Steel Hunters – Weaver: Hunter Guide (Tips & Strategy)

Starter Guide to Weaver

Ву ZeroSkillNoFunYT.

• Real Name: Remy Davies
• Inception age: 35
• Place of birth: Laurentides, Canada
• Gender: Male

System Overview

Triple Cannon

A burst-fire cannon that operates best at close to medium range. High damage per shot but low rate of fire.

Mods

• Venom
• Astute

Mainframe System

Core System that enhances stats and abilities.

Mods

• Skitter
• Calculating

Energy Barrier

Deploys an energy barrier that allows friendly fire and friendly Hunters to pass through it while blocking enemy fire and movement.

Mods

• Assess
• Conundrum

Minigun

Activates a rapid-firing minigun with limited ammunition; mobility is restricted while active.

Mods

• Perseverance
• Diligence

Gameplay

General Stats

With 7700 base structure points and 2100 shields, Weavers stats place him in the middle of the field, representing his generalist playstyle.

General Playstyle

Weaver is best defined as a support marksman. He’s an amazing hunter for extended fights, especially if they’re mid-range. This is thanks to his barrier ability as well as his amazing main gun, allowing him and his teammate to pump damage with little to no risk.

This is further proliferated by his amazing DPM. Systems like Venom or his Minigun ability allow him to deal large sums of damage continuously and for extended periods of time, allowing him to support fire allies and control zones effectively.

Weaver is also heavily reliant on proper resource management and most importantly positioning. Without his abilities, Weaver offers very little to his team beyond support fire, so it is of utter importance to always make sure you’ve got access to one of them, and if not make sure you’re as far as possible from any enemies or danger.

If you manage to survive Weaver’s somewhat weak early game, you will turn into a MONSTER as his zone-controlling abilities turn him into one of the best Hunter at extraction.

Systems

Weapon System

Weaver’s weapon system consists of a mix of burst fire and fully automatic options, these burst fire options are highly accurate at first, but the longer they are shot, the larger the scatter and recoil gets. In a long range matchup, its best to shoot one burst, then hide behind cover until the scatter goes back to 0. The fully automatic option is nothing to be sniffed at either, it is also able to apply pressure at any range with respectable damage.

Venom

Venom offers Weaver a more aggressive playstyle thanks to its automatic 18 round chamber as well as its burning stacks. These stacks have a 33% chance of being applied when shooting a target and can stack up to 5 times, dealing a DoT damage effect that hurts your enemy over time until the stacks run out. This passive hinders enemy hunter’s possibility to activate reactor cores or heal up due to it intervening with the activation process allowing your team to slowly chip them out and all-in them once they’re weak.

Another benefit to Venom is that it strengthens Weaver’s early game due to its high DPM and the possibility to almost fully down any Hunter’s health with a single magazine. This is also thanks to his two other passives which increase his damage a certain percentage after a quick reload and him restoring a certain percentage of his health based on the damage dealt to a target with 3 DoT stacks or more.

Astute

Astute is made for a way more passive playstyle, benefiting longer-ranged engagements and short trades with its 3-bullet burst gun. This gun is more accurate than Venom’s and has higher burst damage but sacrifices some DPM forcing you to avoid close quarters unless Minigun is available. This system’s quick ammo regeneration as well as increased magazine size allows you to continuously fire your main gun, making it more viable in extended fights and making you rely less on your minigun.

Skitter

Skitter is a mod that heavily focuses on improving Weaver’s combat capabilities through the use of his abilities. Firstly, Weaver unlocks the capability to dash whilst using Minigun as well as increasing the dash recharge speed. In short, this means that Weaver goes from being a slow and somewhat vulnerable target when using Minigun to a dashing menace, making it easier to chase down fleeing opponents trying to take cover from it.

Weaver also becomes more resilient to damage whilst barrier is up, overcompensating for his main weakness which is being flanked and giving him the possibility to outtrade other Hunters, especially when Minigun is active.

Last, but not least, Skitter also grants Weaver the possibility to cycle faster through his abilities as he can reduce the cooldown of his barrier by a few seconds for every 10 minigun shots hit, making it very difficult for enemies to bait out all your abilities.

Calculating

This system fully revolves around making Weaver bulkier and improving his sustain in prolonged encounters. To begin with, your shield recharge is reduced by a few seconds, making it easier to gain them back mid-fight, but it doesn’t finish there. When your shields are up, you also become more resistant to critical hits.

If your enemies somehow manage to pierce your shields and damage you, that won’t we a problem, as Weaver’s repair kit effectiveness is also increased and will let you heal to max health in no time. Even though this mod may sound less dynamic than Skitter’s it shouldn’t be underestimated as it can turn you into quite the parasite at extraction.

Abilities

Ability 1: Energy Barrier

On activation, Weaver deploys an Energy Barrier that allows friendly fire and friendly Hunters to pass through it while blocking enemy fire and movement. Be warned, a newly placed Energy Barrier is very weak and can be destroyed in only a few hits. The Energy Barrier needs time to fully deploy for you to gain the full value of this ability.

Once fully deployed, Weaver can kite through and around it, making it usually a bad choice to push toward enemies. Depending on the situation and pressure applied, it is possible to destroy the barrier from outside of Weavers’ line of sight when positioning correctly. Lastly, it can be used to intentionally interrupt movement and block enemies or even counter abilities like Taurus charge.

Assess

Unlike Conundrum, Assess grants Weaver access to two barriers instead of one! These barriers can’t be deployed simultaneously and if the second one is deployed, the first one will disappear. Nevertheless, these barriers are smaller and have less health, but heal over time as well as increasing repair kit effectiveness when the barrier is down. Most interestingly, this system deploys a destructible pylon behind the barrier that increases Weaver and his teammate’s damage output.

This system is better suited for closer combat as it offers a larger error margin during tense fights as well as some extra sustain in case of a necessary heal.

Conundrum

Conundrum sacrifices the possibility of using two barriers but instead gets a way larger one with almost twice the HP! The barrier also lasts longer and instead of deploying a pylon that buffs your team’s damage, it instead passively heals Hunters in its radius.

This option is the best for those looking to play passively and methodically as it offers less versatility but in exchange you get amazing defensive capabilities as well as good sustain.

This combined with systems like Calculating makes even Trenchwalker jealous of Weaver’s healing capabilities.

Ability 2: Minigun

Activates a rapid-firing Minigun with limited ammunition, the main drawback being largely restricted mobility. The damage output is unparalleled within the game and will shred enemy foes within seconds.

The difficulty arises in choosing the correct situation on when to pull the trigger so to say, as simple repositioning by the enemy will make a chase close to impossible. Nonetheless, if you manage to set up the perfect engage for your minigun, then the fight will be over in no time.

Perseverance

This system focuses on making Minigun more accessible as it refunds a percentage of the remaining ability energy as a proportional cooldown reduction. The refund allows Weavers to use Minigun more frequently since often, enemies will take cover when they start getting blasted by it forcing the Weaver to retract the ability and leave them vulnerable to offensive plays.

Perseverance also encourages focus fire rather than shooting anything that moves, since it increases the damage dealt a certain percentage for every bullet hit up to 20 times, making it an amazing system to melt down tanks like Ursus. Lastly, every hit has a 20% chance to recharge x amount of energy, potentially allowing you to shoot for much longer.

Diligence

Now if you wish to turn Minigun into a weapon of mass destruction that tears through ANYTHING, then this is your system. Contrary to Perseverance, this system has a much longer cooldown of 90s with no refunding capabilities, which means that once you used Minigun, you’re out of the game for over a minute. This may sound bad, but its offensive buffs can make it worthwhile.

The energy of the system is increased and combining this with another passive that reduces the energy decay while standing still by a percentage, it allows Weaver to shoot for EXTENDED periods of time, making it an amazing tool for zone control, as no hunter will be able to outtrade the ability with highest DPS in the game. If that doesn’t sound mighty enough, Diligence also stacks damage with critical hits up to 15%, only resetting when the ability ends, allowing for more scattered shooting and multiple enemy-targeting.

General Strategy

As Weaver your job is to support fire your allies from behind as well as using your barriers to hold important positions on the map. This becomes more prevalent at extraction as it allows your team to hold the extract more effectively and with lower risk of getting pummelled by enemy gunfire. Barrier placements can also be used to offer your team a break to heal up during battle or to bypass cross-sections that may be suppressed by enemy fire.

As previously mentioned, you really want to avoid being close-range with this hunter since your health is average. The general rule of thumb is to always play as a support, following your teammate’s shot calls and strategizing accordingly. (This may vary depending on what Hunter you’re teaming with) Minigun is also an extremely important tool. This ability is Weaver’s main fear mechanic since any knowledgeable player will know that it can melt through entire teams in seconds. Use this to scare people away, allowing you to take over good positions and only use it if an enemy team all-ins you, you should win any engagement except for Ursus.

Lastly, whenever your team loots make sure to prioritise damage cores on Weaver as your win condition revolves around dealing damage. Shield and Health cores should be given to your ally first as you generally shouldn’t be taking damage as Weaver thanks to your barriers.

Both Reactor cores and Domes are good for Weaver, but I suggest grabbing reactors as it can allow you to cycle through barriers annoyingly fast, making it very difficult for enemies to know when to push you.

Advanced Tips

• These tips are directed towards players who already have a good understanding of the Hunter but are struggling to push him to the next level. These tips can be niche but will give you an edge over the other Weavers.
• Never Try to outtrade Ursus with Ice armor. It’s been mentioned on several occasions that Weaver has the highest DPS in the game, but Ursus can beat Weaver in a 1v1 thanks to her armor. As a duo, it is of utter importance that you bait out the armor before engaging in a fight, otherwise, you’ll probably lose.
• This can be done by chipping her down from afar, pushing them and once Ursus activates Ice Armor, Barrier and walk away, waiting for the ability to enter cooldown.

Highlighted Synergies

Weaver does best with Hunters like Ursus and Trenchwalker.

Ursus: With Ursus, Weaver has better odds at close ranged encounters thank to Ursus’ tankyness, mitigating one of his biggest weaknesses. Ice armor can absorb all of the damage dealt whilst Weaver can barrier behind and safely melt his enemies. This also allows for Ursus to dash back into cover once her armor is down, as the barrier will still be intact, giving her time to reposition and recharge her ability. If enemies try to push you during that faze, Weaver’s Minigun will make sure to keep them away (or annihilate them).

This duo is also one of, if not the strongest at extract, simply because their zone control becomes almost incontestable with Ursus’ armor and Weaver’s Barriers, making it very hard to push them away from it.