Tangtang Guide and Best Build

Kit Intro

Tangtang is a 6-star, Cryo, Handcannon Caster who brings with her a broad range of benefits to her team, from damage to debuffs to crowd control. Her core mechanic revolves around “Whirlpools” and “Waterspouts”, " which are what drive her burst and supportive value.

Whirlpools are puddles created by Tangtang’s Combo Skill, having a cap of 2, and these can then be converted into Waterspouts by use of her Battle Skill or her Ultimate’s "Early Rogue Wave" attack. These Waterspouts both have steep damage multipliers and apply Arts Susceptibility to enemies hit, packing a wide area effect as they spin around a target.

The more Waterspouts are used up at once, the higher the damage and Susceptibility scaling, leading to a playstyle that revolves around building up Whirlpools, then converting them. As the majority of Tangtang's value is derived from them, working around her Combo Skill cooldown to maximise the opportunities to strike enemies with Waterspouts is core to her gameplan.

Tangtang's Ultimate is particularly strong - not only because of its ability to convert Whirlpools - but because it has an "immobilization" effect to it while active. This freezes enemies in place, making them unable to move and attack, allowing for her to forcefully delay certain attack patterns and keep targets grouped.

Combo

"RIVER, TO ME!" is Tangtang's Combo Skill, and cycling through it as often as possible is key. It will fire a piercing jet stream that does rather disappointing damage, but builds 10 stagger and generates a Whirlpool.

Whirlpools only last for 30 seconds, but as they have a cap of 2, rarely at risk of expiry in most rotations. As the Combo Skill has a low cooldown (only 13 seconds at Rank 9), it has many opportunities to trigger.

Said trigger occurs when either a Cryo Infliction is applied or Arts Burst DMG ticks on an enemy. Thankfully, this is easy to do.

Battle Skill

"IMA WAVERIDAAH!" is Tangtang's Battle Skill, and it builds Cryo Inflictions when it lands on enemies. Rather, it is the Waterspouts it generates that do this, as even with no Whirlpools out on field it will still create at least one.

Assuming all Whirlpools are deployed, this makes for a total of 3 Waterspouts on cast: each additional Waterspout created provides more raw damage, a scaling Arts Susceptibility debuff (with a fixed, 15-second duration), and some SP recovery. Cryo Inflictions, despite being built by the Waterspout, will not have any additional stacks regardless of the number of Waterspouts, being capped to one per cast. Likewise, stagger from the skill is fixed to 10.

Note: It is only additional Waterspouts that yield Susceptibility and SP! A Battle Skill cast without any Whirlpools to convert will not benefit from either.

The Battle Skill itself does deal some limited amount of damage, but the majority of it comes from the Waterspouts. At Mastery 3, each has a multiplier of 300%, meaning that a single Battle Skill can have a multiplier of 1080%! For comparison, Perlica's Ultimate has a maximum multiplier of 1000%.

When coupled with the up to 10% Susceptibility that it builds - which is applied on the very first hit of the Waterspout - it is the core of Tangtang's kit.

Ultimate

"DA CHIEF SEES YOU!" is Tangtang's Ultimate, costing 90 Energy and unleashing a wide circle that deals ticking Cryo DMG over time, named "OLDEN STARE". More noteworthy than its damage however, is that it will fully lock down and immobilize any enemy in its area of effect.

Regardless of enemy rank, they will become completely frozen. All current actions are paused and no further attacks or movement can be made until the skill ends, after which a Rogue Wave will strike enemies for a burst of damage.

By default, it takes 4 seconds for the Ultimate to expire, but by doing a Dive Attack, it will finish early and the Rogue Wave is enhanced to deal even more damage - an increase of 75%. Its stagger build also increases, going from 15 to 20.

Note: Although the early Rogue Wave has a higher damage multiplier this comes at the cost of the immobilize and DoT effect from OLDEN STARE. If looking to maximise utility and damage from the Ultimate, the Early Rogue Wave should be triggered as late as possible.

As mentioned before, this Early Rogue Wave also converts Whirlpools into Waterspouts, but this isn't done by the Ultimate skill itself, but through Tangtang's Talents.

Talents

"Riot Bringer" is said talent. When OLDEN STARE ends early from a dive attack, it will effectively cast an SP-free variant of Tangtang's Battle Skill.

It will create a Waterspout, convert Whirlpools into Waterspouts, and inherit some of its associated effects: namely damage, Susceptibility, and Cryo Infliction build. It's to the point that Battle Skill DMG, not Ultimate DMG, is what applies to the Waterspouts triggered by Ultimate.

Note: The OLDEN STARE DoT and Rogue Waves all scale with Ultimate DMG. It's only the Waterspouts created by Riot Bringer that scale with Battle Skill DMG.

It does not, however, benefit from the SP recovery effect. Effects tied to the Battle Skill itself (as opposed to the Waterspouts) also do not apply, like its base damage and stagger.

On the flipside, Riot Bringer has an added effect of boosting the damage of all Waterspouts by up to 60%. Considering how high its multipliers are, it's in part due to this talent that Tangtang has such competitive DPS.

"Fam of Honor" is Tangtang's other talent: it boosts the movement speed of allies by 20% and decreases those of enemies by 40% when within 5 meters of a Whirlpool, lingering for 3 seconds after leaving the area.

As it is Whirlpools and not Waterspouts, this means that the Whirlpools created by Tangtang's Combo Skill serve as a sort of trap, lingering on field and buffing nearby allies while simultaneously debuffing enemies.

Unfortunately, as these effects are strictly to movement speed, it has limited use. Despite it not being a direct damage increase, it can make dealing with mobile enemies and groups of mobs who tend to stray a lot easier.

Basic Attack

"I'LL BLOW YOUR MIND" is Tangtang's Basic Attack and it's surprisingly decent.

Its multipliers are rather unremarkable, be it damage, stagger or SP, and there isn't much benefit to animation cancelling it, but that's not needed as it is decently fast. As it deals Cryo DMG, having Tangtang as the controlled operator is at times an optimal choice.

Arguably as important as its speed is its movement. Unlike other ranged characters, who can often be stationary or even slowly distance themselves from enemies with every sequence, Tangtang will dash forwards and integrate a melee kick into the string.

This can be both a boon and a hindrance depending on the enemy, but as the Final Strike is a projectile, it can miss if enemies move out of the way during its wind-up. Being close increases the chances of it landing against mobile enemies, especially if Fam of Honor is active.

Energy

Tangtang’s Energy needs are varied; she can often make do with 0 Ultimate Gain Efficiency, as her teammates tend to have long rotations that are accommodating of this, assuming that Tangtang is able to get 3+ Combo Skills out. 

Some rotations can at times demand back-to-back Battle Skill use to make up for missing energy in order to have her Ultimate ready, which can be costly if staggers don’t align for Finisher SP recovery bonuses.

Other rotations however, can be even trickier. On a Yvonne 1+3 setup for example, Tangtang would need multiple Energy Gain Efficiency pieces to keep up. This is exacerbated by certain Umbral Monument stages, where enemies either die too quickly for extended rotations to have any use, or where there are multiple mobile enemies, increasing the value of an early Ultimate cast for immobilisation.

As a single off-piece wouldn’t be enough in these scenarios, running multiple supportive set pieces (e.g. Eternal Xiranite) can work best.

Owing to the significant variety in Energy generation across her teams, as many frequent allies return SP - Tangtang included - there is no easy reference table that can be used to determine exact thresholds, with them varying by team and rotation.

Gameplay

There isn't much more to cover regarding Tangtang's gameplay: she is all about getting as many Waterspouts as possible in the course of an encounter. This can make her seem somewhat flowcharty:

• Trigger Tangtang's Combo Skill with either her own Battle Skill, or through another Operator.

• Trigger her Combo Skill a second time, but not with a Battle Skill so as to not convert the existing Whirlpool.

• Use either her Battle Skill or Ultimate's Early Rogue Wave to unleash 3 Waterspouts on enemies for damage and debuffs.

Then rinse and repeat. In practice, though, there is nuance to it.

If full Ultimate Energy starts are factored in, it can often be best to trigger 2 Combo Skills before bursting so as to benefit in full from Tangtang's personal damage contribution and Susceptibility, but doing so won't always be the optimal choice. The reverse is true for 0 Ultimate Energy starts, where it may be best to overcap on Whirlpools if it means having her skills align with allies' bursts and stagger periods.

Tailoring rotations to work around Tangtang's Combo Skill cooldowns and Waterspout burst is the way to get the most value out of her.