It’s a tough world for newcomers who want to learn how to create a new character in Genshin Impact. Many guides are full of game jargon, and Reddit posts are often full of incomprehensible walls of mathematical calculations. You won’t find any of this here. Instead of focusing on one specific character, I will explain the general principles of equipping a new character, any new character, for combat.
This article was first published in Kotaku Australia on January 12, 2022. It has been rescheduled for weekend reading.
In most role-playing games, most of your stats come from leveling up a character with experience points. That’s not true in Genshin Impact, where more than half of your characters’ stats come from weapons and artifacts. If you don’t bother with the artifact system, your characters won’t reach their full potential. On the other hand, the artifact system allows players to have tons of personal customization, especially for different types of game styles.
You don’t really have to do a lot of damage to overcome most of the challenges in this game. This guide is designed to help you create reasonably decent characters without putting yourself too “in the weeds” to minimize the amount of damage.
How can I deal with large amounts of damage?
It depends on the character. Some characters (Eula) focus on simply hitting the enemy with as much physical damage as possible. Reaction-based characters (Mona, Xiangling) are designed to inflict staggering amounts of damage by combining fire attacks with water attacks. Supporting characters like Albedo only reach their full potential for damage when a different teammate activates their special ability.
Before building any characters, you should check their “Talents” in the character menu and find out where most of the damage comes from. Is it to combine your elemental skills with the ability of a different character (Bennett, Xingqiu)? Are they a “selfish” damage dealer that requires as much time as possible in the field (Razor, Xiao)? If you know in advance the main source of damage to a character, you can save a lot of time and waste resources.
A word of warning: no understanding of Genshin’s mathematics can completely replace how the characters work in the actual tests. Some of the best characters for the final content of the game have had a pre-release bug due to how their skills were seen on paper. If in doubt, check /[Character Name]Main subreddit or YouTube to see how fully created characters really work.
Elementary domains? Power recharge? What do all these words mean?
Screenshot: miHoYo / Kotaku
You can see all of your characters’ stats on the “Details” tab of the character’s screen.
All damage is affected by attack statistics, and the elemental damage bonus modifies the amount of elemental (non-physical) damage a character can inflict. The elementary domain (MS) is different. EM refers to the amount of damage that enemies do whenever an elemental reaction occurs. For example, hitting a Pyro enemy with a Hydro attack will cause a very damaging “Vaporization” reaction. When a “wet” enemy is hit by an electro attack, it causes the “Charge” reaction. The resulting damage is modified by the character’s MS whenever they initiate a reaction. If you’re playing with a Geo element character, ignore this statistic. The crystal shields they create are always inferior to the shields created by dedicated support characters.
The energy recharge determines how much energy is gained with each energy particle. Energy particles are generated when you attack enemies. You must completely fill the power bar for “Elemental Burst” before you can use a character’s final attack.
Attacks by some characters generate more energy than others. Supporting characters usually generate a lot of particles. Those who excel in this role are colloquially referred to as “batteries.” You can donate particles to a different member of your computer by changing them quickly before the particles are absorbed.
What weapon should I give my character?
Unless you spend money on gunfire, you’ll almost never have enough four-star weapons for each character. I usually give my characters what is not equipped. For the characters I usually use, I pay more attention to the main stats that each weapon gives than to the weapon’s abilities. This is because most four-star weapon abilities have little chance of activation or have a limit on how often they are activated. So I don’t take them into account so much in my decision making.
What artifact sets should I use?
At first, you can go out with the three-star artifacts you find in the world. But you should focus on raising your “global level” by completing various missions. When you’re at the highest levels in the world, the game allows you to get the best artifacts from various bosses and “Blessing Domains” challenges. As a result, it is more beneficial to save the artifact culture for when you are later in the game.
If you use at least two or four pieces of the same set, your character can benefit from special bonus effects. The Ocean-Hued clam set offers a 15% cure bonus when you have two pieces of the set. When you have four pieces, the set allows your healers to turn the excess damage into healing. Thus, four-piece artifact sets not only improve statistics, they can also improve specific aspects of a character’s style of play.
While four-piece combinations can be powerful, they are not preferred for all scenarios. Some players use two pieces of two different sets. This is usually the case when a character benefits from more stats, rather than the special ability given to him by a set of four pieces.
How do I select individual artifact pieces?
There are five types of artifacts: flower, feather, cup, sand, and circle. Remember that you always want a% stats, instead of a flat stats (% ATK is better than ATK).
Screenshot: miHoYo / Kotaku
Flower and feather: The main statistic of the flower will always be HP, while the feather will always be the attack. This means that you only need to focus on choosing an artifact with the best statistics in this set. If a particular set of artifacts is annoying to obtain (Viridescent Venerer), I will usually use the feather and flower to ensure the bonus of two pieces.
Circlet, Sands: These pieces must be chosen carefully, as the optimal main statistic depends a lot on the character’s style of play and how the damage is spelled. The% ATK is usually a safe bet for the sands, and the% ATK or% CRIT is usually decent for circles.
Panties: Cups are the only artifact that can give your character an elemental damage bonus. Because of how Genshin’s math works, most characters benefit from having a cup piece that matches their type of elemental damage. So don’t be embarrassed to give your characters an elementary cup piece from an unrelated set. In most cases, it can cause them more damage than a% ATK flat glass.
What statistics should I focus on?
For damage dealers, the main statistics are usually attack percentage, critical percentage, and critical damage. There are a few exceptions to this, most notably Arataki Itto. Your damage bonus increases with your defense stats, so you should increase your defense instead of your attack. Always read the detailed text before committing to weeks of grinding artifacts.
For the supporting characters, it depends on their role within the team. Sucrose wants elementary dominance so that its anemo element attacks can produce potent eddy reactions. Bennett wants a weapon with a high attack statistic as it affects the attack bonus he can bestow on his teammates.
If you don’t have a “battery” character to charge your damage dealer (“burst”) last as often as possible, it may be a good idea to give them a weapon with the “Power Recharge” statistic. . Yes, even team composition can affect the type of statistics you need.
What first-level talents do I have?
Again, this depends on the importance of the talents for a character’s team. DPS characters will always want to level their normal attack quickly. Support characters prefer their elemental ability and their elemental explosion (final attack). This also depends on how you want to use your character. If you want to use your support character as a DPS, you want to prioritize increasing your normal attack. If you want to use them for a specific support skill, you can expect to improve their offensive skills.
What is a good critical percentage for my DPS?
The consensus of the community seems to be around 65% or so. You can always have more, but it may be better to connect more points in attack or critical damage. Any point you invest in a statistic is a missed opportunity cost to increase a different statistic.
Can I create a “support” character as a DPS?
I believe a lot in playing the game the way you want. For a long time, I gave Zhongli a shield with a weapon that allowed him to use his final attack (“explosion”) as often as possible, simply because he thought the animation was bad. This is a valid way to play the game, even if it was not supported by goal.
However, here’s the caveat: You’ll need a lot more resources to create a support character as a DPS, compared to creating a DPS as a DPS. You will be crushing for much longer. Helping them deal a high amount of damage may also require pairing them with other well-constructed supporting characters. If you think it’s worth it, don’t let anyone stop you.
How can I build a healer? Can I hook them up with a% Cure Bonus Circle?
In my opinion, no. Here’s why: Most healing reduces a character’s HP or attack. Both stats also give the character some other benefit, such as damage or his ability to close. Unless you use a set of ocean-colored clams (where excess healing turns into damage), there is no benefit to healing above a certain …