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Specialization

Zero Company Scoundrel class guide

Crit enabler that ignores four points of enemy Defense, forces guaranteed criticals with Identify Weakness, and rides ally attacks through Easy Mark.

Confirmed
Confidence
Confirmed
Verified
14 August 2026

Quick answer

Opportunistic support that penetrates armour, sets up guaranteed critical hits and assists whoever attacks its mark.

Range
close, medium
Ultimate
Easy Mark
Build themes
Guaranteed criticals through Vulnerable · Armour penetration against tanky targets · Assist damage stacking · Easy Mark crit chains that carry across turns
Suggested weapons
PistolRifle
Tags
critical-setup, debuff, single-target, advantage-spender

Ultimate

Scoundrel Ultimate: Easy Mark

Every Specialization has exactly one Ultimate. It is the ability the class is built around, and the one it spends the squad's shared resources on.

Costs 7 Advantage to mark a single enemy. Whenever an ally attacks that target the Scoundrel assists, and if the attacker scores a critical hit the assist critically hits too. Each rank raises the assist's critical damage to a maximum of +6, and the final rank removes the once-per-turn restriction. The mark does not expire at the end of the turn.

Build value: The only Ultimate that persists across turns, which makes it a set-up placed one turn and cashed the next. It compounds with the Scoundrel's own Never Play Fair assist bonus, and because an assisting Operator never misses, the Scoundrel's contribution to a chain is unconditional. It needs the squad to agree on a priority target — a mark nobody shoots pays nothing.

Abilities

Confirmed abilities

Only abilities named by an official source appear here. The complete kit has not been published.

  • Identify Weakness

    Confirmed

    A Fast Action costing 1 Action Point. Applies Vulnerable to a single enemy, and the next attack against that enemy critically hits. Each rank extends its range; the final rank applies Vulnerable twice, so the next two attacks both crit.

    Build value: A guarantee, not an improved chance — which is what makes it worth saving for the squad's largest hit rather than its next one. Spent on a Precision Shot that cannot miss and carries +50% critical damage at max rank, it produces the biggest single hit available. Its limitation is timing: Vulnerable is wasted unless a teammate can act on it before the turn ends.

  • Easy Mark

    Confirmed

    Costs 7 Advantage to mark a single enemy. Whenever an ally attacks that target the Scoundrel assists, and if the attacker scores a critical hit the assist critically hits too. Each rank raises the assist's critical damage to a maximum of +6, and the final rank removes the once-per-turn restriction. The mark does not expire at the end of the turn.

    Build value: The only Ultimate that persists across turns, which makes it a set-up placed one turn and cashed the next. It compounds with the Scoundrel's own Never Play Fair assist bonus, and because an assisting Operator never misses, the Scoundrel's contribution to a chain is unconditional. It needs the squad to agree on a priority target — a mark nobody shoots pays nothing.

  • Never Play Fair

    Confirmed

    Increases this Operator’s Assist Damage by +1. Its Focus Tree ranks raise the figure; only the first is published.

    Build value: Small on its own and the reason the Scoundrel is a squad Operator rather than a damage one. Easy Mark makes the Scoundrel assist every ally attacking a marked target, so this is added to every one of those assists rather than to one attack — the value scales with how often the squad shoots what the Scoundrel points at. It also stacks with Hawks’ Fearless Leader, which raises assist damage for everybody, so an assist-built squad compounds two sources on the same action.

  • Scoundrel’s Instinct

    Confirmed

    All of this Operator’s attacks Penetrate the target’s defenses, ignoring up to 4 points of Defense. Its Focus Tree ranks raise the figure; only the first is published.

    Build value: The answer to the enemies that make an otherwise good squad feel useless. Defense reduces incoming damage, so four points ignored is worth most against exactly the targets everything else struggles with — armoured elites and anything with a Heavy’s own +2. It applies to **all** of this Operator’s attacks rather than to a chosen one, which makes the Scoundrel the slot that does not need setting up, and it is a large part of why this database recommends Scoundrel as Cly Kullervo’s secondary: her Talent already handles mobility and displacement, and armour penetration is the thing she has no other route to.

Squad partners

Who to pair the class with

Each pairing states whether the interaction is officially confirmed or our reading of confirmed mechanics.

  • Sharpshooter

    Vulnerable converts into the largest single hit available, and Precision Shot's max rank adds +50% critical damage on top of a crit that was already guaranteed.

  • Gunslinger

    More attacks per turn means more chances to consume Vulnerable and more assists triggered off a single Easy Mark.

  • Soldier

    Rocket Strike's final rank leaves survivors Vulnerable, so the two classes generate the same status from opposite ends — one on a group, one on a priority target.

  • Scout

    Easy Mark and Identify Weakness both want more casts per turn, and the Scout is the only class that fills the Advantage pool on purpose.

Talents

Talents that suit the Scoundrel

A Talent is chosen separately from a Specialization, so these are combinations you assemble yourself. The Squad Builder models the class half only.

  • The Bigger They Are…

    Identify Weakness guarantees the critical; this Talent decides how much that critical is worth against the target it is usually saved for.

  • Fearless Leader

    Never Play Fair and Easy Mark are both assist abilities, and this Talent raises assist damage for the whole squad — the two stack on the same action.

Strengths

  • Scoundrel's Instinct makes every attack penetrate up to 4 points of the target's Defense, so a Scoundrel hits armoured enemies hard even holding a low-damage pistol. Four points is exactly a max-rank Heavy's combined Defense, which is not likely to be a coincidence.
  • That makes it the direct answer to flat damage reduction, which is the mechanic that most blunts high-volume attackers elsewhere in the squad.
  • Identify Weakness makes a target Vulnerable and the next attack against them critically hits. It is a guarantee, not an increased chance.
  • At final rank Identify Weakness applies Vulnerable twice, so the next two attacks both crit.
  • Never Play Fair adds +1 assist damage per rank to +5, which makes the Scoundrel the Operator you want selected whenever an assist is offered.
  • Easy Mark costs 7 Advantage and marks one enemy: whenever an ally attacks it the Scoundrel assists, and if the attacker crits, the assist crits too.
  • Marks do not expire at end of turn, so a crit chain can be set up on one turn and cashed on the next.
  • Each Easy Mark rank raises the assist's critical damage to +6, and the final rank removes the once-per-turn restriction so more Advantage means more marks.
  • An assisting Operator never misses, which makes the Scoundrel's contribution to a chain unconditional.

Weaknesses

  • The kit is thin until invested. Both the ability and the Ultimate need most of their ranks before the class earns its slot, which makes it a poor early pick.
  • Setup is wasted if no teammate can act on the Vulnerable target in the same turn.
  • Easy Mark only pays out when allies attack the marked enemy, so it requires the squad to agree on a priority target.
  • Base damage is low. The Scoundrel's value is entirely in what the rest of the squad does with it.
  • The Cold Blooded talent grants any Operator an automatic critical, which overlaps with Identify Weakness on squads unwilling to spend a slot on a dedicated enabler.
  • Armour penetration caps at 4 points, so it blunts flat Defense rather than ignoring it.

Open questions

Points the shipped game has not yet answered for us, or that need a controlled comparison to state as fact — recorded rather than guessed at.

  • Identify Weakness's Action Point cost and base range.
  • Whether the two Vulnerable stacks at max rank can be spent by two different Operators.
  • Whether the Easy Mark assist consumes the Scoundrel's own Action Points.
  • Whether armour penetration applies to shields as well as Defense.
  • Focus Point costs for each rank.

Other Specializations

Sources