Well, there is a hydro hot chick as well. Debating whether I should make a swipe at her too or just stick with pyro greatsword.

 

Running through the first quest for the new event and the cutscenes are really well done. While they still weirdly won't let Zach or Sarah talk more, Traveler's body language changing in the middle of somebody's dialog really makes them feel more present.

Even if so far it's just expressing annoyance at the bottomless pit that is Paimon's stomach doing the talking.

Honestly, I'm debating if I should go for greatsword or give Hu Tao a go, since she's gone the longest without a banner rerun and at this rate it's quickly becoming a thing she only appears during the Lantern Rite.

 

Reminds me of Zaheer's ultimate Airbender philosophy in The Legend of Korra: to become one with the wind, let go of all earthly tethers.

 

So, after today's leg of the Lantern Rite story, who else is pulling sight unseen on the

Spoiler

Cloud Retainer

banner, if it ever happens?

Just, wowza.

Also, we sorta learned last Lantern Rite, but fully confirmed this time around that

Spoiler

Madame Ping in her prime was a total cutie pie. Too bad that's a road probably closed to us, but I'll totally take leggy glasses birb as a consolation prize.

On a more serious note, I feel extra sad for Zhongli now. Guizhong seems like she was just pure sunshine (that smile), and for him to lose her under such tragic circumstances must have been heartbreaking. That he chose to follow closer in her footsteps after the Archon War says a lot about how much she meant to him.

 

Spoiler

Cloud Retainer

was definitely a looker.

As to

Spoiler

Madame Ping, it seemed pretty heavily implied that she looks old because she wants to look old or feels old. Paimon straight up points out adepti usually don't age much or at all, and they clearly can change their forms if they so choose. So I wouldn't be surprised if they found a way to get her to feel (and thus look) young again to have her become playable. Granted I'm not holding my breath for that, but it seems to me like the door's not quite locked.

 

Ooh, spoilers, but I want to be surprised so I'm trying to get all the quests done today as I'm super busy this weekend.

Also, I'm sure this has been in the game for a long time, but I encountered a new (to me) voiceline from Fischl and Oz. She calls him 'Ozzy' and asks that he use his wings to blot out the sun, he in turn chastises her for complaining that it's hot and she forgot her parasol. It was great  

 

Re: the spoilered stuff. Yup, I want her as my hydro polearm character, or no one. I'll wait. Decided that a year ago when we first saw. (she's gotta be hydro, right? Very few characters "wear the wrong colors")

::edit:: Her colors aren't TOO far from Alhaitham's----perhaps she's an extremely blueish Dendro? (vs a rather greenish hydro).

 

Currently got stuck trying to beat the Signora boss fight in the Inazuma Archon Quest campaign, so for now I'm really just taking a slow break and slowly grinding to improve my party member's stats, trying to figure out some kind of strategy and maybe return to fight Signora later.

Speaking of the Inazuma Archon Quest... I honestly find this one a bit of a messy chore both from a gameplay and story POV. There are quite a lot of standalone aspects that could've been great, but honestly, the kindest way I could describe Inazuma's Archon Quest story so far is like someone took the bullet points of what was supposed to happen and showed that, but without a lot of the proper connecting lines and build-up. Most of the seemingly important stuff felt rushed because a lot of the exciting things either happened outside the MC's POV, or only been mentioned without being shown (Like Kokomi being a genius military strategist, everything about the Resistance and them struggling against the Shogunate, etc.) with characters that look like they should be important just showing up out of nowhere and then barely seems to do anything while you and Paimon did all of their work (Like, almost over half of the Inazuma cast are either glorified cameos that only shows up to make you go "Pull this character!" like a toy commercial such as Ayato, Ayaka, Gorou; or is really a side character with a role in a single scene such as Yoimiya or Sayu)

The story so far feels like an anime that has more than enough content to fill a 26-episode run but was somehow cut short into only 13 episodes, so a lot of stuff just feels like they've been speed-runned. The previous Archon Quests in Mondstat and Liyue aren't anything too great, but at least they don't feel like they tried to cram too much stuff in a short time.

 

Yeah, that's a pretty common complaint RE: the Inazuma Archon quest. Story outline is good, but needed a lot more to fill in the blanks. The Resistance being a big nothing burger is the largest offense.

There was some unconfirmed talk of one of the head writers leaving the project around that time, but even without, I think they were too concerned with sticking to the three-act story structure, and Inazuma's more complex politics pushed the limits of the allotted time (even the ending of Liyue's arc was slightly rushed, IMO).

On top of this, I think most of the story was planned out before the game's multi-billion dollar success was confirmed, so some of the early jank like the conservative character economy was still in effect.

Many of the follow-up quests do their hardest to rectify this, inserting a lot of the much-needed character depth.

Sumeru's story much better takes advantage of the resources given to them, and it shows. They stretched it out to five acts, and its diverse cast of characters are far more involved and interactive.

 

Yeah, the mid-to-late part of Inazuma's quest is kinda "random" but the actual end is great, my fave moment in Genshin so far.

Signora is always annoying, even the 20th time you fight her grinding for materials.

@YellowCorvette What part is worst/where do you get stuck? I'm happy to give suggestions, and what team are you using? She is IMHO about the toughest boss to have a good team for, due to the elements/roles needed----it's pretty easy to not have quite the right mix of decently-built characters/roles to fully cover all phases of the fight. IMHO leveling/grinding won't help nearly as much as a team/strategy change might.

Something easily over-looked: resistance potions etc. I RARELY use them, but the elemental potions are VERY useful in that fight. Both offensive and defensive, because that is ALL she does and her weakness.

 

Without knowing your cast, my suggestion currently is to bring a good healer and really stick to using the Hot/Cold mechanics. Destroy them to clear ground if you need it but generally move around so damage ground doesn't get too heavy.

As far as Inazuma itself...yeah. It started strong but fell apart. A shame as Inazuma is definitely a favorite region of mine.

 

As for my current most active party setup, here's what I had (With Yanfei serving as the main DPS, Noelle as the sub-DPS/Shield, and both Dendro Traveler and Barbara as supports):



After another go (As well as crafted some of the resistance portions that @David Hingtgen mentioned, which helps a lot), I finally defeated both Signora and Raiden and completed the main Inazuma Archon Quest (Yeah?). Eh, the ending part where Raiden executes Signora like she's Galvatron blasting Starscream into dust (And Kazuha's fallen friend's vision manages to briefly awaken and help him defend MC, for some reason) is kinda cool I guess, and I do admit that the Inazuma arc starts off pretty promising and ended alright, but everything else in the middle execution-wise is just... I dunno, seems like a lot more can be done better.

There's more than enough good content here on paper than I honestly think could've benefitted more from having a longer but more evenly-paced structure, where important plot points are given proper time to breathe and be further elaborated (As well as actually showing what's going on, instead of just tell us in exposition and dialogues).

 

Wow, dendro against Signora---that's a first! (literally wasn't possible until recently). My original thought was going to be to try electro MC instead of dendro (as electro actually is often fairly good against pyro), but with Barbara, I wonder if hyperbloom might be better--but again, I've never actually seen/tried anything dendro against Signora. I may have to google and see... (though, I have enough talent materials by now that I think I literally "will never need to fight her again" at this point)

Yanfei as main DPS---good for the first half, not so much for the second.   If anything, you can skip a pyro character entirely, as the butterflies "infuse pyro".

But it's pretty much all moot if she's already defeated now.

 

For my MC, I mostly use her Dendro kit the most because I find her Anemo, Geo, and Electro to be kinda underwhelming in some way or another, while her Dendro kit was honestly pretty decent even at just C1 (Especially if you have some decent Pyro, Electro and Hydro characters around) and feels good to play with.

TBH, during the Signora I mostly just spent my backlog of food items and elemental portions buffing my party members, swapping my active combat characters constantly to deal all sorts of elemental reactions, and just trying to last as long as I can until I somehow defeated Signora. Thinking back, maybe I can use an Electro character in place of the main DPS instead of Yanfei since Electro can react with both Cyro and Pyro, but then again the only other Electro character I had is Lisa whose build wasn't exactly best-suited as the main DPS dealing character...

Not exactly the most elegant of strategy, I'm just happy that I can even beat Signora (And Raiden Shogun later on) at all.  

 

So did a hyperbloom against Signora with Zhongli Mona Kuki Nahida. Definitely doable, no food used. Also unlocked Icy Rivers, Crimson Witch achievement for not destroying any of the corner things.

My personal tips for Signora: Avoid destroying the corner things unless you feel you have to (whole floor's paved with fire/ice) and make sure Signora's not in the middle of some firestorm thing because otherwise you're just wasting your time. I usually use a catalyst or archer that doesn't rely on stamina paired with a shielder since Signora throws a lot of homing and AOE so it's tough to dodge all of them plus her 1st phase will sap your stamina quick if you're not careful. When Signora enters her cocoon phase, hand near the corner things until a firefly appear and quickly grab it, hit Signora, and dash back to the corner. It only takes 4 fireflies to break the cocoon so no need to go wild with a pyro campaign because you may leave yourself vulnerable to counterattacks. When in her firestorm phase, just hang near the corner thing and avoid destroying it until she ends her phase (you can do some damage to it beforehand so you can break it right away). I usually avoid using a pyro/cyro in a Signora team comp but I'm sure better players have a way to pull it off.

Big agree regarding the Inazuma archon quests. It's a huge disappointment since a lot of my favorite units are Inazuman. Inazuma does have quite a bit of good story-driven quests but they don't involve the playable characters, sadly.

 

I tried to pull for the current Xiao banner one time today, and...




Yup, Xiao is really the first 5-star I've gotten. I also got YaoYao and a C2 for Yun Jin in the same pull, which is also great.

 

What I would give to have seen some of these vignettes in "canon":

 

So I went ahead and did act 2 of Lantern Rite since it's hard to avoid seeing references of it on social media. Regarding certain characters...

Spoiler

I'm also very much interested in human Cloud Retainer. However, to me, Ping seems to be the one more likely to be released as her human form was teased back in the God Guoba video together with Yunjin.

 

Right. She's also been seen with a weapon twice now, and canonically teaches it to others. So seems much more likely to be playable some day.

 

So, long time lurker, first time poster, been playing since... May 2021?

This is gonna be a loooooong two weeks for the Hu Tao rerun banner.