Deadly Assault Guide and Best Agents for Zenless Zone Zero

Deadly Assault is a high-stakes, endgame challenge mode in Zenless Zone Zero, designed for experienced players seeking more challenge. It is a much higher difficulty than Shiyu Defense, and you will need to come prepared.

Deadly Assault acts currently as the Pinnacle Endgame activity, it is not really accessible to all players, as it requires you to master every aspect of Zenless Zone Zero. There is also no lower difficulty version, so it is not suited for beginners or low level agents.

Deadly Assault consists of time-limited battles against enhanced versions of story campaign bosses, each possessing new mechanics and increased difficulty. The objective is to accumulate as many points as possible within a three-minute timeframe, with rewards based on performance.

Deadly Assault will reset every other Friday. The current Deadly Assault Stages are available from January 11, 2025 until January 23, 2025.

Reset will erase all your progress, allowing you to challenge bosses, and receive all the rewards again! Some of the Bosses and Buffs may change upon reset. We will update this guide accordingly each time.

In order to access Deadly Assault, you need to reach Inter-Knot Level 40, and unlock the Shiyu Defense mode. After Shiyu Defense is unlocked, you will have to complete the Deadly Situation commission.

Once completed, you can access Deadly Assault at Scott's Outpost.

Deadly Assault is a time-limited challenge against Story Bosses. You will have 3 minutes per boss to score as many points as possible. The bosses are more aggressive, have more health, and new mechanics, giving you a serious challenge.

The Enemies will be level 70 versions of Story Bosses. The mode will NOT scale for lower-level agents, and you will not manage to complete it if your agents are not properly equipped.

The three bosses have 30 life bars. The goal is not to actually kill them. You can try, but even with top tier teams you will likely not get all the health down to zero. The goal is to do the most points in a very short time-frame.

There is three point thresholds you need to reach:

• B-Rank: 6000 points
• A-Rank: 14,000 points
• S-Rank: 20,000 points

You can get 3 stars per challenge, and each star gained will give you access to a reward.

You will also need three different teams. Each time you pick a squad for a boss, the agents gets locked to this specific boss, and you will need one squad per boss. You can reset the teams if you picked the wrong ones, but this means loosing your progress. The rewards previously obtained can still be claimed even after you reset a team.

You will also be able to pick between three different buffs for each team. Which one you choose will depend on your squad and the boss you are fighting:

The system is different from everything you have played so far in the game. You will earn points by doing damage, however, the most points will come from completing specific tasks that will depend on the boss.

Those tasks can be things like interrupting a specific attack, or killing adds that spawn during the fight.

Each boss has different weakness and resistances, as well as new mechanics that differ from their story version, forcing you to use specific squads and strategies to get through each boss. Here is a detailed look at the bosses and the recommended squads and strategies:

Make sure your squad are fully leveled, with good W-Engine and Disk Drives sets, and leveled Skills! You will not be able to get maximum points with agents that don't have a very good build!

5.

Bosses, Mechanics, and Recommended Squads

Sacrifice - Bringer Autonomous Assault Unit - Typhon Destroyer Dead End Butcher

5.1.

Sacrifice - Bringer

The first boss you can face is Bringer. He is weak to Ice Damage and Resistant to Physical Damage.

5.2.

Enemy Details

When you inflict an Attribute Anomaly or Disorder, all squad members gain 1 stack of Laser Focus. You can stack up 6 times. Each Laser Focus stack increases the Agent's CRIT Rate by 5%. When you have 3 or more stacks of Laser Focus, inflicting an Attribute Anomaly will increase its duration by 5s.

When Bringer attacks with his Sacrificial Knife, all squad members' Laser Focus stacks will be reset.

5.3.

Special Mechanic

If you successfully interrupt a chant, you gain additional 2000 Performance Points. A maximum of 5000 Performance Points can be obtained this way.

During the fight, Bringer will transform into a Giant Arm. We recommend you save your ultimates for that moment. This will help you prevent him to charge up and release his Sacrificial Knife.

5.4.

Recommended Squads

Buff	DPS	Sub	Support	Bangboo
Graceful Mastery	Hoshimi Miyabi	Tsukishiro Yanagi	Alexandrina Sebastiane	Agent Gulliver
Swift Resolution	Hoshimi Miyabi	Lighter	Soukaku	Agent Gulliver Sharkboo
Swift Resolution	Ellen Joe	Lighter	Soukaku	Sharkboo
Swift Resolution	Hoshimi Miyabi	Von Lycaon	Soukaku	Agent Gulliver Sharkboo
Graceful Mastery	Hoshimi Miyabi	Caesar King	Tsukishiro Yanagi	Agent Gulliver
Swift Resolution	Hoshimi Miyabi	Lighter	Lucy	Red Moccus

5.5.

Tyhon Destroyer

The second boss you can face is Typhon Destroyer. He is weak to Electric Damage and Resistant to Fire Damage.

5.6.

Enemy Details

Agents inflict Overwhelmed when landing a Defensive Assist hit against the boss, and 3 stacks of Overwhelmed when accumulating 3 Defensive Assist hits and triggering impaired.

Each stack of Overwhelmed increases Daze by 15%, and Chain Attack and Ultimate DMG taken while Stunned by 10%.

The enemy will fix the impaired parts and reset the impairment level while charging, and will reset its Overwhelmed stacks after recovering from Stun.

5.7.

Special Mechanic

If you successfully impair an enemy you will earn 600 Performance Points. You can get a maximum of 5000 Performance Points this way.

Caesar and Seth are two good units for this fight, coupled with any Electric agents. The boss hits quite hard, so any additional defense will help you. If you don't have any Electric team, Jane is very efficient as well against this boss. Using both Seth and Caesar will allow you to stack the Overwhelmed effect quite often.

5.8.

Recommended Squads

Buff	DPS	Sub	Support	Bangboo
Graceful Mastery	Jane Doe	Seth Lowell	Caesar King	Bangvolver
Graceful Mastery	Piper Wheel	Seth Lowell	Caesar King	Red Moccus
Swift Resolution	Asaba Harumasa	Seth Lowell	Caesar King	Plugboo
Swift Resolution	Asaba Harumasa	Qingyi	Alexandrina Sebastiane	Plugboo
Graceful Mastery	Tsukishiro Yanagi	Qingyi	Alexandrina Sebastiane	Plugboo
Graceful Mastery	Tsukishiro Yanagi	Seth Lowell	Alexandrina Sebastiane	Plugboo

5.9.

Dead End Butcher

The third boss you can face is Butcher. He is weak to Ice and Ether Damage, and has no specific resistances.

5.10.

Enemy Details

When not in a Stunned state, the Boss gains 1 stack of All or Nothing every 6s, stacking up to 3 times. Each stack of All or Nothing increases the damage dealt by the Boss by 10%.

When an Agent's attack hits an enemy, the Agent's CRIT DMG increases by 25% for each stack of All or Nothing the target has. All or Nothing stacks will be reset when the enemy recovers from being Stunned.

5.11.

Special Mechanic

If you successfully trigger Perfect Dodge you earn 150 Performance Points. You can obtain a maximum of 5000 Performance Points this way.

The boss is very easily stunned, so if you use Zhu Yuan, she will have big windows to do quite a lot of damage.

5.12.

Recommended Squads

Buff	DPS	Sub	Support	Bangboo
Overthrow	Zhu Yuan	Qingyi	Nicole Demara	Resonaboo Officer Cui
Overthrow	Zhu Yuan	Nicole Demara	Seth Lowell	Officer Cui
Graceful Mastery	Hoshimi Miyabi	Tsukishiro Yanagi	Alexandrina Sebastiane	Agent Gulliver
Graceful Mastery	Hoshimi Miyabi	Lighter	Soukaku	Agent Gulliver Sharkboo
Swift Resolution	Ellen Joe	Lighter	Soukaku	Sharkboo
Swift Resolution	Ellen Joe	Von Lycaon	Soukaku	Sharkboo

Each time you reach a Performance Point threshold you will gain one Star. Each star will give you access to a set of rewards:

Rewards will be obtainable again each time the Deadly Assault mode resets!

Deadly Assault is not really there for the rewards but more for the challenge. If you love spending hours gearing your agents perfectly and want a bigger challenge to test your squads against, this mode is what you are looking for!

It is worth trying out if you wish to get the few Polychromes and Merits you can earn, but otherwise it is only worth if you want a tough challenge for your squads.

Deadly Assault is the hardest challenge of Zenless Zone Zero for the time being. It is perfect if you have high level Agents with very good gear, and want to test your own skills against strong bosses. It can help you identify your own weaknesses, or what your agents my lack.

If you are only looking for rewards, you are better of farming Shiyu Defense, Hollow Zero, or the latest Events.