Genshin Impact Yelan build, artifacts, and more

Genshin Impact developer HoYoverse clearly thought Childe was getting lonely being the only Hydro bow user in the game, so it went and made a new one in Yelan. This mysterious denizen of Liyue claims to work for the Ministry of Civil Affairs, though her true alias is very much an unknown quantity in the hit gacha-infused ARPG. What isn’t a mystery, however, is the best Genshin Impact Yelan build you’ll want to opt for to maximise her potential.

Yelan may be able to put out plenty of damage, but due to her primary function as a Hydro applicator through her Elemental Burst, she’ll mostly be rotated off-field as a Burst DPS, allowing your main damage source to take centre stage and create all of those lovely elemental reactions. As one of the best sub-DPS Genshin Impact characters, you’ll want to pull for her when her Genshin Impact banner rolls round.

As confirmed by HoYoverse, Yelan will return on the Genshin Impact 3.4 banners. Featured alongside her will be Hu Tao – another top tier pull in our Genshin Impact tier list of best characters. If you’re looking to spend your Wishes on any of these great characters, then it’s worth keeping up with the active Genshin Impact codes to snag some free Primogems. Throughout this guide, you’ll learn the best artifact sets for Yelan, as well as her stat and talent priorities, alongside her best weapons and ideal team compositions that make a great Genshin Impact Yelan build.

If you don’t quite know what she does, then definitely take a look at our Genshin Impact Yelan banner guide for a full rundown of her abilities, Constellations, and talents.

Genshin Impact Yelan build overview

To give a brief overview of the best Genshin Impact Yelan build, here is what you’re going to want:

• Artifacts: Emblem of Severed Fate
• Stat priority: Energy Recharge, HP%, Crit Rate and Crit DMG
• Talent priority: Elemental Burst, Elemental Skill, and then Normal Attack
• Weapon: Aqua Simulacra (The Stringless or Favonius Warbow for F2P)

Below you’ll find our full breakdown of each recommendation, as well as example team comps you should absolutely slot Yelan into.

Yelan build artifacts

Yelan’s best artifact is Emblem of Severed Fate, available in the Momiji-Dyed Court, Inazuma. Emblem of Severed Fate is Yelan’s best artifact set because it provides additional Energy Recharge and causes her Elemental Burst, her strongest ability, to deal even greater damage.

	Yelan Burst DPS
Artifact	Effect
Emblem of Severed Fate	Two-piece set: Energy Recharge +20% Four-piece set: Increases Elemental Burst DMG by 25% of Energy Recharge. A maximum of 75% bonus DMG can be obtained in this way.
	Yelan Main DPS
Artifact	Effect
Heart of Depth  Tenacity of the Millelith	Two-piece set: Hydro DMG Bonus +15% Two-piece set: HP +20%
	Yelan Sub-DPS/Support
Artifact	Effect
Noblesse Oblige	Two-piece set: Elemental Burst DMG +20%. Four-piece set: Using an Elemental Burst increases all party member’s ATK by 20% for 12 seconds. This effect cannot stack.

Yelan is a five-star Hydro bow-user adept in off-field Hydro damage through her unique and incredibly stylish Elemental Burst that will result in Yelan dealing Hydro damage to opponents off-field through floating dice. Similar to Xingqiu’s Elemental Burst, Guhua Sword: Raincutter, these dice will attack enemies whenever the active character uses a Normal Attack. Yelan’s Elemental Skill is no slouch either, causing her to turn into a shadow with enhanced movement speed to mark them with Hydro which will explode for massive damage once the skill ends.

As an off-field DPS, Yelan relies on her burst to deal damage while she’s not around. Additionally, without getting her to C1, Yelan suffers from some unfortunate energy issues. As such, Emblem of Severed Fate is the go-to artifact set for her – even at C1 and above – as it not only boosts her Energy Recharge, but also provides a big boost in Elemental Burst damage based on how much Energy Recharge she has.

While Emblem of Severed Fate is Yelan’s best artifact set since it improves her already powerful Burst, there are other powerful alternatives, namely a combination of Tenacity of the Millelith and Heart of Depth if building her as a main DPS. Since Yelan scales mainly on her HP stat, gaining the +20% HP buff from Tenacity of the Millelith is a great start to boosting her damage. Pairing this with Heart of Depth for the +15% Hydro damage will further improve her overall damage potential without relying on her Elemental Burst.

Alternatively, a four-piece set of Noblesse Oblige is also effective is Yelan is taking a more supportive role, since it boosts her Burst damage and increases party member’s ATK after using her Burst. However, this set is better suited for a fully support character, rather than Yelan who is typically a Hydro sub-DPS character.

Yelan build stat priority

Yelan’s stat priority is Energy Recharge, HP%, Crit Rate and Crit DMG. Given that Yelan’s Elemental Burst is as strong as it is, increasing her Energy Recharge to get it back quicker is top priority. While the exact amount of Energy Recharge you’ll want will vary based on artifacts and team composition, aim for around 210 Energy Recharge. From here, getting HP% is great as all of her ability damage scales on HP, rather than ATK. Lastly, increasing Crit Rate and Crit DMG is always a great strategy to improve damage on DPS characters.

While a Crit Rate/Damage Circlet is best, an HP% one will also work well if it has good sub stats. As always, you should be looking for a 2:1 Crit DMG-to-Crit Rate ratio, with a Crit Rate at or above 50% as a baseline, so choose accordingly based on what you need.

As for Sands, an HP% main stat would be best unless you are lacking Energy Recharge if you’re not using an Energy Recharge weapon for example.

For your Goblet, Hydro DMG is ideal on Yelan, especially if you’re not using Heart of Depth for that straight up damage boost. Finally, opting for either a Crit Rate or Crit DMG Circlet will round out Yelan’s main stats. As always, you should be looking for a 2:1 Crit DMG-to-Crit Rate ratio, with a Crit Rate at or above 50% as a baseline, so choose accordingly based on what you need.

Finally, Elemental Mastery will bolster the potency of Yelan’s elemental reactions, which suits her burst – which is primarily for applying Hydro like Xingqiu’s – down to the ground.

Razer DeathAdder V2 Pro – Genshin Impact Edition Razer DeathAdder V2 Pro – Genshin Impact Edition Razer $139.99 Buy Now

Yelan build – talent priority

Yelan’s talent priority is Elemental Burst, Elemental Skill, and then Normal Attack.

With Yelan primarily operating as an off-field DPS, most of her damage output will be coming from her Elemental Burst. Regardless of how much you do use her Elemental Skill, it will still provide more value than investing in her Normal Attack.

Yelan build weapons

The best Yelan weapon is, of course, her patented Aqua Simulacra. Boosting both her HP and damage – even when off-field – Aqua Simulacra is a match made in heaven for Yelan. With that said, there are several other bows that synergise well with Yelan.

	Yelan best weapon
Weapon	Effect
Aqua Simulacra	The Cleansing Form HP is increased by 32%. When there are opponents nearby, the DMG dealt by the wielder of this weapon is increased by 40%. This will take effect whether the character is on-field or not
	Yelan alternative weapons
Weapon	Effect
Polar Star	Daylight’s Augury Elemental Skill and Elemental Burst DMG is increased by 12%. After a Normal Attack, Charged Attack, Elemental Skill, or Elemental Burst hits an opponent, one stack of Ashen Nightstar will be gained for 12 seconds. When 1/2/3/4 stacks of Ashen Nightstar are present, ATK is increased by 10/20/30/48%. The stack of Ashen Nightstar created by the Normal Attack, Charged Attack, Elemental Skill, or Elemental Burst will be counted independently of the others.
Elegy for the End	The Parting Refrain A part of the “Millennial Movement” that wanders amidst the winds. Increases Elemental Mastery by 60 When the Elemental Skills or Elemental Bursts of the character wielding this weapon hit opponents, that character gains a Sigil of Remembrance. This effect can be triggered once every 0.2s and can be triggered even if said character is not on the field. When you possess four Sigils of Remembrance, all of them will be consumed and all nearby party members will obtain the “Millennial Movement: Farewell Song” effect for 12s “Millennial Movement: Farewell Song” increases Elemental Mastery by 100 and increases ATK by 20%. Once this effect is triggered, you will not gain Sigils of Remembrance for 20s Of the many effects of the “Millennial Movement,” buffs of the same type will not stack
The Stringless	Arrowless Song Increases Elemental Skill and Elemental Burst DMG by 24%
Favonius Warbow	Windfall CRIT hits have a 60% chance to generate a small amount of Elemental Particles, which will regenerate six Energy for the character. Can only occur once every 12s.
Sacrificial Bow	Composed After dealing damage to an opponent with an Elemental Skill, the skill has a 40% chance to end its own CD. Can only occur once every 30s.
Slingshot	Slingshot If a Normal or Charged Attack hits a target within 0.3s of being fired, increases DMG by 36%. Otherwise, decreases DMG by 10%.

For those lucky enough to own Elegy for the End, the premium five star bow will supercharge Yelan’s elemental reactions, even when she isn’t on the field. Offering up Energy Recharge, a ton of Elemental Mastery, and an ATK% buff when stacked, it is certainly the most attractive option for those who don’t manage to roll Aqua Simulacra.

Heading onto the four star options, The Stringless serves up a big old helping of Elemental Mastery as its secondary stat, with a solid ability damage boost on top. This is a solid choice, particularly for Burst DPS Yelan as it will bolster the power of both her burst, as well as the resulting elemental reactions.

If you’re really hurting for Energy Recharge, then both the Favonius Warbow and Sacrificial Bow will serve you well – especially the former as it offers double the Energy Recharge when fully-levelled. However, don’t expect to benefit from their passive abilities if you’re building Yelan as a Burst DPS, as both require her to be on the field to activate.

Finally, if you’re looking for a three star free-to-play option, then Yelan works very well with the Slingshot. Again, you won’t be making use of its passive unless you’re planning to use Yelan as a Main DPS, but the whopping 31.2% Crit Rate it offers when fully levelled will either free up plenty of room in your build for more Crit Damage, or simply make the crits from her Elemental Burst more consistent.

Yelan build team comps

There are several Yelan team comps that you can create, with Yelan operating predominantly an off-field sub-DPS character. Most team compositions will centre around another character as the driver, while Yelan provides Hydro application and damage from off-field. Therefore, her teams mostly focus on Hydro Elemental Reactions, such as Electro-Charged, Vaporize, Hyper Bloom, and Freeze.

This team is perhaps Yelan’s most powerful and popular team, since it makes full use of Hu Tao through Yelan’s excellent Hydro application, though it is quite expensive to create given the number of five-star characters involved. Yelan and Xingqiu will both offer off-field Hydro damage and application while Hu Tao causes devastating Vaporize reactions and heavy Pyro damage. The support role can either be filled by Kazuha or Zhongli. Kazuha will offer the most damage potential through Swirl reactions and the Viridescent Venerer artifact set. On the other hand, since Hu Tao gains a damage boost when below 50% HP, a healer is discouraged but a shielding character such as Zhongli works wonders for survivability.

This is a classic Raiden National Team, though Xingqiu is replaced with Yelan. Thanks to Raiden Shogun, Elemental Bursts will be readily available, allowing Yelan and Xiangling to deal massive damage while Raiden triggers Elemental Reactions and Bennett provides healing and a damage boost. It’s easy to build and use, yet has great damage potential.

With the introduction of the Dendro element and a whole host of new Elemental Reactions, Yelan can now also shine in a Hyperbloom team. Nahida will act as the driver, applying Dendro and spreading damage to all enemies targeted by her Elemental Skill. Yelan and Kokomi will apply Hydro, with Yelan boasting strong damage through her Burst while Kokomi heals. Dendro and Hydro will cause Bloom which can then be reacted by Electro through Kuki Shinobu or Raiden Shogun to trigger Hyperbloom, a strong particle that will track enemies and deal huge damage.

And that’s the best Genshin Impact Yelan build available right now. As always, we’ll be sure to keep this guide updated as new builds and compositions arise. In the meantime, check out a powerful Genshin Impact Ayato build or Genshin Impact Raiden Shogun build, two other incredibly strong characters.