Ganyu

The secretary at Yuehai Pavilion. The blood of the qilin, an illuminated beast, flows within her veins.

Official Art

Preface

Not really a “guide” per se, but the following is just some early thoughts of some people who have been testing out Ganyu quite extensively for the couple of days she has been out. As always, information this early is subject to change as we discover new mechanics or try out new compositions.

Melt Shotganyu:

Using Xiangling elemental skill and burst to apply 1U pyro to enemies while spamming Frostflake Blooms at short range. Using your Q causes this playstyle to fall apart because your burst eats melts as Ganyu’s ultimate will overtake the pyro aura, but will still do more damage as long as you are fighting more than one enemy.

Pros:
- Highest damage ceiling in the game, surpasses Diluc with Xingqiu vaporize, and does at least 20% more single-target damage than Freeze Ganyu, in practice probably more because melt supports do more damage than freeze supports
- Powerful at bossing, given that you can apply the pyro aura.
- Wanderer’s Troupe set pieces might already be in your inventory at high Adventure Ranks.
Cons:
- Requires immense skill and practice to practically approach theoretical damage, and can feel clunky or weird depending on the team composition and rotation.
- Struggles with shields in current abyss floor 12, but this can be circumvented by abusing mitachurl charges next to walls.
- Virtually impossible to farm Wanderer’s Troupe, at Adventure Rank 55, it’s 40 resin for a 50/50 for Gladiator or WT. **

Freeze Ganyu:

Using Xingqiu, Tartaglia, Mona, or Barbara to apply a hydro status and spamming Frostflake to get 40% Crit Chance, or just applying Cryo for 20%. Offers decent CC as enemies will be frozen.

Pros:
- Damage is comparable to Diluc with Xingqiu vaporize.
- Cheap to build:
  - Blizzard Strayer’s 4 piece effect gives you 40% Crit Rate on frozen enemies
  - Cryo resonance gives you an additional 15% Crit Rate
  - Ganyu’s ascension 1 passive gives you 20% Crit Rate on Frostflake Arrows and Blooms
  - Ganyu’s ascension stat gives you 19.2% Crit damage at 70/70 and 38.4% Crit damage at 90.
- Extremely powerful against the current abyss floor 11/12 because frozen enemies cannot block with their shields.
Cons:
- Requires Tartaglia, Mona, or Xingqiu with a Sacrificial Sword. Barbara is the F2P option, but requires you to be in shotgun range, if not closer.
- Increasing power means increasing your Crit damage substats.
- Depending on the Hydro unit, the window to damage an enemy while they’re still frozen is extremely short.

Credits:

Artesians#0002 IlidanNaga#2163 LimiT#7826 Striss#0557 Karzak#7126 Zakharov#5645 Daybreak#0584 Bish#1051 Aerylle#1254 Michael/mSoo#1561 Bobrokrot#0111 Boesik#3192 ZΛNTO#4984

r/Keqingmains

Talent Priority

Normal Attack: Liutian Archery > Celestial Shower > Trail of the Qilin

Upgrading her auto attacks obviously takes priority for carry Ganyu and upgrades her Frostflake Arrow and Frostflake Bloom. Celestial Shower is the second priority for a stronger burst, and Trail of the Qilin does surprising amounts of damage, but it’s okay to delay leveling it.

Support Ganyu?

While Ganyu’s Q may seem like a powerful tool for supporting Klee or Diluc as a melt enabler, this is not founded in playtesting. Her Cryo application from her ultimate isn’t enough to keep up with strong Pyro DPS on single targets with optimal play. Using her with Xingqiu as both Hydro and Cryo sub-DPS for Klee or Diluc averages 1:2 rate of melt:vaporise on DPS against single targets. The only effective way to provide enough Cryo aura is to cast her Q on 3+ grouped enemies or combine it with Cryo infused Venti ultimate.

Not having the possibility to enable constant melts isn't a big issue due to her insane damage values she brings even as a sub-DPS. She easily replaces Kaeya as a superconduct trigger, but her Q Cryo application on non-grouped enemies leaves a lot to be desired. You also have the option of intentionally reverse melting her Q with Klee and Diluc against large numbers of enemies. Of course, this can be supplemented by the free unit Kaeya, and can offer significant rates of melt with their combined Cryo application.

Ganyu has worse energy generation, Cryo application, and single target DPS as a support than Kaeya. Her value in quickswap as a sub-DPS /support role is largely reliant on keeping enemies grouped.

Constellations

C1: Dew Drinker

Taking DMG from a Charge Level 2 Frostflake Arrow or Frostflake Arrow Bloom decreases opponents’ Cryo RES by 15% for 6s. A hit regenerates 2 Energy for Ganyu. This effect can only occur once per Charge Level 2 Frostflake Arrow, regardless if Frostflake Arrow itself or its Bloom hit the target.

Constellation 1 Ganyu is really good. It offers the same amount of utility as Viridescent Verner (but easier to apply and upkeep), but with how valuable grouping is on Ganyu, you want Anemo units anyways. That’s without considering the value of the energy to fund your ultimate casts.

Buff

Damage Increase

Viridescant Venerer

27.7%

C1: Dew Drinker

14%

Both

36.1%

C2: The Auspicious

Trail of the Qilin gains 1 additional charge.

An overrated constellation that’s kind of neat to have, but really only shines after obtaining C6.

C4: Westward Sojourn

Opponents standing within the AoE of Celestial Shower take increased DMG. This effect strengthens over time. Increased DMG taken begins at 5% and increases by 5% every 3s, up to a maximum of 25%. The effect lingers for 3s after the opponent leaves the AoE.

Strong constellation that propels her support capabilities a little further, but the additive damage bonus is locked behind a theoretical 15s, which is how long her ultimate lasts. Something of note is that if you cycle elemental bursts (e.g burst off of cooldown) the damage boost will persist.

C6: The Clement

Using Trail of the Qilin causes the next Forstflake Arrow shot within 30s to not require charging.

Ganyu’s constellation 6 offers the sustained playstyle of Ganyu high moments of burst, allowing you to fire off two Frostflake Arrows and Blooms in succession with your E casts. This constellation also propels Ganyu’s power in a quickswap composition to ridiculous levels.

DPS gain per constellation (Take it with grain of salt, tends to undervalue C6 based on assumption of long fight, which isn’t true with C6 Ganyu, or with Ganyu in general)

C1: 10%

C2: 0%

C3: 7%

C4: 4%

C5: 2%

C6: 9%

Weapons

In general, the rankings for Ganyu’s weapons in her Melt and Freeze compositions are fairly similar. Amos’ Bow has a very specific interaction with Ganyu’s Frostflake Bloom in that no matter what distance you fire the shot from, the bloom will always take 3 stacks of the Amos’ Bow’s passive. This interaction pushes the bow beyond the traditional powerhouse Skyward Harp and makes it the premier weapon for Ganyu. You don’t need Amos’ Bow to output insane damage, but it might be easier to obtain than 5 Northlander Bow Prototypes.

Weapon	Melt	Melt No Burst	Freeze
Amos’ Bow	114.8%	124.3%	116.5%
Prototype Crescent R5	111.1%	111.2%	111.6%
Skyward Harp	108.3%	110.1%	111.0%
Prototype Crescent	16405 = 100%	18284 = 100%	14840 = 100%
Blackcliff Warbow (1 Stack)	94.5%	95.2%	92.2%
The Viridescent Hunt	94.0%	94.5%	94.0%

Note that the graph displays the increase in damage dealt by your weapon relative Prototype Crescent at R1. Another important addendum is that The Viridescent Hunt should have more value in the Freeze playstyle thanks to its ability to group enemies.

As for sub-DPS Ganyu, her weapon choices don’t particularly matter. I don’t recommend playing her as a support at all, but if you want to slot her in that role, the Skyward Harp will be the best option followed by Amos’ Bow, The Stringless, Favonius Bow, and Sacrificial Bow.

Calculations were done by Zakharov#5645

****Ganyu Weapon Rankings:

Melt Ganyu

Melt Ganyu’s ceiling will be mentioned in a lot of media/content about her in the coming days. Her theoretical ceiling has blasted through the Diluc/Vaporize combo on paper, but why do people still hesitate when recommending this playstyle? It’s clunky and difficult to play.

Playstyle

Melt Ganyu is quite simple in theory to pilot: you cast Xiangling ultimate and it applies a pyro aura that you can reverse melt with Ganyu’s Frostflake Arrow and Bloom. The problems arise when you think of the limitations this places on you: this playstyle requires you to pilot an archer that only does damage with charged attacks that take 1.7 seconds to charge at near point-blank range and the energy cost of your pyro enabler is 80 energy. You can supplement the Xiangling ultimate issues by using a pyro battery, smart Guoba placement, or Sucrose to supplement the pyro application. In general, you use Xiangling ultimate off cooldown and use your charged attacks to try and melt the pyro aura, while Ganyu’s elemental skill has a taunt that can be combined with Guoba to provide mildly reliable pyro application. The emphasis on melting on Ganyu is not crippling however, her base damage will still allow her to be a top-tier DPS unit without consistent melts, even more so against grouped enemies.

Artifacts

Artifact set

Description

Wanderer's Troupe (4)

Best unconditional option of all. Gives 35 DMG% to CA + 15 DMG% (from 80 EM bonus) to Melt. Use it if you have it.

Blizzard Strayer (2)

Wanderer’s Troupe (2)

Easier to get than 4WT set, second best unconditional option.

Retracing Bolide (4)

Close results to the 4WT set, but usable only with Zhongli or Diona.

Honorable mentions include: 2/2 Gladiator’s Finale + Wanderer’s Troupe, 2/2 Blizzard Strayer + Gladiator’s Finale, 4-piece Bloodstained Chivalry, 4-piece Heart of Depth, 4-piece Lavawalker.

Compositions (some examples)

The composition on Melt Ganyu only really requires Xiangling because her burst allows you to sustain double melt charged attacks. The only possible way to replace Xiangling is with Venti, and we don’t think Venti based compositions require much covering. The rest of the team slots can be used for a battery for Xiangling’s expensive 80 energy cost burst and your support. Some of the premier pyro units that come to mind are Bennett and Xinyan with a Sacrificial Greatsword. Bennett condenses as an attack buff, can pivot as DPS during Ganyu Q, and a healer. Xinyan offers a shield and a pulsing pyro proc if you can get a level 3 shield off, but without C2 this is slightly more difficult. Other niche options include units like Klee or even triple pyro hero option with both Bennett and Xinyan\Klee battery.

Compositions with Bennett:

Since to battery Xiangling’s ult team requires second pyro hero - most logical choice would be Bennett, who is the best utility pyro support, who can fit second dps role and most importantly: with his tap E and Q having 2U pyro gauge it’s possible to have “triple” melt - E + charge attack.

Ganyu / Xiangling / Bennett / Fill

This composition makes the most of Ganyu’s Q, because you can use Bennett to DPS if built properly (use Ganyu otherwise) and battery Xiangling in the same slot, as well as provide healing for the team. For general ballpark estimates: 200+% energy recharge on both XL and Bennett to have ult off cd with only them 2 generating particles. The composition is close-combat, so a shielder is much appreciated.

Last slot options (skipping Venti, his teams will be covered later) could be:

Zhongli - arguably the best possible choice for current spiral abyss floor 12, overall solid choice for his shield + crowd control even before buffs come to live servers.
Sucrose - solid choice due to giving EM to her teammates and crowd control. VV set isn't as valuable as one might think due to having split damage type (more valuable if you manage to swirl cryo and less - if pyro). This team will have big problems in the current spiral abyss floor 12 due to lack of either claymore or overloads
Jean - healer with big motion value (highest scaling in game on elemental skill (E)) and possibility to use VV set. Same problems as sucrose in the existing abyss.
Beidou - even though her ultimate doesn't bring much value into team damage (at least it comes after charge attacks, so it doesn’t ruin melts), she is one of the best geo shield breakers in entire game (overloads if you have enough pyro application + claymore), and her c1 ultimate shield and parry could work as damage mitigation mechanics and save some time, otherwise spent dodging. Best option for the current spiral abyss floor 12 for players who don't have Zhongli.

(Example of clearing floor 12-3, second team: https://youtu.be/2tp4VhbZhgw)

Diona - Second healer in a team who can work as battery for Ganyu-Bennett double dps quickswap. Her C6 ultimate gives +200 EM (+37.7 DMG% for melts and vaporise), but “eats” 0.5U of gauge with her own cryo, thus making double-melts with Xiangling ult less consistent, so you better not use it a lot.
Kaeya - better than Diona damage-wise for the team, about the same battery for Ganyu. For the same double-dps quickswap idea Kaeya adds his low CD E and Q to rotation.
Xinyan - third pyro hero in the team. Particles she produces helps a lot with filling Xiangling’s ultimate (reducing required ER estimation to somewhat about 170%). C2+ she also gets a consistent 1U pyro application each 2 seconds from her shield, which helps a bit to catch pyro aura timings after using Ganyu’s ultimate. (Klee can fit same 3rd pyro role, but with more damage and less consistent pyro application)

Compositions without Bennett:

Ganyu / Xiangling / Klee / Fill https://streamable.com/6j1fea This composition uses Klee E as a battery and pyro application while Xiangling ultimate is off-cooldown, and Klee behaves very similarly to Bennett, but you can get more charged shots off per Klee E cast. This build also makes it possible to get quadruple melts everytime Klee casts E (if enemies walk into her mines to reapply 1U Pyro), so Sacrificial Fragments is a solid choice. Klee also fills the claymore slot, which is invaluable for current Floor 12 of spiral abyss.

Ganyu / Xinyan / Xiangling / Fill

This composition follows the same idea as the previous one - replace Bennett with another pyro hero who can act both as a battery for Xiangling and Claymore-wielding unit. Xinyan also provides shield and better off-field pyro aura than Klee, even though it requires c2 to be consistent (thus being less valuable hero than Klee she becomes superior choice for most players). Weapons for Xinyan in this composition are either Sacrificial or Favonious GS.

Fill slot in Bennett-less compositions: For both compositions best 4th hero would be Jean, since she provides both healing and VV debuff. Diona, Sucrose can also be quite valuable in this composition by providing extra EM for Ganyu and Xiangling (going without healer is not recommended for most players, but sometimes Sucrose can be the best option).

Freeze Ganyu

This composition is typically played because the CC it offers can have a cleaner playstyle than the melt Ganyu playstyle. Freeze Ganyu is cheaper (in terms of artifacts) and still clears the DPS bar to clear F12 quite easily. Even running only Ganyu built out with nothing on her supports is enough to clear the abyss with 9 stars. https://streamable.com/viujoz

Playstyle

A Freeze team uses a hydro support and Ganyu to lock enemies in place and get +40% Crit Crit from Blizzard Strayer. Unfortunately for Ganyu, she suffers from similar problems in her Freeze compositions as her Melt compositions, she lacks good, reliable supports. Weaving a normal attack between charged attacks is a simple cancel to learn with Xingqiu support that can allow for 100% freeze uptime with limited AoE. Tartaglia and Mona offer less than reasonable freeze uptime at C0, but improve significantly at higher constellations (C4 for Tartaglia and C1 for Mona). Barbara requires you to hug enemies to get hydro application, but the freeze effect mitigates the downside of the short range and provides healing as well.

Your rotations depend on how fast/well you can apply the hydro, but in general the freeze compositions are gated by hydro units. It should be noted that freezing enemies with weak Hydro and weak Cryo leaves a very short time to make use of Blizzard Strayer’s 40% Crit Chance bonus. Viridescent Vernerer has huge value in these compositions because you’re typically doing mostly Cryo damage. The freeze variations excel at bypassing shielded hillichurls and mitachurls, which is excellent for floor 12 of the abyss.

Artifacts

Artifact set

Description

Blizzard Strayer (4)

+15% Cryo DMG and +40% Crit Chance against Frozen enemies is too much to pass over. +20% Crit Chance against Cryo aura is strong already.

It should be noted that Ganyu’s Ascension 1 talent offers 20% Crit Chance for 5 seconds after every Frostflake Arrow, so it’s extremely easy to pass 100% Crit Rate. Prioritize Crit DMG.

Compositions

The compositions on Freeze Ganyu typically run a hydro unit (duh), an additional Cryo unit for the Cryo resonance, and a suitable support (with large preference for grouping). Anemo supports typically take the cake for the last slot, not leaving much wiggle room.

Ganyu / Xingqiu / Diona / Fill

This is a reasonable level of investment for Freeze Ganyu for a playstyle that isn’t gimped by any glaring weaknesses. Xingqiu applies Hydro when you do normal attack - charged cancels which can maintain 100% freeze uptime to a single target and a small area around it (about half of an abyss tile of AoE), Diona condenses as a Cryo unit, healer, and offers stagger resistance against charged attack interrupts. Ganyu’s Q offers a 20% damage bonus to Cryo DMG, so opting in for more damage with Kaeya or Chongyun is also an option. It should be noted that this composition will use a small portion of Xingqiu’s potential damage output, so you might prefer to have Xingqiu support a Diluc, Klee or Keqing.

Ganyu / Barbara / Anemo Traveler / Kaeya (or any Cryo/flex)

Ultimate Ganyu F2P/L2P comp. Ganyu works surprisingly well with Anemo Traveler (full DPS uptime during enemies pushed away by tornado), and C6 is -60% res shred with +0 VV set. Ganyu hyperstack strategy allows overall cheaper investment than similar teams for 9* abyss clear (sample run https://streamable.com/viujoz). Barbara provides hydro hugs for nice freeze uptime.

Ganyu / Tartaglia / Diona / Sucrose

Tartaglia’s riptides are amazing for staggered hydro application in AoE floors. Even at C0, he can use ranged ult spam and keep up permafrozen without even swapping to melee stance. On lower enemy count floors, splitting on-field time between Tartaglia and Ganyu can be awkward. His passive +1 normal talent arguably provides a bigger boost to Ganyu than to any other unit.

Ganyu / Mona / Diona / Sucrose Mona’s hydro application is fairly weak and struggles to maintain good freeze uptime. However, the raw power of the Omen buff on Mona’s Q ability more than makes up for the freeze downtime and losing 20% Crit Chance because enemies aren’t frozen is not a massive concern. It is possible to extend the duration of Mona’s Q Omen buff, which is explained below.

Venti, Mona, and C4+ Tartaglia

If you haven’t noticed, Ganyu scales exceptionally well with Mona C1 Omen stalling, Venti’s Elemental Burst, and Tartaglia’s constellation 4. These three units are listed separately because they excel at propelling Ganyu’s damage profile even further away from her normal ceiling or have anti-synergy with the normal team cores listed above.

Venti

Venti Q with nearly any kind of elemental infusion barring electro provides utility, damage, and synergy with both melt and freeze compositions. Most of the weaknesses of Melt or Freeze compositions are just blown out by Venti’s utility. For melt compositions, he warps the profile of using Ganyu as a main DPS because her Q damage will scale quadratically with Venti’s grouping. Enemies are hit by ice shards per wave from her ultimate, and each ice shard has an AoE, so the total damage is equal to the number of enemies squared. For freeze compositions, Venti’s powerful hydro application/grouping covers for the weaknesses of current hydro units and applies Viridescent Vernerer.

Melt: - Anything that can hit enemies in Venti Q, alternate DPS with Pyro/Ganyu

Freeze:

- Any kind of hydro application, DPS with Ganyu

Mona

Mona’s Q, Stellaris Phantasm, applies Illusory Bubble to enemies. When they sustain damage, Omen is applied.

“You need to understand Omen DMG buff. It applies in 2 parts: 1. It must buff the attack that triggers the bubble to burst. 2. It must buff for the duration stated in the talent level.

The simple way to code things is: apply Omen as soon as you cast, if Illusory Bubble is bursted by damage, begin Omen DMG timer. This is where freeze comps come in: when you freeze an enemy that is in a bubble, you can continue to hit them with hydro and cryo damage because the freeze effect prevents the bubble from bursting. You essentially extend the duration of Omen artificially because you freeze them in the bubble state and prevent the bubble from bursting, but you can still hit them for the bonus damage.” Credit to Boesik#3192

Boesik’s Mona Guide

Omen Stalling Video Guide:

Ganyu / Mona C1 / Venti / Fill To guarantee that you extend the Omen duration, you need to cast a Hydro Infused Venti Q -> Ganyu Q -> Mona Q in that order. This will extend Mona’s Omen buff on enemies, and allows you to spam Ganyu’s Frostflake Arrow and Blooms for up to a 60% damage bonus depending on your Mona’s talent level. If enemies enter an unfrozen state for a single frame, Illusory Bubble will be burst. You lose Venti uptime, but nothing is realistically surviving this rotation.

Tartaglia

Tartaglia’s C4 allows him to be the premier unit for hydro application for Ganyu, applying 5 hydro procs over 18 seconds, effectively allowing you to perma-freeze enemies while spamming Ganyu charged shots. Deaths cause the riptides to move onto other enemies, so grouping tools like Venti cause the power of Tartaglia support to skyrocket.

Example: https://youtu.be/X7SU6ZL3H6Y

Ganyu / Tartaglia C4 / 2 Flex

This composition features the best in slot unit for hydro application, because C4 Tartaglia allows you to permafreeze just with 2 characters thanks to his Constellation 4, allowing you to fill in any character of your choice.