Raccoon is the method of choice for downloading apps from Google Play for anyone who either doesn't have GAPPS enabled device or doesn't want to use GAPPS to begin with.
Raccoon is build with gradle. It is recommended to use the "launch4j" task instead of the standard one. Also, the version of the build must be submitted via the "version" property, e.g.:
gradlew -Pversion=4.x.y-DEV launch4j