Mualani is powerful a 5-star Hydro Catalyst character in Genshin Impact who acts as a Hypercarry DPS dealing damage through her Normal Attacks during her Surfshark Wavebreaker Elemental Skill.
I. Mualani Strengths and Weaknesses
- Strengths
- Sharky's Bite lets Mualani deal damage and mark opponents while increasing the damage she deals to them with the number of marks.
- Damage is frontloaded, making her an extremely good choice for an Elemental Reaction like Vaporize.
- Mualani's damage source comes from her own HP, which can be easily stacked with leveling, artifacts, weapons, and even Hydro Resonance.
- Elemental Skill allows Mualani to ride through water, providing a quick way to travel around watery areas.
- Weaknesses
- Her Sharky's Bite during Elemental Skill can miss when the enemy suddenly moves. Proper timing is required especially with the build-up she requires.
- Surfshark Wavebreaker (Elemental Skill) can be awkward at times when trying to tag the same opponent multiple times to increase Wave Momentum Stacks.
- Normal Attacks are pretty worthless.
II. Mualani Best Builds
Mualani is an HP-scaling character who uses her waveboard from her Elemental Skill to tag opponents, and then using her last enhanced Normal Attack from her rotation to deal damage to enemies, specializing in the Elemental Reaction, Vaporize.
The Obsidian Codex artifact set is Mualani's best build, which provides an abundance of CRIT Rate and lets you stack CRIT DMG from substats. Focus on HP% and Elemental Mastery stats as well to ensure that her most important attacks benefit from as many multipliers as possible.
1. Hydro Main DPS
2. Mualani Talent Priority
1st (Elemental Skill) > 2nd (Elemental Burst) > 3rd (Normal Attack) Mualani's damage potential comes first and foremost from her Elemental Skill, followed by the emergency Burst Damage from her Elemental Burst, so level up those two in order. Despite her primary source of damage being considered Normal Attack DMG, Mualani's Normal Attacks do not directly contribute to it, so you can level them last.
III. Mualani Best Artifacts
Obsidian Codex outshines the other two options solely because she can trigger Nightsoul's Blessing, and is something that Mualani can consistently trigger, leading to a near-unconditional 40% increase to CRIT Rate.
Other than that, Heart of Depth and standard 2-piece HP or Hydro DMG Bonus sets remain consistent choices for those still in the process of farming for 4-pc. Obsidian Codex or those deciding to settle on the artifacts, as their flat Hydro DMG increase is always welcome.
Obsidian Codex is the Best Choice
1st (Obsidian Codex):
- 2-PC: While the equipping character is in Nightsoul's Blessing and is on the field, their DMG dealt is increased by 15%.
- 4-PC: After the equipping character consumes 1 Nightsoul point while on the field, CRIT Rate increases by 40% for 6s. This effect can trigger once every second.
2nd (Heart of Depth):
- 2-PC: Hydro DMG Bonus +15%
- 4-PC: After using Elemental Skill, increases Normal Attack and Charged Attack DMG by 30% for 15s.
3rd (Vourukasha's Glow):
- 2-PC: HP +20%
4th (Nymph's Dream):
- 2-PC: Hydro DMG Bonus +15%
IV. Mualani Best Weapons
Mualani's Signature Weapon, Surf's Up, is tailor-made for both her kit and her Vaporize-centered damage style.
If her Signature is not available, then use HP weapons such as the Battle Pass Sacrificial Jade, or the Natlan free craftable Ring of Yaxche.
Surf's Up is Her Signature and Best-in-Slot
1st (SurfSurf's Up):
- Base ATK: 542
- Bonus Stat: CRIT DMG 88.2%
- Skill Effect: Max HP increased by 20%. Once every 15s, for the 14s after using an Elemental Skill: Gain 4 Scorching Summer stacks. Each stack increases Normal Attack DMG by 12%. For the duration of the effect, once every 1.5s, lose 1 stack after a Normal Attack hits an opponent; once every 1.5s, gain 1 stack after triggering a Vaporize reaction on an opponent. Max 4 Scorching Summer stacks.
2nd (Sacrificial Jade):
- Base ATK: 454
- Bonus Stat: CRIT Rate 36.8%
- Skill Effect: When not on the field for more than 5s, Max HP will be increased by 32% and Elemental Mastery will be increased by 40. These effects will be canceled after the wielder has been on the field for 10s.
3rd (Ring of Yaxche):
- Base ATK: 510
- Bonus Stat: HP 41.3%
- Skill Effect: Using an Elemental Skill grants the Jade-Forged Crown effect: Every 1,000 Max HP will increase the Normal Attack DMG dealt by the equipping character by 0.6% for 10s. Normal Attack DMG can be increased this way by a maximum of 16%.
V. Mualani Best Team Comps
Team comps specializing in Vaporize are Mualani's best teams as she can forward most of her attacks towards Pyro-afflicted opponents to trigger big Vaporize damage consistently.
Other than that, slotting her in as a Hypercarry or in Electro-Charged teams is also viable due to her easy Hydro Application using her Elemental Skill.
1. Mualani Vaporize Team
Mualani works best in Vaporize teams due to most of her damage being front-loaded into her Shark's lunging bites.
With that in mind, pairing her with characters with good Pyro application like Xiangling with Bennett, and a buffer like Kazuha can help ensure that she can always Vaporize this instance of attack.
Note that Bennett only helps Xiangling in this case due to Mualani not needing ATK. If you have enough Energy Recharge on Xiangling, you may use someone else like Dehya.
2. Mualani Burning-Vaporize Team
A variant of Mualani's Vaporize team utilizing the constant Pyro application of Burning with a Dendro character. Make sure to Burn the enemy first with Emilie and Xiangling before using Mualani as she may accidentally extinquish the Burn effect or make Bloom cores instead.
3. Mualani Hypercarry
Mualani can also be paired up with a full buffer support team to scale her own damage. As an added bonus, pairing her with someone like Furina can benefit both characters due to Hydro Resonance directly increasing both of their damage.
VI. Mualani's Ascension and Talent Material Summary
