Flins

Flins

5★ElectroPolearmMain Damage

TL;DR

Flins presses his Skill to light the lamp and step into a form where his spear turns Electro. Inside that form the Skill button becomes a spear volley, and pressing it swaps his Burst for a much cheaper version that you fire twice in one go instead of once every 20 seconds. All his real damage is the moon version of Electro-Charged, so he needs a Hydro teammate and a second character carrying the moon mark.

Rotation

  1. Your Hydro teammate goes first and gets Hydro onto the enemy.
  2. Skill (E) to enter the form.
  3. Skill (E) again for the spear volley, then Burst (Q) straight after for the cheap version.
  4. Normal attacks until the volley is back, then repeat step 3. Two cheap Bursts per form.

Abilities

Skill (E) About 10 seconds in his form. Normal and charged attacks turn Electro and nothing can override that, and he gets much harder to knock about. 16 second cooldown.
Skill (E) in the form A volley of spears in front of him for Electro damage. Its own 6 second cooldown, which nothing shortens, and for 6 seconds afterwards the Burst button becomes the cheap version.
Burst (Q), the cheap one Costs 30 Energy. One big Electro hit that counts as a moon reaction. This is the one you actually press.
Burst (Q), the full one Costs 80 Energy on a 20 second cooldown. A hit up front, then a few more after a short delay, all counted as moon reactions. Bigger, but nearly three times the price.
Normal attacks A five-swing string, Electro while he is in the form. This is what you do between volleys, and it is where the Energy for the next Burst comes from.

The one mechanic to understand

The cheap Burst is the entire rotation.

Press the volley and for the next 6 seconds your Burst button turns into a 30 Energy version of itself, and the volley is back off cooldown in those same 6 seconds. So the loop is volley, Burst, swing the spear a bit, volley, Burst, and you get through two of them inside one 10 second form. The 80 Energy version is the trap. It does more per cast, but it costs nearly three cheap ones and sits on a 20 second cooldown afterwards, so in practice you press it when you have Energy going spare and nothing else to do with it.

What actually matters

The two or three real decisions. Everything else is noise.

  • A Hydro teammate applying off the field. His damage is the moon version of Electro-Charged, and Electro is the only half of that he can supply. No Hydro means no reaction and no character.
  • A second character with the moon mark. Flins pushes the party's Moonsign up a level by himself, and that is one short. With a second one the level goes up and two things switch on: his extra reaction damage, and additional hits on both versions of the Burst.
  • Attack, not Elemental Mastery. One passive converts 8% of his attack into Elemental Mastery for free, and another scales the reaction's damage off his attack as well. Attack does two jobs on him where Elemental Mastery does one.

Gear

A build that works. KeqingMains lists every other option.

Weapon Crit first, attack second. Prospector's Shovel is craftable and its passive is built for exactly this reaction, which makes it the best thing you can simply go and make. Deathmatch instead if you would rather have the crit and the attack up front.
Artifacts 4-piece Night of the Sky's Unveiling, which is the set the moon reactions were written alongside.
Main stats Attack sands, attack goblet, crit circlet. An Electro damage goblet loses here, because reaction damage ignores it. Roughly 120% Energy Recharge, or a bit less if there is a second Electro character feeding him.

Works well with

HydroElectroAnemo

Hydro is the requirement. A second Electro character covers his Energy, and Anemo strips Electro resistance off enemies while grouping them for the volley.

Don't bother

  • Charged attacks. They cost stamina and the five-swing string beats them.
  • Plunging attacks. He physically cannot while he is in the form, which is where he spends his whole rotation.
  • Chasing Elemental Mastery on artifacts. He is handed a pile of it off his attack stat for nothing.
  • Counting Energy. Swing the spear between Bursts and 30 comes back fast enough that it stops being a decision.

Want the full theorycrafting version? Read Flins on KeqingMains.