Chiori
GeoSwordOff-field DamageTL;DR
Chiori is off-field Geo damage with one input to learn. Press Skill, then press Skill again straight away: the second press swaps her out and sets her doll up to strike alongside whoever comes in. Burst first if it is available, since it is a single clean hit. Everything she does scales off Defence as well as Attack, so build Defence and not Attack.
Rotation
- Burst (Q) if it is up.
- Skill (E). She dashes forward, plants her doll and sweeps her sword upward.
- Press Skill (E) again immediately. She swaps herself out to the next character in your party order.
- Attack with whoever came in. The doll joins in on your hits, twice over the next 8 seconds.
Abilities
| Skill (E) | A short dash, then a doll planted beside her plus an upward sweep of Geo damage. The doll stays 17 seconds and slashes on its own roughly every 3.6 seconds. Hold it to aim the dash. 16 second cooldown. |
|---|---|
| Skill (E) again | Pressed in the short window after the sweep, this swaps to the next character along and gives the party 8 seconds where their normal, charged and plunging hits make the doll attack too. Up to two of those follow-ups, one every 2 seconds. |
| Normal Attack after the sweep | The other branch of that window. Instead of the follow-ups she gets 5 seconds of Geo on her own attacks. This is also what happens by default if you press nothing. |
| Burst (Q) | One heavy AoE Geo hit. 50 Energy on a 13.5 second cooldown. |
The one mechanic to understand
The second press is the whole character.
There is a brief window after her upward sweep where your next input picks what she leaves behind. Press the skill again and she swaps out, handing the party the doll's follow-up attacks. Normal Attack instead and she infuses her own attacks with Geo for 5 seconds, which is also the default if you stand there doing nothing. Off the field you want the second press every time. The thing to know is that it swaps to the next character in your party order rather than one you choose, so put her in the slot directly ahead of whoever should be hitting things.
What actually matters
The two or three real decisions. Everything else is noise.
- Defence. Her skill and her Burst both scale off her Attack and her Defence together. Defence main stats give more back than Attack ones do.
- Party order. The second press moves you one slot along, so a badly ordered team drops you onto a support instead of your damage dealer.
- Geo constructs. A teammate who plants one while her doll is out gets you a second doll. The same construct gives her 20% Geo damage for 20 seconds.
- Somebody has to be attacking. The follow-ups fire off your active character's normal, charged and plunging hits. A character who spends those 8 seconds casting gets nothing out of them.
Gear
A build that works. KeqingMains lists every other option.
| Weapon | Crit first, Defence second. Harbinger of Dawn is a 3-star that hands over a pile of Crit DMG as long as she stays above 90% health, which off the field she generally does. Cinnabar Spindle if you kept it from the old event, since its passive reads off Defence too. |
|---|---|
| Artifacts | 4-piece Golden Troupe. All of her damage counts as skill damage, the doll's follow-ups included. The set adds a further chunk on top while she is off the field. |
| Main stats | Defence sands, Geo goblet, Crit circlet. Defence goblet if your Geo one has bad substats. |
Works well with
GeoGeo is the only element her passives care about, purely because of the constructs. Her damage itself is happy anywhere.
Don't bother
- Energy Recharge substats. Her Burst is a bonus rather than the plan, so cast it when it is there.
- Attack sands. Defence is the bigger half of her scaling and it is the stat nothing else on your team wants.
- Her Normal Attacks at C0. The Geo infusion is the consolation prize for missing the second press.
- Standing on the field waiting for the doll to swing. It attacks on its own timer whether she is there or not.
Want the full theorycrafting version? Read Chiori on KeqingMains.