Zenless Zone Zero (ZZZ)GraceBuild and Guide

Grace is a Standard S-Rank Electric Anomaly Agent whose gameplay revolves around quick in-and-out rotations and high Shock DMG, with the ability to trigger Ablooms giving her a consistent source of non-Disorder damage contribution.  She can be somewhat flexible in role, either as a main carry or a secondary damage dealer, revolving around building “Zap” stacks which can then be spent to increase her Electric Anomaly Buildup rate.

When using her Ultimate, she also gains stacks of “Pulse”, having an inverse relationship with Zap: the more Zap stacks get generated, the more Pulse stacks get consumed, triggering up to 4 Ablooms per cycle.

An Abloom is an extra tick of Anomaly damage: whenever a character is suffering from any Attribute Anomaly of the 5 standard elements (Ether, Electric, Fire, Ice, Physical), Abloom will deal a percentage of the existing Anomaly currently inflicted. For Grace, if an enemy is taking 10,000 DMG Burn ticks, the scaling rate on her Ablooms means it’d deal 70,000 DMG.

As this scales with Anomaly and not Disorder DMG, it means that Grace’s Additional Ability bonuses apply to it too, further increasing its value.

Core Passive & Additional Ability

It’s important to understand what all of the different stacks are and how they are built.

Despite being an Electric Agent, many of Grace’s attacks deal Physical DMG, and this is necessary to build Zap stacks. For every hit (not skill, but individual hit!) that deals Physical DMG, Grace will gain 1 stack of Zap, with a cap of 8. All stacks are consumed at once when using a Special or EX Special and increase the Electric Anomaly Buildup of the skill by up to 130%.

After her Awakening Potential, her Additional Ability - which requires Anomaly, same Faction or same Attribute Agents in the team - will also grant Grace the “Enhanced Zap” buff for 25s when consuming them, increasing her Electric DMG by 30%.

With it active, Grace inflicts a debuff on enemies upon landing her EX Special that causes the next instance of Shock to gain an 18% Anomaly DMG increase, up to 2 stacks total for a potential 36% bonus. This resets when the Shock state ends but is helpful to both boost the individual Shock ticks and any Ablooms that land during it.

Kit Breakdown

For Grace to be able to get Ablooms, she must first use her Ultimate. When cast, it will grant 25 stacks of Pulse, lasting 30 seconds, and 8 Zap - both going hand in hand.

This is because whenever a stack of Zap is gained (not spent!) 1 stack of Pulse is dropped. Once 8 stacks of Pulse are consumed in this manner, the next grenade throw by Grace will trigger an Abloom - this throw can be from her Special, EX Special, Dodge Counter, anything that meets the criteria.

The most effective way to gain Zap is through her Basic Attacks, as they all deal Physical Damage. She has a 4-hit string with a variety of multi-hits that allow for it to max out Zap stacks with only a few attacks. It also has a unique property where even when it’s interrupted by most of her skills, namely her Special, EX Special, Dash Attack and Dodge, it will continue from where it left off.

So it’s possible to do B1, B2, B3 - which together build a little more than 8 Zap stacks - then cast Special to consume 8 Zap stacks. The next Basic after would be B4, which alone builds 8 Zap stacks and can be followed with another Special.

When holding a directional input, Grace can also replace one of her Basic Attacks with an alternate repositioning Basic Attack. This means she can do B1, Side Input, B3, or B1, B2, Side Input, B4, providing alternative rotations to build Zap.

Dodge Counters are great for this too. Dodges don’t interrupt the Basic Attack string, and if a Perfect Dodge is triggered, Dodge Counters can shortcut to B4 which is an instant full load of Zap stacks.

As for spending Zap, this is done via Specials and EX Specials. The most common method  is with Special: Obstruction removal, a quick grenade throw that can reposition Grace based on directional inputs and can Perfect Dodge attacks when consuming Zap.

If at 40 Energy or above, EX Special: Supercharged Obstruction Removal is used instead, working in much the same way but throwing 2 Grenades instead of 1, with a potential third “Vortex Cluster Grenade”, dealing additional damage and having a vacuum effect.

There is one Special that generates Zap instead of consuming it, Obstruction Removal - Cycle. This is only accessible by holding the Special button while Grace has Pulse stacks, and in it she will repeatedly hurl grenades forwards and generate 1 stack of Zap per throw. Simply holding this skill will both generate Zap and trigger Ablooms, as every attack during it is a grenade throw. 

It starts off quite slow but speeds up the longer it’s channeled. Although Grace can use directional inputs to reposition and Perfect Dodge during it, doing so resets the speed boost so it’s best reserved for when enemies are Stunned or unlikely to attack.

Assist Follow-Ups and Chain Attacks may see occasional use, but they aren’t all that noteworthy. Grace has an Evasive Assist instead of a Defensive Assist, using up only 1 Assist Point but leading to worse Daze build and locking her out of certain boss mechanics. Her Chain Attack on the other hand is a standard, Electric DMG dealing skill that builds a decent amount of Anomaly but nothing outstanding.

Grace’s general plan comes down to using her Basic Attacks to build Zap, then spending them with Special or EX Specials, juggling Anomalies and Disorders with another Anomaly Agent or even looping Shock triggers given her high Shock DMG values.

Once there are enough Decibels, make sure to spend Zap before using Ultimate to get full benefit from its 8 Zap refill. The Pulse stacks give a boost to her damage through Ablooms, with the cycle of building and spending Zap repeating throughout.

Even out-of-stun, there are some “combos” that Grace can do to maximise Zap cycling, Anomaly build-up and Decibel generation.

• B1

• B2

• B3

• Special or EX Special

• B4

• Special or EX Special

Is the bread and butter of Grace’s rotations. After B1 or B2, slotting in a Side Input Basic works just fine and still allows for full Zap build and spend without sacrificing on time.

Doing 2 sets of these will consume 25 Pulse and yield 4 Ablooms, while being the most effective in terms of damage (both raw DMG Multipliers and Anomaly build-up) as well as Energy and Decibel generation.

When in Stun, holding Special for Special: Obstruction Removal - Cycle can work due to its rapid Zap generation. It isn’t as strong as looping Basics with regular Specials/EX Specials, but when the goal is to get as many Anomalies and Ablooms to fit within a short period, it can pull out ahead.

The biggest potential point of optimisation is in managing her Ultimate use and its Abloom triggers. It may be better to hold onto it for a little longer if it may align with a Stun, and given that Ablooms scale with the current Anomaly inflicted on the enemy, timing its triggers to land on the strongest Anomaly (be it Grace’s Shock due to her Additional Ability, or a higher scaling element/better built Agent’s Anomaly) can go a long way at improving scores.