Aino

Aino

4★HydroClaymoreSupport

TL;DR

Aino's Burst drops a little water-spraying duck that sits there pelting enemies with Hydro for about 14 seconds while you go and play somebody else. Her Skill hooks her forward into the fight and does a bit of damage on the way. Two buttons, then swap off and somebody else reacts with all that water. She raises the party's Moonsign on top. She also needs a lot of Energy Recharge.

Rotation

  1. Skill (E) to close the gap and put a little Hydro out.
  2. Burst (Q) to drop the duck.
  3. Swap off and spend the next 14 seconds on the rest of your team.
  4. Back in every rotation for the same two buttons.

Abilities

Skill (E) Throws a hook forward and drags her along behind it, hitting for Hydro on the way and again where she stops. Hold to pick the direction. 10 second cooldown. Mostly a travel move that happens to do damage.
Burst (Q) Costs 50 Energy, 13.5 second cooldown. Plants the duck, which stays for about 14 seconds and fires water balls at whatever wanders near it while she is off the field. This is the whole reason she is in your team.

The one mechanic to understand

Half of what she brings is the Moonsign level.

Aino carries the Nod-Krai moon mark, so having her in the party pushes its Moonsign up by one. On her own that leaves the party on the lower tier. With one more Nod-Krai character it goes up a level. That upgrade makes her own duck fire faster over a wider area. It also unlocks the half of several other Nod-Krai kits that sits behind the higher level. She often ends up in a team as much for the level as for the water, so pairing her with another Nod-Krai character is worth more than any single stat on her artifacts.

What actually matters

  • Energy Recharge, a lot of it. Everything she does comes from the Burst. She is bad at paying for it herself, so around 200% is the honest number if nothing else in the team is feeding her. It drops a long way with a Favonius weapon or a second Hydro character.
  • Elemental Mastery. Her duck adds half her Elemental Mastery to its own damage. Every reaction her Hydro sets up for the team scales off it too. It is the only offensive stat on her worth the slot.
  • Somebody to react with the water. She applies Hydro and nothing else. Electro or Dendro in the team is what turns that into real damage.

Gear

Weapon Energy Recharge first, Elemental Mastery second. Favonius Greatsword fixes the exact problem she has, though it needs enough Crit Rate to actually land the crits its passive wants. Master Key is craftable and carries both stats without that condition.
Artifacts 4-piece Silken Moon's Serenade, which hands the party Elemental Mastery and stays up the whole time on her. 4-piece Instructor does much the same job for free while you farm it.
Sands Goblet Circlet Substats
ER EM EM EM / ER

A Hydro damage goblet is worse here, since most of her value is reaction damage other characters trigger. Ignore Crit unless you gave her a Favonius weapon.

Works well with

ElectroDendro

Electro gives you Lunar-Charged (the moon version of Electro-Charged), Dendro gives you Bloom. Either way the reaction is the payoff rather than her own numbers.

Don't bother

  • Her Normal Attacks and the spinning Charged Attack that eats 40 stamina a second. She is off the field.
  • Building her for damage. Crit stats do almost nothing here.
  • Levelling her talents much. Her own numbers are small either way and Elemental Mastery moves them more than a talent level does.
  • Using the Skill as an attack. It is how she gets to the enemies so the duck lands in the right place.

Want the full deep dive? Read Aino on KeqingMains.

Found something wrong? If a rotation is wrong, or a page skips the bit you needed, the contact form lands straight in my inbox.