Beginner's Guide to Genshin Impact

Have you installed this game on your phone, console or PC and don't know what to do? Paimon won't stop talking and you're already trying to hit her with the sword to see if she'll shut up? (if so, stop immediately! Paimon is cool). Are you lost in between weapons, artifacts, talents, wishes and everything else? So, despair no more! We'll explain everything you need to know to start playing Genshin Impact.

With almost 5 years since its release, Genshin Impact (Official Site) is a big game and you, as a beginner, may be lost without knowing how to start, which resources to spend and where. So calm down, close that wish window so you don't spend everything on the wrong character and read this guide carefully, it will save you a lot of headaches later.

Did you take a deep breath? So let's go!

The first thing I’ll explain is: What does Genshin mean? Basically, Genshin means “Original God”, so, in short, the translated name would be “Impact of the Original/Primordial God”. Whether this will be reflected in the story in the future, we don't know.

It's an Action-RPG type game with GACHA, which comes from “gachapon”, that is, those machines where you insert a coin and turn a lever to get a random reward (they often have those little rubber balls that jump very high, gum or those poorly made Pokémon toys which come in the wrong colors). In other words, you need to have luck (or to invest some money) to get all the characters you want.

Currently, there are around 85 characters who are divided among the elements they manipulate and the types of weapons they use. You must combine 4 characters into a team which will face the world's monsters, using their powers to create elemental reactions. And these reactions are the “main course” of the game!

Elements and Elemental Reactions

As said, each character manipulates an element, them being Geo (stone), Hydro (water), Electro (thunder), Cryo (ice), Pyro (fire), Dendro (plants) and Anemo (wind) and each of these elements , when combined, causes a reaction and this reaction is the characters' main source of damage. You can deal damage with the element alone and with your normal attack (Physical damage), but using reactions is generally the most effective form of attack in the game.

Some of these reactions are simple. For example, using Hydro (water) and Pyro (fire) causes the Vaporize reaction; using Hydro (water) and Cryo (ice) causes Freezing; using Pyro (fire) and Electro (thunder) causes an Overload. These are very intuitive reactions (if you didn't miss physics classes) and in no time you’ll master them all. The exceptions are Anemo, Geo and Dendro.

Anemo does not react with Geo and Dendro, but can Spread other elements on the field. In other words, if the grass is on fire and you use Anemo, that fire will spread over a larger area. If an enemy is wet, because of Hydro, and you throw Anemo at it, it’ll also wet other nearby enemies.

Geo does not react with Anemo and Dendro, but creates Elemental Shields that strengthen your resistance to enemy elemental attacks (a Pyro shield is stronger against fire attacks). This shield appears in the form of a crystal which remains on the field and disappears after a few seconds if it’s not collected.

Dendro is the last element added to the game, and the most complex one, it does not react with Anemo, Geo and Cryo, but the interactions with Pyro, Electro and Hydro have reactions and subreactions (Dendro+Hydro creates a seed on the field that explodes after a few seconds, but if you deal Pyro on the seed one thing happens, if you deal Electro something else does, and so on), making this a very complex and powerful element.

Finally, Physical damage has no reactions and is dealt with your normal attack, being, generally speaking, a type of damage that you’ll only use while waiting for your elemental powers to recharge (with one exception, the character Eula, powerful in physical damage, but we'll talk about that later).

This means that your teams need characters with varied elements to always cause powerful elemental reactions. Having two characters of the same element on the team also guarantees a bonus related to the element, so think carefully about how you’ll assemble them.

Traveler

Within these elemental matters, our protagonist, called the Traveler, is an exception. This character, which we choose at the beginning of the game as a boy (known here in the West as Aether) or girl (Lumine), is capable of changing elements. Currently, you can manipulate Anemo, Geo, Dendro and Electro. But only one at a time (unfortunately you can't have two elements on the same character).

This element interchange allows you to switch powers and complement your team as needed, if you don't have a character of an element that you need for your strategy. So use Traveler as a wild card for your teams. Currently, at the time this article is being written, in version 5.0, it’s expected that we’ll also have access to the Pyro element, but, for some unknown reason, we cannot access it yet.

Weapons

Regarding weapons, the characters use five types: Sword, Bow, Greatsword (or Claymore), Spear and Catalyst. These weapons have a main attribute, a secondary attribute and an effect. Like the characters, they are divided into categories, with 1, 2 and 3 Stars being the weakest and most common, 4 Stars the most used by players and 5 Stars the most powerful and rare.

1 and 2 Star weapons you’ll find scattered in chests and other boxes throughout the world. The 3 Star ones, you’ll find in rarer chests, such as the Precious or Luxurious ones, and you’ll also get many (believe me, many) through wishes, mainly when you are at the beginning of the game (and some even at the end due to their surprisingly good attributes).

4 Star weapons are rarer and can be obtained through wishes or forged in city blacksmiths. They have better attributes and more useful effects and you’ll use one of these on most of your characters. It's difficult to get one at first and you'll usually only get it through wishes. As your character evolves, you’ll begin to be able to forge some.

Finally, 5 Star weapons are the strongest and, therefore, even rarer! 90% of the time you will only get a 5-Star weapon with wishes and, rarely, through an in-game event. These weapons, as it was to be expected, have better attributes, sub-attributes and effects than any others and are launched with a character, being the “signature weapon” of a 5-Star character, perfectly matching them and complementing their powers. Usually (unless you spend a lot of money), only your main characters (or the ones you like the most) will get one of these.

Artifacts

Another important thing you should look for to improve your characters are artifacts. These are divided into 3, 4 and 5 Stars and have five categories: The flower, the plume, the goblet, the sands and the circlet. You’ll find them in chests, investigations, defeating bosses, defeating enemies and in dungeons.

At the beginning of the game, you’ll use many 3-Star artifacts and 4-Star ones will be rare and highly desired. 5 Stars can be obtained from bosses and dungeons, but only after a lot of evolution of your world (the Adventure Rank and the World Rank will define this). And, no, you won't need wishes to get 5-Star artifacts.

3-Star artifacts can be leveled up to level 12, 4-Star artifacts can be leveled up to 16, and 5-Star ones can be leveled up to 20. To level them up, you need to use other artifacts as “food” and once used, they cannot be recovered.

The artifacts are divided into Sets of Five Pieces (Flower, Plume, Goblet, Sands and Circlet), they have a main attribute and 4 secondary ones in addition to a special effect. This effect varies whether you are using 2 pieces of a Set or 4 pieces of the same Artifact Set. See the image below.

Regarding attributes, there are some rules which need to be observed:

- The Flower and the Plume have fixed attributes in their main one. The Flower will always increase your HP and the Plume will always increase your Attack! No exceptions! Secondary attributes may vary, but the main ones will always be HP and Attack.

- The Sands is the only piece that can give you Bonus Elemental or Physical Damage. No other pieces, including substats, will have elemental bonuses. For example, you will never find a Goblet that gives Bonus Electro Damage or a Circlet with Bonus Cryo Damage.

- Not counting the substats, the Circlet is the only piece which will give you Critical Damage Bonus (Crit DMG) or Critical Rate Bonus (Crit Rate) in the Main attribute.

Each character, depending on their role, will need certain attributes and sub-attributes, and in addition, some artifact sets would match them perfectly. Check out our articles on character builds to find out which artifact to equip on which character.

We still have a lot to talk about the characters, wishes, world and more! So, keep an eye on the website and we’ll still explain many more important things that will make your life in Teyvat easier! But, the last tip is: Paimon is not emergency food!

Until next time!