Best Yanagi build in Zenless Zone Zero – Weapons, Team Comps, Discs, and Mindscapes – Destructoid

Yanagi, the first five-star premium Agent in Zenless Zone Zero’s Section 8, has made quite a splash in the community thanks to her highly unique gameplay. As a character, Yanagi is a lot more complex than most of the roster, but if you’re interested in playing her at her highest potential, here’s everything you need to know.

Best Yanagi Build in Zenless Zone Zero

Jumping right in, Yanagi is an Electric Anomaly character with a significant focus on Shock DoT (Damage over Time) and On-field damage. Thanks to her combo-heavy nature, Yanagi wants to be on the field as long as possible, while you still cycle through the rest of your team to apply buffs and debuffs as applicable. While she does play your standard main DPS role, her kit is highly flexible thanks to the non-static nature of it. Compared to all other characters in Zenless Zone Zero, she is a complex character, but proper play allows her to exceed in any of the game’s content.

Yanagi’s Gameplan

The complexity of Yanagi’s kit shows itself when enacting her ideal game plan, which has several moving parts and features. Rather than explain this in one big paragraph, I’ll break it up for your clarity. The following is in priority order for Yanagi’s goals while she is in play.

Polar Disorder

When Yanagi uses her EX-Special, she is able to apply a special version of the standard Discord mechanic called Polar Disorder to any enemies suffering from an Anomaly. When Polar Disorder is activated, it will deal 15% of the active Anomaly’s total damage plus an additional percentage amount (based on Yanagi’s Anomaly Proficiency), to targets struck.

Unlike standard Disorder, Polar Disorder does not remove the Anomaly on the enemy, allowing Yanagi to apply this effect in rapid succession provided she has enough Energy. Polar Disorder will also activate on any Anomaly, including Shock, meaning Yanagi can apply Shock to an enemy and trigger Polar Disorder all on her own–a contrast to the standard Anomaly team playstyle.

You want to land as many Polar Disorders as possible during Anomaly windows to make the most of Yanagi’s damage. Polar Disorder is entirely unique to Yanagi, and it is the source of a majority of her damage, hence its importance on this priority list.

Stance Swapping: Jougen and Kagen

Yanagi has two special Stances she uses to dish out damage outside of Polar Disorder. These stances are Jougen and Kagen.

• Jougen (Blue) – Buffs Yanagi’s Electric Damage by 10%. Faster attacks, longer string, longer animation lock.
• Kagen (Yellow) – Buffs Yanagi’s PEN Ratio by 10%. Slow attacks, shorter string, shorter animation lock.

Yanagi has different attack strings while in Jougen or Kagen, and you can swap which stance she’s in by pressing the Special button at any time. You can always tell which Stance Yanagi is in by the color of her hair braid. More importantly, when Yanagi swaps stances, she will retain the effects of the inactive Stance for an additional eight seconds. The idea here is to swap stances frequently enough to maintain both stance buffs at all times.

Additionally, when Yanagi switches stances during the third, fourth, or fifth portion of her basic attack string, her following attack will be sped up, allowing Yanagi to attack faster than normal while also skipping the start-up of her string. This also ensures that Yanagi is only dealing Electric damage and not Physical, which happens during the first and second portions of the basic string. Additionally, during this swap, Yanagi can parry any attack that hits her during the animation.

I know this is a lot to take in, but it’s much easier to get the hang of when you play her yourself. If anything’s unclear, I really recommend taking Yanagi into the Training Room to practice her moves and get comfortable with her gameplan.

Best Drive Disks for Yanagi in Zenless Zone Zero

Yanagi is an anomaly character who thrives on inflicting shock on her enemies, so she values ATK% and anomaly proficiency (AP) above all other stats. That said, PEN Ratio % becomes a highly valuable stat for her if you have other sources of it already.

• Disk 4 – AP or ATK%. Note that ATK% should only be used if you have good AP sub-stats on it.
• Disk 5 – ATK% or Electric DMG%. PEN Ratio% is an option if you have other sources of the stat already.
• Disk 6 – ATK%

Yanagi two main Drive Discs are Chaos Jazz and Thunder Metal, and the one you should use on her depends on the type of team you’re playing her in.

Disorder

If you’re playing Yanagi with a focus on applying standard Disorder, then use Chaos Jazz as that will provide her with the most damage. Just make sure you’re running a second, different element Anomaly character with her.

Mono-Electric

Since Yanagi has access to Polar Disorder, she is not strictly tied to running in a pure Disorder team setup and can, instead, be the headliner in an all-electric team composition. In this case, Thunder Metal pulls ahead as it allows Yanagi to permanently have a 28% ATK boost through Shocked enemies.

Best W-Engines for Yanagi in Zenless Zone Zero

Yanagi has a solid selection of W-Engines she can effectively make use of. Without question her own signature W-Engine, Timeweaver is her best option. However, if her signature is out of reach, here are some strong alternatives.

• Fusion Compiler – Fusion Complier is the second best option and a five-star W-Engine meaning it provides her with a higher base ATK. Its PEN Ratio % substat means that you should prioritize PEN Ratio % on her gear and team composition.
• Electro-Lip Gloss – Yanagi naturally has excellent Anomaly Build-up which means this W-Engine’s effects will stay active almost all of the time. A good four-star W-Engine option.

If you don’t have access to any of these three W-Engines, then I highly recommend you reconsider pulling Yanagi until you do. These are by far her most viable options.

Best Mindscapes for Yanagi in Zenless Zone Zero

At M0, Yanagi is a serious powerhouse in the Zenless Zone Zero meta thanks to her ability to use the Disorder mechanic via her own Polar Disorder. This means that her Mindscapes are largely unnecessary to pull for. That said, if you really enjoy Yanagi’s gameplay and want to vertically invest in her Mindscapes, know that the best stopping point would be M2. For your clarity, though, here are all six, detailed.

• Know Thy Self, Know Thy Enemy (M1) – When an Anomaly triggers on an enemy, Yanagi gains a Clarity stack. With Clarity, if she’s hit, she ignores the attack and becomes immune to all damage for one second. Plus, while she has at least one Clarity stack, she gets an 80 AP boost. It’s a decent damage boost, but the real strength is in her survivability. She can hold up to three Clarity stacks at once, making her incredibly resilient in tough content.
• Outstanding Adaptability (M2) – This Mindscape gives her EX-Special additional functionality. When held, Yanagi will launch additional EX-Special thrusting attacks for 10 extra Energy each. Each extra thrust improves the Polar Disorder multiplier. Yanagi’s Polar Disorder also will deal 20% of the Anomaly’s effect, instead of its standard 15%. This Mindscape is a considerable boost to Yanagi’s power, and is her most important one. Best stopping point.
• Tsukishiro Style Management (M3) – A solid all-around boost to her standard moveset’s damage. More damage is always nice, but far from required.
• Chestmaster (M4) – When Yanagi inflicts Shock on an enemy, they will suffer the Exposed effect, which rewards her team with an additional 16% PEN Ratio. Very good, but exceptionally so with other sources of PEN Ratio like Rina and Fusion Compiler.
• “Other Mother” (M5) – This is the same as M3.
• Inhuman Blood (M6) – This is a significantly empowered version of Yanagi’s M2, with the added effect of increasing the duration of her Shinrabanshou buff to 30 seconds. Overall, this is a ridiculously strong M6 that only makes her game plan even easier to accomplish.

Best Team Comps for Yanagi in Zenless Zone Zero

Yanagi has a few team compositions because of her required on-field time.

Yanagi/Burnice/Caeser

This is Yanagi’s strongest team composition, and it functions like your standard Disorder team. Yanagi is the main damage dealer with Burnice being the sub-DPS via Burn and Afterburn off-field damage. Caeser provides a flat 1000 ATK to the on-field character (which is Yanagi for a majority of the time), while also supporting with her shielding mechanic.

Yanagi/Caeser/Rina

This is Yanagi’s strongest Mono-Electric team comp, and it focuses on having Yanagi on-field almost all the time. In this team, Yanagi will be delivering constant Polar Disorders by hitting the Shock status that she triggers herself. Caeser is here to provide her large ATK boost and shielding. Rina is present to activate Yanagi’s Passive while also activating her own and providing additional PEN Ratio %.

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