• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Genshin Impact |OT| 5.0 (Natlan) - Everything Changed When the Fire Nation Arrived

jonnyXx

Member
Are those poses in the shop permanent or temporary ?
There is going to be different ones next cycle but I don't know if they will be additional to the current or a replacement.
KHYrDnV.jpeg
My guess is they are additional, would be pretty shitty otherwise.
 

Pejo

Member
Are those poses in the shop permanent or temporary ?
So I found out you can only get 3 medals per reset (the items you need to exchange for poses), and the poses rotate. So the original 6 will swap out with 6 new ones and so on, and will eventually come back after god knows how long. I wonder if you already own a character if they'll still rerun for you or if you get a different one randomly from the pool.
I think that early leak about the theatre saying that some will hate it and some will love it was actually spot on. I wouldn't say that I hate it but the RNG nature of it is not something I'm into.
I just don't enjoy using a random arrangement of characters that at times don't work together at all. At one point I was stuck with Arle and Gaming on the team and Gaming was just a dead slot.
But that is probably just due to me not having enough characters built, most of my pyro characters are on field dps and only have 4 well built electro characters and 3 anemo characters.
Even with a lot of characters you still end up using some sub-par teams due to RNG, which is one of the things I kinda like. Especially now that I know the goal challenges are all optional and don't effect rewards. In your example, Gaming was kinda a wasted slot but he also supplies Pyro resonance to that team, making your whole team hit harder etc. So there's a few layers of "usefulness" of each of the characters. Also I found that the HP values weren't super over-inflated this time, so not having the best possible team setups isn't a death sentence or a time out and fail. I will say the buffs could use... well... buffs. I barely noticed any of the various wonders I picked up in my run, and they didn't seem to offer a significant edge considering most of them also come with drawbacks. I hope they revisit the effects and values a bit and improve them.

I only did that one run but I regret picking so many healers and so many Anemo. Your HP is refreshed in each new round so healers are only necessary if you take a lot of damage or need them to trigger a mechanic like eventual Furina etc. I'd rather take shielders in the future for the interruption resistance. At least they had the trial Thoma who was pretty handy and one of the few characters I never leveled.
The wider your selection of characters the better off you are in this mode, it's like the opposite of abyss which rewards vertical investment over horizontal investment.
Think I'll be focusing on leveling characters for a while, I'm tired of getting screwed by artifact domains anyway.
Yea I think you nailed it with this statement. In every game I've ever played, I always focus on leveling up all of the characters instead of focusing on just a few strong ones, gacha games, JRPGs, etc. It's just how I'm geared. This is the first 'endgame' mode I've played in a long long time that actually rewards that kind of play, so I'm actually pretty satisfied with it. It's impossible for me to say this without sounding snobbish, but I kinda hope they don't buckle and offer even more trial characters or whatever. It kinda feels nice to be rewarded for playing the anti-meta for a change and having all my time, effort, and rolls vindicated in a mode instead of letting the vast majority of these mostly built characters sit in a menu on a bench and rot.
Yup I'm on America server.
Want to DM me your genshin UID? I'll add you. I think Dragon_Rocks Dragon_Rocks deanote666 deanote666 Icymanipulator Icymanipulator are the other Americas server people in this thread that still play.

The Dehya part was the highlight of this video, lol.
My guess is they are additional, would be pretty shitty otherwise.
It'd be hilarious if they didn't rerun Kaveh next patch but have his pose, Dendro as one of the Imaginarium elements, and have him as a trial character. Not that I want more copies or whatever, but he's still only had a single banner in the entire length of time since his release.
 
I think there's lots of room for improvement but I will actually play this mode unlike Abyss, there's some strategy and randomness involved.
You seem to be in the minority when it comes to this mode. The online discourse is quite negative. I like that it encourages using your entire roster. But this is a team-building game. Characters aren't usually meant to be self-sufficient. If you just remove them from their proper supports, they feel terrible to play. None of the unique mechanics here, like boons and stamina are fun or satisfying to use.

There's also some questionable design choices that make me wonder if this isn't just hidden P2W stuff. Why can you only take lvl 70+ characters into this mode? So people can piss away their precious resin? I could attempt Abyss with lvl 1 characters if I wanted to. Why do you have to fill all 4 slots in the team? This just makes it difficult for players who lack characters.

I would have preferred that they just added an additional (optional?) room to each Abyss floor or something to encourage the use of more characters.
 
Last edited:

jonnyXx

Member
Just found out that you can only use one supporting character from a friend, once you pick a character you can't switch to another of that friend's characters. If you cancel your selection you just can't use any characters from that friend anymore, you have to use someone else's character. Lame.

Also you can't share the 6 opening characters.
 

Pejo

Member
What's up with Genshin and the events that are basically 3-4 days left when they launch? As a perpetual slacker and procrastinator, this is causing me some stress.
 

jonnyXx

Member
What's up with Genshin and the events that are basically 3-4 days left when they launch? As a perpetual slacker and procrastinator, this is causing me some stress.
Yea I noticed that too, that last combat event came and went so damn fast. For the last few events new stages have been unlocking next day instead of 2 days later.
 

deanote666

Member
You seem to be in the minority when it comes to this mode. The online discourse is quite negative. I like that it encourages using your entire roster. But this is a team-building game. Characters aren't usually meant to be self-sufficient. If you just remove them from their proper supports, they feel terrible to play. None of the unique mechanics here, like boons and stamina are fun or satisfying to use.

There's also some questionable design choices that make me wonder if this isn't just hidden P2W stuff. Why can you only take lvl 70+ characters into this mode? So people can piss away their precious resin? I could attempt Abyss with lvl 1 characters if I wanted to. Why do you have to fill all 4 slots in the team? This just makes it difficult for players who lack characters.

I would have preferred that they just added an additional (optional?) room to each Abyss floor or something to encourage the use of more characters.
Using resin has nothing to do with P2W. Got over 1000 purple books on both accounts and never paid for resin. Still have over 100 of the moon resin that refreshes 60 resin and haven't bought the teapot resin in months. Takes a good amount of resin fighting bosses but still takes only a few days to get enough resources for a character. Plus the crafting bench to change the stone colors.

The higher floors of the abyss require multiple built characters. The new mode just requires more.

If you're AR is high enough for level 70+, you've farmed enough for enough wishes to have 10 characters while staying F2P.

My F2P account has 3/5 archons, and one archon is C1. 2 5* have their signature weapons. Haven't even started the Sumeru archon quests so there's still plenty to farm on that account.

Note that I'm not defending the new mode, I'm just saying that requiring built characters isn't the thing to be mad about. It's the fact that they made the enemies hard enough to make built characters seem like they're made of paper. Floor 12 of the abyss is more forgiving than Act 4 of the new mode. Whaling won't even save you.
 
Using resin has nothing to do with P2W.
Maybe P2W wasn't the right term. I meant that these restrictions encourage people to waste resources on characters to fit the strict requirements. They could wish for the special guest characters (Which just so happen to be conveniently featured on the banner) to have enough playable characters, or refresh resin by spending primos, just so they're eligible for thr mode. They may even be tempted to spend money on it. This is no issue for us veterans, but newer players are targeted by these restrictions.

The higher floors of the abyss require multiple built characters. The new mode just requires more.
This is a bit of a simplification. Abyss doesn't require you to build a certain number of characters of specific elements. You're given the freedom to clear rooms however you like and with whomever you like. With skill, unconventional teams could still clear the challenge.

It's the fact that they made the enemies hard enough to make built characters seem like they're made of paper. Floor 12 of the abyss is more forgiving than Act 4 of the new mode. Whaling won't even save you.
My experience is completely different. I found the challenge itself very easy, as long as you pass the roster check and your characters are decently built. I couldn't even field my C6 Nahida so I used a pretty normal F2P lineup. Abyss has had way more difficult floors IMO.
 

jonnyXx

Member
Note that I'm not defending the new mode, I'm just saying that requiring built characters isn't the thing to be mad about. It's the fact that they made the enemies hard enough to make built characters seem like they're made of paper. Floor 12 of the abyss is more forgiving than Act 4 of the new mode. Whaling won't even save you.
What were you fighting that was hitting you so hard? I did see a couple encounters that looked like trouble, 2 Abyss Heralds for instance, but the enemies in the theatre seem like same strength as overworld enemies.

The only thing I found could make it tough is ending up with really scuffed teams especially if using the trial characters, otherwise it's pretty easy. Nowhere near as tough as Floor 12 abyss I think.
 
This new mode is worst possible addition to Genshin. Randomized crap is horrible design. I think this convinced me that Genshin has nothing interesting to offer anymore and Mihoyo has shifted focus to HSR and ZZZ fully. I think I will move on now and won't even bother finishing the story and other nations.
 
Last edited:
Damn ZZZ presentation is out of this world.
Love the animations and details everywhere.

That said, not being able to jump feels weird and limiting in battle. Also, I got a maid character for pre registration, then my first 5* was the maid character with puppets, and now the first banner is a maid character with a tail.
Lots of maid style characters… it is what it is I guess.
 

deanote666

Member
What were you fighting that was hitting you so hard? I did see a couple encounters that looked like trouble, 2 Abyss Heralds for instance, but the enemies in the theatre seem like same strength as overworld enemies.

The only thing I found could make it tough is ending up with really scuffed teams especially if using the trial characters, otherwise it's pretty easy. Nowhere near as tough as Floor 12 abyss I think.
It was just the regular mobs. Monument was down 50% before I took even one out.

Edit: Apparently, I was in hard mode and didn't even know it. Wish the explanation was better.
 
Last edited:

Pejo

Member
Some QoL stuff coming next patch. We already know about most of it from leaks.

This is my biggest highlight. Full hide of UI and text/audio logs of quest dialogue. Text logs have been in Star Rail since launch, kinda puzzling we had to wait so long to get it.
homoxt91jnad1.gif


Also this one made me laugh. Imagine being filtered by Amber's gliding quest.
u07vws91jnad1.gif
 

jonnyXx

Member
I say bring it on!

Season 3 Laughing GIF by The Simpsons
If they're really expanding it and going to require more characters then I say increase the number of allowed elements to 4, let us use more than just 1 character from friends, buff the boons, and increase the difficulty.

This is my biggest highlight. Full hide of UI and text/audio logs of quest dialogue. Text logs have been in Star Rail since launch, kinda puzzling we had to wait so long to get it.
You know there are mods to hide UI.
I'd appreciate a skip dialogue button, shouldn't have to manually skip through the daily commissions dialogue all the time.

Also this one made me laugh. Imagine being filtered by Amber's gliding quest.
Maybe mobile players, touch controls suck.
 
Just watched the 4.8 stream. Nilou is now cosplaying Kokomi. Doesn't look better than her original skin. Emilie seems somewhat boring so I've decided to skip her. The new area is based on toys, and unfortunately they had to drag out Scara for this event. Seems fine otherwise, but I prefer the island theme of GAA. They also mentioned special challenges to unlock those sprinting effects. Your character needs to be lvl 70+ and have high friendship.

As for Natlan, I expected to see Iansan, but her absence here is not bad. Maybe there's still hope for her to be a 5-star. I think the shown characters look cool and rather unique with their built-in traversal(?) skills. I saw someone compare the new characters to Pokémon gym leaders, and I can't unsee it now. They look rather modern for citizens of an isolated nation. They're wearing sneakers, clothes with zippers etc. Doesn't fit with Genshin's fantasy aesthetic.

The most baffling part of the stream was when they brought up the new encounter point system. You know how you can open chests , do quests etc. and get points to skip your daily commissions? You can now save those points for later and use them when you're not in the mood to do dailies. The catch is that you have to spend 30 resin per commission, for a grand total of 120 resin. What's the point of this? Resin is way too valuable to just waste on this when dailies take maybe 5 mins to complete. What a joke.

Overall I'm pretty satisfied.
 

Pejo

Member
If they're really expanding it and going to require more characters then I say increase the number of allowed elements to 4, let us use more than just 1 character from friends, buff the boons, and increase the difficulty.
This removes almost everything that I currently like about the mode...
You know there are mods to hide UI.
I'd appreciate a skip dialogue button, shouldn't have to manually skip through the daily commissions dialogue all the time.
Yea I know about the mods, but it'll be nice to try it standard. I hope it's adjustable, like we can get rid of just the button icons and maybe leave the HP bar and minimap, something like that.
Maybe mobile players, touch controls suck.
I guess anything is possible. They have the data and apparently have a reason to believe that it was a gatekeeper. I didn't even know they nerfed the Yae quest (which I didn't think was that tough when I did it originally) and then they just nerfed it again.


Well, not as bad as I was expecting when I read about them from the leaks. Blue girl design is nice. I'm laughing at this being the level of "dark skin" that we can expect from Natlan though. HoYo is probably fighting their urge to give them awful kits as we speak. Don't really like the modern day streetwear stuff, but it's better than Fontaine designs already.

Just watched the 4.8 stream. Nilou is now cosplaying Kokomi. Doesn't look better than her original skin. Emilie seems somewhat boring so I've decided to skip her. The new area is based on toys, and unfortunately they had to drag out Scara for this event. Seems fine otherwise, but I prefer the island theme of GAA. They also mentioned special challenges to unlock those sprinting effects. Your character needs to be lvl 70+ and have high friendship.
You weren't kidding about the Kokomi/Nilou
2krmwtgawoad1.png


If that's all you need for the running effects, I'm golden.
As for Natlan, I expected to see Iansan, but her absence here is not bad. Maybe there's still hope for her to be a 5-star. I think the shown characters look cool and rather unique with their built-in traversal(?) skills. I saw someone compare the new characters to Pokémon gym leaders, and I can't unsee it now. They look rather modern for citizens of an isolated nation. They're wearing sneakers, clothes with zippers etc. Doesn't fit with Genshin's fantasy aesthetic.
Yea I don't like that modern street mix either. I'd appreciate if Genshin stayed more fantasy. But I'll wait and see. The character designs aren't bad so far.
The most baffling part of the stream was when they brought up the new encounter point system. You know how you can open chests , do quests etc. and get points to skip your daily commissions? You can now save those points for later and use them when you're not in the mood to do dailies. The catch is that you have to spend 30 resin per commission, for a grand total of 120 resin. What's the point of this? Resin is way too valuable to just waste on this when dailies take maybe 5 mins to complete. What a joke.
Looks like they're shifting focus to capturing hyper casual players with a lot of the changes recently. They probably have a reason for it, but it does nothing good or bad for me.
 
Looks like they're shifting focus to capturing hyper casual players with a lot of the changes recently. They probably have a reason for it, but it does nothing good or bad for me.
I'm just not sure what their strategy here is. They increased the resin cap so you don't have to log in as often. Events however are available for a much shorter amount of time, requiring people to log in more frequently to even get the chance to complete them. On the other hand they now offer the ability to waste away precious resources to save on 5 mins of daily commissions? It's counter-intuitive to me.
 

deanote666

Member
I guess anything is possible. They have the data and apparently have a reason to believe that it was a gatekeeper. I didn't even know they nerfed the Yae quest (which I didn't think was that tough when I did it originally) and then they just nerfed it again.
I had a friend on the ps4/ps5 that was stuck on that quest and invited me in to try and complete it. Think it was bugged ultimately but don't remember.
 

Pejo

Member
Natlan 5.0 map preview:
uh2q2wm9dvad1.jpeg

*edit*
I wonder about the quantity of the hubris that MHY designers have, making us wait 6 months to give us this and charge us for it, when they clearly see the quality and variety of mods available for free.
iqln8wbwbtad1.gif


Outside of braindead redditors, who looks at this and is like "oh my god so amazing OMG I need to buy it here's my wallet omg omg omg"

Like this one for example, makes me think of desert dancer way more than anything Nilou has ever officially been drawn in.
 
Last edited:
Like this one for example
Too much skin, boobs too big. Rejected by the Chinese ministry of morals. But yeah, that one looks great. It even has a built-in swimsuit mode. Hoyo is especially rigid when it comes to coloring their characters. Nilou is Hydro, so she needs to be blue. We see this with all skins. Maybe they think the color-coding is necessary to make characters easier to recognize during combat.
 

deanote666

Member
Wild star rail codes encountered.

Redemption Code to redeem Stellar Jade ×50 -
Firefly & SAM: 2024/06/19 – 2024/07/09
6T3F5HVD6LK7
Jade: 2024/07/10 – 2024/07/30
WAKE4HCV745T

Make note of the effective dates.
 
Last edited:

SSfox

Member
I'm not too hype about Natlan so far, least hype région for me, doesn't feel like Genshin but more like Pokemon

Also please don't tell the little geo girl is a redesign of the girl in first teaser
 
Last edited:

jonnyXx

Member
Like this one for example, makes me think of desert dancer way more than anything Nilou has ever officially been drawn in.
Yea I don't even have Nilou but have this mod installed.

I'm still puzzled that hoyo isn't releasing a way more skins cause I'm sure it'd be really profitable for them, but they'd have to do better than what's currently available.
Like add new VFX to abilities, apply a weapon transmog while using the skin, maybe even bundle wings with them. There is so much they could explore.
Pricing would become an issue however, they already charge too much for their mostly shitty skins.
 
Also please don't tell the little geo girl is a redesign of the girl in first teaser
The one from the teaser is an important pre-established character from the prequel comic. I doubt they would redesign her.

Edit: Just saw the developer's discussion about skipping dailies. Apparently I understood it completely wrong. By using resin on bosses, domains, ley lines, even by crafting condensed resin, you can use those encounter points to skip your dailies. Very convenient.
 
Last edited:

Pejo

Member
I'm not too hype about Natlan so far, least hype région for me, doesn't feel like Genshin but lore like Pokemon
I'm just hoping we're not spending 90% of explore mode as a little dragon gremlin. I was expecting mounts when the mechanic first leaked, which would be much cooler.
Also please don't tell the little geo girl is a redesign of the girl in first teaser
For better or worse they didn't even redesign Lyney from his appearance in the 1.0 promotional materials, so I'm sure Iansan is fine. If anything, they'll probably lighten her skin to be more in line with what we see with the 3 current Natlan characters. Disappointing if so, but whatever.

So in WuWa, I've been casually playing still. Mostly just doing Dailies and spending the not-resin (haven't touched the new story quest or new area yet), and tonight I finally hit level 50 Union rank. I was expecting an uncap quest but nope, as soon as I hit 50, the average enemy level in the open world switched to 72-76. I didn't pre-farm anybody because I was working on building out two teams for the tower mode, so I was only able to advance my Rover, but the rest of my team still holds up pretty well. The difference wasn't as big as 60-70 IMO. Probably helps that I have everyone in full gold Echoes of the correct sets with mostly the correct main stats, so they're only missing the base stats from leveling + weapons and the new skill nodes.

There was some big drama today with CN players reporting that WuWa just outright deleted their 5* characters that they had, or t hat they were going over 10/80 pity and not getting a guaranteed 4*/5*. Kuro confirmed it was a server issue and are giving compensation to only those affected for now, but I wouldn't be surprised to see it blow up and everybody get more free pulls in a few days. CN is all riled up about it again.
 

Nankatsu

Member
So uh, you guys think a Wuthering Waves OT would make sense around here?

GAF being all over ZZZ and sleeping on Wuthering Waves kind of surprised me not gonna lie.
 

Pejo

Member
So uh, you guys think a Wuthering Waves OT would make sense around here?

GAF being all over ZZZ and sleeping on Wuthering Waves kind of surprised me not gonna lie.
I've just been using this thread to discuss various higher quality gachas, but if you think a WW thread would survive, go for it. Sadly GAF is pretty against gacha and Chinese games, so you're fighting an uphill battle from the start.
 

Nankatsu

Member
Interest in (discussing) gacha games seems rather low on GAF. I'm not sure another dedicated thread is gonna do much to promote the game.

I've just been using this thread to discuss various higher quality gachas, but if you think a WW thread would survive, go for it. Sadly GAF is pretty against gacha and Chinese games, so you're fighting an uphill battle from the start.

If I made the OT at least you guys would be there? Right? Right? :pie_roffles:

Now on a more serious note, I might do a OT for the game. I think it deserves a shot.
 

Pejo

Member
Man is anybody else's ping to Genshin fucking terrible over the past few hours? I usually have under 100 ping and right now it's 700-800.

*edit*

WuWa is bad too, despite my general speed/pings to google and other US IPs are fine. Seems to be a thing with wherever CN games house their Americas servers? Taiwan maybe?
 
Last edited:

Nankatsu

Member
Man is anybody else's ping to Genshin fucking terrible over the past few hours? I usually have under 100 ping and right now it's 700-800.

*edit*

WuWa is bad too, despite my general speed/pings to google and other US IPs are fine. Seems to be a thing with wherever CN games house their Americas servers? Taiwan maybe?

Played Wuwa like 9h ago and everything was fine, no lag at all.

Don't know about genshin though.

Wuthering Waves related:

Did a bit more of 1.1 Main quest, and damn, they went all out with this one.

Finally released Jué and the dialogue between it and Jinshi is intense and full of cinematic camera angles. Damn well excuted.

And I legit dig what they did with the plot here.

Can't wait to see what they reserved for the battle with Jué.
 
Last edited:

Pejo

Member
How's that one. Been meaning to try it out too.
It's basically third person Destiny with lots of obtuse mechanics/currencies/things to keep track of, but with thick thighs and fat asses. Gunplay is serviceable, the grapple mechanic is fun, and once you get your bearings it's got a pretty good progression/grind. I like it, but I was a huge Destiny addict at one point so YMMV. The monetization looks pretty bad at first, but you actually can just unlock all guns and characters just by playing the game and grinding. It's F2P so give it a shot if that sounds good to you.
You're playing on PC or console?
Everything on PC unless console exclusive.
 

Nankatsu

Member
It's basically third person Destiny with lots of obtuse mechanics/currencies/things to keep track of, but with thick thighs and fat asses. Gunplay is serviceable, the grapple mechanic is fun, and once you get your bearings it's got a pretty good progression/grind. I like it, but I was a huge Destiny addict at one point so YMMV. The monetization looks pretty bad at first, but you actually can just unlock all guns and characters just by playing the game and grinding. It's F2P so give it a shot if that sounds good to you.

Need to check it out. I heavely played Destiny back in the day, more 1 then 2. Does it have raids?
 
Last edited:
Another week for Navia, maybe i should start pre farming, get a head of the game a bit
Probably a good idea. Especially for the sea creature drops.

In other news, two leaks:

df339mB.png

Questionable leak about how new characters might have more unique animations, rather than sharing them with others of the same body type.

xo3fIKf.jpeg

Supposed list of (initial) characters for Natlan. Reddit (and Twitter presumably) in shambles because there's not enough men.


a7e2c588-597f-4a3a-9ed3-d97e9cd984bf_text.gif
 

Pejo

Member
Need to check it out. I heavely played Destiny back in the day, more 1 then 2. Does it have raids?
Not sure yet, I'm still in the early game. I've been grinding stuff to unlock new characters first before I progress. But yea all the makings for them are there. There's an OT for it in Gaming, check it out if you're interested. Did you make a WuWa thread?

New Web Event, one of the pain in the ass multi-day ones:
Genshin Impact: Take part in the "Fragrant Fantasy" event and share stories of fragrances with your companions~ https://hoyo.link/cffjFBAL
 

Nankatsu

Member
Not sure yet, I'm still in the early game. I've been grinding stuff to unlock new characters first before I progress. But yea all the makings for them are there. There's an OT for it in Gaming, check it out if you're interested. Did you make a WuWa thread?

Not yet. I take my sweet time doing my OT's, plus I'm setting a new rig.

Until I finish that, it will be a little complicated. But I'll do the OT still this month


aalto-wuthering-waves.gif


Wuwa story heavy spoilers:


So MC is a Lord Arbiter (whatever that is) and Jué's former master?
Man, lore keeps getting pretty interesting. Hope Kuro doesn't screw this up.
 
Last edited:
Top Bottom