Zenless Zone Zero Season 3 is right around the corner, and it brings quite a few goodies: new region, new Element and reaction, new storyline, characters, and much more. There’s plenty to be excited about.
However, the ever-present nagging voice simply won’t let go, reminding that there are quite a few characters who find themselves struggling already, before Season 2 is over. What will become of them when another wave of fresh agents arrive? You know the answer. Back to the bench to gather dust unless the developers choose them as the lucky ones to be next in line for the Potential unlock, like it happened with Ellen or Soldier 11. Needless to say, players far and wide wonder who will be next – and when will the next group of enhancements kick in.
Let’s get this out of the way: the Standard S-ranks are in a desperate need of help, especially poor Nekomata that at this point is worse than some of the A-ranks, unless you’re whipping out M6W5 with highly invested Dialyn and Astra, of course – but then again, is it Nekomata clearing content or being wheeled through it? Still, while standards and A-ranks getting buffed would be lovely, I think it’s worth talking about limited S-ranks first.
After all, quite a few players had spent their pulls or even irl cash on getting some of these characters, only for them to be forgotten at some point in development. Let’s go specialty by specialty, outlining what’s wrong and what can be done to fix the situation.
Attack – Zhu Yuan & Hugo
Zhu Yuan was a limited Ether Attack agent for a much different and way more simpler time. Not only does she feature an Evasive Assist, a mechanic that has aged rather poorly with every second boss requiring you to chain Defensives, but her kit reflects that ZZZ was simply a different game in its early 1.x stage.
Zhu Yuan needs a certain in-field time to generate her Enhanced Shells by using auto-attacks and EX special. Then, you want to unleash them in her Suppressive Mode when the target is stunned, preferably incorporating the Ult and at least one EX Special attack.
For those who love combos and skill expression, there’s plenty of optimization to dig into. But, nowadays she has to oppose Yixuan in the niche of Ether damage and face the upcoming Pyrois who will be free together with his Mindscapes and Signature, neither of whom require that amount of preparation to deal damage – and the damage they do outclasses Zhu Yuan’s in similar circumstances.
Allowing her to execute her burst in a faster fashion or gather her shells passively while the Stunner does their job would help out the rotation – but she could also use some good ol’ improved multipliers.
On the other hand, we have Hugo – the man who can immediately unleash most of his damage through his unique mechanic, Totalize, letting you deal some massive numbers as soon as the enemy enters the Stun window.
However, a combination of several things brought Hugo down:
- He’s Ice, so he had to pay for Miyabi’s sins with the rest of the element until the release of Yidhari;
- The newly introduced Miasma and Anomaly Shields (the likes Sanguine Sweeper has) run his kit into the ground;
- Sobek. That’s it, Sobek.
I will be honest, I don’t know how to “fix” Hugo without removing the Totalize mechanic from his kit completely. As is, he is good against the bosses that fit his element and don’t disable a part of his kit simply by existing, but the number of them grows slimmer with every update. In a way, it is somewhat similar to Break in Honkai: Star Rail, and what ended up turning the tide is the character that allowed the analogue of Totalize damage being done before the Daze bar is broken.
Anomaly – Jane, honorable mention Yanagi
Jane, our first ever limited Anomaly character, is still putting up a fight and remains a potent boss slayer – even if in certain situations she loses out not only to Alice, but also to Piper.
Jane is notoriously single-target oriented, and taking her to Shiyu Defense can be an exercise in frustration when you see trash mobs scatter all across the map and have to chase them one-by-one. Even Burnice’s and Yuzuha’s gathering doesn’t help much – perhaps, Jane could use some extra grouping added to her Salchow Jump or other abilities, to make sure she hits multiple enemies at once.
Additionally, Jane’s Additional Ability requires Jane to be paired with another Anomaly, being locked to the Anomaly + Support setup and excluding Stunners. Previously, it wasn’t a big deal – there weren’t really any Stun agents that would buff her anyway, but with the arrival of Nangong Yu and multiple strong support options – Astra Yao, Yuzuha, Sunna – you are starting to feel the restrictions.
It would be interesting to see how various agents, Jane and Alice included, interact with the new Wind mechanic – perhaps that’s where Jane’s untapped potential hides.
Oh the other hand, we have Yanagi. The Deputy Chief of Section Six had a strong start: you could play her as sub-DPS with Miyabi, go for your typical double Anomaly comp or run her as Hypercarry since her Polarity Disorder would still allow her to show some impressive numbers.
However, between the release of Angels of Delusion, Promeia and Wind (including Velina), it does seem like HoYoverse intends to focus on the Abloom side of things when it comes to Anomaly, leaving Disorder-reliant characters to flounder. Even Burnice and Grace got Ablooms in their Potential unlocks.
At the moment, an invested Yanagi can still clear out Anomaly and general Electric content, but it is becoming harder to do so without Mindscapes for herself or her supports. And, with no Potential unlock for her in sight, would you spend your valuable Polychromes on getting a copy of Yanagi or two to bring her up to speed, or get a couple of new characters from Season 3 instead?
Defense – Caesar King
In my Season 3 wishlist, I’d already shared that I believe the Zenless Zone Zero team has not settled on the identity of the Defense specialty as a whole. Defense is described as “Agents who are proficient at withstanding attacks while counterattacking enemies, gaining an advantage for the squad in intense battles.”
Ben, Seth and Caesar provide the squad with shields and a relatively small buff at the cost of utilizing Defense Assists and their abilities. However, with the release of Pan Yinhu and Zhao, it feels like Defense is sliding into the Support Lite situation – Pan Yinhu is literally Lucia at home and the Rupture go-to support for those who didn’t pull the goat, and Zhao is largely considered a generalist support as well.
Caesar is among those who got slapped by this identity crisis the hardest. She requires you to stay on top of Perfect Assists and only buffs the active agent. Sure, she also provides a lot of Daze – but in this day and age, it feels like the bare minimum, especially when you compare her with the competition, be it a Support or a Stun agent that would take over her slot.
I hope HoYoverse figures what they want the Defense class to actually be, and buff Caesar accordingly, the girl deserves it. Make these Perfect Defensive Assists feel worth it to press, one way or another, and allow her buff to extend to the entire party to start with.
Perhaps she can also get extra Impact from her Defense stat and provide some Sheer Force based on Impact to work with Ruptures – after all, we’re still stuck with Pan Yinhu and Lucia only as supports.
Stun – Qingyi
Qingyi’s problems stem from the same source as Zhu Yuan’s or Caesar’s: she’s a stunner made for a whole different game, before Stunners started packing sub-DPS capabilities or massive buffs like an extra Ult.
Qingyi has a monstrous Daze output, but requires a substantial time on field to utilize it, which automatically makes it awkward to play with damage dealers who want that time to themselves.
That is pretty much it: Qingyu has damage reductions, anti-interrupts and immunities in her kit which ensure that she stays on field and stuns the target. Then she applies a damage amplification which boosts the damage of the Attack agent that takes the field to burst into the stun window.
In a simpler world, it was a perfect kit that did exactly what was expected of it. But in the world with Ju Fufus, Dialyns and Nangong Yus, suddenly it doesn’t look as impressive and instead seems closer to the abilities of Koleda, whose huge Daze output is pretty much her only great side right now.
Support – Rina
I know I’ve said we’ll focus on the limited characters, but the truth of the matter is that limited S-rank Supports are either quite new or have aged incredibly well. You have Yuzuha for Anomalies, Lucia for Ruptures, and Astra Yao and Sunna both acting as generalists.
And then there is Rina, lagging behind with Drusilla and Anastella and her 1.0 kit that buffs Electric Damage, the duration of Shock and gives allies some good ol’ PEN Ratio. In the early game, she was used in teams with Yanagi, Grace or Harumasa, but age caught up with her – other characters simply offer stronger buffs with none of the drawbacks.
At M0, Rina can feel quite clunky to play due to the short duration of her buffs. You have to stay at the top of your game and swap to auto-attack or Skill to regain the buffs. M1 makes it much easier to manage, although still not on the level of “use and forget until the rotation is through”, like other S-rank Supports are.
Not to mention, quite a few Attacks and Anomalies alike have had DEF shred added to their kit, either baseline, through mindscapes or signatures, which naturally makes them clash with Rina’s RES PEN buff.
All in all, Rina simply needs more: more buffs, more QoL enhancements such as adding passive energy regeneration to her kit or making Drusilla’s and Anastella’s attacks use up her energy, extending the duration of the buff automatically and counting as an Aftershock, which would give her extra synergy with Soldier 0: Anby and Trigger. Ether Veil, since it’s all the rage now, while at it?
