Written By: CQLQRS#7853

Updated for Patch 2.5

Feel free to read Barbara’s Quick Guide, also written by CQLQRS#7853.

Art by Kai1UP

Preface

Welcome to the KQM guide to Barbara! This guide will cover everything players need to know about Mondstadt’s idol: from basic mechanics to team comps, and everything in between! Barbara isn’t only a healer and I hope this guide can show that. Without further ado, let the show begin!

Introduction

Barbara is a free 4 star Hydro Catalyst user, available to players after completing the quest ‘A Long Shot’ at AR 18. She excels at healing teammates in dire moments and can serve as a DPS option when the situation calls for it.

Why should you play Barbara?

Art by BACHU

“Tada! *giggles* Barbara is here~ Leave the healing to me, I will not disappoint you!” – Barbara

Talents

Talent Priority: Elemental Skill = Elemental Burst > Normal Attack

Talent Overview

Constellations

Art by Mr2D

“My dream is to bring a smile to the faces of all the people in my life! As long as I can help you on your journey, I’m happy~” – Barbara

Playstyles Overview

Support Barbara

Barbara’s primary role in teams is to act as a healer, one that is able to provide sustained healing as well as a large burst of it in emergencies. This playstyle is generally easy to gear compared to her DPS counterpart.

DPS Barbara

A complex and niche role for Barbara. DPS Barbara is a playstyle with many nuances and factors that players have to consider. It builds on Barbara’s fast animation cancels and access to Vaporize while aiming to maximize her field time.

Support Barbara

Artifact Stats

Building Support Barbara is straightforward. The main stats that players will look for are HP%/HP%/Healing Bonus%. Building ER is not recommended as her Burst will only be used as a last resort and should not be expected in a rotation.

Artifact Sets

4 Maiden Beloved	Support Barbara’s Best in Slot (BiS). It maximizes the healing done by off-field Barbara but it is a very Resin inefficient artifact set and players should not intentionally farm for it.
2 Maiden Beloved / 2 Ocean-Hued Clam / 2 ToM	Alternative set. Any of these 3 artifact sets can be used in combination with each other. The difference between Hybrid and 4 Maiden Beloved is insignificant, making this much more resin efficient. Note that Ocean-Hued Clam and Maiden Beloved are more valued as their set bonuses are not available as substats.
4 Instructor	Alternative set. Hydro Application from Barbara’s Skill can be used to proc an Elemental Reaction and buff the team’s Elemental Mastery, which is a valuable stat in teams centered around Amplification Reactions.

Weapons

Weapons	Notes
Not PJC (Everlasting Moonglow)	Everlasting Moonglow gives Barbara all the stats she wants. The Donut is only a stat stick and its passive cannot be utilized by Support Barbara who plays off-field. The HP% from its substat and Healing Bonus% from its passive makes it easier to reach the healing cap of 4OHC. A more DPS-oriented build (HP%/Hydro DMG%/HB% or ATK%/HP%/HB%) can be used instead.
Prototype Amber	It is a craftable weapon that mirrors what Moonglow provides. The Energy refund and team heals also scale well with refinements. Like The Donut, it becomes easier to hit the healing cap for 4OHC, but to a lesser extent compared to Moonglow. As a result, Barbara shouldn’t use a more DPS-oriented build.
Thrilling Tales of Dragon Slayers R5	Similar to other support Catalyst users, TTDS is Barbara’s BiS for support. The 48% ATK buff provides great utility on top of it having a HP% secondary stat that Barbara can make use of.  Like The Donut, it becomes easier to hit the healing cap for 4OHC, but to a lesser extent compared to Moonglow. As a result, Barbara shouldn’t use a more DPS-oriented build.

Hydro Application

Barbara can fill the role of applying Hydro when other options are not available, most notably in Freeze comps. This should only be considered if there are no alternatives as her Hydro application has a very long cooldown and very limited range which prevents the player from keeping Freeze uptime.

Art by 日下氏

“Thank you for being with me all for all this time, I can feel that I’m getting closer to my dream. Hope we can keep this up in the future~!” – Barbara

DPS Barbara

Playstyle Overview

DPS Barbara is a complex build with many nuances. Players will have to optimize both Barbara’s personal damage through animation cancels and specific Normal Attack strings and team rotations, which can be a tall order without much practice. DPS Barbara has 2 main playstyles, 4OHC and Vaporize.

Animation Cancels

Animation canceling is crucial for optimizing DPS Barbara. As mentioned previously, she has one of the fastest animation cancels of all Catalyst users, allowing for a fluid playstyle.

Normal Attacks 

Barbara’s Normal Attacks are relatively simple to cancel. The moment a Hydro visual appears in front of the Normal Attack, it can be canceled. Barbara can cancel her Normal Attacks by jumping or using an Elemental Skill.

N1J Cancel
Video by Risuke#6743

N2J Cancel
Video by Risuke#6743

N3J Cancel
Video by Risuke#6743

N4J Cancel
Video by Risuke#6743

Elemental Skill Cancel
Video by Risuke#6743

Charged Attacks 

Like most Catalyst users, Barbara’s Charged Attack animations are long. They can be canceled once Barbara lifts her hands into the air. Barbara can cancel her Charged Attacks by jumping or swapping to another character..

4OHC Barbara

This playstyle has been made possible with the addition of the new Ocean-Hued Clam set. It is highly recommended for Barbara in Electro-Charged team comps, but it can still be played in other teams. The damage from the new 4OHC set bonus is one of DPS Barbara’s highest damage floors and ceilings.

Electro-Charged vs 4OHC

Prior to 4OHC, the DPS ceiling for EC Barbara was from Physical damage from weapon passives. Players can still choose to play the traditional EC Barbara comp, but it is recommended to use 4OHC, even if the player is using Barbara in an EC comp due to a higher damage ceiling. In comparison, EC has higher single-target damage while 4OHC has higher multi-target damage.

Artifact Stats

4OHC Barbara will be using HP%/HP%/Healing Bonus% to maximize 4OHC bubble damage. HP%/HP%/HP% and ATK%/Hydro DMG%/CRIT are weaker possible variants, as Barbara’s healing is lower and her personal damage is not high enough to rival that of 4OHC.

Assumptions: Barbara C6 Lvl. 90/90 T9/12/12, Prototype Amber R1 Lvl. 90/90, 100 ER requirement, 20 fluid subs KQMC standards, 4NO buff.

Artifact Stats	N2C Total Damage	vs HP%/HP%/Healing Bonus%
HP%/HP%/Healing Bonus%	27,919	100%
HP%/HP%/HP%	23,918	85.67%
ATK%/Hydro DMG%/CRIT	22,206	79.54%

Weapons

Assumptions: Barbara C6 Lvl. 90/90 T9/12/12, Weapons Lvl. 90/90, 100 ER requirement, 20 fluid subs KQMC standards, 4NO buff.

Weapon	Damage Breakdown	vs Prototype Amber R1	Notes
Not PJC R1	N2C: 4,478 Bubble: 24,300 Total: 28,778	103.8%	Gives the highest personal damage. Unlike her support counterpart, 4OHC Barbara is able to capitalize on everything The Donut provides. Using this increases her own personal damage, maximizes her healing, and helps out with some Energy generation.
Prototype Amber R1	N2C: 3,619 Bubble: 24,300 Total: 27,919	100.00%	Same explanation found in the Support Barbara section.
Thrilling Tales of Dragon Slayers R5	N2C: 3,188 Bubble: 24,110 Total: 27,299	97.78%	Gives the highest team damage. Lower personal damage than Prototype Amber but more than makes up for it due to the 48% ATK Buff.
Hakushin Ring R1	N2C: 3,837 Bubble: 22,258 Total: 26,094	93.46%	Niche option that is only applicable in EC teams. While it has slightly lower Bubble damage, it increases team damage by buffing the Electro DPS in the team, most notably Beidou. Generally not worth crafting since it’s not versatile.

Rotations and Attack Strings

Optimizing 4OHC can be a very daunting task. Its high damage ceiling requires an equally high amount of skill to achieve. Barbara will use different attack strings depending on the level of investment. From low to high, the attack strings are N3C, N2C and in some cases, N1C. These team rotations can be simplified into 4 levels.

Level 0: Using Normal Attacks only

Barbara remains on-field and uses her Normal Attacks until she needs to be swapped off.

Level 1: Using Normal Attacks only with Swap Weaving

This is the simplest usage of 4OHC. Barbara is essentially an on-field driver that only makes use of Normal Attacks before being swapped off. Level 0 is the better option as opposed to Level 1 due to less time being wasted. It must be noted that Level 1 rotations can struggle to proc the maximum amount of damage from 4OHC passive.

Level 2: Including Charged Attacks

Level 2 rotations are quite demanding in terms of player skill. Players need to know how the enemy AI works, have good stamina management while maintaining good positioning to hit as many targets as possible with Barbara’s Charged Attacks. Level 2 rotations are well worth it, especially in multi-target scenarios as the maximum amount of damage from 4OHC passive can be achieved much more easily than with Level 1 rotations.

Level 3: Including Charged Attacks and Swap Cancels

Level 3 rotations are essentially Level 2 rotations but with the addition of Swap Cancels. The player now desyncs both rotations and Barbara’s attack strings. These rotations are the ones that give the highest damage, at the cost of being the most challenging to carry out. What makes Level 3 rotations exceptionally difficult is the fact that there is a lot of memorizing to be done. Between each swap, players need to memorize how many hits of field time are required to resync rotations. Normal Attacks count as 1 hit while Charged Attacks count as 4 hits. A combination of both must be used and there is no room for error. On top of this, the player will need to accommodate the 5s heal interval the Elemental Skill has. It is thus recommended for players to use the Level 2 rotations and use the extra time saved from swap canceling as a margin for error.

Team Compositions

Team images generated using Muakasan’s Team Portrait Generator.

4OHC Barbara teams are played in a quickswap manner. However, unlike traditional quickswap teams whereby characters swap in to use their Elemental Skills and Burst before swapping out (A>B>C), 4OHC Barbara teams require Barbara to be slotted in with those actions (Barbara+A > Barbara+B > Barbara+C). 4OHC Barbara will also run 1 Electro and 1 Cryo unit to proc Superconduct, which buffs 4OHC damage.

Barbara | Flex | Flex | Flex

4OHC Barbara teams are very flexible. Electro and Cryo Flex options are the best low investment options as they can proc Electro-Charged and Superconduct, which buffs the Physical damage from 4OHC. At high investments, the player can run virtually any character as long as they are suited for the content the player is facing.

Barbara | Fischl | Beidou | Rosaria

Beidou and Fischl provide a significant amount of constant off-field damage as well as Electro application. This pair also has a great synergy that makes them self-sufficient. Rosaria provides a CRIT Rate buff to the team as well as Cryo application to proc Superconduct.

Vaporize Barbara

Vape Barbara relies on using her Charged Attacks to proc Vaporize reactions. She has the 3rd highest Charged Attack MV amongst Catalyst users, allowing for some ridiculously high damage, leading to it being DPS Barbara’s damage ceiling.

Artifact Stats

The main stats that players will look for are ATK%/DMG%/CRIT. EM can be viable but it is a very niche option. Only Xiangling can allow Barbara to fully make use of the EM due to her Pyronado, which has no ICD. As mentioned previously, building for ER is not recommended as her Burst will only be used as a last resort and should not be expected in a rotation. 

Artifact Sets

Assumptions: Barbara C6 Lvl. 90/90 T9/12/12, Dodoco Tales Lvl. 90/90, 100 ER requirement, 20 fluid subs KQMC standards, 4NO buff, 4VV Shred.

Artifact Set	Vape CA Damage	vs 4WT	Notes
4 Wanderer’s Troupe	27,577	100%	Vape Barbara’s BiS Set. Heavily buffs her main source of damage and provides some EM to amplify Vaporize reactions.
4 Heart of Depth	23,758	86.15%	Alternative Set. Provides Barbara with Hydro DMG% and buffs her Normal and Charged Attacks after using her Elemental Skill, which also reduces the amount of Stamina needed to cast a Charged Attack.
2 Heart of Depth / 2 Shimenawa’s Reminiscence	23,079	83.69%	Hybrid Set. A combination of these 2 sets provide an ATK% buff and Hydro DMG% buff. Good substats on this hybrid set can allow it to perform better than the aforementioned 4 piece sets.
4 Shimenawa’s Reminiscence	22,962	83.27%	Alternative Set. Similar to 4HoD, after using her Elemental Skill, Barbara receives a buff to her Normal, Charged and Plunging Attacks. However, Barbara needs to have 15 Energy when casting her Skill for this passive to work. On top of that, Barbara immediately loses 15 Energy, making casting her Elemental Burst much more difficult.

Weapons

Assumptions: Barbara C6 Lvl. 90/90 T9/12/12, Weapon Lvl. 90/90, 100 ER requirement, 20 fluid subs KQMC standards, 4NO buff, 4VV Shred.

Weapon	Vape CA Damage (No Physical Damage)	vs Dodoco Tales R5	Notes
Skyward Atlas R1	33,023	119.75%	Vape Barbara’s BiS weapon. Provides a hefty amount of Hydro DMG% and serves as an ATK% stat stick. Favor of the clouds provides some extra damage as well.
Lost Prayer to the Sacred Winds R1	31,956	115.88%	Provides increasing amounts of Hydro DMG% the longer Barbara remains on-field and serves as a fantastic CRIT Rate stat stick. Can potentially overtake Skyward Atlas but requires a lot of Barbara field time to do so.
Memory of Dust R1	30,819	111.76%	Similar to Lost Prayer, Barbara will need to have a lot of field time to maximize the passive. Overall a very good ATK% stat stick that performs best when Barbara has a shield.
The Widsith R1	ATK% Buff: 29,400 EM Buff: 29,970 DMG% Buff: 29,315 No Buff: 27,365	ATK% Buff: 106.61% EM Buff: 107.95% DMG% Buff: 106.3% No Buff: 99.23%	Vape Barbara’s BiS 4 star weapon. Unlike some Catalyst users, Barbara can benefit from every buff provided by The Widsith, making it a very good option. Also a CRIT DMG stat stick.
Mappa Mare R1	28,877	104.71%	Vape Barbara’s BiS F2P weapon. Provides some EM to buff Vaporize reactions. Barbara is able to keep a long uptime on the maxed Hydro DMG% buff provided, as she will be constantly proccing Vaporize, making this a good complement to Vape Barbara.
Dodoco Tales R5	27,577	100.00%	Vape Barbara will be able to utilize this free weapon to its fullest potential as she will be doing combinations of Charged Attacks and N2C while she is on field. A very good option for her and is highly recommended.
Blackcliff Agate R1	27,365	99.23%	CRIT DMG stat stick that buffs Barbara’s ATK% for every enemy she defeats. Not worth the Starglitter which could have been a Bennett or Xingqiu.
Solar Pearl R1	27,076	98.18%	CRIT Rate stat stick that buffs Barbara’s Normal Attacks after using her Elemental Skill. Barbara cannot fully utilize this weapon’s passive and it is likely better used on other Catalyst users.
Frostbearer R1	26,752	97.01%	Free weapon that serves as an ATK% stat stick with some extra external damage from the passive. Not worth crafting if the player doesn’t already have the weapon.
Eye of Perception R1	26,166	94.88%	A stronger version of Frostbearer due to higher damage dealt by the passive.
Not PJC R1	26,166	90.93%	Support option. Slightly buffs Barbara’s Normal Attack damage and ensures higher healing.
Prototype Amber R1	25,075	82.61%	Support option. Similar to The Donut, players should only use it if they do not want to lose out on Barbara’s healing.
Favonius Codex R1	22,782	82.61%	Support option. Barbara can crit, unlike Kokomi, making her a possible Favonius holder, but there are always better options for holders in a team.
Thrilling Tales of Dragon Slayers R5	19,910	72.20%	Support option. Significantly reduces Barbara’s personal damage in exchange for the 48% ATK buff. The trade off may not be worth it.

Rotations and Attack Strings

The biggest downside to this playstyle is Stamina dependence. Each Charged Attack has a cost of 50 Stamina points, which is lowered to 44 when used in tandem with her Elemental Skill, thanks to her A1 passive. It can be tempting to do 5 Vaporize Charged Attacks that deal ~50k damage each at the cost of being hit, but Barbara is at the lowest in terms of her survivability in this playstyle, making this very difficult without risking her dying if Barbara does not have a sturdy shield or a ton of unwanted HP or DEF stats in her artifacts.

Charged Attack Spam

This is Vape Barbara’s Primary Attack String. This string of Charged Attacks will maximize damage output in a short period of time, but players will have to be mindful of her Stamina and the fact that she is vulnerable to animation cancels that do not deal damage but drain Stamina (knockback or dodging). 

Regardless of whether the Charged Attack costs 44 or 50 stamina points, the player should stop at the 3rd or 4th Charged Attack to ensure that Barbara has sufficient Stamina to dodge incoming attacks.

N2CJ

This is Vape Barbara’s Secondary Attack String. It is used to trigger reverse Vaporize reactions after the 3rd or 4th Charged Attack in her Primary Attack String, to help her regenerate Stamina while ensuring decent performance and safety from incoming attacks. 

With Anemo characters, multiple sources of Pyro application can be obtained which allows for some forward Vaporize reactions from time to time as well. This attack string is also generally recommended when going against enemies that stagger, knockback or hit hard. 

N4J

This is Vape Barbara’s Stamina Regeneration Attack String. It is generally used when Barbara has used up all her stamina. In this case, there are 2 options—swap Barbara out, or use this attack string and continue having her on-field.

The former is preferable to the latter as it offers room to charge up her Elemental Burst and for any other intermediate aspects that happen in between rotations.

Generally speaking, the optimal way to play Vape Barbara would be to use a combination of Charged Attack Spam and N2CJ. N4J should be avoided as much as possible and should only be used in situations where Barbara has run out of Stamina and swapping to another character does more harm than good. 

Team Compositions

Team images generated using Muakasan’s Team Portrait Generator.

Vape Barbara’s teams are fairly simple and flexible. She will need either 2 Pyro units for sufficient Pyro application, or 2 Anemo units to absorb the Pyro element for Barbara to proc Vaporize with. The player can also choose to replace the Anemo unit with a shielder to increase the team’s survivability at the cost of 4VV shred and possible crowd control. 

If the player wants to further optimize Vape Barbara, there are added steps to achieve this. Between each Charged Attack, Barbara can swap to another character to use their Elemental Skill/Burst before swapping back for another Vape Charged Attack. Depending on how long each action takes, Barbara becomes Stamina positive (has more Stamina than before swapping off) or Stamina neutral (has the same amount of Stamina compared to before swapping off) as opposed to being Stamina negative (has lower Stamina than before swapping off).

Examples:
1) Xiangling E > Barbara CA > Bennett E > Xiangling Funnel > repeat is Stamina positive

2) Barbara CA > 2 swaps > Barbara CA is Stamina positive

3) Barbara CA > Bennett Hold 1 E (or C4) > Barbara CA is Stamina neutral

Barbara | Anemo | Pyro | Pyro

Barbara | Anemo | Anemo | Pyro

Barbara | Shielder | Pyro | Pyro

Afterword

…And that’s it! I think I have addressed everything that I wanted to talk about and this is as comprehensive as it gets. Hopefully it has convinced you to try out different playstyles with Barbara or at the very least, help you optimize her in your current team. Do check back regularly as the guide will be updated with new artifacts and weapons when they are released. Anyways, that’s it from me. Until next time! -CQLQRS#7853

Special Thanks

• Risuke#6743 
• Alerine#1519
• Raven#9205
• Ai#7362
• Prévisible#7440

References

Risuke’s Weapon and Artifact Calculations:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1PvqQKre8GTd01gIMnoIUbEIb72F3wGiyuuNgDMbukp4/edit?usp=sharing