CP2077 Assault Perks Guide | Tierlist, what’s good?

Here’s a rather short guide on the Assault Perks Tree. Here you’ll find a list, tierlist, attribute requirement, shortened description about each perk, and a short blurb about why each perk is “good, bad, or something in between”. Here goes!

Overall, the Assault perks tree deals with buffing up all sorts of Rifles and SMG’s. These perks are likely tied to general increases, increases in cover, and have a very strong recoil reduction theme. While the cover sub-theme may be a little annoying for people who want to go guns blazing, there’s something for everyone here. Even the tech weapon snipe-thru-wallers, heh.

Assault is joined by Handguns and Blades in the Reflexes attribute tied Perk trees.

Assault Perks List & Tierlist

Some of these perks really depend if you like the “cover” subtheme, but even if you’re not completely sold onto it – most are still “good” whether you accept the prerequisite or not.

Assault Perk list rundown / viability / analysis

[A] Punisher (Reflexes 20*): For a duration after defeating an enemy with a Rifle or SMG, weapon sway and spread is nullified. An absurdly powerful capstone trait. If you like shooting a pseudo-laser, well, here it is.

[A] Bullseye (Reflexes 7): While aiming, increase damage with Rifles and SMG’s. Great power to perk investment ratio. It’s always active, pretty much, since you’ll always be aiming (or I hope you are).

[A] Shoot, Reload, Repeat (Reflexes 9): Defeating an enemy with Rifles and SMG’s reduces reload time for a short duration. This is REALLY REALLY GOOD. Some people might sleep on this, but reload times are a huge disruption to your potential damage output – prevents and gets you out of sticky situations.

[A] Recoil Wrangler (Reflexes 16): Reduces recoil with Rifles and SMG’s. Due to the weapon type, recoil reduction is more important. Of course this is better or worse depending on what exact weapon subtype you use. Generally, if you use a multitude of rifles chances are you’ll find titanic use of this.

[A] Long Shot (Reflexes 18): with Rifle and SMG damage is increased the further you are from your target. OP. It nullifies the typical weaknesses of some of these weapons, while reversing the weakness turning it into a buff. Incredibly powerful and opens up whole vectors of combat options.

[A] Savage Stoc (Reflexes 20): Significantly increase damage with Rifles and SMG’s when standing still. Can be a bummer, but the increase is savage indeed. More often than not, you’re not too mobile with this weapon type anyway.

[A] Executioner (Reflexes 7): Deal more damage with Rifles and SMG’s if target has more than 50% HP. You will ALWAYS maximize this. Always. As such, this is amazing. Chances are you will “do more than 50% of their health” before this deactivates.

[A] Named Bullets (Reflexes 14): Increases crit damage with Rifles and SMG’s. I rank this highly since it’s an “always on” perk, that has impressive numbers.

[B] Nerves of Steel (Reflexes 11): Increases headshot damage with Sniper and Precision rifles. Depends if this is your thing. Even if it is, headshot damage is something these weapons do not really need. It’s great to ENSURE your headshots kill. More often than not you’ll be taking this…

[B] Bulletjock (Reflexes 1): Increase damage with Rifles and SMG’s. Basic and good. No frills, does as it says on the tin. High investment and low numbers, but it’s still good.

[B] Skull Sipper (Reflexes 14): Each headshot reduces recoil with Rifles and SMG’s Stacks 5 times. Any way you reduce recoil is worth its weight in gold. The prerequisite and duration is weird, but this is a decent midgame perk.

The “behind cover perks” are all depending on how much you’re into this gameplay style.
I rate these B even if you’re into the style since it has a rather strict prerequisite.

[B] Covering Killshot (Reflexes 5): From behind cover, increase crit chance with Rifles and SMG’s. Crit is rare with this weapon type so this is amazing.

[B] Trench Warfare (Reflexes 12): From behind cover, increase damage with Rifles and SMG’s. Eh, more damage is always welcome.

[B] Hunters Hands (Reflexes 12): From behind cover, reduce recoil with Rifles and SMG’s. Less recoil is always great.

[B] Bunker (Reflexes 16): Shooting from behind cover with Rifles and SMG’s increase your armor and resistances. This seems to be the worst for me, since being behind cover is the best “armor” there is… However, it’s still pretty good.

[C] Eagle Eye (Reflexes 1): Reduce time to aim down sights with Rifles and SMG’s.  I struggle to think this is “important”. ADS is pretty quick with this weapon type, and even then… I don’t know… It seems a little overkill.

[C] Feel the Flow (Reflexes 11): Reduce reload times for Rifles and SMG’s. This is okay, but the on-kill reload perk vastly outperforms this. This is still not bad but I’d get other things first.

[C] In Perspective (Reflexes 18): Bullets fired with Rifles and SMG’s recoil an additional 2 times. A for the fun and memes, but C for practicality. Recoils are “fun” and can be good at times, but its niche.

[D] Too Close for Comfort (Reflexes 5): Quick melee attacks with Rifles and SMG’s are stronger. I would almost never want to quick melee with this weapon tree, and the bonus of “a little more damage” simply doesn’t cut it. The animation time alone doesn’t compare to the couple of bullets you COULD have shot anyway.

[D] Quick Hunter (Reflexes 9): Increase damage with Rifles and SMG’s against moving targets. Targets out in the open, moving, are likely to be mowed down by this weapon type anyway. As such, while decent it’s low priority.

Summary and Closing

Some of these perks become irrelevant once you reach the L20 ultimate perk, or after heavy mods and such. Use respecs!

The Assault perk tree, while comparatively vanilla – does the job. The cover subtheme can be a little grating, but it does enforce a certain playstyle (whether you enjoy it or not). If you like to play an “XCOM-like tactical shooter”, heh, then the Assault tree helps out.

Well that’s about it for a list of Assault perks – hopefully you enjoyed our tierlist of these perks to help you decide what to get for your build! Check out our tierlists on the other perk trees in Cyberpunk 2077!