#i typically focus on crit rate and damages ideally

[starmocha]

People who suck at using the claymore, where you at, I need to be with my people 😔😔😔😔😔

[hematomes]

genshin impact: the neverending suffering of artifacts’ farming

hi, don’t forget to drink water, do you daily commissions in genshin and get your daily bonus on the mihoyo lab website thingy

so today, since all... idk, 12 of you seemingly asked for it, i’ll be rambling about genshin’s artifacts and how to boost your character’s performance with them. get ready for broken english and me going on and on about stats (but not too much bc i hate maths). let’s goooo

quick disclaimer before we begin: this is just the opinion of one (1) single player. i just enjoy the strategy a lot and the fact that this forsaken game forces me to think long and hard about stats. at the end of the day, if you’re satisfied with your DMG, you don’t have to listen to me.

finally, if you want personalised help in building a specific characters, i’ve been studying most of them (especially 4* since I have all of them zkzezek) so you can DM me anytime! or even go with the asks if you want to remain anon, i don’t mind. i’m happy to help anyone!!

table of contents

I. data about the different artifacts (stats when maxed out, info)

II. ideal stats for each type of character

1. main DPS

2. sub/burst DPS

3. healers and tanks

III. CRIT rate/DMG and the 1:2 ratio

I. data about the different artifacts

so, first, a little bit of info/data about the artifacts!

you’ll get an added substat at lvl 4, then substats will improve every 4 levels. one random substat improves, so you’ll have to pray and cross your fingers

the substats cannot be the same as the main stat

5* artifacts go up to lvl 20, 4* to lvl 16 and 3* to lvl 12

the percentage bonus is added on your character’s base stats

the flower and the plume’s main stats are always HP flat and ATK flat. focus on their substats to pick the best

added bonus: every set of artifact has extra lore in the archive. for example, eula’s set (pale flame) has incredible lore about the fatui harbingers and has dangerously increased my need to see scaramouche again

and now, the maxed out stats of artifacts. i’ll go over 5*, 4* and 3* for new players!! baby genshin players are literally the best idc.

flower: 3* goes up to 1,893, 4* to 3,571 and 5* to 4,780

plume: 3* goes up to 123, 4* to 232 and 5* to 311

HP%, ATK%, DEF%, elem DMG bonus%: 3* goes up to 23.1%, 4* to 34.8% and 5* to 46.6%

phys DMG bonus%: 3* goes up to 28.8%, 4* to 43.5% and 5* to 58.3%

EM: 3* goes up to 92, 4* to 139 and 5* to 187

ER%: 3* goes up to 25.8%, 4* to 38.7% and 5* to 51.8%

CRIT rate%: 3* goes up to 15.4%, 4* to 23.2% and 5* to 31.1%

CRIT DMG%: 3* goes up to 30.8%, 4* to 46.4% and 5* to 62.2%

healing bonus%: 3* goes up to 17.2%, 4* to 26.8% and 5* to 35.9%

a. sands of eon/timepiece

so the sands of eon aka the timepiece is quite decisive for the type of character you’ll be doing: either a main DPS or a support (tank/healer/sub DPS). as such, it has similar drop rates & maxed out levels on the big 3 stats: HP, ATK and DEF. however, when building a support like a sub DPS or a healer that relies on their ult (like diona for example), you’ll need energy recharge (ER), which is a lot rarer. elemental mastery (EM) isn’t generally recommanded as a main stat, it’s best to find it in sub stats. DEF% is also not a good option unless it’s for specific characters that rely on their defense, like albedo or noelle.

basically, a main DPS will most likely have a ATK% timepiece, while a support would need an ER%. that being said, supports like xiangling must also have a good chunk of elemental mastery because her ult can deal insane amount of damage with elemental reactions. you’ll need to balance both ; for example, a weapon with elemental mastery (like dragonbane) and a ER% timepiece, or good EM/ER substats etc.

b. goblet of eonothem

the goblet is where you’ll typically get your elemental/physical DMG bonus. it’s the only artifact that gives this bonus at all (it’s not found as substats). you can also drop EM, ATK%, HP% and DEF%.

there’re little characters that would need phys DMG. if you’re building a physical DPS, consider their base ATK and the stats of their normal/charged attacks. albedo, for example, would not be your typical phys DPS. the main phys DPS that exists is razor, and now there’s also eula; razor is an especially good physical DPS bc he gets a phys bonus either way so at lvl 80 + a lvl 20 goblet you go up to 105% phys DMG bonus. however, electro DPS is also a nice option! claymores tend to be very good physical DPS because their normal attacks easily go over 100% of their ATK, but i heard that fischl and xiangling are viable as well. all in all, anyone can be a physical DPS, but some of them are better off as elemental DPS. you do you, though!

c. circlet of logos/hat

the hat is crucial, because it’s where you’ll get your main CRIT rate/DMG. CRIT is super important, especially with your DPS; i’ll talk more about the best way to build CRIT in a bit, but just know that the main theory is building the 1:2 ratio: 50% CRIT rate and 100% CRIT DMG.

you might also know that there’s the healing bonus, needed for... healers. like crit rate/dmg, you’ll only find the healing bonus on the hats.

II. ideal stats for each type of character

now that that’s out of the way, let’s talk about the ideal stats for each type (main DPS, sub/burst DPS, healers, tanks).

1. main DPS

there’re a lot of good main DPS characters in genshin. mine are xiao, yanfei, razor and hu tao, for example. there’s also childe, ganyu, ningguang... and usually you’ll build them the same way (with exceptions). as such, your goal would be at least 1.5k ATK% (unless your DMG depends on something else, like hu tao and how it relies on her HP%), 50% CRIT rate and at least 100% CRIT DMG.

your substats priorities would be: CRIT rate/DMG > ATK% > EM (unless it’s a physical DPS) > ER%. there’s always exceptions, like hu tao once again (i talk a lot about her but im pissed bc i can’t drop a good HP% timepiece).

as such, your timepiece will generally be on ATK%, with CRIT rate/DMG subs. elemental mastery is an added bonus on characters like hu tao, yanfei, etc. DEF% and HP% are generally secondary (except for hu tao because, as i said, her DMG relies on her max HP & her burst on her health bar status), so focus on the big 3. flat stats (no percentage) aren’t very good either, but better than nothing.

your goblet will be either on ATK% or on elemental/phys DMG bonus%. the easiest way when you’re building a set is to leave the goblet as your broken set (aka the 5th piece with no set bonus), since the drop rates on elem/phys goblets are very low.

your hat will be on CRIT rate/DMG, depending on which one you need. ATK% is a viable alternative, but crit is really good. however, if you’re just starting to build, you can use a temporary ATK% hat.

2. sub/burst DPS

support DPS are very interesting characters to build and play. unlike DPS who focus on DMG/ATK/etc, this time you’ll have to balance energy recharge% and elemental mastery. the substats are also very important and should be focusing on ATK%, EM and ER%.

when building a support, you need to keep in mind that they’ll be buffing your main DPS’ damages, so they rely a lot on elemental reactions. which is why your substats priority becomes ER% > EM > ATK%. CRIT is always good but not as important, especially if you have around 200 EM and your main DPS is already past 50% rate/100% DMG.

your timepiece should be on ER%. with a sub DPS that relies on their burst, the ideal ER% is around 150%, especially if they need a lot of energy to build their burst. xingqiu, for example, is better around 170%, but chongyun would be fine at 150%. since the timepiece is the only artifact with the ER% bonus, it’s kinda crucial.

your goblet needs to be either on elemental DMG bonus% (not physical!) or ATK%. EM can be an alternative, especially if it helps you reach +50% on elemental reaction DMG. otherwise, elemental DMG bonus% is the safest option.

your hat should be on EM or ATK%. EM is better because it’s super rare and really helpful for elemental reactions so, if you drop one with good substats go for it.

3. healers and tanks

they are absolutely vital in dungeons like the abyss thingy, because you can’t use food so you’ll need to heal with characters. currently we have qiqi, jean, zhongli if you have his c6 (god), diona, bennett, barbara (free) and noelle (free). there is two type of healers: those who only heal on their ult, like jean, bennett and diona (moreover, bennett only heals 75% but he gives an ATK% bonus so he’s still incredible), and those who heal with their elemental skill like barbara, c6 zhongli, qiqi and noelle. the first type will need a focus on their ER% while the second on HP% (except qiqi, it’s on her ATK%). zhongli in particular needs as much HP% as you can because at c0 he’s a tank & his shield is the best of the game. it relies on his HP%, so aim for around 30k at lvl 80. if you can go higher, even better! and if you want a run-down of my stuff for zhongli i can too, mine is at 49k HP and his shield is at lvl 10, so he can basically shield me from anything. anyway.

healers that rely on their ult

your timepiece will need to be on ER%. aim for at least around 150% energy recharge, maybe more depending on how much energy their ult needs. ideal substats would be HP%, the rest isn’t that important.

your goblet has to be on HP%. if you can get an ER% sub it’s even better.

your hat, in healing bonus%. same thing, if you can get an HP% and/or ER%, even better.

healers that don’t rely on their ult

this time, the focus would be on HP%, but ER% is always important so look for it in substats. same hat.

exceptions: qiqi, noelle

qiqi’s heal is based on ATK. her e is based on her ATK but the ult is based on the character that deals the DMG. meaning if qiqi has ult and the opponent is marked with a talisman, and if your character deals like a 1k DMG, they’ll get 1k HP. so switch your timepiece and goblet to ATK%, and keep your hat on healing bonus%.

noelle, however, relies on her DEF. same thing than qiqi, switch timepiece and goblet to DEF%. noelle as a healer/tank doesn’t have a very useful ult, but if you got lucky and have ATK% ou CRIT rate/DMG% substats, see if you can up her ER%!

III. CRIT rate/DMG and the 1:2 ratio

if you’ve done some research on the ideal crit rate/dmg, you might have heard of something called the 1:2 ratio. it basically means that you need to have half as much CRIT rate% as you have CRIT DMG%. the starter would be 50% rate & 100% DMG but, in my opinion it’s not really enough if you’re around AR 45 or aiming to clear the last stages of the abyss spirals. 50% CRIT rate is enough but if you can up your CRIT DMG% to like 125/150% it’d probably be the best. i got super lucky with my xiao and went up to 200% CRIT DMG, but it’s because he already has a CRIT rate bonus as you level him up so it wasn’t my priority.

anyway, i’ve been playing with around 50% CRIT rate on my DPS (except xiao bc he also has the CRIT rate polearm + his lvl bonus) and frankly it’s been enough for now. dealt a 98k with the hutao & mona ults combo, hu tao around 50% rate & 150% DMG while mona was at 30%/150%. naturally, the higher your CRIT rate, the better, but the 1:2 ratio is just a good start. don’t obsess over it!

conclusion

well, this was fun. now, it’s your turn: if you have questions or you disagree with something i said (very plausible, i might have said a lot of dumb stuff and i could be a terrible player lol), do tell! keep it polite though, i don’t want to start a fight but i’m always interested in other players’ experience. i’ll say it again: drink water. mwah

[mvmadvice]

MvM Bootcamp: Wave 666, the ultimate wave order guide

THE ULTIMATE MANN VS MACHINE, WAVE 666 GHOST TOWN GUIDE INCOMINGGG

I know it’s been awhile folks, but I’m back (briefly) with a down-and-dirty guide on wave 666.

Wave Order:

1. Crit W+M1 Pyros + Crit Bat Scouts + Crit Giant Demoknights

2. Crit Giant Soldiers + Uber Medics (one medic per soldier)

3. Giant Deflector Heavies + Giant Burst Fire Soldiers + Soldiers + Heavies

4. Tanks + Crit Scattergun Scouts

5. Giant Burst Fire Demomen + Crit Demoknights (small) + 1 Tank

6. Extended Banner Direct Hit Soldiers

7. Giant Heavies + Giant Quick Fix Medics

8. Tanks + 96 fucking Spies <----- HALFWAY POINT!!!!

9. Crit Huntsmen

10. Crit Rapid Fire Soldiers

11. Crit Burst Demomen

12. Crit Airblast Pyros

13. Crit Scattergun Scouts (not to be confused with part 4)

14. 1 Tank + Crit Heavies + Uber Medics

Yes, despite it all being one big waves, the bots still come in a specific order. I’ll organize them as “parts” (part 1, part 2, part 3, etc) since it’s all one big wave. Quick explanation of each part under the cut.

Part 1:

Aka the warm up. Just don’t let them get in close to you, and you’ll be a-okay. The demomen come in groups of four, and the little bots come in groups of I wanna say 10? I’ve never really counted because they’re not that big a threat.

Part 2:

The first time you meet Uber medics in the wave. It’ll be hard for Medic pickers to isolate the medics, since each giant soldier comes attached with one and they come as one messy group, meaning there isn’t a convenient place to put all your stickies/throw your gas to kill all the medics cleanly. Ideally, a good Sniper can take out most--if not all--of the medics. However, since good Snipers are hard to come by, you’re better off popping the medics as fast as possible. If you have a kritzkrieg Medic and a Soldier on your team, it may be worth popping kritz on the Soldier, since Soldier’s crockets can fairly reliably 1 shot Uber medics. 

Part 3:

The Giants will always come as a pair. Ideally, you’ll want to kill the first pair before the second one drops, etc etc. The little bots can be annoying though, since the spam is super crazy during this part. If you have a medic, make sure your projectile shield is ready, because you can literally render all the bots useless for a short period of time. If you’re playing Engineer, move your sentry gun out of the way at the beginning of this part or get ready to wrangle it. If you’re playing Soldier, you can fire a few cheeky rockets early to try to damage the bots right as they hit the ground. Splash damage is your best friend during this part. Soldier, Demoman, and Sniper really shine here.

Part 4:

This is the easiest tank part (and also probably the easiest part of Wave 666 if your team is good at working together). If you have an Engineer, he can singlehandedly hold the bomb for the entire duration of this wave, allowing the other 5 players to focus down the tanks. Alternatively, if you either lack an Engineer or your Engineer doesn’t realize the power he has against a bunch of Scouts, dedicate ONE person to stopping the bomb. Some good classes you’ll see often that are good at watching the bomb are: Soldier, Demoman, Scout, Sniper (if he can aim), Pyro (if they’re not on the tank), and Heavy. Demoknights and Spies can also watch the bomb, but they aren’t nearly as effective. Phlog Pyros, Buff Banner Soldiers, and Carbine + Bushwacka Snipers should always be on the tank, not on the bomb. If you’re really struggling, try seeing if your team has enough tank damage. I’ll talk about tanks and tank damage more extensively in another post.

Pro tip: If you think you might be done with the Scouts and want to stop watching the bomb, press tab and see how many Crit Scouts are left. You’re done with Scouts (for now) if the number is 75.

Part 5: 

The demomen (both the giants and the little ones) will move in groups of five or ten. This means that they’ll be grouped up very nicely with each other, but it also means that you can quickly get overwhelmed by 20+ giant demos all spamming grenades everywhere. They do, however, take a long time to reload, so if you want to get in a few quick Ubersaws, it’s possible with good timing (2-3 depending on how much you wanna push your luck).

This part is also pretty easy, depending on how much AOE (area of effect) damage you have. Basically, if you have a lot, the giant demos go down fast. If you have very little, well, it’s do-able, but you’ll need to be very efficient at rotating between the tank and the bomb. Oh yeah, did I mention that after 10-15 giant demomen drop, a single tank will appear? Yep! This tank has more HP than the tanks you just fought, so be careful. Ideally, your team will split in half and deal with them at the same time. If you have very little tank damage but a lot of bot damage, focus the tank first (I know, but hear me out). Since you know you don’t have a lot of tank damage, starting on the tank early will make sure you have enough time to get rid of the tank before you take on the robots. Most teams with very little tank damage will have a lot of robot damage, so you should be able to take care of the robots fairly quickly. If you have very little of either, I have to genuinely wonder how you got so far into the wave in the first place.

Part 6: 

If you’re playing Engineer, you basically have to hide your sentry around corners to pick off bots before they can react to your gun. If you’re playing any other class, buy crit and blast resistance. Wave 666 is different from other modes in that you can refund your upgrades during the wave. The ending of Part 5 is very slow (a few crit demoknights filter in over a short period of time), so take that chance to get as much crit and blast resistance as you can. Let the sentry gun watch the bomb while your team goes to get upgrades. You’re gonna need it.

This part usually isn’t that hard though, overall, since most people have blast and crit resistance by now anyway.

Part 7:

As soon as the last soldiers spawn, the first Giant Heavy/Medic pair will also spawn. Try to clean up the soldiers before they drop. This is a pretty straightforward part of the wave. Kill the Medic (without letting it pop uber, or else it’ll go back to full hp), then kill the Heavy. Make sure you don’t have more than 2 pairs on the field at any given time, or your life will be hell and the wave will be over.

This part you’ll have relatively little control over, but don’t let the last pair touch the bomb. Usually, the first or second pair will be able to touch it, maybe let the third pair, but absolutely do not let the last pair touch the bomb. If they do, you risk having the bomb still in play during the dreaded part 8.

Part 8: 

The spookiest and hardest part of wave 666 that everyone has told you about. Wave 666 is known for 2 things: being really fucking long and the ninety-six fucking spies that come at the same time to destroy your life.

These spies are NOT your normal support spies, which typically come in groups of two or three. No. These spies will swarm. There will be something like 10 or 20 on the map until you kill them all. They also drop money ($2 or $3, this is the part where even the best scouts will lose that A+ rating). But the most annoying, least known part about these spies is as follows:

They can cap the bomb.

You read that right. It’s extremely rare that they have the opportunity, since the tank usually gives enough time for the bomb to respawn, and the Spies will never spawn with a bomb, but if you do happen to have a bomb? Good luck winning this.

During this part of the wave, buy backs, crit canteens, and uber canteens are your best friends. If you’re a non-explosive class, you can jump on top of the tank. If you’re a Scout, please don’t do that if you already see someone up there. You can dodge spies with pretty good success, let the tank Sniper sit up there. Sincerely: a tank Sniper.

HALFWAY POINT IS OVER, SOMETHING LIKE 7 OF 10 TEAMS FAIL BY THIS POINT, SO IF YOU’RE HERE, CONGRATS! YOU’RE BASICALLY DONE!

Note for parts 9-14: These bots all come in a row, and don’t give you a break in between bot types, so you’ll often get a mix of two bots at the end of one part and beginning of the next. You might also start to lag due to the large number of particle effects now in the game.

Part 9:

Crit huntsmen. They’re pretty easy if you have a Medic and a Soldier. I’d argue they could probably hold the bomb all on their own if they don’t die. Snipers are really weak in the HP department, so they’re easy to burst down in groups. By now you should have more than enough damage.

If you’re playing Sniper, this is the last part of Wave 666 that you’ll be useful in until part 13 (since Soldier does your job better).

Part 10-11:

The Crit Soldiers from part 10 are very dangerous. You might want to dodge in and out from behind walls (the ones on either side of the main pathway are good, as well as the wall on top of the building in the middle. If you’re lucky, the bomb bot will go towards the right side (if you are looking from the hatch to the robot spawn), where there is a really good bottleneck corridor. Have a low quality screenshot from a recent game (ignore the icicle sentry buster).

This bottleneck is absolutely amazing vs the bots from part 10-12 because if you can get the bomb placement just right, all the robots will funnel in from the front.

Sometimes, you might get a cheeky flanker, but if you have an Engie or a very aware power class, they aren’t a problem.

The Demomen can be dealt with similarly as the Soldiers.

Part 12:

The Pyros are where your power classes start to falter. The best class against these Pyros is your Engineer. If you don’t have one, good luck. They’ll probably be able to push you all the way to your hatch, but if you have enough people alive (2-3) at any given time, you should be able to prevent the cap.

If you’re at the bottleneck, have one person above and the rest of the team on the ground. Ideally, your soldier(s) are smart enough to figure out that these Pyros know how to reflect and have perfect reflect timing, so they’ll position themselves accordingly. 

Part 13:

The Pyros will soon trickle to a halt and some Scouts will start to mix themselves in. Be careful, these Scouts do a lot more damage than the Scouts from part 4.

Part 14:

A few minutes after the Scout’s start spawning, a tank will spawn. This tank is even tankier than the tank from part 5 and drops very little money when you kill it (but that doesn’t matter, you’re basically done anyway at this point). At the same time, the Heavy/Medic pairs will also start to drop, so it’s just a giant fuckfest of crits and panic.

Be warned: robots can cap while ubercharged. If you do not have a Demoman, Pyro, or another class that can disrupt a bomb drop, make sure to pop the medics’ uber before they reach your base.

If you’re playing Sniper, this is the part of the wave that you get to be useful again, because your charged bodyshots will 1 shot the uber medics, preventing them from popping.

If you beat all of that, then you’re done!

Congratulations!

You get to feel accomplished that you beat wave 666.

Make sure to keep an eye out for some in depth analyses of the harder parts of the wave, along with some class guides for wave 666.