Zero Company class tier list

It is the only deliberate Advantage generator in the game, and Advantage is the resource every other class's best ability is priced in. Combat Recon grants 1 Advantage per enemy in its area and reaches a 7-metre area at 24 metres when invested, so one cast against a droid formation can fill a pool that caps at 10. Tactical Timing then adds a guaranteed Advantage per kill at maximum rank. Spotted, applied by damaging a target, removes distance and smoke hit-chance penalties against it for the whole squad. Its own Ultimate is the only one in the game with no fixed price — Ambush spends the entire pool at 2.5 bonus damage per Advantage, rising to 5, so a full pool is 50 bonus damage on one shot. A class that both fills the pool and provides the largest single sink for it is not competing for a slot, it is defining what the other three slots can afford.

Moves if Combat Recon turns out to be once per combat rather than once per turn, or its Advantage grant is capped below the enemy count. Either would cut generation to a trickle and drop this to A.

It decides who gets shot, and it does so as a side effect of shooting. Intimidating Posture makes the Heavy's primary blaster attack taunt whatever it hits, so redirection costs no separate action; Heavy Armor Training gives +2 flat Defense, subtracted from every incoming hit, and Bulwark adds up to another 6 for a turn while taunting an area. A previewer played the taunt-plus-Retaliation combination and describes four enemies redirected into a counterattacking tank in one encounter. The consequence is the reason for the band, not the survivability: a Heavy that reliably absorbs the incoming fire lets the other three slots be built greedily — no second healer, no defensive investment, no Utility slots spent on mitigation. It buys squad-wide freedom with one slot.

Moves if Enemy AI ignores taunts on higher difficulties, or the Injury threshold makes absorbing damage a losing trade — being downed is what causes an Injury, and three mean permanent death. Either drops this to A.

The highest ceiling in the roster and the one most dependent on the fight it is in. Onslaught adds +1 blaster damage for every shot fired within the turn, and Quick Draw refunds its own Action Point on a kill — so a line of weak droids is cleared for free while each kill loads the next shot. Keen Eye reaches +18% critical chance, which against that many attacks stops being occasional. It is also the class that turns an item into a build: a previewer respecced their Hawks into Gunslinger specifically to get more triggers out of a Weapon Mod that ignites on every attack. It is A rather than S because it is a finisher that needs targets already in kill range, because Onslaught resets every turn, and because flat Defense is its hard counter — an enemy with 2 Defense subtracts 2 from every one of six shots.

Moves if Common enemies carry meaningful Defense at standard difficulty, which would blunt the whole volume economy. Alternatively, Quick Draw's 25% hit penalty proving cheaper to erase than it reads would push this to S.

The most difficult class to build a bad version of. Arms Master gives +2 blaster and grenade damage from the first mission with no investment at all, which is the only unconditional damage on this list. Brutal Strike dazes — a dazed enemy cannot attack, so it is damage and damage prevention out of one action — and stuns at final rank. Rocket Strike answers both confirmed swarm factions at once: Outlaws overwhelm with numbers, Separatist droids arrive in formation, and one area attack is the reply to each. It is held out of S by the Advantage price: Rocket Strike bids against Morale Boost, Easy Mark, Precision Shot and Open Fire for the same pool of ten, and that pool starts every fight empty — so the biggest area attack is unavailable exactly when enemies are most tightly packed.

Moves if Rocket Strike proves cheap enough to fire twice in a long fight, or the campaign's enemy density makes area damage the default rather than a specialism. Either moves this to S.

Fully invested it crosses ground nothing else can and kills without rolling to hit. Fleet of Foot and Bull Rush together add 11 metres to an opening move, which is the length of many combat arenas, and collapse a move-and-attack into one Action Point where it would otherwise cost two or three. Bull Rush is melee, so it cannot miss, still takes Strike the Flanks' +20% critical chance against Exposed targets, and pushes — and pushing an enemy off a ledge kills it outright whatever its health. Sweeping Salvo disorients a whole cone for a 20% hit-chance penalty on everyone in it. The reason it is not S is the shape of the curve: before its ranks are bought it has 1 bonus metre and a 2-metre charge, which is not a map-crossing class, and the ledge kills depend entirely on map geometry.

Moves if Maps turn out to have few exploitable drops, which removes the instant kills and leaves 4 impact damage. Conversely, if Focus Points arrive fast enough to front-load the mobility ranks, this is S.

Excellent and conditional, and the condition is the difficulty you chose. First Responder equips a permanent two-charge med pack that costs no Utility slot, a Medic's Rally fully heals the Operator it revives, and Morale Boost heals 20 across four turns at first rank and 110 across ten at maximum while cancelling the injured Operator's hit-chance penalty. But Injuries come from being downed, not from taking damage, so preventative healing has a much smaller job here than in games where chip damage accumulates. Against permadeath it is close to mandatory; with permadeath off it is a slot that could have been damage. It also raises Bonds faster than any other role, which is a reason to run one early even in a squad that re-specialises later.

Moves if Retail difficulty downs Operators often enough that revival is a per-mission event rather than an emergency, which makes this S on standard settings. If Combat Stim's temporary health proves to prevent downs outright, same result.

The most certain damage in the game and the narrowest use of a slot. Sharpshooter Training is a flat +10% chance to hit before any investment, Zero In stacks to +40% hit and +24% crit, Precision Shot cannot miss, and Pick Them Off makes it far better at Overwatch than anything else — which matters, because Overwatch cones lose hit chance the further out they are placed. Three things hold it at B. Lethal is lost the moment the Sharpshooter moves or is displaced, so an enemy that pushes counters it without dealing damage. It is a pure Advantage sink that does nothing to fill the pool. And the developers state outright that line of sight and mission structure limit pure sniper strategies — four long-range Operators is explicitly a bad squad.

Moves if Enemy displacement is rarer than the preview footage suggests, or long sightlines are common enough that a stationary turn is not a real cost. Either makes this A. Paired with Luco Bronc's Combat Gas the accuracy stacks past anything else in the game, which is worth measuring on its own.

C is a statement about when, not about whether. Scoundrel's Instinct penetrates up to 4 points of Defense — exactly a maximum-rank Heavy's combined Defense, which is unlikely to be coincidence — and it is the direct answer to the flat damage reduction that blunts every volume attacker in the squad. Identify Weakness guarantees a critical rather than raising a chance, twice over at final rank, and Easy Mark's marks do not expire at end of turn, so a crit chain can be set up on one turn and cashed on the next. All of that arrives late. Both the ability and the Ultimate need most of their ranks before the class earns its slot, its base damage is low, and its whole contribution is contingent on a squadmate acting on the setup in time. The Cold Blooded Talent also grants any Operator an automatic critical, which lets a squad get part of this without spending a slot.

Moves if Enemies in the middle campaign carry enough Defense that 4 points of penetration is the difference between a squad working and not. That would move this to A regardless of how late it comes online.