Intro
Yelan has been rumored as a 5-Star Xingqiu for quite some time now. We already know her similarities with him from the livestream, but how similar is she to Xingqiu? Can Yelan replace him? And what is her best build?
Conclusion
Since Yelan’s role is solely as the off-field DPS, 4-Emblem of Severed Fate is easily the best option for her.
Artifact Main Stat:
• Timepiece: Energy Recharge% or HP% (If there's no Battery, aim for at least 180% ER. I’d recommend 200% for a more comfortable run)
• Goblet: Hydro%
• Circlet: Crit% or HP%
Artifact Set:
1. 4-pieces Emblem Of Severed Fate
2. 2-pieces mix of (Use the ones with the best substats):
• Emblem Of Severed Fate
• Heart of Depths
• Tenacity of the Millelith
• Noblesse Obliged
Best Weapon For Yelan:
1. Aqua Simulacra
2. Polar Star
3. Favonius Warbow
4. Fading Twilight
5. Skyward Harp
6. Thundering Pulse
7. Elegy For The End
8. Sacrificial Bow
9. Viridescent Hunt
10. Recurve Bow
11. Mouun's Moon
12. The Stringless
13. Alley Hunter
All of Yelan’s key features scale with HP, so she doesn’t need ATK at all. Because of this, Amos’ Bow is a terrible weapon for her. Since ATK is useless on Yelan, you also won’t benefit from ATK buffs like Bennett or Noblesse Obliged.
ER weapons' performance drop in ER build. They're also less viable in a team with Battery, like Raiden Shogun comp. In this case, non-ER weapons rank better.
Yelan's Mechanic
Breakthrough State
Yelan’s kit has a feature on her Normal Attack, making this talent eligible for leveling up. This feature is called the Breakthrough State.
• Breakthrough State: After being out of combat for 5s, Yelan’s next Charged Attack will have 80% reduced charge time and deal AoE damage based on Yelan’s HP.
Remember that being out of combat is not the same as being off-field. So in Spiral Abyss, you can’t regain Yelan’s Breakthrough State by keeping her off-field. Instead, to regain it, you need to use her Elemental Skill. When Yelan’s Skill hits an enemy, each opponent grants her a 34% chance to reset the state’s cooldown.
This state is indicated by her glowing bracelet. Additionally, a mark will appear above her head if the cooldown is reset by her Skill. There are also some SFX when her Breakthrough state is available.
Elemental Skill
Yelan has a Tap and Hold version on her Skill. Both versions have the same CD and effect, but the Hold allows you to hit more enemies.
• Tap: Move in a direction.
• Hold: Dash around until you press the Skill again to end it (or after 3s).
When Yelan hits enemies, she will put a mark on them. Once the dash ends, this mark will explode, dealing damage based on Yelan’s max HP.
After the explosion occurs, the Skill will grant four Elemental Particles. This means Yelan has an effective 0.4 Particles generated every second. Because of this, one can argue that Yelan is a decent Battery. Unfortunately, since she relies highly on her Burst, you’ll still need to equip her with Energy Recharge.
Elemental Burst
When Yelan casts her Burst, she deals AoE Hydro damage. Afterward, a dice will appear, following the active character. When you use Normal Attack, the dice will attack with you, similar to how Xingqiu’s Burst works.
Yelan hits the enemies thrice every time, so she can reset the Internal Cooldown (ICD) easily.
Ascension Passive
• A1: When the party has 1/2/3/4 Elemental types, Yelan’s max HP is increased by 6%/12%/18%/30%.
• A4: When her Burst is active, the on-field character deals 1% more damage. This increases by 3.5% every second, to a maximum of 50%.
Yelan’s A1 boosts her greatly in a rainbow team. But I’d personally recommend you to not mind this part too much. It’s better to focus on some Elemental Resonance for the party’s sake, rather than solely focusing on Yelan’s damage.
As for her A4, it’s mainly there to boost your main DPS. Note that this buff is attached to Yelan’s Burst rather than the active character. So even if you switch a character in and out, the buff won’t snapshot on them.
For example, let’s say we have this damage count for Zhongli and Yae Miko:
P.S. Zhongli’s numbers are made up.
P.P.S. This is a first-day observation, so feel free to lmk if I’m wrong!
So let’s say you use Yae Miko’s Skills > Yelan’s Burst > switches back to Yae Miko.
Now we have:
• Second 1: 11139 Yae Miko DMG
• Second 2: 11326 Yae Miko DMG
Then, you switch to Zhongli and use his NA
• Second 3: 1030 Zhongli DMG + 11081 Yae Miko DMG
• Second 4: 1040 Zhongli DMG + 11081 Yae Miko DMG
Then you switch back to Yae Miko
• Second 5: 11889 Yae Miko DMG
Talent Level-Up Priority
1. Elemental Burst
2. Elemental Skill
3. Normal Attack
Yelan has her Breakthrough State multiplier from her Normal Attack, so you can upgrade it to enhance its damage.
Yelan's Constellations
C1: Elemental Skill gains one additional charge.
Priority: Medium
• This Constellation can lower Yelan's Energy requirement, on top of adding her damage.
C2: Yelan’s Burst fires an additional arrow, dealing 14% of Yelan’s HP. Can occur once every 1.8s.
Priority: Very High
• Yelan gains around ~20% (My number shows around 25-27% increase) personal damage. This Constellation also increases her Hydro application, helping with some issues (that we’ll talk about later).
C4: Increases all party members' Max HP by 10% for 25s for every opponent marked by Elemental Skill when it explodes. Max 40%.
Priority: Depends
• Apart from her own personal damage, the importance of this Constellation depends on who you’re planning to pair her with.
C6: After using Elemental Burst, all of Yelan's Normal Attacks will be special Breakthrough Barbs. These are considered Charged Attack and deal 156% of a normal Breakthrough Barb's DMG. This effect is removed after 20s or after Yelan fire 5 arrows
Priority: Medium
• I can’t test this ability for sure, but the impression I got from this is that Yelan C6 doesn’t make her a main DPS. She’ll deal higher damage and have ~2s more field time, but that’s about it.
Yelan VS Xingqiu
Yelan is like Xingqiu because…
• They’re both a sub-DPS and Hydro enabler that rely on Elemental Burst, so Yelan works in most of Xingqiu’s comp.
• Yelan’s Burst hits thrice on each trigger, resetting ICD for Elemental application.
Yelan is not like Xingqiu because…
► Elemental Skill differences ◄
• Yelan generates more particles per second than Xingqiu (0.4 vs 0.238).
• Yelan has a shorter cooldown (10s vs 21s), but her Hold skill may take a few seconds to cast.
• Yelan’s Skill is better in AoE cases, while Xingqiu’s is better for single-target.
• Yelan provides zero protection and only a one-time Hydro application on her Skill.
► Elemental Burst differences ◄
• Yelan hits thrice on every trigger, whereas Xingqiu does 2 > 3 (C0-C5) or 2 > 3 > 5 (C6). This also means Yelan has a lower Hydro application overall.
• Yelan has a higher damage potential.
► Other differences ◄
• Yelan has a mini-buff ability on her A4.
• Yelan scales off HP instead of ATK.
• It’s not so bad to level Yelan’s NA.
Yelan + Hu Tao or Xingqiu + Hu Tao?
TL;DR: Yelan works great with Hu Tao against a horde of enemies, but Xingqiu is better against single targets.
Generally, Yelan works just fine with Hu Tao, but because her Hydro application isn’t as strong as Xingqiu’s, I found some cases where Yelan ended up the one triggering Vaporize instead of Hu Tao.
In a normal N1CD play, you’ll find Yelan working with Hu Tao perfectly, but when you use Hu Tao’s Burst or when her Blood Blossom triggers, Yelan sometimes doesn’t have enough Hydro application to replace Hu Tao’s Pyro. Meanwhile, this problem doesn’t occur with Xingqiu as he can refresh the application easily.
If you’re fighting small enemies, this usually won’t be an issue as you’d kill them easily anyway (so Blood Blossom doesn’t get to trigger), but if you’re fighting single targets like bosses, then Xingqiu is a far better option than Yelan.
Yelan’s Best Synergy
• S: Raiden Shogun, Kazuha, Xingqiu, Ayaka, Venti
➢ Yelan’s Burst triggers on Normal Attack movement, so she works fine with Raiden Shogun. Raiden will also allow Yelan to focus on HP% stat, maximizing her damage.
➢ Yelan doesn’t benefit from ATK buff, so Kazuha is one of the rare few that can boost her damage.
➢ Xingqiu + Yelan may be redundant, but the combo of the two also allows Yelan to focus on her damage.
➢ Sword users always do NA before CA, so Yelan + Ayaka can easily be paired for a permafreeze team.
➢ From what I’ve seen, Yelan can hit her Skill inside Venti's Burst, so that's a very easy way to deal high damage with minimum effort. Cmiiw on this tho!
• A: Hu Tao, Yoimiya
• F: Bennett, Kujou Sara
Choosing the Artifact
Tested Sets:
1. 4-Emblem Of Severed Fate
2. 2-Emblem Of Severed Fate + 2-Heart of Depths
3. 2-Emblem Of Severed Fate + 2-Tenacity of the Millelith
4. 2-Heart of Depths + 2-Tenacity of the Millelith
5. 2-Heart of Depths + 2-Noblesse Obliged
Tested Main Stat:
1. ER/Hydro/Crit
2. HP/Hydro/Crit
Choosing the Weapon
Tested Weapons:
1. Aqua Simulacra
2. Polar Star
3. Favonius Warbow
4. Skyward Harp - Passive hits once on every rotation
5. Thundering Pulse
6. Elegy For The End
7. Sacrificial Bow - Passive is considered
8. Viridescent Hunt
9. Recurve Bow
10. Mouun's Moon - Tested at 210 and 300 Energy
11. The Stringless
12. Alley Hunter - Tested at full-stack
13. Amos' Bow
Simulation Assumptions
1. Yelan is level 90
2. Enemy is a level 90 Hilichurl
3. Talent level 8/10/10, C0
4. Elemental Skill hits 2 times in the simulation
5. Elemental Burst hits 33 times in the duration
6. Tested with +18% HP from Ascension passive
7. Credit to ㅤ ㅤ ㅤ ㅤ for the idea: This time, my first focus is to get enough ER for Yelan to function. Sub-stat rolls are distributed after reaching 180% ER. There are 25 sub-stat rolls in total, with two extra HP rolls on Favonius, and one HP roll on Sacrificial.
Stat Overview
Damage Overview (Average Damage)
Simulation Overview
Result Overview
Here, you can see that:
1. Aqua Simulacra is ~10-20% better than the F2P option.
2. Favonius Warbow performs greatly, on-par with 5-Star bows.
3. ER weapons' performance drop in ER build. They're also less viable in a team with Battery, like Raiden Shogun comp.
4. The 2-pieces sets are all close to each other, so use the one with the best substat.
5. Recurve Bow is highly viable for new players.
6. Amos' Bow performs terribly for Yelan.
R5 Result Overview
Note: There are no changes for Favonius and Sacrificial calculation for R5.
Here, you can see that:
1. Mouun's Moon performs greatly at R5.
2. The Stringless is on-par with 5-Star weapons at R5.
3. Sacrificial Bow at R5 isn't as good as the other options.
What about Fading Twilight?
Crit VS HP Circlet (R5)
Pull or Skip?
Pull if:
• You like Yelan
• You need a second Xingqiu
• You have characters that synergize with Yelan
• You can handle Yelan’s Energy demand
• You don’t need Xingqiu’s defensive feature
Skip if:
• You don’t like Yelan
• You’re fine with one Xingqiu
• You don’t have a team for Yelan
• You want defense on your team
• You can’t feed Yelan’s Energy
Personal Opinion
Yelan quickly grew on me as I tried her. I think she’s amazing, powerful, and can be a great addition to some teams. Unfortunately, I barely use Xingqiu in Abyss too, so I don’t see a need for a second Yelan.
If I have her, I’d likely put her with Raiden Shogun so I can maximize her damage. I personally would keep Hu Tao with Xingqiu
Penny for your thoughts
What do you think about Yelan?
Is she just a 5-Star Xingqiu, or is she better?
Do you think she’s bad with Hu Tao?
As usual, if you have any questions, corrections, or feedback, feel free to throw them in the comment!
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