Xiangling is an S-tier unit and for good reasons. She’s not only a free character but also the strongest Pyro sub-dps in the game. She can be used as a main DPS, but her real value lies in her off-field Pyro DMG and application. Xiangling was buffed when Inazuma came out and it’s happened again with the release of Sumeru and Dendro in Genshin Impact Version 3.0- but not in the way one might expect.
Why Xiangling is So Powerful
Xiangling is mainly used as a burst-DPS and reaction enabler in Genshin Impact. Her elemental burst or Pyronado is a spinning ring of fire that covers a considerable AoE around your active character. This is her main source of Pyro DMG as it has a very high scaling- sometimes even surpassing the DPS output of your main DPS.
The game-breaking thing about her Pyronado is that it does not have an ICD which means all of its hits or Pyro applications can be used for reactions. They can all be vaped, melted or even overloaded depending on what teammates you use with her. This Pyronado also moves with your active character so you don’t need to necessarily group enemies or keep them within a set area.
With the release of Inazuma, the Emblem of Severed Fate became her best-in-slot artifact set. Because she’s a burst DPS, she needed ER to get back her burst on cooldown and this compromised her other DPS stats like ATK% or CRIT. With the new Emblem Set, she could stack as much ER as needed and still output a great deal of DMG since the 4-set of Emblem buffs your burst damage based on the total ER% of the user.
How the Dendro Meta Indirectly Buffed Xiangling
Pyro characters are unfortunately not high on the Dendro meta. The Burning reaction is heavily flawed and has low scaling. As for Burgeon, there is only one Pyro character (Thoma) who’s appropriate for such teams. It’s very difficult to synergise Hydro, Dendro and Pyro into one team because the Vaporize reaction exists which can disrupt Hydro’s reaction with Dendro to cause Blooms.
In short, Xiangling does not synergise with any of the current Dendro teams. Sure, she can still function in Burgeon teams and she’s still an S-tier unit but more often than not she triggers Burning instead of Burgeon and sometimes even Vapes with Hydro.
But the new artifact set- Gilded Dreams can situationally outperform the Emblem Set in terms of total DPS. In a team with battery characters like Raiden and Fischl, and with an ER weapon, Xiangling can meet her ER requirements to the point she can change her artifact set to that of Gilded Dreams.
Since Gilded Dreams is an EM DPS artifact set, it aptly suits Xiangling’s Pyronado which has no ICD and thus can cause tons of reactions. While it’s not the best set for her, if you can manage to meet her ER demands, she could do better with the Gilded Dreams set on reaction-heavy teams which have some batteries to help her.
It’s still only the start of Sumeru so we can expect a Burgeon-based character or team soon who can utilise Xiangling’s kit to its full potential. With the release of Nahida in Version 3.2, players expect her to be one such character but that is still something we have to test and find out for ourselves. The Version 3.2 Special Program is today so we’ll get a confirmed glimpse of Nahida’s abilities in it.
Xiangling is still expected to get more broken with future updates so if you haven’t built her yet, it would be a good idea to do so now as she is already an S-tier unit. If you haven’t reached Inazuma yet, you can also use the Noblesse Oblige set or the Crimson Witch set to get the best out of her for your current AR rank.
