Wuthering Waves Tier List

We offer separate tier lists that assess characters based on different criteria due to the diversity of character traits and abilities different contents require in order to beat them. As a result, we recommend you to check all of the tier lists we offer before concluding on a character’s full position in the game’s meta. The better they perform in a variety of gamemodes, the more valuable they are overall.

Important! Characters are ordered alphabetically within a tier.

Tower of Adversity

This tier list assesses characters based on their combat potential in one of Wuthering Waves’ most challenging endgame contents, Tower of Adversity (ToA). This tier list assesses their performance in the Hazard Zone that resets periodically, as other zones do not reset. ToA is a mode similar to Genshin Impact’s Spiral Abyss or Honkai Star Rail’s Memory of Chaos and requires 3 teams of 3 equipped with strong Echoes and good Weapons. This mode offers a reasonable mix of Boss encounters (single target) and Elite packs (2-3 targets) along with rare AoE scenarios (5+ targets), allowing different categories of characters to find a niche. However, a bias towards single-target is present, as the most challenging floors are centered around beating Boss enemies.

Whimpering Wastes

This tier list assesses characters based on their combat potential in another challenging endgame content, Whimpering Wastes (WhiWa). This gamemode, in a similar fashion to Honkai Star Rail’s Pure Fiction, heavily favours a character’s ability to deal with several waves of smaller, lower health enemies quickly (AoE). It requires 2 teams of 3 equipped with strong Echoes and good Weapons. AoE characters are very strongly favoured over single-target ones, almost always creating a big discrepancy between the two archetypes.

Characters on this Tier List are evaluated based on their average performance in the "Infinite Torrents" stage (final stage) where players are given a total of 2 minutes to clear as many waves of enemies as they can.

Skill Ceilings

As an action-combat game, Wuthering Waves offers many combat mechanics for players to exploit - some of which are not easily executed, but can boost character performance drastically. Swap Cancelling is an example of such a mechanic, allowing you to switch out a character mid-attack to a new character while still fully executing the move you interrupted, essentially allowing you to attack with two characters at once. Such techniques won’t be for everyone, but a tier list must assess characters based on their optimal performance in optimal teams. With that being said, in order for our tier list to assess the performance of characters to the majority of the playerbase, we will only consider the easiest and most powerful swap cancels, such as Encore’s Cosmos Rupture, the Sentry Construct Echo skill, and other similarly lengthy animations. The most complex swap cancels with short time windows, such as Calcharo’s Death Messengers or Changli’s True Sights, will only be considered for certain character tags (Cancel, Expert) and will not affect characters’ positions on the tier list.

Buffs and debuffs that vary periodically are not considered, but may impact short-term unit performance.

Criteria

• All characters are assumed to be utilized in their full best 3-man team, played with optimal baseline rotations without input mistakes, using best Echo main sets and correct Energy Regen values. This means the overwhelming majority of rotations will be executed in a simplistic, one character at a time manner;
• All characters are using maximum level gold rarity Echoes;
• All Echo main stats are considered to be best in slot for that character’s build;
• Each Echo used by characters is assumed to have 5 sub-stats with average rolls;
• 15 Echo sub-stats are designated as “good” sub-stats the character would desire where the remaining (10) are random. This represents fairly high quality endgame gear;
• 5★ characters are all rated at Sequence 0 unless otherwise stated such as the Rover (Spectro) who starts at Sequence 6. 4★ characters are rated at Sequence 6.
• All characters are assessed as if they have access to R1 of all 4★ weapons, R5 of all 2★ and 3★ weapons and R1 of the standard 5★ Winter Brume weapon series, any one of which is given to select for free at Union Level 45. The best out of all these choices is used for their assessment;
• In Whimpering Wastes, all characters are assessed as if they have access to any "Exquisite Token" (purple rarity). The best out of these choices is used for their assessment;
• All characters are considered to be the maximum possible level with all Fortes upgraded to maximum rank with a maximum level Weapon.

Roles

We compare characters within their role - so DPS are compared to other DPS for example, and their ratings are adjusted based on their performance within the role. Please do not compare characters between roles, as their ratings are based on entirely separate criteria.

DPS

DPS characters focus on being your main damage dealers and the rest of your team is built to synergize with them and make them stronger. Stacking Echo set bonuses, character kits and Outro Amplify bonuses together to power up a DPS is the goal of a lot of meta teams. Some exceptions exist as certain DPS characters can be played with multiple characters of the same role, but they’ll generally aim to occupy the most of your team’s on-field time, sometimes even up to 14 or 15 seconds. This time can vary depending on the character, but in all cases they’ll have the goal of making the most of your team’s buffs to deal the majority of your team’s damage.

Criteria that impact ratings for DPS:

• Character rotation difficulty (potential for mistakes, or severe decrease in performance if their playstyle isn’t the absolute best possible);
• Character damage within best possible team;
• Character on-field flexibility and adaptability (Does being forced to dodge hurt them? Are they able to follow a scripted rotation easily? Can they adapt to different enemy mechanics?);
• Character ability to deal with different situations (AoE, Cleave, Single Target). This has a minor impact in ToA as single-target is favoured. In Whimpering Wastes, dealing AoE or Cleave damage is heavily favoured.

Hybrid

Hybrid characters directly support your damage dealer of choice, often with incredibly synergistic kits, specialized Outro buffs like “Amplify” multipliers or other beneficial effects, or even by being a great source of secondary damage. They’re often built to complete their rotation right before your DPS performs their full damage combo, as their buffs may, in some cases, expire when switching. Hybrid characters, fittingly to their name, can often execute a variety of roles and offer offensive, supportive or sustaining abilities, if not all three at the same time. As a result of this, they fill the widest variety of niches and playstyles. They typically want to execute their combos in the shortest time windows possible in order to generate Concerto and Resonance Energy quickly to get their buffs up for your main damage dealer in the shortest amount of time. Certain Hybrid characters may be especially desired to deal additional damage in concordance with your main damage dealer, but in any case they’ll usually want to swap in and out of the field quickly.

Criteria that impact ratings for Hybrid:

• Character rotation difficulty (potential for mistakes, or severe decrease in performance if their playstyle isn’t the absolute best possible);
• Character performance within best possible team;
• How many effective teams the character is playable in;
• Impact of kit on a team’s performance (units that can carry teams a rank higher);
• Character on-field flexibility and adaptability (Does being forced to dodge hurt them? Are they able to follow a scripted rotation easily? Can they adapt to different enemy mechanics?);
• Character effective damage contribution after including their buffs on the team;
• Total on-field time required to perform rotation.

Support

Support characters must have the capability to provide benefit to the team regardless of the order in which they are switched in, so as to not conflict with the majority of Hybrid characters’ Outro buffs, that tend to solely buff the next character to enter. Their primary utility is to provide team-wide buffing, but they may often be desirable by providing defensive and sustaining/healing capabilities as well; all of this in the shortest field time possible, as they typically aren’t personally responsible for the majority of their team’s damage, in order to maximize the potential of your DPS and Hybrid characters.

Criteria that impact ratings for Supports:

• Character rotation difficulty (potential for mistakes, or severe decrease in performance if their playstyle isn’t the absolute best possible);
• Character performance within best possible teams;
• How many effective teams the character is playable in;
• Impact of kit on a team’s performance (units that can carry teams a rank higher);
• Character on-field flexibility and adaptability (Does being forced to dodge hurt them? Are they able to follow a scripted rotation easily? Can they adapt to different enemy mechanics?);
• Character effective damage contribution after including their buffs on the team;
• Total on-field time required to perform rotation.

Other criteria affecting the ratings

The criteria above this section apply to all our tier lists; however, each unique tier list rates characters based on their average value in the specific mode it represents. Hence, the higher a character is rated on a given tier list, the greater their power and usability in the mode, making accessing all rewards easier for players. We do not consider going for the highest scores or lowest time, only the ability to easily max out rewards. However, some criteria may be specific to certain character archetypes, or within certain modes altogether, depending on the tier list you view. They are as follows:

• For certain Hybrids: ability to perform effectively at lower levels of investment (if applicable, this is only a slight bonus judged on a separate scale and never negatively impacts other character ratings);
• For Healing and Shielding Supports: how much sustain/defensive utility they provide to the team, how much they allow for mistakes during gameplay;
• For Whimpering Wastes characters: ability to gather enemies efficiently, ability to deal with multiple waves of enemies quickly.

Additional specific criteria may be developed according to game updates/meta shifts.

Special tags

Tags represent the most defining features of a character's kit.

• ST - Character deals mostly single-target damage to enemies but can hit multiple enemies if they are stacked directly on top of each other.
• Cleave - Character has a mix of smaller range cleaving attacks or attacks that strike in a radius around them but does not consistently hit all enemies on screen with the majority of their rotation.
• AoE - A large portion of these characters’ damage or benefit is in the form of pure AoE, hitting most if not all enemies on the battlefield.
• Frazzle: Character's kit relies upon or is able to apply Spectro Frazzle to enemies.
• Erosion: Character's kit relies upon or is able to apply Aero Erosion to enemies.
• Bane: Character's kit relies upon or is able to apply Havoc Bane to enemies. (Currently unused).
• Burst: Character's kit relies upon or is able to apply Fusion Burst to enemies. (Currently unused).
• Chafe: Character's kit relies upon or is able to apply Glacio Chafe to enemies. (Currently unused).
• Flare: Character's kit relies upon or is able to apply Electro Flare to enemies. (Currently unused).
• Sustain - Character can provide effects that increase the team’s resistance to damage, such as Healing, Shielding or Damage Reduction. This tag is only given to characters who can provide these effects to party members other than themselves.
• Coord - Character can perform or benefit from Coordinated Attacks consistently, thanks to a major portion of their kit revolving around Coordinated Attacks or being able to execute Coordinated Attacks, providing damage and/or utility even when off-field.
• Control - Character has elements in their kit that can hinder enemy actions, such as freezing, slowing or stunning them.
• Gather - Character is effective at grouping clumps of small enemies together, allowing you to deal with several targets at once effectively.
• Ult - Character is ultimate-centric with most of their damage occurring during or via an ultimate, creating a reliance on it. Without the ultimate available, the character feels lackluster.
• Partner - Character is graded based on their best team as normal, but is especially reliant on being partnered with one specific character in order to function at the highest level. Characters marked with this tag will perform at least one tier lower than their listed position on the tier list without those characters alongside them (sometimes even more).
• Expert - Character can be considered one placement higher than their default tier list ranking, but has an optimal playstyle that needs to be mastered to qualify for that higher rating. Characters only obtain this tag if the expert playstyle creates a significant discrepancy in power compared to their baseline playstyle, more so than characters without the tag.
• S0 - Exclusive to 4-star characters. Characters with this tag have their performance noticeably lowered if they are at S0 (no duplicates) instead of S6 (max duplicates, which they are graded with on the Tier List). This tag provides precisions on how much being at S0 hurts them — for example, a character with the S0 -1 Tag will perform 1 tier lower at S0 compared to their rating on the actual Tier List.

Meta Lines

Meta Lines categorize each section of the tier list into a power bracket. Here are the three brackets:

• Apex Characters (T0 & T0.5) - characters in this bracket are the cream of the crop. They’ll make clearing content a breeze, by doing some of the best damage numbers in the game, and/or providing massive buffs or debuffs quickly. Certain sustain characters even make dying practically impossible no matter how little you dodge enemy attacks. In their best teams, these characters make achieving the best results simple and consistent.
• Meta Characters (T1 & T1.5) - characters in this bracket still clear endgame contents easily, however they may need you to put more effort in your playstyle, or require higher levels of investment to perform comparatively to top tiers. This can be because they’re more restrictive in their builds, they’re mechanically intensive, they’re overshadowed by better options, or they possess a notable weakness or downside. Most often a mix of these reasons, they’ll regardless not disappoint if you give them the conditions they need to shine.
• Niche Characters (T2 & T3) - characters in this bracket are lacking in their respective roles. They have one fundamental flaw that makes them comparatively worse to higher tier characters, or they have multiple smaller flaws that add up together. More often than not, they cover a niche that’s filled by another unit that performs much easier than them. These characters still possess the ability to clear all content given the right amount of love, however they’re played noticeably less and will require higher maintenance to perform.

28/08/2025

Tower of Adversity Tier List changes:

• Augusta added as T0 DPS (both Tier Lists). Augusta is a beast damage-wise, able to perform at all levels of investment from R0 to R1 with premium or F2P teammates. We expect Iuno to be her best secondary buffer, but currently even just using Mortefi she has performance rivaling the other T0 DPS characters which is frankly impressive. She's looking to be quite a strong carry for veterans and new players alike.
• Mortefi T1 -> T0.5 (Signature tier list). Mortefi's team flexibility only extends further this update, from Jiyan to Phoebe to a usable F2P Zani, Jinhsi and mono Fusion teammate, and now even finding a new best team in Augusta. He was initially ranked higher on the R0 Tier List than R1 due to not being as competitive at higher vertical investments, but with Augusta's release that just got changed, earning him back his spot in the Apex bracket comfortably.
• Ciaccona DPS removed from both Tier Lists. While DPS Ciaccona technically still isn't the worst idea ever, it's a much better idea in Whimpering Wastes than ToA, as she offers constant damage output over a long period of time with a lot of grouping from doing multiple Forte Heavy Attacks. In single-target situations which she will mostly face in ToA, this alternate playstyle of hers is still usable but we chose not to illustrate it on our Tier List anymore due to how niche it is compared to her standard Hybrid use case, so we removed her from the DPS category altogether in this mode (we did keep her as a very much usable DPS in WhiWa though).

Before we get into the Whimpering Wastes Tier List changes, it's worth noting that there is an issue with overinflated enemy HP pools which is severely affecting a ton of character performances. We're holding off on any major changes for now and are simply adding Augusta and adjusting the placement of the recently added Phrolova; but if the HP pools stay the same in the next WhiWa reset, expect the Tier List to look way different. Now let's get into the changes:

• Augusta added as T0.5 DPS (Both Tier Lists). On her end of things, Augusta in WhiWa is in a similar position to high-ranking ToA characters like Carlotta and Cartethyia. Due to the backloaded nature of her damage (even though she does have a good amount of damage spread across her whole rotation), her kit is undeniably more tailored towards boss encounters than clearing several waves of small enemies over an extended period of time, which causes her to rank lower in WhiWa than ToA even though she's more than just capable of clearing, she's capable to exceed those thresholds with low effort and this earns her a placement in the Apex bracket.
• Phrolova T0.5 -> T0 (no Signature tier list). We'll be upfront and say it; Phrolova is the single strongest DPS in WhiWa bar none. Her reliance on limited weapons like her Signature or Stringmaster doesn't matter, because much like Cartethyia in ToA, her damage potential is so high in the mode that it doesn't even matter to reach - to put it lightly - scores above clear thresholds. Hence, she's become T0 on both Tier Lists.

13/08/2025

As announced previously, we finally added separate tier list that takes into account R1 Limited weapons (you just need to pick the right category in the switcher). Additionally, we're introducing the influence of Sequences on 4-star characters in the form of a tag. More information on this below, along with who's impacted by limited weapons and a few Tier List changes we did on both Tier Lists as a revision. Overall, this is once again a really lengthy changelog, so be aware of this.

New tag for S0 4-stars: This tag will be introduced in a similar format to the Expert tag, currently the only affected characters go down by 1 tier at maximum. Note this tag, like all others, will affect the Tier List whether or not Signature weapons are factored in. The characters who will get the S0 -1 tag are as follows:

• In Tower of Adversity: Danjin (DPS), Mortefi, Sanhua, Yangyang.
• In Whimpering Wastes: Danjin (Hybrid), Sanhua, Yangyang.

Now let's briefly discuss who is impacted by factoring in limited weapons and why in Tower of Adversity:

• Phrolova T1 -> T0.5. Her own Signature weapon is a massive DMG boost (as high as Hybrid Brant's) in all situations, warranting a tier boost. While we're at it, DPS Brant's rating is not impacted because his Signature competes closer to alternatives when doing Double Forte Main DPS rotations (it's still a big boost, just not as much).
• Rover-Havoc T1 -> T1.5. Their rating is fairly high without Signatures mostly because their performance is not reliant on it. As other characters acquire their Signatures, Havoc Rover's performance falls behind others.
• Brant (Hybrid) T0.5 -> T0. Brant is a powerhouse thanks to the huge boost his Signature weapon provides, very similarly to Phrolova but particularly in the Hybrid role for his case. It boosts his sustain abilities by providing a bigger shield and healing, as well as being a significant damage boost. His performance spikes up to T0 thanks to his huge damage particularly with Changli and Lupa, as well as his ability to provide lots of extra sustain for the party thanks to the extra Energy Regen provided by his Signature weapon.
• Sanhua T0 -> T0.5. As limited characters acquire their Signature weapons, Sanhua's performance gets closer to theirs. She isn't any worse, but she doesn't get better via limited weapons, meanwhile other characters do and start competing with her/outright outclassing her (Roccia in Camellya teams, Lupa in Encore teams, Ciaccona in Phoebe teams etc.) which takes her performance out of T0.
• Danjin (Hybrid) T1.5 -> T2. Similar reasoning to Havoc Rover and Sanhua — Danjin doesn't benefit much from Limited weapons and other characters start outclassing her when Limited weapons are factored in.
• Mortefi T0.5 -> T1. Again a similar reasoning to the ones above; a lot of 4-star characters lose value in terms of how competitive they are relative to other options when higher vertical investment is considered. While Mortefi remains best in slot for Jiyan, he's a T1 DPS character and his team flexibility doesn't go much beyond Phoebe who tends to prefer Ciaccona, and Zani who really wants Phoebe instead of Mortefi whose best in slot weapon is not limited. As a result we deem T1 to be a fairer placement for him with Signature weapons in mind.

Onto Whimpering Wastes:

• Phrolova T0.5 -> T0. Exact same reasoning as in ToA, only that Phrolova's kit is more effective in WhiWa than ToA.
• Cantarella T1 -> T0.5. As discussed in the previous Changelog, Cantarella's performance in WhiWa is further boosted on the Limited weapon Tier List not because her own Limited weapon is a big deal, it's much more about Phrolova being a more competitive character in the gamemode as she acquires the huge damage boost her Signature provides, which boosts Cantarella's rating as they are each other's best partners.
• Sanhua T0 -> T0.5. While Sanhua remains a force to be reckoned with in teams like Camellya's, with Signature weapons factored in Roccia undeniably starts outclassing her by a lot, and her team flexibility mostly applies to characters lower down the Tier List, which makes her performance dwindle slightly as a result (but she remains an Apex character nonetheless).
• Danjin (Hybrid) T1.5 -> T2. As Danjin doesn't benefit much in terms of damage from having Limited weapons equipped on her, this causes her to be more and more outclassed by higher options on the Tier List, pushing her down into the Niche character bracket.
• Yangyang T1.5 -> T2. Similar to Danjin, only real difference being that her grouping is starting to get outclassed by better buffing options as well (we discuss this later down the Changelog).
• Jianxin T2 -> T3. Jianxin is in a very similar position to Yangyang grouping-wise, it unfortunately won't be long until she drops down to the bottom of the Tier List without Limited weapons factored in as well; the more grouping options release, the more and more niche and outclassed Jianxin becomes. With other characters dropping down to what originally was her tier, she's pushed down to T3 on the R1 Tier List.

And finally, the Tier List changes we're doing in general.

• For Tower of Adversity:
• Ciaconna (DPS) T1.5 -> T2. Ciaccona as a DPS in Tower of Adversity is a playstyle that was definitely overestimated at the time of her release, due to how much the stage buffs were in her favour. In Whimpering Wastes the playstyle still genuinely scores amazingly well, however the higher damage thresholds required to perform in Tower of Adversity don't warrant her a spot in the Meta Characters bracket on the Tier List, particularly when compared to her Hybrid performance. That said — for what it's worth it's better to use her than Lingyang so we'll keep her in the Niche characters bracket.
• Youhu T2 -> T3. Honestly, we did want to bump Youhu down to T3 last update and just forgot (whoops LOL). Youhu has practically no uses in the current meta due to no characters doing enough Coordinated Attack damage to earn her a position on any team — we tested it, even if Coordinated Attackers are in your team you're better off just using Baizhi instead. Hence she's going down to T3.
• Roccia T1 -> T1.5. This change only applies to the R0 Tier List, but Roccia becomes much harder to justify at R0 on any team that isn't Phrolova. The reason for this is because at S6, Sanhua outright starts to outperform her because Roccia doesn't compensate for her extra field time with enough personal damage (plus her CRIT Rate requirements to apply her maximum ATK buffs are much harder to meet too). Phrolova only being in T1 on our Tier List, we deem T1.5 to be a fairer placement for her, but she retains her T1 rating with Signature weapons factored in.
• For Whimpering Wastes:
• Lingyang T3 -> T2. Lingyang may surprise some players but indeed, he is very much playable in Whimpering Wastes if you give him a chance. Now we're not going to say Lingyang is meta by any means, he's not going past the Niche character bracket, but even in his hypercarry style composition with Zhezhi he does have a good amount of AoE via his Mountain Roamer skills which allows him to perform well enough to clear given proper alignment and a good build.
• Cartethyia Expert +1 Tag Added. Cartethyia has a lot of room for improvement in her playstyle via quickswap and alternate rotations, explaining her acquisition for the tag. Without going too in-depth, she can go as far as outperforming top tiers like Jiyan in the mode via her ability to rotate in very short amounts of time in a quickswap context, allowing her Fleurdelys form to clear more waves of enemies per rotation than with a more casual playstyle. Overall she's a fantastic character to master for Whimpering Wastes and one of the top performers in terms of high scores since her release.
• Xiangli Yao T1 -> T1.5. Xiangli Yao does not have as strong of a performance as he used to, the main problems being his lack of damage to clear lots of waves of enemies per rotation which operates on long cooldowns, as well as his best partner Changli being relegated to the mono Fusion team nowadays, which caused him to drop.
• Ciaccona (DPS) T0.5 -> T1. While Ciaccona as a DPS remains highly viable in Whimpering Wastes, she does not display T0.5 level performance anymore due to facing more trouble clearing waves of enemies consistently as a result of her lower damage ceiling than the characters above her, explaining her drop.
• Rover-Havoc T1 -> T1.5. Havoc Rover is currently struggling to keep up with the meta unless paired with their best teammate being Roccia to group enemies consistently. Even still, in such situations mobile enemies cause a lot of problems for them to kill waves consistently as frontloading their AoE damage is suboptimal to their rotation, and Roccia is simply better used with Phrolova and Camellya nowadays which is why they dropped.
• Yangyang T1 -> T1.5. Yangyang is also unfortunately beginning to fall out of the Whimpering Wastes meta in the face of enemies with increased HP, more DPS and Hybrid characters getting grouping and stunning in their own kit which diminishes how helpful her grouping is, and finally her lack of strong buffs to support the DPS she is associated with, hence why she is dropping as well.
• Jinhsi Expert +2 changed to Expert +1. Revised to better fit her position on the Tier List when played at Expert level.
• Calcharo Expert +2 changed to Expert +1. Revised to better fit his position on the Tier List when played at Expert level.

24/07/2025

We'll make this introduction brief and get into the Tower of Adversity Tier List changes right away, but first we wanted to provide a small update on the progress for the Tier List toggles to enable or disable Signature Weapons and S0 characters. That's still in the works (the team got busy with ZZZ). Not for long though, expect it to release in a few weeks at maximum and before 2.6; Phrolova is highly impacted by her Signature weapon so we'll get ahead of that and discuss her performance with and without her Signature in this Changelog. Now, for the Tower of Adversity changes:

• Phrolova Added as T1 DPS. This placement may be a shocker to a lot of you — this is because Phrolova has a really really big issue, and that's her Signature weapon. Her weapon is simply made to work with her so well that it's practically a requirement to have her perform compared to the DPS in T0.5 and particularly T0. This is the kind of situation Brant was facing (we recommend checking our calculations on this), Phrolova is very similar to him in this regard. Her damage is balanced around the fact that she actually owns this Signature weapon and comes more as a package deal with her weapon rather than a fully fledged-out DPS at R0, to a point we'd recommend Camellya over her if you can't afford to spend 1.5x the usual pulls to get not only Phrolova but her Signature as well. However, provided you do have her Signature, it's very safe to bump her up a tier to T0.5 (she's definitely stronger than Camellya in her best team and with her Signature she's easily the best Havoc DPS, but she's not at the damage level of Carlotta, Zani and Cartethyia even factoring that in).
• Cantarella T1.5 T1. Pretty easy to understand why Cantarella was bumped up — she's good for Phrolova, Phrolova is pretty good, more importantly for the R0 Tier List Cantarella is a good alternative for Jinhsi teams and she has healing and Crowd Control. Even with Signature weapons she'd stay in T1 but she's comfortably there. While we're at it, for those of you who are curious about Roccia, Phrolova isn't strong enough at R0 and Roccia doesn't make big enough of a difference to bump her up a tier even at R1, so both her and Cantarella will be staying in T1 even on the R1 tier list.

Whimpering Wastes changes:

• Phrolova Added as T0.5 DPS. Phrolova's kit seems way stronger in Whimpering Wastes than Tower of Adversity — if you assumed that, you'd be correct. She has her Signature weapon issue on this Tier List as well, but she's genuinely fantastic with Cantarella and particularly Roccia, making for a team with practically infinite Crowd Control and constant damage output. With her Signature factored in, she's safely placed in T0 on this Tier List, and without she's comfortably in T0.5.
• Cantarella T1.5 T1. Very similar reasoning to the ToA Tier List; Phrolova good, so Cantarella good now. Can be considered as a T0.5 character with Signature weapons factored in thanks to Phrolova retroactively impacting Cantarella's own performance as they are each other's best team.

03/07/2025

This time around with Lupa's release, not too many changes outside of the characters she works with but we did re-investigate some older characters' performances.

Also, small teaser — we're working on toggles that will factor in limited weapons & S0 vs S6 for 4-stars. Expect that to roll out soon!

Below are the changes for the Tower of Adversity (ToA) tier list:

• Lupa Added as T0.5 Hybrid. Lupa is definitely a much-needed buff to Changli and Brant for more casual players. While the two were already working brilliantly in quickswap, both sporting playstyles closer to Hybrids than DPS, Lupa is the final piece of the puzzle that Brant-Changli needed not only for an easier time performing well, but also for quickswap enjoyers who want to take the team to its limits. The trio is looking really solid and while it's not game-breaking like Cartethyia's sheer nuke potential (mostly due to Brant and Lupa's weapon limitations on our Tier List), we deem its performance to stand around T0.5, hence why we're placing Lupa there.
• Changli T1 T0.5; Expert +2 changed to Expert +1. Very similar reasoning to Lupa's placement, as we consider Changli in her new best team being her trio with Lupa and Brant. It's however worth noting she retains her Expert tag potentially allowing her to slide into T0 because Changli's potential as a quickswap Dual DPS in any team (including Brant-Lupa) hasn't changed in the slightest — still a highly recommended playstyle for the more experienced players out there. Note that her Expert factor changed due to her baseline ranking being higher now — overall she's no weaker at Expert level than before.
• Brant T1 T0.5. After a while of player feedback, finally he's in T0.5. Not having Brant's weapon is still a huge deal which our Tier List is definitely factoring in, because otherwise Brant would honestly be T0 at this point, but with Lupa's release Brant finally gets the bump he needed to reach the Apex bracket.
• Chixia T2 T1.5. Along with Lupa's release, Chixia is finding herself a niche too! While she's nowhere near the level of the heavy hitters found in the tiers above her, teams like Chixia-Brant-Lupa work wonders with her and allow her to squeeze her way into T1.5 as a good replacement to the premium Fusion characters if you don't own them.
• Ciaccona (DPS) T1 T1.5. After further testing in ToA, DPS Ciaccona is definitely not performing to the level of T1 DPS characters like Jiyan. While her performance in WhiWa is unquestionably high and the playstyle is perfectly viable in ToA, seeing as she isn't comparing to the big premium DPS units in T1 like Jiyan or Xiangli Yao, an unfortunate drop for DPS Ciaccona was warranted, but worry not as she's still one of the best Hybrids in the game.
• Rover-Spectro (Hybrid) T1.5 T1. Spectro Rover as a Hybrid (traditional 2nd slot teammate) mostly sees use in teams like Phoebe DPS + Shorekeeper or Zani + Shorekeeper. In those teams, while Spectro Rover is best fit as a support, we deem their performance to stand closer to T1 than T1.5 hence their bump in that tier.

Now onto Whimpering Wastes:

• Lupa Added as T0 Hybrid. Now that Lupa's around, the Fusion team has undeniably become pretty crazy in WhiWa. Brant doesn't need his Signature weapon to clear waves of enemies thanks to Lupa's buffs, Changli has always been amazing in the mode, and Lupa herself does potent AoE damage that can take out enemy waves too. Overall, thanks to their sustained DPS across all of their rotations, the Fusion premium 5-stars all find themselves in a top tier spot, which you'll see below.
• Brant T0.5 T0. Changli was already T0 thanks to her team flexibility, now Brant also gets a turn since Lupa released. Like mentioned before, Lupa's Outro and kit buffs are enough for him to take out enemies without his signature weapon thanks to his Forte anchor's hitbox lingering across several waves. As he already had great capabilities in conjunction with Changli, now that Lupa's also there to buff him he warrants his placement in T0, no doubt.
• Rover-Spectro (Support) T1 T0.5. While as a Hybrid, Spectro Rover sees little use, they're amazing in WhiWa as a Support thanks to their own personal damage being solid enough to take out a wave of enemies (which most Supports can't do), all the while providing much-needed Spectro Frazzle to both Phoebe DPS and Zani as well as Spectro RES Shred and being able to activate Rejuvenating Glow via their Ultimate. Overall amazing with either Phoebe or Zani in WhiWa (or even both).
• Rover-Aero T1.5 T1. After further testing of Cartethyia in WhiWa, Aero Rover of course retains their partner tag since they're basically stuck to her team but they seem to be equally as clunky in ToA and WhiWa which wasn't the case before (maybe Kuro changed their hitboxes in some way and we didn't notice)? Either way, they warrant the same placement in ToA and WhiWa for that reason — effective only with Cartethyia hence Partner tag, and Cartethyia herself is effective hence the T1 placement, that's that.
• Yinlin T1 T1.5. Unfortunately for Yinlin, she finally will stick in T1.5 for hopefully a little while due to the Hybrid competition getting fiercer and fiercer over time, but also the lack of her Signature weapon on our Tier List's criteria greatly impacting her performance. She has T1 level performance with Stringmaster — without, she doesn't deal enough damage to clear waves of enemies reliably, and regardless she works with characters that are rarely used in the mode, which is why we dropped her down.