How The "Power Five" Ruined Four Star Characters | Genshin Impact

[@buttermanaws4693]

I still believe the main reason we got so many units who want HP or EM over attack more often than not us that Bennett provides so much bonus damage that they had to make it so you didn't have a reason to use him for so long

[@LelouchOfBritannia]

Pretty much, Hutao was the first attempt by making her need lower hp to have maximum damage efficiency. It just opens your 2nd team comp's flexibility though since you have a free Bennett to use.

[@shadouai]

@@LelouchOfBritannia yep but even then hu tao can still use bennett specially more if he's c6 which just kinds of, not fully though negate the effects of her being >50% hp

[@cd36_]

​@@LelouchOfBritanniaand then Bennett can make hutao do more at max than she does below 50% anyway, even with homa lol

[@finding_aether]

Another reason why so many enemies have been given ridiculous amt of EM is to make Bennett circle a deathtrap😂

[@lawfulgoodnun1646]

Thats why bennet is bad now. Em dendro teams are just better in every way.

[@yu-gi-noob9656]

My God. I remember the early days of Genshin. The power 5 were so underestimated. While Fischel was always seen as a really good unit, water swords dude was seen as a defensive unit with a weird gimmick. I remember Bennet was always placed on the bottom of tier lists, and people said Sucrose was worst Venti and reliant on C4 to function. No one called Xiangling bad, but people did call her a good early game character, suggesting that better alternatives of her will pop up at late game. It’s like reverse power creepy 😂

[@otozm92]

Man, 1.0 was a wild time when people said Qiqi was S-tier and Bennet was trash. I cringe so much at tier lists from that time

[@sb18wlc]

​@@otozm92 That's because tier-lists back then were made DAY 1 or a week at most. Of course Qiqi is better than Bennett back then simply because Qiqi can on-demand heal meanwhile Bennett needed energy to burst and he does not heal fully, maybe you're forgetting that artifacts only really get good at AR 40. It's the same reason why the power 5 exists, Mihoyo themselves didn't know how their system worked and all these characters are huge oversights.

[@Dani_RdM]

People were building physical Xiangling at that time. LOL

[@blaze8308]

​​@@otozm92Because people thought like typical rpg games healers were needed but Genshin created a mess by making supports do more dmg than some Hypercarries

[@hypetrail]

​​@@Dani_RdM😭😭 its the reason why my Xiangling has tl7 NA same for Fischl too 💀

[@YEHEY55]

Yaoyao is a great unit outside of the power 5. Great heals, good battery, can boost your em if you equip the sumeru craftable spear. And also she's quite tanky for a chibi. And not to mention her bunny shoots out explosive cabbages

[@Gnidel]

It's possible it's because she was designed alongside them.

[@floriansanial2694]

Yao yao and noelle complètes the éléments... because Noelle is strong for a geo caracter (her shield is very tanky). She is 4 star Zong+itto With rumors abou Navia and crystalise....

[@ryefieldshiningsun]

shes an insane tank honstly! i use her in nilou bloom and you literally just pop her burst and jump around. heals everyone, applies quite alot of dendro and tanks so well that you can pretty much just ignore any coppelia in the abyss (or that new gravity boss, yk what i mean). also heals on skill, which is good for the oveworld. honestly, people sometimes forget how good she is.

[@iDroiD-Gaming]

@@floriansanial2694 What I exactly thought while watching the video

[@Karthaen]

She is a good unit. Though the spear actually gives Attack, not EM, unlike the other craftables.

[@onlymyself1234]

I'll be honest, one of the funniest parts of watching new characters come out is seeing how Mihoyo is gonna dodge Bennett this time. It feels like ever since version 3 they've been desperately, carefully designing each and every new unit to not have Bennett automatically be the best in slot. Be it by giving them their own dedicated Bennett like Shenhe or completely ignoring attack like dendro and monogeo.

[@wellwellwell881]

They only dodged Bennett a lot in Sumeru because its focus was dendro. It will be hard in Fontaine unless they stop making attack scaling characters that don't rely on a gimmick. 2/3 of the new characters already desperately hold onto Bennett for their best teams.

[@onlymyself1234]

@@wellwellwell881 I think we'll get more HP scalers that don't want Benny and will prefer Furina's generic damage buff very shortly

[@kira0703]

Im sure Bennett will come back when Natlan arrives and he is going to be in lot of Team comp with Natlan characters.

[@mozzy2968]

Considering we just got 2 new dps that practically require bennet to even function properly, there could be a decent chance that the 5 star version of Bennet might be coming, possibly with Natlan.

[@xxx_lolidestroyer69_xxxuwu58]

​@@wellwellwell881tbh if Xiangling doesn't have such energy problems she could fit in Lyney teams without needing Bennett. Just like Beidou in Cyno teams. And with Furina, it looks like healers who can heal the whole party are more preferred since Bennett burst only heals the on field unit

[@albertodelarosa8047]

I can't take it anymore. I'm sick of xiangling. I try to play diluc. My xiangling deals more damage. I try to play yoimiya. My xiangling deals more damage. I try to play Hu tao. My xiangling deals more damage. I want to play Klee. Her best team has xiangling. I want to play raiden, childe. They both want xiangling. She grabs me by the throat. I fish for her. I cook for her. I give her the catch. She isn't satisfied. I pull engulfing lightning. "I don't need this much er" She tells me. "Give me more field time." She grabs bennett and forces him to throw himself off enemies. "You just need to funnel me more. I can deal more damage with homa." I can't pull for homa, I don't have enough primogems. She grabs my credit card. It declines. "Guess this is the end." She grabs gouba. She says "Gouba, get them." There is no hint of sadness in his eyes. Nothing but pure, no icd pyro application. What a cruel world :'(

[@lXlDarKSuoLlXl]

You got me on the first half, ngl 😂

[@froeloe]

i have read this way too many times now on different social media platforms. got anything new you can copy and paste somewhere?

[@issacclarke4194]

​@@froeloe this is my third time

[@JaekMC]

Displaying her mastery over both fire and polearms, Xiangling sends a Pyronado whirling around her. The Pyronado will move with your character for so long as the ability persists, dealing Pyro DMG to all enemies in its path.

[@thatsnotveryfresh]

best copypasta

[@drace1956]

I think units like Kuki and Gorou are exactly what every 4-star should be going forward. Units that are "Power 5" levels of usefulness but only when locked in their certain niche like being carried or limited by a certain element, reaction, play-style, and utility. That way we can have a diverse cast of 4-stars that can still compete in the meta, without having them all-encompassing like Power 5.

[@gintasasd]

The thing is, kuki was, let's be honest kinda meh on realise only dendo saved her if dendro made xynian better, then maybe now even dendro can't save her dori needs c6 to do what c0 fish do hoyo just try to make unique characters but they end up making characters so unique it's bad or needs years for that character to be good maybe even hoyo stops treating 4 star like 5 stars for dps something wilo chandge until then nah

[@silverYolo]

i mean, if they are locked to a specific niche, then they aren't power five level then. its not just about being super strong

[@gintasasd]

@@silverYolo true because we can argue that sara gorou yun jin shenhe etc are grate because hoyo is never realising other neash elemental buffer

[@Marcus-iz7vq]

@@gintasasdkuki was designed with dendro in mind. Dendro didn’t “save” her, she just released earlier than it. I’d say they had Dendro reactions planned out since 2.5 (Yae’s release)

[@gintasasd]

@@Marcus-iz7vq nope if character is realised 1 year before dendro it doesn't mean that character was meant for dendro because by same logic we can say raiden was made for dendro in mind to same as razor and barbara hoyo see if character is not being used they buff them indirectly take heizou faruzan was ment for scara but she revived xiao and heizou

[@Ali-cya]

Strong or even average powercreep in gachas is usually what a lot of people hate about gachas in general and why the term 'gacha' itself is an immediate turn off for many people. The power five are pretty much the backbone for why the game doesn't have immense powercreep and why old characters don't just suddenly become obsolete and forgotten. Most gachas can get away with it because creating 2D characters is moderately easy, creating complex interconnected 3D characters in an open world only to make them obsolete or even unusable in gameplay later on is a tease that no one wants to see being done to their favourite character.

[@tayschrinngaming8002]

The newer 4* units also tend to have story locked and/or tedious to gather ascension materials that tend to also be needed for 5*. Tooks me months to finally get around to unlocking the fog island for Thoma's mushrooms, and well...hes still level 20ish.

[@Kaisatousno1fan]

Yeah, my Mika is stuck at lvl 70 meanwhile Kuki is 40,I want to level her up but I don't have the time and energy to farm her boss

[@samkeiser9776]

Yeah I think this is for me a big issue with weak 4*’s for me, it’s not even just artifact grinding, even getting a character from 1 to 80 can take some doing, especially because of the overworld mats you need. You need to kill a boss more than 20 times and spend resin doing it in order to ascend any given character.

[@leopoldotactico]

Co-op?

[@powwowken2760]

I remember back when I first started playing and actually got excited for new 4* characters... Then I eventually realized that the only remotely viable 4* units Hoyo will ever permit to see the light of day will be relegated to being "Like Bennett, but bad and/or so niche as to be useless in 99% of scenarios".

[@arizona_anime_fan]

layla is probably the best 4^ they released in the last 2 years; and she's just a discount/frost version of zhongli. you use her the same. only she has some modest frost mechanics that can work in a team, instead of useless geo mechanics.

[@lucklei4665]

​@@arizona_anime_fanTheres yaoyao whos an insane healer and also being dendro, the niche buffers like Faruzan,Gorou,Sara, and Yunjin, also kuki being cracked and you chose the shielder that brings nothing to the team other than a shield, not even healing

[@lucklei4665]

Layla is such a flex character that brings nothing to the team aside from a shield, calling her the best 4* in 2 years is just wrong

[@AzureDrag0n1]

@@arizona_anime_fan The best 4 star they released in the last 2 years is clearly Kuki. She has the hallmarks of the power 5. No ICD in hyperbloom, role consolidation, and self synergistic (EM increases her damage and healing abilities). Layla does not have the features of a powerful 4 star. She is mostly just a shield with minor cryo application that obeys ICD rules. If her damage scaled with her shield strength then you might have a case or if her cryo stars fired at a rate similar to Fischl or Xingqiu while also being a shielder then you might have a case where she might be near them in power.

[@Marcus-iz7vq]

@@arizona_anime_fankuki, yaoyao, gorou, faruzan, and thoma are all better than Layla lmao. I’d even put Lynette above her.

[@andersoul4916]

I think mihoyo should keep doing what theyre doing now, which is introduce new mechanics and characters. For example, Nilou buffing a specific reaction or Fontaine characters having hp draining mechanics allows for new meta units while also not diminishing the viability of the "power 5".

[@Derek-bq4fx]

If looking at the archons; Anemo is Crowd Control, Geo has Impenetrable Defense, Electro must have Energy Recharge, Dendro needs Elemental Mastery, and Hydro are Hitpoint Fluctuations. I wonder how does Mihoyo approach Pyro and Cryo units

[@gregnog8119]

@@Derek-bq4fx can't wait for pyro archon to be something like "based on critical hitting REALLY HARD" and just skyrockets Bennet to be mandatory as a damage buff for huge attack stat crits with them

[@TheGreatAndEpicMe]

@@Derek-bq4fx Probably CD/CR.

[@Derek-bq4fx]

@TheGreatAndEpicMe I know this is going to be farfetched, but what if its based on max healing- Like overflowed healing- Meaning with the pyro archon, pairing her with furina wont work hence the pyro archon not gaining stacks of stacks of damage Edit: By doing so, pairing the pyro archon with bennett also doesnt work

[@randomness.stupidness]

speaking of overheal and bennett, i think ocean hued could work on bennett in a lyney team because he's constantly healing lyney​@@Derek-bq4fx

[@Astonthepunk]

One thing to note that bro seemed to have missed out on during summaries was that fischl’s electro app being so strong not only comes from her skill with essentially 100% uptime, it’s from her A4 procing with no ICD whenever she triggers a reaction. This passive also does no small amount of damage either.

[@flipside9608]

Doesn't even have to be her triggering a reaction. The active character just needs to trigger an electro related reaction: quicken/aggravate, overload, superconduct, electro-swirl, and electro charge.

[@lynnmorgan5897]

Just adding a small note, Fischls own reactions will almost never land an A4 proc, unless you are using her charged attack for some reason. A4 needs the on field character to trigger the electro reaction, so Oz attacks that trigger reactions will be considered as being triggered by an off field character (Fischl) instead, thus no A4. This is also the case for XQ/Yelan Burst attacks that trigger EC. Another thing, although it is correct that A4 has no ICD, it does have a ~0.5 second cooldown, so it is limited to around twice per second. C6 coordinated attacks are also tied to Oz, therefore they will never trigger A4 unless Fischl is on field. This is for people who still think her C6 is some huge power spike; it really isn't.

[@The-hamster2471]

⁠@@lynnmorgan5897 true actually it isn’t a huge power spike, but the bonus uptime on her skill is welcome as a quality of life change.

[@RandomPerson-cf3gt]

It's almost 100 percent uptime with her c6

[@gilroyscopa]

I still think the impact of the power 5 could be a net positive for Genshin. Not just because of the lid they put on powercreep, but because the Genshin devs need to get creative with designing 4-stars. make them super niche or fun to play (e.g. a weak unit that insanely buffs your attackspeed, some fun stuff with constructs; a charge attack support instead of a normoal attack support for once). That the Genshin devs don't see that chance and don't get creative to solve the 4-star problem is really on them and them alone. There is so much design space left that isn't just "create a damage area for 10seconds", yet they still default to the latter.

[@gilroyscopa]

More examples: - someone that changes the active characters dodge to a far ranging or homing teleport -someone creating a sniper tower underneat them like the geo samachurls and then buffing bows and plunging -someone that interacts with the geo-shards by turning them into elemental projectiles (we need a geo overhaul more but such character would create some geo viability) -in the same vein: someone who uses geo-shard pickup for a counter (for example an ULT-buff). Doesn't even have to be a geo character. just someone who interacts with all pickups and objects, like blooms and those new hydro spheres, thus making the inclusion of a geo character viable for the team. -someone that brings back falldamage for enemies, like jean was originally supposed to. -someone who locks your teams HP to 1, but buffs ATK to its limit in as long as they remain at 1 HP in a high risk high reward fashion for the pros. -a spear character who can throw his spear with his charge attack like a bow-wielder. Maybe create banner-zones on impact. -a geo character who creates a cage around you and your enemies so you can go crazy with overload and your foes will just bounce off the walls back to you.

[@browserjunior4707]

There’s still more stuff that should be added too like artifact sets that aren’t just “hey look a 2pc stat buff that’s a copy of another one” Right now we have 4 artifacts that provide a 2pc Atk buff and yet we still only have 1 that provides a defense buff and is limited to Geo only despite there being a defense scaling unit called Xinyan. It’d be so cool to have an Emblem set but for Defense scaling characters so that we don’t just default to Defense Stacking Left Clicker like we do with Itto Noelle and Ningguang. It’d be nice for other future characters too cause only having Geo be the defense guys stinks. It’d be nice to have other defense scaling characters and artifacts cause it’d add more variety to both 4* and 5* character. Like imagine a 2pc Def set that buffed Defense by 30% like Husk, and then buffed your Burst by 75% of your Defense Stat. It’d make Xinyan go from bad to a very unique shielder who can provide a meaty defense shield and staggering Burst damage with her guaranteed Crit on her Burst

[@HuyTran-lt6xg]

they have made so many junk kits already, even 5 stars, i doubt anything will change

[@polareli3124]

​@@gilroyscopa all 5☆ by now

[@poppling60]

Is it me or does the power 5 look like a highschool friend group Xiangling - the outgoing social butterfly Bennet - the funny and clumsy Sucrose - the shy and adorable cinnamon Xingqiu - the calmest, wisest, motherly nerd Fischl - the dramatic entertainer 280 likes and a reply from the actual vars.... 1. WTF?!? 2. If this is a dream I do not want to wake up

[@peptobismolveins]

Damn good observation ….seems like a made up plan in the bigger picture 😂

[@Safineya]

I would argue for a Beidou as the cool babysitter for these guys. Maybe not as much but she is definitely strong herself. I'd be willing to call it the power 6. Though the power 5 even match in height so Beidou would stick out.

[@NewOctopus52]

They're the fuckin' Power Rangers bro!

[@Warmness]

I, Fischl, Prinzessin der Verurteilung approve of thine comment with the blessings of the Immernactreich, the holy and mesmerizing land of the Prinzessin. One witnesses thou has seen the beauty of the ways of the Prinzessin. So I, the perfect ruler of thee, grant thee the approval of thine Prinzessin to celebrate thyself in the royal ways described on ancient scripture, with happy as the dark glow bestowed upon the majestic crown of one's head and like the taste of the cold-cut platters Kaiserin der Verurteilung prepares for me. From this noble and sacred day on forward thee art the royal retainer of thy Prinzessin. (She means she is impressed that you captured her role very well in your word)

[@junyaiwase]

Yeah it sure does for some kind of random rp bs or band class

[@spiderdude2099]

I read somewhere that the reason some of the OG 4 stars are so strong and never got nerfed is due to A. Hoyo really didn’t have a great handle on how the meta or power balancing would evolve and made a bunch of the 4 stars better than they intended. B. There is a Chinese gaming law that states that you can’t make a character (that people pay for) worse after release. So, nerfing a character is not allowed after release. So basically, I don’t think hoyo expected them to be as overpowered as they ended up being, and by then it was too late, they couldn’t make them less powerful. What they CAN do, and what they started to do more and more as time went on, was release 4 stars that are underpowered until they get more cons. And that’s basically where we’re at. Most 4 stars are con locked and feel incomplete at C0.

[@lucianof9080]

For a time I didn't want to face reality. I never really liked Xingqiu's design and I also didn't like his story and since I didn't have him until AR 55 I used Candace since I love her design and story. But then I suddenly got a Xingqiu who performed way better and with less effort than Candace. I got extremely frustrated since one of my favorite characters was only occupying space.

[@dogishappy0]

Yeah... I wanted Fichl and got a C6 Xingqiu instead. I didn't use him at all until he was the last character I had who didn't have lvl 10 Companionship.

[@little_blackwinged_crow181]

My Xingqiu is still benched at level 20 at AR 55, I got Kokomi around ar 25 or so and had him since the beginning, I went out of my way to get Yelan in 4.0 just so I had a second off field Hydro. Him and the other three (except Benny) are on the do not build under any circumstances pile. I want to enjoy the game with charactes that make it interesting and enable new team comps, since I got Wrio I actually built my Thoma bc now he's really useful and comfortable to play. Also I never got why Xiangling is good? She basically needs to build every stat that every hyper carry wants, good EM, enogh ER, high Atk, also a 1:2 crit ratio please, for a 4* that's so much investment that It shouldn't be good anymore, also she literally wants Bennett with her at all times, and that screams good unit?💀

[@amadeus8343]

@@little_blackwinged_crow181 fOr A 4 sTaR, ThAt'S tOo MuCh oF aN iNvEsTmEnT, sHe NeEdS eVeRy HyPerCaRrY stAtS Tf does that even mean? Every character needs investment, it just boils down to how much time/resources are you willing to spend on a certain character. ShE's ReLiAnT oN bEnNeTt, hOw Is ShE a GoOd UnIt Bro, by your statement, Hu Tao shouldn't be considered a good unit because she's reliant on Xingqiu/Yelan. Nahida should be considered bad because you can't trigger her E without other elements/because she's reliant on procc-ing elemental reaction. Zhongli sucks because all he does is shield. Kazuha is trash because, like Nahida, he needs other elements to work, in his case, to swirl.

[@Hesketh32]

Eh it’s fine. Xingqiu Xiangling are my least fav characters by far and although I like Bennetts personality I hate his design and gameplay (not saying he isn’t good obviously) so anyways I haven’t used them and I never will. 95% of the content in this game is still so easily done with any character you want. Ik there’s a lot of meta heads out there and a whole bunch that just repeats stuff they hear without thinking, but GI hasn’t made a single non viable character. I understand the frustration tho ofc bc some newly released ch. have some decisions going into them and their kit as sort of control that these 5 guys didn’t have but idk I still encourage using “bad” units I don’t think there’s anyone in this world that will stop me from enjoying using Dehya Candace and Dori. Dehya is the only pyro application ch that I like, I find Candace shield actually incredibly useful and Dori I love her so much with Childe

[@gktte2574]

@@little_blackwinged_crow181girl she is good. She can deal that much dmg while being just an off field meaning u get to slot even stronger on fielder. Like imagine Yoimiya but instead of ur dmg being centralised to Yoimiya only u can have her dmg in the background while having dmg from the likes of Childe, Raiden, Lynney, etc. imo even with just her as the main dmg dealer she can still carry

[@Grac01]

I genuinely think that nowadays, shinobu might be the closest we've ever had to breaking the status quo when it comes to four stars competing with these 5. Its all down to hyperbloom, yes, but the sheer amount damage a full em kuki does with it, while ALSO providing enough healing to solo sustain a team, is severely underrated. Something i think people also overlook with her is how cheap and accessible she is. Similar to benny, you CAN give her a 5 star weapon, amazing artifacts and all their constellations, but the difference between that and f2p weapon, mid artifacts and c2 (c1 for benny) is minimal bc their baseline performance is so good. I'd still say that it goes power 5 > shinobu >> all other 4 stars but she's unbelievably good nowadays.

[@AzureDrag0n1]

Yup. Kuki is good because she has role consolidation like Bennett and Xingqiu. Faruzan, Gorou, or YunJin can all provide bigger buffs than Bennett but they are very restricted and do not have role consolidation. Those other 4 stars simply lack the power budget Bennett has as their buffs are only slightly stronger than Bennett in their best case. Another reason the power 5 are so strong is because of the rate of elemental application they have. Kuki, unfortunately only has no ICD in hyperbloom scenarios. Otherwise should would have far more widespread use.

[@taylormoreira1266]

I think Yaoyao is a decently close contender too, good healer and applies dendro pretty well

[@Marcus-iz7vq]

I think people heavily underestimate thoma, beidou, and yaoyao tbh.

[@loreyxillumina]

​@@Marcus-iz7vqpeople underestimate diona and kaeya even more. Kaeya is the cryo version of Xiangling

[@lightishredgummi]

yea, she contributes to basically the team comp version of that xiangling joke. "when in doubt, use -xiangling- hyperbloom." from what I've heard, kuki and raiden are really the only reasonable electro choices for hyperbloom. which is a shame because I have neither lol

[@NoGoodIdeas]

As a cyno main who cannot get enough er but also couldnt get a songle fishcl until 1 and a half years into playing shes an insane battery and sub dps

[@clashcon11]

I'm waiting for Sucrose and Jean... for years....

[@Eclipsed_Embers]

@@clashcon11 Jean was the last of the original standard 5* for me, been playing since 2.1 but only got her about a month ago (wasn't even a 50/50 loss, it was a standard banner at 20 pity) now the only standard 5* I'm missing is Deyha

[@NoGoodIdeas]

@@Eclipsed_Embers DUDE I WANT TIGHNARI SOOO BAD AND I STILL CANT GET HIM T-T (although I don't like Mona's play style and at least I never got her so got lucky there)

[@Eclipsed_Embers]

@@NoGoodIdeas ehe... Tighnari was actually my first 5* after he got added to the standard banner... like I lost Nahida 50/50 (thankfully had enough primos saved that she was ultimately guaranteed) and got Tighnari. it was enough of a coincidence that I genuinely wondered if it was rigged to let people know that standard banner additions were going to actually be a thing from then on.

[@NoGoodIdeas]

@@Eclipsed_Embers starting to wonder bcuz I saw A LOT of tighnari losses on the cyno banner right after his

[@dustinabigan2776]

My own explanation as to why these five got released and ended up being destroying the case for a big chunk of 4* units is that Mihoyo didn't know as well what they were up to as they do now (somewhat). I don't think it's a coincidence that all five came from 1.0, which was a time when who we know as good or bad is all over the place with the benefit of hindsight (and that likely is the case for the developers as well). They basically had no idea what they were cooking until it was too late. And for obvious reasons they can't nerf them. Personally I'm not really a fan of releasing newer more powerful 4* to match them as well. Because that could push 5* to be released as even more powerful units with higher scallings. And yeah it will solve the problem (maybe), but it doesn't seem fair for the big chunk of players that have already invested so much into specific units (esp 5* constellations and perfect artifacts) only to realize said unit could get blown out of the water with a half-assed built new 5*. And obviously releasing a more powerful unit would entail releasing a proportionately more powerful enemy, which just causes more problems for players. The whole thing just feels like a problem that you can't solve without introducing a solution that could cause even more problems.

[@lXlDarKSuoLlXl]

They can't nerf them, but they CAN buff later units, dehya came in 3.3 iirc, them being so terrified of powercreep is ridiculous...

[@DG_Toti]

@@lXlDarKSuoLlXl3.5

[@osmial]

Your 2nd take is like you don't want newer character that does good because you have invested too much into it And my friend that's how we get the stalemate powercreep where only certain units such as archons are bound to change scenario not the other unit hoyoverse just didn't utilise on powercreep as well as they did in Honkai 3rd they want everything to be either balanced or broken while they're afraid to touch older characters which in my opinion should've long powercreeped

[@riotangel4701]

They don't need to design upgrade characters, just alternative sidegrades.

[@andrewpauly4783]

​@@lXlDarKSuoLlXlthe whole dehya not getting buffed situation is wacky. Like hydro dragon man can exist but only zhongli gets a buff?

[@wolfwoof2000]

Mihoyo seems to go either for the niche main dps or support (anemo damage, bloom, superconduct). It's totally fine. Though I don't like for some of them they are locked by constellations or only feel usable with them. I wish to see more support for like overloaded, superconduct support, burgeon, shatter.

[@Defi4nc3s1]

Wasn't the Freminet, shatter user? The flower set was made for burgeon even tho other sets do same. Baizhu buff burgeon reactions aswell.

[@seelevollerei7340]

i think you'd like Chevreuse

[@j.thewoodcraftninja3918]

I think one benefit of having these starter units being so strong, is that for new players who have them, since they are original starter characters in a sense, they are relatively easy to build and not region locked for leveling up, making good teams more accessible for anyone starting out in the game, even now. (assuming you have half decent luck pulling them)

[@fudgeugaming7341]

Besides Xiangling these guys are not starter characters a lot of new players don't have these guys. I'm 7 1/2 months in and just recently got Fischl from her last banner and got Benny and Xingqiu from my last standard pulls right before the reruns many can go up to a year and never see them on banner

[@EduSaav]

100% started this feb. got my Xiangling then did lantern rite and got a copy of Xingqiu and its been easy sailing so far. Can even play Geo travler for roleplay bc it rly doesnt matter with those 2

[@neoinfinity5204]

As Sucrose fan I loved how she rose to meta fame similar to how Kokomi is now top support, i believe hoyo is being very careful about power creep since Genshin is mostly player friendly and you don’t need specific gimmicks outside floor 12 sometimes, an example of this is Pokemon Masters they release new units every few months and drastically change meta every year and units that were op top meta are now better above average and one of best per type, while new units are mostly for the events they dont force you to pull for them since there’s multiple options to replace them nevertheless they do make much difference on competitive stages which Genshin doesn’t focus a lot on since it’s ultimately open world free game.

[@Riwul]

the main issue with the post 1.0 4 stars has been mainly that they either try to fill the same nieche as already existing characters like in the case with yanfei or most importantly going in for a gimmick but stopping halfway trough their kit. characters like xinyan , freminet and a couple others have this big issue where they try something new that is something to set them apart from the existing cast just to not acutally pull trough with the planned gimmick. be it shatter with freminet , energy regen or whatever the goal was on dori or on field anemo application while healing with sayu. they all have either half their kit working against their game plan or just decide to not work with half the cast like in sayus rolling state. the only way these characters can see good use is if this specific nieche might one day be needed. example being for example kukis and thomas slower off field waves of application or some healers that profit from fontaines new hp drain mechanics. And dont get me started on the insane ER requirements on alot of the 4 stars. its insane how for example pre c6 farzuan might have issues even with 300 ER for gods sake

[@DxxxN]

MY BROTHER IN CHRIST YES, THAT GOD DAMN ALL-ROUND HALF-ASSED XINYAN!!! Spent so much time in my early game days trying to put her to use - only to figure out that she's neither a shielder, neither a F**KING PHYSICAL support, neither a dps (even though I'd be fine if she was at least one of the above). To comprehend the whole level of absurdity, please read more below. Backstory: I got Wanderer when I was early into the game, and didn't even had his A4 that allows free dodges. So naturally I need a shielder to comfortably spam his CAs. The only shielders available to me were Noelle and Xinyan, and Noelle has ridiculous cooldown that doesn't fit in at all. So I went for Xinyan which has shorter CD and synergize with Scara's A1 pyro infusion. And I also had some of Xinyan's consts! That constellations thingie must be cool because you have to be very lucky to get a certain character MULTIPLE times, right??? (Genshin was my first gacha so I didn't know better.) All that made her very suitable, on paper. But it turned out that paper is what her shields are made of, and most of all she has so very VERY VERYYY confusing and self-contradicting kit that was most probably made by a delirious opossum. Lets just take a quick overview: 1. She has a shield that scales on def. So should I invest in def? 2. It also scales on the number of enemies hit (???) - but what if I only have one strong boss, which is far more demanding for a shield? 3. And her NAs and burst scales off her attack only. So am I investing in def or atk now?? 4. Okay, since I need a shield which she has a rare luxury of - again, a shield that scales off def, so you gotta go all-in with that stat. Then she should have something in her ascensions or at least constellations that should boost that precious shield, right? RIGHT??? Well F**K YOU and no! Her """"perks"""" (I can't have too much "quote unquote" here) are: A4: «Skill shield boosts character with a 15% increased Physical DMG» - so she's also a physical support now. Huh, interesting. C1: «Upon scoring a CRIT Hit, increases ATK SPD of Xinyan's Normal and Charged Attacks by 12% for 5s» - what the actual f**k? So she's a shielder, support or wannabe dps now?? C2: «Bursts's Physical DMG has its CRIT Rate increased by 100% and will form a shield at Shield Level 3: Rave when cast» - BUT THAT SHIELD DOES P Y R O DAMAGE!!! Not to mention that she FIRST does that phys strike and only then goes pyro, so for the max dmg you have to cast her skill first (that makes a shield) and ONLY THEN do the burst (which makes the very same shield again). And why am I supposed to do her NA/CAs after, since that crit will proc her C1? So f**king messed up... C4: «Skill hit decreases opponent's Physical RES by 15% for 12s» - IT'S C4 ALREADY, WHERE MY SHIELD BUFFS ARE, FOR F**K'S SAKE??? C6: «Decreases the Stamina Consumption of Xinyan's Charged Attacks by 30%. Additionally, Xinyan's Charged Attacks gain an ATK Bonus equal to 50% of her DEF» - no surprises here, just a pure f**king disappointment of a lackluster dmg bonus WHILE ALL I NEEDED WAS A F**KING SHIELD, WHY DID YOU GIVE HER A SHIELD AND THEN MADE A L L OF HER IMPROVEMENTS ABOUT ATK THAT ANYWAYS WILL BE NONEXISTENT BECAUSE SHIELD ONLY NEEDS DEF??? WHY, MIHOYO??? WHYYYYYYYYY????????????? That's where I learned that not all characters are meant to be played. So much time wasted on reaserches for the game I then knew nothing about, and on hours of climbing with way too short stamina bar for that f**king violetgrass when I didn't even have a teapot to grow it in. So all in all, Xinyan sucks so hard. F**k Xinyan. And f**k the half-assed unplayable kits. F**k the delirious opossums of a lazy devs team. COINCIDENTALLY the only character with a kit of same shittiness was also a colored pyro claymore lady, just a 5-star this time. Sadly, she went straight to the standard banner to ruin your pity, but I guess we cried all we can about it a long time ago. Still I'm not losing a glimmer of hope for her to get a buff. She very well deserves it. That's it for today, thanks for coming to my TED talk. [Bad word was censored out because KZbin insisted.]

[@allentertainmentanimegames2107]

I think the main reason why the power five exists were for us f2p players, cuz honestly I dont know what I would do without Xianling, bennet or fischl. They had to be very easy to attain to make players experience less difficult

[@krandomk]

it's frustrating that they won't even make 5 stars that have any of the qualities that make these characters good. Modern characters barely ever snapshot, ALWAYS have an icd on their element application, and often have pieces of their kit made intentionally clunky to sell constellations and weapons.

[@NrdDy]

Because they realized their mistake. That’s a good thing. Xiangling having no ICD plus snapshot is part of what makes her OP, that’s why they haven’t done that again.

[@therranolleo468]

one of the worst aspects of these are the "opps u switched out, now u miss your entire DPS" gimmick that plagues infusion DPS with long cooldown like Alhaitham and Cyno despite Noelle having no problems switching out of her ultimate, at least Alhaitham has extra chances at mirror blades using his CA, Cyno is dead on waters if you miss his ultimate timing

[@xxx_lolidestroyer69_xxxuwu58]

​@@therranolleo468well tbf even till this day only Noelle & Diluc has such gimmicks

[@charjohn2468]

@@xxx_lolidestroyer69_xxxuwu58and I love them for this. I WISH we had more units who you can swap and their burst is still there.

[@dhruvacharya-wx4bj]

@@xxx_lolidestroyer69_xxxuwu58 Noelle, Diluc and even Keqing

[@zeph7210]

Honestly I think that at this point Mihoyo should just create more 4*s at the level of the power 5 or keep creating ones that can legitimately keep up with other options in a niche like Faruzan. Genshin is not a game with difficult content and they've made it clear that they have no intention of making it more difficult, so i don't see why they would have to feel limited when it comes to the power levels of any of their units in comparison to what already exists. Undertuned units like Dehya and units with no niche like Dori do nothing for anyone that doesn't already enjoy their character in the games story, and they have no reason to make them this way. Players that are able to 36 star abyss have been doing so for an insanely long time already, making characters that are powerful enough to compete with the power 5 or can slot into new teams or give existing teams something both powerful and interesting wouldn't lose the game or the playerbase anything.

[@peckneck2439]

One more thing why there so good is their descriptions of what they do. It's simple and easy to understand. Meanwhile modern units(and weapons) have descriptions so unnecessarily complicated it's like you're reading an instruction manual on how to build a quantum computer. Old units: When character does X, Y happens. New units: When character uses (insert overly convoluted skill name) there is a chance of X happening, but only if Y condition is met while Z thing happens in the background during the night while it's raining but only if it's Friday. This skill becomes better if you first do the other thing but only if you do it 0.5 seconds after you've done the other.

[@Vivian-ks7jr]

I wish Hoyo implemented more of the weapon and element restrictions used in weekly bounties. I love the constraint of running a whack, non-meta team of all electro, or all polearms to play along with the enemy’s vulnerability.

[@Jieteru]

My thoughts on this is when hoyo was making genshin, they've used the common benchmark used by most of the gacha games at that time which are mostly either turn-based or autoplay in terms of their gameplay leading to not only the developers but also the players to think that this kind of play style wouldn't be that strong. 1.0 players will remember back when the game was still relatively new players thought that healers are the meta or kind of a needed unit and the reason being going back to the previous sentence, the benchmark players used in the beginning of the game is that of common gacha titles where in most cases healers are highly sought out. As such the kit of the power 5 are seen as "just" damage and bennett's "weak" healing and "small" damage amp are seen as not that strong but as time passes and people began to realize that the name of the game are damage and elemental application these characters began to strengthen due to circumstances (mind you some of them got nerf prior to release) which definitely saying something since they are already not seen as weak it is just that hypercarries and healers were sought after due to their viability in the overworld. Seeds were already planted back then and there due to people slightly seeing the viability of these characters as early as that when the "meta" was still kinda not catered towards them

[@randomness.stupidness]

mihoyo keeps nerfing my main healer im so mad (i deadnamed hoyo👹👹)

[@aravind8797]

I feel beidou is not as popular because her kit is not as easy to use as the others..

[@Beeper_Bee]

I find it pretty easy, just me though and I am very loyal

[@wolfwoof2000]

She needs good investment and Fischl. It's just she is nicher because of her ER needs than the other 4 stars

[@Matthew-qt3jk]

She is mid now, she used to be best paired with Fischl but after 3.0, Fischl has better teams that don't need Beidou.

[@joeltoomer3332]

@@wolfwoof2000she doesn’t really need fischl she just needs fav great sword lol

[@BlackCascade]

What do you mean not as easy? Beidou's gameplay is literally skill + burst unless you play her for her parry mechanics which isn't her optimal gameplay.

[@sebastianmiranda3722]

I’m currently using Lynette and man it’s so sad people don’t even try her bc she doesn’t surpass Sucrose, she’s so fun to use !

[@xxx_lolidestroyer69_xxxuwu58]

Her taunt is really overlooked, it's a great defensive option without ever needing a shield. I play Keqing aggravate with Sucrose & Dendro MC and i die a lot, while it's not the case with either Lynette or Kirara

[@sebastianmiranda3722]

ikr!! I'm currently using her with Neuvi and bc of her taunt i don't have to bother about getting his auto canceled!!@@xxx_lolidestroyer69_xxxuwu58

[@randomness.stupidness]

at c1, shes like a 4* kazuha and sucrose from wish but not exactly, as a non sucrose haver i still use her sometimes over sucrose

[@ldcgfx8710]

I'm from the future: Lynette is best paired with Kinich, give it a try for maximum destruction Ajaw rampaging and Spike Cannon oneshotting stuff

[@hitomichan7]

I loved Xiangling from the start that luckily she could be obtained after passing the 3rd floor of the Spiral Abyss, she was also one of my first characters to reach friendship level 10 with my Traveler and to reach being leveled up to 90. Im a cosplayer where I cosplayed as Xiangling too for Hoyofest in my country sometime last week

[@deonardomendez9426]

When it comes to the whole power five thing, for me i personally only use fischl . She fits my playstyle and is super fun and not brain dead team , that is just press Ult and win so to speak. As of recently since i had max friendship a bunch of characters i been looking into the character archive and constellations. And one thing i noticed is that, alot of recent 4☆ have alot of power/ versatility hidden behind them. Which i think is good, for the game as if u like using a character you shouldnt bench them, just cuz you have one of the Power Five. For me , i want Candace soo badly, been reading her skills and constellations and i realized that she can fit my team/playstyle more than Xingqiou

[@AlessaBlazelynn]

9:36 this is wrong. While it's that we've had 1 free Bennett, 2 free Fischl's and Xingqiu and Xiangling have been given for free at least once outside of Lantern Rite where you could've chosen them still, it is the case that we have never gotten a free Sucrose before. The Mandela effect sure is wild.

[@MarionTubo88]

2 free bennets in total if you played during the 1.2 event back in 2020

[@AlessaBlazelynn]

@@MarionTubo88 Not sure where you got that info cuz I cant find evidence of that anywhere, afaik we only get a free weapon or free character unless it's a X.0 version. For 1.2 we got the 4-star sword Festering Desire and no free characters iirc

[@joe_simon]

@@AlessaBlazelynn Yeah the Mandela Sucrose effect. How often do i forget that she isn't a shop character. Like I hate this. I make this mistake way too often.

[@nierven]

Sudden Brave Frontier cameo just made me feel ancient.

[@spaghettios5748]

lowkey the gacha goat

[@nierven]

@@spaghettios5748 The true Gacha OG

[@spaghettios5748]

@@nierven i fucking love the lore units in that game it was so cool

[@gambadrawing5669]

1:30 as an epic 7 (the game these characters are from) player this is my “um actually” statement 😂. For that 3* specifically, she has been compared to and even made most 4 and 5 star characters in her field obsolete. She has the best stand alone mitigation for the team and very strong control utility on top of that makeing her a one of if not the best tank in the game (this is not me saying the 5 star on screen is bad, no she is one of the best characters in that game as well but performs a much different role)

[@rykersixx]

Small thing, but “snap shot” is not something genshin players made up. It’s a term that’s been around for a long time in gaming to describe that way of buffing. You likely first heard it yourself playing genshin.

[@darkwing272]

I'm glad sucrose moved up from good to one of the best because I have always liked sucrose the most out of any character in the game. She wasn't really seen as really really good until the 1.6 buff and dendro came out, but she has always been good. Playstyle and personality both

[@mangosteiny]

nahh i think she was seen as good pre 1.6 em update because they used her for vape and melt showcases,, but her use rate definitely increased after the em update

[@justsomeguy727]

Everyone who sings praises for sucrose never actually plays the character. It's so strange.

[@electricant55]

@@justsomeguy727 There's not a single character I play more than Sucrose. She's great.

[@DeathThreat_xu]

Don’t forget about Kuki. Kuki made hyperbole one of the best reactions alone. Radien is a good 5* swap but Kuki is one of the most amazing hyperbloom potentials, and she’s a healer.

[@raderelcaroman1403]

I dont think the big 5 being good ruins other 4 stars, the reason i find genshin to be the superior gasha is that your 4star don't become obselete as soon as you get a few 5stars going, but genshin is afraid to print good new 4stars now because they still want to make money

[@YOU_SHALL_NOW_PASS]

I personally don’t really get it. If they made good 4 stars they would still make money, people wish for 4 stars also right? Obviously I understand more money might be made from 5 stars because more people wish for them specifically, but the wishing and pity for 5 stars will stay the same. Say I wish for this new super powerful 4 star on current banner for 42 wishes. I finally get them. But I also want to wish for another 5-star the next banner, don’t that just mean I just did the same amount of wishing I otherwise woulda done still? It’s all RNG mostly anyways, some people get the 4 star very fast and others are unlucky and get a 5 star before the 4 star and there’s no way to guarantee a specific 4-star, unlike 5 stars so you can technically wish forever, but the majority would probably get them in about 30-50 wishes. I feel like it wouldn’t change much tbh. If they made 4 stars worth wishing for more people would be wishing for specific 4 stars also.

[@deception845]

@@YOU_SHALL_NOW_PASS And we could add that if they were to buff the older 4☆ characters, they could perform better and have more people rolling for them and having the business company make money in reaction instead of just being cannon fodder until players get a better character;

[@dragonsreingsupreme1]

​@YOU_SHALL_NOW_PASS this right here. I got a c4 yaemiko trying to get kuki constellations because she is genuinely one of my favorite characters mihoyo had released. And I still don't have a kaveh despite having pulled nearly 100 times on the banner he was featured on. 4 stars can definitely carry their own weight purely from the non guarantee at hitting

[@backpackpepelon3867]

Reverse powercreep system. I've no idea how terrible 4 star from Sneznaya will be, but for certain, only the archon will be worth pulling.

[@randomness.stupidness]

​@@backpackpepelon3867imagine they make one of the 4* really good and the power 5 becomes the power 6

[@Blazing_Justice]

0:09 in loving memory of Brave Frontier

[@owenpicasso9451]

I still dont have Sucrose and I've played on and off since launch. Kazuha took pity on my soul but that's it

[@Eclipsed_Embers]

how do people go so long without getting 4* characters I started in 2.1, played on and off since then (generally I play from early September to mid-January then stop with only a couple of days of play in between) took me like 4 months to get Razor (the most evasive of the 4*s that was out at the time) now, besides the dedicated elemental supports (Gorou, Kujou Sara, Mika, and Faruzan) and the starting 3 (Amber, Kaeya, and Lisa) I've got pretty much every pre-Sumeru 4* up to C6

[@randomness.stupidness]

ive played since raidens release and STILL dont have sucrose (alongside a ton of 4* units)​@@Eclipsed_Embers

[@Eclipsed_Embers]

​@@randomness.stupidness huh... this might just be some weird luck thing because currently the only 4* I don't have is Sethos (and since I'm not trying to get Clorinde or Alhatham I probably won't be getting him for a while)

[@NihilRefertSubSole13]

In the Arena in FEH (though it is unfortunately dying), there is a biweekly bonus for a specific set of units, and free to play and low rarity units are included in that set. This cycles in a specific order and players can basically know what specific characters go on that specific season. What happens when the player uses that said unit in the arena? 1. It gets buffed synthetically like a +10 unit (in genshin c6 is the closest comparison to it.) 2. Said units give bonus arena points when the player wins Said system can be applied to genshin where specific 4 stars can be used weekly giving them temporary stat boosts when used in the abyss, or give them additional combat effects like shockwaves upon skill/burst, chance suction effect on basic attack (like Viridescent Hunt). Some 4 stars are unjustly unused just because a CC said so, but players can enjoy more ways to play with them and even enjoy underused units like Amber, Hydro Traveler etc. when a system like this is implemented.

[@rirururu4697]

This is a very interesting video to make right before Furina's release. Furina is probably the most dramatic and massive shift in the meta that I've ever seen. Bennett is being kicked off most of his best teams for characters like Mika, Sayu, and Barbara. Furina also takes Xingqiu's place as Yelan's best partner, consequently kicking him out of a lot of his teams too. Furina wanting a healer means a lot of people who need VV would opt for Jean over Sucrose as well. Pretty much only Xiangling and Fischl out of the big 5 are coming out of 4.2 unscathed. Hoyo being able to do so much to the meta with just one character (well one character, two artifact sets MH and possibly the overhealing artifact set coming out in 4.3, and some HP draining mechanics) is honestly impressive.

[@Swagumico]

Until you realize the teams without Furina will still work just as well and that the meta isnt really shifting at all because there's no real endgame content

[@ginichimaruan3572]

it would be much easier to just not use Furina and stick to the old meta to be honest.

[@rirururu4697]

@@Swagumico That's a pretty meaningless point to make in a video about how the big 5 have been dominating the meta. You could just say to not use the big 5 because 4 stars outside of them would still work-- your damage would just fall through the roof. Same thing with not using Furina.

[@maroldbaluyot3345]

Removing Bennett is a problem for Xiangling too. Only Fiscl is unscathed

[@SuperKevinho1]

If only her hydro application was good as XQ and Yelan. So she is not the first choice for some Vape teams

[@kacperwoch4368]

The only solution i see that does not involve buffs and nerfs is making a difficulty spike in the main/archon quest and the next region ASAP by creating new enemies and situations that require niche strategies covered by underutilized characters. Vivienne of the Lake fight made me call for reinforcements, that is Noelle, the only shielder i had that could tank the attacks. This kind of fight outside the Abyss felt refreshing.

[@lovemyself217]

I don't see this as an issue because i don't think i would ever use the power 5 at the same team. I more enjoy playing with random team configuration and somehow having that team work well, of course by building a lot of character. I don't really think i need the best team to finish spiral abyss or an event, honestly if you build character well, any team would be able to finish spiral abyss

[@Vantitas]

🎯

[@Pyrolite]

This is a solution for those who want to play the game and have fun with it. But for others who may not have a diverse collection of characters to choose from, knowing that your character is literally just a direct downgrade from another, especially in gacha, is just less incentives to play them.

[@ArandaLuciano]

when i start the video i hear the music and panic thinking what champ to select, then i remember that i dont have lol on my pc anymore

[@mini-mei]

I would add Diona to the list of excellent 4* because she is also extremely versatile. She gives a shield (with C2 she also gives that shield to co-op party members), she has good cryo application, she heals, she is mostly off field, and has relatively short cool downs. In my opinion, what makes or breaks a good 4* or 5* are their cool downs and energy costs. With all new units that have come out over the years, I noticed that I come back to characters whose E and burst are readily available, while those whose are not usually end up benched. And if you do want to use one with 'bad' cool downs and energy costs, you always need a battery character. This has become even more pronounced after HYV nerfed physical dmg. And it continues, as I have noticed that the cool downs and energy costs for both 4* and 5* characters alike have become worse over time. You can immediately tell the difference when a character comes out that does have good cool downs and energy costs. Compare Tighnari and Cyno, for example. Tighnari can use his E and burst multiple times in a fight, while Cyno can use his maybe once. I adore Cyno as a character, but I hardly use him due to the low availability of his E and burst.

[@LibraritheWizardOfficial]

C6 Diona also buffs with her burst

[@-toriizaka46]

wow we have the same idea about what makes or breaks a character lol. I value energy recharge and prefer quick swap characters, so chongyun is great for me. I just give him favonious greatsword and noblesse- perfect. a character with a burst cost of 80, I'm only gonna use if I like them and they make enough particles, like sucrose.

[@jadenalexis820]

As much as I love playing these Power 5 and seeing the DMG go through the roof, I’m really trying my best to mix and match with other 4 stars observing and finding a way to make them work. Bennett alone really makes it difficult because his Burst is universal. But it’s a nice challenge for me to play around and discover potential cursed build or meme teams.

[@dendenmushi9714]

I love these vids. Cause you always inadvertently jinx things. With the powercreep of Fontaine, I wonder which one will stay especially with Furina powercreep incoming.

[@randomness.stupidness]

fischl and xiangling ended up being unscathed

[@Lost_S]

I remeber when one of the first genshin tier list placed xinqiu and bennet in F tier and qiqi in S+ tier, good times

[@kachowdah1520]

I wonder if they will continue the whole 5 star versions of the big 5 .. like Xingqiu to Yelan , Sucrose to Kazuha, Fischl to Yae .. wonder if Arlecchino will be 5 star Xiangling lol

[@alexandrachernysh7]

Thank you for making this video, you had voiced a very serious concern. It has been a problem that plagued this game for far too long, and I strongly hope that developers finally do something about it. I agree that more characters should match their functionality and give us choice, so we are not hard-locked to "Power Five" We need choice and variety

[@justsomeguy727]

Ain't nobody hard locking you to the most overhyped characters in the game. There's PLENTY of teams that don't use them and do just as well as teams that do . Vars is literally rotting y'alls brains with confirmation bias.

[@KittyNatiquinha]

13:14 Why is Sayu on this list? Besides being the face of exploration, she can Very well have usage in the abyss and combat overall. She can heal a lot, use VV, even be build as a DPS with her skill to make Sayunado! I don't see why she's being compared to these other units.

[@excrosed2425]

GIGA PETACHAD VARS INCLUDING BRAVE FRONTIER GRAPHIC IN HIS VIDEO WTF i loved that game more than anything!

[@kx2174]

I honestly think with how good hyperbloom is Shinobu is just as valuable as Bennett, maybe even more so. You get mobile healing and a ton of dmg all from one character who takes pretty much no field time. Also for non Dendro teams she can hold TotM and again, mobile healing without freezing you like Barbara.

[@ragnarokda206]

Also, one thing that can cause newer 4 and 5 star characters to compete with the power-5 is new mechanics that necessitate the use of newer characters. Which is usually what most Gacha games end up doing but Genshin has only barely touched. (like decrease and increase in hp mechanic)

[@yumewoame6983]

Calling Genshins combat system "less complex" then Diablo IV or Skyrim I think is justs a flat misunderstanding of the combat system. The problem doesn"t stem from lack of complexity, it stems from not being forced or enticed into using said complexity.

[@uAlienatedIllusion]

I have never played a gotcha game with the thought of which is the strongest characters to conquer the game, rather I much preferred the prospect of asking how do I make the characters that I like most become the strongest character(s). This has been my strategy even if my choices end up being less than ideal. Somehow there has to be a way. It hasn’t failed me yet in Genshin.

[@dragonslayerXYZ]

chongyun is way underrated

[@ragnarokda206]

The other thing that is usually understated about Sucrose is her driving ability. She is a very fast normal attacker that can machine gun enemies in tandem with other off-field dps skills like fischl and XQ. And those fast normals are Anemo to boot.

[@noob_jr_2sjrkc]

There's also the gacha elephant in the room that players are **conditioned** to optimize their playstyle. To obtain the maximum resources in the least amount of time and get the most out of those resources. When someone reaches the point of being able to play "fun" characters, they likely have much better teams, so the downgrade doesn't feel great.

[@chashu5461]

MAN AINT NO WAY YOU USED OLD TRACK FROM THE GAME DUNGEON RAMPAGE... THAT BRINGS SO MUCH MEMORIES. TY VARS

[@saimfaisal6795]

There are definitely some 4 stars that have caught up to the weaker lot of the power 5, being fischl and sucrose, like diona, shinobu and even some of the more niche ones like sara, gorou, faruzan and yun jin. The real problem is how overtuned bennett, xiangling and xingqiu are, to the point where hoyo is afraid to make a 4 star that crazy. Its not 4 stars in general, just the 1.0 ones

[@Shinigami344]

Not the league of legends music, I'm having war flashbacks

[@lettuce5658]

I honestly think that the power 5 didn't ruin the other 4 stars. I often find myself using the less OP characters because they fulfill a specific role. Rosaria & Diona are two of my favorite supports, as they just offer a lot of utility for my teams.

[@princemannic]

great video, check all the boxes even showing how some 4*s are just underrated because of the power five despite being fairly competative : kaeya,rosaria,beidou,layla,gorou,faruzan

[@Bronze_Age_Sea_Person]

Of all 5, I think only Bennett really ruins things the most. Normally, when I'm building a team, I not only consider what reaction I'm going for, but also what role a character will enact in my team. For example, if I have Kokomi, there's no reason to put Diona, despite her having both healing and shielding in a single, so I'll probably use Layla as shielder whom trades healing for a stronger shield and off-field Cryo for some freeze reactions. Baizhu does both what Kirara and Yaoyao does, while using one slot of the team only, and Nahida applies more Dendro than both DMC and Collei together, so depending on the role, a 5* kinda dictates how I'll use my 4 stars. If all 4* starts had similar power levels, this would give plenty of Variety, and even certain characters from Power 5 like Xiangling or Fischl or Sucrose, has specific conditions to be played in their best state. For example, Fischl loves a character that can dish a lot of Electro attacks really fast like Keqing, and Xianling's absurd Pyro application needs an absurd Hydro Application like Childe to be used, and she has ER issues to compensate. Bennet has nothing of this. Bennet should never have the healing, or never have the atk buffing. There should've been two Bennets, one with each function. Given Bennett without Buffing is just a worse "Pyro Barbara", he should have been just an ATK% Buffer, and should have ER issues to compensate as well, to require a Pyro Battery instead of being a Battery for Xiangling, opening a niche for a Pyro Battery that does other things(Ex. Xinyan if her kit had an actual focus instead of the stat mess that she is, with Physical ATK Buffing, 100% Crit Rate, Pyro Shield and Split scaling) and a 5* that "saves" a team slot by doing more things. Xingqiu might be the strongest 4*, but he's just a Sub-DPS as his healing and "shielding" ain't much. He could also have a niche bonus instead of Plain ATK. Maybe buffing just Skill and Burst, contrasting the NA Buffers like Yunjin, or maybe just CAs, making them not synergistic with anyone but the CA-Based Main DPS like Yanfei. Maybe His buff only worked with different elements on his teams, so you'd lose strength on his buff by putting other Pyros with him. Pretty much all strategies done with later 4* like Yunjin. So, if Bennett's only had a single role, Xiangling wouldn't be a problem for new Pyro 4* to Compete, because she'd probably want another Pyro or a general battery for her, and maybe someone to Vape her Pyro Applications, and maybe someone to Buff and Snapshot her Pyronado. Bennett does all of that except Vaping, which Childe does. Xiangling's kit open niches, Fischl's kit Open Niches, Xingqiu's kit has a specific role and so does Sucrose's. Bennet's kit is the only one that actively close niches, because he does too much too well. He's Overloaded. Also, I don't like how 4* characters' kit in general are done. To me, a C6 4* should be at the same level or even higher than a C0 5*, because it costs a lot of time to get 7 4*, and most of the time, we get them by pulling in banners too, so they also cost money for non-F2P, although almost no-one pulls on a banner solely for the 4*.

[@mrlampy]

I remember in some other video you mentioned some way to “ascend” lower tier units and I think that could apply very well to genshin’s. Making some of the weaker 4 stars able to compete with the stronger 5 stars. Either 4 stars have to directly become stronger or their unique playstyles ought to be encouraged more.

[@gnilccud]

I can't take it anymore. I'm sick of Xiangling. I try to play Diluc. My Xiangling deals more damage. I try to play Yoimiya. My Xiangling deals more damage. I try to play Cyno. My Xiangling deals more damage. I want to play Klee. Her best team has Xiangling. I want to play Raiden, Childe - they both want Xiangling. She grabs me by the throat. I fish for her. I cook for her. I give her the Catch. She isn't satisfied. I pull Engulfing Lightning. "I don't need this much er" She tells me. "Give me more field time." She grabs Bennett and forces him to throw himself off enemies. "You just need to funnel me more. I can deal more damage with Homa." I can't pull for Homa, I don't have enough primogems. She grabs my credit card. It declines. "Guess this is the end." She grabs Gouba. She says "Gouba, get them." There is no hint of sadness in his eyes. Nothing but pure, no icd pyro application. What a cruel world.

[@ZenithintheMaking]

She's just that good😌

[@spartaan1318]

Obviously meta and power will always be a factor no matter what, but i feel like at least some of the problem comes from how much emphasis is placed on completing challenges in a time limit, you cant upgrade weapons and talents unless you complete domains in the required time, so i felt a lot of pressure as a new player to get powerful characters to make it further in the game to get the resources to then get the characters that i want

[@erikastauffer8021]

I like to believe that MiHoYo has some plan that will redeem Geo and physical damage, somehow bringing basically every lack-luster character up to par with their peers. Kuki and Thoma came out before Dendro, and they seem to have been built for it. Zhongli was a really odd character to leave so lack-luster upon release; if had a Geo-buffing mechanic in mind that we simply don't have yet, and then they responded to the fan outrage by switching him to dominate in the elemental reaction playstyle, it makes more sense. Also, they HAVE to have the entire main story planned out through the end of the game, possibly with many or all of the playable characters. I can absolutely see them planning a Geo/physical component of the game that will help balance out the characters. It simply hasn't been released yet. (I can also see this being absolutely wrong on my part. But it's a theory, at least.)

[@Falllll]

Dunno if I agree that Thoma was built for Dendro. Dude ascends with Attack and needs ER, HP, and EM for it. His ER requirements are beyond insane until C4 and even then they're still pretty hefty. His C6 buffs normals, charged, and plunges. I think it may genuinely have been an accident that he's "good" now.

[@reialmero]

I want to put my trust in mihoyo like you do, but I just can't 💀

[@f4llenleaves]

@@Falllll He was built to be a sidegrade to Zhongli in Hu Tao team because of pyro resonance + C6 but ironically, I don't see anyone using Thoma with Tao nowadays xD

[@hOFalt]

Problem is Mihoyo can't perfectly predict a characters potential after launch, there's always a margin of error. If they keep releasing 4* that are at the level of the top 5 it won't be long until the power ceiling that has been set by Xingqiu and co. is broken. Keep repeating that and all you get is a bunch of older characters that have been completely powercrept. That doesn't mean some of the the pretty much useless 4* they have released in recent times make for a better solution.

[@birdiebancha910]

Honestly as a hi3 player it's shocking to me that the genshin fans want to be incentivized to pull new units and have them outscale old ones, with hi3's equivalent of abyss you're forced to run certain characters or you just won't clear it perfectly (pls someone creep flamescion soon before I give up) but yeah no I think genshin four stars are fine, the content isn't scaled aggresively enough to say that any of them are a downgrade imo

[@viablue8143]

I think Fontaine is an interesting part of this discussion. Although it isn’t that relevant at this point, we did get introduced to two new elements to combat in ousia and pneuma. Those can currently only be countered with new characters. As we move forward into the story and get closer to both the abyss and Celestia, I think it’s likely that we’ll encounter some different themes like this. If, let’s say, in the future they were to release a boss with a powerful mechanic that needs, say, ousia to counter … you might be tempted to just use Lynette instead of the other options, if you need an anemo unit in the team. Because although by herself Lynette cannot compete against Sucrose/Kazuha in normal scenarios, if there was a strong need to have at least one ousia aligned unit in the team along with someone that can swirl and reduce resistance, her value would skyrocket because she could do all of those compared to Sucrose and Kazuha, who might be excellent at swirling, but cannot do anything with the added mechanic and will require someone just for that purpose. I think it’s important to remember this aspect of characters too - their value depends strongly on their kit but also what they’re up against. You can severely limit a character without touching their kit by making them less useful against their opponent. I think there are a lot of opportunities in terms of enemies, environments and different mechanics (such as rewarding HP drain, for example), so we might see some interesting shifts in the meta in the following years.

[@Makkushimu]

I think you're framing this topic/issue wrong. I don't think the issue is that the 4 stars are "too strong", rather everyone else, especially the ones you called out, is too weak. The most fun I, personally, have had in games is when I'm either adequately challenged, or, especially for the point I'm building up to, when I break a game. The "power five" being as strong as they are, is most likely because of the constant brakes Hoyoverse keep applying to their characters and the way they design enemies/challenge in general. Punishing elemental self-application was a step in a (not the) right direction, but because of the lack of complexity you mentioned, Hoyo's idea of "challenge" are bloated values and BS enemy behavior (be it RNG dependent attack patterns, or running away/invulnerability phases), which forced players to revert back to their consistent performance. It's Hoyoverse's inability to design enemy types that require a specialist approach, or who could counter the meta that's the issue, while simultaneously preventing every character from realizing their full potential. They're still thinking like indie developers, when they're as big as AAA studios. It almost seems like there's a huge issue with gatekeeping creativity in the company, or authoritarianism, where everything's just watered down because of "one person's" incorrect idea of balance (and it being the same as enjoyability). Basically they're being too careful/conservative, when what this game needs is to let it fly. If it's too close to the sun, then it's meant to be that way, but right now this game is just wholly unsatisfying.

[@Crab380]

I agree with you and this is actually the reason I quit World of Warcraft years ago. The move from version 7 (Legion) to version 8 (Battle for Azeroth) was just too painful for me. They scaled everything down _heavily_ by doing a stat squish, de-powering the weapons we used all throughout version 7, out-leveling us from our legendary-rarity armor, etc. Once you open the can of worms of letting your players be extremely powerful, you just can't be conservative anymore. We'll always feel like the game "got worse".

[@mettaursp309]

100% this and it annoys me when people get it around backwards. I personally don't care about "enablers" who "enable" (prescribe) a small handful of teams. Unless those teams are ridiculously strong to the point of eclipsing other teams that character will never see the light of day on my account (Baizhu, Gorou, Sara). I want the freedom of creativity and expression, the ability to put two characters together and not feel hamstrung by putting them together, or by not pairing a character with someone they're tied to the hip to who also imposes their own constraints on the team. For the past 3 years I've generally stuck to 2-4 teams in abyss at a time even while I was constantly pulling new characters because new characters often hardly give reason for me to want to use them over what I already have. The most interesting (and sometimes downright frustrating) abysses are the ones that challenge my ideas of teams, forcing me to solve a puzzle for completion. Floors where parts of old team archetypes are good, but don't quite fully work so need to figure out who to pull out and who to slot in in their place. These substitutes are pretty much never the hyper niche "enabler" characters, but usually characters that are also flexible, just not quite as good under normal circumstances because they bring other things to the table.

[@nobody-xh6ii]

​@mettaursp309 wait, are you saying baizhu's forever benched? Because him AND kokomi are the best healers we have to date. One enables freeze teams + stand still type teams. The other allows for mass party heal at a click of a button, is bis for furina AND is amazing for teams that have non-stop movement like cyno.

[@mettaursp309]

@@nobody-xh6ii I might use him when I get Furina, but I have no constellations on him so his lower dendro application puts him lower on my pick list. I have other characters who can fill the roles I need and more often than not I only need 1 dendro team at a time if any.

[@NoirN3rd]

I finally convinced my friends that they don’t need Bennet since we all have Kuki, YaoYao and other - much better - healers. The community is too hyper focused on what “the power 5” can instead of what the other characters bring. If there’s one thing the “power 5” have in common is that they’re burst reliant which is a chore and there are characters that do what they do that aren’t burst reliant.

[@phoenixlau]

There is no inherent problem with recent 4-stars. The issue is that Mihoyo has for the most part moved the line where they are "strong" to high cons. C6 Sara, C6 Faruzan, C4 Thoma, etc. Less people have them, so less use them. You see the real reason why the exceptions you mentioned like Yaoyao and Kuki are exceptions, not because they are better designed overall, but because they get activated at C0. All they have to do is design 4-stars to be Rosaria/Heizou level at C0 and everything will be kosher. Obviously they are playing with the C6 tactic to squeeze money, and I guess it works.

[@NrdDy]

Kuki and Yaoyao are exceptions because of their roles with Dendro, not because of them being good a C0. Kuki definitely struggle at C0 because she doesn’t have unlimited uptime on her E. I also don’t see the C6 4* star thing as an issue because they are easier to get, BUT trying to c6 a 4* is hard because there is no gurantee.

[@phoenixlau]

@@NrdDy C0 Kuki can just use burst to cover the downtime. Both C0 Kuki and C0 Yaoyao are strong and can run their respective dendro comps well. Can you say the same thing for C0 Thoma?

[@NrdDy]

@@phoenixlau Thoma is ass. Period. Dendro made him relevant. My point was more so the Power5 are still a tier or two better than Luki and Yaoyao at C0 because of ICDs and elemental applications. But C0 Kuki and Yaoyao can hold their own. I just wanted to point out the clear difference in power though. I’m not saying you are wrong by any means.

[@banyamano010]

I agree with your points, just wanted to mention that there have been some 4*s that are of a similar level but wasn't available in 1.0. Diona and Layla are examples of this, which at C4+ easily cover all your sustaining needs, the former basically being the Bennett for the 2nd team and reaction comps at C6(200EM is no joke) on top of a strong shield, decent cryo applicator, super high energy regen and healing Layla has a shield that is comparable to Zhongli and does significantly more damage than he ever could(without constellations of course, not that his help him very much) and buffs the active's character's attacks Both of these apply to almost everyone regardless of element and team comp, with the exceptions being bloom comps and self sustaining comps, due to the lack of cryo and need for survivability respectively(though the latter really only includes Hu Tao and Lyney, both of which would be a lot more comfy with these characters) Other than that, I'd say that there's a very small amount of other 4*s that can keep up outside of their niche. For solutions though, honestly I'd rather they keep releasing niche supports or DPS types. THose characters help pad out the roster and has been what they've been doing for a while. Even if it gives us a hit(like DIona and Layla) once every 2 years, it's still a chance at getting up on the roster, while the niche supports will always work in certain team comps(like Faruzan and Gorou)

[@ozzcoremidmx8287]

You can always change the 5 stars, but the great 5 4-stars characters will always be there, Fontaine domain gave Fischl her third (if not fourth) breath thanks to the bonuses it provides, Xingqiu is so essential that has always been in the top tier support lists like.. forever? Since people understood his role, the only one I can think has lost a little bit of meaning is Bennett, but even so Wriothesley revived Bennett's role once more.

[@Dankusez]

lyney exists, it wasnt wriothesley's doing

[@hitsurei]

I tried using Bennett for Wrioteshley. It's trickier for Wrioteshley, since Bennet would keep his healt at 70% most of the time, while Wrioteshley needs to be under 60% to deal crazy damage. I still used Bennett on Eula team and for wanderer. It used to be awesome playing him in Diluc team, but you know nowadays Diluc can only deal 30% damage of SS tier Dps like Ayaka, Hutao or Alhaitam.

[@joyhammer3148]

​@@hitsurei You can think of it the other way around, just like me ;-) : everything dies too fast in Genshin now, since the newer units deal "too much" damage. So, why not just use my old units (Diluc, Venti, Ningguang,...) with the artifacts of the new ones, and their working supports? (Dps Venti + c6 Faruzan and the new elemental-skill-buff artifact set is 🔥). Less damage means more time to kill an enemy, more time to kill means more playing, and more playing means more fun. No?

[@brochiing4295]

@@joyhammer3148 But I like seeing big numbers when I press the skill or burst button

[@BigBoyAndrew05]

There are no "bad" characters in this game, just characters that need more investment than the average character. You can clear the hardest content in the game with any team as long they are well built. Which is one of my favorite parts of this game, taking a traditionally "bad" character and building them enough to be a good addition to a team.

[@nationalgeografic7687]

Dehya, candace, dori, xinyan 💀

[@BigBoyAndrew05]

@@nationalgeografic7687 I've built all of these characters and they are very usable and not bad

[@qizeaqfile]

This dilemma is easy to surmise. Genshin is a forever casual game. The strongest 5 4* characters are easy to get, is just because Hoyo wants people to complete the game without any worries. Other "weak" 4* with unique gameplay is here just for the people wants to diversified their playstyle so that they don't get bored in this game. Anyone who insisted playing the same 'strong' characters over and over again is the one who easily getting burnout. With no pvp or endgame every "strongest" characters is pointless except for looking high numbers. To surmise, there's no dilemma to begin with, everything is as intended.

[@ShdowXYZ]

you get it.

[@shadeblackwolf1508]

They have 3 potential paths to fix this: 1, obsolete a chunk of the roster by treating the power 5 as the strength benchmark for new characters from here on. I think it's obvious why this is a major risk. 2, nerf the power 5. This will send the community into a revolt, and we all remember the last major community revolt. 3, rebalance everyone else using the power 5 as the benchmark. This would be the most effort, but also the most rewarding.

[@OktavianusCelestialine]

perfect video to watch after watching "5 Reasons Why Hyperbloom Is Evil (and 5 reasons it's your savior)" the Low Investment Savior (or Devil?)

[@E1337N3SS]

I think one issue that isn't really mentioned is that the only real metric we have to judge if characters are 'strong' is Spiral, and Spiral is balanced around the current 5*s not being able to beat it without trying at c0. They can't make Spiral easier or the only 'hard' content in the game would be a cakewalk, and they wouldn't be able to justify selling you a new shiny 5* to beat the mechanic of the week. So these 4*s that we're getting that mostly kinda suck would have been perfectly fine in the early abyss cycles, but they just can't keep up with the new stuff.

[@oxdaman1]

I appreciated that this video didn't use the term "busted", since that's a subjective topic. Only four star out of the group who fits this bill imo is Bennett since he doesn't need constellations and gearing him stat-wise is stupid easy. Meanwhile, the other four all have a caveat of needing specific stats, wpn refinements, constellations, and team comps to reach that god-tier status which most people don't mention or do so after the fact. That said, I completely agree that these four being as strong as they are messed up the game balance. I tried to use Lynette in place of Sucrose for a Hu Tao team for her atk increase, but it really didn't feel that good. As for how Mihoyo could fix this, first off, they need to be open to doing balance adjustments and actually play their own game. And second, since you can nerf any characters in a gacha game, just do the opposite: raise everyone and everything up. They're already inflating the stats of enemies in Spiral Abyss without giving the roster a way to deal with them fast enough, so why not do the same for every character? That and do away with the constellation system. Whenever I look at what cons do for both 4 and 5 stars, I feel like Genshin sells you incomplete characters, which is super scummy.

[@blaze8308]

Genshin kit devs have allergy to buffing characters kit they made bad intentionally and addiction to buffing power 5.

[@EdDrow]

Besides Sucrose, you can buy the other characters in the show and c6 them eventually and you can level them up from the start without doing story quest to gain access to the next area. I build Lynette because I could and the new abyss, but since I maxed her Friendship Level I benched her, because only c4 and c6 would make her enjoyable close to the level of a c1 Sucrose.

[@lucasfreitas2245]

At this point I'm waiting for Murata to be a direct powercreep, filling the position of both xiangling and Bennet in a team

[@darylewalker6862]

But Murata is an archon 5-star. How the heck are Natlan’s rando Pyro units supposed to compete with Bennett and Xiangling?!

[@lucasfreitas2245]

@@darylewalker6862 Yeah, I know she is an archon. But my point is that those 4* are so ridiculously broken that even some archons struggle to reach them, for example: do Raiden and Venti really outclasses sucrose and fischl in most scenarios? Doubt that. I wish that Murata has furina kinda vide where she takes the best of those units and collapses that in one kit

[@Nikkikkikkiz]

ganyu melt time

[@sweetbabyrayso5262]

@@lucasfreitas2245 your example doesnt make sense because you cant compare characters that fill a completely different role.

[@TheBikeOnTheMoon]

the thing is Murata will definitely be another main DPS while Xiangling and Bennette are not. They are sub dps and suppport. It doesn't matter if Murata powercreeps them at all because they fill different roles. Not to mention the majority of the players ain't gonna get Murata.

[@CytoRamos]

i like the fact that these characters are release 3 or 2 years ago and is still able to outshine most new 4 stars and even the 5 stars

[@paulyvii]

It's not like every four star aside from the Power 5 are useless. We got Shinobu who's just as universal and....that's about it

[@izzywang5304]

Yaoyao is a great dendro applicator and healer, diona heals and shields for cryo teams, and... that's about it

[@user-mq1ng6sj7b]

Kuki isn't universal, she's very good with hyperbloom, and that's about it Hyperbloom is great but that's just one type of team at the end of the day Edit: (Kuki in aggravate also good but the main thing making aggravate so good is fischl honestly. Not to say other characters aren't good with aggravate without fischl, but you'd mostly only use characters like kuki in aggravate with fischl)

[@Number.1Yanfei.Fan123]

Layla has the second best shield

[@ghotifish1838]

I always have the feeling that Bennet was supposed to be Dilucs personal pyro support in the same way gorou faruzan and kujou sara are for their respective elements. It probably makes sense given Diluc could most certainly make use of the attack buff and healing, but I guess nobody would've guessed it would be so good for everyone

[@naufalnoorizan1763]

Most likely, and due to how mihoyo failed with bennett, they no longer did the atack buff, but put more on the c.dmg buff with their c6

[@DonKangolJones]

Ah yes, the days where I used physical Xiangling and Fischl. We knew nothing in the early days. It’s amazing how much of the power of these characters was just a matter of resolving energy issues.

[@naufalnoorizan1763]

Yeah, early game it was difficult to get artifacts, so people thiught physical was the way to go. And i still believe physical XL is good for beginners

[@randomness.stupidness]

IS PHYSICAL XIANGLING GOOD I MUST KNOW

[@leka2095]

​@@randomness.stupidnessshort answer: no long answer: nooooooooooooooooooo.

[@leka2095]

i still remember my old crescent pike xiangling, helping me kill the geo cube for noelle before i fed her weapon to the catch. or bennet, who i had no idea how to use or what his burst did, but kept him in my team anyway and played him as an on-field dps. good times~

[@karsonkammerzell6955]

My two favorite things about Genshin is that I can just use whoever to do whatever and that every character is unique from the others in some degree or approach (way they accomplish it, how it looks, etc.) I can, 100%, say that is NOT the case with a LOT of gacha games; especially being able to tackle all content by just committing to your favorite characters regardless of rarity.

[@artistcomplex]

Well, it could solve a number of concerns if Hoyo now upped the level cap from 90, to 100-120. Then they could simply ensure that the stats increase on all the 4* could be re-tailored past 90 to offer a bit more balance at the new level cap. It would also give a bunch of us at 60AR something new to work for!

[@serezelveydawn]

I always feel that the 90-100 level could unlock another ability/passive that can hopefully balance characters

[@kwayke9]

100 could genuinely be interesting (a7 passive unlock)

[@reialmero]

And make a new endgame mode that is harder so we can enjoy our newly upgraded characters, cause honestly, the abyss is the only content where I can actually enjoy fighting with all the characters I've built over the years as any enemies on the other contents just die so quickly. And I'm not even a whale, I'm just a super low spender who only buys monthly.

[@Pyrolite]

Sort of reiterating the points in this video, but this is probably mainly due to a lack of foresight in character abilities and at the start they probably wanted more generalized supports to fulfill the lack of 5-star DPS and supports in general in the beginning. I would assume that later on in the game's lifespan, when Hoyo wanted to make more unique support kits and since there's very few aspects to Genshin's combat, there's only so much a character can do that can be considered a "support". So everything ended up being a fancier deviation from the initial character supports.

[@luminous3558]

This video isn't based in reality. Its stuck in 2.X. We have long since moved away from these 4* being team defining. Dendro teams, Geo teams, Anemo teams, Hydro teams, Cryo teams all exist separately from these characters with at most 1 or 2 getting slotted in if you miss the actual good supports for that team. Plenty of the new 4*s are viable in teams where they are the only option aside from a 5* and the "power 5" isn't even considered in their evaluation. People just spent most of 1.X and 2.X glued to these characters so they can't see the actual meta thats happening outside of them. People pick the 5*s they like and build the teams that support them.

[@benjaminmyburgh6936]

I solved the dilemma by not building and never using any of the power 5. May not have the most efficient teams this way but i still have fun exploring my way

[@AfterAFashionASMR]

I tried that but couldn’t take it and caved eventually. They just make a lot of stuff so much easier 🤷‍♀️

[@sb18wlc]

Thats what I did back when only 3 of them was seen as the broken units, I actively avoided raising them. But I wanted to use sukokomon before for Kokomi so I have a slightly raised Sucrose, Fischl and Xiangling now.

[@ayblablabla]

I hate fischl and started using her bc she c6'ed herself.

[@cyberneticant6813]

I'd say that newer 4 stars should hyper focus into a niche, much like Mikah. I got Eula on her last rerun, and decided to build Mikah to support them because he is simply the best in that very specific thing. Personally I think such niche use characters are fine, because lets be honest nobody feels like making a completely new team from scratch for a new character. What I enjoy about building teams right now is that I can build a main dps, pick a support that might match them really well and fill up the rest with the power 5. This makes building acceptably effective teams way more convenient whilst still enticing me to build a new 4 star each time.

[@melqu]

Early! Love your high quality vids man, I love to put them as background video while I do my work. Good job!

[@Lurdusaur]

Just as you mentioned, I would find that gorou and kuki would be the only strong 4 stars since the start, and then if we really want to add dendro then yaoyao could also be thrown in there, but what hold them back is that gorou is geo and kuki and yaoyao are incredibly niche, where fischl is just usually better in any team that isn't dendro. I just hope we can get someone that there is a fix in the future, possibly with how future 5 stars work or with possible geo updates as I keep hearing about a rework, but past that I can't really see a fix without gutting all of these characters

[@UmDevoto]

Theres another way to solve this "problem" Just dont play them. If you tired of placing xingqiu or bennet in almost every team, just place somebody you like. Thats it.

[@blaze8308]

For example if you ever try to showcase your X character in a Genshin social site group then some people will come and say that "Xingqiu, Xingling, Fischl better" and ruin your mood. The stans won't nake people enjoy their characters properly if they aren’t Xingqiu, Xingling, Fischl. They will always try to make you feel regret pulling for your favourite characters. At least that’s what I understood from my experience.

[@BodylessAndNowhere]

It doesn't solve anything, the game is configured in a way which it will not allow you to play how it pleases you, because it's balanced around those said units. In the end you will return to play one or another of those units because Hoyo is allergic on making new good non niche 4 stars or actually healthy game mechanics. I can't play Eula (as f2p) AT ALL for the shitty elemental shield, stupid gimmicks and all stuff neglecting physics damage and circumventing her kit. But it rewards you if you pick that op teamcomp everyone knows and builds. How is that even fair? Do you think somebody didn't already thought about what you are saying? It's on the mind of many players like me tired of hearing Bennett there and Bennett that or Dendro comp that otherwise you can't play for the whole 3.0 patches. So no, that's not it. It's hoyo's responsibility to solve those kind of issues, not players' limiting themselves for playing a gacha game.

[@UmDevoto]

@@BodylessAndNowhere i wish i could see your account. Search for, heizou dps abyss 12, or any other "shitty" character and you will see, you can literally play any character if you spent your resine and resources well. Also i think eula is S tier for sure

[@UmDevoto]

Not throwing shade or anything.

[@A_Clavicle]

if you ask me, its kind of like how the beginning of an essay is where your writing is the best, and then later on it gets worse and worse in quality, either because you're dragging on too long or maybe you already repeated yourself. The characters that were in the beginning of the game's life were able to get away with these kinds of playstyles, the simple yet effective kits could be done because, what else could be done? its a bad explanation but to me it makes sense