Wuthering Waves Echoes Complete Guide

Wuthering Waves Echo System Guide

In this article, we’ll cover the Echo system in Wuthering Waves, how Echoes work, how to get them, and more. Currently, you can also participate in a Web Event, where you will be able to claim one Echo for free. This can be a great way to accelerate your progress.

TLDR: Just pick a Gold Rarity 3-cost Echo.

What Are Echoes

Wuthering Waves uses “Echoes” as the gear system in the game. Instead of equipping traditional armor pieces, you instead equip Echoes which are overworld monsters you fight in the game. Equipping Echoes will grant a variety of stat bonuses and each Echo has a skill.

In combat, you can briefly transform/swap into your character’s main Echo and activate their skill. These skills have a variety of effects like dealing damage or healing. This adds a lot of build diversity as you can modify things to your liking.

Since a team consists of three characters, you’ll have three Echo skills available during combat. You can run three of the same one, three different ones, etc.

While you can farm monsters in the world to drop Echoes, you won’t be able to upgrade them without spending “stamina.” You’ll get free upgrade materials as you explore the world, but that will eventually dry up.

This is the time gated resource that prevents players from attaining endgame gear too quickly.

Types of Echoes: Class and Rarity

We briefly covered Echo Skills, but there are a few more classifications. Each Echo will have their own Class, Cost, and Rarity. These determine a variety of things, so let’s dive into each section.

Echo Rarity

Green (Rank 2): Max Level 10, 0 Substats
Blue (Rank 3): Max Level 15, 3 Substats
Purple (Rank 4): Max Level 20, 4 Substats
Gold (Rank 5): Max Level 25, 5 Substats

When you get an Echo, there will be four different rarities: Green, Blue, Purple, and Gold. Green will be the lowest rarity and most common, with Gold being the highest. The rarity of an Echo will determine how much you can level it up and how many sub stats you can unlock. As expected, Gold rarity Echoes will provide more stats as you can level them up more.

We’ll dive deeper into stats in a bit, but let’s first talk about Echo Class/Cost.

Echo Class/Cost

Common (1-COST)
Elite Class (3-COST)
Overlord/Calamity (4-COST)

There are 4 types of Echo classes you can get in Wuthering Waves.

The first are common Echoes you’ll find killing the majority of monsters in the overworld. Next are “Elite” Echoes which are the slightly tougher/rarer monsters. Lastly are “Boss” Echoes which are the Overlord and Calamity class.

You will be able to equip 5 echoes per character, with a cost limit of 12. (In the early game this number will be 10)

A common configuration players will use is 4/3/3/1/1. This means you can have a Boss Echo as your main Echo (skill). The remaining 8 points go toward two Elite and two Common Echoes.

Common Echoes are easily found throughout the world, and you can grind for Boss Echoes since they respawn very quickly. Elite Echoes can be quite tough to farm as there are a limited number in the world that refresh every day.

Echo Stats

In Wuthering Waves, Echoes will have three different stat categories:

Main Stat
Secondary Main Stat
Substats

The Main Stat and Secondary Main Stat will both increase when an Echo levels up, but Substats are unlocked with Tuners (a resource you farm).

Main Stat

Main Stats are dependent on Echo Class. Each Class will have a different pool of potential stats to roll.

Common: HP%, ATK%, DEF%
Elite: HP%, ATK%, DEF%, Energy Regen%, Attribute DMG% (Glacio, Aero, Electro, etc)
Overlord/Calamity: HP%, ATK%, DEF% Crit Rate%, Crit DMG%, Healing Bonus%

In general, Common Echoes don’t matter too much for character strength. Your Boss/Elite Echoes will provide much stronger bonuses since they provide strong stats like Attribute DMG% or Crit Rate.

As previously mentioned, you can fight bosses over and over until you get the Main Stat you want (usually Crit Rate). However, Elites can be tough to farm since it’s difficult to get the exact Attribute Main Stat you need.

Secondary Main Stat

Secondary Main Stats are fixed based on the Echo Class/Cost. For example, if you’re using a 4/3/3/1/1 setup, you’re Secondary Main Stats will always be 3x Flat ATK and 2x Flat HP.

Common – Flat HP
Elite – Flat ATK
Overlord/Calamity – Flat ATK

Because of this, you don’t need to worry too much about the Secondary Main Stat. There might be niche situations where you can use 4/4/1/1/1 or 3/3/3/1/1, but that hasn’t come up yet.

For example, if a future character cannot crit, you would want more Attribute Damage and skip a 4-cost. Or maybe a future character has a lot of bonus Attribute DMG in their passives. In this case, you could consider 4/4/1/1/1 to get more Crit.

Substats

Substats work differently from other games. Each Substat will be one value that you reveal by unlocking. Once you reveal all 6, that’s it. Substats also have a range in which they can roll. If you unlock a Crit Rate Substat, it comes out from a range of potential values. This system creates an infinite grind, where you can always optimize your Substats further and further.

Flat HP
Flat ATK
Flat DEF
HP%
ATK%
DEF%
Energy Regen%
Crit Rate%
Crit DMG%
Basic Attack DMG Bonus%
Heavy Attack DMG Bonus%
Resonance Skill DMG Bonus%
Resonance Liberation DMG Bonus%

For offensive characters, the obvious stats are Crit Rate, Crit DMG, ATK, And ATK%. However, each character generally has a damage type they focus on. (Basic, Heavy, Skill, Liberation)

Energy Regen is also a solid Substat for almost any character. This will charge your Liberation faster. (But it doesn’t apply to Concerto Energy)

Echo Sets

The last Echo classification comes with Set Bonuses, or as the game refers to it: Sonata. Like in other games, these Set Bonuses will activate when you equip Echoes of the same Set.

For the Set Bonus to activate, you need to equip unique Echoes. For example, if I equip two Cyan-Feathered Herons with the Aero Set bonus, it will not activate the 2-set bonus.

There are currently 9 different Echo sets. One for each damage type, 2 support-oriented sets, and one ATK based set. Here’s a rundown of the different effects.

Freezing Frost (Glacio)

2 Set: Glacio damage increased by 10%.
5 Set: After using Basic Attack or Heavy Attack, Glacio damage is increased by 10%, this effect can be stacked three times, lasting 15 seconds.

Molten Rift (Fusion)

2 Set: Fusion damage increased by 10%.
5 Set: After using Resonance Skill, Fusion damage is increased by 30%, lasting 15 seconds.

Void Thunder (Electro)

2 Set: Electro damage increased by 10%.
5 Set: After using Heavy Attack or Resonance Skill, Electro damage is increased by 15%, this effect can be stacked twice, each lasting 15 seconds.

Sierra Gale (Aero)

2 Set: Aero damage increased by 10%.
5 Set: When using the Intro Skill, Aero damage increases by 30% for 15 seconds.

Celestial Light (Spectro)

2 Set: Spectro damage increased by 10%.
5 Set: When using the Intro Skill, Spectro damage increases by 30% for 15 seconds.

Havoc Eclipse (Havoc)

2 Set: Havoc damage increased by 10%.
5 Set: After using Basic Attack or Heavy Attack, Havoc damage increases by 7.5%, this effect can stack up to four times, lasting 15 seconds.

Rejuvenating Glow (Healing)

2 Set: Healing Bonus increased by 10%.
5 Set: When performing the Outro Skill, the ATK of the entire team’s Resonator increases by 15%, lasting 30 seconds.

Moonlit Clouds (Energy)

2 Set: Energy Regen increased by 10%.
5 Set: After using Outro Skill, the ATK of the next Resonator to enter the field increases by 22.5%, lasting 15 seconds.

Endless Resonance (ATK)

2 Set: ATK increased by 10%.
5 Set: When on the field, ATK increases by 5% every 1.5 seconds, this effect can stack up to four times. Exiting Attack damage increases by 60%.

How to Get Echoes

As previously mentioned, you can farm Echoes by killing monsters in the overworld. You won’t always get an Echo drop or a high rarity drop, but it’s something you can do every day. If you run out of monsters, you can join a friend’s world and keep going. This is a nice way to incentivize co-op play in Wuthering Waves.

Lastly, if you don’t want to mindlessly farm monsters every day, you can enter a Tacet Field (unlocked at UL 19). This dungeon will give you Echoes, Echo EXP, and Tuners in exchange for spending stamina.

In the early game, it’s not advised to do this as you want to raise your data bank level and use stamina for other materials. Leveling up your characters, weapons, and skills will take priority until you reach the endgame.

Data Bank

As you collect Echoes, you’ll start leveling up your Data Bank. This is essentially like an Echo completion tracker. As you find more unique or different rarity Echoes, you’ll level up the Data Bank.

Depending on the level of your Data Bank, you’ll have increased odds of finding Echoes, higher rarity Echoes, and Cost Limit.

Echo Drop Rate:
Echo drop rate starts out at 10% and increases to a maximum of 20% at Data Dock Level 10.
Enhanced Absorption Probability:
Everyday, you get a bonus to your Echo drop rate for a limited number of monster kills.
Max absorbable Rarity:
At level 1, you will only be able to find Rank 2 Echoes (Green). As you level up, your Max will increase, up to Rank 5 (Gold) at level 15.
Cost Limit:
Starts out at 10. At Data Dock level 9, this increases to 12.

Note: Your Max absorbable Rarity also increases the floor of your Echoes. You will only absorb 2 rarities of Echoes, your max absorbable and one tier below. So if you’re at Data Dock level 15, you will only absorb Purple and Gold Echoes.

Reaching Data Dock level 15 is an important milestone for progression. This unlocks Gold Echoes which are the highest rarity. At level 15, you’ll have a 30% chance of finding Gold Echoes (with 20% Drop Rate) and a 70% of finding Purple ones. As you level up more, the odds of finding Gold Echoes will increase.

Echo Pity

This mechanic is not explained in game, but there is actually a pity system when it comes to Echo drops. Normally, Echoes drop at a 20% rate, and this is the max even at Data Bank level 20.

However, there is actually a pity system. Depending on the tier of monster, you will guarantee an Echo drop if you don’t find one within a certain amount of tries.

Elite – 4 Pity
Boss (Calamity/Overlord) – 2 Pity

This means that you’re guaranteed to drop a Boss Echo every other run. Note that Calamity and Overlord Bosses do not share pity. Echoes of different classes do not share Pity either.

With this strategy, you can target farm specific Boss/Elite Echoes to farm the Echoes you want. Boss Echoes correspond to different Sonata Sets, and Elite Echoes have specific Sonatas as well. You can always check your Data Bank to see which Echoes to target.

For example, if I want to farm a specific Elite Echo, I can go around killing other Elites I don’t need until I kill 3 without a drop. I then track down the Elite I want and guarantee an Echo drop.

How to Upgrade Echoes

When you first acquire an Echo, it will be level 1 without any Substats unlocked. By spending stamina on the Tacet Field Cleanup mode, you’ll get rewards including Sealed Tubes, Tuners, and random Echoes. Make sure to enter Tacet Field with the Echo Sets you want.

Tuners are what you will use to level your Echoes. When you have extra Echoes you don’t want, you can’t use them to upgrade other Echoes, you’ll need specific EXP material, the Sealed Tubes.

You can, however, feed leveled up Echoes to other Echoes. When doing this, you’ll gain 75% of the experience used on the leveled up Echo.

Tuners will be how you unlock Substats on your Echoes. Substats have a level requirement, in intervals of 5. For example, you can unlock Substats on a Gold Echo at level 5, 10, 15, 20, and 25.

When you feed an Echo to another one, you’ll be refunded some of the Tuners used as well.

You will also find Tubes and Tuners throughout the world as you explore. This will help you level up Echoes without Stamina in the early/mid game. Once these resources dry up, you’ll need to spend your Stamina on Tacet Fields to upgrade more Echoes.

How to Maximize your Resources

When it comes to gacha games, resource management is a key factor when you want to progress efficiently. If you level up or tune Echoes too early, you might put yourself behind.

When upgrading Echoes, you want to identify a few key things.

Which Sonata Set do I want for a character? (Glacio, Fusion, etc)
What Cost Curve will I use? (4,3,3,1,1)
What Main Stats do I want on each Echo? (Crit Rate, Energy Recharge, etc)
What Substats do I want on each Echo? (ATK, Crit Rate, Crit Damage, etc)

Baseline Echoes

Let’s take a look at Jiyan for example. He will be the first Event Character in Wuthering Waves, and is an Aero Broadblade Resonator. His kit also utilizes Heavy Attack DMG for a large portion of his damage.

Instead of trying to get perfect Echoes, you instead want to simply aim for a baseline that will be strong enough to tackle harder content. This gives you more resources to build up other characters for your team or other teams.

In general, you want to simply aim for 3 things. In the case of Jiyan, we can use these:

Set: Sierra Gale
Costs: 4,3,3,1,1
Main Stat: Boss Echo (Crit Rate/Crit DMG), Elites (Aero DMG), Common (ATK%)

Once you find 5 Echoes that matches these requirements, you can then level them up to get stronger Main Stat and Secondary Main Stat bonuses.

After this, unlocking your Substats will be a bonus on top of what you already have. If you don’t get offensive Substats, don’t worry too much. You can always keep trying in the future.

But in the beginning of the game, don’t spend too many resources on perfecting one character. You can throw this advice out the window if all you want to do is maximize one character’s potential. This is just advice to build up more characters and progress through the game more efficiently.

Upgrading Purple Echoes

In general, you never want to level up Green or Blue Rarity Echoes. You’ll move past these into Purple and Gold fairly quickly, and you’ll lose out on EXP materials if you do.

When it comes to Purple Echoes, it’s a bit situational.

If you want to absolutely min max, you can play the game without upgrading any purple Echoes. Wait until your Data Bank reaches level 15 and farm Gold Echoes. This ensures that you don’t waste any EXP when going from Purple to Gold.

However, it’s also completely fine to level up Purple Echoes a little bit if you want to just take your time and enjoy the game. Just don’t pour everything into leveling up Purple Echoes. Maybe pick one character and stop at level 10/15 instead of going to 20.

You get a lot of Purple Tuners from exploring the world, so feel free to use those as you see fit. Once you reach Gold tier, your Purple Tuners become useless. (Unless something is added in the future)

Farming Endgame Echoes

As mentioned previously, farming Boss echoes is extremely easy. Once your Data Bank is at least level 15, you just need to spam Boss fights until you get a Gold Boss Echo with the Main Stat you want. (Usually Crit Rate)

For Elites, you can use a similar Pity strategy by farming Elites you don’t need until you hit Pity, and then target the Echo you actually want.

When it comes to Elites, you usually will target Attribute DMG% for your specific character. (Aero for Jiyan, Havoc for Danjin, etc)

For Common Echoes, getting ATK% Main Stat for your DPS is ideal, but not of the utmost importance. Common Echoes are fairly easy to farm as they are more common, and the Main Stat pool is smaller, meaning you’ll get your ATK% Main Stat much easier than for Elites.

Once you get your set, you can level them up and start unlocked Substats.

Note: Taoqi and Yuanwu are DEF scaling characters rather than ATK scaling.

Support Echoes

When it comes to your support characters, your Echo levels/stats are less important. For example, you’re better off upgrading your Jiyan Echoes compared to Verina.

Depending on your team, you will have different characters in the DPS and Support role. As a general guideline, you can leave your Support Echoes behind while you focus on your DPS.

Once you have your DPS at a good point, you can then start allocating resources to your Supports. Supports generally provide value through things like Skills, Liberations, Outro Skills, etc. As such, Echo levels/stats are less important.

Thanks for Reading! Be sure to check out our other Wuthering Waves Guides or our Wuthering Waves Tier List.

Wuthering Waves Beginner Guides