Hello to all readers! With the upcoming global release of Vanguard Zero, we have prepared a guide for you to figure how to approach the game best for the first time, what to do to boost your starting chances and how the game operates.

Starting your account





The game thrusts you straight into the first episode of the anime and a basic tutorial fight happens to get a general understanding of the game's mechanics. We'll delve more into those later on. Remember to have ample room on your device because as a mobile gacha game, other data updates are scattered through the game as new content arises. Initial downloads add up to be over 1GB in storage. After these you will be prompted to make your account.





Re-Roll guide





For those of you who have never seeped into the realm of mobile gacha games before, re-rolling is an important step to maximise starting resources to give you the best boost in starting the game.





In Vanguard Zero, you want to be able to acquire a suitable amount of RRR cards to fuel you through the game. When you have access to the shop, you are given 20 packs in starting rewards from the pre-registration campaign and approximately 500 gems. With the gems, 100 gems can buy you 1 pack, so you essentially begin the game with 25 packs. A big tip is that if you are planning on spending money on this game, make sure to wait until you are happy with the account you have.





Start to pull packs using all your gems and your starting rewards. On average, you want to be attempting for 4-6 RRR cards and hopefully on top of that, obtain RR cards that are tied to one specific clan. This will give you enough cards to make a suitable deck going forward and supply insight into what clan(s) you potentially can invest in.





To re-roll your account, other games delete and re-download the game to have fresh access to a new account. Vanguard Zero has the option to delete your current user. You can then begin a new user and try your luck again.





The steps to delete your user account is shown below:





1. Go to Home > Menu > Back to Title









2. Select Menu > Delete User









3. Select Delete User









From here, you go through the tutorial again until you have access to the shop again and re-roll your cards.





Linking your account





The next important step before anything else is to link your account to social media or create a password to backup the data of your account. It is essential to do this to keep your data in case you delete the app or saves you from any other errors. You can use either Facebook or Twitter to link your account.





To link your account, follow the steps below:





1. Go to Home > Menu > Data Transfer













From here, choose your preferred social media platform to link your account. Alternatively, you can save a User ID and a Data Link Password if you choose to Link with Password. The Data Link Password will be valid 30 days after it is issued.





Gameplay





Here is the fundamental part of the article that will explain the gameplay of Vanguard Zero in comparison to Cardfight!! Vanguard.





Decks are 40 cards in Vanguard Zero. Grade 0 has basically been removed, except for your starting vanguard. The triggers that would normally be on Grade 0 cards are now on your Grade 3's. Grade ratios are set to 1 starter, 13 Grade 1, 13 Grade 2 and 13 Grade 3, which means you have access to 13 triggers. Triggers are not assigned to specific cards, which means you can make your cards any chosen trigger type you wish. However, the game still has the restriction of 4 heal triggers and 4 sentinels.





The first noticeable difference in gameplay is that the player going second draws 2 cards at the beginning of the game instead of one, which is to help balance out the advantage that going first gives when Vanguard was first released.





The next mechanic is drive checking. In this game you do not add your drive checks to hand. If the drive check is not a trigger, it goes to the bottom of the deck. If it is a trigger, you get the effects of the triggers and the card then goes straight to the drop zone. Trigger effects work like normal Vanguard except for critical triggers, which will only apply the extra critical to your Vanguard.





Damage checks are different in Zero. Each time you take a damage, your vanguard gains +5000 POWER. In addition, all power obtained from triggers on damage checks are applied to the Vanguard only. This is an interesting dynamic because you have to plan out your attack patterns and numbers properly, while still taking into account defensive triggers.





There is no guarding from hand in Zero. The only ways you block attacks in this game is by having Grade 2 rear guards in the front row and perfect guards. Players are forced to attack the Grade 2's first before they are able to attack the Vanguard. Perfect guards are automatic. They come into effect if you fulfil one of the two following conditions:





You would lose if you do not guard Your remaining damage would be 1 or less if you do not guard an attack with 2 or more critical.





What to do at the beginning of the game and what are the best clans to try for?





At the beginning of the game, you want to grind resources as fast as possible to make best use of your stamina and overall, your time. It is highly recommended that you work to Grade 12 (which is basically your profile levels in the game). Doing this will unlock the function to quick battle Character Fights, which means that you skip and complete the fight. This is your best method of obtaining crafting materials you use to make cards in the game.





In terms of priority in crafting, perfect guards should be left aside as you get sentinel tokens later in ranked seasons which you can redeem for perfect guard of your choice.





For people who are looking to compete in ranked, it is worthwhile trying to invest in Kagero and Nova Grappler in this base set. These clans have had the most consistent results in ladder climbing. However don't feel the need to commit to these even if you don't have much of those clans. Additionally to that, following from the base set, Kagero and Nova Grappler will obtain outstanding support in the second set focusing on Dragonic Overlord the End and Beast Deity, Azure Dragon which are both top tier decks in the future sets.





Another thing on the priority list is to get to 1,300,000 VP as fast as possible. This will allow you to obtain 1 gacha ticket every 100,000 VP obtained after acquiring the milestone. This allows for free-to-play (F2P) to stock up on tickets for future sets without needing to spend money but at the same time, having a way to obtain a suitable amount of new support for the decks that they play.





When it comes to gems and gacha tickets, free-to-play players should be careful about how much to invest and use. It is not viable to think that you can build full power decks from every set without putting money into the game. A suggestion would be to use resources that free-to-play gathers to commit to one certain clan and work on saving the rest from the next set. Pace yourself with crafting materials to get the things you need. Otherwise the next set will come along and you will have little resources to get the cards to be relevant in competing in the game and end up struggling going through later phases of the game.





Summary

To wrap up the starting phases of Vanguard Zero, stay tuned for more articles and have fun playing the game. The game for its initial release is super fun, we hope you enjoy the game as much as we do and continue to support it into its foreseeable future!





Written by Toby Jones & Derick Dao