|OT| Genshin Impact - Breath of the Elements

[Ascheroth]

Well, yesterday was an interesting day for my account. I did a little bit of wishing and then did a little bit more and ended up with these new characters;

Raiden Shogun C1
Kujou Sara C6
Chevreuse C5
Mona
Ningguang
Kuki Shinobu
Qingqiu
Fischl (from the starglitter store)
and Bennett went from C4 to C6.

At the pace I play the game it would take me months to level up these folks. Actually, aside from streamers who can play the game for 9 hours a day, it would probably take everyone months to do it. I know, I know... nobody actually does that. Nobody expects to be able to. I suspect that while all of these characters are varying degrees of good and useful, most people who have put time into the game have several 4-stars who are just gathering dust in the inventory so to speak. Kind of makes one step back and think about the whole game design purpose for them. From the developers' point of view, it obviously enables the gacha system. From the players' perspective, it enables more specific team combinations to achieve various outcomes and, as a secondary endeavor, I guess it keeps people busy as they work towards leveling/building them up. I still have to imagine that most people are not able to keep up

Anyway Raiden seems fun so far. I farmed The Catch R4 for her and I still need to do a bit of fishing to get to R5. Also need to do the domain to get some more of her talent level up materials. Not made any progress with Sumeru world quests yet. It seems like every quest is part of a long chain of quests to get through. I've just been doing the events in the game for the last couple of weeks. Will have to make time to get back to doing all the quest chains. Still have 140+ wishes left so I'll easily get to 160-170 by the time Nahida arrives. After that I have no idea who I'd want to get. It already feels overwhelming to try and gather materials to level up the 6-8 characters I'm doing right now and this is all before I even start farming for artifacts. I did consider ascending from AR35 to 45 sooner than Fontaine so that I could start farming for yellow artifacts but my friend also got Raiden (in one ten-pull!) yesterday and she doesn't have Inazuma unlocked yet. For now, she'll have to come to my world to get the materials to level her up (and fish for The Catch) so I'll stay at AR35 for a while longer so that she can join my world.

What are you guys upto in the game?

Yeah I definitely don't use or even have built every character. But that's fine. I do enjoy having a growing selection of "ingredients" for cooking up various teams though, especially when a new character comes around and I can think about how to play them with other characters I like.
Right now playing Navia/Furina/Charlotte/Miko for dailies and farming.

Otherwise I'm not doing much. I'm more or less caught up on everything other than a few world quests and Navia's quest, which I'll slowly milk for Encounter Points if necessary, otherwise it's just waiting for 4.4 which is gonna be very very chunky again by all accounts, and doing events.

That's a lot of characters! I definitely have way more characters than I will ever level or play. I stick to a core 8 or so, and even they are not fully leveled.

Right now I'm sort of just dialing it in with Genshin. I do my commissions, use my resin(usually), and then I'm done for the day. I'm always like this with Genshin though. When I get a new character that I'm really excited to use, or when there is a new AQ I am all in. Then I lose steam and just go through the motions. Right now, there aren't really even any characters I am looking forward to. I like Chiori's design, but geo makes me worry. Gaming has cool animations, but I'm not sure how good he'll be(plus 4 stars are the worst to pull for).

Gaming's gonna be free at C0 (unless you have another Liyue character you wanna pick up) and seems to be actually quite good. Might try and build him as well since he seems fun (and looks great).
If Chiori works with Navia I'll pick her up for sure since I'm having a blast with her. Turns out they can make Geo good if they want to!
I'm actually no longer sure I want to go for Xianyun/Cloud Retainer tho. Since I'd still want Chiori (potentially), Clorinde and Arlecchino and then we're already close to 5.0 with a potential avalanche of awesome new Natlan characters.

 

[Dandy]

Gaming's gonna be free at C0 (unless you have another Liyue character you wanna pick up) and seems to be actually quite good. Might try and build him as well since he seems fun (and looks great).
If Chiori works with Navia I'll pick her up for sure since I'm having a blast with her. Turns out they can make Geo good if they want to!
I'm actually no longer sure I want to go for Xianyun/Cloud Retainer tho. Since I'd still want Chiori (potentially), Clorinde and Arlecchino and then we're already close to 5.0 with a potential avalanche of awesome new Natlan characters.

I have no idea what Chiori does, but I just think she looks amazing! I hope she's not dependent on a geo team, cause I have very few geo units and none of them are leveled above 40. If she's going to require me to build 3 other units, I'll have to pass.

I think Xianyun looks really cool as well, but her kit doesn't appeal to me. I'm not really interested in Clorinde or Arlecchino(I get why people like her but she's not for me). So saving until Natlan might be what happens for me.

Or I might pull for Nahida. She's rumored to be with Gaming, I believe. I kinda hate her design/voice, but she's really strong and would bring a lot to my account.

I'm really looking forward to 4.4!

 

[Line]

Well, yesterday was an interesting day for my account. I did a little bit of wishing and then did a little bit more and ended up with these new characters;

Raiden Shogun C1
Kujou Sara C6
Chevreuse C5
Mona
Ningguang
Kuki Shinobu
Qingqiu
Fischl (from the starglitter store)
and Bennett went from C4 to C6.

Right, a little bit and then a little bit more of wishing
You just can't level everyone up in the game, even after years I have plenty of chars that are still half baked at best.
But sometimes I like to just really give it all to characters I like even if don't need them for anything.
Note that having multiple rosters of chars has one big issue: the artifacts. Yes they are annoying to farm, but you also end up collecting tons of "just in case" pieces of many different sets, and they end up taking a lot of room. I really hope they'll improve the systems at some point.

As for me, still the artifact mines for Neuvillette and Furina, now they do wear decent enough sets.
I'm more or less done with farming for Navia's stuff, but I'm waiting a bit before using her with her own team, I want to hear some beta feedback of Chiori to have a decent idea and that won't be until 4.4 releases at the very minimum.

Xianyun and Gaming I really don't know, I neither need her nor do I even remotely want to play anything plunge related, so that puts a lot of plans on hold. I don't know what the end numbers will be, maybe they will be very strong, but to me it sounds more like they're forcing the ultra niche archetypes on 5* too now (and arguably Shenhe was just that so maybe it runs in the family).
And I know people joke about Dehya's designers working on Xianyun, but I wonder if there might be some truth there, with some attempts to make different and very specific characters... and trying too hard to make bad things work.

Also, I'm completing some old moldy content that I've never done, I'm doing Ayato's quest. Talk about a fun character to play as that was utterly ruined by his design, his personality, his non-importance, and even his voice actor I don't think I like.
Phew, I think only Xiao is lower on my list, and that's saying something.

 

[Ascheroth]

As time goes on my initial Xianyun hype is definitely cooling off. I'm going to get Arlecchino and Clorinde for sure and am also interested in Chiori, and after those we're basically already in Natlan with another potential dozen candidates I could be interested in dropping.
I also don't really know where I'd put her anyway and as I just got Neuvillette, Furina and Navia in a row and I'm still getting my fill from them.
I suppose it will come down to how fun her trial is and how interesting whatever story we're getting with her is gonna be (I already like Cloud Retainer though, so I suppose she has a starting bonus).

Also Navia putting in work. Been a while since I bothered with Abyss 12. Not the biggest fan of that team for her, but it does the job.

 

[Ascheroth]

Really interesting stuff!

 

[Ascheroth]

Back from yesterday's concert. That was a cool experience!
They didn't really have many regional instruments (just a Guzheng) or an electric guitar, so a lot of it was either backing track or "imitated" via other instruments. A bunch of songs were a bit messy too, but overall they did a good job working under those constraints (would have been cooler if those didn't exist though xd) and the atmosphere was great. Conductor looked like he had the time of his life too, lol.

Also, very hyped for Lantern Rite and Chenyu Vale - it looks gorgeous.

Anyway, I'm off finally watching the Shanghai performance

 

[spindoctor]

Came across this really cute video from the event. The Chinese VA of Paimon humming the theme tunes for some of the characters


I think I've reached the part of Sumeru that everyone finds extremely tedious...

But to back it up a bit, one issue I've had with both Genshin and Star Rail is that I cannot understand why the main characters are not voice acted. They actually do hire voice actors for those roles and in the case of Star Rail they get about 2 lines of dialogue every patch. Why are all their other spoken lines silent? You can make the case that it's not as bad in Genshin because Paimon talks a lot but it's completely bizarre in Star Rail where every character is voice acted except the main character. The archon quest in Genshin being voice acted but world quests being silent is quite jarring while playing world quests. I don't mind reading text in RPGs but the contrast is too much to ignore. I can sort of understand if there were budgetary constraints when Mondstadt/Liyue first came out but they've earned billions since then and they can definitely afford full voice acting. Did you guys know that there are quite a few adult visual novels that release on Steam without voice acting because they're low budget productions but if they sell well enough the creators patch in voice acting later? Obviously there's a huge difference in the size of the script and the budget but still, respect to creators who reinvest into making their product better. Surely mihoyo can patch in voice acting for world quests if they wanted to.

So anyway, I'm now caught up in a multitude of silent world quests with seemingly endless parts and it's really draining my energy while playing the game. I understand that longer quests allow for more complex storytelling and richer world building but they should have paid some attention to the pacing of the quests as well. You think a quest is about to end and it gets extended. When it does end it goes right into another quest so it's not actually complete anyway. I happened to start 2-3 world quest chains together and it's just so heavy to play the game right now. Another particular issue with one world quest (the tomb raiding series where you desecrate King Deshret's tomb). There are those puzzles that are right in front of you but you cannot solve because your magic key tablet has not unlocked the correct clearance level or something. Man, do they think this is a Metroidvania? This is a huge, massive open world and it is entirely likely there are parts of the map I will never see twice (or even once). Do they really think I'm going to get the ability to do these puzzles and then come back and look for these puzzles in the mazes that I cannot remember? I hate this conceit of modern game design which, to me, is nothing but padding. I remember God of War 2018 had this same shit. You were boating around that lake and always coming across puzzles you couldn't solve and then you play the story further and 5 hours later you unlock some ability that lets you solve the thing. And then they expect you to go back and hunt those puzzles down again. It's fucking ridiculous in both a thematic sense (the God of War is chasing trinkets around a lake) and from a gameplay perspective.

I know these quests are optional but for me, personally, my threshold for considering a region complete is finishing the main quest, all the world quests (or as many as possible without RNG), all the domains and stuff and preferably with a decent amount of world exploration percentage stats. So my enthusiasm for the game has waned a bit and whenever I'm thinking of playing Genshin, doing something else usually wins out. These days I'm enjoying Dave the Diver on my new Steam deck quite a bit. Sometimes I think it would be nice to play Genshin on that device but I've read mihoyo does not like that.

Anyway, to end on a positive note, I found someone who managed to play the beautiful Surasthana theme entirely on the in game lyre. This might not be new for you guys but I thought it was really great. I really, genuinely love this bit of music so much. In over 30 years of gaming there are maybe less than 10 bits of video game music that have touched my heart the way this one has... (a couple of others are DuClare Chateau from Deus Ex and Peaceful Moments from Witcher 1)

 

[Line]

But to back it up a bit, one issue I've had with both Genshin and Star Rail is that I cannot understand why the main characters are not voice acted. They actually do hire voice actors for those roles and in the case of Star Rail they get about 2 lines of dialogue every patch. Why are all their other spoken lines silent? You can make the case that it's not as bad in Genshin because Paimon talks a lot but it's completely bizarre in Star Rail where every character is voice acted except the main character. The archon quest in Genshin being voice acted but world quests being silent is quite jarring while playing world quests. I don't mind reading text in RPGs but the contrast is too much to ignore. I can sort of understand if there were budgetary constraints when Mondstadt/Liyue first came out but they've earned billions since then and they can definitely afford full voice acting. Did you guys know that there are quite a few adult visual novels that release on Steam without voice acting because they're low budget productions but if they sell well enough the creators patch in voice acting later? Obviously there's a huge difference in the size of the script and the budget but still, respect to creators who reinvest into making their product better. Surely mihoyo can patch in voice acting for world quests if they wanted to.

Hoyoverse is just weird with that. Like in HSR, you talk... in your thoughts to remind you where to go after major events. The one time where voice acting is literally pointless
And it's not like you can't hear the Traveler, there's tons of voiced lines in the Profile about everything and everyone, but they don't play during the game because...?

So anyway, I'm now caught up in a multitude of silent world quests with seemingly endless parts and it's really draining my energy while playing the game. I understand that longer quests allow for more complex storytelling and richer world building but they should have paid some attention to the pacing of the quests as well. You think a quest is about to end and it gets extended. When it does end it goes right into another quest so it's not actually complete anyway. I happened to start 2-3 world quest chains together and it's just so heavy to play the game right now. Another particular issue with one world quest (the tomb raiding series where you desecrate King Deshret's tomb). There are those puzzles that are right in front of you but you cannot solve because your magic key tablet has not unlocked the correct clearance level or something. Man, do they think this is a Metroidvania? This is a huge, massive open world and it is entirely likely there are parts of the map I will never see twice (or even once). Do they really think I'm going to get the ability to do these puzzles and then come back and look for these puzzles in the mazes that I cannot remember? I hate this conceit of modern game design which, to me, is nothing but padding. I remember God of War 2018 had this same shit. You were boating around that lake and always coming across puzzles you couldn't solve and then you play the story further and 5 hours later you unlock some ability that lets you solve the thing. And then they expect you to go back and hunt those puzzles down again. It's fucking ridiculous in both a thematic sense (the God of War is chasing trinkets around a lake) and from a gameplay perspective.

Now this I literally don't understand, because coming back later is not new... that's quite the opposite.
That's how games worked... since their creation really, having secrets, unlockable areas, strong enemies that you cannot deal with and finding your way? That's the basis of anything that has any sort of exploration.
Unlike the modern design which is the opposite, with only level scaled content, everything being throwaway and one and done, and never anything asked of the player, be it to remember places to go, or challenges they can't deal with easily.

Which is also why Genshin world design is good, since you can go where you want... but will have to find items or resolve quests to do it all, instead of being on an eternal conveyor belt that will only ever offer you one thing to do. The Hypostyle desert is definitely an outlier in that, and its main weakness is not the tons of secrets and extra stuff to unlock... it's that the story quests just guide you and never ask you to think for the main dungeon. Thankfully they have a bit more than that...

 

[spindoctor]

Now this I literally don't understand, because coming back later is not new... that's quite the opposite.
That's how games worked... since their creation really, having secrets, unlockable areas, strong enemies that you cannot deal with and finding your way? That's the basis of anything that has any sort of exploration.
Unlike the modern design which is the opposite, with only level scaled content, everything being throwaway and one and done, and never anything asked of the player, be it to remember places to go, or challenges they can't deal with easily.

I think there's a broader discussion that can be had about what constitutes fun and interesting exploration in a game and what expectations you have from any particular game. In other games where there's an area that is too high level or a boss that's too hard, you'd leave it and come back later. It would be something new for you to do. In the examples I mentioned above, you have explored the areas and have to go back and repeat them. There are games that ask you to go back and redo levels (metroidvanias) but then their levels are typically immensely smaller in size and scope.

Genshin is operating on a whole other level when it comes to scale. Sometimes when I don't feel like doing the daily chores I teleport to a random point in the desert and start looking for chests to get encounter points. It's not hard because there are so many of them around. A while ago I jumped down this hole and found an underground cave with a stream flowing through it. There were some puzzles there I solved (a seelie, a timed thing, one of those matching tablet things) but there was also a locked door I couldn't figure out how to open. So I just left the place. Maybe I should have put a marker there because honestly, I don't think I'll ever go back there.I couldn't find that place today even if I wanted to.

If you recall that quest I was talking about (tomb raiding), you'll remember that the tombs were quite big. Multiple floors, holes you drop down, elevators to go up, winding, branching and looping corridors, puzzles to navigate and enemies that respawn. And the locked puzzles were interspersed along the way. There were multiple such tombs too. Now, going back there after you get the ability to solve those puzzles is doable, obviously, but the question is whether it's fun to do that. Is it rewarding enough to repeat all that tedium? That's the general design principle I'm questioning here... when playing a game, is it fun to see something you can't collect or complete and do you feel joy knowing that you'll come back to it later? And does it specifically work for game like Genshin or God of War? I know Genshin introduces new game systems with every region but, to my knowledge, this is only the second time the game has done this particular thing. The first time was in the Chasm where you had to upgrade that blue light gadget before you could clear out the higher level blights. Did anyone come across those and was it fun when they realized they would have to come back later and do them?

I'm not asking for all games to be easy or level scaled (although Genshin is fully level scaled)... I just feel like this particular game would be better off without this particular design choice. I just don't think it adds value for certain kinds of games.

 

[Line]

Considering the Mausoleum is the only actual open dungeon worth a damn in Genshin, I'd say, yes it was very much worth it.
Same thing applies to God of War, the map changing and giving you access to new things in old places is the only reason I even bothered finishing it, since the story and characterization were abysmal and the combat plain crap.

I certainly didn't waste my time in linear games like Uncharted which felt like a waste of time because it was - literally push forward and look at the cut scenes, that was shaking keys in front of a baby level of interest.

Not having everything handed to you is the main point of exploration games, and that's fine if you don't like it. But then that's weird to play Genshin just to see things once and not bother with what isn't available immediately as if it costs you anything in a game that has way too many teleporters for its own good already.
And stranger to somehow consider that as "modern" in a world of level gated check lists.

 

[Ascheroth]

My general approach to exploration in Genshin is that I place a marker everytime I come across something that looks important, is not yet accessible or is something I could go to but don't want to right now for one reason or another. That's the same for chests, puzzles, locked doors, Oculi, Temples, etc.
With the underground caves and structures that sometimes got a bit annoying cause placing the marker to the point of interest is one thing, finding the entrance to the underground section leading to it was a whole different topic.
But with the underground maps now that also shouldn't really be an issue anymore.

I think there's a broader discussion that can be had about what constitutes fun and interesting exploration in a game and what expectations you have from any particular game. In other games where there's an area that is too high level or a boss that's too hard, you'd leave it and come back later. It would be something new for you to do. In the examples I mentioned above, you have explored the areas and have to go back and repeat them. There are games that ask you to go back and redo levels (metroidvanias) but then their levels are typically immensely smaller in size and scope.

Genshin has so many teleporters everywhere that while the map itself is ginourmous, getting to one specific area usually really doesn't take that much time/travel distance so I don't really see this much different than backtracking in Metroidvanias (and yes, just because it's a huge open world doesn't mean everything has to be available immediately the second you come across it without any effort, some parts having Metroidvania-ish "backtracking" is not a bad thing imo).

 

[Ascheroth]

Man, Chiori has such a good design.

And Xianyun banner has Faruzan and Gaming

Xianyun, Chiori, Arlecchino and Clorinde (+ ideally not having to go into Natlan completly empty)?
I'll have to run the numbers again and see if I can try that or if I'll have to skip (and if so, who).
At the very least I think I can go to 50/50 for Xianyun without having to worry.

 

[Dandy]

Man, Chiori has such a good design.

And Xianyun banner has Faruzan and Gaming

Xianyun, Chiori, Arlecchino and Clorinde (+ ideally not having to go into Natlan completly empty)?
I'll have to run the numbers again and see if I can try that or if I'll have to skip (and if so, who).
At the very least I think I can go to 50/50 for Xianyun without having to worry.

I love her design so much., but I only have enough primos for like 105 pulls, so unless I can make good use of her I'll have to pass.

 

[Line]

Man, Chiori has such a good design.

And Xianyun banner has Faruzan and Gaming

Xianyun, Chiori, Arlecchino and Clorinde (+ ideally not having to go into Natlan completly empty)?
I'll have to run the numbers again and see if I can try that or if I'll have to skip (and if so, who).
At the very least I think I can go to 50/50 for Xianyun without having to worry.

She is the coolest char in a while, and Fontaine has already been good
Xianyun has been the deflating hype for me, and now that we've even seen her weapon and all... I don't think she could be less interesting to me.

Now that we're starting to get rumors of Natlan, I won't hesitate for chars I don't really like. Now to see how many lies the leakers will tell about the new chars like Xbalanque because they only got access to artwork and nothing else

 

[Ascheroth]

I've actually been getting more interested in Xianyun again. I need to trial her and Gaming first, but a character that changes how you play others (+ being a teamwide healer that is not locked to a circle) is still really appealing to me. And Gaming looks fun as hell and they work great together + Furina.
Also, I kinda just wanna have the family together, lol. Need to see if I can make a Ganyu/Shenhe/Xianyun team work somehow.

 

[Ascheroth]

Well, more reliable Chiori kit leaks have appeared and... it certainly make me feel better about prioritizing Xianyun :/
Not really feeling her kit.
Off-field sub dps is good but she needs a 2nd Geo user in the team, and it can't be any Geo user but has to be one with a construct. Which means anti-synergy with Navia and you are limited to Geo MC, Zhongli, Albedo, Itto or Ningguang.

Will need to see how things look in practice and what beta changes may happen, but it's not a good first impression and despite loving her design she's now way more skippable to me based on what we've got so far.

 

[Dandy]

Well, more reliable Chiori kit leaks have appeared and... it certainly make me feel better about prioritizing Xianyun :/
Not really feeling her kit.
Off-field sub dps is good but she needs a 2nd Geo user in the team, and it can't be any Geo user but has to be one with a construct. Which means anti-synergy with Navia and you are limited to Geo MC, Zhongli, Albedo, Itto or Ningguang.

Will need to see how things look in practice and what beta changes may happen, but it's not a good first impression and despite loving her design she's now way more skippable to me based on what we've got so far.

That's such a shame. I hate how Geo in general feels so limited. It's made me avoid it altogether.

 

[Ascheroth]

That's such a shame. I hate how Geo in general feels so limited. It's made me avoid it altogether.

Navia is great, so they can do it. But Geo is weirdly split even within its own roster. Some are Atk scaling, some are Def scaling. Some have constructs, some don't. Some want other elements on the team, some don't.

I suppose if Chiori does a ton of damage, I can think of some teams using her + Zhongli as a core, but it's a bit of a bummer cause it means I most likely would only be able to run either a Chiori or a Navia team. Will have to see how things will look like after seeing actual gameplay and better talent descriptions and will keep an eye on any beta changes.

I won the 50/50 for Xianyun so I could now get her without having to worry about my primo stash, but I do need some idea of what I would do with her. We'll see.
For now it's time to build Xianyun and Gaming and explore the beauty that is Chenyu Vale

 

[Dandy]

Navia is great, so they can do it. But Geo is weirdly split even within its own roster. Some are Atk scaling, some are Def scaling. Some have constructs, some don't. Some want other elements on the team, some don't.

I suppose if Chiori does a ton of damage, I can think of some teams using her + Zhongli as a core, but it's a bit of a bummer cause it means I most likely would only be able to run either a Chiori or a Navia team. Will have to see how things will look like after seeing actual gameplay and better talent descriptions and will keep an eye on any beta changes.

I won the 50/50 for Xianyun so I could now get her without having to worry about my primo stash, but I do need some idea of what I would do with her. We'll see.
For now it's time to build Xianyun and Gaming and explore the beauty that is Chenyu Vale

Congrats on Xianyun! I watched a few videos this morning and she looks really good! It sounds like she enables a lot of new team comps.

I just threw a 10 pull at her since I was at 69 pity, but I lost the 50/50 and got Diluc C1, C2 Noelle and my 9th Rainslasher lol

I also just accidentally exchanged my Starglitter for Intertwine Fates because I thought the shop had refreshed and I was exchanging Stardust

Edit: After watching some more footage, and playing around in the trial I decided to go for her. Got her early-ish, but I would've loved to get Gaming or Faruzan to C6. I got them to C1 and C3, respectively, and Noelle is C5 now.

 

[Ascheroth]

Really happy with Xianyun. Her skill is just incredibly fun to use and so versatile in traversal. She's basically about as fast as Yelan, except it "feels" even faster and she can also do stuff like traversing a bigger horizontal distance in the, getting a headstart on climbing with the initial jumps and descending mountains faster with her special skill plunge.
Playing her with Gaming, Furina and Bennett and that's also been really fun. Never would I have imagined plunge-gameplay could actually be enjoyable.
They really did a tremendous job here.

Chenyu Vale is also just straight fantastic. They did it again.

 

[Ascheroth]

If I had known Navia and Xianyun work this well together it would have made the decision of getting her or Chiori or trying both so much easier, lol.

But I dunno if it's just me, this Abyss felt fairly easy to begin with.

 

[Ascheroth]

4.5 is gonna be pretty lightweight by all accounts, but we're getting Arlecchino crumbs and probably kit leaks soon

Uncropped (dunno why their English announcements always crop it)

 

[Dandy]

I don't think I'm going for her, though I need to play her before knowing for sure.

 

[Line]

Finally the Queen is here.
Now to see what she does because the leaks have been a whole bunch of jank for some time.

Also, slow patch, but then, not much time to play.
I did love Chenyu Vale, and even the food event was cool. The story of the lunar new year with Gaming though, eh.

 

[Ascheroth]

I personally really liked all of the 4.4 content. Chenyu Vale is great, though I've left a bunch of stuff for this patch knowing it would be pretty empty.
Xianyun's quest was goddamn fantastic, one of my favorites in the entire game.
Really enjoyed Lantern Rite's story as well.
Cooking event was a good time too.

Anyway, I'm probably actually pulling Chiori, lol. I did the maths and I have enough wishes to Yolo pull her, Father Arle and Clorinde and still be able to go into Natlan with some guarantees saved and she apparently can work in the Navia Plunge team I've been having a blast with even at C0 - you still get better damage than Zhongli and more consistent particle and crystallize generation. It's a pretty expensive sidegrade though, but whatever .

 

[hersheyfan]

I personally really liked all of the 4.4 content. Chenyu Vale is great, though I've left a bunch of stuff for this patch knowing it would be pretty empty.
Xianyun's quest was goddamn fantastic, one of my favorites in the entire game.
Really enjoyed Lantern Rite's story as well.
Cooking event was a good time too.

Anyway, I'm probably actually pulling Chiori, lol. I did the maths and I have enough wishes to Yolo pull her, Father Arle and Clorinde and still be able to go into Natlan with some guarantees saved and she apparently can work in the Navia Plunge team I've been having a blast with even at C0 - you still get better damage than Zhongli and more consistent particle and crystallize generation. It's a pretty expensive sidegrade though, but whatever .

Hmm, do we have confirmation that we're actually going to get Clorinde before Natlan launches? She was rumored for such a long time but kept getting pushed back, I stopped following GI leaks too closely after the Hoyo crackdown..

 

[Ascheroth]

Hmm, do we have confirmation that we're actually going to get Clorinde before Natlan launches? She was rumored for such a long time but kept getting pushed back, I stopped following GI leaks too closely after the Hoyo crackdown..

We do not, but we still have 2 patches after 4.6 with Arlecchino, and both Clorinde and Siegewinne are characters from the story that aren't playable yet and it would be quite weird to keep 4.x story characters until 5.x where they'd be completely overshadowed by the new Natlan hotness imo.

 

[Ascheroth]

Did Chiori's story quest. Fantastic stuff once again. They haven't really missed once in 4.x and have become scarily efficient at using minimal time to sell you on a character. And I'm here for it!

Collected a bunch of C6 on her banner: C6 Gorou, C6 Dori, random C6 Xinan and C6 Qiqi... which was thankfully after 2 multis so it didn't really bother me.
Have also gotten around to trying her out more in combat and I'm actually very happy with her in my Navia team even with C0 and with her still needing work with artifacts, talents and levels. Her design is also just really gorgeous and Tamoto is hella cute. No regrets.

Dream team right here.

 

[Line]

Best design but no place nor need for her...

 

[Ascheroth]

Yeah, she is a very niche/luxury pick with a fairly basic kit. Her only unique gimmick really is the auto-character swap after using her Keqing skill even in the air, which let's you chain into a plunge attack or Kazuha mid air jump for example. Other than that she's Albedo 2.0 with more restrictions, but way better looking, lol.
I certainly would have thought twice about picking her up if I didn't have enough yolo funds in the bank thanks to a very lucky pulling streak throughout 4.x.

 

[Line]

Those Arlecchino animations

Guess I know who I will play next.

 

[Ascheroth]

Those are some delicious animations and I think they are even incomplete! (I don't think they showed her enhanced state at all).
Also some really weird animations in there, in the best possible way, which make me extremely interested in whatever they got cooking with her story in 4.6.

 

[Dandy]

Arle's animations are very nice! I'm going to pass though. Too many characters, not enough uses for them. There are no upcoming characters I am looking forward to, so my next pull will probably be Neuv's signature weapon.

 

[Ascheroth]

Arle's animations are very nice! I'm going to pass though. Too many characters, not enough uses for them. There are no upcoming characters I am looking forward to, so my next pull will probably be Neuv's signature weapon.

Is what you say now and then they'll come and dump the Natlan crew on us

 

[Dandy]

Is what you say now and then they'll come and dump the Natlan crew on us

So true! I'm excited to see what they come up with for Natlan for sure.

 

[Line]

And we're going to get Natlan crumbs very soon, though it will probably be Clorinde in 4.8.
What if they drop a new trailer with Iansan being the coolest

 

[Line]

I got a very early 5* on the standard banner

After over three years, I finally got my first Qiqi.

 

[Ascheroth]

Man 4.6 looking absolutely stacked



New playable (and awesome looking) area.
Playable Father
Fightable Father
Father Story Quest
Cyno (with the boys + Collei) Story Quest also introducing a new character
Concert main event featuring Itto
Rythm game event
Windtrace
Good boss fight combat event
Natlan crumbs

We're eating good!

 

[Dandy]

Man 4.6 looking absolutely stacked



New playable (and awesome looking) area.
Playable Father
Fightable Father
Father Story Quest
Cyno (with the boys + Collei) Story Quest also introducing a new character
Concert main event featuring Itto
Rythm game event
Windtrace
Good boss fight combat event
Natlan crumbs

We're eating good!

I like Sethos' design!

 

[Line]

Sounds like a good update, love Arlecchino.
Didn't expect a new story quest for Cyno and Sumeru in general, that's an interesting choice. Sethos is another electro boy, keen eyes have seen his vision in the trailer, he looks cool, hoping for an interesting toolkit.

 

[Ascheroth]

Genshin starting to make Animated Shorts too! They be pushing Arle hard (I'm not complaining!)

 

[Dandy]

I knew Sethos would be a bow user. Oh well. I'm saving for Natlan.

 

[Ascheroth]

Arlecchino is so cool.

---

I like how Sethos looks, but I can't get excited for 4 stars since who knows when I'll ever get one.
Finally Clorinde though!

 

[Line]

Arlecchino got the most promotion out of anyone... weird. Not complaining though.

Interesting that we have three characters coming soon. I'll need to see how they work in combat with my own eyes, because their kits look a bit complicated in writing.
We'll see how it goes, we have rolls to do tomorrow!

 

[Ascheroth]

It feels like they are hyping her up more than Archons for whatever reasons.
I'm kinda expecting wild lore drops from her story quest. She gets hyped up so much and there's so much mystery surrounding her: the curse, the "glitching" in her animations, the Crimson Moon references in all of her materials (go read the "Perinheri" books they added with 4.5 I think),...

 

[Line]

It's weird, I think my Pyro daddy looks different than in pictures

I guess that completes my standard collection though. Still had to go to near pity to get Arlecchino... but I did get C6 Faruzan along the way!

 

[spindoctor]

It's weird, I think my Pyro daddy looks different than in pictures

I believe in the kingdom of weebdom, she is canonically known as "best girl"

Anyway I got Arlecchino in 75.

Not actually sure why I pulled her except she looks cool as hell (especially flying around). Not able to level her past 40 because I haven't farmed anything for her and have actually not played the game in months. I still love the game and it bothers me that I cannot get myself to play it now. A bunch of different things happened that pushed me away... first were the desert quests that just got the better of me. Then I played Cyberpunk 2077 for almost 2 months straight. Then I've been extremely sick for almost 2 months. And now summer has arrived and just playing anything on the PC is a real chore.

I had plans to finish Sumeru, then go do Enkanomiya and then do Fontaine all before Natlan. Then they added Chenyu Vale and I was thinking, okay this might be difficult. Now they've added something else to Fontaine today I think? And we have the summer event region coming soon. It's just not possible anymore. And it's absolutely not possible if you're just not playing it.

I'm really looking for some sort of impetus to get back to the game. Just don't know where it's coming from

 

[Ascheroth]

They went extra hard on this Special Program and version content. Filler patch? Lol no.
New permanent endgame mode, Archon Quest, 2 Story Quests, lots of events, tons of new cards, Animated Short and a Natlan trailer.

 

[Line]

And the "mounts" are finally there!
It looks so much more interesting than the pneumousia mechanics of Fontaine, diving was cool and well done, but the area definitely lacked in new good ideas.

And Natlan look so good...

 

[Dandy]

WOW! There is so much coming!

There are 2 more patches before Natlan right? I wish there were some character leaks! I need to know who I am saving for.