Why Raiden Shogun Became The Most Popular Character in Genshin Impact
With her banner raking in over $270 million dollars, Raiden Shogun has rapidly risen to take the crown as the most popular character in Genshin Impact. What is it exactly that has elevated the God of Thunder to achieve such coveted primogem pull priority amongst players?
Raiden‘s meteoric rise stems primarily from her flexibility as both a main DPS and support character, extreme power potential, and crucial role enabling the meta-defining Raiden National team. Both veteran spenders and free-to-play users alike find immense value in Raiden‘s versatile kit.
Why Raiden Shogun Became An Instant Hit
As the almighty Archon ruling over Inazuma, Raiden Shogun has an intriguing background and divine character design that inherent attracts player interest.
However, it is specifically Raiden‘s innovative mechanics and multiplier reactions that have made her a staple across various team archetypes:
Innovative Mechanics – Raiden‘s energy restoration support through her E skill battery provides a completely new form team synergy. Her hit-confirm burst forces players to master basic attack combos to maximize damage.
Extreme Damage Scaling – With investment into her talent levels, weapons, and optimal artifacts, Raiden‘s damage during her 7s burst mode can eclipse that of even traditional main DPS characters.
Seamless Flexibility – Raiden can comfortably fill either role of on-field burst damage dealer or off-field battery support with no caveats. This versatility makes her a universal slam dunk option.
F2P Viability – Unlike other 5-star characters, Raiden provides tremendous value and world-class support even at C0 constellation.
Enables Meta Teams – By providing copious energy restoration, Raiden enables teammates with high energy costs like Xiangling, Beidou, and Xingqiu to spam their bursts off cooldown reliably. This has given rise to defining teams like Raiden National.
Statistical Data Highlighting Raiden‘s Surge In Popularity
Let‘s look at some player data and statistics in Asia servers that quantify Raiden‘s overwhelming popularity:
- According to a JP poll, Raiden Shogun rated as most popular out of all archons by a large margin at 40.3% compared to Venti‘s 28.6% and Zhongli‘s 26.1%.
| Archon | Popularity % |
|---|---|
| Raiden Shogun | 40.3% |
| Venti | 28.6% |
| Zhongli | 26.1% |
CN usage rate data shows Raiden used in 36.2% of Spiral Abyss team comps, making her the 3rd most used character behind only Bennett and Xingqiu in the hardest PvE content.
Raiden Shogun ranks #1 out of all characters with a dominating 74% usage rate in CN version 3.3. Her C2 is also the 2nd most used constellation.
Raiden Shogun‘s banner revenue topped $270 million, which makes her the single highest grossing character banner in Genshin Impact, exceeding previous highs from popular waifus like Hu Tao.
Detailed Character and Kit Analysis
Now let‘s analyze Raiden Shogun‘s talents to understand exactly why she outputs such an overwhelming amount of damage and energizes team rotations:
Resolving Element Skill – This skill has standard particle generation to restore team energy on a short 5s cooldown. Hold E at max Resolve stacks also buffs burst damage by 30% unconditionally.
Secret Art: Musou Isshin – This converts Raiden‘s normal attacks during her 7s burst mode to deal additional Electro damage scaled on her burst talent level. With C6 these attacks ignore 60% of enemy DEF.
Engulfing Lightning (Signature Weapon) – Provides a 55.1% Electro damage bonus and increases Energy Recharge by 30.6%. This scales additional burst damage by 30% of her ER. Restores an extra 30 flat energy over the duration of her burst.
Raiden also gains major power spikes upon unlocking later constellations:
| Constellation | Raiden Buff |
|---|---|
| C1 | +60% DEF Ignore |
| C2 | +1 Burst Level (+7.5% DMG) |
| C3 | +3 Burst Level (+22.5% DMG) |
Strongest Raiden Shogun Team Compositions
Now let‘s analyze Raiden‘s best team archetypes in Genshin Impact:
Raiden National Team
With Raiden Shogun providing heavy energy restoration through her Elemental Skill and Burst, characters like Xiangling and Xingqiu can now spam their 80 energy cost elemental bursts off cooldown continuously.
| Unit | Role | Value Provided |
|---|---|---|
| Xiangling | Vape DPS | Raiden enables Pyronado spam for massive vaporize damage |
| Xingqiu | Hydro Applicator | Rain swords enable pyro Vaporizes |
| Bennett | ATK Buff | Massive Pyronado damage amplifier with Noblesse ATK buff |
| Raiden Shogun | Battery | Burst support fuels team rotations & deals big damage |
With amplifying reactions, ATK buffs, and AOE attacks going off nonstop, this famed "Raiden National Team" utterly demolished previous DPS benchmarks – becoming one of the highest DMG team comps in Spiral Abyss to this day.
Raiden Shogun Hypercarry
As a flexible on-field DPS, Raiden enables brute force Hypercarry setups were she assumes the role of the main attacker during her high damage Musou Isshin stance.
Example team:
| Unit | Role | Value Provided |
|---|---|---|
| Raiden Shogun | On-field Carry | Deals massive AOE damage in Burst mode |
| Sara / Bennett | ATK Buffers | Provide damage amplification |
| Anemo unit | VV Shred + Crowd Control | Reduces Electro RES for more damage |
| Flex spot | Utility | Zhongli shield, Yelan damage etc. |
With ATK buffs from Bennett/Sara, VV shred from Kazuha pull + Electro RES down, then DAMAGE focused weapons and artifacts, Raiden‘s Musou Isshin attacks can directly one-shot enemies by herself!
Closing Thoughts
In summary, Raiden Shogun‘s overwhelming versatility, unmatched battery and team support capabilities, combined with her extremely high damage potential make her one of the most universally valuable 5-star characters ever released in Genshin Impact.
It is this unmatched flexibility and ability to enable both stronger individual characters and synergistic team rotations that rocket boosted Raiden Shogun to her status as the undisputed most popular character.
Her reign over the meta and primogem pulls will undoubtably continue as more Inazuma characters are released that can utilize Raiden‘s unlimited flow of energy restoration to amplify reactions!
