Genshin Impact | 5.2 Special Program

[Dragon Lord]

So the Chile re-re-run banner has been officially revealed. It will include Chongyun, Ningguang and Yanfei as the 4*s. This was already an easy skip for me, but it's made even easier by the fact that I already have Chongyun and Ning at C6 and I don't care about Yanfei in the slightest, so I'm in no need of her constellations at all.

The weapon banner will feature the new 5* bow for Childe, Polar Star, and the 5* Catalyst Memory of Dust (BiS weapon for Ningguang, I guess). Nothing too interesting here either, another easy skip. While I am considering building my Ningguang, it's solely to be an energy battery for Noelle, so I'll want to run her with something like Favonius Codex instead.

Two new characters were also revealed, Arataki Itto and Gorou, both Geo element. But I'm not going to go into details about them because I don't give two shits about either of them. Itto's design is garbage and Gorou is a trash dogboy (we need more catgirls MiHoYo, not males).

In conclusion: Easy three more weeks of Primo saving to take the C6 dive on Hu Tao when she re-runs in a few weeks. I'm up to like 85 pulls saved up so far, so I can at least guarantee a 5* pull. Though I'd have to win the 50/50, which is where things get sad. With more event and such in the next few weeks to help pad those numbers, I can hopefully guarantee at least 180 pulls by the time her banner comes. So that would mean I'd "only" have to pay to get four copies of her, instead of all five. Of course I could just get lucky and get 5 copies of her in one 10-pull (think I'd literally shit myself if I saw that happen).

In random news: Once I complete my Inazuma reputation quests for this week, I'll finally have my hands on those purple wings for my Keqing, Raiden and Fischl to look good in.

Speaking of Keqing, I'm really happy with how mine is turning out. She's sitting at a pretty nice 80% Crit Rate and 214.2% Crit DMG bonus. Crit DMG could be a little better, but I feel like that's pretty decent for now. My Crit Rate might actually be a little higher than it really needs to be, but oh well. Probably could go with like 70% Crit Rate and 250-300% Crit Damage for a more optimal build.

I could also run Mistsplitter on Keqing instead and switch to a Crit Rate headpiece instead of damage, but I don't want to have to keep switching my Mistplitter between Ayaka and Keqing (especially if I plan to run them together in a domain for friendship exp), so that's why I decided just to go with Jade Cutter on Keqing. It's good enough and she's pumping out some decent damage with it. Granted she's never going to do GREAT damage compared to what I'm used to seeing with Ganyu, Hu Tao, Ayaka and now Raiden, but she's matching my Yoimiya's damage (both without reactions -- with Overload spam, Yoimiya wins).

Biggest problem I'm having with Keqing right now is finding a good team comp with her. I thought that maybe Electrocharged set-up with Xinqui would work out well, but Electrocharged is such a butts reaction. The damage is so bad, though that's mainly because of the stupid way that electro reactions work to begin with. MiHoYo really needs to give Electro a very nice re-work so that it can actually compete with Pyro/Cryo. Even Hydro, in the case of Childe.

I'm having fun with her though. Glad to finally have her to a point where I can do respectable enough damage that using her isn't a huge disadvantage. I don't see myself bringing her into the Abyss ever, but she's really fun for Overworld/Domains.

Also just for fun, and to maybe spark some more discussion about the game, here's a list of my current goals in Genshin that I'm working towards:

-Continuing to farm for good artifacts for Raiden and Yoimiya. Coincidentally, Burst Support Xiangling also wants the Energy Recharge set that Raiden wants, so I can farm for both of them at the same time.
-Actually get my ass working on fishing so I can get the R5 Catch for Xiangling.
-Working on ascending Noelle to level 80.
-Working on farming Talent Books for Hu Tao so I can triple crown her.
-Considering triple crowning Ganyu as well, so may need to farm for Talent Books for her as well.
-Build support Ningguang to be an energy battery for Noelle.

Those are the immediate goals. Since we're in a re-run stretch, where we might have back-to-back re-runs, I can start to focus more on building up my current characters more and worry less about what I need for future characters. However, I may end up wanting to build Thoma after all. I was fully intent on having him just sit on my bench permanently, but apparently he's going to be a shielder, and I've read rumors that his shielding capabilities are going to be comparable, though maybe not quite as OP, as Zhongli's. If this turns out to be true, this turns Thoma into the PERFECT supporter for Hu Tao. She wants a shield, plus she wants the Pyro Resonance bonus. The only problem? None of the other Pyro characters really work well with her. Bennett heals, which is bad for Hu, and Xiangling steals Vaporize procs (learned that the hard way). Klee/Diluc/Yanfei are bad pairings because they all want to be on the field DPSing as well. Amber is... well, Amber. So if Thoma ends up having a pretty potent shield, then he gives Hu Tao a shield AND is her Pyro Resonance buddy. This way instead of running Hu Tao/Zhongli/Xinqui/PyroResBot, we get to merge the two into one, and can run Hu Tao/Thoma/Xinqui/Filler. Filler spot probably best filled by an Anemo character so that we can make use of the Pyro debuff from the 4pc VV set. Kazuha would likely be the best for this spot. I cry every time I realize he'd be the best Anemo for so many of my teams, and I was stupid enough to skip him. Sucrose would probably be second best for this team, since she would not only proc the VV debuff, but C6 Sucrose will also pass a ton of her EM to the rest of the team, making those Vaporize hits from Hu Tao even better. Gonna have to test her as an option with Hu now, at least until the day finally comes that Kazuha gets a re-run.

[Mr EliteL]

I'm still skipping Childe's banner on both my accounts. I...could've actually used his banner on my PC version but I went and got Kokomi instead, mainly because I was fishing for just a C1 Beidou but after 60 pulls all I got were FIVE Xingqiu and a Noelle. Just makes me hate Xingqiu so much more now, I don't care how vital he can be in comps, just fuck him. He's appeared at least 15 times across my PC & PS4 now. When my other characters who I have at C6 on PS4 I'm fine with the Starglitter/Stardust you get but now if he shows up again I'll be "I DON'T WANT YOU OR YOUR STAR CRAP!"
To put it into perspective I got Beidou and Rosaria back in July I think, they were both on Kokomi's banner yet still remain at C0 while Xingqiu is my best constellation at C4 now. Noelle I was happy with because she can heal properly at C1. I did a single pull after all that and then got Kokomi. Yeah I could've saved that single pull for Childe so I can have a bow user other than Amber and he'd be a good character out of what I have, but darn it I felt sorry for what's been going on with Kokomi. I may have Qiqi as healer, but been finding Kokomi good still for my team for healing and AoE Hydro applying. Yes, I'm going to be stubborn and not use Xingqiu on this account.

I was finding it hard in the game as I was trying to build too many characters when I should've focused on only four like I did in my PS4 to get far into the game as there I was doing Barbara/Ganyu/Klee/Keqing. All were built poorly except Ganyu sort of as she had Amos' Bow plus her C0 is crazy, but they got me through a crap ton of stuff. For PC I'm aiming to do the same type of team with Hydro/Pyro/Cryo/Electro, so far it's Kokomi as Hydro and Beidou as Electro. Either Xiangling for Pyro or Amber but I'd rather not, although not having a bow/projectile is painfully obvious, (Yanfei takes Noctilous Jade from Beidou so she's out for now but good for a second team in Abyss for later). Either Kaeya or Rosaria for Cryo, although I do wish I had Diona, she's fill bow, healer and Cryo easily. I did receive Keqing in the Permanent Wish banner, but that was after I went in with Beidou. She'd fill the projectile role at least, but now that's for at least the second team I'll have. Xiangling would be good for her that team then, but have to decide if she'll be on my A team right now.

I have completed Chapter 1 in Liyue and have Dainsleif's Prelude and the Reunited chapter before I can go to Inazuma, so I can start building Kokomi then. Although the amount other quests I have to do is insane.

OK to my mostly up to speed main account now. Itto with Claymore who I assume is 5-star, Gorou with bow as 4-star. Gorou is an easy skip, Itto likely too for me. I don't mind his design, it's certainly out there but I can live with it. Main thing I'm interested in is will he have a bigger body type as the other tall playable male characters, Baizhou included, have lean types and Itto is obviously not lean.

I need to go back to my Keqing too, that's in the long list of stuff I want to get done at some point. Holy shit, my characters' Crit DMG is so poor, Mona's my best at 150%, and she's not fully built yet. Although to be honest I haven't noticed a good CRIT DMG artifact yet, or I got rid 'em before I realised they could have potential. That's another thing I need to do, farm a hell of a lot of more artifacts. Think my highest damage has been in the 60k's, possibly 70's. Nothing higher than that yet. So yeah I'll write a list, probably not full but from the top of my head...

-Farm for better artifacts overall (more CRIT DMG's plz)
-Farm for talent items (used characters vary 5-9 not including constellations, so more on them will be great)
-Farm for Hu Tao stuff
-Build Jean & Sucrose more
-Build Xingqiu, at least get Mona to 80 ascended before that
-Finish 20'ing Eula, Yoimiya, Raiden, Klee, Noelle, Diona, Keqing, Fischl, Mona, Xinagling's artifacts; sort out with better artifacts after or during (Yoimiya needs one more, but it's HP Circlet as I was using whatever I had at the time so need a better one)
-Get Zhongli at least two Millelith artifacts, preferably on Timepiece and Flower, maybe a better Geo DMG Bonus artifact (my Zhongli's only 35k)
-R5 Whiteblind, 2 more to go
-Inazuma Reputation, Sacred Sakura tree, more exploration
-Perhaps fish for Catch too

Yeah I was wondering if Thoma would be good for Hu Tao. Maybe that's why they put him in her banner for those who don't have Zhongli. I can put him in another team then, as I assume getting C6 Thoma will be easy. Sitting at 16 Pity, currently have 22 Fates with 72 more from primos at the moment. At best I'll have 40 pity after I get to 70, plus whatever I can get added on in-game first before I have to look at Crystal Top-Ups. Will probably do that on the week of 15th November if I can hold on that long. Fingers crossed I can get C1 Hu Tao before I do Top-Ups for Staff Of Homa, and not losing 50/50's. Oh man, really don't want to lose any of the 4. Hopefully the length of time since I last pulled helps.

[Dragon Lord]

I'll be able to get C6 Thoma in my quest for C6 Hu Tao, so that's something I know will happen. Hopefully his constellations will add to his shield strength. I haven't looked up any of the leaked information about him yet. I may look up what ascension materials he'll need, so I can have all of those prepped for when he releases so I can get him to level 80 right away. Unless he requires a new material from a new world boss that comes with his release, but I can prep everything else aside from that.

Since I got my Noelle to level 90 now (well, level 80, but last ascension unlocked), I've turned to going and farming the classic Anemo Hypostatis, for Sucrose. I'm really hoping that she proves to be a great pairing with Hu Tao in place of Kazuha. Unfortunately Venti doesn't seem to work too well, as Hu Tao seems to be one of the characters that suffers from his burst lifting the enemies too high into the air. So that leaves me with only Sucrose left for CC and VV shred.

I might also start to build Jean at some point, despite not liking her at all. I've never intended in building her/using her ever, but if Corrosion is going to become a normal part of future content in Genshin, then I'm going to need to think about building up some more healers, and Jean provides some utility outside of healing, so that makes her worth building a little more than Barbara or Qiqi.

I know there's a new enemy in the 2.2 update that applies corrosion, but I don't expect them to be a huge threat. At least not until they get added into the Abyss, which I'm fully expecting them to make an appearance on Floor 12 once the current Abyss changes to the new one.

You definitely want to fish for The Catch if you plan on building Xiangling at all (she's very much worth it). It's by far her BiS weapon right now due to the Burst Damage increase, and you also want the Emblem set for her for the Energy Recharge increase + increased burst damage as well. She was already an insane character, but the addition of The Catch + the Emblem artifact set has made her even more insane. I can't wait to have her built up so I can start running some interesting team comps with her.

I haven't played the 2.2 update yet, so I can't comment on any of that stuff right now. I'll post my opinions on it once I get on and explore the new island some.

EDIT: OH MY GOD THEY MADE IT SO YOU CAN RAPIDLY PICK UP ITEMS. At least on PS5, not sure about PS4. But this is one thing I've wanted on PlayStation Genshin for so long! PC/Mobile players have always been able to rapidly pick up a group of items, while we on PlayStation have always had that annoying 2-3 second delay between every pick-up (especially annoying when you have a pile of 5+ loots to pick up). This might be a very small QoL update for us, but god damn does it make me happy to be able to pick up multiple items in 2 seconds flat.

[Mr EliteL]

Hmm, I suppose I'll get The Catch for her and get that Emblem set too. Mine's still at 79, she's the next Pyro character I want to get up there. Oh yeah I've been slacking on Bennett so need to farm for him too, damn forgot about that. Especially now with Corrosion being more of a thing now. I don't want a team of healers but having a good pool to choose between and have up to perhaps two on a time will be fine when I have to deal with Corrosion. Ah that reminds me I got Floor 11 & 12 to try as I finally got full stars on Floor 9 & 10 earlier, just haven't got round to the other two yet as I only got 1 star or less for Floor 11 last time.

Only played briefly on both yesterday so haven't noticed that change yet, but better pick up speed sounds good. Will see later today.

Also didn't realise I was getting Aloy from her event on the PC version, so that's good for me, she can take the bow and Cryo slot I've been needing....but I have to get Inazuma for her level ascension and farm Cryo Hypostasis for her, so she won't be helpful just yet. I'll use her like Yoimiya since I got Rust, as my PS4 Yoimiya uses that.

[Moonface]

So I've been thinking on this for a bit now and figured I'll just ask:

How difficult would it be for a player to get into the game if they started now? Like would it be harder to get certain things compared to an earlier point in the game? I just wonder because I know things like events and banners are rotated out or time sensitive, and a good part of the game involves getting characters and weapons but I wonder if that gets harder over time if you start from scratch or not.

[Dragon Lord]

I think the hardest part of starting the game now is that any new characters that come out are going to have their upgrade materials locked in Inazuma, and you have to go through the entire story of Mondstadt and Liyue, plus some other story events, before you can even step foot into Inazuma. So if someone was to start the game now, you'd be stuck to using the standard characters in the early-game until you progress far enough.

Re-run banners would be the only chance someone would have of getting a character they could upgrade earlier in the game, such as the current Childe re-run banner or the upcoming Hu Tao re-run banner, both of whom have all of their upgrade materials located in Liyue.

There's definitely a lot of lost resources from missing out on the various events throughout the first year of the game. The biggest one being the Crowns of Insight that a player would have missed out on (7 or 8 of them), which are used to upgrading a character's talent from level 9 to level 10. Anything else that came from events can mostly be earned via farming (talent books, exp books, upgrade materials, weapon enhancement materials, etc.). Primogems and the Crowns of Insights being the only major things that someone would have missed out on.

It'd be hard to get any of the previous limited characters as well. For example, if someone just started now, and they really wanted Klee, they'd be waiting a long time. Klee had her re-run back in July, and it's very unlikely we see another re-run for her any time soon. Same goes for Zhongli and Venti, who had their re-runs this past year as well. Though Zhongli would probably get a re-run sooner than others due to his overwhelming popularity. There's still characters waiting for their re-runs as well, with no sign of them coming any time soon. So I suppose the biggest problem would be if you really wanted a past limited character, with no knowing if they'll be getting a re-run any time soon.

Other than that, if you wanted to get into the game, just keep in mind that not intending to spend any money means it will take a little longer to collect resources and get characters leveled up/powered up. But if you just plan on playing a little bit every day and have no real desire to quickly get up to speed and tackle everything the game has to throw at you, then you'd be fine. Also as an added bonus, if you did want to speed up your character development a little bit, you can have players of higher world levels/adventurer ranks come into your world. So for example, if you were playing on the NA server, I could come into your game with my whale'd out characters and defeat the world bosses for you so you could get character ascension materials easier (granted you'd still be gated by the Resin limit).

One thing about gacha games to remember is that you're always going to feel lost/hopeless in the beginning, until you get a better understanding of how the game works, how upgrading characters/talents/weapons/etc. works, how weekly bosses and world bosses work. etc.. That's just something that happens in every Gacha game. The way to progress is always slower for F2P players as well, but Genshin isn't *too* bad in that regard. I've never spent money to refill my Resin so that I could farm more every day, and I'm still where I'm at. It's just a matter of time and remembering to have patience with how slow progress is going to feel in the beginning. The nice thing about Genshin is that you have so much world to explore when you're first starting out, that you don't really notice the slow grind forward. By the time you go around and explore a lot of the areas you have access to, you'll already be approaching Adventure Rank 35-40.

But yeah, if you're ever interesting in giving the game a try, let me know. I can fill you in on some details, give you some advice, and if you play long enough to unlock co-op, I can come in and do some stuff with you, granted you end up on the NA server. You'd have to choose the EU server to play with Elite, as sadly each region is locked to their own servers (Asia, EU and NA). I don't know how much lag there is for people in NA playing on the EU server, so I can't really give you any outlook on how that would work out for you, performance-wise. If playing on PlayStation, you're on whatever region your PlayStation is set to.

[Mr EliteL]

For anyone starting and want to be F2P, I'd recommend keeping to a team of 4 for a long time, but also having at least one character of each element on the bench that isn't on your team also levelled up alongside them. That will be Pyro, Cryo, Hydro, Electro, Geo and Anemo and you can get at least one of each quite quickly. Traveler (Anemo) you get at the start, Amber (Pyro), Kaeya (Cryo), Lisa (Electro) soon after, Noelle (Geo) from the Beginner Wish that you can easily earn 8 Fates for with the discount, and Barbara (Hydro) after getting to a certain point in the Prologue chapters. Even if you switch to another character of the same element you find better later, make sure you stick with them over the previous one and be mindful of ascension items, as some characters share the same item needed to ascend. Like say the Nectar from Whopperflowers, or Noctilucous Jade, as you may end up needing two lots for two characters each. Kinda how I did with Ganyu and Keqing on my PS4 where one character got stronger quicker than the other, and I was trying to level Rosaria/Lisa and Beidou/Yanfei that share items in my PC version.

Again keeping to one element character for F2P as I am, I thought being an experienced player I could juggle multiple characters but doing so started making me under leveled thus taking longer to complete things, and had to resort to low level domains to use up my daily Resin quickly. As I am focusing more on a set team, finding things better now, albeit still needing levelling up.

Also! Aloy is currently available on PC, not PS4/5 anymore as that was last patch so she is limited too. Unless there is something about her still available now or later I haven't come across yet.

[Dragon Lord]

Another very important thing to take note of is do NOT worry about artifact farming until you hit AR45. The AR45 levels of Artifact Domains are the only ones that guarantee at least one 5* Artifact every clear, and thus spending Resin on doing them prior to that is a complete waste.

Instead, focus on spending your Resin on:

-Weapon ascension material domains
-Talent book domains
-EXP book leylines
-World bosses
-Weekly bosses
-Mora leylines (though I'd put this as very low priority)

I'd also suggest rushing through the story as fast as you can to unlock the weekly bosses, as you will need their materials for upgrading talents to the upper levels, and you'll need a lot of them too. It's been over a year and I still do the first weekly bosses in the game for their materials, because I never feel like I can have enough of them (plus want to have that extra chance at a weapon prototype).

It'd be a lot easier with having a friend help you too. If you were to start the game, don't be ashamed of asking someone for help. Like if you played on NA server and asked me to come destroy a world boss you were struggling on. No one is going to judge you for that, especially since we know how annoying some of them can be in the beginning.

Also, I did it...



Triple crowned Hu Tao! Ready to get C6 and max her out completely! I do need to go back to farming the Crimson Witch domain a bit though, because since her C6 provides her with 100% Crit Rate when she falls below 25% HP, that means I can focus on stacking nothing but Crit DMG on my artifacts to maximum the pain I can dish out with her. So I need to change out my current circlet for a CRT DMG one.

Also I LOVE the Rift Hound enemies. They aren't particularly hard and their corrosion is weak, but man they look awesome and I love their attack animations (especially when the big ones do that teleport > slash with claws > teleport > slash with claws pattern). In terms of design, they are my favorite enemy in Genshin to date. I saw a leak that they will be in the next Abyss cycle on Floor 12, so we'll see how dangerous they might become then.

Speaking of leaks, there's been a couple of leaks about Itto's 5* Claymore and a new artifact set for him. Coincidentally (or not), it's looking like the Claymore and the set are both going to be the new best in slot for Noelle as well. Here's a pic of the Claymore if you want to check it out, Elite. Granted MiHoYo could change anything about this weapon by release, but if this is what the weapon actually is going to be, Whiteblind might not be her best any more. We might be able to put shiny 5* weapon on our adorable maid knight.



So CRIT DMG main stat, the FIRST CLAYMORE IN THE GAME WITH EITHER CRIT RATE OR DMG AS THE MAIN STAT! Also provides +20% DEF and turns 28% of DEF into more damage for normal and charged attacks. Also this is just at Refinement 1, so who knows how much these could go up by for Refinement 5.

Might still be worth holding onto the Whiteblind just incase it eeks out this weapon for Noelle with its higher DEF% main stat, but the fact that it's going to have much higher Base ATK + provide a much desirable main-stat in CRIT DMG, I'm thinking Noelle is going to look pretty nice with it.

I forgot what the new artifact set is supposed to do, but I remember it being something that Noelle might be able to make great use of. Of course we're going to have to wait for these items to actually come out and for people to test them on her to make sure, but it's pretty exciting to know that Noelle might be getting a nice boost in power via this new Claymore and that new artifact set.

[Mr EliteL]

Agreed for thinking about artifacts later, you get some as you go along anyway that can do as filler. They can be maxed out as 3-star or 4-star just to give you more oomph for the time being, but you should be getting tons of low level artifacts as rewards to level them up, plus others you don't need.

Ha, speaking of AR45, I reached that on PC yesterday but I'm still too weak for the next ascension so I'll do what I did earlier and let the EXP pile on as I build up my current team of Kokomi (artifacts only until I can do Inazuma, she may be Lv 40 un-ascended, but she still helps), Amber (yeah...I settled on her as Aloy is stuck on Lv 20), Rosaria and Beidou.

Well done on the Triple Crowning! Ah, I can't see the picture, but I assume it's looking good. My closest is Zhongli, although only intend to double crown him as Normal attacks aren't fully needed, although I do have him at 7 there as I do like to chain his charged attack when I can't be bothered with an enemy. So may just have him go to 9 eventually, save the crown for someone else. Kaeya or Ganyu are also closest, will be triple crowning them as my Kaeya is more towards physical, yes Eula will be better but I enjoy playing as him and I still use her too. Mad that I have four Cyro characters I use on rotation. Diona will be similar to Zhongli but won't bother at all with her Normal, I'll leave her at 6 for that, same with Xiangling. Ah man, I only have 10 Crowns at the moment, better fully plan who will get those for now. OK, I'll leave Kaeya at 9's, Yoimiya will get a Normal 10, Raiden and Ganyu I'll triple, Zhongli will get the two I want him to have, last one to whoever, possibly Eula, Noelle, Xiangling or Hu Tao....or I'll leave Zhongli at 9's and triple Hu. Need to find me some more Crowns then, noes!

I've yet to fight the larger Hounds, but they do sound and looked cool from the trailer. I'm wondering if there'll be a boss version of them kinda like how we got one for the Geovishaps, then Azhdaha on top, although we don't need a Weekly Boss version.

The claymore does sound promising, but will it be enough as the DEF stat on Whiteblind will be higher, although the CRIT DMG looks like it'll make up for it. My fingers are crossed, because that Claymore looks better visually than Whiteblind and the colours fit Noelle more than the blue. OK, that isn't all I care about but would look good for her, man if it turns out be true I might have to try and get it. Don't know how deep I'll go but if the R5 looks nuts, yikes. How I hope Noelle is one of the other two 4-stars that appear on Hu Tao's banner, need that last constellation for C6. Shouldn't be on Itto's as Gorou's likely to be there and there won't be 3 Geo's on a banner. That or Noelle turns up as I wish on Hu Tao and Staff of Homa, then I won't care.

[Dragon Lord]

There could be a chance that Gorou doesn't show up on Itto's banner. Nothing solid yet to prove it, but there is apparently an upcoming event weapon (sword) that is basically BiS for Albedo, and with Itto's kit looking like he wants to run a 4-geo team, I could very easily see 2.3 being Itto first banner and then Albedo re-run with Gorou on it for the second half.

Again, nothing set it stone on it, but with that sword coming, and the fact that Itto wants to run a full Geo team, and Albedo being one of the best Geo supports (especially for a mono Geo team), I could easily see them going that route. Albedo was one of the lower end earners during his first run, but running his re-run right after you release a new Geo 5* that everyone is going crazy for, that just so happens to want a full team of Geo support? Yeah, that's setting Albedo up for some success his second time around.

Albedo also pairs amazingly with Noelle, which makes me mad because I don't like him at all, but I want my Noelle to have the best of the best she can get.

As for further crowning, I'm going to triple Crown Ganyu and that's it. Then I'll just spread my Crowns to other characters depending on what they specialize in. Hu Tao and Ganyu are just two rare examples of characters who actually make use of all three of theirs. Might crown Zhong's shield (probably not his Burst though). Yoimiya I think I'm happy keeping at 9's. Might triple crown Ayaka too just because she's top 3 waifu.

After that I'll probably just save the rest of my crowns until I see what else I'll want to do with them. I do love that Inazuma has given us such a huge increase in Crowns, so that I can actually start using them and not feel like I risk wasting them. Hopefully MiHoYo keeps giving us ways to get lots of Crowns so we can continue to crown more freely then the first 9 months of the game.

[Dragon Lord]

So I want to bring up something we've never talked about before in here: Friendship levels.

Now, as we know, friendship levels don't do a damn thing outside of giving you a Namecard, but I've started to focus on friendship levels more now because of a lack of anything else to do. I ignored these for the longest time (could have all characters close to max if I hadn't by now), so I'm trying to make up time. For the longest time I just ran every domain with Ganyu and Hu Tao.

So, my current progress on friendship looks like this:

Max Friendship: Ganyu, Hu Tao, Keqing, Eula, Venti, Zhongli, Qiqi, Mona, Klee, Diona, Fischl, Xinqui, Bennett,

So yeah, not a whole lot of maxed friendship levels there. Here's the progress on everyone else currently:

Ayaka - LV9
Yoimiya - LV9
Barbara - LV8
Diluc - LV7
Xiangling - LV7
Sayu - LV6
Noelle - LV6
Amber - LV6
Raiden Shogun - LV5
Sucrose - LV5
Razor - LV4
Jean - LV2
Ningguang - LV1
Kaeya - LV1
Beidou - LV1
Lisa - LV1
Rosaria - LV1
Kujou Sara - LV1
Xinyan - LV1
Yanfei - LV1
Aloy - LV1

So yeah, not too hard to see what characters I've never touched, haha. I don't know if I'll ever actually work on Friendship level for Aloy, as she's absolute garbagio and I don't feel like wasting time on her. I could just slot her into a domain team and just run three characters with her just there for friendship EXP, but meh.

Yanfei and Xinyan are two other characters I'll never build, but will probably get Friendship on them eventually. I forget Xinyan exists 90% of the time though.

I wish Friendship levels meant more in this game. Most other gacha games I play, affection levels lead to stat increases. In Azur Lane, once you hit 100% affection with a character, you can Oath them (marry), and they get a 3% stat increase from that and their affection level cap increases to 200%, and once they hit 200%, the stat increase goes up to 6%, I believe.

In Arknights, Operators also get a stat increase once their Trust level hits 100%, but unlike in Azur Lane, it's not an increase to all of their stats. They just get an increase in a specific stat or stats. 6% stat increase in Azur Lane doesn't sound like much until you realize it's a 6% increase in every stat.

I really wish Genshin would do something like that. It'd give a much better reason to actually get Friendship levels on characters and would be a small boost to characters that every single player could get regardless of F2P or whale status. It also wouldn't be locked behind the most god-awful RNG you'll ever find in Artifacts. Maybe some day it'll be a change they'll implement into the game, though MiHoYo really doesn't seem like the type of company who is willing to give away any type of character power boosts away for free.

In other news, rumors are coming out that the weapon banner for the Hu Tao re-run will be Staff of Homa and Amos Bow. If this is true, that's an insane weapon banner. You have the best in slot weapons for both Hu Tao and Ganyu -- two of the game's most broken DPS characters -- on a single banner. I personally don't see this happening because that'd just be way too good of a banner. Unless they are planning on releasing a new weapon for Ganyu during her re-run. That's the only way this makes sense. I could see that happening regardless though. Ganyu is one of the 5* characters that lacks her own unique weapon, so I won't be surprised if she gets her own 5* bow on her re-run. Though she's already insanely broken with the Amos Bow, I can't imagine what she'd be like with a bow that was actually 100% designed around her abilities.

The fact that Venti and Childe both have gotten signature 5* weapons during their re-runs is probably a good sign that Ganyu may be receiving something as well. Zhongli, Hu Tao, Eula, Kazuha, Ayaka, Yoimiya, Raiden and Kokomi all launched alongside weapons tailor made for their kits. Itto will be launching alongside his signature weapon. That just leaves Ganyu, Xiao and Klee without their own signature weapons. Klee does have the 4* Dodoco Tales that released during the summer event, and Albedo will be getting a 4* weapon that only works for him during his re-run. Xiao does have the Primordial Jade Winged Spear, but that weapon was a launch weapon and not specifically made for him (just like Ganyu and Amos' Bow, which was also a launch weapon).

I hope to be able to chase R5 Staff of Homa along with C6 Hu Tao, so if the Amos' Bow really does show up on her banner, then I may walk away with R5 Amos' along with SoH.

As for 4* characters on Hu Tao's banner, we already know Thoma will be one of them, but I'm really hoping that Sayu will make an appearance already. didn't get C6 Sayu before and I really want her constellations, so being able to get C6 Hu Tao, C6 Thoma and C6 Sayu on the same banner would be pretty awesome. Though since MIHoYo knows Hu Tao + Thoma will sell well enough on their own, I expect the other two to be trashier 4*s like Barbara and Noelle (obviously Noelle can be good at C6, but before that she's pretty bad).

I know she was just recently on a banner, but I'd be okay with Rosaria making another appearance too. I'd like to C6 her at some point so I can build her up and try her with Ayaka/Ganyu. While I don't like Rosaria's character, I do like that her Burst gives CRIT Rate, and I'd like to test her out in some team comps to see what could happen. I haven't looked into what kind of team comps she's good in yet though. Maybe good with Eula/Raiden? She puts a Cryo field down, allowing Raiden's ESkill to proc Superconduct every time, and the Crit Rate boost for Rosaria's Burst would benefit Eula. Plus Eula gets even more CRIT Rate from Cryo Resonance. Which is good for her, because unlike Ganyu and Ayaka, Eula can't run a perma-freeze team that can potentially give her 100% Crit Rate.

So ideal banners for me:

Hu Tao/Thoma/Sayu/Rosaria
Staff of Homa/Amos' Bow

What will probably happen:

Hu Tao/Thoma/Barbara/Noelle
Staff of Homa/Vortex Vanquisher (Zhongli's signature weapon that isn't even good for him lmao)

[Mr EliteL]

Ah yeah, that's pretty much the reason why I haven't bothered bringing up Friendship, as it does basically nothing for gameplay. It serves a tiny purpose in Serenitea Pot where you can get extra dialogue options for them to talk about depending on their level, but that isn't much. I like the sound of stat boosts in Azur Lane and Arknights, which would be good for Genshin too to have something like that for more meaning to get Max Friendship. A name card and dialogue just isn't much at all for something that takes a good while to build up. Here's what I have;

Max: Barbara, Ganyu, Klee, Keqing, Zhongli, Kaeya (in order of who got there first, only for this level)
Lv 9: Raiden
Lv 8: Eula, Fischl, Xiangling
Lv 7: Yoimiya
Lv 6: Jean, Mona, Rosaria
Lv 5: Diona, Noelle, Sucrose, Ningguang, Xingqiu, Xinyan, Yanfei
Lv 4: Bennett, Amber, Aloy
Lv 3: Sara, Lisa, Beidou
Lv 2: Sayu, Razor
Lv 1: Chongyun

Level 7 and up plus Mona got there for genuine use, everyone else did get levels for use but they also spent time in Serenitea Pot and got some levels that way. I don't go in everyday to get the Friendship points so some might be higher if I did, plus used to swap characters in and out at times to get the points. Other than Chongyun who sits at the bottom who I've done nothing with, poor guy. I better give him some time in the Pot then. Otherwise Razor, Yanfei, Xinyan, Beidou, Xingqiu, Aloy and possibly Sara would all be down in Level 1 still. Jean, Ningguang, Rosaria, Amber, Sucrose and Noelle would be a little lower. Lisa and Sayu I haven't kept in the pot so are still quite low but they got there from use.

For the banner, oh man Amos' Bow being the other 5* weapon would be so ideal for the 50/50, so I won't be mad at losing it. Would probably make me consider putting more in to get at least another rank on mine if I'm lucky to get the two SoH I want out first. For the two 4* characters, I'm not that bothered, I just bloody hope there's no Xingqiu even if that'll be good for other players who might not have enough constellations on him. Did say I'd like Noelle to get her final C6 so a pretty much guarantee of her would be great. Fischl would be nice too, only got C4 on her but a Hydro character taking a slot is likely. But I have C6 Barbara and Xingqiu, dang it!
I wish you got the constellations I got for Sayu, since I have all six but can't use her when I have Jean and Sucrose who want to ascend past 80 and slowly getting the Anemo Gemstone for them. Attempting to do Sayu too when I have little Resin to go around for everything I'm trying to get is too much. As much as I do like Sayu and feel bad she's ascended only three times.

Ah, that's something I saw someone think about in a post on Reddit or YouTube, can't remember where. If there'll be a banner for older characters who've been a part of the available roster to appear for them, also could have reruns for the older 5*'s, and then the normal limited banner for the newer characters, which still has the chance of old 4*'s appearing as featured there too of course. Yes there's the permanent one, but that gets filled up with the new 4*'s but then there's less chance of pulling the one you actually want constellations for, so all you can do is hope for them to finally be featured, or waste Primos on the Fates that banner takes when you really shouldn't.

I still haven't done much on Tsurumi Island, did start the Labyrinth event, the story part I can do without but am enjoying the actual Labyrinth itself, even with it's random traps you need to avoid, don't mind keeping an eye out instead of simply wandering around to the next battle section. Also kinda like the "Support" team you bring in, basically just have them to swap out. I at first thought you need characters you usually use as a Support in a team comp to be there, but nah you can have other DPS to take over if one takes too much damage/status ailments. It's easy to avoid selecting the cursed seals too, I just did it to see what happens, but it meant benching my Ganyu for the rest of the floor so I know not to do that again.

[Dragon Lord]

Yeah, being able to get friendship passively in the Teapot has been one of the few things it's actually been good for. It's made getting several of my girls to level 10 a lot quicker. Almost have Ayaka there, probably tomorrow or Thursday.

I really need to start working on building my Sucrose. She's the one Anemo character I have right now that will pair up best with Hu Tao (doesn't heal like Jean + passives a part of her EM on to Hu Tao which makes her Vapes stronger). While I do love me my Sayu, she just doesn't do what I need her to do for Hu Tao. If I decide to pull Xiao during his re-run though, I might pair her up with him. That might make for a decent double Anemo pairing.

I haven't touched the new event much yet, so I need to get around to doing that. I did go through and get Perfect scores on all of the songs in the rhythm mini game. There was absolutely no point it doing it, but I just felt like doing it for fun. Glad they made the songs a little more challenging on Professional this time around. They actually had some note patterns that were able to trip you up pretty easily.

Man, this Childe banner feels like it's been running for two years already. I just want it to be over already so I can sink my life savings into best girl Hu Tao.

[Mr EliteL]

My Raiden is about to reach Level 10 soon too, I usually change my namecard briefly to the new one I aquire so it'll be good to use her's for a while. I'm kinda surprised my Yoimiya isn't at least 8 yet for how much I do use her, but I suppose swapping the team I use in overworld fights and such is the reason why.

In the new event the Hounds actually destroyed me. The 3rd Labyrinth on it's Floor 2, I usually go Dire and had them come up three times, not in a row as I chose my first Serious option when all four of my team were in red life and had a breather with Pyro Slimes. I thought surely there'll be heals coming up soon as I had no healer on and had Barbara on the Support team of two (the other was Kaeya in case I needed to swap someone out), as I was doing the team no more than 6 challenge. I just went Dire on the next room and yep, a third full group of hounds. The first group of hounds were only the small ones with other enemies, second had both of them then I tried, but nope they got me. I should've attempted to dodge more in the rooms before, but now I know to focus more when they appear, or have a healer on board, which I shall do today!

Does feel longer than it should be, but I still need to do the two Hangout Events for Primos, get more Primos from the event and Tsurumi Island, and I should be good. I estimate I need at least two of the 6480 Crystal pack and one 3280 pack and I should have enough afterwards, might try to hold out on any events during Hu Tao's banner for their Primogems too.

[Dragon Lord]

I finally did the first stage of the event and man this event is fun. I love just having a huge dungeon I can go in, no timer, and I can just go apeshit with Hu Tao and destroy everything in my path. The game decided to throw me every passive that benefited Hu Tao as well (30% Pyro DMG, increased charged attack damage, decreased charged attack stamina, decreased sprinting stamina) and it just made it so she could end every fight in seconds.

I brought Bennett with me because I expected Rift Hounds, but none showed up on the first level. Gonna be hitting up the second level here, and then maybe the third. Might save that one for tomorrow though. Anyways, really enjoy having an event that doesn't have a timer on it. We need more combat events that aren't just the usual timed DPS checks.

I really should do the hangout events... I haven't done a single one of them since they came out. Now that they made it so you can see which options you've already chosen for the different endings, I should get around to them now.

My Primo savings are going good right now. I finished the questline for Tsurumi Island, so that added to my total a bit. Unfortunately not as my chests there as I would have liked, but oh well. The story was pretty interesting for that segment, I suppose. Right now I'm sitting on 34 Fates and 15K Primos. Still need to 9* floors 11 and 12 in this Abyss cycle, so that's 300 more Primos sitting there waiting for me. Then 4 more Fates and 680 more Primos once I buy the BP for this period as well.

Then of course we have monthly reset coming up, so that's 5 more Fates for the Stardust shop. So I should be at about... 17-18K Primos and 45-ish Fates by the time Hu Tao's banner comes out next week. Maybe a bit more Primos after finishing this current event + if I get my butt busy and start doing hangouts. Unfortunately I won't quite make it to that 180 pull mark I need for a guaranteed Hu Tao, but I'll be at around 150 or so. Maybe I'll get lucky and I'll hit a couple of early 5* pulls and they'll be 50/50 victories for a few Hu Tao dupes before I need to start spending, haha.

I've been pre-farming materials for Thoma as well. Very excited to see how well he pairs with Hu Tao. If I'm right in my thinking on him, he might let me finally build a Hu Tao dream team, allowing for Pyro shred via Sucrose's swirls + 4pc VV, Sucrose boosting Hu's EM, and then doing major Vape damage with Xinqui. My Hu Tao already hits 50-60K vapes with subpar artifacts and not VV shred, so it just makes me excited to see what I can accomplish with her after getting Thoma.

Also frees up Zhongli to go to another team, like an Eula or Yoimiya team, instead of being stuck with Hu Tao and then running Diona on anything else (she can go back to being just for the Ganyu/Ayaka perma-freeze team).

As a side note, apparently they buffed that Claymore I posted before. If true, and depending my how much, my thirst to have it for my Noelle grows even more.

BREAKING: Leaks have surfaced of the supposed Hu Tao and weapon banner!

Character banner: Hu Tao, Thoma, Sayu, Diona

Weapon banner: Staff of Homa, Elegy of the End

Damn, if this is true, then that's a great weapon banner for me still. I wanted Elegy for my Venti when it released with his re-run, but didn't have the funds to pull it. I'll gladly take a few of those while I'm (maybe) pulling for R5 Homa. Also SAYU!!!! I can C6 her along with Thoma if these are the actual banners! Hype.