Deep Rock Galactic: Rogue Core, the long-awaited sequel to Ghost Ship Entertainment’s dwarven shooter, has finally arrived! With it, we have a new set of characters to play with, each with their own kits that work with the new roguelike elements to shake up returning fans.
Let’s go over the long-range support of the new crew, the Falconer. We’ll be going over her strengths, how best to build her, and what you can expect from her as you descend deeper into Hoxxes IV.
How Does The Falconer Play?
The Falconer relies on her mechanical Shock Drone to provide a variety of support for the team. Her drone technically has 5 ability charges, which it spends to maintain uptime on its attack runs.
Falconer’s primary kit can be split into three active abilities, most of which rely on her Drone Charges. The Drone will spend them over time as it attacks and uses Revive, and will recharge while holstered.
- Shock Drone – Pressing Q and left click will launch the Shock Drone towards whatever enemy you’re looking at, dealing heavy bursts of Electric damage. If no enemy is in sight, the Drone will attempt to search the nearby area.
- Remote Drone Revive – At the cost of one Drone charge and a 30-second cooldown, the Falconer can revive a fellow Reclaimer from a distance. The revive can’t be interrupted unless the Falconer herself goes down, so keep a safe distance.
- Thunder Rod – The Falconer’s main burst cooldown, Thunder Rod summons a small beacon that increases all Electric damage dealt by the Falconer and allies within it’s radius. This provides a huge increase to the Shock Drone’s output and rewards the Falconer for using weapons and upgrades with Electric damage.
Falconer feels like a class split in half, with two sides of her kit that reward her for playing at opposite ranges. Luckily, this allows Falconer to shift her game plan based on the current situation.
Hang back when fights initally break out, supporting your team from range while sending your Drone after high priority targets. Once the moment to lay down the hurt presents itself, drop your Thunder Rod to make quick work of anything dumb enough to step up to you.
Builds to Aim For
Builds are hard to fully set up from the outside, especially when compared to the original DRG. Thanks to Rogue Core’s Roguelike nature, you’ll need to be adaptable, taking what’s generally good where you can find it.
Despite this natural rule, it’s good to know what picks will send you over the top when it comes to effectiveness, and the Falconer’s split kit nature gives her two easy paths to look for.
Through the REPD, Toolkits, and Bio Boosters, you have plenty of ways to get stronger as a run goes on, so here are two game plans you can shift between as you descend.
- Disjointed Support – Look for Armor repair, revive speed, and Red Sugar spawns to keep your team healthy and happy against the worst the Cores have to offer.
- Electric Damage – Why sit back and let other folks play for you when the Falconer’s innate Electric Damage and unique Bio Booster decks reward her for shocking enemies and keeping them stunned.
Safe Support Build
While both of Falconer’s natural builds are simple, this one will easily make you the team MVP, especially in public lobbies.
The power of a free, long-range revive is almost impossible to overstate, and this build does everything it can to maximize that benefit while minimizing risk. If you like playing the healer, this is the most at home you’ll feel in Rogue Core.
Keep an eye out for perks like Defibrillation, which can cut your overall revive time in half, and Red Sugar spawning perks like Hemoforge. Once you start nabbing some Artefacts, look for the BFF perk that allows you to regen Armor for nearby allies at close proximity.
In short, the Falconer can easily abuse already decent supportive perks, making the best out of bad situations and stopping them from cropping up altogether. Expenite will be your main source of power here, so nab all the green you can to keep your team out of the red.
Electric Mayhem Build
Now here is where the magic happens. While the Falconer can easily hang back and provide support, the close range of her Thunder Rod means to put out maximum damage, she’ll need to get up close and personal.
Plenty of Falconer’s default Bio Boosters reward her from dealing Electric damage, which initially will only come from her Shock Drone. Make sure to use it whenever it’s off cooldown, and prioritize Toolkit upgrades to increase its output and uptime via Burst Fire and Cooldown Reduction.
Expenite perks like Arc Lunge will give you easier access to Electric Damage while the Shock Drone is on cooldown. If you’re really lucky, nabbing a weapon upgrade that converts some of it’s damage to Electric can dramatically increase your uptime.
The Voltaic SMG is an easy slot in on the Falconer for that exact reason, always dealing Electric Damage and bouncing between enemies.
With just a few lightning-themed upgrades, the Falconer can burst down entire phases of Gatekeepers in the blink of an eye. After all, the best form of damage mitigation is making sure the other guy can’t deal any.
