Like many online games in recent memory, Genshin Impact reels in players with the vivacious personalities and slick design of its characters. Although it launched with a modest roster of 21 characters, it’s already added five more, has two more likely being revealed this month and about a dozen more rumored to be dropping in the next year or two.

All of those hype-fueling heroes need flashy special abilities, or “elemental bursts” more specifically, to complement their unique styles. Most bursts get the job done, but some needed a bit more time in the proverbial oven, keep reading to sort the must-haves from the hard-passes.

10 Bad: Riff Revolution (Xinyan)

Bullying the new kid is always frowned upon but this must be done. Disclaimer for those wishing for Xinyan this month: she’s a formidable DPS with amazing survivability… on paper. Building shields to absorb/spread pyro based on how many enemies Xinyan hits at once means she’s the proactive yin to Beidou’s reactive yang.

Right now, however, her bugs are debilitating. While her burst looks cool enough to make up for these things, ultimately it’s just a big damage explosion. Are you picking her over Diluc? No. What about the pyro support king, Bennett? No way. Even Xiangling can boost your team’s attack once you invest in her. So until Xinyan’s bugs are fixed she’s only better than Amber. Talk about wasted potential.

9 Great: Dawn (Diluc)

Reasons to love Diluc are plentiful and Dawn is one of them. This burst is a tragedy in four parts, a tragedy for all of the hilichurls on the screen, that is. Dawn consists of far-reaching slashing damage, a phoenix projectile that spreads pyro, an explosion, and an eight-second blessing that imbues all of Diluc’s normal attacks with pyro as well. Usually the best bursts in Genshin will provide you with something more than big damage alone, but as far as bursts of that nature go, Dawn is simply too good to be ignored.

8 Bad: Cloud-Parting Star (Chongyun)

Chongyun carries the burst-that-should-be-a-regular-skill curse. Add a hefty damage buff to his skill’s cryo blessing and make that his burst instead, the two talents should be swapped. Chongyun isn’t a bad character at all but Cloud-Parting Star feels uninspired. Genshin characters are never short on style and Chongyun is no exception, but in a game where other heroes can morph into crows cloaked in lightning and fly through foes, he just seems comparatively drab.

7 Great: Stellaris Phantasm (Mona)

Mona’s skills are as useful as her character is quirky. While she’s generally not thought of as a great unit for dealing damage on her own, the buffs she provides to your team can turn even the least exciting heroes into heavyweight champions.

Some confusion caused by mistranslations in the description of Stellaris Phantasm means that it doesn’t quite provide as much of a boost as some players expected, but it’s nothing to scoff at. Just two weeks after launch players were already posting hits dealing anywhere from 20,000 to 100,000 damage and many of those were thanks to Mona.

6 Bad: Fiery Rain (Amber)

No series of Genshin Impact critiques would be complete without mentioning the most ubiquitously lamented character. Amber-hating is a meme at this point. miHoYo made sure that Amber’s kit would make you want to replace her immediately, which is a shame because personality-wise she’s one of the better characters.

Fiery Rain has some meager utility, it’s your most reliable option for breaking wooden and non-pyro mage shields in the early game, but claiming that a finishing move is good at finishing shields – and not the enemies that hold them – is damning with faint praise. Still, Genshin’s worst character narrowly avoids also winning the title of “worst burst.”

5 Great: Raincutter (Xinqui)

Xinqui and his Raincutter burst can do it all. Xinqui’s rain swords are summoned through his various talents, when they’re active they apply the ever-useful hydro element to enemies and reduce incoming damage.

Raincutter summons the maximum allowable number of rain swords that provide all of the aforementioned benefits, rapidly carve up your foes and imbue your regular attacks with hydro afterwards. Raincutter also persists while changing characters and has a fifteen-second duration – nearly double that of Dawn’s eight-second pyro imbue. Combine gear that returns a small amount of HP for burst usage with Raincutter’s defensive buff and Xinqui will also function as a competent healer.

4 Bad: Lightning Rose (Lisa)

All new Genshin players will have some strong feelings, good or bad, about the game’s most gratuitous anime-trope character. But whether you love or hate her, everyone can agree that the thing to like about Lisa is certainly not the Lightning Rose burst. As with her normal skill, Lightning Rose looks awesome, but its damage is lacking, its range is small, and it knocks enemies outwards, away from its area of effect… it essentially bounces your foes to safety.

3 Great: Fantastic Voyage (Bennett)

Most players thought of Fischl as an honorary five-star character throughout patch 1.0, if she deserved that title at the time then Bennett has definitely earned it as well. Bennett’s Great Voyage makes him the support character to beat right now. When you need healing Great Voyage heals you, when you don’t need healing it boosts your attack substantially.

ATK is a stat with gradually diminishing benefits for most characters, but the damage buff that Bennett grants scales with his ATK, meaning those artifacts you’ve swapped out for CRIT on other characters can be hand-me-downs for Bennett and will return dividends for your whole team.

2 Absolute Worst: Wake of Earth (Geo Traveler)

Traveler is in a weird spot for now, he or she will undoubtedly get stronger as the plot hands out more elements to wield, but the current situation is bleak. The geo talents are especially bad, only useful in very specific cases. Wake of Earth is arguably the worst burst in the game. It’s a moderately strong knock back with some stalagmites that provide useless cover. Wake of Earth improves a bit as you level Traveler (eventually it boosts CRIT, for example) but by that point you’ve probably already found characters you enjoy more.

1 The Best: Preserver of Fortune (Qiqi)

Qiqi is brilliantly designed but some will object to her burst being crowned the very best. The biggest problem with Genshin’s combat philosophy is that 90% of its battles boil down to time trials. Burn through enemies with colossal HP pools before time is up. Death is rarely the reason for failure here.

miHoYo needs to introduce hard-hitting enemies soon to prevent staleness, when that happens Qiqi will shine even brighter. Her burst curses enemies, letting you and your co-op partners heal by attacking. This makes Qiqi nearly immortal and encourages your teammates to steal health from foes directly – it’s a mechanic that perfectly complements Qiqi’s zombie motif and makes healing fun. Her healing also scales with ATK meaning Qiqi encourages aggressive combat in a more engaging way than simply watching a clock deplete.

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