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Zenless Zone Zero is HoYoverse’s new kid in its gacha game family and as such, there are bound to be millions of beginners. Right at the start, Zenless Zone Zero is already distinguishing itself apart from both Genshin Impact and Honkai: Star Rail. Hence, even some of the more initiated gacha veterans might find themselves blindsided by certain mechanics. Regardless of how seasoned you are, watch out for these beginner mistakes in Zenless Zone Zero.
Using Polychrome for Permanent Channels
This one has to be reiterated for just about any gacha game in case you were hoping that Zenless Zone Zero would try to reinvent the wheel when it comes to gacha pulls. There are still two sets of banners here: Premium/Limited and Permanent. Permanent is where permanent (and slightly worse characters) are relegated.
Thus, you don’t want to spend your hard-earned Polychrome (currency for purchasing gacha pull tokens) on Permanent banners. Instead, reserve your Polychrome for the Limited Character Banner only. You’ll get plenty of Permanent banner tokens anyway either through quests or event rewards as they tend to be rewarded more commonly.
Buying Weapons (W-Engines)
W-Engines are the weapons in Zenless Zone Zero and the game will immediately introduce you to a Gadget Shop vendor in the tutorial. However, as you might have expected, this shop is a noob trap. The Gadget Shop named Box Galaxy mostly sells only B-Rank W-Engines and a few A-Rank ones.
However, after a few pulls in the Standard Banner using the free gacha tokens you get, you’ll be swimming in A-Rank W-Engines anyway. Moreover, purchasing B-Rank W-Engines in the Box Galaxy shop is a net loss and one of the worst beginner mistakes you can make in Zenless Zone Zero. You would need to dismantle A-Rank W-Engines for the currency. Overall, just don’t buy B-Rank W-Engines.
Ignoring the Energy/Battery Mechanic
Soon enough, you’ll begin to realize that the consistent way to play a gacha game daily is none other than spending your daily energy. In Genshin Impact, this was the Resin mechanic, in Zenless Zone Zero, it’s called Battery. You should make it a habit of draining your battery even before you run out of quests to do.
This way, you can maximize your play time and get as many artifacts as you can for your characters. They’re often the best way to make your characters more powerful, similar to Genshin Impact. Thus, the best way to go about the early game in Zenless Zone Zero would be interchanging between artifact/material farming and quests.
Not Picking Multiple Favorites to Focus On
Speaking of building up your account in advance, one of the typical late-game or endgame activities in a HoYoverse gacha game would be the Spiral Abyss mode. It’s the best test of your in-game teams. In Zenless Zone Zero, its equivalent would be Shiyu Defense. Once you start getting to Shiyu Defense 7, you’ll likewise need two teams, just like in Spiral Abyss.
That means fixation on upgrading one favorite character will not just limit your playstyle but also your late-game activity. Thankfully, you only need to pick six favorites to level up in Zenless Zone Zero since each team only needs three characters, unlike Genshin Impact‘s 4-character teams. So in short, pick six favorite characters and keep upgrading them, you’ll be thankful you did later on.
Ignoring the Food
Food in Genshin Impact is often inconsequential or reserved for emergency situations when your shield character fails. Moreover, they can be unreliable since characters get full if you use them as healing crutches. Zenless Zone Zero handles food differently. They’re mostly treated as pre-combat buffs.
Some of them, however, can replenish Battery or your daily energy for the game’s artifact and material farming. You can get food from General Chop in the city and with how cheap they are, they’re practically free. In fact, you should make it a habit to order General Chop’s food before any quest or combat activity.
Chasing the Meta
You’ve seen the tier lists and ubiquitous videos about who’s best at this and who’s best at that. Those will never go away for gacha games. However, what’s best might just get dethroned after a week or a month with how frequent updates are for gacha games.
So don’t focus on what’s the current meta, pick who you like to level up and make them work regardless of how others perform. It’s not a race anyway. If anything, you’ll feel less exhausted or burnt out if you’re not chasing the meta or the best since there will always be power creeps or stronger characters in the future.
Rerolling Incessantly
Speaking of which, the usual ritual for any new gacha game is to keep rerolling your initial bonus pulls until you get two or more 5-stars or S-rank characters or something. Sadly, enrolling is not easy in Zenless Zone Zero. There’s no guest account and you have to use a new email every time you reroll. On top of that, you need to go through a 20-30-minute tutorial.
It can be a pain and might drain your excitement for a new gacha game, so for the sake of your sanity, refrain from enrolling too much. Better yet, just work with the hand you’ve been dealt with. What’s important is that you’re having fun in a video game. It does help to avoid beginner mistakes in Zenless Zone Zero.
