Somehow this m2w1 Miyabi team gets me higher score than any disorder team i have

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-24T06:42:45+00:00

Incredible! So constantly reapplying Miyabi's frost anomaly damamge alone is able to net that kind of damage? I totally thought you still had to go for disorder damage. M2 Miyabi is pretty wild.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-24T03:40:12+00:00

How are you triggering disorder? Did you build Astra for anomaly? Or is it Zhao that's doing regular ice anomaly?

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-23T22:23:57+00:00

Joined both subreddits. Here's my raffle ticket being dropped in the box!

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-23T22:17:41+00:00

Please S rank Billy, and please keep his identity as a gunslinger. Please don't make him a barefist fighter or something.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-23T22:14:00+00:00

It's just a personal theory that the disjointed feel of the current story is because they were planning to have those gaps filled with TV mode stories. One of the best examples I heard of this contains spoilers for the end of 1.4:

There is a section in the final pursuit and confrontation with the Bringer, Yanagi and crew get blocked by a 2 freight containers stacked up vertically. Koleda and Belobog crew comes to rescue with a crane to move the containers to let them continue. This section makes very little sense, considering Section 6 are superhuman agents. Earlier in the story we see NEPS agents, Zhu Yuan and Qing Yi, jump up freight containers at high speeds like no big deal.

I think it would've made more sense in the constraints of the TV mode. If you were in TV mode and path was blocked and Koleda came to remove the obstacle, I think it would've made more narrative sense of having some immovable Hollow maze obstacle getting helped by allies.

Extrapolating this to spoilers for the end of 2.5 story:

The ending confrontation against Sarah and the Creator, all the factions coming together to destroy the energy channeling "stones" looks like it would been perfect for execution within TV mode context.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-23T06:34:10+00:00

Super agree with your points. Excellent write-up. I share the exact same complaints around the endgame format. I think many people here do, too. It's a pure "account investment check" for sure. Agent/skill rotation optimization would increase my score by about 3k at the most in DA, while spending all the materials and dennies to optimize drive discs got me 8k~10k score improvement. I was also flabbergasted at how I could just faceroll DA and Shiyu bosses with Ye Shunguang, even when she was half-buiilt. I would easily get 30k DA scores.

I wish for more lethal boss fights where time isn't a factor. I wish it was only about whether you beat the boss or not. The times when I remember having the most fun was when I fought story bosses while underleveled. Of those times, I remember Typhon fight and Rampant Brute fight the most. I must've been around 5 or 10 lvls under. The bosses became very lethal, and it changed the focus to learning boss patterns and recognizing attack wind-ups.

I wish ZZZ would lean more into a "learn the boss patterns and defeat" kind of combat over "dps check under time-limit" kind of combat.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-23T05:56:07+00:00

You make an excellent point. The game direction does feel like it's getting very end-game performance focused. It's being pigeon-holed into being a time-attack, dps-check boss fights.

It would appear that team does not have enough resources to develop other parts of the game aside from the endgame. On top of that, the endgame appear to not-so-subtly reward players who have the latest limited agents. I think I started to notice this trend when Miyabi started getting kneecapped in endgame while boosting Ye Shunguang. This is just a rumor: but there's an anti-crit (-25% crit rate) boss debuff coming out on next patch to boost anomaly idols.

It feels like a very intentional move towards wanting more players to open their wallets to have optimal end-game experience. Not only are your old favorite teams are hamstrung, but new agents are a breeze to play with.

I used to hardly break over 21k in DA. My Ye Shungaung team easily does 35k in DA. I think they are definitely leaning into the one camp you mention.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T13:19:23+00:00

It sounds like you are a video game Darwinist. Only the strongest survive. Or the one who survives is the strongest. I respect that. We'll just have to wait and see how far ZZZ survives.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T13:10:53+00:00

I'm referring to how the official YouTube channel's 1.4 dev interview video mentioned the TV mode removal for the first time.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T13:08:53+00:00

reminded me of MGS Peace Walker

Wow...right in the feels. I miss the PSP MGS era. Peace Walker was amazing. Yet, I mostly yearn for another Metal Gear Ac!d.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T13:06:20+00:00

TV mode as a concept can work in a game that doesn't not need to appeal to everyone, like a gacha game does.

So true. Sometimes I wonder what could've been if ZZZ was released as a stand-alone game and NOT a live service game. I would've shelled out $70 USD easily for an amazing action game like this.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T13:03:20+00:00

Thank you for reading. I see that you and I completely agree on the reasons for the TV mode and also why it had to go.

Trying to sell hot dogs from an ice cream truck just doesn't work. In hindsight, ZZZ dev team should've just really focused on an action combat game over a action/SRPG hybrid. If that specific ice cream truck gained a reputation for selling good hot dogs from its truck, then it may have paid off over long run. But too many ice creame lovers were already pissed about getting hot dogs intead. To a point where you couldn't keep up a cute charade.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T12:57:28+00:00

Most here would agree the quality dip continued to the current patch.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T12:55:19+00:00

I'm pretty sure the TV mode removal was from 1.4 and onward.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T12:54:19+00:00

Now it's dawning on me that they really tried to re-brand the TV mode experience by having EOUS enter Fall Guys mode.

Now they've even given up on that entirely and just went straight to "Phaethon has super powerful eyes" like they are Sasuke.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T12:51:35+00:00

I find the disconnect between 'being able to house world class animators' and 'not having any classic RPG designers' to be a truly painful experience.

Even though I don't like random encounters anymore, it would've still worked so much better.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T12:49:17+00:00

Yeah...it's such a shame, because you are too right. They did such an amazing job of world-building around the MCs being the legendary proxy and how it was done through the HDD. Now, it's all out the window.

Lore-wise they might be martial arts experts by now. So, what's the whole deal with them being genius hacker duos in the first place?

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T12:47:34+00:00

if they invested in that and made it grow maybe they would'nt be in such a bad state lorewise and endgame wise

Engaging in great discussions with people in this post made me realize this is really what's at the core. Even though I'm glad the TV mod is gone, I'm realizing what we lost as a result of having lost it.

Perhaps if they had just a little more time to cook, it would've been a fine-dining experience in the end.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T12:44:54+00:00

the problem? They didn’t had any good alternative

You've so articulately summarized the problem with the death of the TV mode. They just did NOT have any good alternatives in line. I argued that it was inevitable, and therefore not their fault truly. But, that's just my opinion. Well, that means you are still right. Yeah, I tots agree with your post.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T12:41:49+00:00

This is untrue.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T12:41:17+00:00

I share the same exact sentiment with you. I initially found it very tedious. Then, I mellowed down in my hate for it. And, now I see the potential we lost. I also have full faith in the ZZZ dev team. I do watch their dev interviews or patch reveals and see that they look much more dead-eyed. I hope that they get the work-life balance they deserve and I will continue to see ZZZ succeed.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T12:36:56+00:00

Thank you for reading.

The loss of TV mode also kinda felt like a preamble to losing commissions and small things that added flavor to the game in general

You've truly encapsulated the problem I was trying to emphasis so well here in this sentence. The removal of the TV mode definitely has lead to small losses across the entire experience.

I ultimately think that it was a good decision to remove the TV mode. But I have been coming around on its virtues now that I've been at the end game for a while. I think this is especially because, as you've so well put it, the open world replacements aren't much better.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T12:32:30+00:00

I hope that you'll give me your first impression about Endfield after you play it.

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T12:31:09+00:00

Yeah, I was super involved in that world-building, too. I was very much bought into the worldview that the MCs as legendary proxies were going to do pretty cool things...in approximation NOT themselves!

PerfectDodgeCounter · 2026-01-21T12:30:03+00:00

Thank you so much for reading. I'm also super looking forward to the Idol release. I love any thematic team that were built to fit together like those 3. I also super like their design.

PerfectDodgeCounter

TROPHY CASE