Chaos Zero Nightmare (CZN)YukiBuild and Guide

• Inspiration: The entirety of Yuki’s kit revolves around the Inspiration effect, which grants her cards additional abilities whenever they’re drawn outside of the start of the turn procedure. These effects take the form of reduced costs, bonus abilities, or increased damage. The key to playing Yuki is to ensure all her Inspiration cards are activated whenever possible.

5

Skyscraper Cleave

Ego Skill

300% Damage to all enemies.
Move all Attack Cards in hand to the top of the draw pile.
+50% for each card moved.

Skyscraper Cleave

Yuki’s Ego costs 5EP to use. It Moves all of her attack cards in the hand back to the draw pile, then deals 300% + 50% per card moved with its effect to all enemies. The main purpose of this ability, outside of dealing a large hit, is to fix hands where you draw Yuki’s Inspiration cards in your opening 5. However, the 5EP cost often makes it hard to use except for in chaos runs, where you plan around it or in longer duration save data modes. In high card draw decks, you can also put back already active inspiration cards if you’re confident in redrawing them for extra damage. Note: The +50% damage from moving cards is considered base damage.

1

Longsword Slash

Attack

100% Damage.

Longsword Slash

Standard Basic card that can be upgraded to add an Inspiration that reduces its cost to 0 if you draw into it. A very worthwhile card, assuming Inspiration is active compared to most other combatants' basics, and one often not removed even in endgame Yuki decks.

2

Rapid Slash

Attack

220% Damage.

Rapid Slash

2-cost Basic that gains 30% (multiplicative) damage increase thanks to Inspiration, making it a very hard-hitting ability for Yuki. Its high cost often makes it a candidate for cutting to ensure Yuki isn’t too AP hungry, but some endgame decks that have the AP to spare do still keep this card for higher damage potential.

1

Flowing Parry

Skill

100% Shield.

Show Effects

Flowing Parry

Yuki’s basic shield is completely standard and doesn't have any extra synergy with her kit. Removed first in almost every Yuki deck.

0

Prepare to Subdue

Skill

Draw 1 Attack Card(s) of this unit.
Increase Damage Amount of those cards by 20% for 1 Turn.​

Prepare to Subdue

A 0-cost skill that draws one of Yuki’s attack cards from the deck, therefore activating Inspiration. It also applies a 20% (multiplicative) damage increase to the card drawn for 1 turn. A vital card for ensuring Yuki accesses all her attacks each turn and that they have Inspiration active.

2

Flash Slash

Attack

180% Damage to all enemies.
Inspiration: Decrease cost by 1.

Show Effects

Flash Slash

One of Yuki’s main attacks, which costs 2 and deals significant AoE damage. This card is incredibly flexible and can be changed in many ways through Epiphanies to either cost significantly less (1 or 0 AP) or deal far more damage. Which is best usually boils down to the team you’re using with Yuki and how much AP it has to work with.

1

Trickery Strike

Attack

[Retain]

150% Damage.
Activate Inspiration for 1 random card of this unit in hand.

Show Effects

Trickery Strike

1-cost single target attack with Retain that, after use, activates the Inspiration effect of 1 random card in hand. Yuki’s only in-kit tool to fix hard drawing her Inspiration cards outside of her Ego Skill, making it a powerful crutch in case you have no way to manipulate your hand with discard or card returning effects. This effect is strong in Chaos runs, especially early, and can be exchanged using epiphanies for more card draw or higher damage if you don’t need it.

1

Freezing Blade

Upgrade

[Unique]

When using a card of this unit with an activated Inspiration, 50% Damage to all enemies.​

Show Effects

Freezing Blade

A 1-cost upgrade that causes Yuki to deal a small amount of AoE damage whenever playing a card with its inspiration effect activated. This damage is not considered an extra attack, doesn’t scale with potentials (e.g., 20% unique card multiplier effect), but does work with both additive and multiplicative boosts to card damage as long as they don’t specify “attack”. In optimized Yuki builds, when established early, this upgrade makes up a sizable amount of her damage, making it one of her best cards. Epiphanies can also be altered to deal high single-target damage as well.

1

Iceberg Cleave

Attack

180% Damage to all enemies.
Inspiration: add 1 Hit, decrease Damage Amount by 20%.

Show Effects

Iceberg Cleave

Yuki’s other main attack card, which costs 1 AP to deal AoE damage with an Inspiration effect that allows it to hit an extra time in exchange for dealing 20% less damage. This damage decrease is a true damage decrease (outside of the normal formula), meaning there is no way to escape it; whatever the card multiplier would have been will be adjusted to be 20% lower.

Yuki’s Signature Potentials offer significant damage boosts as well as some additional functionality, making them a high priority to unlock.

• 3-1: A must-have upgrade which adds an Inspiration effect to Yuki’s basic attack cards, Longsword Slash and Rapid Slash. Long Slash gets a cost reduction, making it free when Inspiration triggers, and Rapid Slash gets a 30% (multiplicative) Damage increase, putting it above the curve for basic Attack Cards.
• 5-1: Increase the base damage of both of Yuki’s basic attacks by +5% Damage baseline and another 5% if her Attack is greater than 500. A nice bonus, but nothing game-changing.
• 7: Increase the base damage of Flash Slash and Iceberg Cleave by +5% Damage baseline with an additional increase of 1% per 80 attack she has over 500, up to an additional +5% at 900. Stronger than 5-1, but not a major improvement over 3-1.

Standard Playstyle

Yuki is an aggressive spam-oriented character. You're not looking to build up a combo over multiple turns, and you don't ramp in anyway. Her abilities are at full power as long as you draw into them. This means you should prioritize having draw-based characters or heavy generic card draw to make sure you get as many attack cards with activated Inspiration effects as possible. Draw power and lower deck size create consistency in how often you'll get Yuki cards every turn, which means more consistent DMG in your runs.

Ensure you budget enough AP to be able to play all the cards you draw each turn to avoid wasted damage potential. You can do this by adjusting which epiphanies you choose for Flash Slash, whether you remove her 2-cost basic, and which cards you duplicate.

• E1 [★★]. Removes the “true” damage reduction from Iceberg Cleave, increasing its relative damage by 1.25 times (80% efficacy -> 100%). Iceberg Cleave is one of Yuki’s hardest-hitting abilities, but even if you duplicate it, it isn’t responsible for enough of her damage to make this a super-strong investment breakpoint.
• E2 [★★★]. Activates Inspiration for cards drawn at the start of the turn, for 2 turns. It primarily helps Yuki’s performance in non-save data-based game modes like Chaos and Zero System, where she has trouble consistently accessing hand manipulation tools, improving her performance/consistency significantly. Offers little to no benefit in save data game modes, though, as most Yuki decks are built to work around Inspiration and have ways to mitigate hard drawing those cards anyway.
• E3 [★]. Increases the base damage scaling for Yuki’s Ego skill, improving its total damage potential, but overall isn’t a large improvement to Yuki’s total damage as her Ego skill is one of the smaller portions of her damage over a fight.
• E4 [★★★]. Grants a 10% (multiplicative) damage increase for Yuki’s cards every time one of her cards is drawn by any means, stacking up to 2 times for a 20% total boost. This is a strong overall damage increase, especially in Chaos when you don’t already have a ton of card boosts from equipment and buffs.
• E5 [★]. Boosts the base damage increase of Yuki’s potentials from 20% to 26%. A small damage increase, but nothing major.
• E6 [★★★]. Raises the stacks granted by E4 from 2 to 3 and the buff they grant from 10% to 15%. elevating the maximum gain from 20% to 45% (essentially doubling the value of E4). Strong for all the same reasons E4 is.

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

1

Executioner's Tool [2-PC]

[2-PC]: +25% Critical Damage.

Black Wing [2-PC]

[2-PC]: +12% Attack.

Flex

A set-up of 2/2/2 running Executioner’s and Black Wing alongside Cursed Corpse or Seth’s Scarab is usually the most flexible and sometimes even highest damage for Yuki. If Agony is consistently on enemies 2/2/2 with

Cursed Corpse [2-PC]

it will beat out all 2/4 combinations, and if you value early power, Chaos 2/2/2 with

Seth's Scarab [2-PC]

can also outperform.

Still, without either Agony in the setup (which is hard to add in normal Yuki setups), or when you remove all Basics, the combo is worse than 2/4.

2

Bullet of Order [4-PC]

[4-PC]: When Attack Cards are used, increase Damage Amount of Order Cards by 10% for 1 turn (Max 2 times).

Executioner's Tool [2-PC]

[2-PC]: +25% Critical Damage.

If you cannot sustain Agony and don’t value the Basic Attack DMG from Seth's, a 2/4 setup can be a better option for Yuki, assuming you’re able to land 3-4+ attacks per turn to ramp it up. If all these conditions are met and you don’t already have an overabundance of card damage, this set combination will pull slightly ahead 2/2/2 (this is only assuming the last 2P of 2/2/2 isn’t useful to you, though).

Other 4-PC Sets

• 

  Conquerer's Aspect [4-PC]

  - This set bonus could be considered for Yuki for some builds, but falls notably behind 4P Bullet and 2/2/2 options in most cases, as it does not affect any of Yuki’s Freezing Blade (which makes up a solid portion of her damage) or Ego Skill damage, as they aren’t considered to have costs. This set will also lose value if you’re using any 0-cost or 2-cost epiphanies of cards, further decreasing its performance. Based on this, we don’t recommend it outside of very specific builds.

Weapon

• 

  W-52 Dopamine Injector
• 

  Chimeranite
• 

  Mutant Predator Spike
• 

  Replica Core
• 

  Obsidian Sword

Armor

• 

  Wings of Freedom
• 

  Fragment of the Empty Void
• 

  Rocket-Adorned Cape

Trinket

• 

  Dimensional Cube
• 

  Emblem of an Exceptional Entity
• 

  Amorphous Cube
• 

  Superconductive Protein

Comments - Weapons

1. 

   W-52 Dopamine Injector
   - Offers a stackable +20% (multiplicative) damage boost whenever the wearer draws a card by an ability (a card that draws two gives two stacks), capping out at two stacks (40%) and lasting 1 turn. Stronger than all other options but requires Yuki to be able to consistently draw each turn in order to maintain it, something that isn’t always easy.
2. 

   Chimeranite
   - Grants the wearer a +35% (multiplicative) damage on all their damage for 1 turn after they use a draw card themself. Numerically, a little behind Dopamine Injector, but only requires 1 draw instead of 2, making it easier to fully activate and maintain. Has the downside of being UNIQUE rarity, though, cutting off some other options.
3. 

   Mutant Predator Spike
   - Grants +30% (multiplicative) damage to all of Yuki’s abilities while holding 4 or more cards in hand, putting it slightly behind other options, but while being far easier to keep active across the fight, assuming you have a way to maintain a reasonable hand size. If you can’t consistently draw cards every turn, it usually becomes the best choice.
4. 

   Replica Core
   - When Yuki uses her own ability to draw one of her attack cards, that attack gains +50% (additive) damage for the turn. This weapon is far more restrictive than any of the options above, often not affecting a good amount of cards you play in the turn outside of specific builds. Still a good damage boost though.
5. 

   Obsidian Sword
   - Grants +12% (multiplicate) damage to all of Yuki’s damaging abilities. Not as good as any of the S1 weapons for her, but a very common substitution if you don’t happen to come across any of the others in your runs.

Comments - Armor

1. 

   Wings of Freedom
   - Best damage Armor option for Yuki in Season 1. Every time the team is hit, it grants Yuki 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 need or want more damage, Fragment of the Empty Void is an insanely high-value utility pick for Yuki, allowing you to choose up to 3 cards in your opening hand to “mulligan”. The new cards drawn after discarding will have Inspiration active. Also, this armor stacks multiple times if you have duplicates across your teammates.
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.

Comments - Trinkets

1. 

   Dimensional Cube
   - The highest damage potential accessory available to Yuki, assuming you have a strong discard outlet like Nia on the team with a good deck. If you can’t consistently discard 2-3+ cards a turn, though, it performs worse than the options below for Yuki.
2. 

   Emblem of an Exceptional Entity
   - Has a +30% (additive) bonus for all of Yuki’s abilities, making it the best option after Dimensional Cube and the top option if you value consistency.
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

Yuki has two different builds, a single-target one and an AoE one, with the only difference being the Freezing Blade epiphany you choose.

• The The AoE build, of course, is better at AoE but can also access its damage early on, thanks to Freezing Blade gaining Initiation and costing 0 instead of one. This build does notably less damage in single target, though in longer fights.
• The The Single Target build converts Freezing Blade into a single-target hit in exchange for it dealing significantly more damage, which, after multiplicative damage scaling, becomes a big lead compared to the AoE build. The downside is that it costs 1 AP to use, and you’ll have to hard draw it.

Card Removal Priority

• Flowing Parry
  - First priority to be removed in all endgame Yuki decks.
• Rapid Slash
  - A very solid card, but a costly one that limits the other cards Yuki and her teammates can play in a turn or pushes her toward needing AP support, restricting the teammates she can run alongside and the decks they can run. Remove this to lower your AP costs per turn, or keep it if you can support it.
• Longsword Slash
  - A basic card with a surprisingly potent effect, which is often better left in than removed. Leaving this card in gives Yuki more cards to draw and spam while also not costing any AP. Only using two removals also gives you much more leeway in using dupes, adding neutrals, and keeping divine epiphanies on your other cards.

Card Dupe Priority

Dupe Priority

Prepare to Subdue IV

=

Iceberg Cleave

=

Flash Slash II

Yuki has multiple good duplicate options, and the best one depends on the Epiphanies you’re offered, the neutrals you’ve secured, and how much card draw you have available. The three options to duplicate are Prepare to Subdue, Flash Slash, and Iceberg Cleave.

• Prepare to Subdue
  - If you don’t have any card draw/add for Yuki from neutral cards and hit the best epiphanies on this card, it’s a strong dupe target to ensure you can access all of Yuki’s attacks each turn for maximum damage.
• Flash Slash
  /
  Iceberg Cleave
  - If you have sufficient draw through neutrals or other means, it’s better to dupe Flash Slash or Iceberg Cleave, though, to give you more attacks to activate per turn, ensuring Yuki doesn’t run out of cards for your team to spend AP on. Flash Slash can outperform Iceberg Cleave in damage and efficiency, given the right epiphanies, but Iceberg Cleave is always consistently good. Both are valid targets to duplicate.

Epiphany Alternatives

• Freezing Blade
  - Choose between Freezing Blade II for AoE or Freezing Blade III for single target. In AoE and with enough card draw, you can also give up Initiation and the AP discount and run Freezing Blade I if you’re confident in drawing your whole deck on turn 1 to reach it.
• Prepare to Subdue
  - Subdue IV is best in almost all cases; it adds 2, buffs, and also triggers Freezing Blade via Inspiration. But if you don’t hit it in your runs, III also works, but it does much worse damage.
• Flash Slash
  - Flash Slash II is the most AP to damage efficient option among Yuki’s signature five epiphanies but if you have AP to spare Flash Slash III deals notably more damage for one extra AP.
• Outside of these two options the generic options such as +Morale as well as powerful debuffs applications are actually arguably even better than any of Yuki’s signatures if you can manage to secure them.
• Trickery Strike
  - Trickery IV can fish out Yuki’s core draw card - Prepare to Subdue - on use and can also bridge into other attack cards as well. But if you’re not in need of any more draw and are already accessing all her attack cards every turn easily in teams you’re playing, you can use Trickery Strike V for more damage and an extra Inspiration trigger on Freezing Blade.

Neutral Cards

Important!

There are a lot of strong Neutral Cards Yuki can use, and which are worth the save data points to include in her decks. Here are the ones that are most notable.

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!

• Aggressive Mutant
  - Costs 0AP and draws one of Yuki’s attack cards immediately while also offering a major damage boost. Easily activates Inspiration for a card on use, making using Yuki’s kit effectively much easier, especially if you have multiple copies, which cuts down on her need for multiple copies of Prepare to Subdue. Has exhaus, though, so in shorter fights you may still need duplicates of Prepare to keep her combos going.
• Forbidden: Ecstasy of Violence
  - Yuki’s single target can use some help; this card provides that. Costs 9 AP initially but is reduced by 1 permanently every time you draw until it becomes 0. Yuki draws enough to make achieving this easy, while the damage this card provides is a massive boost to her potential. Pick it up if you have save data to spare and encounter it in your runs.

Nia

• Can filter through Yuki’s team’s deck quickly to find her core combo pieces as fast as possible while also activating Inspiration effects.
• Is able to discard any hard-drawn Inspiration cards you start the turn with to be added back later with Prepare to Subdue to ensure all cards have hard Inspiration on them in a turn.
• Good enough healing to keep the team alive in endgame for long enough to clear in most cases.
• Allows Yuki to run the Dimensional Cube accessory for constantly stacking damage every time Nia triggers discard.

Veronica

• Has incredibly AP-efficient and numerous card draw, which gets you to Yuki’s inspiration combo pieces and activates them both at the same time while leaving all or most of the AP open for her as well.
• Deals very solid sub DPS without requiring an AP.
• Thins the deck considerably, as most of her non-draw cards are all upgrades, which, once used, are removed.

Cassius

• Can discard starting hands containing Inspiration cards with Shuffle drawing a new hand and activating any Inspiration effects within it automatically.
• Solid card draw between Devil Dice and Full House, with the option to pursue triple 0 builds with certain Yuki decks/teams as well, for higher damage.
• Can search out Prepare Subdue with Joker, automatically activating its inspiration effect to get you to two more attacks, which also have their Inspiration activated.

Rei

• After Epiphanies, Rei has solid draw power with Snack Time, offering Yuki a 0 AP cost draw 2, which has retain. Keep in mind these draws have exhaust, though, and therefore are mainly useful for turn 1 and setting up.
• The main reason to run Rei when her card draw is more limited is her buffs, which, assuming Rei’s deck is tailored toward Yuki, can amplify her damage tremendously.
• Thanks to how many upgrades Rei’s deck has, she’s also great at thinning out the deck, making Yuki’s combo 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.

Balanced Team

Pure damage, Yuki teams want enough healing to survive, sufficient card draw to access all of her attack cards every turn, and ideally a way to discard inspiration cards you draw at the start of each turn (this can somewhat be helped by Yuki's ego skill, equipment, or signature partner, though). Each of Yuki’s synergies assists with one or multiple of these in their own unique way, and which is most optimal will depend on your playstyle or the quality of saves you already have available.

Damage

Support

Support

Survival

If you’re struggling to survive in endgame modes such as Chaos/Zero System, consider swapping out one support for a shielder instead to mitigate enemy hits and stress accumulation.

Damage

Support

Shielder

Any Shielder