged Cells Implant
Concentrated Fire Implant
Energized Charges Tactical

Similar to Arsenal, this build boosts your survivability, mobility, and AoE potential. The AoE damage boost primarily comes from enabling some of your core single-target abilities to deal AoE damage. Unlike Arsenal, IO is better suited to heroics and FPs because it takes more time to set up the damage.

The idea is to light an enemy on fire, make them bleed, and then spread those effects to the whole group. While they’re burning and bleeding, you can focus down the stronger enemies with single-target abilities.

Both implants and the tactical I recommend synergize with each other to strengthen Supercharged Gas. Technically, you can use the Continuous Fire tactical instead of Energized Charges, but the AoE DPS increase isn’t super huge or ever essential. Meanwhile, Energized Charges provides a massive boost to your single target damage output, allowing you to finish off those pesky Elites (golds) a lot faster.

How to use this build

This is the general rotation you’ll be using your abilities in against each group of trash in order to maximize your damage output.

1. Serrated Shot (pre-cast, DoT 1)
2. Incendiary Missile (DoT 2)
3. Fusion Missle (DoT spread)
4. Supercharged Gas (if applicable)
5. Thermal Detonator (at enemy with highest HP)
6. Mag Shot (at Strong or Elite enemy)
7. Sweeping Blasters (AoE, procs Mag Shot)
8. Missile Blast (finisher, only use with Volatile Warhead)
9. Mag Shot (finisher, will be procced)

Again, your objective is to apply your DoTs and then spread them to the group with Fusion Missile. After they’ve been spread, you can start mixing in some single-target abilities like Thermal Detonator (which does AoE damage too) and Mag Shot. Since Mag Shot is a heavy hit on its own and will detonate Thermal Detonator early, we want to use it before we get its proc to reset its cooldown.

Sweeping Blasters is what will proc Mag Shot, though Unload and Power Shot also work as single-target alternatives if you don’t need more AoE damage. Finally, you’ll have Missile Blast and another Mag Shot. Only use Missile Blast if you have the Volatile Warhead proc (the button will be glowing), otherwise the attack does far less damage and while being far more expensive.

Major Cooldown Abilities for Mercenaries

These abilities offer some sort of temporary boost to your offense, defense, and/or mobility. They are referred to as cooldowns (CDs) because they usually only last a short time while having a long cooldown. I’ll only be covering the ones that you’ll reasonably have access to all the time.

You may want to group each category together on your bar so you can recognize them more easily, though keep them separate from the attacks I listed above.

Offensive Cooldowns

Offensive cooldowns (OCDs) increase your damage dealt temporarily. Sometimes they’re more generic boosts to everything, other times they only apply to specific abilities. It’s important to make sure you’re being thoughtful about which abilities you use and try to use them as fast as possible while the boost is active to maximize their effectiveness. Use them against stronger enemies to defeat them faster.

Supercharged Gas

Supercharged Gas increases your damage dealt in some way that is unique to each discipline, and it makes your next Rail Shot or Mag Shot autocrit. It’s a lot stronger with IO compared to Arsenal, so it’s more important to pay close attention with that spec.

In Arsenal, it really just makes your attacks ignore some more of your target’s armor.

In IO, the first time you deal weapon damage after activating the ability will apply a super strong DoT called Supercharged Burn, though the target needs to already be affected by your Incendiary Missile. It’s best to activate Supercharged Gas when you’re attacking a Strong or Elite enemy since they have more HP, allowing you to full benefit from the DoT.

Electro Net

This ability is a lot more complicated in PvP, but in PvE, it’s really just a super strong DoT and slow, so it’s good to use against something that has a lot of HP like an Elite or Champion if you think it’ll take a while to defeat.

Vent Heat

Vent Heat causes your next ability to cost no Heat and after activating that ability, rapidly dissipates 50 Heat over the next few seconds. It’s best to activate it when you’re at about 60-70 Heat right before doing an ability with a 3s channel (Blazing Bolts, Unload, Sweeping Blasters, or Death from Above). There’s no need to activate Vent Heat if the combat encounter is almost over because you can just use your out of combat regen ability instead.

Defensive Cooldowns

Defensive cooldowns (DCDs) increase your survivability temporarily, making it less likely that you’ll be defeated. Use them whenever you’re taking more damage than you can handle.

Energy Shield

Energy Shield offers 25% damage reduction for 12s. It works against all attacks and lasts a long time, so try to use it preemptively whenever you expect to take a lot of damage. Thanks to Trauma Regulators, Energy Shield will heal you for 40% of your max health when it ends, assuming you got hit 10 times while it was active. Its cooldown is also reduced whenever you take damage thanks to Energy Rebounder.

Chaff Flare

Chaff Flare makes you more likely to dodge weapon damage like blastersfire and lightsaber swings. It also makes you take no damage from the next 2 single-target Force or Tech attacks. Both components only last 6s, so it really just buys you a little bit of time if you accidentally overcommitted, so you might want to consider following it up with Rocket Out or Jet Boost.

Kolto Overload

Activating this ability applies a Health Monitor to you for the next minute and if you drop below 60% HP, Kolto Overload triggers, causing you to heal rapidly back up to 60% HP for a short period. While Kolto Overload is active, you’re basically unkillable except by massive singular hits, the likes of which you won’t encounter in solo content.

Crowd Control

These abilities have some sort of controlling effect on your opponent that often provide some sort of defensive benefit to you.

Disabling Shot

This ability can interrupt your target’s cast or channel and locks them out of activating that ability again for a short time. Typically the longer or more threatening-sounding the ability is, the more important it is to interrupt.

Concussion Missile

This ability mezzes a target for up to 60s, meaning they are stunned but the stun breaks if they take damage. Use it on the strongest enemy that is furthest from the group. You want to mez the one that will hit the hardest that you can avoid DoT spreading to. Sometimes it isn’t possible to do this, and in those cases, I recommend just DoT spreading to it and leaning on other defensive or offensive cooldowns.

Jet Boost

This is your knockback. It fires your jetpack to send targets back pretty far if they’re standing near you. Use Jet Boost if you need to interrupt something and Disabling Shot is unavailable or want a bit of breathing room between you and your enemies.

Mobility

These cooldowns allow you to move much faster than you would normally be able to go.

Rocket Out

This ability sends you flying backward 20m and has 2 charges. Use it whenever you want to create distance between you and your enemy.

Hydraulic Overrides

This ability offers a small movement speed boost and makes you immune to knockback, roots, and slows. I recommend using it right before an enemy knocks you back. The most common knockback attack that NPCs use is called Surge, so keep an eye out for that cast.

Determination

This ability breaks you out of any controlling effects. Since it has such a long cooldown, only use it if you are prevented from doing what you want to do. For example, if you’re rooted in place but can still hit your target, there’s no need to break free.

Power Surge

Power Surge makes your next ability with a cast time instant, allowing it to be used while moving when it otherwise wouldn’t be. It is not a DPS increase just to make something instant, so only use it if you want to use something while moving that isn’t instant.

Mercenary Solo Gearing and Stats

This section will cover the core elements of gearing and stats for Mercenary. If you want a more detailed explanation, please refer to the main guides for each discipline. Don’t forget to obtain the legendary implants and tactical items I mentioned when referring to individual disciplines!

Stat Priority

As a DPS, you’ll need to care about 3 different stats: Accuracy, Alacrity, and Critical Rating. There are thresholds associated with Accuracy and Alacrity, so you need to prioritize reaching those thresholds to get the full benefit from each stat point.

1. Accuracy to 110.00% – Accuracy reduces the chance for your attacks to miss.
2. Alacrity to ~7.5% – Alacrity holistically increases the speed at which you can execute your rotation. Please note that you’ll need different amounts of Alacrity Rating to reach 7.5% with each of this combat style’s disciplines. Refer to the main PvE guides for each spec for more information.
3. Critical gets the rest – Critical refers to both your chance to critically hit and the damage multiplier for critical hits. Critical Rating affects both.

Find out which mods to purchase from Hyde and Zeek in SWTOR on the Fleet to minimize spending and optimize your build. The dedicated guide contains tips for all roles in both PvE and PvP.

Individual Pieces

• Augments: Blue 296 augments ([Type] Augment 83 + Augmentation Kit Mk-11)
• Crystals: Advanced Eviscerating (+41 Critical)
• Relics: Relic of Focused Retribution and Relic of Devastating Vengeance (highest iRating you have)
• Biochem: Advanced Kyrprax Medpac, Proficient Stim, and Critical Adrenal

I recommend a Relic and Adrenal that boost your critical chance for solo content because, unlike Power, Critical Rating isn’t capped by level sync.