Encore and Combat Backloading in WuWa

If you're like me, you may have seen Encore and thought "haha new Klee/Hook" before selecting her as a cute and strong DPS. You may or may not have then also played her and realized her combo is pretty much identical to Eula, who is well-known in Genshin for having backloaded damage that can be lost by a well-timed dodge by the enemy. For Encore, this actually goes a step further as her normal attack combo damage is backloaded into the finisher as well, having more than double the value of the previous attack and dodge counter.

This type of backloading in character attack patterns can conflict with the kind of highly active boss patterns you see in WuWa. For example, boss multi-attacks don't always leave enough time after a dodge for the combo finisher after a counter. Or the boss can literally just fly out of range and dodge the attack completely.

Additionally, this doesn't just extend to damage, but to support as well. Sanhua, one of the supports/hybrids with the fastest Concerto rotations, backloads most of her Concerto gauge build into ice detonation with a timed heavy attack. If the boss attack timing prevents you from detonating this ice, or worse, the boss dodges this detonation, you can lose significant outro buffs and important intro skill activations.

You can contrast a Sanhua/Encore setup with Danjin/Havoc Rover, the latter of whom both have powerful dodge counters. In Danjin's case, her dodge counter finisher is fast and builds a good amount of Forte gauge, which she can use to heavy attack for a good amount of Concerto gauge, so it doesn't slow her down much at all. Additionally, you can use Liberation whenever and there's little risk of being dodged due to timestop.

With three different gauges to fill, and an outro skill system that tries to lock you into a support -> hybrid -> DPS rotation, Wuthering Waves has a surprising amount of backloading in combat systems. These systems all interact with each other too, with Forte and Liberation building Concerto gauge, which in turn gives the next character an outro buff and an intro skill, which depletes boss super armor and builds more gauge. It's a very theme-fitting system for WuWa, having all of your characters work in concert and building to a crescendo.

But similarly, it means that characters with a more rigid, backloaded kit may be more easily impeded by the enemy, and then you may death spiral into longer rotations, buffs falling off, fewer burst windows, and lower damage, which opens you up to more oneshot attempts by the boss, like a band playing for an audience that has a ready and willing supply of tomatoes.

Note that none of this is necessarily a bad thing, it's just characters having flaws and matchups, which does result in emergent complexity in the game overall (though whether it's fun complexity may be a matter of personal taste). But it is an important aspect of character kits to consider when pulling for new characters that I haven't really seen discussed that often, and it's also an area that might be power crept in future characters