Chaos Zero Nightmare (CZN)SerenielBuild and Guide

• Afterglow: A buff that gives +1 Tenacity Damage to Attack Cards, or +50% Damage if the enemy is already Ravaged, decreasing by 1 stack each time the effect is activated. While this buff is stackable, the bonus can only apply once. Also, each stack applies per hit of abilities, meaning if you only have 1 stack and use a 4-hit ability, only the first hit will be buffed, but if you have 4 stacks, all 4 would be consumed to fully buff the ability.

6

Death Halo

Ego Skill

400% damage to all enemies.
Move all Homing Laser L in Exhaust Pile to hand

Death Halo

Costs 6 EP, deals a large amount of AoE damage, and moves all Homing Laser L from Exhaust Pile to hand. Best used as a finisher after emptying your hand as much as possible and with a fully loaded Homing Laser L exhaust pile.

1

Pulse Fire

Attack

Deal 100% damage.

Pulse Fire

Sereniel’s basic attack starts standard, but can be upgraded via Potentials to have a 50% chance to create 1 Homing Laser L cast, boosting its value and potential in her decks.

1

Magnetic Field

Skill

100% Shield.

Show Effects

Magnetic Field

Sereniel’s basic shield is completely standard and doesn't have any extra synergy with her kit.

0

Homing Laser

Attack

100% damage.
2 Afterglow.
On Ravage, move from Graveyard to hand.

Show Effects

Homing Laser

A 0-Cost Attack card that deals moderate damage, grants 2 Afterglow stacks, and is Moved from graveyard or played to hand whenever enemies are Ravaged (broken). The add-back effect of this card is at the heart of many Sereniel decks and strategies, making this one of her most important cards. Note: If a Homing Laser triggers Ravage, that same Homing Laser cannot be added back, as it wasn’t in graveyard or played yet. Therefore, it’s better to use all lasers, then trigger Ravage with other cards.

1

Plasma Missile

Attack

120% damage.
0.5 Tenacity Damage.
If the target was not Ravaged, activate 1 more time.

Show Effects

Plasma Missile

A 1-Cost Attack card that deals moderate damage, but more importantly, deals 0.5 Tenacity damage and activates again if the enemy was not Ravaged, doubling its potential. This card is fairly weak in its base form, but gains significant improvements and variations after epiphanies, which ensure it’s still worth using/keeping.

1

Shining Core

Skill

Create 2 Homing Laser L.

Shining Core

A 1-Cost Skill card that creates 2 Homing Laser L cards in hand. The most accessible and most common way Sereniel can generate Homing Laser L - and it is the bread and butter of one of the most popular Sereniel’s Homing Laser L spam decks. This card has multiple Epiphanies that increase its power significantly, but also change its functionality, most of which are viable and potent options.

3

Cobalt Light

Attack

120% x 4 damage to random enemies.
1 Tenacity Damage for each hit.

Show Effects

Cobalt Light

A 3-Cost Attack card that deals moderate damage 4 times. Each hit targets a random enemy and deals 1 Tenacity damage to each while also dealing a moderate amount of standard damage. Baseline, this card is incredibly expensive, but it is also one of Sereniel’s most powerful tools to inflict Ravage consistently each turn. Most of this card’s epiphanies make it either cheaper or more flexible to use. A strong supplementary damage card for Sereniel’s kit, and one which can help her quickly deplete enemy Tenacity to trigger Ravage.

2

Pale Shooting Star

Attack

150% damage.
Activate 3 Homing Laser in Draw Pile and Graveyard.

Pale Shooting Star

A 2-Cost Attack card that deals average damage but also activates up to 3 Homing Laser cards from either the Draw Pile, Graveyard, or played pile while retaining all their effects and epiphanies (including divine). The activation of all of these cards is considered to happen at the same time, meaning effects that draw cards, generate other cards, etc, will all trigger after the card fully resolves. This means these effects usually cannot interact with each other either (you can’t generate Homing Laser L’s and add those generated cards to your hand at the same time). At worst, this card usually represents using 4 attack cards in one, but in fine-tuned Sereniel decks, the cards activated can have incredibly powerful effects and combo potential! Cards activated by Pale Shooting Star are considered to be properly used, meaning exhaust cards like Homing Laser L will lose a charge or be fully exhausted.

Potential Priority

Crit Rate% > Crit DMG% > Unique Card DMG% > Common Card DMG% >= Basic Card DMG%

Sereniel’s Signature Potentials offer some extra damage for her main damage card, Homing Laser, which is essential, and also includes some improvements to her early chaos potential, smoothing out the start of runs.

• 3-1: Adds a 50% chance to create a Homing Laser L card to the Pulse Fire card, helping with Laser generation. A useful bonus in early chaos runs and cheap enough to unlock so there isn’t a reason not to.
• 5-1: Increases the base damage of Sereniel’s basic attack Pulse Fire by 5%, with an additional 5% if Sereniel’s Crit Chance is above 20%. A low-impact unlock, which only sees noticeable benefit in Chaos, making it an optional investment.
• 7: Increases Homing Laser’s (and Homing Laser L) Base Damage by 10% if Sereniel’s Crit Chance is above 30%, with an additional 5% if her Crit Chance is above 60%. A must-have upgrade for maximizing Sereniel’s damage potential.

Standard Playstyle

Sereniel’s simplest form of gameplay focuses entirely on Ravaging enemies as many times as possible per turn in order to continually add back her Homing Laser cards to her hand. This playstyle boils down to using all her available Homing Lasers, Homing Laser L generating cards, and buffing cards before ravaging enemies, then, next, adding them all back after finally reducing the enemy Tenacity to 0.

Baseline, on a single target, Sereniel can only do this once, but in multi-target scenarios, this can be repeated multiple times, and when combined with specific teammates, a single enemy can also be Ravaged multiple times per turn as well, further extending her combo potential against a single enemy.

Finally, after enough turns and with sufficient hand size, Sereniel can use her Ego skill to recover a full hand of Homing Laser L’s for a huge burst damage spike.

• E1 [★★★]. Increases Pale Shooting Star’s Base Damage by +50% and increases the number of Homing Laser cards it activates from 3 to 5. How powerful this Ego unlock is depends on the type of deck your Sereniel has. In a deck with 4 copies of Homing Laser, with optimal epiphanies, and which is able to consistently maintain a Homing Laser L in the deck for a 5th, this bonus is a sharp power boost to Pale Shooting Star’s potential. But in Chaos, especially early on in runs, or in decks without many Homing Laser copies, this Ego loses power.
• E2 [★★★★]. Create 2 Homing Laser L at the start of battle, and Draw 1 extra card if Homing Laser was drawn at the start of the turn. Will very consistently net Sereniel and her team an additional draw per turn and also turbo change her first turn potential substantially, granting her the power to load her grave with Homing Lasers, but also to establish afterglow and inflict a lot of tenacity, making it likely she’ll ravage an enemy and add both lasers back again. A phenomenal Ego point that shines brightest in Chaos but is also very strong in save data modes.
• E3 [★]. Increases Death Halo’s damage by +50% Damage, and applies [Haste] to each Homing Laser L moved by this Ego skill activation. Death Halo doesn’t amount to much of Sereniel’s overall damage potential, and the Haste effect is incredibly niche.
• E4 [★★★]. Gives Sereniel [Firepower Amp] for each Homing Laser that is moved to hand on Ravage. Firepower Amp: +10% (additive) Damage to Sereniel’s Attack Cards for 1 turn (max 5 stacks). A powerful buff that isn’t hard to trigger each turn, but which usually requires a save data deck or multiple ravages per turn to fully take advantage of. Still a very strong damage boost.
• E5 [★]. Boosts the base damage increase of Sereniel’s potentials from 20% to 26%. A small damage increase, but nothing major.
• E6 [★★★]. When an ally (or Sereniel) inflicts Ravage, Sereniel inflicts 80% Damage for each Tenacity bar segment the enemy has. A 10 tenacity bar enemy = 800% damage. A strong additional burst of damage, but one that has its damage vary dramatically on the total tenacity of the enemy and how many times you can ravage them.

Note

For every Epiphany, we're colored their name based on how useful we think it is compared to the other variants. Here's the key to the colors:

• Epiphany Name - the best variant,
• Epiphany Name - a good variant,
• Epiphany Name - a niche variant.

Recommended Loadout

Other 4-PC Sets

• 

  Instinctual Growth [4-PC]

  - 4P Instinctual Growth is an alternative choice to Judgement’s Flames if you aren’t confident playing around, focusing your damage during ravage windows. It provides 20% (multiplicative) damage to instinct cards while you hold 4+ cards in hand, something that is easy for Sereniel, but the mere 20% bonus definitely loses out when compared to the alternative.

Weapon

• 

  Intellect of Discord
• 

  Foggy Crystal Ball
• 

  Mutant Predator Spike
• 

  RFS-17
• 

  Obsidian Sword

Armor

• 

  Wings of Freedom
• 

  Fragment of the Empty Void
• 

  Rocket-Adorned Cape

Trinket

• 

  Emblem of an Exceptional Entity
• 

  Dimensional Cube
• 

  Amorphous Cube
• 

  Superconductive Protein

Comments - Weapons

1. 

   Intellect of Discord
   - Offers a huge 18% combat attack, a very rare stat only found really on partners and equipment. Hard to acquire, but Sereniel’s best choice when it comes to weapons when playing her in teams that have sufficient card damage buffs from other sources.
2. 

   Foggy Crystal Ball
   - Unconditionally boosts all 0-cost attack cards by 40% (multiplicative) damage. A large amount of Sereniel’s damage comes from Homing Laser, all of which are usually 0 cost, which makes this weapon one of her most consistent and highest damage boosting options.
3. 

   Mutant Predator Spike
   - Grants 30% (multiplicative) damage to all of Sereniel’s abilities while holding four or more cards in hand. A solid option if you can maintain your hand size, something that isn’t too hard on Sereniel. Has the upside of affecting all of Sereniel’s damage compared to Foggy Crystal, but is hard to keep active at all times and has a lower bonus.
4. 

   RFS-17
   - Similar in function to Foggy Crystal Ball, but grants 0-cost attacks +10% Crit Rate instead of 40% Damage. Whether this weapon wins or loses out to Foggy Crystal Ball and Mutant Predator Spike depends on how much Crit DMG and Card Damage (Buffs) your Sereniel already has access to. The more card damage and Crit DMG you have, the better this weapon becomes in comparison.
5. 

   Obsidian Sword
   - Adds 12% (multiplicative) damage to all of Sereniel’s damaging abilities. Not as good as any of the options above, but better than nothing if you can’t get them.

Comments - Armor

1. 

   Wings of Freedom
   - Best damage Armor option for Sereniel in Season 1 in Lab-0. Every time the team is hit, it grants Sereniel a stacking 10% (multiplicative) damage boost for the rest of the fight, up to 3 stacks (30%).
2. 

   Fragment of the Empty Void
   - If you don’t want more damage, Fragment of the Empty Void is an alternative choice, allowing up to 3 cards in your opening hand to be redrawn.
3. 

   Rocket-Adorned Cape
   - If neither of the options above is available, Rocket-Adorned Cape is also a solid choice, giving you an extra draw at the start of combat and also 1 damage reduction stack. Depending on your needs, the extra draw can sometimes outperform the re-draw from Fragment.

Comments - Trinkets

1. 

   Emblem of an Exceptional Entity
   - A +30% (additive) bonus for all of Sereniel’s abilities, making it her best damage option thanks to how well she scales from additive card damage.
2. 

   Dimensional Cube
   - Grants Sereniel +10% (additive) damage whenever any character discards any card anywhere, with the exception of the end-of-turn discard. When paired with discard characters like Nia or Cassius, it massively elevates Sereniel’s damage. Does nothing without discard synergy, though making it a niche, specialist choice, only useful for certain teams.
3. 

   Amorphous Cube
   - Slightly worse than Emblem, but far easier to get boosting damage by +25% (additive) instead of 30%.
4. 

   Superconductive Protein
   - If damage options don’t appeal to you or you, for some reason, aren’t offered one that works for you, Superconductive Protein can be used to gain additional momentum for the wearer and their team on turn 1 by discounting one card in your opening hand to 0.

Important!

CZN is a game of randomness; sometimes you’ll be offered generic or Divine epiphanies that are stronger than a character's standard five options. In these cases, breaking the listed build can result in an even more powerful save. Adjust as you see fit!

Build Comments

There are currently two build paths used for Sereniel, each with its own merits. Both also have multiple variants and different epiphany choices depending on what you’re after. While there are two builds, we’ll be focusing primarily on the Core Build as it is by far the most common.

• Core Build (Multi Ravage): This build is the most commonly used Sereniel build and focuses on duplicating Homing Laser which in combination with Shining Core III results in Ravaging enemies generating and adding back a huge amount of Homing Lasers for consistent damage every turn with even higher potential in encounters with multiple enemies to ravage, or alongside team mates that make ravaging the same enemy multiple times possible. If you’re able to apply strong divine epiphanies to your Homing Lasers, this build only becomes that much more powerful, as you’ll be activating those Divine epiphanies an absurd amount of times per turn, assuming you can Ravage enough.
• Generator Build: The other, much less popular playstyle for Sereniel is to focus on getting as many copies of Shining Core I as possible to generate a massive amount of Homing Laser L’s per turn, which, after Ravaging an enemy, can all be added back to hand. This variant of the build is stronger upfront against single enemies when only a single ravage may be possible, but will fall behind the multi-Ravage build as soon as multiple Ravages per turn can be achieved, where the constant add backs of proper Homing Lasers and Shining Core III triggers start to overwhelm.

Card Removal Priority

• Magnetic Field
  - First priority to be removed in all endgame Sereniel decks.
• Pulse Fire
  - A solid card for Sereniel after epiphanies, making it acceptable to leave in but still weak enough compared to her unique cards so remove it if you’re able to, without ruining your point budget.

Card Dupe Priority

Dupe Priority

Homing Laser IV

/

Homing Laser I

>>>

Pale Shooting Star

=

Shining Core III

(1 copy only if III, then other EPIs) >

Plasma Missile III

=

Cobalt Light

Sereniel’s multi-ravage, core build usually focuses on duplicating

• Pale Shooting Star
  - While expensive, this card represents up to 3 more (5 with E2) Homing Laser activations per turn, which, with the right Epiphany+Divine Epiphany, can be well worth the cost. Usually never a top priority dupe, but also often never bad.
• Shining Core
  - Most Sereniel builds want one copy of
  Shining Core III
  , but this upgrade is unique, making duplicating this card impossible. To get around this, you can dupe Shining Core before it receives an epiphany, opening up the door to having one Shining Core III and one copy of a different Epiphany, or you can simply use a different epiphany from the start, like the Generator Build does. Regardless, while not straightforward, duping Shining Core is still an option.
• Plasma Missile
  &
  Cobalt Light
  - Both are also fine options to dupe and are usually better than nothing, assuming they have suitable epiphanies, but both usually fall behind other options.

Epiphany Alternatives

• Homing Laser
  - For maximum consistency,
  Homing Laser IV
  is usually the choice as it adds all copies of the card to your hand at the start of each turn, saving card draws, thinning the deck, and ensuring you always start with multiple high tenacity attacks each turn. But for maximum damage, if you are okay giving up that consistency,
  Homing Laser I
  can deal twice as much damage when used against destroyed (enemies with 0 Tenacity) enemies. It’s worth noting that you won't always be attacking destroyed enemies, so this effect won't always be in play.
• Shining Core
  - Most builds want at least one copy of
  Shining Core III
  first. After that,
  Shining Core I
  and
  Shining Core II
  are both strong additions for additional Homing Laser L spam, or
  Shining Core V
  can be used to add additional proper Homing Lasers to your deck's rotation. All of this should only come after your first copy of Shining Core III, though.
• Cobalt Light
  - Cobalt Light’s epiphanies are all viable depending on how much AP you have to spare, and what the goals of your deck are.
  Cobalt Light IV
  is the easiest to weave into combos and can consistently hit large hit counts, but if another epiphany appeals to you more, select that instead.

Neutral Cards

Important!

Sereniel’s own cards are strong enough that she doesn’t need or sometimes wants to rely on neutral cards. However, if you are interested, here are the one/s that are most notable and applicable for her.

Depending on your team, the content you’re facing, and your playstyle, Neutrals aren’t always “best in slot”; as such, we haven’t included them in the sample decks. Modify and update the decks as you see fit based on whether you want to include neutrals or not. They may not always be worth the save data points!

• Forbidden: Ecstasy of Violence
  - Sereniel has no deck-based card draw of her own, but if paired with teammates that do, Ecstasy of Violence becomes another substantial source of damage for her. This card has incredibly high damage, costs 0, and hits 4 times. It doesn’t have any specific synergy with Sereniel past that, but damage is damage.
• Forbidden: Portrait of Fury
  - A 1-cost source of card draw for Sereniel, something she doesn’t have without neutral or divine epiphanies. Usually a 1-cost, 2-hit, draw 2, at worst, but can become a 3-hit draw 3 in best-case scenarios. Not a must-have, but can be a nice inclusion if you need additional cycling in your decks.
• Forbidden: Eternal Hunger
  - A strong addition to Sereniel’s deck if you know you’ll be playing her alongside discard characters like Nia or Cassius or characters with hand manipulation cards/decks (not that useful for Sereniel without them). This card's effect triggers when it’s drawn from the deck, immediately draws you another card, and grants you 1 AP. It also has Retain and Exhaust, meaning it will stick in your hand and vanish if you play it. To get around this, aim to discard it instead so it can re-enter the deck to be drawn again later.

Selena

• Has multiple epiphanies that allow her to dedicate her entire deck to supporting the ravage archetype.
• Can refill the enemy Tenacity gauge through Tactical Maneuver IV, letting Sereniel continually ravage the same enemy to constantly add back her Lasers. No other character can do this, making her uniquely suited to Sereniel.
• Can deal considerable coordinated attack damage through High-Power Scope IV and Target Spotted V without consuming too many resources or disrupting Sereniel’s game plan.
• A solid array of neutrals thanks to the Ranger class, which offers even more supportive benefits.

Cassius

• Sereniel’s abundant 0-cost Lasers allow Cassius to very easily complete his Triple 0 quest, fully activating his kit and ability to act as a sub DPS.
• Sereniel can implant Instinct Weakness with one of her main epiphanies on Plasma Missile, boosting Cassius’s damage potential and allowing him to help with Tenacity as well.
• Through activating Triple 0 Quest, Cassius can grant huge amounts of Morale/fortitude to the team
• Offers outstanding card cycling and searching thanks to the combination of Dice Trick V granting Full House quest cards (draw 1), Shuffle, Devil Dice, and Joker. The Triple 0 quest can also be swapped out in favor of the Full House quest for even more card draw (but at the cost of damage).
• Capable of outputting enough healing after E2 when combined with the potential free Triple 1 card rewards from Dice Trick V.

Veronica

• Offers absurd card draw and cycling at 0 AP cost, which doesn’t interfere with Sereniel’s game plan at all.
• Deals solid damage consistently every turn for free.
• Most of her deck is either upgrade cards or card draw, meaning your hand each turn should just be your other two combatant cards.

Nia

• Solid enough healing to get by, maintaining the team's life pool in endgame.
• Great card searching and deck churning ability to get to the cards that matter most fast.
• Allows Sereniel to take advantage of Dimensional Cube due to all her discards boosting her damage potential significantly.
• Can generate a massive amount of card draw and AP every turn by cycling the Eternal Hunger card continuously with her hand manipulation cards.

Rei

• Solid temporary draw power through Snack Time, which can also be held to work through suboptimal hands.
• Incredible buffing cards that massively buff the amount of damage Sereniel can deliver in a single turn when set up correctly.
• Thanks to how many upgrades Rei’s deck has, she’s also great at thinning out the deck, making Sereniel’s combos more consistent in longer fights.

Important!

If you’re losing runs when playing a damage-focused composition either to sanity or dying, consider using a team with more defensive characters - so including both a shielder and healer. This is especially important in the Zero System mode.

Sereniel Save Data Team

Damage

Support

Support

Survival Chaos Team

Many of the characters who are strong for Sereniel in Save Data can’t reach their full potential without specific epiphanies. This means in Chaos, it’s often stronger/easier to default to more generically strong characters when farming decks. Neither Mika nor Khalipe is a standout choice for Sereniel in save, but due to how generically strong their base decks are in Chaos, they are good choices there.

Damage

Flex

Flex

Flex

Flex