Best Build for Alhaitham in Genshin Impact: Weapons, Artifacts & Talent Focus

Not that I liked hearing through the Genshin community that Alhaitham received several hits to his damage before HoYoverse was satisfied that he wasn’t going to be as powerful as an Archon. But the man is pretty strong even still. I haven’t personally ever been a Keqing main, but I can see the appeal if her damage is meant to be similar to what Alhaitham is outputting right now at only Level 60. Pupas are hard to find; let me into your world. Thank you.

Here’s the best build for Alhaitham in Genshin Impact, including artifacts, weapons, and talent focus.

Elemental Skill/Burst – Reintroducing the Dendro Keqing

Let’s take a review over Keqing–Alhaitham because he’s got a peculiar setup that took me a mug of coffee and a Coke to fully absorb what these letters were meant to be saying. Occasionally, on the screen, you’ll see that Alhaitham has these three gems that float alongside him. Man is the king of anti-symmetry. It would drive Death the Kid wild. These Mirrors are your indicator that Alhaitham’s Normal Attack damage will now be converted to Dendro Damage and considering how many you see floating above his left shoulder, he’ll do additional damage through geometric Dendro sword slashes whenever he hits enemies. 

Related: All Materials Required for Ascending Alhaitham in Genshin Impact

Like Keqing, you can either tap or hold his Elemental Skill. Holding it will allow you to choose approximately where you want him to teleport to while tapping while transporting him a short distance just in front of him. If he has no Mirrors on his person, it’ll generate two to appear, but if he already has one floating alongside him, using his Elemental Skill will only generate one more to join it. Unlike Keqing, his damage will automatically convert to Dendro so you don’t need to use his Elemental Skill twice.

Alhaitham’s Elemental Burst is surprisingly simple after all of the complicated builds that we’ve seen thus far coming from Hoyoverse–it’s actually quite refreshing. Within a certain arena, Althaitham will attack all of the enemies within that AOE, dealing Dendro damage. Depending on how many Mirrors he has stacked on him, they will be consumed in his Burst and deal additional damage on top of the original damage dealt. His Burst also comes with a peculiar setup where if he has a certain number of Mirrors on his person, it may help or hinder him from regenerating more Mirrors. If you go into battle and use his Burst with no Mirrors on your person, then his Burst will generate three Mirrors to start you off into battle, allowing you to deal Dendro damage to your enemies immediately after you attacked them with his Burst. But if you finish up a battle with all Mirrors intact and then use his Elemental Burst, it’ll consume those Mirrors and not regenerate anything for him. So you’ll need his Elemental Skill to regenerate those Mirrors. Either way, it allows you always to keep Mirrors on your person that you’re dealing with some powerful Dendro attacks that are the fastest Dendro application to be seen since Nahida. 

Weapon of Choice – Elemental Mastery or Straight-Up Critical Damage

DPS’ make for such easy builds because they will always need the same thing, something based on Attack or Crit. So let’s get the obvious one out of the way–that the game is clearly hinting at–Alhaitham’s Signature Weapon, Light of Foliar Incision. This weapon’s Main Stat is Crit Damage, and yet in its passives, it’ll automatically increase the character’s Crit Rate by four percent. More importantly, whenever the character attacks with a Normal Attack, Charged Attack, or Plunged Attack that results from Elemental Damage, it’ll increase their Attack based on 120 percent of the character’s Elemental Mastery. This is going to be Alhaitham’s best weapon, although it requires a bit of Elemental Mastery in his build, so some of the artifact sets that are going to be recommended just might not be up to the task. So it’s all dependent on what sword you have built on him when it comes to deciding what type of set you’re going to want. Any five-star weapon will work fabulously on characters, but Alhaitham’s Signature will be the best by far. 

Anything based on Crit Rate and Crit Damage is going to be great on a DPS, but the best by far has to be The Black Sword and Harbinger of Dawn. The Black Sword is based on Crit Rate and will increase Normal and Charged Attacks for Alhaitham while the Harbinger of Dawn is based on Crit Damage and will increase Crit Rate as long as its character sits at a reasonable health above 90 percent. Other great contenders will be Paimon’s Bargains Swords, such as the Blackcliff Longsword and the Royal Sword. They cost 24 Starglitter to trade in if you save enough, and both are very good on Alhaitham since Blackcliff will increase Attack Damage based on how many enemies Alhaitham can take down, and Royal Sword can increase Crit Rate (Passive Effects). 

Some strong contenders that can either be crafted or gifted upon finishing a quest are going to be the region-exclusive weapons such as Amenoma Kageuchi, which is based on Attack and will gain seeds to it whenever a character uses their Elemental Skill. You can gain up to three seeds, and once that character unleashes their burst, that character will get 6 Energy for each seed consumed upon use. Given Alhaitham’s Mirrors, this can help to easily bounce back and forth between his Skill and his Burst, keeping them charged or always dealing Dendro damage. The other weapon up for consideration is the Sapwood Blade that is actually based on Energy Recharge which isn’t so much needed for Alhaitham, but its passive works quite well since it’ll increase Elemental Mastery whenever the character deals some sort of Elemental Reaction with Dendro. Given Alhaitham’s quick attacks with Dendro, he’s bound to come into contact with some other element, whether against the Enemy or within his party. This can help out with his damage since in his passive, Mysteries Laid Bare, his Projection damage and Burst damage can be increased by 0.1 percent on each point of Elemental Mastery Alhaitham has. 

Related: What is Mika’s Weapon in Genshin Impact? – Answered

Artifact Sets – Sometimes Two-Pieces Are Easier in Terms of Accessibility

Alhaitham is very flexible regarding artifact sets, and it’s all a bit dependent on just what weapon you decide to use for him and how you plan to use him in battle. For the time being, here are some pretty safe options for you to take back to your world when you consider building him.

His easiest build will be what you see in the trial, with four-piece Gilded Dreams and then an off-piece that will let you use a powerful Dendro Goblet or a Better Crit Crown. At two pieces, this set will increase Alhaitham’s Elemental Mastery, but at four pieces, it’ll buff both the Attack and Elemental Mastery of this character depending on how many types of different Elements you have in your present party. So while you can use a character such as Collei or Yaoyao to provide Dendro Resistance and debuff enemies, so they are more susceptible to the Element, you can get a bit more bang for your buck if you have as many diverse Elements in your party with Alhaitham as your head runner and forefront for damage. Elemental Mastery is incredibly valuable for a Dendro character. Since Alhaitham’s passives will boost his damage dealt based on his Elemental Mastery, having your artifacts give you a needed boost doesn’t hurt.

But in my discovery, I found that while a four-piece Gilded Dreams is really good on Alhaitham, it’s hard to find great sub-stats on these pieces since they are still so new. So a viable option for those in the meantime is a mix of two different types of artifacts sets. The best that I have found that is pretty much rival to that of Gilded Dreams are a mix of Attack Pieces and the Deepwood Memories two piece’s that will increase Dendro Damage. Elemental Mastery is essential on Alhaitham, but it’s a nice boost that you can include in your sub-stats or use as a Sand piece in exchange for Elemental Mastery as a two-piece artifact set. Unless you had his Signature weapon, it isn’t detrimental that you use Elemental Mastery in your mix of two-piece sets since most other weapons aren’t going to boost Elemental Mastery except for the Sapwood Blade. 

As you can see, Alhaitham is incredibly workable through the artifacts that you may just have on hand; depending on which you put on him, though, might change what main stats you want to focus on. 

Artifacts Stats – Life Revolves Around the Sands

Like with any DPS, it’s going to be important that the sub-stats to any of these artifacts are going to include but don’t necessarily need all of are: Attack, Crit Rate, Crit Damage, and Elemental Mastery. 

If you’re going with the Gilded Dreams artifact set with four pieces, then you will want to either focus on Elemental Mastery or Attack for his Sand pieces depending on what sword you run with him. His Signature and Sapwood Blade would require him to need more Elemental Mastery so that his damage increases that much more significantly, while other damage-dealing weapons can allow for you to use an Attack Sands and still do really good damage. His Goblet Cup will require Dendro Bonus Damage, and depending on what you need more of to increase his odds, a Crit Rate or Crit Damage Crown is needed for his last slot. 

Talent Priority and Focus

Once again, the issue with Alhaitham’s build is that he’s a DPS, meaning that all three of his branches are important to build. But I’d argue that for Alhaitham, his Normal Attack and his Elemental Skill will be slightly more important to build up the branches before focusing on the Elemental Burst. All options are incredibly viable and you won’t regret accidentally leveling any of them on a whim. They increase Alhaitham’s ridiculous damage output, and putting a ring, no, a crown, on him will make him even stronger. 

Related: All Materials Required for Ascending Xiao in Genshin Impact

Although Alhaitham’s abilities and powers are already on par with the archons, do you think he deserved those nerfs? Or do you find that he’s good without them?