Cartethyia

Quick Verdict

Pull Cartethyia if you like her and you can build her team. She is a DPS, so personal preference matters more here than it would for a universal support — if she is a character you want to play, she is worth pulling, and at S0 she is already a complete main DPS.

Cartethyia is team-dependent. Her whole kit keys off Aero Erosion staying on the target, and she cannot keep it stacked alone through a full rotation. Her number 1 team right now is Cartethyia, Chisa and Ciaccona — more on this in Team Fit & Account Value. Ciaccona is the partner she least wants to lose; the third slot is Chisa at the premium end or Rover Aero for free.

At S0, Cartethyia is complete: both forms, her full combo, and her finisher all work without sequences. For low spenders, S0 is enough. If you want vertical investment, S2 is the first realistic stopping point — the page's sequence chart jumps to 184% there — with S3 (254%) as the next step and S6 (353%) as the whale ceiling.

How Cartethyia Works

Cartethyia has two forms, and every rotation is one trip through both: Cartethyia (her base form) sets up the field, then her Liberation transforms her into Fleurdelys, where all of her real damage happens.

Step one — base form: summon three Sword Shadows and stack Aero Erosion. Three different moves each summon a Sword Shadow (each type lasts 20 seconds, one of each at a time) and inflict Aero Erosion:

• Her Intro Skill inflicts 2 stacks of Aero Erosion and summons Sword of Discord's Shadow.
• Basic Attack Stage 4 inflicts 1 stack and summons Sword of Divinity's Shadow.
• Her Resonance Skill inflicts 2 stacks and summons Sword of Virtue's Shadow.

That is 5 stacks of application from her opening alone — more than the default Aero Erosion cap of 3. Whether those extra stacks actually land depends on a teammate raising the cap, which is a large part of why her partners matter (see Team Fit & Account Value).

Step two — recall the Shadows. Her Mid-air Attack recalls all active Sword Shadows, and each recalled type grants its matching buff for her transformed state: Heart of Virtue (Basic Attack Stage 4 creates a field that Stagnates targets, plus resistance to interruption), Mandate of Divinity (Aero Erosion damage against enemies near Fleurdelys is Amplified by 50% and ticks twice as fast), and Power of Discord (after her key Fleurdelys hits, the Aero Erosion stacks on all nearby targets are raised to the highest count among them — her multi-target tool). Recalling all three Shadows is what arms her full transformed state, which is why the tested rotation always summons all three first.

Step three — transform. Her Liberation, A Knight's Heartfelt Prayers, cuts her HP to 50% of Max HP (no cost if she is already below 50%), transforms her into Fleurdelys, and starts the Manifest state for 12 seconds. Entering Manifest clears all Conviction — Conviction is the gauge her Fleurdelys attacks build on hit, and it only matters inside the state.

Step four — the Fleurdelys combo and the finisher. Fleurdelys has her own moveset: a 5-stage Basic string, mid-air attacks, an Enhanced Heavy Attack, and a two-part Skill — Sword to Answer Waves' Call (a pulling force field) followed by May Tempest Break the Tides (a giant Sword Shadow crush that also pulls). One condition to respect: if May Tempest Break the Tides is not cast soon after the first Skill — or if she swaps out — the Skill goes on cooldown and the follow-up is lost, so the two parts are always cast back to back.

Three of Fleurdelys's hits — Basic Attack Stage 5, Mid-air Attack Stage 2, and May Tempest Break the Tides — instantly trigger 1 instance of Aero Erosion damage and reduce the target's stack count by 1. In other words, she spends Erosion stacks during her combo to cash them in as immediate procs. This is her kit's central failure point: if the target has no Aero Erosion when one of these hits lands, the proc does nothing — and the same condition gates her Echo set bonus, her signature weapon's amplification, and her own Inherent Skill (targets with 1–3 stacks take 30% more damage from her; above 3 stacks they take 10% more per extra stack, up to +30% more, for 60% total at 6 stacks). Everything she does wants Erosion on the target at all times, and everything she does keeps consuming it — her team has to keep refilling it.

When Conviction reaches 120, her Liberation becomes Blade of Howling Squall: the finisher. It removes all Conviction, ends Manifest, restores 50% of her Max HP, and deals Aero damage in a line — and on hit it removes all Aero Erosion stacks from the target, with each stack removed Amplifying the hit by 20%, up to 5 stacks (100%). The finisher's damage therefore depends on how many stacks are still on the target when it lands, which is the second reason her team must keep feeding Erosion through her combo.

She also has a free Avatar swap: below 120 Conviction, pressing Liberation flips her back to Cartethyia (pausing the Manifest timer), and casting it again returns her to Fleurdelys (resuming the timer), with no Energy cost. The tested rotation does not need it, but it is useful tech when a fight forces you off the field mid-Manifest.

Her Outro Amplifies the Aero damage of the active teammate (anyone other than her) against targets with Negative Statuses by 17.5% for 20 seconds. It is a minor part of her value: in her number 1 team she Outros into Chisa, whose damage is Havoc, so the buff does nothing there; with Rover Aero behind her it does buff an Aero teammate.

Her tested rotation — about 14 seconds of field time, and identical in all 11 of her tested teams:

Intro > Basic 2, 3, 4 > Skill > Mid Air Swords > Echo > Liberation > Skill 1 > Skill 2 > Basic 3, 4, 5 (Dodge Cancel) > Basic 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 (Liberation Cancel) > Liberation

One stable rotation to learn — there is exactly one version of it in the tested data.

Build Priorities

Cartethyia's tested damage profile, with Ciaccona and Rover Aero in the team:

• Basic Attack: 55.66%
• Resonance Liberation: 29.09%
• Resonance Skill: 10.98%
• Intro Skill: 2.76%
• Echo Skill: 1.50%

Build her as a Basic-attack-heavy HP carry with a big Liberation finisher — not as an ATK-scaling sword DPS. (The page notes that adding Sanhua pushes her Basic Attack share even higher.)

• Sub-stat priority: Crit Rate, Crit DMG, HP%, Basic Attack DMG Bonus, Liberation DMG Bonus, Energy Regen. ATK% is effectively a dead stat on her — it only feeds her Echo's damage, about 1.5% of her total.
• Talent priority: Normal Attack Lv. 10, Forte Circuit Lv. 10, Resonance Liberation Lv. 10, Resonance Skill Lv. 6, Intro Skill Lv. 6.
• Build targets: HP 48,000–50,000, Crit Rate 73–75%, Crit DMG 270–275%, Energy Regen 120–125% (she transforms every rotation, so the Liberation must be ready on time), Basic Attack DMG 15–20%.

Her Echo set is Windward Pilgrimage with Reminiscence: Fleurdelys as the main Echo (10% Aero DMG Bonus, plus another 10% because the wearer is Cartethyia). The main-stat answer is unusual and worth understanding: the page's comparison, calculated with her signature weapon, puts 1× Cost 4 Crit Rate + 1× Cost 4 Crit DMG + 3× Cost 1 HP at 100% — no Cost 3 Echoes at all — with 2× Aero Cost 3 at 96.20% and an HP/Aero Cost 3 mix at 94.12%. The reason is her stat profile: HP is her scaling stat, while Aero DMG Bonus is already flooded by her own buffs (Windward's 2-piece and 5-piece give 40%, Reminiscence adds 20%), so more Aero% adds little and HP main stats win.

Her best weapon is Defier's Thorn, her signature, and as a main DPS she is exactly the character who should have her signature at R1: it is the only sword that gives HP, her main damage stat, plus DEF ignore and a 20% damage amplification against targets carrying Aero Erosion. The page comparison shows how structural the gap is: Defier's Thorn R1 at 100%, Red Spring R1 at 77.73% (reaching 82.06% only in the more Basic-Attack-heavy Combo 2 referenced in the weapon notes), Blazing Brilliance at 74.65%, Emerald of Genesis at 72.77%, Unflickering Valor at 70.49%, and the 3-star Guardian Sword R5 at 69.30% as a purely temporary HP holder. Red Spring is the real backup plan if the signature is not an option.

Team Fit & Account Value

Cartethyia's best team is clear: her number 1 team is Cartethyia, Chisa and Ciaccona. The live cards include faster and normal-paced variants of this trio (the "Fast Ciaccona" entries), and Cartethyia, Rover Aero and Ciaccona is the close free alternative built the same way. Use the live Team DPS section for the current tested compositions, ordering, DPS values, equipment, and rotations — those cards update from the validated projection.

Ciaccona is the partner she least wants to lose. Cartethyia spends Aero Erosion stacks all through her Fleurdelys combo, and Ciaccona's Liberation keeps applying stacks from off-field while that happens — she is the engine that keeps the target eroded for the procs, the set bonus, the weapon amp, and the finisher. Her Outro also Amplifies Aero Erosion damage dealt to targets near the active Resonator by 100% for 30 seconds, which covers Cartethyia's field window, and she deals real sub-DPS damage of her own. The tested data is blunt about the alternative: every tested Cartethyia team without Ciaccona loses a large share of its damage.

Chisa is the premium third slot, and she fits for a specific reason: none of her buffs are ATK-based, so they all work on an HP scaler. Her Outro raises the target's Negative Status stack cap by 3 — that is what lets Cartethyia's 5-stack opening actually land, unlocks the above-3-stacks half of her Inherent Skill (up to the full 60% damage taken), and feeds the finisher's 5-stack amplification cap. Her Thread of Bane gives 18% DEF ignore against marked targets, and it works on Cartethyia's dual-typed hits — strikes like her three-sword recall hit, which count as both Basic Attack damage and Negative Status damage — though it does not increase the raw Erosion ticks, since those are the status's own damage. Grouping, healing, and shields come on top. This is also where Suisui fails her: Suisui's package is built on ATK buffs, and ATK buffs do almost nothing for a character whose damage scales with HP.

Rover Aero is the free third slot and a genuinely close alternative: their Outro grants Aeolian Realm, raising the target's Aero Erosion cap by 3 — the same key unlock Chisa provides — and their Liberation heals, which pairs with Cartethyia's Inherent Skill (Rover Aero restores 25 Windstrings upon casting Omega Storm when she is in the team). Cartethyia's own Outro buff lands on an Aero teammate here instead of being wasted. Shorekeeper is the tested generalist sustain alongside Ciaccona, and Sanhua anchors the budget hypercarry team with Rover Aero: her Outro gives the next character 38% Basic Attack DMG Deepen, and more than half of Cartethyia's damage is Basic Attack damage.

Her honest limits, stated plainly: her second slot belongs to Ciaccona and her third slot belongs to whoever raises the Erosion cap; ATK-based supports are wasted on her; and her Outro buff only reaches Aero teammates. Opportunity cost also cuts both ways — Chisa is wanted by other Negative Status teams (she is in Xuanling's number 1 team), and Ciaccona anchors other Aero setups, so check where yours are committed.

Sequence Value

Cartethyia is complete at S0 — both forms, the full Fleurdelys combo, and Blade of Howling Squall all function without sequences. The page's sequence damage chart: S0 100% → S1 115% → S2 184% → S3 254% → S4 273% → S5 273% → S6 353%.

• S1 — Crown Destined by Fate (5/5): Comfort plus a real damage ramp. Whenever Fleurdelys's Conviction crosses 30/60/90/120, she gains 25% Crit DMG for 15 seconds, up to 4 stacks — +100% Crit DMG at full ramp, removed after the finisher. The chart's calculation applies it progressively through the rotation, with the finisher itself enjoying the full 100%. The Zeal mechanic (carrying stack counts over to the next target after a kill) is multi-target quality of life. 115% on the chart.
• S2 — Blade Broken by Tempest (5/5): The first real stopping point, at 184%. Transforming raises the Aero Erosion cap of nearby targets by 3, her next hit applies 3 stacks to all of them, and it immediately triggers Erosion damage once without consuming stacks. Read together with her kit, the cap raise alone unlocks three things at once: her 5-stack opening lands in full, the above-3-stacks half of her Inherent Skill activates (up to 60% damage taken at 6 stacks), and the finisher can reach its 5-stack amplification cap without a teammate's help. On top it adds +50% multipliers to her base-form attacks and +200% to her Mid-air Attack, plus Skill cooldown refund per recalled Shadow type.
• S3 — Prisoner Hanged in the Tower (5/5): Her key Fleurdelys hits now inflict 2 stacks each, so she feeds her own procs and finisher instead of relying fully on the team, and Blade of Howling Squall's multiplier is increased by 100%. 254% on the chart — the second stopping point.
• S4 — Sacrifice Made for Salvation (3/5): A team node. After anyone in the team inflicts any Negative Status, the whole team gains 20% DMG Bonus for all Attributes for 20 seconds — permanent uptime in her teams, since Erosion is applied constantly. 273%.
• S5 — Hope Reshaped in Storms (2/5): Pure comfort: a once-per-10-minutes shield against a fatal blow, and the transformation's HP cost drops from 50% to 25% of Max HP. The chart does not move.
• S6 — Freedom Found in Storm's Wake (5/5): Her whale ceiling at 353%. Blade of Howling Squall raises the target's Erosion stacks to maximum instead of removing them, targets take 40% more damage from Fleurdelys, and for 30 seconds after her key casts, any Resonator in the team inflicting Erosion on a max-stacked target immediately triggers its damage once. Her stack economy stops being a constraint entirely.

Pull Value