Unlocking Hutt Contracts for Battlefront’s Death Star DLC: My experiences and thoughts

I just finished unlocking the sixth and final Hutt Contract for Battlefront’s Death Star expansion pack.

With all of them completed, I figured I’d share my experiences, as well has providing thoughts on the contracts and items. Hopefully this is helpful if you are still working on some of the contracts!

If you want to look at prices and requirements for the Hutt Contracts, check out my earlier post on the topic.

Imperial Instrument: TL-50 Heavy Repeater

Experiences: This was a relatively easy Hutt Contract to complete. I managed to win my first Battle Station match as the Imperials. This enabled me to knock off two of the three criteria (20 kills as an Imperial and win a round of Battle Station).

The third criterion, 75 heavy blaster kills, just took time. I paired myself with the DLT-19 until I unlocked the TL-50. Equipping the Explosive Shot with a heavy blaster like the DLT-19 allows you to melt through enemies very quickly.

Thoughts: The TL-50 is probably my favorite item in this expansion pack. Its rate of fire is very quick, although you’ll have to manage the reasonably heavy recoil. Overall, it’s a fairly forgiving weapon and is fun to use. Personally, I see little reason to use the DLT-19 or the RT-97c if you’re looking for a heavy blaster.

The secondary fire function is also enjoyable. It took a little while to get used to, but eventually I managed easy kills with the TL-50’s concussion blast. To fire the concussion blast, you’ll have to hold down you zoom button until the weapon is charged, then fire the blast by pressing your primary fire button.

Sapper I & II: Laser Trip Mine

Experiences: Sapper I was rather easy to unlock. I equipped the Scout trait right away and was able to get the 20 kills with that trait quickly. I paired the Thermal Detonator with the Bacta Bomb (to go with Surgeon I) and the 10 explosive kills requirement was pretty simple. The tight-corridors of the Death Star maps are perfect for racking up explosive kills. Note that you can also earn explosive kills with pick-ups like the Thermal Imploader and the Proximity Mine.

Sapper II wasn’t much more difficult. I swapped the Bacta Bomb for the Laser Trip Mine while keeping the Thermal Detonator. Planting laser trip mines around corners worked very effectively as enemies often ran blindly around corners. Additionally, laser trip mines can come in handy when running away from enemies; set it on a wall and let greedy opponents run right through the laser. Note that laser trip mines count towards the explosive kill count and placing them on the ground isn’t very beneficial, as opponents will have to run right over the laser.

Thoughts: The Laser Trip Mine is handy on maps like the Death Star. It’s also helpful with crowd-control as you can encourage enemies to stay away from openings.

They’re not nearly as effective on maps that lack frequent corridors, however. Also, explosives or blaster fire can blow up laser trip mines, meaning that keen opponents won’t be halted by them.

One more thing to note: you can only have one Laser Trip Mine placed at once. So if you place one when another one is deployed, the first mine will disapear.

Surgeon I & II: Medical Droid

Experiences: The Bacta Bomb made the first criterion (“Heal 10 Team Members”) of Surgeon I a sinch. Dropping a bacta bomb into a group of friendlies at the start of matches is a quick and easy way to rack up heals.

Reaching level 3 of the Survivalist trait was a bit more difficult. In order to reach level 3, you must score six kills in one life. If I was playing on maps or modes I’m more acquainted with, I probably could’ve checked off this requirement rather quickly. However, I spent most of my time on the Death Star. Its maps are frantic, especially when still learning them. I ultimately managed to complete the requirement after playing a cautious round of Blast inside the Death Star.

If you really want to reach level 3 quickly, I’d suggest playing an open map and hanging back to kill enemies from afar. This will allow you to score kills while staying away from harm.

Surgeon II was actually easier. Reaching the 1500 objective score in Battle Station was done rather quickly by (shocker) playing the objective, while healing 20 team members was also fast thanks to the bacta bomb. I didn’t actually use the Medical Droid to complete this contract, as it seems to do a poor job healing teammates without proper placement.

Thoughts: The Medical Droid and I haven’t really meshed yet. I’m very grateful when I see a teammate place one, but the sporadic burst of bacta are only helpful when numerous friendlies are hanging around.

I think the best use for this card might be in the larger modes that deal with stationary objectives. Placing a Medical Droid near an uplink, for example, might provide a better outcome over modes where your team moves around to hunt down R2-D2.

Dark Enforcer: K-16 Bryar Pistol

Experiences: This contract took the longest for one simple reason: Han Solo. While I feel pretty competent in other aspects of the game, I’m definitely below average when it comes to heroes. I’m especially bad with Han and there seems to be a bug with his shoulder charge. Over the past 16 hours or so, I wound up playing a lot of Hero Hunt. Thankfully, in my last game, I managed to get 13 kills with the smuggler after struggling for several rounds.

The other criteria came pretty easy. 10 kills with a blaster pistol was over with almost immediately. Getting 3 blaster pistol streaks was also pretty quick. For those three streaks, you’ll need to score seven blaster pistol kills in one match, though you can get multiple streaks in one match if you manage enough kills.

Thoughts: The Bryar Pistol definitely isn’t my favorite pistol. However, it does provide a high level of cooling power. This means you can mostly shoot to your heart’s content.

The secondary fire isn’t terrific when compared to the TL-50’s. However, its bolt does do a fair bit of damage to vehicles and AT-ATs. Like the TL-50, you’ll need to charge up the bolt with the zoom button and then fire it by pressing the primary fire button.

Overall, these Hutt Contracts were fun to unlock, although the numerous rounds of Hero Hunt did get a bit boring. However, I’m sure there are much better Han Solo players who managed to complete that part of the Dark Enforcer contract with ease.

One gripe I do have is that if you want to play the Death Star playlist while working on your contracts, most of the time you can only do so during the second phase of Battle Station and the short rounds of Blast. I’m not sure how that could’ve been remedied this time around, but if the next Battlefront keeps a similar system with Hutt Contracts/Star Cards, it might be interesting to have unlockable modifications to vehicles. Then you would be able to play fighter-combat modes will continuing to unlock items.

Anyways, hope my experiences might be able to help you unlocking items! If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to ask, either down in the comments, on Twitter on on Facebook.