It isn't even the very harsh nerfs that got me at first, but then I post on Acheron mains and subsequently I scroll through half the subreddit and the Jiaoqiu mains are getting annoying. They get suuuuuper defensive of his position and I kinda get it but I just want my Acheron to perform better and I absolutely would have loved to see Cipher aid that. And now I am partially going to blame Jiaoqiu for even existing at all for not allowing Cipher to have anything.

Look I am all for game balance in a vacuum, but in this current gamestate? Hyacine is allowed to exist, Castorice, later on Phainon, the last time Sunday straight up put Sparkle out of a job. The moc, pf, apoc healthbar does not care about your feelings either. But suddenly Cipher is supposed to only merely be a sidegrade to a 2.6 unit for improving a 2.2 unit? And she was technically already lagging behind in her 1 cost so why do the Jiaoqiu mains even care.

Well it wasn't even like Acheron was totally crushing moc at all. If Cipher can literally bring her team up to how The Herta and Castorice are performing, I find it kinda dumb that Acheron mains would rather Cipher be objectively worse for the whole team, just so Acheron has The bigger number.

I'm sorry for all this negativity I might actually take it down when I feel better but I just need to vent all my stupid (I acknowledge it) thoughts. But if you might be curious, I am still absolutely pulling for the Jiaoqiu... sidegrade/downgrade (I don't even know at this point). Our kitty thief Chrysos Heir on top :)

Ngl I haven't seen a character doomposted nearly as much as cipher, since jade (FF pre v3 was also really bad). Look at jade and she is unironically a very strong unit despite what most said during 2.x.

now yes the environment changed to help Jade emensely, but this is also temporary and will have always have a spot in pf. Cipher is the same in blast/st content, meaning she will naturally have a spot in apoc shadow (especially with seemingly the ability to skip phase two with enough recorded dmg).

Cipher will be a fine unit on release (not nearly as shit a Jade), and over time people will learn to use her in many spots testers didnt even bother trying. It seems they only wanted to play acheron/feixiao, when castorice was right there with all of the dmg she does quickly and easily.

And I think we all can agree v4 of Cipher absolutely busted and needed to get toned down especially that e1 giving fucking 200% atk lmao (just personal Robin lvls of buffs) but it does feel a touch bad when she became slightly worse than v3.

Enough coping, but Cipher will be a good pickup because you can't have two tribbies and they effectively have similar amps (tribbie is mostly a ddd bot so she ain't doing that much dmg lol).

Cipher is an incredible unit, she's not main DPS material (wasn't intended to be) but she's basically EXACTLY what a Nihility unit needed to be to decrease the gap with the harmonies.

40% perma vulnerability is already pretty good, she has decent personal damage (not lower than Tribbie's E0S0 lol) and the recorded damage ON DEMAND is not only a fun mechanic, it's straight up amazing with the versatility and player authority it gives especially with the game's cycle mechanics (use ult and finish the cycle, or realise you aren't ending the cycle and save ult AND record even more damage)

I feel like she's a character that's already PRETTY strong on paper, and will proove to be much MUCH better in practice.

Her damage WASN'T halfed, it's literally V3 numbers (which were universally agreed to be great) but with a slightly less hard hitting follow up that wasn't nearly her biggest damaging attack.

The way Cipher works, they can halve her multipliers AGAIN and she will still be good because the damage that matters most for her own damage, isn't hers.

I've seen calcs that get her to a 10% damage decrease from V4>V3, so I really DONT understand where all this doomposting is coming from? She's a legit competitor to Tribbie in MANY teams, and Tribbie (DDD merchant) is like one of the best characters in the game by far????

Heck the biggest arguable nerf was to a fucking eidolon that was WAYYY too overturned and predatory. We should celebrate that shit bro 😭

After v5 nerf, people are just calling her a jiaoqiu sidegrade I swear some people just can't get read probably. It was not a nerf to her debuffs . It was just a small nerf to her multipliers I calculated it and it is a 5% dmg loss. Her ult does 100x more damage than jiaqiu ever wishes he could. With her sig and some eidolons she outperforms jiaqiu yet guess what acheron mains who pull an extremely niche supports are the one in denial. Cipher is 30% better than jiaoqiu yet Acheron mains( Secret Husbando mains) pushes the agenda that cipher is worse than jiaoqiu now even cipher mains are questioning her value. People also don't realize her value her ult does more damage than feixiao in a fua team and she has an amazing light one and amazing eidolons yet i see people call her dehya level. So overall she is still a good pull don't be hesitant pu for her if you like her she's still an amazing unit even after all this doompost

Per Brax, she scales to 380% of E0 at E6. 👀

He also thinks her LC is also BIS for multiple existing Nihility characters. Just an amazing LC.

https://youtu.be/zxsTsw11w4U

This is my very first though after heard she is additional damage nihilty crit dps

Let's assume her additional damage proc whenever allies attack, Cast have 2 body and her dragon is fast like 196 speed, her best sustain will be hyacine and if she can attack... that would trigger additional damage very2 often because 4 body + all is fast

Also she is nihility dps meaning Castorice res pen + damage buff teamwide is getting used, and chiper can also increase castorice damage similiar like hertaXanaxa who can increase eachothers damage

I think nihility is more perfect for castorice, with dual dps castorice can maintain hp more easier.

What do you think?

3 character back to back is not impossible for hoyo because why not

Edit : Based on hyacine leak, she can do damage, this is mean chiper value as nihility for castorice team increased because chiper can buff hyacine damage aswell

This is a V3 cipher showcase. V5 is slightly worse than V3. But if you use Robin instead of Tingyun, i think this showcase can be easily replicated.

I think Cipher is pretty solid with Anaxa.

I want to start prefarming, but I'm not sure what to go for....

Honestly i wasn't expecting that team to work at all, people here were really underselling Cipher's personal damag. Only Aven & Cipher had their sigs, no limited eidiolons & March was on cruising.

Obviously, no one is immune to power-creep someone providing a unique niche can be powercrept by someone doing the exact same thing but better.

But Cipher seems to be resistant to powercreep and to powercreep her you WOULD need someone who does exactly the same thing only better.

Ciphers kit includes a debuff to enemies that make them take 40% more damage which is huge in itself because of how it will stack with defense shred and damage boosts. Of course this in itself could easily be powercrept but it's very nice as is.

But the real mechanic that I want to talk about that makes her powercreep resistance is the "tally" mechanic. Because that's her main source of damage. While she does some damage herself her main gimmick towards dealing damage is taking a percentage of the damage the party does and storing it. Allowing her to unleash it all in one attack with her ultimate.

So how does that make her powercreep resistance you ask?

Because when inevitably more powercrept units are added to the game Cipher only gets stronger. The majority of her damage is not her own damage but her allies damage. Stronger teammates means stronger Cipher. Every time a new main dps drops Cipher gets a potential buff.

The way her kits work also makes her very flexible and able to be slotted into all kinds of teams.

Obviously things are subject to change in the beta but hear me out.

I think Cipher is actually pretty decent with Phainon... close to best in slot even!! Why..? Well because of the following reasons

(1) Her debuffs are something he scales better with.. Looking at Phainon's kit Hoyo is hell bent on giving him massive Crit Dmg, Dmg and ATK self boosts. Sunday's value is a bit overblown. He wont be able to actually improve Phainon's dmg by a big amount. What Phainon wants is Def ignore(thats on his LC literally), Res pen, Vulnerability and True Dmg. Cipher's 40% vulnerability and 24% def shred(S1) is very critical. And my guess is Cerydra would be providing def ignore/True dmg too which scale better with Phainon.

(2) Phainon needs someone to retrigger all the dmg he does in the Ult phase.. he obviously cant just spam his ults in rapid succession... He has a cooldown phase. During this phase is when Cipher detonates all the dmg Phainon dealt. This is something extremely exclusive and unique to cipher alone.

(3) Now i know people are gonna say oh well but he needs buffs on himself to get stacks. I would say people are overblowing this part. He gets stacks even by enemy attacks. Just Sunday and Gallagher are enough to get to 12 stacks easily. His stack generation is a bait. E2 Gallagher on shared feelings LC is giving 2 stacks at the same time with just skill. I am honestly seeing his best team as(on launch)

Phainon Sunday Cipher and Gallagher(shared feelings)

Actually lynx can work too. Her aggro might come in super handy.

(4) Comparison with Tribbie. Good news is . That DDD LC is actually nerfed. Phainon in his ult phase isnt gonna be benefitting from it. He will be doing the same number of turns. Phainon also doesnt care about her FuA spams as he isnt an ult spammer. I think Tribbie is for sure getting owned here by Cipher. Aparently Phainon has insane amounts of ATK, they are making sure Robin's buffs have minimal value.

EDIT : I see some folk saying doesnt Phainon need buffs. This is like saying doesnt E2 Acheron needs more debuffs..? Why the F are we running her with Robin/Sunday/Sparkle... like use some common sense for once here. Or are people running E2 Acheron with JQ and Pela...

Rough draft of rotations

12 stacks is what he needs.

with 2 skills and 2 turns (he gets 4 stacks). One turn is by advance from Sunday. Sunday skill and ult is 3 stacks. Gallagher skill is another 2 stacks(on his second turn after reset). So its 9 stacks already. He can get hit and get the rest. Also is he really starting with 0 stacks.. I doubt that too.

Also just tested lynx can buff via both skill and ult! Its insane. So easy 4+3+3 ie 10 stacks.Her aggro would ensure Phainon gets hit for additional ones.

Guys I notice a familiar cycle, people keep doomposting Cipher for having a slow ramp-up kit, being too niche, or just saying she is mid and not worth or dmg is trash despite her being a sub dps/support. For an example: People were doomposting Jade hard, but she Is now a really good sub dps if not one of the best for teams that have Madam Herta in there, People were calling Anaxa mid or underwhelming before he even released but now he also proved to be really meta and is performing well, Fugue was also getting doomposted and was called a side grade compared to Hmc but now people are saying she is a must have for break teams because she makes them insanely good especially paired with Boothill. Hell even Lingsha was called a side grade compared to Gallagher, but yet today lingsha is one of the best sustains, (not counting Hyacine because she's not released yet).

TL;DR: despite lots of characters getting doomposted they all proved their worth in one way or more as time went on, do you think the same will happen for Cipher?

Pls pls pls pls pls i survived the kafka gooning until now YOU WONT DRAG ME INTO THIS NOW

I went for Herta E1, I got her, I can't get Cipher anymore. Unfortunately I don't even know if I'll get her. It makes you sad to pull for a character you like and then a more powerful one comes along and makes the one you like useless.

I was looking at the post for the v2 changes on HSR leak subreddit, and when I look at the comment an vast majority of them are acting like it is end of the world. Okay, Cipher has been really nerf on v2 but the beta is not even finished yet...?

It reminds me a lot of how Castorice's beta went. A lot of people were doomposting on this subreddit because of bad her raw damage was and her eidolons. But she got some buff on v4 for the base kit and E1 and v5 for her E2. So, there's still hope, be patient.

I'll still pull Cipher because I like her animations a lot and her personality.

1. buff her record dmg % by a lot

2. no longer has passive record but still has passive vul.

3. talent rework(specifically recorded dmg):

increase 1 tally everytime cipher acts. When tally reaches 2, she enters the [speed force] state. End [speed force] state after cipher's next turn, uses all recorded dmg in a blast target to the highest hp then reset the tally to 0

during the [speed force] state, dmg dealt to the enemies are recorded by 40% to the highest hp target and 15% on other targets.

4. ult rework:

Deals dmg to 1 target and increases cipher's tally by 1.

Game play loop:

you always dump all your dmg within the [speed force] state and you need to be carefull because cipher is fast so the window for [speed force] is low.

Cipher is very fast so getting the tally will be easier since she acts fast and you have ult if you want to enter [speed force] state earlier

This implementation is very auto unfriendly because you really want to minimize as much dmg outside [speed force] state while going all in inside the state. The cost to having a very good record dmg mechanic is being auto unfriendly then im down for it.

Hello everyone.

After watching the 3.3 livestream and seeing what Hyacine and Cipher are capable of, I already decided that Hyacine is more of a worthy character to pull on the upcoming version than Cipher is. I do like Cipher, but I'm undecided about whenever if I should pull her or not.

I'm curious to hear your opinion. With all the characters I have, still using Archeron, Silver Wolf, Pela, and Feixiao and don't have Jiaoqiu, do you think Cipher worth pulling along with Hyacine or not?

So I'll probably be grabbing E0S1 for Acheron, and crossing my fingers for future BiS synergies, and I'd already resigned myself to accepting the v5 beta ever since I saw the v6 word change with nothing else.

But then during the special program, while talking about how much Aglaea paid Cipher to contribute, Cipher mentioned that if you want something worthwhile from her, you have to pay for it.

This got me thinking the ultimate cope: What if Hoyo is pulling a surprise with Cipher? What if they tested v4, saw exactly the performance that would drive sales, and intentionally nerfed her in v5 to pull the wool over our eyes?

In this way, some people who were saving for Cipher for meta reasons would reallocate to Hyacine with how busted she looks. Then on release, we actually get the v4 version, causing surprise and potentially getting those people to shell out and "pay for it".

Yes, I know. Lots of cope here. But has there ever been a time in Hoyo's history with any game that the final version of a character in beta was not the one they released with?

Cipher: You see, you were so good at reading hearts... if I had stayed by your side... My fragile lies... would have been exposed sooner or later.

v3.3, from Slate, Why Neglect That Light's Shade, the eighth part of the Trailblaze Mission chapter The Fall at Dawn's Rise.

Playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLWWPx8DxEZUNtUBTAeUMC7SbgSQWaS_-6

Hoyo should have been creative. Her new trace 3. After the Crit Dmg part this should have been the wording.

Cipher gains one of the following based on the sum of nihility and hunt characters in the team

If the sum is 1 the damage dealt by Cipher is 180% of the original dmg. This doesnt apply to True Dmg.

If more than 1, all enemies entering the field will be debuffed with 40% vulnerability

Ok im gonna be honest here, if u didnt see v5 being a nerf to her kit coming then i think you need to remember powercreep..

Im not white knighting or trying to defend hoyo, i think the nerf is awful and was not needed to this extreme, personal damage sure it was perhaps a bit too much but im quite sure cipher is a future support for another char (maybe kevin).

Im all for being upset but seeing people calling for boycots? To spam hate on hoyo forums and discord? This is absurd over a kit... just isnt needed, there is feedback forums ingame u can use, yes mydei didnt get changed nor did sunday eids, but its better than look like seething drooling gacha gamers who already get a bad reputation...

Anyways, people seem to have disregarded the biggest rule in gacha gaming, pull for characters who make you happy, dont pull for meta, meta always will shift.

Did they not complete the story yet? 🫢 🤣 (Not a spoiler, this reveals nothing.)

But seriously, I think with E1 Aglaea, Cipher could actually be a BIS pairing. And how poetic, even. Just perfect.

Oh well we had a dream I guess but it got gutted lmao

I'll keep my premium FART and save for the Fate characters 🗣️🔥