I was glued to the July launch stream long enough to know two things: HoYoverse’s new ARPG is outrageously stylish, and if you treat it like a pure gacha sprint you’ll burn out before you ever parry a Faction War boss. After four closed-beta weekends and the first live patch, here’s the week-to-week system I’ve settled on—small habits that keep my damage graphs climbing without letting Polychrome spending spiral.
1. Route First, DPS Later
Every district in New Eridu funnels you toward the Hollow Deep Dive, but the most important resource is still Order Tickets. Map runners who skip street-level “Side Hustles” leave thousands of credits on the asphalt. My loop:
- Morning commute – clear three 90-second courier gigs for 14 k credits and a random W-Engine part.
- Lunch break – dispatch Bangboos on two-hour chip hunts; the success-rate bump from S-rank Bangboo is minor, so send whatever isn’t in your main squad.
- Prime-time session – funnel stamina into Deep Dive only on bonus-drop days (Wednesday/Saturday). Anything else is banking half yields.
By Sunday night you’re sitting on enough gear cubes to push a main DPS weapon to Phase 4 without touching your Polychrome stash.
2. Build Around Resonance Windows
Every Agent has a six-second “resonance” window where they dump extra damage after triggering another unit’s core skill. I stopped chasing elemental triangles and instead assemble trios whose cooldowns dovetail:
- Soldier 11 → Billy Kid → Anby: 11’s shield break feeds Billy’s bullet cyclone, which ends in time for Anby’s stun burst.
- Nekomiya Mana → Grace → Ben Bigger: catgirl taunt locks mobs, Grace double-charges Gauss stacks, Ben slams AOE for cleanup.
That overlap means full rotations land before enemy counters, pushing damage curves higher than an S-tier carry flanked by two off-color fillers.
3. W-Engine Math Beats Banner FOMO
Six-star W-Engines steal headlines, but a +15 four-star often outperforms a level-one gold brick. Rule of thumb:
| Quality | Stop-point | Reason |
|---|---|---|
| 4-star | +15 | Cheapest path to dual stat lines. |
| 5-star | Phase 3 | Matches baseline ATK of unrefined six-star. |
| 6-star | Only if weapon matches agent role and you’re ready to refine it once. |
Maxing one purple W-Engine on every squad slot raised my Hollow score more than the single gold I prized from launch day pulls.
4. Event Calendar = Free Polychrome
HoYoverse keeps its loops tidy: Bangboo Festival every four weeks, Gear Armory double-drop two days afterward, Limited Agent banner six days after that. I color-code reminders—green for credit winds, blue for Banner prelude, orange for Double Drop. If stamina caps on a non-orange day, I auto-clear early Hollows and hold the rest. Over a month that discipline spared roughly 1 800 Polychrome—half a ten-pull—by converting free stamina into gear instead of impulse refreshes.
5. When You Do Spend, Shave the Tax
Some banners genuinely fix a roster hole—Grace turned my single-target woes upside-down—and pity math won’t close itself. That’s when I skip the mobile-store cut and reload through the Zenless Zone Zero top-up center. Price tags already include tax, checkout clears in about a minute, and Polychrome lands before the lobby door animation fades. Because transactions route through HoYoverse’s API, first-purchase doubles and time-limited rebates still trip, but I’m not feeding a 30 percent platform fee.
I keep the same link bookmarked as “ZZZ quick reload” for moments like the recent 49 % Daily Deal: 500 Polychrome plus 1 000 Denny chips for the cost of a coffee. Two clicks, no app-store markup, and I’m back to theory-crafting resonance combos instead of staring at pending payments.
The Loop in One Sheet
- Morning street jobs bank credits; no stamina required.
- Only burn stamina on orange-flag double-drop days.
- Break gear at +15/+Phase 3 before chasing six-star toys.
- Draft trios whose cooldowns touch, not just share an element.
- Top-up Polychrome only when pity math says so—and only through a tax-included portal.
Run that for two patches, and you’ll see your damage sheet creep upward while your credit card stays flatter than a Hollow floor. New Eridu’s economy may be harsh, but smart routes, resonance math, and the occasional fee-free reload keep the city’s monsters—and its micro-transactions—from taking a bite out of your fun.