Genshin Impact Childe build | Pocket Tactics
Genshin Impact’s Childe, also known as Tartaglia or Ajax, is a hydro bow user and one of the eleven Fatui Harbingers. His kit is very unique, but also quite tricky, allowing you to switch between melee and ranged attacks on the fly. So let’s take a look at the best Genshin Impact Childe build, including his role, best weapons, artifacts, and more.
If you need some help planning out a team, check out our Genshin Impact tier list. We’ve also got a Genshin Impact codes guide in case you need some extra primogems to wish for Genshin Impact’s Childe or any other characters you may be after. We also have build guides for all the other characters, including Genshin Impact’s Alhaitham, Genshin Impact’s Yaoyao, Genshin Impact’s Yoimiya, and more.
Here’s everything in our best Genshin Impact Childe build guide:
What’s the best Genshin Impact Childe build?
Childe is a hydro DPS with strong multi-target damage and fast hydro application that enables other members of his team. His burst deals high damage, and, in its ranged form, has low energy requirement, allowing you to use it more frequently. He’s pretty flexible when it comes to team comps, has a uniquely flexible rotation that switches between ranged and melee, and he isn’t constellation reliant, meaning you don’t need more than one copy for him to be a worthy member of your team.
On the other hand, he has lower individual damage output compared to many of the other five-star DPS on offer, and he heavily relies on a well-built team excel. Childe is also pretty tricky when it comes to the technicality of his skills, and you need some practice and dedication to manage his rotations well.
He can play multiple roles on a team depending on his allies, including main DPS, burst DPS, enabler, sub-carry, and even, in some situations, a support – though the latter isn’t widely recommended.
What’s the best Genshin Impact Childe weapon?
As a main DPS, the best weapon for Genshin Impact’s Childe is Polar Star, followed closely by Thundering Pulse and Aqua Simulacra. For burst DPS Childe, your best choice is Aqua Simulacra followed by Thundering Pulse and R5 Mouun’s Moon.
If you’re looking for something a bit more easily accessible, Viridescent Hunt is a good choice for main DPS Childe, and R5 Stringless is great for burst DPS Childe.
| Weapon | Effect | How to obtain |
| Polar Star | Base stat: crit rate Skill: elemental skill and elemental burst damage increases by 12%. After a normal attack, charged attack, elemental skill or elemental burst hits an opponent, gain one stack of Ashen Nightstar for 12 seconds. When 1/2/3/4 stacks of Ashen Nightstar are present, attack increases by 10/20/30/48%. Stacks of Ashen Nightstar created by the normal attack, charged attack, elemental skill or elemental burst are counted independently of the others |
Gacha |
| Thundering Pulse | Base stat: crit damage Skill: increases attack by 20% and grants the might of the Thunder Emblem. At 1/2/3 stacks, the Thunder Emblem increases normal attack damage by 12/24/40%. The user obtains one stack of Thunder Emblem in each of the following scenarios:
|
Gacha |
| Aqua Simulacra | Base stat: crit damage Skill: HP increases by 16%. When there are opponents nearby, the wielder’s damage dealt increases by 20%. This takes effect whether the character is on-field or not |
Gacha |
| Mouun’s Moon | Base stat: attack Skill: for every point of the entire party’s combined maximum energy capacity, the elemental burst damage of the equipping character increases by 0.12%, to a maximum of 40% |
Gacha |
| The Stringless | Base stat: elemental mastery Skill: increases elemental skill and elemental burst damage |
Gacha |
| Viridescent Hunt | Base stat: crit rate Skill: upon hit, normal and aimed shot attacks have a 50% chance to generate a cyclone, which continuously attracts surrounding opponents, dealing 40% of attack as damage every 0.5 seconds for four seconds. This effect can only occur once every 14 seconds |
Battle Pass reward |
What are the best Genshin Impact Childe artifacts?
Generally, the best artifact set for DPS Childe in most situations is Heart of Depth. However, if you don’t have a Genshin Impact’s Bennett to spare for your Childe team, you should combine two Heart of Depth and two Gladiator’s Finale.
For burst DPS Childe, you can combine two Noblesse Oblige with two Heart of Depth for a great damage boost. For a more in-depth breakdown, check out Kequing Mains’ super detailed guide.
| Artifact set | Effect | How to obtain |
| Heart of Depth | Two equipped: Hydro damage is increased by 15% Four equipped: After an elemental skill is used, normal and charged attack damage is increased by 50% for 15 seconds |
Peak of Vindagnyr domain, Dragonspine, Mondstadt |
| Gladiator’s Finale | Two equipped: attack +18% Four equipped: increases normal attack damage of the wielder by 35% if they use a sword, claymore, or polearm |
World and weekly bosses, artifact strongboxes, etc |
| Noblesse Oblige | Two equipped: Elemental burst damage is increased by 20% Four equipped: When an elemental burst is used, all party members’ attack is increased by 20% for 12 seconds |
Clear Pool and Mountain Cavern domain, Minlin, Mt. Aozang |
Stat and sub-stat recommendations
Main stat:
- Sands – attack% or elemental mastery
- Goblet – hydro damage%
- Circlet – crit rate/crit damage
Sub-stats:
- Crit rate/crit damage (try to maintain a 1:2 ratio)
- Attack%
- Elemental mastery
- Energy recharge
What are Genshin Impact Childe’s skills?
Here are all of Childe’s attacks and passive talents. As with many bow-wielding characters, we generally advise against using Childe’s normal ranged attacks as the damage they deal is negligible – that is, unless you’re going for a physical, bow-focused build with a physical damage goblet. If you want to learn about normal attack rotations in a physical, bow-focused Childe rotation, check out the breakdown on Keqingmains.
Outside of that, the most complicated part of Childe’s kit is working out how long to leave him in melee stance. The longer you leave him in melee stance, the longer the cooldown will be. Therefore, the ideal time scale for a comfortable 24 second rotation at C0 is to stay in melee mode for nine seconds, which gives you a cooldown of 15 seconds before you can activate it again.
If you want a more specific breakdown suited to your personal Childe build, you can check out this community-made Childe melee duration calculator. Or, for a simpler way of counting, you can use markers from other characters, such as Bennett’s burst buff, Fischl’s Oz duration, Beidou or Xingqiu’s aura durations, or even your stamina bar. Eventially you should get a feel for how long melee mode should last to suit your team, and it’ll become second nature – or, at least, it has for me!
Active skills
| Skill | Effect |
| Normal attack: Cutting Torrent | Normal: Perform six shots with a bow Charged: fire off an aimed shot with increased damage. When fully charged, the arrow deals hydro damage and applies the Riptide status. Enemies affected by riptide suffer from AoE hydro damage when you attack them.
|
| Elemental skill: Foul Legacy: Raging Tide | Tartaglia enters a melee stance and deals AoE hydro damage. In the melee stance, his attacks change in the following ways:
After 30 seconds, Tartaglia will return to his ranged stance |
| Elemental burst: Havoc: Obliteration | This move does different things depending on what stance Tartaglia is in:
|
Passive skills
| Skill | Effect |
| Never Ending | Extends riptide duration by eight seconds |
| Sword of Torrents | While in melee stance or when a normal or charged attack critically hits, riptide is applied to the enemy |
| Master of Weaponry | Increases party members’ normal attack levels by one |
What are Genshin Impact Childe’s constellations?
To make sure Genshin Impact’s Childe is as powerful as possible, you need to level up his constellations. You can do this after you obtain him as a duplicate when making a wish.
| Constellation | Effect |
| C1: Foul Legacy: Tide Withholder | Reduces the cooldown for Foul Legacy: Raging Tide by 20% |
| C2: Foul Legacy: Understream | When you defeat an opponent affected by riptide, you restore four elemental energy |
| C3: Abyssal Mayhem: Vortex of Turmoil | Increases the level of Foul Legacy: Raging Tide by three, to a maximum upgrade level of 15 |
| C4: Abyssal Mayhem: Hydrospout | If Childe is in Foul Legacy: Raging Tide’s melee stance, he triggers Riptide Slash against all on-field opponents affected by Riptide every four sexonds. Otherwise, he triggers Riptide Flash. Riptide Slashes and Flashes triggered by this constellation aren’t subject to the time intervals that typically apply to these two effects, nor do they have any effect on those time intervals |
| C5: Havoc: Formless Blade | Increases the level of Havoc: Obliteration by three, to a maximum upgrade level of 15 |
| C6: Havoc: Annihilation | When Childe casts Havoc: Obliteration in melee stance, the cooldown of Foul Legacy: Raging Tide resets when he returns to ranged stance |
What are Genshin Impact Childe’s ascension materials?
You need a lot of Starconch in order to ascend Tartaglia. We recommend searching around the beaches of Liyue to build up your stock of these. you also need the insignias from the Fatui skirmishers, pyro agents, and cicin mages, as well as cleansing hearts from the Oceanid world boss in Liyue.
| Required level | Mora | Materials |
| 20 | 20,000 | One Varunada Lazurite Sliver, three Starconch, three Recruit’s Insignia |
| 40 | 40,000 | Three Varunada Lazurite Fragment, two Cleansing Heart, ten Starconch, 15 Recruit’s Insignia |
| 50 | 60,000 | Six Varunada Lazurite Fragment, four Cleansing Heart, 20 Starconch, 12 Sergeant’s Insignia |
| 60 | 80,000 | Three Varunada Lazurite Chunk, eight Cleansing Heart, 30 Starconch, 18 Sergeant’s Insignia |
| 70 | 100,000 | Six Varunada Lazurite Chunk, 12 Cleansing Heart, 45 Starconch, 12 Lieutenant’s Insignia |
| 80 | 120,000 | Six Varunada Lazurite Gemstone, 20 Cleansing Heart, 60 Starconch, 24 Lieutenant’s Insignia |
What are Genshin Impact Childe’s talent level up materials?
As with any other character, you can level Genshin Childe’s normal attack, elemental skill, and elemental burst up to level ten. You need the following materials to level each of his talents/skills.
When leveling up his talents, the order you should prioritise them depends on how you intend to use him, as follows.
- Melee centric – elemental skill > elemental burst > normal attack
- Burst-focused DPS – elemental burst > elemental skill > normal attack
- Bow centric – normal attack > elemental burst > elemental skill
Here are all the materials you need in order to raise one of Childe’s talents to level ten. You can farm the freedom talent books from the Forsaken Rift domain on Mondays, Thursdays, and Sundays, and, once again, the insignias come from those dastardly Fatui. And yes, you need to fight Childe as a boss to level up his talents – which actually summarises his character pretty well, if you ask us.
| Talent level | Materials |
| Two | 12.5k mora, six recruit’s insignia, three teachings of freedom |
| Three | 17.5k mora, three sergeant’s insignia, two guide to freedom |
| Four | 25k mora, four sergeant’s insignia, four guide to freedom |
| Five | 30k mora, six sergeant’s insignia, six guide to freedom |
| Six | 37.5k mora, nine sergeant’s insignia, nine guide to freedom |
| Seven | 120k mora, four lieutenant’s insignia, four philosophies of freedom, one shard of a foul legacy |
| Eight | 260k mora, six lieutenant’s insignia, six philosophies of freedom, one shard of a foul legacy |
| Nine | 450k mora, nine lieutenant’s insignia, 12 philosophies of freedom, two shards of a foul legacy |
| Ten | 700k mora, 12 lieutenant’s insignia, 16 philosophies of freedom, two shards of a foul legacy, one crown of insight |
What are the best Genshin Impact Childe team comps?
Childe can fit into quite a wide range of teams due to his healthy hydro application and flexibility between ranged and melee stances. Unless you intend to focus on a more physical, bow-focused build, we generally recommend teams based around elemental reactions, so he can take full advantage of his kit.
Probably the most popular team comp for him is Childe national. Much like Raiden national, it pairs Childe with Xiangling and Bennett, who unite to offer off-field pyro application for vaporise reactions throughout Childe’s melee duration. Of course, Bennett’s burst also offers healing and a substantial attack buff that can truly see Childe’s damage soar.
Childe national is usually vaporise focused but, due to Chile supplying the hydro, it doesn’t require Xingqiu like Raiden National does – though he’s a great flex option. Alternatively, you can switch Xingqiu out for an anemo character that can offer crowd control and resistance shred, like Kazuha or Venti. You can also fill the slot with a geo like Zhongli, who offers a great shield to his pal.
Childe can also fit comfortably into electro-charged teams alongside characters like Beidou and Fischl, both of which help provide great markers for his melee duration.
But honestly, Childe can slip in just about anywhere – a comfy freeze team? He’s got you. Bloom or hyperbloom? No problem. Overload? Say no more, comrade. If you enjoy Childe’s playstyle and build him well, you can mould him to fit just about any team. Just have fun! You can also head over to the r/childemains sub-reddit for some great showcases and personal advice to suit your available pool of characters.
Here are some of our favourite team comps for you to peruse. Click on the character icons if you want to see their individual build guides, too.
Alright, comrade, that’s all we’ve got on Genshin Impact’s Childe, otherwise known as Ajax, otherwise known as Tartaglia, otherwise known as the best toy maker and big brother in the world. If you need more info on the other Genshin Impact Harbingers, take a look at our Genshin Impact Columbina and Genshin Impact Arlecchino guides. We’ve also got a bunch of guides for Hoyo’s other exciting RPG, including our Honkai Star Rail tier list and Honkai Star Rail codes.
