As a unique hydro sword-wielder, picking the right Genshin Impact Nilou build can be pretty tricky. Her kit is highly situational, dependant on intriguing hydro and dendro interactions, and though she’s quite a situational DPS or sub-DPS, her bountiful cores guarantee and explosive stage show. So let’s take a look at Genshin Nilou‘s skills, weapons, artifacts, and more.
Need some extra Primogems to wish for new characters on the Genshin Impact banner? Take a look at our regularly updated Genshin Impact codes list. We also have a Genshin Impact tier list, and the recent Genshin Impact update too.
Genshin Impact Nilou
What’s the best Genshin Impact Nilou build?
Nilou is a hydro DPS or sub-DPS sword-wielder with a unique kit that unfortunately limits her team comps dramatically. Her playstyle focuses on dendro and hydro elemental reactions, and she’s great at dishing out AoE damage with her bountiful cores when used correctly.
However, she requires a fixed team of two hydro, and two dendro, and is hungry for other gacha-limited five-star units in order to make the most of her talents. She also relies on having a hydro healer to recover from dendro core explosion-friendly fire, and needs an on-field hydro character to enhance her utility, meaning you really need Genshin Impact’s Kokomi on your team (Genshin’s Barbara is a possible substitute in this scenario, but her weak attacks make her a less viable option for on-field hydro application).
On the dendro side, Nilou is best complimented by Genshin’s Nahida, another five-star unit. Her lack of flexibility in team builds and her situational rotation makes her a tricky character to utilise and prevents her from being considered ‘meta’.
What’s the best Genshin Impact Nilou weapon?
Regardless of how you intend to use Nilou, her signature weapon Key of Khaj-Nisut is the best weapon to suit her kit. It buffs her max HP and elemental mastery, both of which help her pack more of a punch with her dendro cores.
A Sacrificial Sword is a great option for an on-field Nilou, as it allows her to use both elemental skill forms, maximizing her hydro application. As an off-field enabler, Freedom-Sworn is a good choice as it boosts her elemental reaction damage and provides buffs for the entire party when she triggers an elemental reaction.
For a more affordable option, you can equip Nilou with Iron Sting, which also boosts her elemental mastery and buffs her damage after she applies elemental damage to an enemy.
| Weapon | Effect | Where to get |
| Key of Khaj-Nisut | Base stat: HP Skill: increases HP by 20%. When an elemental skill hits opponents, you gain the Grand Hymn effect for 20 seconds. This effect increases the equipping character’s elemental mastery by 0.12% of their max HP. This effect can trigger once every 0.3 seconds. Max three stacks. When this effect gains three stacks, or when the third stack’s duration is refreshed, the elemental mastery of all nearby party members will be increased by 0.2% of the equipping character’s max HP for 20 seconds |
Gacha |
| Sacrificial Sword | Base stat: energy recharge Skill: after dealing damage to an opponent with an elemental skill, the skill has a 40% chance to end its own cooldown. Can only occur once every 30 seconds |
Gacha |
| Freedom-Sworn | Base stat: elemental mastery Skill: increases damage by 10%. When the character wielding this weapon triggers elemental reactions, they gain a Sigil of Rebellion. This effect can be triggered once every 0.5s and can be triggered even if said character is not on the field. When you possess 2 Sigils of Rebellion, all of them will be consumed and all nearby party members will obtain “Millennial Movement: Song of Resistance” for 12s. “Millennial Movement: Song of Resistance” increases Normal, Charged, and Plunging Attack DMG by 16% and increases ATK by 20%. Once this effect is triggered, you will not gain Sigils of Rebellion for 20s. Of the many effects of the “Millennial Movement,” buffs of the same type will not stack. |
Gacha |
| Iron Sting | Base stat: elemental mastery Skill: dealing elemental damage increases all damage by 6% for six seconds. Max two stacks. Can only occur once every one second |
Forge via blacksmith |
What are the best Genshin Impact Nilou artifacts?
Currently, we found that the best artifact set for Nilou is a combination of two Tenacity of the Millelith and two Gilded Dreams which gives her a boost to both her HP% and elemental mastery.
| Artifact | Effect | Where to obtain |
| Tenacity of the Millelith | Two equipped: HP +20% Four equipped: upon hitting an enemy with an elemental skill, all nearby party members gain 20% attack and 30% shield strength for three seconds. You can trigger this effect once every 0.5 seconds, even if the character equipped with the artifact is not on the field |
Ridge Watch domain on Bishui Plain, Liyue |
| Gilded Dreams | Two equipped: elemental mastery +80 Four equipped: within eight seconds of triggering an elemental reaction, the character equipping this obtains buffs based on elemental type of the other party members. Increases attack by 14% for each member whose elemental type is the same as the equipping character, and elemental mastery increases by 50 for every member with a different elemental type. Each of the buffs count up to three characters. You can trigger this effect once every eight seconds, even when the equipping character is not on the field |
Spire of Solitary Enlightenment domain in Sumeru |
Artifact stat and sub-stat recommendations
When picking stats for Nilou’s artifacts, remember that crit is not as good as elemental mastery, as bountiful cores don’t crit. Generally, you want to get her energy recharge to about 170% or higher. Aside from that, your focus should be on gaining HP% through main stats and as much elemental mastery as possible through sub-stats.
Main stats
- Sands: HP% or energy recharge
- Goblet: HP%
- Circlet: HP%
Sub-stats
- Elemental mastery
- HP%
- Energy recharge
What are Genshin Impact Nilou’s skills?
Here is a showcase of what Nilou has in terms of skills, and what they do:
Active skills:
| Skill | Description |
| Dance of Samser | Perform up to three consecutive sword strikes |
| Dance of Samser (charged) | Consume a set amount of stamina to perform a twirling slash |
| Dance of Samser (plunging) | Plung from mid-air to strike the ground below, damaging opponents along the path and dealing AoE damage on impact |
| Dance of Haftkarsvar | Nilou enters the pirouette stat, dealing hydro damage to nearby opponents based on her max HP. While in the pirouette state, her normal attacks and elemental skills cause her to enter the sword dance and whirling steps stances respectively, converting all her damage to hydro damage that can’t be overridden, and is considered elemental skill damage. In these stances, Nilou’s third dance step ends pirouette, and has different effects based on the type of said dance step. For sword dance, she unleashes a luminous illusion that deals hydro damage to any enemies it touches. She is recieves the lunar prayer effect, which converts Nilou’s normal attacks into sword dance techniques, with her final hit unleashing a luminous illusion. For whirling steps, Nilou unleashes a whirling water wheel that deals AoE hydro damage and creates a tranquility aura that follows your active character around and applies hydro to opponents within its AoE. Nilou can’t perform charged attacks when under the effect of pirouette or lunar prayer. All effects are removed when Nilou leaves the field |
| Dance of Abzendegi: Distant Dreams, Listening Spring | Begin a dance that spawns a lotus of distant waters, dealing AoE hydro damage based on Nilou’s max HP and applying the lingering Aeon effect to all opponents hit. After an interval, opponents affected by lingering aeon take hydro damage |
Nilou’s passive skills:
| Skill | Description |
| White Jade Lotus | When Nilou cooks a perfect meal with adventure-related effects, there’s a 12% chance for you to obtain double the product |
| Court of Dancing Petals | When all characters in the party are dendro or hydro, and there are at least one dendro and one hydro character, the completion of the third dance step of Nilou’s skill grants all nearby characters the Golden Chalice’s Bounty for 30 seconds. Characters under the effect of Golden Challice’s Bounty increase the elemental mastery of all nearby allies by 100 for ten seconds whenever they’re hut by dendro attacks. Additionally, triggering the bloom reaction creates bountiful cores instead of dendro cores. Boutiful cores burst very quickly and have larger AoEs. Bountiful Cores can’t trigger hyperbloom or burgeon, and they share an upper numerical limit with dendro cores. Bountiful core damage is considered damage dealt by dendro cores produced by bloom. If the party doesn’t mee the conditions for this passive, any existing Golden Chalice’s Bounty effects are cancelled |
| Dreamy Dance of Aeons | Every 1,000 points of Nilou’s max HP about 30,000 increases the damage dealt by bountiful cores by 9%. The maximum increase in bountiful core damage that can be achieved this way is 400% |
What are Genshin Nilou’s constellations?
Constellations are buffs that improve how a character performs in battle. You can level up Nilou’s constellations when you pull more than one copy of her.
| Constellation | Effect |
| C1: Dance of the Waning Moon | Dance of Haftkarsvare in enhanced, increasing luminous illusion’s damage by 65%, and extending the duration of the tranquillity aura by six seconds |
| C2: The Starry Skies Their Flowers Rain | After characters affected by the golden chalice’s bounty deal hydro damage to an opponent, that opponent’s hydro resistance decreases by 35% for ten seconds. After a triggered bloom reaction deals damage to opponents, their dendro resistance decreases by 35% for ten seconds. Requires the ‘Court of Dancing Petals’ talent |
| C3: Beguiling Shadowstep | Increases the level of Dance of Abzendegi: Distant Dreams, Listening Spring by three. Max upgrade level 15 |
| C4: Fricative Pulse | After the third dance step of Dance of Dance of Haftkarsvar’s Pirouette hits opponents, Nilou gains 15 elemental energy, and damage from her Dance of Abzendegi: Distant Dreams, listening spring increases by 50% for eight seconds |
| C5: Twirling Light | Increases the level of Dance of Haftkarsvar by three. Max upgrade level 15 |
| C6: Frostbreaker’s Melody | for every 1,000 points of max HP, Nilou’s crit rate and crit damage increases by 0.6% and 1.2% respectively. Can increase a maximum of 20% crit rate and 60% crit damage |
What are Genshin Nilou’s ascension materials?
Nilou requires Varunada Lazurite pieces to ascend, as well as Sumeru-native Padisarah flowers. To find the Fungal spores and their two evolved versions, you need to hunt down plenty of fungi enemies.
| Required level | Mora | Materials |
| 20 | 20,000 | One Varunada Lazurite sliver, three Padisarah, three Fungal spores |
| 40 | 40,000 | Three Varunada Lazurite fragment, two Perpetual Calibers, ten Padisarah, 15 Fungal spores |
| 50 | 60,000 | Six Varunada Lazurite fragment, four Perpetual Calibers, 20 Padisarah, 12 Luminescent pollen |
| 60 | 80,000 | Three Varunada Lazurite chunk, eight Perpetual Calibers, 30 Padisarah, 18 Luminescent pollen |
| 70 | 100,000 | Six Varunada Lazurite chunk, 12 Perpetual Calibers, 45 Padisarah, 12 Crystalline cyst dust |
| 80 | 120,000 | Six Varunada Lazurite gemstone, 20 Perpetual Calibers, 60 Padisarah, 24 Crystalline cyst dust |
What talent level-up materials does Genshin Impact’s Nilou need?
Here is the shopping list for upgrading Nilous talents. You need the Praxis family of talent books, and Tears of the Calamitous God which are a drop from the weekly Raiden Shogun boss fight.
| Level | Mora | Materials |
| Two | 12,500 | Six Fungal spores, three teachings of Praxis |
| Three | 17,500 | Three Luminescent pollen, two guides to Praxis |
| Four | 25,000 | Four Luminescent pollen, four guides to Praxis |
| Five | 30,000 | Six Luminescent pollen, six guides to Praxis |
| Six | 37,500 | Nine Luminescent pollen, nine guides to Praxis |
| Seven | 120,000 | Four Crystalline cyst dust, four philosophies of Praxis, one Tears of the Calamitous God |
| Eight | 260,000 | Six Crystalline cyst dust, six philosophies of Praxis, one Tears of the Calamitous God |
| Nine | 450,000 | Nine Crystalline cyst dust, 12 philosophies of Praxis, two Tears of the Calamitous God |
| Ten | 700,000 | 12 Crystalline cyst dust, 16 philosophies of Praxis, two Tears of the Calamitous God, one Crown of Insight |
That’s everything we know about Genshin Impact’s Nilou so far. For more exciting adventures, check out our list of the best games like Genshin Impact.
