Corpo Assassin Build - The Contractor - Cyberpunk 2077

Corpo Assassin Build - The Contractor

I intended to make one build to have a corporate background, and for me, this mash of weapons and quick hack playstyle looked like the one. The idea is to Stealth weapons - pistols and snipers to eliminate targets. You do everything not to reveal yourself and create that perfect sequence of enemy takedowns.

Of course, if you are playing on Very Hard this becomes challenging, enemies become bullet sponges, and what usually could one shot enemy does not work. However, by utilizing the game knowledge we can use silencer pistols against normal grunts and silenced snipers against elites.

Sometimes you may risk revealing yourself if the single shot does not remove the target. For this reason, you have Reboot Optics, Cyberware Malfunction, and other quickhacks to allow you to reach the foe easily and do a takedown. If everything goes wrong, you can just pop Overclock​ and System Collapse for an instant kill.

If this has inspired you to try out the build, let's go!

Attributes

First, let's go through attributes, they provide stat bonuses and unlock new perks. The more points you invest the better options you unlock that allow creating the Assassin build.

Starting Game

Here are the attributes you should take at the game's start. You can allocate a total of 7 points.

I recommend checking Cyberpunk 2077 beginner tips to avoid missing or misunderstanding important things early in the game.

Attribute	Allocation	Description
Cool	+3	Will be used to progress with Pistols and Sniper Rifle per trees.
Body	+1	Unlocks the first-tier perks.
Intelligence	+2	Starting progression toward better quickhacking.
Reflexes	+1	Unlocks the first-tier perks.

End Game Attributes

Here is how the end-game setup would look with the build once you have all the attributes sorted out:

Attribute	Allocation	Description
Reflexes	9	I only go for 9 due to Dash, it's such an amazing perk that makes traversing easier. Otherwise, it doesn't give any combat bonuses.
Body	15	The main goal is to get an Adrenaline Rush​ as this will allow for some crazy quickhack combos once you activate Overclock.
Technical Ability	15	Improves cyberware options and unlocks additional upgrades.
Cool	20	This unlocks the most important weapon perks and improves critical damage for late-game optimizations.
Intelligence	20	Unlocks better quick hack-related perks.

Perks

Let's go through the perks of the Corpo Build. You will need about 60~ perk points for the build, and the base game awards about 80 with skills progression and perk shards. So some should be left to adjust the build to your needs.

Cool Perks

These perks will improve weapon effectiveness for pistols, revolvers, and sniper rifles. Moreover, some perks will be useful for out-of-combat or stealth approaches.

Level 4 Perks

These perks are mainly for stealth, however, I would say only Killer Instinct​ is mandatory due to its big damage boost, allowing for one-shot kills.

Perk	Description
Killer Instinct​	The big damage boost makes it easier to one-shot kill some enemies with silenced pistols and snipers.
Gag Order​	In case you, are not able to instantly kill a foe, the perk gives a few seconds of leeway to avoid full combat.
Feline Footwork​	Improved mitigation chance and movement speed while crouching, to better reach your targets.
Blind Spot​	Improved stealth detection delay which utilizes your mitigation chance.

Level 9 Perks

Finally, you will be able to get the first mobility perk. It is useful both for exploration and combat

Perk	Description
Focus​	The perk allows for more accurate shots as they do not drain stamina. This is relevant early in the game, later on with various cyberware the negative effect is negated automatically.
Head to Head​	Reset the duration of Focus, making it easier to sustain no stamina drain period.
Deep Breath​	Slows time by 25%. This makes it easier to land precise shots. If this is not a problem, you can skip it.
Rinse and Reload​	Improved reload speed makes it easier to continue shooting after you empty the clip.
No Sweat​	Reduce the stamina cost of Focus​ after it ends. This is relevant early in the game, where stamina has a huge impact on accuracy.

Level 15 Perks

Perk	Description
Deadeye​	The most powerful perk for any pistol user. Gives a big headshot damage increase. This pairs well with Focus​ as the effect only applies when stamina is full.
High Noon​	Improved reload speed after you neutralize an enemy.
Long Shot​	Removes any distance penalties that pistols have.
California Reaper​	This perk will allow you to get back to 85%+ stamina so that both Deadeye​ and Focus​ can be reactivated.
Quick Draw​	Excellent way to regain stamina as you swap weapons.

Level 20 Perks

Perk	Description
Nerves of Tungsten-Steel​	This perk is a huge damage boost for Sniper rifles, almost guaranteeing a one-shot kill if you land a headshot.
Run 'N' Gun​ (Optional)	I would say this is optional. The bonuses are okay, but they do not give any damage improvement making the perk lackluster.

Reflexes Perks

A few of the perks are of interest here due to improved mobility and weapon handling during combat.

Level 4 Perks

Perk	Description
Slippery	Base perk, that we will need to progress to other levels
Muscle Memory​	Gives you more agility in combat as you can reload while sprinting.
Multitasker​	Although not mandatory, having the option to shoot while moving fast can be handy.

Level 9 Perks

Finally, you will be able to get the first mobility perk. It is useful both for exploration and combat

Perk	Description
Dash	Another new perk that gives a short dash to avoid or get close to the enemies.
Can't Touch This	A 100% mitigation chance while dodging is very valuable. This will give you a higher chance of reaching an enemy if you are under heavy fire.

Technical Ability Perks

This tree will improve the cyberware capacity and allow you to maximize the number of slots. It will also give a healing item boost, in case you are pinned down during loud combat.

Level 4 Perks

Perk	Description
Glutton for War	You will be taking out a lot of enemies, so why not faster healing item recharge?

Level 9 Perks

Perk	Description
Health Freak	You now have 3 health recharge items, making combat a bit easier.
Borrowed Time	Gives instant health item recharge when taking out an enemy when being close to death.
All Things Cyber	Mandatory perk as we will need as much Cyberware as we can. Reduces its costs
Renaissance Punk	With this build, we will have 4 attributes above 9, so worth taking it.
Chrome Constitution	With Samurai build we are filling all the slots with chrome, so reduced damage is nice.

Level 15 Perks

Perk	Description
License to Chrome	Improves Skeleton cyberware and unlocks a new slot for even more chrome
Extended Warranty	The increased duration will work on Kerenzikov and other cyberware effects, although without an operating system, it is not as impactful.
Ambidextrous​ (Optional)	This is a great perk if you can afford two of the hand's cyberware. Without them, I would just skip it.

Intelligence Perks

These perks will serve to enhance the quickhacking capabilities of Corpo build. Because Cool is the primary stat, I would also not expend so many perk points early in the game, and concentrate on Cool Tree.

Level 4 Perks

Perk	Description
Optimization​	Needed for progression, but bonus recovery is still welcome.
Encryption​ (optional)	This is a great perk, once Tracing starts to pile up. This somewhat delays detection as you chip away at enemies with quickhacks.
Subordination​	This can be a great perk, as you may use something like Sonic Shock, Ping, or Reboot Optics and want to take care of surrounding enemies. It's more of quality of life improvement rather than damage improvement.
Eye in the Sky​	Mainly taken for progression as I do not use cameras as much.
Warning: Explosion Hazard​	This is an often overlooked perk. For the cost of a few RAMs, you can deal decent damage to multiple targets. With this perk upgrade you can kill grunt enemies most of the time.

Level 9 Perks

Perk	Description
Hack Queue​	This is a very powerful feature, allowing you to combo quickhacks and get bonus damage from perks like Embedded Exploit.
Data Recycler​	This perk is great for when you will be doing some bigger combos so that unused quickhacks will have RAM returned.
Counter-a-hack​ (Optional)	I would say this is an optional perk, and you can pick it based on your personal preference. I would always find knowing the enemy Netrunner location especially if you enter combat state. This way you can neutralize the deadliest target very easily.
Copy-Paste​ (Optional)	If there is an enemy netrunner this can be used to instantly destroy everyone in the group. However, most of the time I forget to activate this, so I decided not to take it.
Embedded Exploit​	Amazing perk that allows to greatly increase quickhack damage using Combos. Just be sure first, to upload non-Combat quick hacks. I cover this more in the Quickhack Combo guide.
Speculation​	Additional RAM regeneration after enemy neutralization.
Embedded Exploit​	Increased RAM recovery speed.
Shadowrunner​ (Optional)	This perk can be an excellent addition to reset the Tracing bar. However, once you get Memory Wipe Tier 3, it loses its value.

Level 15 Perks

Perk	Description
Queue Acceleration​	Increases queue size, allowing for some stronger combo setups.
Queue Hack_Root​	Reduces RAM cost when you upload more than 1 unique quickhack. Moreover, this is needed to unlock the next one.
Blood Daemon​	Gives bonus HP regeneration when you kill an enemy during Overclock​ and if the queue is filled.
Overclock​	This is the most important perk in the Intelligence tree. It allows using HP instead of RAM, which unlocks huge potential for costly quickhacks and taking out multiple enemies.
Sublimation​	Improves health regeneration from RAM recovery improvements.
Race Against Mind​	Improves quickhack damage as HP gets lower. This is what will allow some of those big damage numbers.
Queue Prioritization​	If the queue is long, this greatly improves the upload speed, neutralizing or disabling the enemy faster.

Level 20 Perks

These perks are optional in my opinion, as the Corpo build does not need to rely on quickhacks.

Perk	Description
Queue Mastery​ (Optional)	This perk is optional because to activate it you will constantly need to fully utilize the queue. If you are not doing that with extensive combos, I would just skip it.

Body Perks

The tree is left with minimal investments as the build aims for a non-direct combat approach.

Level 4 Perks

Perk	Description
Painkiller	A very valuable perk that is recommended for any build. We also need it for the progression
Dorph-head	Blood Pump will be one of the main Cyberware that we use to drastically boost HP restoration

Level 15 Perks

Perk	Description
Adrenaline Rush​	This is a huge survivability boost for any build that uses Overclock, as an additional layer protects from one-shot kills when you are low on HP.
Juggernaut​	Adds additional damage and movement speed while Adrenaline Rush​ is active.

Perks - Relic

These perks are available with Phantom Liberty DLC. They will give further improvements to some of the game mechanics.

Priority	Perk	Description
1	Vulnerability Analytics	Shows enemy weak spots, which when hit, create an electricity explosion. It is especially useful against robots and stronger enemies which are hard to chip away with just melee  attacks
2	Machine Learning	Improves Vulnerability Analytics by making them appear faster and giving a higher critical damage boost
3	Emergency Cloaking​	If you plan on using Optical Camo, this perk is great, otherwise it is taken just for progression.
4	Sensory Protocol​	It gives you a moment to escape enemy vision if you are about to be detected.

Equipment for Assassin Build

This section will cover what gear I recommend using with the Corpo build. Always try to obtain the highest tier equipment as it provides the best stats and most modification slots.

Pistols

The idea behind pistols is that they can equip (or already) have silencers. This makes it possible to one-shot many enemies with a headshot and high stats.

Item	Description
Pride	The strongest pistol in the game, but requires you to finish the game first. Using it, you are guaranteed to one-shot Elites with 3 health bars.
Death and Taxes	If you can handle the recoil of the second shot, this pistol can kill most of the normal enemies. The downside is that it also drains your HP, so use it sparingly.
Tamayura	Quite a niche pistol and rare to find. However, it has very good base damage, headshot multiplier, and armor penetration. Slap the XC-10 Cetus silencer and you have one of the best weapons in the game.
Her Majesty	Extremely popular and well-made pistol. I would use this if you plan on equipping Optical Camo, as this guarantees critical hits, ensuring you one-shot most of the enemies.
Pariah	Very satisfying weapon that is silenced (although it is tech-type). The bullets hit at the same time making it deadly and getting all the stealth bonuses.
Seraph	This pistol applies Burn on the enemies and increases damage. Overall, Seraph is a good choice in mid-game, you can also use it effectively on loud encounters, as Burning will help at chipping away foes.
Lexington X-Mod2	Comes with multiple modification slots and a very high headshot multiplier bonus.

For modifications any silencer is necessary to get the most out of stealth or out-of-combat shots, to get the bonus damage.

However, the pistol damage falls off if you continue shooting with them during combat, so I recommend having an alternative weapon without silencers.

Modification	Description
XC-10 Cetus	Go for the Tier 5 version as it guarantees critical hits. This makes most of the normal pistols on equal ground or stronger than the iconic ones. For example - Tamayura.
Swiss Cheese	Improves armor penetration at the cost of increased Stamina. This is not a problem for Pistols and Revolvers as Focus​ will somewhat negate this effect.
Pinpoint	Reduces bullet spread after you land a headshot
Zenith	Improve weapon handling and crit chance, but require you to draw a weapon for this effect to initiate.
Better Half	Improves crit chance with the second half of the magazine.
Equalizer	Improved damage against elite enemies

Revolvers

Item	Description
Mancinella	The only revolver that is with silencer and has very high headshot damage multiplier. It also retains stealth bonuses even after the first shot. Another great thing is that it also activates Nerves of Tungsten-Steel​ allowing to guarantee crits.

Sniper Rifles

I think the snipers below, are what fit the theme. They perfectly fit the build theme:

Item	Description
Overwatch	Technically silenced sniper rifle, but it did not work that 100% of the time. I would use it when your target is not looked at by other allies or you have them disabled with Sonic Shock or Reboot Optics.
Rasetsu	Technically not a silenced weapon, but damn is it cool to use it. It can kill enemies silently if they are some distance apart.

Cyberware

Cyberware is a unique mechanic that allows us to fill the build with implants. Early games can be quite difficult as you will have limited capacity. However, as you progress and drop more Capacity Shards, you will be able to equip more.

I will be covering here what is your goal for the end game, to make the build as powerful as possible

First Priority Cyberware

This is what is essential to make the build work. I would even recommend dropping everything else to equip these if cyberware capacity doesn't allow it. These cyberware selections make the core of the build.

Slot	Cyberware	Description
Frontal Cortex 2	EX-Disk	Gives a flat increase in Total RAM.
Skeleton 1	Spring Joints	Improves mitigation strength, complementing other cyberware like Countershell, and Neofiber.
Skeleton 2	Epimorphic Skeleton	A big boost to HP and armor greatly improves survivability.
Nervous System 1	Neofiber	Together with Countershell and Spring Joints, these will increase your survivability.
Integumentary System 1	Countershell	One of my favorite cyberware. With this, when under heavy fire or using quickhacks with Overclock, you will get a big boost to mitigation chance, greatly reducing incoming damage.
Operating System 1	Tetratronic Rippler	The best cyberdeck for pure damage with quickhacks like Short Circuit and Burnout Synapse.
	Arasaka	The ultimate stealth cyberdeck? Increases Trace duration and reduces the cost of Covert quickhacks.
	Netwatch Netdriver Mk.1	I recommend this one if you would like to upload quickhacks via devices like Cameras.
Face 1	Kiroshi "Cockatrice" Optics	If you can afford the cyberware cost, this is impressive cyberware that will give a higher chance of a critical hit with pistols.
	Basic Kiroshi Optics	Simple eye cyberware, that also improves headshot damage.
Hands 1	Shock Absorber	Reduces recoil and gives a headshot damage bonus from Cool attunement.
Circulatory System 1	Biomonitor	Automatically heals, makes the combat somewhat easier, as you do not have to worry how long it takes to use a healing item.
Circulatory System 2	Blood Pump	The most powerful healing item in the game, it heals during a few-second span.
	Heal-On-Kill	I would say this is the safest option, it gives an additional layer of HP restoration.
Legs	Reinforced Tendons	My personal favorite makes traversing much easier.
	Fortified Ankles	Gives the highest jumps and high boost to armor compared to cyberware capacity cost. But you need to hold the jump button.

Second Priority Cyberware

This is what you should be getting once you have the core cyberware, or you have free capacity.

Slot	Cyberware	Description
Frontal Cortex 1	COX-2 Cybersomatic Optimizer	The single most powerful cyberware for netrunner. Makes all quickhacks do guaranteed critical hits. After you obtain this one, most of the enemies will be one shot with the correct quickhack sequence
	Bioconductor	A weaker version, if you do not have access to the one above or are limited by cyberware capacity.
Frontal Cortex 2	Axolotl	This cyberware will take the build to the ultimate level. It has a very steep cyberware capacity cost. But it gives cooldown reductions for everything - Overclock, Countershell, etc.
	RAM Upgrade	An alternative cyberware before you can afford Axolotl for bonus cooldown reductions.
Skeleton 3	Kinetic Frame	It should be easy to maintain high stamina with Pistols especially when using Focus.
Nervous System 2	Revulsor	Improved version of Reflex Tuner, which works similarly to Sandevistan and does not slow you down.
	Reflex Tuner	Excellent cyberware that kicks in when your health drops below 25%. This has a good synergy with Borrowed Time, which gives a chance to gain a health item when on Low HP.
Integumentary System 3	Painducer	For medium or long-ranged combat this is my recommended pick.
	Subdermal Armor	A simple cyberware that has a high armor-to-cyberware capacity cost ratio.

Final Cyberware setup

Slot	Cyberware	Description
Nervous System 2	Deep-Field Visual Interface	If you want to maximize damage at the cost of survivability using this cyberware will give 20% critical damage with 20 cool.
	Synaptic Accelerator	This cyberware is excellent for stealth playstyle as it gives a few seconds of slowed time before combat starts.
Integumentary System 3	Optical Camo	If you plan on using Her Majesty or want to embrace a stealthy playstyle, Optical Camo cyberware is perfect.
	Rangeguard	Long-range defensive cyberware to improve armor capacity.
Hands 2	Immovable Force	Gives a good recoil and spread reduction making it easier to make perfect shots. If you will not take it, be sure to remove the Ambidextrous​ perk to save a point.
Circulatory System 3	Second Heart	Gives a revival in case you go under and get flatlined.
	Isometric Stabilizer	Gives a substantial stamina decrease for when you are not able to activate Focus.
	Clutch Padding	This cyberware is good enough to limit stamina drain with your ranged weapons.
	Threatevac	Low-cost alternative to fill the slot

How to Use the Build

Here I would like to share some general tips that I would like to recommend for the best approach with this build.

Core Mechanics

Let's go through what I think are the core mechanics of the build to maximize its effectiveness.

Stamina Management

This is an important mechanic for almost any build in Cyberpunk 2077 that uses weapons. The good thing is that Pistols and Snipers get access to the Focus​ perk making it easy to sustain high stamina for a few seconds. Together with some upgrades and Deadeye,​ you will be able to deal big damage for fast kills.

However, I would still recommend always being aware of your stamina as in early to mid-game, having it low will reduce your accuracy. In the late game, you will have upgraded cyberware that can compensate for this.

Look for Cyberware with Decreased enemy vision

When upgrading or buying cyberware you can obtain additional modifiers. This is like "end-game" rolls to help min-max the build. I would only invest into this once you have everything covered. To be honest the bonuses are minimal.

This is a very useful stat modifier for stealth build. It allows you to avoid enemy hits and makes it very hard for enemies to fully detect you. With high enough bonuses, you can lower it to 1%, where you will be practically invisible most of the time.

Using Sniper Rifles for Long Distances

As we are heavily invested in Cool Tree, the build is effective with sniper rifles. Unfortunately, there are not many that allow us to fully immerse in Stealth. However, during Act 2, you can obtain Overwatch from Panam. It comes with a Silencer by default

As you can see, we can freely neutralize enemies without drawing unnecessary attention. Also, using Reboot Optics further increases headshot damage, ensuring a kill even on Elite enemy.

Managing Traceability

With the 2.0 Update, a new mechanic was introduced for quickhacks - Tracing. This is a timer, that starts when you activate the control, combat, and other offensive quickhacks. Once it fills up Combat state starts and enemies know where you are.

Although this sounds daunting it's not. First, there is plenty of time, second, there are various ways that you can minimize it - takedowns with Shadowrunner perk, Memory Wipe T3 upload, etc.

This perfectly synergizes with the Assassin playstyle.

Quickhack Order while Scanning

One of the most irritating things when playing a Netrunner is when an important quickhack is either at the end or in the middle of the list while scanning. This is a major limitation with cyberdecks, that has negative gameplay experience.

Well, there is a way to control them which is very unintuitive, but still gives what you want. When adding quickhacks the order in which they will be shown is right bottom to right top and then left bottom to left top.

The difficulty is that when adding quickhacks, they will first be added to the end of the list, meaning you have to plan how your quickhack list will look.

So even though this system is very unintuitive at least there is a way to control it. In the image above, the quickhack list will be:

1. Cyberware Malfunction
2. Burnout Synapse
3. Short Circuit
4. Reboot Optics
5. Overheat
6. etc.

Obtaining new Quickhacks

The main question is how to get new Quickhacks. Well, there are a few main ways, which are fairly simple:

• Purchase from Netrunner vendors throughout the Night City. New quickhack tiers become available as you level up. if you do not find the one you need, just rest for 24 hours, so that their inventory will reset. Quickhacks that you have will not appear in their inventory.
• Hack access points. These can be found near groups of enemies with NCPD scanners. Just use Ping which will reveal everything in the network. Generally, access points are highlighted with red color on the minimap.

Recommended Quickhacks

Here is a list of quickhacks that I think are the best for the Assassin Build. There are other options, but these allow for creating combos and best suit the playstyle build is aiming for.

Item	Description
System Collapse	This can be an excellent quickhack if you pop Overclock​ and want just to instantly remove the target. It does not activate tracing, and you do not need any combos. Of course, the usage cost is steep, but in the late game this is not a problem
Cyberware Malfunction	This is a mandatory quickhack. First, it disables enemy cyberware and increases damage against them. Second, after you gain Embedded Exploit this ensures that by default you deal 60% more damage with subsequent quickhacks. So this should be your starting option.
Burnout Synapse	This is mandatory if you want an "advanced" netrunner build that can use quickhacks without RAM limitations, I covered it in the Quickhack combo section on how you can do it
Ping	This can be a good quickhack early in the game. It reveals enemy positions connected to the network. However, later on, this is not as good, in my opinion, as you more or less can guess where the next target is.
Reboot Optics	Decreases enemy accuracy with weapons and increases headshot damage against them with weapons. Take this if you are using Smart Weapons.
Sonic Shock	With this Quikchack you can make an enemy disappear from the network, making them an easy picking without raising alarms. This requires at least tier 4. However, quickhacks which are used after it activates initiate Tracing. (this worked differently before patch 2.1). As a cheap option, it is perfect to be used to activate Embedded Exploit.
Contagion	By itself, it is not a very powerful quickhack. Its main appeal is that from Tier 4 it can be combined with Burn effects to create explosions. Moreover, as it spreads, explosions can be created multiple times.
Overheat	Great quickhack if you are using Smart Weapons as it decreases armor and provides bonus damage. Moreover, can be used together with Contagion to create explosions.
Detonate Grenade	It is an ultimate quickhack so you may not get access to it early. However, once you get it you can use it very cheaply after creating explosions.
Memory Wipe	The new king of stealth netrunning. Memory Wipe allows for avoiding Tracing. You will need Tier 4 for this. Higher tiers are very expensive in terms of RAM.
Short Circuit	A very powerful quickhack that deals electrical damage. It is very effective against robots, drones, mechs, etc.

Quickhack combos

There were big changes to quickhacks after the big Cyberpunk 2.0 update, now they have a synergy with each other. Overall, their costs have been increased, and you will mostly be able to use 3-4 quickhacks, without Overclock.

When fighting a group of elites this will be not enough, so you have to be smart about it. I recommend reading the Quickhack Combo guide as it goes into depth on how best to utilize these new mechanics. I recommend a few combos in the next sections where I talk about Early and late-game combat.

Maintaining high Mitigation Chance

This is an important aspect of the build, that will allow it to survive against multiple enemies at the same time if you will engage in direct combat. Mitigation Chance is like a second layer of armor, that works with a specific chance. Mitigation Strength is what goes together to ensure how "Strong" the mitigation effect will be.

It will also improve your detection delay because the Blind Spot​ perk uses Mitigation Chance for its effects.

1. Dorph-head​ - 100% mitigation chance
2. Can't Touch This​ - 100% mitigation chance
3. Countershell + Neofiber + Spring Joints + Kinetic Frame - 78% mitigation chance and 80% mitigation strength.

So for most of the combat, you will be able to soak up a lot of damage. Of course, there will be a second or two intervals, where none of these effects will apply as they will be on cooldown. So that's when you will be the weakest.

Early Game Combat

Okay, let's go through some early-game combat approaches. I recommend checking Cyberpunk 2077 beginner tips for additional information on the early game combat.

Use Grenades

Consumables like grenades are another great choice to give some crowd control for free. Just throw them on the enemy that you want to stagger. This is a great way to open the encounter if you see that you are about to be detected.

Visit ripperdoc at level 10

Once you reach level 10, a new tier of cyberware will be unlocked. For this reason, visit any ripperdocs in the Night City. This is when you will get access to uncommon-tier operating systems.

For Cyberdecks, you will be able to use higher-tier quickhacks and get new effects.

Guns + Quickhacks

In case you enter Gun Combat and want to maximize the effectiveness there are a lot of options. I would like to cover one of the simplest and most effective.

First, be sure to have a smart weapon, they target enemy weak spots and have a good synergy with some cyberdecks. Now, for quickhacks, I recommend using:

Item	Description
Cyberware Malfunction	One of the cheapest quickhacks. Disables enemy cyberware increases damage against them, and stacks for stronger effects.
Overheat	Starts burning the enemy, but the most important effect is that it melts their armor and each shot against them gets bonus fire damage.
Reboot Optics	Makes the enemy almost blind, making it easier to approach them and their shots miss. Moreover, you deal bonus headshot damage.

You can use all of them together against strong enemies like cyberpsychos, easily destroying them in a matter of seconds with a weapon like Yinglong.

Creating Explosions

Explosions are a good source of area of effect damage, that deal decent damage and can be very cheap to use. The easiest source is red containers found in the environment. You can either explode them with quickhacks or weapons. Be sure to have Warning: Explosion Hazard to increase the damage of environment detonations.

The next option is to create explosions yourself with quickhacks. There is a very easy combo - Contagion + burn source. Of course, this is a bit more costly, but the effect is usually even better as you can create multiple explosions one after another.

Sequence	Action	Description
1	Contagion	Setting up the combo, by releasing the poison from the quickhack. The quick hack will spread to other enemies creating even more confusion.
2	Overheat	As you can see there are a ton of options for how you can set off these explosions. And as the Contagion spreads, you can create a second and third, if anyone is still alive. Just be aware, that weapons and Monowire, have a "chance to burn" meaning that some of them are not as effective. For example, Monowire has a 20% chance to burn, and its slow attack speed makes it a problematic choice.
	Thermal Monowire
	Incendiary Grenade
	Errata
	Prototype: Shingen Mark V

Short Circuit against normal targets

This combo is as simple as it gets and is a good option for taking out normal enemies mostly with one HP bar. For this, you will need two quickhacks - a Short Circuit and Cyberware Malfunction. This will activate three effects:

1. Embedded Exploit​
2. Bonus damage from Cyberware Malfunction
3. Additional combo bonus from Short Circuit itself

Sequence	Action	Description
1	Cyberware Malfunction	Use it one or two times to weaken the enemy.
2	Short Circuit	Short Circuit will create a combo and deal additional damage. Moreover, this will also activate Embedded Exploit​

It's a very simple combo but falls short once you start fighting stronger enemies like elites.

Late Game Combat

For the Corpo Assassin build, the late game opens up even more options as you get better quickhacks and improved cyberware.

Gun Combat

At this stage, you will have access to plenty of weapons, like silenced pistols (with very strong silencers) or Snipers. Generally, pistols are considered very strong due to the various multipliers they can stack.

Generally, you would want to remove simple enemies with your weapons and only use Quickhacks on elites. This way you will optimize your resources, and not waste HP with Overclock​ on something that could just be one shot.

Burnout Synapse with Infinite Overclock

This is the most powerful combo that you can use to more or less never run out of RAM. For now, this looks to be the top combination of quickhacking since the 2.0 update. So what makes it powerful? Well, this is a combination of multiple perks and quickhacks. Let's go step by step

1. Overclock allows to use HP instead of RAM for quickhacks
2. Hack Queue and Queue Acceleration allow uploading multiple quickhacks in succession
3. Data Recycler returns 80% of RAM that has been used, so we are trading HP for RAM
4. Finally, Blood Daemon restores HP based on quickhacks in the queue, which we can be further used to fuel Overclock

This is just the part of it. The core of this combo is Burnout Synapse. It has unique effects, if you kill an enemy using it, the Overclock duration is extended by 5 seconds. As long as there are enemies you should be able to sustain it and use HP for Quickhack uploads.

So here are  recommended sequences based on the situation:

Most damage

Be sure to activate Overclock​ as this gives a huge damage boost.

Sequence	Action	Description
1	Cyberware Malfunction	This activates Embedded Exploit​ and Tetratronic Rippler's unique effects. Moreover, Cyberware Malfunction increases overall damage and disables cyberware. The big costing quickhacks are there to activate the bonus effect from Burnout Synapse.
2	Burnout Synapse
3	Cyberware Malfunction
4	Ultimate Quickhack with high RAM cost

Best when high-level in normal encounters

Sequence	Action	Description
1	Burnout Synapse	Once you get some good cyberware and can one-shot most of the enemies, using this one will net you the best results. You can recoup 75 HP from Blood Daemon, at the cost of less damage, as now Embedded Exploit​ will not activate. But this is perfect for simple enemies or in late-game normal encounters.
2	Cyberware Malfunction
3	Cyberware Malfunction
4	Cyberware Malfunction

Stealth Netrunning setup

Stealth Netrunning is also a viable option. With quickhacks like Memory Wipe, you can eliminate the Tracing mechanic and follow up with any hack. This is not available early in the game, so here are some things that you can do.

First, in the early game make sure you have Encryption, this will somewhat delay until you are detected. Shadowrunner​ is another great addition, but it requires you to do a takedown (run behind an enemy and grab them). This is risky and may not be the preferred choice.

Now at level 30, you will unlock Epic quickhacks. This is when you can get Memory Wipe Tier 4. It costs 10 RAM to use and does what Sonic Shock did - disable tracing on subsequent uploads.

Ensure you disable the Spillover​ perk; otherwise, quickhacks can spread to nearby targets, who did not have Memory Wipe uploaded yet.

So if you want a stealth approach always use Memory Wipe Tier 4 first. This will most likely require you to activate Overclock​ more often. Here is the most powerful combo to instantly take out enemies:

Sequence	Action	Description
1	Memory Wipe	A very simple combo, that also has low costs. Make sure that you use Memory Wipe Tier 4, and Sonic Shock at least Tier 2. This way it guarantees the lowest RAM cost. Moreover, you can take out two enemies at the same time in the endgame easily before you activate Overclock.
2	Reboot Optics
3	Sonic Shock

The simplest insta-kill

Because the build uses quickhacks only when Guns are not enough, there is one option for those 1-2 Elites that may be present in the encounter. You can use System Collapse together with Overclock​ to just delete the targets.

Of course, this uses a lot of RAM, but when you need just a simple solution this will do the trick and Adrenaline Rush​ will protect against dying from stray bullets.

No Tracing with insta-kills (might be a bug)

Okay, so you can do some crazy clearing of enemies with Stealth netrunning. How this can be done? There are a few conditions you have to meet:

• You need to kill the enemy with a single traceable quickhack.
• The sequence can contain quickhacks before, but they need to be untraceable (Sonic Shock, Request Backup, Ping, etc.

This allows you to kill the enemy instantly- and the tracing does not start, making it worthwhile to stack everything you can for huge damage bonuses.

Conclusion

Thank you for reading this post on the Corpo Assassin build in Cyberpunk 2077. This mix of quickhacks with silenced pistols and snipers makes it a very satisfying combo if you are interested in taking out enemies with precision without being seen.

Feel free to leave a comment below!