How to earn zen

Income in Zaikan has two halves. The first is the zen that drops from monsters, which is steady and depends only on where you are hunting. The second is selling to NPCs, which is irregular but pays far more per item: a single right piece is worth more than a full hour of ground zen.

• 50%of kills drop zen
• 1/3of the buy price is what a sale pays
• 76monster level where jewels start dropping
• 30%chance of an item dropping per kill

The monster zen math

The zen that hits the ground is not a value registered per creature. It is derived from the experience that kill gave, and that is why a monster that gives more experience gives more zen, with no exceptions.

zen dropped = (experience gained on the kill + 7) × zen rate
Money group roll: 50% chance per kill

monster base experience (before any rate):
  1.25 × [ (level + 25) × level / 3 ]
  plus, if level >= 65:  1.25 × [ (level − 64) × level / 4 ]

The table below is the base experience per monster level, before the server rates. Use it as a relative ruler: a level 275 monster yields about fifteen times what a level 40 one yields, both in experience and in zen.

What is worth selling

This is the difference between farming and making money. Some items have a fixed reference value in the price calculator, far above what their size suggests. A sale always pays one third of the buy price.

Three new items joined the list of what you do not sell, no matter how low the NPC price is. The Gemstone sells for 6,200 and is the door to the whole harmony and socket systems; the three Fenrir materials, which drop in Crywolf, are consumed by the hundreds by the mount recipe. An item that is cheap at the NPC and expensive in farming time is always an item to keep.

The Jewel of Chaos also changed status. It carried a monster level 66 cap in its definition, while the global jewel group only starts at 76, and the two conditions excluded each other: it dropped nowhere. The cap was removed, and since it is an ingredient in almost every Chaos Machine recipe, its price in player trading should come down as more people farm above 76.

Income by level range

1. 1 to 20
   You do not need zen yet

   A small potion costs 80 and what you kill pays for it. Do not spend time trying to get rich here.

2. 20 to 75
   Silver Medal

   Drops at 0.5% on any map, as long as the monster is between level 20 and 75. When opened, 80% of the time it gives equipment between +4 and +7, and 20% gives 50,000 zen. It is the first real income.

3. 45 to 110
   Gold Medal

   Drops at 0.2%, with equipment between +7 and +9 in 80% of cases and 150,000 zen in the other 20%. The pool includes pieces of drop level 61 to 105.

4. 76 onward
   Tarkan opens the jewel tap

   The global jewel group only applies from monster level 76 on, and the Bloody Wolf in Tarkan, level 76, is the first monster in the game that can drop one. This is where income changes tier.

5. 96 and 102
   Spirit

   The raven summoning item drops at 0.1% on monsters level 96 or higher, and the horse one at 0.1% on monsters level 102 or higher. They sell for 5,000,000 and 10,000,000. It is the biggest single prize of the mid game.

6. 120 onward
   Barracks of Balgass and Icarus

   Flame of Condor at 0.1% in Balgass's barracks sells for 1,000,000; the Icarus feather at level 1 sells for 2,500,000. Both are exclusive drops of those maps.

Common items pay too

The global Random Item group has a 30% chance per kill and picks a piece with a drop level inside a window of twelve levels below the monster. It comes out with the refining calculated from the level difference, and it can come with luck and an additional option. None of that is rare: it is what fills up your inventory.

refining of the dropped item = (monster level − item drop level) / 3

additional option: up to +16 (the roll cap is at 4)
skill on the item: 50% when the item accepts a skill

Since the price grows with the cube of the drop level, a high tier piece with luck and an additional option is worth much more than several low tier pieces. In practice, the rule of thumb is: carry what has options, leave the rest.

What is not worth it

• ZenCaps, repairs and the cost of what you always pay for.
• Farming spotsWhere the points marked on the minimap are.
• Endgame farming routesAfter total level 800.