• 🏠
• Commanders
• Community
• Guides
• Missions
• Resources
• Tools
• About
• My Account

Co-op Commander Guide: Swann

Chief Engineer

Sections on this Page

Commander Summary

Swann relies on mechanical units, backed up with a powerful laser drill to control the battlefield.

Level Unlocks

Level/Icon	Name	Description
	Vehicle Specialist	Swann builds SCV's, vehicles and starships 20% faster than other Commanders. Factories and Armories do not cost vespene gas.
	Combat Drop	Unlocks the ability to calls down 4 A.R.E.S. War Bots with timed life, stunning enemy units in the target area upon arrival. Call down the Combat Drop from the top panel.
	Betty and the Gang	Increases the attack range of Devastation Turrets from 6 to 9. Attacks now slow enemy movement speed by 30%. Increases the life of Missile Turrets from 250 to 325. Attacks now deal area damage. Reduces the cost of Perdition Turrets by 50%.
	Drakken Laser Drill: Pulse Cannon	The Drakken laser drill can now be upgraded a second time, increasing its attack damage from 30 to 50. Also unlocks the Pulse Cannon ability, which deals 600 damage to all enemy units and structures in the target area. Activate the Pulse Cannon ability from the top panel.
	Vespene Harvester	Unlocks the ability for Command Centers to call down automated harvesters that gather extra vespene from your Refineries or your ally's vespene-gathering structures. 2 gas for each player every 6.3 seconds.
	New Unit: Thor	Heavy assault mech. Built at the Factory. Can attack ground and air units.
	Factory Upgrade Cache	Unlocks the following upgrades at the Factory Tech Lab: Allow Goliaths to attack ground and air units simultaneously. Increase the damage of the Cyclone's Lock-On ability by 100%. Unlock the Thor's 330mm Barrage Cannon ability, which stuns and deals damage to enemies in a target area.
	Improved SCVs	Allows multiple SCVs to build a structure in tandem, reducing its construction time. Repairing no longer costs resources.
	Armory Upgrade Cache	Unlocks the following upgrades at the Armory: Increase the attack range of all vehicles and ships by 1. Allow vehicles and ships to automatically heal themselves over time.
	Tech Reactors	Combines Tech Labs and Reactors into a single add-on which contains upgrades for units while also allowing two units to be built simultaneously.
	Engineering Bay Upgrade Cache	Unlocks the following upgrades at the Engineering Bay: Allow structures to automatically extinguish fires and repair themselves to 50% of their maximum life. Increase attack speed of all Turrets by 25%.
	Immortality Protocol	Unlocks the ability for destroyed Thors and Siege Tanks to rebuild themselves on the battlefield.
	Starport Upgrade Cache	Unlocks the following upgrades at the Starport Tech Reactor: Upgrade Wraiths to evade 20% of incoming damage while cloaked. Unlock the Science Vessel's Defensive Matrix ability, which surrounds a target with a shield that absorbs 200 damage over 20 seconds.
	Six for the Price of Four	Increases the number of A.R.E.S. War Bots called down by Combat Drop from 4 to 6. Call down the Combat Drop from the top panel.
	Mechanical Know-how	Increases the life of Swann's SCVs, vehicles, and starships by 20%.

Highlighted rows denote large power spikes for the commander.

Achievements

The commander-specific achievements for Swann are:

Achievement	Name	Description
	Combat Ready	Kill 25 units with Swann's Combat Drop before they expire on Hard difficulty.
	Drop 'Em Dead	Kill 250 enemy units with Swann's Combat Drop in Co-op Missions.
	Smooth Operator	Harvest 100,000 Vespene Gas for your ally with Rory Swann's Vespene Harvester in Co-op Missions.
	The Power of the Sun at Your Fingertips	Deal 20,000 damage in a single mission with Swann's Drakken Laser Drill on Hard difficulty.

Calldowns

The calldowns for Swann, at level 15, with no mastery points added are:

Calldown	Name	Description	Recommended Usage	Numbers
	Drakken Laser Drill Attack	Attack with the Drakken Laser Drill. Deals 20 damage per second and has unlimited range.	Auto-targets enemy units in vision. Relatively low DPS, but useful for whittling down high-HP targets. Can be used to take down objectives in vision.	Cooldown: 0 seconds
	Concentrated Beam	Requirements: Drakken Laser Drill Level 1 Deals 400 damage to enemy units and structures in a line across the entire map.	Very useful for dealing with attack waves. Can be used to help with base pushes if bases are aligned correctly.	Cooldown: 180 seconds
	Pulse Cannon	Requirements: Drakken Laser Drill Level 2 Deals 600 damage to enemy units and structures in the target area.	Useful for dealing with clumped up enemies. Very useful for dealing with bases. Can be used for difficult attack waves.	Cooldown: 300 seconds
	Combat Drop	Calls down 6 A.R.E.S. War Bots, stunning enemy ground units in the drop zone. The War Bots are controllable and fight for 60 seconds.	Should be used as often as possible, preferably as soon as they are off cooldown. Useful for defending in the early game. Can be used to tank for your units in the late game.	Coolup: 240 seconds Cooldown:240 seconds

Sub-Ascension Leveling

Difficulty: Moderate

Swann plays the same way he does at Ascension levels when he is at lower levels. However, he is significantly slower to ramp up and build his army. In the early game, build a Commander Center next to your rocks, as it will take time for it to be built by a single SCV. Build four Factories in the later stages of the game, two with Tech Labs and two with Reactors to build your endgame armies.

While leveling through Mastery levels, allocate points into Power Set 1's Concentrated Beam Width mastery until you hit the desired number of points, before allocating them to the Combat Drop duration mastery. Allocate points with an equal split on Power Set 3.

Masteries

Below are the three Power Sets for Swann with the recommended point allocations for each. Note that these are meant to serve a general, all-purpose build that is effective across all maps with no Prestiges selected. You are highly encourged to change these masteries to suit your playstyle and particular challenges you face (e.g. Weekly Mutations).

Power Set 1:

Power	Value	Recommended Points to Add	Further Considerations
Concentrated Beam Width and Damage	2% per point 60% maximum	19	Players that prefer to rely on their Combat Drops to tank for their main army should consider adding more points into that respective mastery. The Combat Drops can severely reduce the amount of damage their army takes.
Combat Drop Duration and Life	2% per point 60% maximum	11

The 19 points into the Concentrated Beam mastery ensures you can 1-shot Battlecruisers with the ability.

Power Set 2:

Power	Value	Recommended Points to Add	Further Considerations
Immortality Protocol Cost and Build Time	-2% per point -60% maximum	?	Immortality Protocol can be critical to ensuring Swann is able to keep up with the eventual losses his army will take as the game progresses. However, it only applies to certain units, and it is important for a player to determine whether they will benefit from Immortality Protocol more than they will benefit from increased structure health.
Structure Health	2% per point 60% maximum	?

This is down to player preference. If you tend to rely more on Siege Tanks and Thors, then the Immortality Protocol mastery should be chosen, otherwise, the Structure Health is a better option, especially when relying on static defenses.

Power Set 3:

Power	Value	Recommended Points to Add	Further Considerations
Vespene Drone Cost	-3% per point -90% maximum	?	Early Vespene Harvesters can provide Swann with the much-needed gas that he needs to get some of his higher-tech units out earlier. However, the Laser Drill mastery will allow the player to have a much more global presence on the map, allowing them to tech up to their end-game build without the constant harassment of attack waves. It is up to the player to determine which mastery/what ratio of mastery points to allocate for this.
Laser Drill Build Time, Upgrade Time, and Upgrade Cost	-1.5% per point -45% maximum	?

The regular choice is the Vespene Drone Cost mastery. However, for more mineral-heavy builds, and builds that rely on the Laser Drill, the Laser Drill mastery is the preferred choice.

Prestiges

Below are the prestiges for Swann. Note that "Effective Level" is the level at which the prestige achieves it full effect.

Level	Name	Description	Effective Level	Notes
1	Heavy Weapons Specialist	Advantages: The Laser Drill deals 100% splash damage and slows enemy movement by 70% and locks on targets 50% faster. Disadvantages: The Laser Drill's abilities are unavailable.	1	Splash damage range is 1.5
This prestige, by itself, is not very useful. While it does compound really well with Vorazun's Black Hole, the hit-and-run strategy for Swann isn't particularly effective. Commanders that can provide global map vision (e.g. Stetmann's Stetellites, Zeratul's Xel'Naga Watchers, Kerrigan's Creep Tumors or Nydus Worms) can help Swann get a little more mileage out of this Prestige by allowing him to deal with attack waves without the use of calldowns.

Level	Name	Description	Effective Level	Notes
2	Grease Monkey	Advantages: Turret upgrades are 100% more effective. Disadvantages: Combat units cost 50% more vespene gas.	11	Fire Suppression Systems upgrade does not gain any benefit from this Prestige.
This prestige makes Swann's already-powerful turrets even more powerful by further increasing their armor, attack speed and range. It should be a go-to pick for any defense-specific scenarios.

Level	Name	Description	Effective Level	Notes
3	Payload Director	Advantages: Hercules have twice the cargo capacity and unload units instantly. Science Vessels can use Tactical Jump and its cooldown reduced by 50%. Disadvantages: Top bar cooldowns increased by 50%.	1	None
The extreme amount of burst damage this Prestige can provide may, at-first-glance, seem valuable in addition to the ability to not only Tactical Jump your damage dealers but also your detection and healer. However, with proper micro, players should not be losing Siege Tanks to enemy units, especially with a Goliath frontline combined with Science Vessel Defense Matrices. Additionally, the disadvantage of having longer cooldowns on the Drill abilities means that the abilities do not sync up with mission attack wave/event timings as well.

For general play, playing without a Prestige Talent selected is recommended, as none of the Prestige Talents available to Swann provide him with a solution to problem he cannot already overcome by proper play.

Recommended Army Composition

The recommended army composition for Swann is below. Note that this assumes no Prestige talent selected and recommended Mastery Allocations. This is a basic recommendation for your army framework. It is recommended to gain an understanding for each of the units in the Units section and further add tech units so that you are able to better handle the situations you face.

Mass Goliath builds can do fairly well in most situations, as Science Vessels can give Goliaths not only healing, but protective Defensive Matrices.

Add a Hercules with 8 sieged up Siege Tanks and drop them behind your line of Goliaths for powerful splash damage.

Combat Units

For more information on Swann's unit stats, comparison between units and upgrade calculations, visit the Data Tables page.

Swann's combat units are listed below:

Build Order

Below is the standard economic build order for Swann. For more information on how to read and construct your own build orders, please check the Build Order Theory page.

14 Supply Depot
16 Factory (4 SCV's)
18 Billy (4 SCV's)
18 Billy (4 SCV's)
21 Command Center (8 SCV's)

Gameplay Guide

Playstyle Traps

A common trap for Swann players is to try and rush Thors out in the early game. Not only does it leave them extremely vulnerable to the early game, mass Thors can only work when actually massed in large numbers.

A much better build would be to start with Goliaths backed up with Siege Tanks and then transitioning to Thors as the economy improves.

Drakken Laser Drill Levels

The below table summarizes the Levels available for the Drakken Laser Drill.

Level	Drill DPS	Unlocked Abilities	/	Research Time
1	20	None	-	-
2	30	Concentrated Beam	200/200	190 seconds
3	50	Pulse Cannon	300/300	220 seconds

SCV Advanced Construction

Swann can send multiple SCV's to build a structure. The time taken to complete a structure based on the number of SCV's building is as follows:

SCV's	Build Time (%)
1	100
2	62.5
3	45.5
4	35.7
5	29.4
6	25
7	21.7
8	19.2
9	17.2
10	15.6

Static Defense

Swann has a few of static defense structures available to him. These are shown below:

Building	Name	Stats
	Flaming Betty	HP: 350 Attack: 16 (vs Light): 20 Range: 4 Speed: 1 Targets: Ground
	Spinning Dizzy	Detector HP: 325 Damage: 12 / 1 Attacks: 2 /8 Range: 7 /7 Speed: 0.86 / 1.78 Targets: Air / Air
	Blaster Billy	HP: 300 Attack: 25 (vs Armored): 50 Range: 9 Speed: 1.5 Targets: Ground

Swann has upgrades that can improve his static defense. The upgrades are listed below:

Upgrade	Name	Effect	/	Research Time
	Hi-Sec Auto Tracking	Adds +1 range to all Turrets.	100/100	60 seconds
	Structure Armor	Upgrades the armor of structures by 2.	100/100	60 seconds
	Fire Suppression Systems	All structure fires are automatically extinguished and all structures automatically repair themselves to 50% of their maximum life at a rate of 15HP/second.	100/100	60 seconds
	KMC Auto-Loaders	Increases the attack speed of all Turrets by 25%.	150/150	90 seconds

The Drill on Dead of Night

The Drill should be used by Swann to clear infested structures on Dead of Night. Clearing defenders with the Concentrated Beam or Pulse Cannon is just an added bonus. The images below show suggested uses for both, the Concentrated Beam and the Pulse Cannon. Note that the Concentrated Beam here has the bare minimum number of mastery points added to 1-shot infested structures (13 points). You will get better results if you have more mastery points added (for example, if you follow this guide and allocate 19 points).

Also, notice the difference in Concentrated Beam Locations depending on the player. Because the beam exits your Laser Drill, the positioning is different depending on which player you are. Unfortunately, Player 2's Concentrated Beams are significantly less efficient, purely due to the layout of the infested structures relative to the drill.

To get the best positioning consistently, Tactical Jump a Hercules to the location to get vision to perfectly position the beam.

Concentrated Beam Locations (Player 1):

11 Structures

9 Structures

8 Structures

7 Structures

Concentrated Beam Locations (Player 2):

9 Structures

8 Structures

8 Structures

8 Structures

7 Structures

Pulse Cannon Locations:

9 Structures

8 Structures

8 Structures

8 Structures

Playstyle Tips

• Always have enough Science Vessels on hand with your army. Not only do they provide you with detection, they also provide you with access to very useful abilities.
• Upgraded Wraiths only deal high amounts of damage while moving. You will need to practice your stutter-step micro to use them effectively.
• A Hercules can pick up sieged up Siege Tanks. Use it to move weakened and damaged Siege Tanks from the front to the back to prevent you from losing them.
• Siege Tanks unloaded from a Hercules will always point in the direction the Hercules is facing. Orient your Hercules towards your intended target to minimize time it takes for the tank to turn its gun towards its target before firing.
• Raynor can use your Tech Reactors! Make your Tech Reactors with a Factory at your ally's base and then lift your building away so he can use it.
• Use a Hercules to get vision so you can use the Drill to take out attack waves.

Note: All data generated on this site is based on Brutal difficulty. Timings, compositions and other elements may differ on easier difficulty levels.

© Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. All rights reserved. Wings of Liberty, Heart of the Swarm, Legacy of the Void, and StarCraft are trademarks or registered trademarks of Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. in the U.S. and/or other countries.