Genshin Impact is on Version 6.7 — six full years of content, seven nations to explore, and enough systems that the first ten hours can feel intimidating. This guide is the shortest path from "downloaded it last night" to "clearing the Spiral Abyss with a real team." No filler, no completionist grind.
Don't reroll — Genshin's wish pity carries across banners and starter accounts have caught up. Play through the Mondstadt archon quest for free Primogems, unlock the Statue of the Seven regions for free elemental characters, and spend your first 20 wishes on the current character banner. Skip the standard banner entirely until you've cleared Inazuma.
Do you need to reroll?
Short answer: no. Long answer: the game gives every new account enough guaranteed 5-star pulls, event freebies, and standard-banner selectors to build a functional team in the first month. Rerolling burns ~20 hours, and the meta shifts every version — you can end up rerolling into a character who no longer anchors a top team. Play instead.
The first 30 hours — what to do
- Finish the Mondstadt archon quest. This is the base tutorial and it unlocks the wish system, adventurer rank progression, and the first free 4-star selector.
- Reach Adventure Rank 20. This unlocks the Spiral Abyss (endgame), your first artifact domain runs, and the Battle Pass equivalent. Everything before AR 20 is a warm-up.
- Unlock the seven Statues of the Seven in Mondstadt. Each one grants a free stat boost and eventually unlocks a free character on completion (Traveler element swaps).
- Run the first weekly boss. Stormterror in Mondstadt drops the material you'll need to ascend your first 5-star. It resets Monday.
- Start Liyue quests once Mondstadt is done. Zhongli, Xiao, and Ganyu live here and their region unlocks Cook's Grove and the first serious domain rotations.
Which characters to build first
Every account gets the same free characters by AR 25 or so:
- Amber, Kaeya, Lisa — starter 4-stars. Kaeya carries early Cryo, Lisa is a functional Electro applicator, Amber is bench material.
- Traveler — becomes any element you swap to; Anemo (Mondstadt) is the strongest free variant, Dendro (Sumeru) the second.
- Xiangling (event reward) — 4-star Pyro off-field DPS. Every serious Vaporize team runs her. Build her.
- Barbara (free from AR 18) — 4-star Hydro healer. Essential for Freeze and Hyperbloom teams before you pull real Hydro DPS.
- Bennett (event or standard banner) — the strongest 4-star in the game. Universal support. Do everything you can to get him.
Your first serious pull should be on the current character banner. Version 6.7 features Sandrone, Columbina, Citlali, and Raiden — pull Raiden if you want the highest-impact 5-star for a new account.
Resin routines — the daily loop that matters
Resin is your energy meter for artifact and material farming. You get 200 per day (regenerates over about 20 hours). Spend it, don't hoard it. The four things worth spending resin on, in order:
- Character talent materials — Monday/Thursday/Sunday boss drops.
- Weekly boss — one run per week for talent ascension materials.
- Artifact domain runs — expensive, but the endgame damage ceiling lives here.
- Character ascension materials — daily boss runs for your main DPS.
Don't spend resin on 2-star or 3-star artifacts. Save until you have a target 5-star set (usually around AR 40).
How the wish system works
Every banner has soft pity around 75 pulls and hard pity at 90. On the character banner, the 5-star at pity has a 50% chance of being the featured character — if it isn't (you get a "losing" standard-banner 5-star instead), the next 5-star is guaranteed to be featured. That's the 50/50 loop.
Your Primogems (the wish currency) come from four main sources: quest rewards, exploration chests, event completion, and Spiral Abyss clears (36 stars per cycle = 600 Primogems). Two months of active play gets you enough Primogems for roughly 80 wishes — one guaranteed hard-pity pull.
Systems you can safely skip for now
Genius Invokation TCG, the underground Genius Invokation ladder, Miliastra Wonderland event minigames, the fishing achievements — none of these matter for your account's growth. Come back to them when you've cleared the story and want secondary content.
For this guide we consulted the Game8 Genshin Impact wiki (Version 6.7 character list, wish mechanics, resin economy, region unlock order), the HoYoverse official page, and community discussion on Reddit and player Discords.