In terms of powercreep with old units, how well would you say each hoyo-game handles it?

Ask yourself questions like this.

How quickly do new characters overshadow old characters?

Do older characters get buffs? If so, are the buffs enough?

Are older characters still able to clear all content, without an insane build?

And yes, I'm copying this to the other subreddits since there isn't a general Hoyoverse subreddit, as far as I'm aware.

Commentaires

_Mysto_2026-01-03 05:09

Genshin - Fairly good

HSR - Absolutely atrocious

ZZZ - Not horrible, especially with the character buffs, but Void Hunters being "Press button, everything dies" characters really fucks with the meta

InukoJon2026-01-03 08:34

What makes HSR so bad? Please put into Genshin terms and pls try not to embellish. I was looking at trying it but these comments are making me not want to Dx

_Mysto_2026-01-03 08:43

The absolute best team a year ago is considered sometimes as low as D tier today. Sometimes even only one update later characters are significantly powercrept.

InukoJon2026-01-03 08:44

Oh that sounds miserable 💀

_Mysto_2026-01-03 08:45

I played it for six days, and that alongside the fact that the whole vibe of it not clicking with me is why I stopped.

Vegetto_ssj2026-01-03 11:51

>The absolute best team a year ago is considered sometimes as low as D tier today.

Tbh, they just released a support that pushes that team back among the S tier teams, but the user is still right, 3 weeks ago that team was a D-tier after dominating the previous year.

You can still clear contents with old units, but you have to invest on supports eidolons...

cartercr2026-01-03 20:49

Imagine pulling for an entire new team, with all of their weapons, just to then have those characters be borderline unplayable in less than a year.

That’s Powercreep: Star Rail in a nutshell.

The game itself is pretty fun. There are mixed reviews on the main stories, but personally I like them for the most part. But the game really isn’t f2p friendly.

LiamMorg2026-01-03 05:14

[deleted]

Signal-Ad-66872026-01-03 08:15

Eula is not bad her team is just the worst quality that literally anyone has access to in this game and maybecall 3 games combined

Impossible_Lock11722026-01-03 08:44

Her teams are bad. No buffs you can give her make her playable today unless you revamp her kit entirely

perfectchaos832026-01-03 05:15

Historically, Genshin's been really good. The worst of it has really only happened within the last year.

ZZZ Is next because they are actually buffing characters regularly. Even those that have been for quite a while.

HSR is lol. Not even worth discussing in this conversation.

RubApprehensive25122026-01-03 08:04

You can't really compare them. 5 almost 6 year old characters are able to clear endgame content and make it look fairly easy with investment.

Lots of supports help bring old units back to life.

Zzz had to buff their og roster 1 year after release. Hsr old characters are dead by now.

PrinceVincOnYT2026-01-03 14:07

they didn't have to, but I am glad they DO something. I give huge credit for the effort!

cartercr2026-01-03 20:46

The ZZZ buffs weren’t really necessary. They’re just a nice little bonus to either make the character feel better to play (Burnice and Soldier 11 both really feel better to play post buff) or to help make them stronger. (They could already clear, but just trying to keep their power levels similar to newer ones.)

Wonderful-Fun-73332026-01-03 05:17

genshin 3
hsr 1
zzz 2

out of 10

Stilnovisti2026-01-03 05:57

For a gacha game, I'd put Genshin at 8/10 or higher. Especially with the latest buffs. I know HSR sucks though.

Wonderful-Fun-73332026-01-03 11:10

for a hoyo game id put genshin at a 10, hsr at a 6 (only bc Hi3rd has gotten better since part 2, otherwise hsr would be 9 or 10) and zzz 8 but OP didnt specify what type of game

Low_Artist_76632026-01-03 05:18

The sad to hear reality is that they manage powercreep perfectly in both genshin and hsr... for the type of crowd it has. HSR keeps printing money.

And ZZZ guys just don't even know what are they doing.

Calm-Engineering-7882026-01-03 05:21

Genshin
\-1.0 era characters like 4 stars (Benney, XL, XQ, Sucrose etc) are still on top of their game and those with Hex buff just become even better. Many continued to remain a staple team member with new character simply opening new team options. There are cases like Eula which requires high investment and skill ceiling to make her useable.

HSR
\-I wont sugercoat it, the powercreep is atrocious. They can keep denying it, but new units just overshadows the older ones. 4 stars is just a myth, everything new is 5\* and their kit compare to 1.0 era characters are just way too OP.

ZZZ
\-I think we can all agree the moment Miyabi appeared, the gameplay changed drastically. She is a one man army that does everything to the point they had to buff Ellen because who the hell would use her when Miyabi is just x10 better. Expect future void hunters or any equivalent tier character to do insane stuff compare to their regular counterpart.

Gold_Pineapple76442026-01-03 05:22

Genshin characters have a lifespan of years, no matter what people try to doompost about. Only very specific stages of certain endgame modes (Abyss 12, Stygian Fearless and Dire) requires investment into new units. Constellations also aren't needed except for those three stages, and signature weapons even less.

The lifespan of a character in HSR though, is of a few months until they release a new must have 5-star support for them, that will make them useful again for 2 more months. But in HSR, signature light cones are most of the time an extension of a characters kit, so you end up having to get both so the character does their job right.

ZZZ I think is in a better position than HSR, since it also has the windows for player skill when fighting, but I don't engage enough with it to know for sure. But these two games release double the characters that Genshin releases, so with just that, you know the rotation of characters is faster in them. Something gets older quicker when you have constant releases back to back.

fat_mothra2026-01-03 06:43

>Genshin characters have a lifespan of years

Yeah except for Eula Genshin characters are like cockroaches that refuse to get killed by the meta

Diluc? First team was like Bennet / Xingqiu / Zhongli, then he got Kazuha, then Redhorn, then Yelan, then Beacon, then Furina, then Chrevreuse, then Xianyun, then Blazing Suns and Citlali, then Durin...

Hu Tao? Pretty much same as Diluc but without the weapons

Noelle? Got Zhongli, Albedo, Gorou, Husk, Redhorn, Yun Jin, Yelan, Furina, Marechaussee, Navia, Xilonen, Ineffa...

Xiao? Vermillion, Faruzan, Furina, Xianyun, Iansan, Long Night's Oath...

Mentooss2026-01-03 05:23

Basing the score on my favourites from each batch

Venti after buffs is nice

Soldier 11 after buffs is peak

Blade after buffs is a fucking coughing baby

Therefore hsr is shit and no amount of buffs will ever save that game

RelationshipHead89252026-01-03 05:33

does blade even have a single week of being good? i quit because of how bad blade has been way back then before the buff. do correct me if im wrong i havent played in years

megadark1212026-01-03 05:49

wasn't hyacine out-damaging him even post buffs or something? lmao idk I don't play that game. it's too funny to be actually true but you never know.

RelationshipHead89252026-01-03 05:54

i think so. but apparently hes not that bad now, its just that newer units have such high floors

Mentooss2026-01-03 05:55

I mean he was kinda good for a month on that buff patch with Hyacine wheelchair since she generates a lot of stacks and his buff increased taunt value so he was getting hit more often. His dmg is just so pitifully mid that i put him on Castorice team and pretend he's doing something because he gets to attack a lot.

NoOne2152026-01-03 06:13

He’s more fine than anything, his E1 makes him comparable to Mydei (another hp scaling dps)

Hyacine and Tribbie are just that good of units as well.

PrinceVincOnYT2026-01-03 14:08

fair

Fit-Application-12026-01-03 05:29

Genshin powercreep has definitely happened but old units are still viable and able to clear content (also helps that you can play around with character mechanics eg Jean in SO)

ZZZ I feel the hp inflation for sure but since i don’t really care for endgame that much (I try my best and get the full clear but if I can’t then oh well) so I can’t comment much

Hsr lmaooo. Enough said.

NoOne2152026-01-03 06:11

I like how every HSR comment is like “Yeaaaa, lmao.”. It is sadly true though.

Fit-Application-12026-01-03 09:10

Hahaha alas everyone knows the blatant power creep situation. Considering the bosses keep doubling in hp..

OriginalYou92782026-01-03 21:45

hsr is my fav hoyo game but the endgame modes are just so fkn dogshit I just play for the story and wait for next patch.

Fit-Application-12026-01-04 05:04

Hahah it’s annoying to see how they just keep inflating the hp so much so quickly

originmaple2026-01-03 05:30

I literally just finished building Acherons "premium" team (Robin/Jiaoqiu/Aventurine) and then they released Cypher, Tribbie, buffed Silverwolf, and Hyacine. Thankfully DHPT was free.

clown_20612026-01-03 05:58

I don't play other games from hoyo but for me genshin is pretty good if you are a decently old player (2 years at least ). If you play normally and don't spend but get like 2/4 good new characters per region you are mostly fine ( which is pretty realistic ) but if you take a break and come back it's gonna be a bit tough if you didn't have the best character in game when you took a break.

fat_mothra2026-01-03 06:23

Genshin is so fucking funny because there's some powercreep (example Varesa >>>>> Raiden) but there's also buffs, either in the way of new characters and gear, or direct buffs like the new Hexerei buffs, so the only characters that get screwed are those old enough to be a little outdated but not old enough for buffs to reach them yet

ZZZ is doing great imo, besides the obvious imbalance of Voidhunters >>>> everyone else, it really seems like you can beat endgame with anything, and the devs immediately started releasing buffs, not only to make characters stronger but also make their gameplay feel better

HSR I don't play it but from what I've heard the powercreep is fucking massive

nylakat2026-01-03 07:14

Raiden was never that good on release though, Xiangling was out damanging her in Raiden national. The only reason why people overrated her was because of her C2 which most players had. Varesa and Clorinde were both good dps while Raiden was more of a driver and I have all three.

But I feel Genshin does it the best out of the three, ZZZ is good, HSR is dog water with power and light cones (weapons). They released two new weapon types just to be more P2W and restrictive. 🛐

Akikala2026-01-03 14:02

Raiden teams were literally the best teams in the game on her release...

>Xiangling was out damanging her in Raiden national.

It's almost like Raiden is an on field support lol. SHE made that team strong at the time.

The funny thing is that Raiden COULD still be meta relevant if HYV didn't get scared of energy as a mechanic since Sumeru lol. If we had proper good off field energy hungry supports and sub dps characters then Raiden would likely be one of the better on fielders for them. But instead, since Yelan, the only things we've gotten were Furina, who doesn't really need energy that much as you can just build her with Fav and er gear as she is an HP scaler and now Durin... who refunds half of his burst energy anyway lol.

nylakat2026-01-03 14:23

That is what I said " Varesa and Clorinde were both good dps while Raiden was more of a driver and I have all three." I called her a driver, which is an onfielder who isn't a main dps.

That team was the best until like 2.4 when Ayaka took over, she wasn't too strong of an archon on release because she didn't have that many synergies compared to the rest who were being used everywhere.

But my point was that it isn't fair to say Varesa and Clorinde powercreep Raiden when they are two different roles, Dps and Driver. I was trying to say that Raiden was a real DPS at C2 unlike, Cyno, Clorinde, etc. who were excepted to be the damage dealers in the team

Akikala2026-01-03 14:32

Well, Varesa and Clorinde DID powercreep C2 Raiden (even c3 I think), who WAS a very strong dps.

>she wasn't too strong of an archon on release because she didn't have that many synergies compared to the rest who were being used everywhere.

On her release she was insanely good and versatile and used basically everywhere as bursts were a big deal back then. But after Inazuma she has gotten literally nothing to work WITH her kit so now she is definitely lacking in synergies. It's a shame too since they could've easily alleviated that problem at ANY point lol.

nylakat2026-01-03 14:36

But honestly, not to sound awful, Varesa powercreeping Raiden to some extent was expected. 2021-2025 is a LONG time in gacha I'm surprised she lasted that long. The "burst" playstyle did not feel good in the overworld so they switched to skill and basic attacks. Buy they need to stop making Archons kick the bucket after their region, it's sad.

Akikala2026-01-03 14:45

Oh yeah, definitely lol.

I'm not even mad about Raiden getting powercrept AS a dps, I'm annoyed that HYV completely gave up on her entire niche more so than anything.

The burst playstyle for overworld can be played around too, so it's just annoying. Cyno for example did not need to have completely dogshit normal attacks and default E lol. And you could make characters that have strong elemental skills even if their focus is on burst. For example Yelan can basically clear enemy camps with just her E and CA. And speaking of Yelan, if an off fielder has a good mobility skill on their E, it doesn't really matter if they're burst reliant as you have 3 other character slots for combat against riff raff and against harder enemies you'll use bursts anyway.

nylakat2026-01-03 14:49

Completely agree!

DarkAlex952026-01-03 06:25

ZZZ has been managing the old units really good to keep up with the meta.

Genshin.. the recent Hex buffs helped some, but with the Lunar focused content it is quite notorious but still not out of hand. As a matter of fact I found more troublesome the Natlan mobs than the current ones

HSR... thats already heavily tainted... a true candidate that I might stop playing this year..a lot of characters strength standards are now at least between E1 or E2.. and the Lightcones has been a problem since 3.x started mainly due to Rememberance... and we are going with the same mindset now with Elation for 4.x

blablawords12026-01-03 08:29

that's just probably your account state is now much better in Nord-Krai compared to back then in Natlan. Objectively, mobs that has another layer of hp that can heal themselves back up (wild hunt) are quite obviously worse than just specific shield then they becomes regular mobs once it destroyed (abyssal mobs). The lunar reaction can even bypass the mobs mechanic altogether, making it way more impactful for shilling. Meanwhile with the nightsoul shield, nightsoul mechanic only lets you shred the shield faster than regular fast element application. In my experience, Fischl + Xingqui were way better in shredding the nightsoul shield compared to some of the nightsoul users with slow application like Mavuika, Citlali, etc. Mavuika + Citlali was harder for me to destroy Papila's shield, but Fischl +Xingqui did it easier.

Akikala2026-01-03 06:28

I only play genshin and zzz (and used to hi3rd years ago).

-Genshin is an excellent example of powercreep done reasonably well. It took ~5 years before people started to even talk about it in a serious manner but even now content is mostly doable with older units and indirect buffs have bern mostly enough to keep weaker characters relevant. And now we are also getting direct buffs finally and they've been great so far.

Abyss and theater are easy enough with old characters. SO usually needs cheese, whaling or shilled teams.

-Zzz is a bit harder to say as it's much newer as a game. But aside from Miyabi, the powrrlevels were kept rather tame from my experience. Now we've gotten YSG wo is supposedly beyond broken but I have no personal experience of her to say anything about her. We also got Dialyn not too long ago and she pretty much powercrept the entire stun category, which is a bit odd but I'm assuming they wanted to increase the relevancy of that role further and plan on improving the other stunners to keep up. We also got direct buffs and while they're great, they don't really change the value of units, they just make them good enough to be playable (except Sanby, she is great now). Though I haven't really played mu h with all the buffed units.

Shiyu is doable with old characters, even with the update to it that made it much harder (I did it with Ellen, the first limited dps). DA is also doable with old teams but you need to actually be good at the game for that. If not, shilled characters exist for a reason. Whether character has a good matchup matters more than raw power overall.

Both are actually pretty good at it imo overall. Though sometimes there are random jumps in overall power.

fourrier012026-01-03 06:38

Genshin handled it the best, but the current trend of contents are worrying.

HSR handled it worst. Buff hardly matters. Old solid team is essentially useless without 1 new team member for tackling new content (I'm looking at you, Constance).

ZZZ seems fair, but at the rate they churned S-rank, I think periodically buffing old characters is not a sustainable endeavor. They need to tube contents such that it'd be a fair playing ground for many team comp.

hakalakalaka12026-01-03 07:03

Genshin and zzz are ok, hsr says: pull 170000 new 5 stars every patch cycle or go fuck yourself

Chuck0062026-01-03 07:44

HSR - LOL

ZZZ - It was fine until recently. Can really feel the HP inflation and shilling of new units in the endgame. Getting into HSR territory.

Genshin has been really good at avoiding it. Fontaine was the first place where you started to see it with Neuvillette and Furina. Natlan really upped it, but old characters could still clear with decent builds. Nod-Krai has buffed old units and kept mid units relevant.

I think Genshin's success has sustained because it's largely avoided power creep while only releasing 1 character most patches, making it easier for low spenders to save and giving spenders breaks for their wallets. Whereas with HSR and increasingly with ZZZ, if you don't have the latest units, good luck clearing.

PrinceVincOnYT2026-01-03 14:08

yeah, the HP inflation from 2.4 to 2.5 was really shocking, my scores dropped by 10k!!! from 40k+ to 30k+

PrimaryPalpitation122026-01-03 09:15

Genshin elemental reaction is the game changing meta, its really hard to balance if they actually want to powercrept cuz the roster is too big

bastianwibisana2026-01-03 09:52

Genshin keep releasing broken supports (Citlali) or faction (Hexerei) to buff old characters. Even Klee and Yoimiya can clear stygian onslaught on dire and fearless let alone spiral abyss

lostn2026-01-03 10:50

genshin is still fine. Older characters can clear content without too much difficulty, including 4 stars. HSR and ZZZ are quite egregious with power creep. Not just power creep but planned obsolescence.

In Genshin, you have characters like Bennett, Sucrose, Fischl, Xiangling, who are 1.0 4 stars that are still doing good even now. The same can't be said for the other games.

Vegetto_ssj2026-01-03 11:55

Genshin also got the opposite problem, the Reverse Powercreep. I hate how this reached its peak (its worst) exactly with my favourite character: Yoimiya 😭🤬

PrinceVincOnYT2026-01-03 13:51

HSR worst > ZZZ 2nd and Genshin the best, since there I don't need Signature so far to beat everything, I have pulled on Weapon Banner once for Neuvilette. Otherwise I only 4\* and Standard Banner 5\* and some BP weapons.

HSR worst cause without Lightcone a lot of Units are borderline crippled and to the Turn based Nature.

ZZZ works well enough for me so far. But in that game I am Vertically investing much more.

They did buff a lot of older units so far, but I don't know how impactful the buffs are personally.

But the HP Bloat is way to hard atm. the newest Character was advertised by Content Creator as it being able to "easily" max score (65k is max 20k is needed for all rewards) at base M0W1, but in reality my M2W1 version of it adequately played only scored 34k on the new boss for her in endgame.

Genshin the best, least amount of reliance on Signature Weapons and Cons are usually more valuable.

BUT they do start to put more and more specific buffs into weapons, which is concerning...

I am sitting on over 600\~ Pulls so far (I have not spended money in the last 3 Years or so on it) since there was no character I particularly wanted that bad or needed.

But not great... Ayaka (my favorite) feels borderline useless these days compared to new units.

Signal-Ad-66872026-01-03 20:01

Don't know zzz genshin is the worst at least in star rail you know they will elevate all the units eventually, in genshin some have been waiting for 5 years at this point soon 6

heyaooo2026-01-03 20:31

I quit HSR like over a year ago but I heard its pretty bad since older characters have hard time with competing new released ones. One patch a unit is considered S tier , next few patches after they considered not worth pulling anymore.

Genshin is guilty with this as well but the devs recently been working on buffing old characters and will continue doing so. Its not that bad.

I havent played much of ZZZ to comment but HSR definitely has it the worst.

cartercr2026-01-03 20:44

Probably a really hot take, but Genshin isn’t *nearly* as bad as people in the community like to make it out to be. Go ahead, throw out your “140k” comments. Mavuika, who released a year ago, being the top dps doesn’t change the fact that every character is still viable. Almost every character has a team that can hit 90k dps without just being a “wheelchair” (ie: the other members of the team do everything while the character just watches) and 90k is more than enough to clear content.

Zenless Zone Zero is a lot like Genshin. Sure, there are newer characters that are stronger than older ones, but the older ones are still plenty strong enough to clear all content. On top of this the devs have already buffed multiple characters to help them either feel better to play or do more damage (and in some cases both) just to make sure that they aren’t falling behind. This, of course, on top of the fact that the devs stated they would be buffing all of the standard characters!

Powercreep: Star Rail is by far the worst offender of powercreep. It’s very telling when a new playable path is announced and there’s not really any excitement over what sort of mechanics it might bring, but rather people have resigned themselves to knowing they’ll be forced to pull for both a new unit and their light cone just to clear content. (And there is precedent to that belief, so it’s not just fear of the unknown.)