I just had a thought, older players, who is the best DPS here before the Powercreep era?

Well Yelan is sub dps and used in team of those 3 (Alhaitham quickbloom uses her, Raiden taser, HuTao vape)

But Alhaitham probably

They still talked about Alhaitham even after Neuvillette and Arlecchino arrived, so I'm guessing he's top in terms of numbers. Hu Tao was the one you used to hear people talking about most. But I think Raiden was the one you were most likely to own.

None of these guys were really significant. Alhaitham and Raiden benefitted alot from good teams that they had synergy with. But if I had to take a gander, probably Hu Tao or Ayaka

Alhaitham in terms of numbers but that’s obv because he’s the latest. In terms of meta dominance, I think either him or Ayaka. Raiden and Hu Tao are both made much better by early Eidolons.

Ayaka. Freeze was so good, they had to nerf the reaction and ayaka died out slowly.

For me it will always be Hu Tao, specially if you build her correctly and invest in her. She’s the first character that managed to hit over 1M damage with one ultimate and the only “buff” she had was Bennet’s C6.

The only character able to top my Hu Tao is Arlecchino, but still, Hu Tao’s rotation and teams are superior and more friendly. I love her to death 😭

Wet Socks, Freeze was benched till Ice Coffee and Skurk because of her.

hutao carry me for 4 years i think.

Tao impresses me being that she still has some of the top dps, her ineffa/columbina team even out DPS arle again


Though alhaithmon will always be the most fun and I still use him more

Raiden actually had a really good run for like a year or two where she totally dominated abyss rankings. Like it was normal to just see 5 different raiden teams in the top 20. She just worked against everything, even if there were stronger options. But team damage is a lot more important to her than personal damage, if that affects your rankings.

For personal numbers, alhaitham, hutao, and ayaka are the main competitors. Alhaitham's numbers were higher i think but his time near the "top 3" seemed so short.

Yelan and xiao were top c6 meta in their times.

Alhaitham stayed till the fontaine era and was considerd ti be power crept when kinich entered dendro meta and vanished at the mavuika meta from the top and is still a great dps but the meta isn't favourable to dendro itself recently

Raiden if C2 was a guarantee half abyss clear. Hu tao after Furina was a monster. those 2 carry abyss for me until maybe Arle

[Kuki outdamaged Alhaitham](https://gcsim.app/db/DKzzWDLT7Pgp) expect for teams with Furina, he was getting credit for someone else's work. Hu Tao was the best because Hoyo abandoned freeze.

I don't really consider Yelan a DPS unless she's C6. C6 Yelan does 300K DPS for me now, so if we're counting C6's, her.

Hu Tao. She and Xiao are the earliest characters from this lot, and not only was she considered very strong, but new characters constantly buffed her strength. She was buffed by Yelan and the change to Hydro Resonance she brought, she was buffed by Furina and MH was more than viable on her, and Xianyun revolutionized her gameplay (hyperbole).

By Fontaine Wanderer had already taken Xiao's spot, playing Ayaka was depreciated, playing Raiden as an Electro DPS was depreciated. But Hu Tao held strong through Yoimiya, all of Sumeru, and Lyney, only Arlecchino took her crown. Alhaitham survived after that, but then again he didn't face on Field Dendro DPS competition until Kinich.

IIRC, it was HuTao (when played right) around the same power level as Ayaka (when her ult actually hits the boss), Alhaitham was a little bit behind in theory but in practice he was much easier to play (thus you get better results on average) despite having to manage his mirrors. Raiden was either kinda washed or just hyperbloom support, Yelan is a support, Xiao was left behind until Xianyun and Faruzan later.

Xiao : in the past he was the weakest in that list but ironicaly he didn't get that much powercreep, cause he got a lot of buff . in bref he was never the best, never part of the meta, but he was good and stayed it

hu tao : simply put she was the best solo target dps every time the boss got too much hp you knew it was for your hu tao to undle


raiden : the rational her main team probably was the longest meta team ever seen, why ? easy to get and always reliable, i remembre everyone was mad about getting her c2. sadly with sumeru she got powercreep by her bloom countrepart


ayaka : shinra tensei, one rotation was enough to clear most abyss stage, without taking any damage because everyone was frozen, it was a very fun team but also was powercreep pretty hard by bloom and fontaine


alaitham : i remember him not being that strong of character, dont get me wrong he was top 2 dps with hu tao but the hyperbloom team already performed realy well without him i always saw him as the cherry on top not as meta defining as the other in this list, bloom was the meta defining


yelan : she wasn't that broken of a thing, she was a second xingqiu and having the best subdps in double was always good, i remember people arguing about who was better at the time between them. what i mean is that if you got her back then you would always play her since she and xingqiu were in pretty much every meta team but if you didn't have her, xingqiu did the exact same job

Abyss was much easier at the time so you could play your favorites even if the match ups weren't good

I remember Nilou bloom being great to usable until early 5.x. Hu Tao was my go to second team (Ayaka and melt Ganyu as runner ups) until Navia came out. Unfortunately, Mavuika released and Varesa teams were way better than all of my teams with the exception of my highly invested Nilou bloom and Nilou Freeze teams (if freeze was shilled) so those two became my second teams even though I liked other carries more

Alhaithem because of dendro introduction and being the newest of the group.

Hutao and raiden were dominant for their times. Ayaka was dominant but because of freeze, many enemies could be perma frozen.

The lack of a freeze meta was due to ayaka freeze for a long time.

Yelan is a sub dps, so sort of unfair to put her against main dps. But i would argue she was relevant to a lot of teams because of the lack of hydro chars.

I dont think xiao was ever really in the meta tbh.

If c6 considered, Yelan. She has withstood powercreep just fine, still one my strongest nukers

Hu Tao but I'm biased

raiden is unfortunately an inazuma character and the dev team decided that nobody in inazuma should do any damage, same goes for ayaka because her ice storm hits 3 times and then fks off 80% of the time

xiao got pretty good when xianyun released but still it was xiao. unless you had crazy good investment on him he wasnt doing anything

alhaitham was the biggest fraud. people were calling him part of the big 3 with neuv and alre but alhaitham was anything but. his team was around 80k instead of the 100k both other big 3 were doing, his team dps was 30-40% coming from kuki and to top it all off, going nahida double hydro kuki instead of alhaitham had more survivability, was mind numbingly easy to play and depending on the account, was doing either the same or higher damage

yelan never really was a main dps

tao had some really good teams, not sure if better than alhaitham, probably around the same level but in her teams she was doing more than 60% of the damage

the real answer is the xiangling. it was always gonna be xiangling. i try to play x, my xiangling does more damage, i try to play.... you get the point.

as a unit xiangling was always present in the meta from 1.0 (dont know if she can be called meta if people havent discovered her) all the way to the release of mavuika. even in the 5.1/5.2 patches xiangling was still played as a pyro off fielder.

its insane to me that xiangling the 1.0 unit was so strong and so overtuned that it took fkn MAVUIKA to powercreep her

I'm biased, but Hu Tao dominated the pyro main DPS throne from 1.3 to 4.6. That's around 3 years. Not many characters can last that long in the meta, even more so for DPS.

Yoimiya failed to dethrone her because of her auto-targeting shenanigans. Dehya is Dehya (plus she's not a main DPS anyway). Lyney was close but his best team being mono pyro caused people to ignore him because Fontaine was the hydro or HP meta, which turns out to benefit Hu Tao even more with MH artifact and Furina herself.

Mathematically it was Hu Tao. She survived the longest stretch of patches here and qualifies as a Main DPS (Yelan's more a support than a DPS despite an impressive damage floor; she has high Hydro app and good DMG% buffs in her kit).

In terms of gameplay feel it'd be Alhaitham. Ever after powercreep he feels good to play because of his skill ceiling. Raiden was a beatstick, Ayaka was a walking burst button, & plunge is clunk as shit.

Yelan was just peak kit design in general because of how FAST she was. C1 Yelan is like the best run-buff in the game, legit limitless stamina for quickly moving from A to B over sprintable surfaces.

Yelan is one of if not thee most fun character in the game. Her dash especially. Also her quick charge shot is one of the best feeling/most satisfying of all bow characters. Maybe not for stygian, but for the overworld especially she is top tier amazingly fun character to play.

Hutao, Double hydro vape is great considering shes such an old DPS. Shes a pyro carry and pyro is pyro like a proper built team shes always been on the cusp. CN side rates her and I trust them more. For doing the lions share of damage i guess she has been there for the longest time.


Ayaka unfornatuely has reached her limitation unless Shenhe gets replaced but Shenhe has legit great synergy. But for a time she was like the OG hypercarry and got a boost with Escoffier years later and rose up to top 4ish for a short while. 


Al never had good numbers on a carry the team did alot of the work and Raiden had more on field driving numbers (CO not C2)

Thats the reality.

Yelan is handy not a necessity at all but her utility is always welcomed

i have four of them but xiao is the only one i still use

All I had before the Powercreep era was Hu Tao. She’s the first 5-star character I got in the game and no, the Traveler doesn’t count as a 5-star, though he/she was an MC of this game. Anyway, her skills were amazing but my main concern was the HP drain every time I used it. That’s why Arlecchino made it so much better, but that’s later down the line.

Still Hu Tao, it's just that she's hard to master at C0. If you also like weird gameplay. You can play her in Hu Tao - Yelan/Xingqiu - Furina - Xianyun team.

Ayaka was very expensive, id say hu tao. Yelan is sub dps, not necessarily main tho there r plenty showcases of yelan dps c0. I personally want yelan and hu tao i still don't have them

It’s really a toss up between Alhaitham and Hu Tao. Both characters were top tier dps’s during 3.x and both got considerably stronger with Furina’s release.

Putting Yelan here isn’t really fair as all of these characters are primarily on fielders while Yelan is primarily an off fielder - until C6 that is.

If everyone is C0 - probably Alhaitham, but that’s kind of misleading. Hu Tao had the higher ceiling because of vape, but Alhaitham is easier to pilot and dendro was shilled back in 3.X which was when Alhaitham was new. Ayaka had her potential stuffed because too many bosses blocked freeze.

At low constellations, Hu Tao’s C1 is the best C1 of the characters here. Raiden and Ayaka’s C2’s are the best C2s. Alhaitham falls off because his constellations are pretty bad.

At max investment, it’s Yelan, as previously mentioned her C6 lets her be an on fielder with massive dmg. This time Hu Tao falls off and so does Raiden - Hu Tao peaks at C1 while Raiden at C3. Xiao is worth a mention as his C6 changes his playstyle significantly. But because this is pre-Fontaine, he doesn’t have Furina or Xianyun to help boost him, leaving his best team with Bennett and Faruzan. Ayaka’s C4 is pretty big for her too and worth a mention as it actually allows Ayaka to support other characters as well (it lowers enemy def by 30%, which is slightly different wording than Raiden’s C2 which only affects Raiden’s dmg).

Hu Tao was the best true dps in the game all the way until Neuvillette released. And it took till Arlechinno for her to finally be bested.

From 1.3 to 4.6, Hu Tao ran completely unopposed as top dog, no other dps has anywhere close to level of pure dominance.

Now, there were other dps like Raiden, Childe or Alhaitham, but both of them were more so riding off the backs of their supports Xiangling and Kuki.

Furthermore, what really gave Hu Tao such a leg up was she was one of the few dps in the game that didn't want Bennett, and when Bennett was basically a requirement on every team, that was massive. On top of that, the buff to Hydro resonance in late 2.x was gargantuan for Hu Tao and the double Hydro core practically carried her for all of Sumeru. And even come Fontaine, she got more buffs between Furina, the new MH set, and Xianyun.

Hu Tao was the best one during the hypercarry days before any of the dendro/region gimmick stuff was introduced

I didnt have her, but when i tested her through one of my hb's account, man she was insane during that time

Raiden Shogun and Yelan are not DPS characters; one is an offensive support character and the other a sub-DPS character, and both still work perfectly, even though some wanted to take them out of their original purpose.

Alhaitham was new and strong, but he didn't powercreep other characters or have overturned endgame specifically in his favor. Genshin's powercreep is an intentional sales tactic and it disgusts me.

I feel like you could have excluded Yelan and especially Alhaitham from this discussion. They're both much more recent than the rest.

Regardless though the answer would remain Hu Tao, the benefits of being a Pyro main DPS.

Al Haitham is hella strong back in the day

None, they are all team dependent imo

It xiangling

Alhaitham. I can still clear content with his team if its not anti-dendro (and I use newest meta team on the other side of abyss..) :D

Man the good old days of the big Liyue monster trio.

Ganyu not being here is a choice.

Hu Tao because she managed to be elite long after she was released. Units like Ayaka were the best "cryo" dps at the time, but not overall unit. Raiden Shogun was a great DPS and Support, but not the best. Yelan was a good Hu Tao support. Xiao was good, but never elite. Al Haitham was also like ayaka, "best dendro" for a while, but that wasn't the best option overall.
Neuvelitte was the spiritual successor to Hu Tao. He was released years ago and is still meta relevant.

one day we will get akademia crew buffs and alhaitham WILL become meta again *gets dragged back into the padded room*

Raiden just because Raiden National is the comfiest among these. E Q E Q E Q click click click E Q E Q E Q E Q

i know constellations might not count but accidentally pulling c2 raiden back in the days was enough to make me demolish the entirety of teyvat


it never mattered what team she was in, national, taser, mono electro, literally anything worked and it was so much fun. it carried me all the way to fontaine untill i pulled for neuvi and furina and after overload's buffs it came back again but ofc didn't feel as powerful as before with the local legends and increasingly difficult content

It was an era where the meta team was your best team. It didn't matter if you needed dendro, you had dendro traveler and he was amazing. 


Wanderer and xiao were tied in dps. 


Hutao was the main vape dps. 


Raiden was falling off in sumeru. But national was still a solid option. 


Alhethem was pretty strong. Not meta defining but strong. 


Ayaka was powercreeped to the ground after inazuma. Yet, she still was one of the top 5 picks for a dps. 


Yelan was mainly a vape driver or a better XQ. She didn't help dendro much because nilou was the much better option. Yet, she still was super strong in some wanderer teams. 


Out of all the characters here, Yelan was the only one who aged the best. Which is quite sad. 

Hu Tao + Yelan and Bennett carried my account for a very long time. My Raiden was pretty good, too. I enjoy using Alhaitham and wish he would've been more useful in Nodkrai. Somehow, I still don't have Xiao. He always released at the worst times. Same with Kokomi.

Alhaitham. Yes I'm biased

As a 1.0 player, I only recognize Diluc as the best DPS before powercreep started. Yes, Hu Tao powercrept Diluc in 1.3

Yelan was a very strong sub-dps character who could set up vaporize reactions. Provided a solid burst damage buff for the on-field character. She's still good now but she needs a lot of ER or energy particles to get her burst up and most of her value requires her burst to be active.

Hu Tao was a strong single target pyro dps character who could utilize melt/vaporize reactions. Left a pyro aura for a bit with her blossom marks which could show other characters to trigger reactions. She's just alright now because her numbers are just too low and she mostly just provided damage.

Raiden Shogun was a strong electro dps character that could easily trigger electro reactions with her skill. She could act as a hypercarry by buffing and maximizing her personal damage. She could also be a team dps driver by being on-field and filling everyone's burst while providing electro application for reactions and dealing solid damage. And she could just be mainly used for her electro skill to trigger electro reactions on anybody that took damage on the field every 2.5 seconds with 100% uptime. She's still pretty good now since she can still do all of that but she needs to be paired with stronger dps supports.

I used Hu Tao to clear Abyss for so long. Basically up until Natlan and they started introducing enemies with nightsoul mechanics.

I disagree with Raiden, as well as most flexible characters in here like Yelan, Hu Tao and the dendro guy who's name i forgot.

Raiden i use even in SO from time to time and she still kicks ass as long you invest in her, Yelan has never seen anyone else who does her role better, Hu Tao benefits from all the recent melt/vape meta and still can easily do insane damage and lastly dendro guy i am sure he is eating well with lunar reactions.

Alhaitham

Raiden in her heyday was the most fun. There's very few teams that were more slick and fun to use than Rational, and it could beat almost anything.

The most OP a unit has ever been was 1.0 Venti, though. Go through the Virdescent Venerer domain with him and imagine the whole game like that and you can get the feeling.

I'll also say, you're missing Ganyu from this little graphic. She and Ayaka were basically interchangeable DPS-wise.

I have all 6 characters with constellations and both Alhaitham and Yelan at C6.

Raiden: She was never that strong even on her release. She was a serviceable dps, but even getting her up to C3 was only slightly comparable to Hutao’s C1. She also fell off hard once Fontain began some noticeable power creep. However, she has Raiden-national which is an incredibly easy and consistently good team. At the time of her release the reliability of said team put her in the top tiers.

Alhaitham: He’s slightly complicated. His constellations are also mediocre, but he was and is still a very strong character. However, people’s perspectives of him have been heavily biased because of a couple things. 1) In beta his multipliers and damage were significantly higher and he was originally meant to be burst-oriented. When he was heavily nerfed before release a bunch of people decried him as being extremely bad and that narrative has stuck around even though he still released as an incredibly strong dps. 2) A big reason for his top dps output on release was because at the time the new dendro reactions were just the strongest in the game, so a lot of people say it wasn’t *him,* it was the reactions doing all the damage. It was both.

Ayaka: Meh. Her only viable teams have always been freeze, and she’s always been a little clunky. She’s best at single targets, but her energy cost, the fact her burst is so hit-or-miss, and that even during the Inazuma updates she wasn’t considered an absolute top tier dps means she was never really broken. She was just decent, and if you didn’t have her best supports before the recent ones, Kazuha and Shenhe, she was kinda ass honestly. Her only actually good constellation is her C4 which is a def reduction for enemies, but it doesn’t make up for her lackluster kit elsewhere.

Xiao has always been good, but he was never an excellent dps. Characters from his time like Hu Tao and Childe were always stronger than him with easier teams to build. It wasn’t until over a year after his release that he got a dedicated artifact set with the Chasm, and not until 2 years after that with Xianyun during the Fontain patches where he got a dedicated support. Even then, he still struggles to keep up with most top-tier dps teams. His C6 does significantly change his playstyle, but his kit is still weaker compared to a lot of other characters.

Hu Tao: She was hands down the strongest character for a while at lower constellations. Her vape teams are incredibly easy to invest in and set up, and her C1 is a fantastic boost to her personal damage. Unfortunately though, the rest of her constellations aren’t very good. Despite that, it wasn’t all the way until Fontaine with Neuvillete and Arlecchino where she began to fall off. However, she’s still a very strong and easy to use dps.

Yelan: At lower constellations she’s not a dps at all and can’t really be compared to the others. At C6? She was one of the strongest in the game for years until newer units like Furina/Mavuika/Kinich/etc. Her C6 makes her a viable on-fielder with an enormous amount of front loaded damage, and she also had extremely good supports from her time like Kazuha.

Pre Fontain my ranking would be:


> At lower constellations -

1. Hu Tao
2. Alhaitham
3. Raiden
4. Ayaka
5. Xiao
6. Yelan


> At higher constellations -

1. Yelan
2. Alhaitham
3. Hu Tao
4. Raiden
5. Xiao
6. Ayaka

Alhaitham for low cost and Raiden if you were willing to get her C2

For me its Xiao. Ive mained him since release and no matter which powerful character released afterwards, i still kept turning back to Xiao because of how powerful he is.

Hu Tao.

And i'm not just saying that because i'm insanely biased towards her.

She was actually the top meta dps until like, Neuvi.

And she wasn't powercrept as a pyro dps until 5.4 when Mavuika came out. Unless you were one of the probably like half a dozen people who have c6 Kaeya.

She's held up insanely well too. She's still strong, even if she's not what she used to be.

Her new Columbina + Ineffa team might make her competitive with more modern dps but idk the calcs on it.

And here's the crazy thing about Hu Tao. She's not even at full power. She's held back by how fast her pyro app is. If they ever release an off-field cryo that lets her melt all her hits, it's over, every other dps is cooked.

4.0 was the greatest shift. Because it gave us better upgrades

Raiden was never meant to be a top dps but with her c2 she was a good candidate for national team. That's not a good thing because national team has a certain ceiling but the endgame was never crazy. Chloride ended her career

Altheimne was one of the best DPS and that's because hyperbloom was cracked plus bosses were shilling dendro at the time. Kinich ended his career

Ayaka is well ayaka. Cryo did not survive well for about 3 years. Wrisouly ended her career?

Xiao is funky. He was one of top dps at one point but his team became so expensive on top of him getting slightly better artifact sets.

Hutao survived a whole lot and even contended with Arlecchino. Mavukia ended her career.

Yelan is a great sub DPS and when folks found out you can pair with xingqui it became nasty. I don't think anyone stole her stole

Hu Tao was a tier above them all, followed by Raiden and Ayaka. And idk why Xiao is even an option lol bro was born powercrept

I think it was Alhaitham, but I’m biased because of how much I like him.

I was an Ayaka main back then, and while she may not have been the very best, she was always very fun.

Yelan was the powercreep, it's crazy to put her here LOL

ofc I'm taking C6 into account, you simply cannot gloss over it. The ocean dwellers make up 80% earning the game.

Those characters are from different times with different roles so it's hard to judge which one is the best. Like, Alhaitham and Hu Tao are from different times and meta periods. And there was never a point where Raiden was actually the best DPS (at C0). Her main strength comes from being a very comfortable driver for a Rational team and she does ok damage herself.

I would say a big difference between the top DPS currently and before was in supports. The strongest DPS back then were because they could take full advantage of the broken generalist supports/off fielders. Alhaitham and Nahida for example or Hu Tao and Xingqiu/Yelan. At present though, the strongest DPS are strong not only because they have ridiculous numbers but also they have supports created specifically for them.

Ayaka. Girl was so strong they spent nearly three years making anti cryo and anti freeze content to stop her.

(It never stopped me)

Hu Tao still clearing my Spral Abyss since her release till this day. She also clears some of the Stygian bosses for me in Fearless. And her team has the 3rd highest dps in my account.

I feel so out of loop with the meta. Play since Yomiya first banner (but on and off and I just finish Fontaine)…. Is El no longer meta? We still pride Bennett right? 

Im assuming pre 4.0 is pre powercreep era, which in that case there’s two answers i think.

The answer of who was perceived as the best during that time, which is alhaitham with pretty much no debate, then there is the answer of “looking back, who was the best”, which i would say is hu tao, but you can debate alhaitham as well.

Assuming they are all at C0, with their best team members (both at present and at the time), Hu Tao would definitely be the best nuke but Xiao would have the highest DPS cuz he's got more hits and usually has more damage per hit, cuz he doesn't have a low hp mechanic

Def hutao , I remember Tony To used to farm 1m+ clips with her like it’s nothing.

Ganyu , she carry me till inazuma.

From only this list, i know people will say hu tao but ill say it's alhaitham. I have hu tao but i don't have alhaitham so yknow, this 100% just my opinion. (and yes ill say lyney better than her)

I never build raiden as dps (cuz dps are already too much already) so i never knew how high she deal. She only electro bot/battery/sub dps if enemy immune to dps element.

I don't have yelan but if i have i won't build her dps too tbh.

Don't have xiao but anemo dps ssr already rare enough for him to actually he good. His damage is alright, better than heizou and wanderer if you ask me.

Ayaka quite good on her release since people never want to play FPS ganyu. She kinda die down and occasionally got revived by shenhe, furina, Escoffier. Ganyu still better imo.

All characters that i have here have their signature too so i think my opinion kinda valid since I've experienced them on their peak (F2P BTW)

Sadly At c0, Raiden have no spot in this contest

For me and my personal preference it was Raiden. I held onto her as my premiere on-fielder for so long, and she wasn’t anywhere near OP, not even the same way the current state of Genshin is where it shills way harder so the status of best character is so whimsical now.

Even though Raiden never was the absolute best, she was still clearly viable for so so long. Now my Ineffa is dealing more damage *off field* than my Raiden does with her standard on-fielder carry build.

There are multiple powercreep eras.

Hu Tao was at the top until Fontaine, when Neuvillette kinda came and took shit over. Then, she really officially fell off when Arlecchino replaced her as top Pyro DPS.

I think Xiao has experienced the most longevity. C0 Yelan has never been a DPS and has always been a Xingqiu upgrade. She’s more of a support, so her longevity I would NOT compare to the others.

Ganyu erasure in the DPS conversation is damning, because only veterans know that the meta back in 1.x was playing with reactions and not pure hypercarry DPS (Morgana freeze, National team, Hutao reverse vape)

I beleive hutao was the absolute best then after alhaitham both were a step above everyone. And after that other started catching up but by that time other better dps already got released. I'd still say hutao and ayaka are the only one still pretty good even now depending on your investment.

Xiao - he is constantly getting indirect buffs

I NEED them to give ny girl hutao some good cons in the liyue buffs

hutao, as ayaka needed a full 5\* team to do good numbers.

Imo Raiden. Best not in numbers but f2p playabilty. Great at c0, Catch as weapon, team's gemeralist artifact on the same domain except for benny's. Team is highly customizable.

Power creep era came within a patch of the games release ✌️😭

out of all the ones in the image, my strongest was Raiden Shogun. But the strongest overall, I think Hu Tao or Yelan. But if you consider old dps other than the ones in the image, it should be Xiangling. There are reasons why this copy pasta exists.

I can't take it anymore. I'm sick of xiangling. I try to play diluc. My xiangling deals more damage. I try to play yoimiya. My xiangling deals more damage. I try to play Hu tao. My xiangling deals more damage. I want to play Klee. Her best team has xiangling. I want to play raiden, childe. They both want xiangling.

She grabs me by the throat. I fish for her. I cook for her. I give her the catch. She isn't satisfied. I pull engulfing lightning. "I don't need this much er" She tells me. "Give me more field time." She grabs bennett and forces him to throw himself off enemies. "You just need to funnel me more. I can deal more damage with homa."

I can't pull for homa, I don't have enough primogems. She grabs my credit card. It declines. "Guess this is the end." She grabs gouba. She says "Gouba, get them." There is no hint of sadness in his eyes. Nothing but pure, no icd pyro application. What a cruel world.


Also if you noticed throughout 1.0 to 3.x, almost every patch buffed xiangling like better weapons, or new characters that buff or buffed by her. IIRC it went like this

1.0 early release
1.1 Zhongli def shred
1.2 Xiangling support Ganyu
1.3 Homa
1.4 Rosaria
1.5
1.6 Kazuha benefitted from Xiangling
2.0 Ayaka helps Xiangling trigger melt
2.1 Raiden helps Xiangling solve her Downtime-damage trade-off, The Catch
2.2
2.3
2.4 Calamity Queller
2.5
2.6 Ayato
2.7 Yelan
2.8
3.0 Dendro Release
and so on... (I don't play that much after this patch and I didn't analyze patches that much either)

Raiden

Alhaitham no?

Childe. International was unbeatable

Alhaitham shouldn't be on that list because he's the start of the powercreep.

As for who was the best dps before. Hu Tao was best without constellations. Raiden Shogun was best with constellations.