A Beginners Guide to Wishes in Genshin Impact

For as much free content as Genshin Impact has, and there is a lot, the biggest draw of the game is pulling new characters from the in-game banners. The problem is that for a lot of players this will be their first ever gacha style game. So, I decided to make this short beginners guide to wishes in Genshin Impact.

So, What Are Banners and What Does Wish Even Mean?

Banners are the things pictured above. These are the places that will grant you new weapons and characters at random. They cost resources, so it’s important to know what you are doing.

Banners have two purchase options; you can make one Wish at a time or 10 at a time.

“What is a Wish?” I hear you ask. A Wish is what Genshin Impact’s gacha system is called. In other gacha games this can generally be referred to as ‘rolling’, ‘pulling’ or ‘spinning’. These terms are in reference to the slot machine nature of these systems. In essence you are ‘pulling’ the slot machine lever or ‘spinning’ the slots.

Making a Wish or ‘pulling’ is the action of spending resources in an attempt to ‘pull’ a character from a particular banner.

The Currency

There are essentially three types of currency used for pull from banners. 

The main currency is Fates. There are two variations of these and two different purposes. 

Acquaint Fates are the standard currency you use on the basic banners. These are the most common Fates that you are rewarded with in game and are used across all standard banners.

Intertwined Fates are only used on special banners and much less frequently rewarded than the previously mentioned Acquaint Fate.

Primogems are a sort of ‘jack of all trades’ type of currency. You can use Primogems to convert into either versions of Fates at a rate of 160 to 1.

Primogems can also be used for other things like refreshing resin. But, if you are a free to play player like me, you are going to want to save all your Primogems for spending on banners. This is because Primogems, unlike Fates, are consistently given to the player as rewards for almost everything you do in the game.

The Banners

Banners come in a few different forms each with their own purpose. A core part of this beginners guide to Wishes in Genshin Impact, is to teach you which banner is going to best suit your needs.

The Standard banner is named Wanderlust Invocation. This banner will provide you with access to a large roster of characters and weapons ranging from 4-5 stars. The banner is not limited and so it will persist throughout the game. It will likely have more characters and weapons added to it as the game adds new ones.

Beginner’s Wish is, as the name suggests, a banner for beginners. Similar to the Wanderlust Invocation banner, it includes the majority of 4-5 star characters as well as 4 star weapons. It does not include any 5 star weapons.

The benefit of the Beginner’s Wish banner is that it comes at a discount of -20%. The caveat is that you can only do bulk 10 pulls at a time as opposed to doing pulls individually. 

Fate Is Your Friend

This means that you are able to get 10 pulls for the cost of 8 Fates as opposed to the usual 10. The other caveat to this is that you can only do a maximum of 20 pulls before the banner expires. As the name suggests, this banner is truly geared towards new players and is likely the banner you will pull from to begin with.

Two other banners exist; these are special banners that are only live for 30 days at a time before rotating out. At any one time there will be at least two of these banners, one geared towards weapons and one geared towards characters.

This is where the beginners guide to wishes in Genshin Impact really starts to pay off.

The current Character banner is Ballad in Goblets and ends on 18/20/2020. Each special banner will include bonus rates for specific characters. For example in the Ballad in Goblets you have a 50% chance that when you pull a 5 star character, that character will be Venti. If the 5 star you pull is not Venti, then the next 5 star you pull from that Banner will 100% be Venti.

Additionally these banners also have improved rates for three select 4 star characters; currently Barbara, Fischl and Xiangling. Make sure you check this when pulling from these banners as they may influence your decision greatly, depending on which characters you are looking for.

As a quick note, the 4 star characters in the Ballad in Goblets banner are all very powerful and certainly worth looking into!

Finally you have the special banner relating to weapons. This works in the same way as the special character banner, it only lasts for 30 days (in sync with the other banner ending 18/10/2020) and gives improved rates for specific 5 star and 4 star weapons.

Make a Wish

So after that giant info dump you’re probably asking yourself “ that’s all well and good, but what should I actually be spending my resources on?”. 

The short answer is, it depends. It really is about what is most important to you. Genshin Impact has a wide variety of characters, weapons and builds, meaning there is no real right answer. Having said that, there are better paths than others and I’ll try my best to explain what those are.

If you are like me, you are going to want as many awesome characters on your team as you possibly can. If that’s the case then the best answer is the Ballad in Goblet and whatever banner succeeds it. 

First off, if the banner has an improved drop rate for a character you’re specifically looking for (currently Venti, Fischl, Barbara and Xiangling) then this is basically a no brainer. If you’re not interested in the characters with high drop rates, that’s not a problem, this is still the best banner for you. 

The reason is that this banner does not include any 5 star weapons or any of the characters you start the game with (Amber, Lisa and Kaeya). Because of this the odds of you picking up a new character in this banner is much higher than it would be if you pulled from the Standard banner (Wanderlust Invocation).

Stick With Your Banner

If you are looking for weapons specifically, then the Weapon Event Wish is the banner you want to pull from. This banner does not include any 5 star characters meaning whatever 5 star you are lucky to pull will be a weapon. And as with the Character Event Wish, certain 4 star weapons will have improved drop rates. 

This banner does include some 4 star characters, so it’s not exclusively weapons but with the lack of 5 star characters and improved drop rates for 4 and 5 star weapons, this is still the best banner for weapons by far.

Finally the Standard Wish banner. This banner is the most inclusive banner of them all. There are no enhanced drop rates for any specific characters or weapons, with both being spread across 4 and 5 stars. This truly is the pot luck banner. If you have no preference on what you get and you don’t care about getting duplicates for your Constellations; this banner is not a bad call.

That’s because of the final piece of important info you need before you start rolling for 5 stars; the pity timer.

I Pity The Fool That Can’t Pull a 5 Star

You’ve learned about what a banner is and what each one contains. You have also learned a little about drop rates and which banner is going to be best for you.

The final thing to learn is about the all important pity timer. 

The pity refers to the time it takes for you to be guaranteed a specific tier of item/character. In Genshin Impact the pity is 10 for 4 stars and 90 for 5 stars.

This means that if you pull 10 times and do not get a 4 star in the first 9 rolls, your tenth will be guaranteed to be a 4 star. This timer always resets when you pull a 4 star.

For example; if you pull 10 times and get a 4 star on the fifth roll, your pity resets to zero.

The same rules apply for 5 stars, except the pity is much larger sitting at 90. This means if you pull 89 times without a 5 star, your 90th pull will be a guaranteed 5 star. If you get lucky enough to pull a 5 star before then, your pity is reset.

The most important thing to note about the pity is that it rewards you for committing to a specific banner. Getting a 5 star is not easy, which makes building towards your pity very important. If you spread your resources across all banners, you might end up spreading yourself too thin and not achieving the pulls you want. Why pull 30 times in 3 different banners, when doing all 90 pulls in one will guarantee you a 5 star?

This is why even though I suggest not pulling from the Standard Wish (Wanderlust Invocation), it’s not the end of the world if you commit to it and pull until you hit the pity.

Pity Carries Over

One last important thing to note is that your pity carries over from banners of the same type. This is only relevant for the Character/Weapon Event Wish banners as they are the only timed banners so far. 

This means that if you have made 89 pulls on the current Ballad of Goblets banner then when that rotates out and is replaced with the Sparkling Steps banner, your first pull of that banner will be a 5 star. It’s something to keep in mind. I personally stopped pulling on Ballads of Goblet after I got a 5 star because I knew I wouldn’t be able to hit the pity before it gets rotated out. I ended up pulling from the Standard banner and wasting a lot of resources, when I could have continued to build the pity on the Character Event Wish banner. So make sure to learn from my mistakes!

How’s your Genshin Impact experience at the moment? What did you think of this beginners guide to Wishes in Genshin Impact? Is this your first gacha style game? Did our guide help you pull that 5 star you were looking for? If so, why not drop us a comment below!

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