I just fought a battle where the special ability button of the gunner was faded and unusable for the entire battle even though there were active, firing gunners in play. The GS gunners worked as expected with their special ability button.
No pictures? I love pictures. Best thing to do is send an ingame report here. Then they can check all your data.
If it shows up again I will try. As to pictures I was so frustrated watching my gunners NOT take out the defense quick enough, it completely slipped my mind to get a snapshot. I don't think anyone likes seeing a 3* slip through their fingers...