At this early stage I’ve noticed that people are having success with any character so long as they pair accordingly with gear and teams. Time will definitely tell but unlike other gachas, this one actually seems like it has potential for less characters to become obsolete.

they afraid to use ben bigger because hes taking half of screen

I have been using Ben since the start he is on my mono fire team and i have few things to say about him , his EX move is basically a free parry . which deals a lot of damage , provides a shield , BUT ALSO as longs as the shield is active he gives more damage to other agents. the utility that he provides to the team is honestly insane

You don't notice until later content,but some enemies have attack combos that are faster than your dodge cooldown,and so the interrupt and daze from character swap assists become more important. Additionally,most Ultimates interrupt a boss' immune phases(like the Ballet Twins charge and turret phases)

Interesting that two of our defense agents are all animal hybrids

One more utility for defense units beyond just comfort: There's this specific boss that stays dazed for barely any time. Rendering stunners like Anby and Lycaon much less useful, as you don't get much benefit from the daze beyond chain attacks. This specific enemy attacks a LOT so it doesn't really give that much time to set up buffs and debuffs for the DPS to shine either. I can imagine defense units like Seth and Ben to be SUPER useful in the future, as I imagine Hoyo will add a lot more enemies like this. The shields a defense agent gives, lets you actually set up for the crucial bursts of DPS in the midst of combat, which is useful for enemies like this where they don't remain dazed for long.

People might not mind doing 50 tries on a defense level now but I could see that changing after the 5th reset. Looking at Seth's kit I could see him being great or I could see him being useless if it's hard to get him to not eat his own shield. Everything starts with his hold E and if that shields himself and puts it on a 10 sec cd it could be rough.

I really appreciate the context you give regarding Hoyo games, and gacha games in general, as it helps me a lot as someone who's only played Genshin and quit before the Venti banner was over and doesn't know much about gacha. Your tone, video style, and the fact that you're a fighting game player set you apart from the rest of the ZZZ content creators I've seen and helps me to relate to the information better. Thanks for your videos.

i think every class have a lot of potential on their own, all we need to do is wait for ZZZ dev to slowly filling in all the possibilities, playstyle and niche along the way

This was a super helpful video to someone who's always struggled to understand defense characters! All my favorite new characters (Seth, Caesar) are all defense and I want to learn how to play them. Thank you!

Throughout the beginning of the game I got used to even bosses barely dealing any damage, then was absolutely flabbergasted in Shiyu Defense 9 when I got slapped for almost 2k damage. Still it's just a third or less of the average character's HP at those levels, but man it makes the game so much more interesting when avoiding damage becomes actually important. Personally I'm very interested in the potential shielding and healing mechanics that they could introduce, though the unfortunate fact is that Defence and potential "Healing" characters are always gonna be much more viable if they also offer significant damage, buffs or other utility like HSR's Gallagher or Aventurine. Good thing is that Ben already has some stunning and amplifying capacity, so it looks like we could be getting more even A-rank sustain-like units that are actually good and useful, not something like Natasha that gets completely outclassed by everyting except maybe March 7th just because she offers basically nothing except healing and a single target cleanse.

I predict future end game content where a Shiyu or other future game mode boss casts an unavoidable screen wide ultimate which will require a beefy shield to survive; requiring a 5-star limited defense unit.

I'm just hope seth could run if he a defender character

Ben's engine [Big Cylinder] makes it so that when hit, Get DMG reduction of 7%, Ben's next hit is a crit & that crit gets a DMG bonus of +600% of DEF as extra DMG. Ability has a 7 sec cooldown. Ben special move gives invincibility frames and shield even without energy/charge. I'm sure his DMG can be high, Spec him with DEF, ATK, and CRIT DMG and he should be soaring. He has auto/confirmed crits so no need for crit chance, just max out the crit DMG cap.

It does look like defense is the most practical approach to crack if not break the balance on game mechanics. Assuming you can't either raise your damage or stun infliction to the point of rendering even bosses unable to attack you before you kill them, then the ability of enemies to also do those autotargeting attacks from incredible range means your ability to block hits will at least some of the time become crucial. Of course, this is assuming you don't care about the clock which is as always the basic judge used in a Hoyoverse game - and I do realize my disinterest there places me in a minority.

Defense being a "4-star centric class" seems to be the way to go, and apparently Hoyo is following this route. Defense agents should be "another class"+"comfort" imo. Stunner + shield or buff + shield. Heck, even, in the future, heal + buff would fall into Defense class Apparently Seth is pretty good in the Anomaly niece, as he can trigger quick assists like a Support character and bring shield + anomaly buildup bonus to the next character. A perfect match with Jane Doe, the 5 star of his banner!

i hear your point about survivability however when it comes to defense units they either become mandatory or useless. Because you have to play against a timer in shiyu defense you are going to be forced into building teams to help you beat that timer. If enemies reach a point where you need a defense unit to survive them than you kill off another archtype to accommodate for them(most likely stun). I dunno how they can solve the problem tbh.

there are already indicative of consecutive attack pattern that can stagger you from some enemies. at one point they will make dodge and assist worthless to force you use defense agent

Next sons of calydon character has been leaked to be a 5 star defense agent so I’m looking forward to that as I like that faction

i'm already looking at the potential of DEFENSE base agents and juggling agents in the future meta.

Defense agents will probably have synergies with other agents such as Ben and koleda, but that’s just a hypothesis atm

I actually think defense unit might end up having quite decent damage if Ben is the template Also, maybe I’m overrating it but Ben W-Engine being a free mini nuke could make most defenders decent sub-dps characters

Funnily enough, in 1.1, I'm most excited for Seth, instead of the S-rank or the busty rat. I love his Sentinel/Paladin motif, and I really want him to be good.

I've been clearing basically every mission with Ben and two supporting characters. He has 1900 attack currently, and over 1200 defense. His parry when timed corectly blocks 100% of all damage, and also gives you a shield to all your units. In addition to this, it's still a special attack and with Ben's A drive, it becomes a guaranteed crit with an additional 6x, your defense as attack power every 12 sec. So essentially my Ben has ultimate level damage every 12 seconds with his Special, while also being invincible.

Zhongli is a 5* limited Character, if Defence will get someone as casually broken (after buff) as Zhongli then that would shift the way people build teams. Ben gives your whole team crit rate which is kinda crazy considering the amount of Discs you would need to get the same amount. But his Daze buildup is definitely not on par .-. Mine is friggin C6 and even with his 25% more Daze buildup he stunns slower, hits like a truck though ^^.

I really like how all the defense characters in zzz are so versatile! They can serve as buffers, daze units, and also defensive utility!

Possibly, defense units may give shields or many other things in the near future. Such as damage reduction, or reduce/ buff damage to certain elements. Im not sure, will we get healers though?

Other people: I need to roll for the biggest number DPS in the game. Me: I am glad I rolled for HuoHuo, my team is now immortal and I can just chill.

Irrelevant to ZZZ but since you mentioned Huohuo, my favorite Abundance, the other reason why I use her much more than healers like Luocha is because her Talent, which heals whenever her and her allies starts their turn, also removes 1 debuff every it triggers. There are a lot of enemies in the game that has annoying gimmicks and CC that she just invalidates.

the reason why Support characters aren't fitting the typical "Healer" archetype might be because it's meant for the Defense club

he is confirmed a def support agent and a A rank agent most probably coming out with 2nd half of the new patch along side jane doe. you can search his leak kit online

I got into floor 11 in shiyu defense, and dying isn’t that much of a problem for me. Energized friday do hit hard in floor 10, but i think that’s mostly because i have my HP and defense disc at level 0, i don’t have the luxury to level it yet to clear shiyu defense. Some bosses like friday burns your counters really fast if you use it everytime, so maybe that’s where they’ll be good? I’m interested on what they are going to do with S rank defender, because rn a good stunner might be able to just double as a defensive utility, through stunning the targets before they move too much lol, and chain attacks from dazing replenishes your counters back.

Literally been farming Def materials in the event that I have to build my Boi Ben before I reach lvl40. I heard shield and just knew. Lmao❤ I love my big ole bear❤

Defence is meaningless. Survival is meaningless. This game is too easy for defence to matter. Until we get actually hard content the only thing that matters is your DPS. It's either finishing a boss in 1 minute, 2 minutes or 3 minutes. Which is it going to be? The only reason I would ever put a defence character into my team is if they buff the hell out of my other characters. This is coming from a level 42 account.

I hope there could be up to 4 rosters in 1 kit tbh, having only 3 characters in one team kinda limits the gameplay and that bothers me.

I hope they no longer release Loli characters

Ben is highly underrated. 16% crit chance when shield is up on top of a 50+% soldier 11 and Lucy is really strong and has more survivability than the "meta" teams. I love how many well thought out synergies and hidden combos are in the game

Me personally i prefer the risk of not having heals or defense (my favorite part of hollow zero is literally collecting all 5 debuffs) I'm also not a big fan of ben but he and seth seem really good for comfort players.

TBH, I'd love to have a healing unit rather than a shield. Maybe a defense unit with healing capabilities?

As I don’t grace I will most likely be using an anton, Seth, rina team so I can’t wait to see how it does since my first team is Zhu yuan , anby , Nicole

I have to disagree. I think just playing better will be more beneficial than running a defence agent. Achieving an S clear is entirely dependent on the timer for the combat gamemodes. Damage is everything, and sacrificing it is a huge ask.

Don't hold even a tinge of hope, gachas will go through the vicious cycle of phasing out old characters in order to promote their new glittering toy and for 4 stars, they definitely will need vertical investments as we proceed down further patches. This time round, I'm doing things different for once, just to see how long I can hold out before making another pull on the limited banner. After getting 2 standard 5 stars, and training up 8 characters, including the 2 5 stars, I hope they will be enough to last me through 1.5 at least... Lol. Just gonna keep hoarding polychromes and encrypted master tapes, only spending whatever standard master tapes earned while progressing through the game until the time comes to offload those premium pulls.

i mean the idea of defence characters is that they sacrifice damage for survivability.. i mean true doing more damage is good and all but doing more damage doesn't do shit if you die, then again it just mite be that am bad at dodge counters but i don't care

If you are good at dodging and assist then just play the characters that suits your playstyle. I beat almost everything with nekomata anby and nicole coz i love that team.

You make an interesting point. Hollow Zero provides potential for Defense. IMO I think it’s too early in the game to start thinking about DEF units. They generally need a ton investment to make them work. Probably comparable to the investment needed in a DPS unit. Unlike slapping on some ok stuff on your Stun and Sup. As the game matures and we’ll have more and more teams built for Shiyu, I think we’ll then see more good Defense units come in. Shiyu represents speed running whereas HZ can represent wars of attrition requiring different units builds built to last as opposed to being built to be fast

Shoutout to RAT GANG! (counter: 1)

Nice music

Nahhh bro that's not how you say zongli xd I'm hopeful that Hoyo knows what they're doing with their defense characters cuz I really want Ben to become more viable in the future...

Cat boy will be A rank because players only care about S rank if they are babes, we all know it.

But Seth's "shield" is a sword blade

Yep im getting mega punished rn in shiyu defense😢

Does anyone know when will Seth be released?

Seth is an a rank def and has the playstyle of sns in mon hun still praying he has a combine ult like ben

.-.

BEAR

Nekomata hot asf 🥵

@KetteiThe7th Confirmed Furry

doing pulls for Ellen this weekend, and if i do pull her i’m going to start a fully fledged youtube channel! Trying to show the universe i’m pulling with a cause to see if they’ll bless me with what i need. Wish me luck, love the videos🫂