But generally: if you have time to learn and practice his rotations, then he’s worth pulling. Tartaglia’s strongest team – International – can easily carry you through every Spiral Abyss phase and battle content in-game. This team is a bit harder and more complicated to play, but it’s easy to learn with practice. Otherwise you’re better off pulling for another Hydro unit. This is because International is Tartaglia’s only meta team. If you can’t draft or use this team, then he loses a lot of his value. And there are other Hydro units that can replace him – like Xingqiu, Yelan, and Ayato. They will perform worse in International, but they’re much easier to play. Note: This is based on meta only. If you like Tartaglia regardless of his power level, don’t let this stop you from pulling him.
Pros & Cons
Tartaglia Strengths
Hydro is a very strong and contested element. It’s at the center of most meta teams, like vaporize, freeze, and electro-charged teams. Xingqiu is a 4-star Hydro unit that can fit into all of these teams – thus also making him a highly contested unit. Tartaglia has the benefit of effectively replacing Xingqiu in vaporize teams with Xiangling. This basically lets you use Xingqiu in another team that needs a Hydro unit. Plus, Tartaglia is a sizable upgrade from Xingqiu against AOE. The International team is easily among the strongest teams in-game. This team is composed of Tartaglia, Bennett, Xiangling, and Kazuha/Sucrose. Aside from Tartaglia, these are characters you likely already have – thus making it easily accessible if you pull for him. International mainly excels against AOE, but it’s also great against single-target. Its strength can make light work of every Spiral Abyss floor and battle content. Tartaglia has both a powerful burst and elemental skill. His burst has among the highest multipliers in-game. And at the start of every International team rotation, you can vaporize his burst – which effectively doubles its damage. This is great for speedruns and against content that has multiple waves. In speedruns, Tartaglia’s nuke burst can deal a significant amount of damage that one-shots opponents. And against content with multiple waves, his burst can one-shot the first wave of opponents. For the following waves, he’ll then switch to his elemental skill to deal sustained DPS. Tartaglia easily deals both nuke and sustained DPS every International team rotation. Not every attack applies an element. Instead, attacks have an Internal Cooldown or ICD. This is the time or number of hits between attacks that apply an element. Most abilities follow the Standard ICD of 2.5s or every 3 hits – this includes Tartaglia’s elemental skill. However, his Riptide has a separate ICD from his elemental skill’s Hydro infusion. This basically means that he applies double the amount of Hydro. Tartaglia’s strong Hydro application lets him enable multiple vaporize reactions. He can effectively enable vaporize for Xiangling’s burst, Xiangling’s Guoba, and Kazuha’s burst – thus all of these attacks gain the 1.5x damage multiplier from vaporize. Strong Hydro application also means that he’s especially great against shield-breaking. Tartaglia’s melee stance can easily shred Pyro shields – namely Pyro Abyss Mages and Pyro Abyss Lectors.
Tartaglia Weaknesses
A common misconception against Tartaglia is his long skill cooldown. Staying on his melee stance for too long will result in a longer cooldown, but this isn’t a major problem. The International team has very strict but smooth rotations. The entirety of Tartaglia’s cooldown is effectively spent by other teammates, so it isn’t an issue. Still, this requires you to have a good understanding of the team and its rotations. Without it, this team can feel very bad to play. For instance, you can lack energy for your Xiangling or greatly extend Tartaglia’s skill cooldown. This can be an issue for most players. International is a very strong team, but its damage output greatly depends on your mechanical skill and knowledge. International is Tartaglia’s only top meta team. He works in Taser (electro-charged teams), but it’s generally not recommended. There are far better Hydro units for this team. So if you don’t plan on using him in International, he loses a lot of value – to the point that he simply isn’t worth pulling in that case. In all of Tartaglia’s teams, he’s not the only one dealing damage. For instance, he often shares the same amount of team DPS contribution with Xiangling in the International team. This means that you need to build DPS units aside from Tartaglia – or else it’s a damage loss. Building characters is very expensive and time-consuming. This can be an issue for early-game players or those with lesser resources.
Are Tartaglia’s Constellations Worth Pulling?
Tartaglia has decent constellations, although he’s already very functional at C0. If you’re still going to pull for constellations, C1 is a good place to stop – but it’s still not needed. C1 is a decent quality-of-life buff that allows you to use his melee stance longer. It can also make his rotations slightly easier to play. But if you’re already very familiar with the International team’s rotations, this constellation is insignificant. Proper rotations already solve his cooldown issues. If you intend to pull for more constellations, here’s a more detailed look at each one.
C1: Foul Legacy: Tide Withholder
Reduces his skill cooldown by 20%. This lengthens Tartaglia’s melee stance uptime, which is a decent damage gain – but it isn’t a significant difference. It’s highly recommended to stop pulling for constellations here.
C2: Foul Legacy: Understream
He generates 4 energy when defeating an enemy marked by Riptide. This constellation is very inconsistent. Defeating multiple opponents already generates a lot of energy, thus making this constellation insignificant. And against fewer enemies – thus fewer kill counts – the energy generation isn’t noticeable. This constellation alone isn’t worth pulling. But if you already have a C2 Tartaglia, his C3 can be worth considering.
C3: Abyssal Mayhem: Vortex of Turmoil
Increases his elemental skill talent by 3. This increases his melee stance multipliers – which deals a sizable portion of his damage. C3 is basically just a good damage buff.
C4: Abyssal Mayhem: Hydrosprout
Riptide damage is dealt every 4s against opponents affected by Riptide. This constellation can either be a damage loss or gain depending on its timing. If the periodic Riptide damage steals a vaporize reaction from his burst, this is a massive damage loss. Still, it can boost his damage in other ways. C4 further increases his Hydro application. This lets him consistently enable Hydro-related reactions even while off-field. It also enables a niche Tartaglia build for freeze teams. Riptide’s periodic Hydro application lets him maintain the freeze status. This isn’t a recommended team comp, but it’s perfectly viable.
C5: Havoc: Formless Blade
Increases elemental burst talent by 3. This increases his elemental burst multipliers. Since his burst also deals a decent portion of Tartaglia’s damage, this is a good damage gain.
C6: Havoc: Annihilation
Casting Tartaglia’s melee burst resets his skill cooldown. This is mainly a quality-of-life constellation – it can essentially enable 100% uptime on his melee stance. But without enough Energy Recharge, you’re likely to encounter energy problems. And without casting your melee burst, this constellation is useless. Pulling for Tartaglia’s C6 simply isn’t recommended.
Polar Star vs. Skyward Harp for Tartaglia
With proper use of its passive, Polar Star is Tartaglia’s best weapon. It pulls ahead of all other 5-star bows by a decent margin – but not significant enough to recommend pulling for this bow. Skyward Harp is already a really strong weapon. So if you already have it, Polar Star loses some value. Plus, Harp is a standard 5-star weapon. This means that you can get from both the weapon and standard banner. But still, Polar Star is a great weapon that fits most DPS bow users. So if you want to spoil your Tartaglia a bit more, then this is a much better option than pulling for his constellations.
Thundering Pulse vs Aqua Simulacra for Tartaglia
Aqua Simulacra outperforms Thundering Pulse by a really small margin. Both weapons work great on Tartaglia so use whichever one you have. It’s also not recommended to pull for the other if you already have one of them.
Is Amos’ Bow Good for Tartaglia?
Yes. It’s still a 5-star bow with a high Base ATK and good passive. Amos’ Bow generally outperforms every 4-star option – but it’s also the worst 5-star option available. Still, it’s perfectly viable. If you have an Amos’ Bow but no Ganyu, Tartaglia can take good care of it for you.
How Important is 4-piece Heart of Depth?
Heart of Depth (HoD) is Tartaglia’s best artifact set – its passive is even tailor-made for him. But the gap between this and other artifact sets isn’t significant. So it’s recommended to just use your artifacts with better stats. For instance, a 2pc HoD and 2pc Gladiator’s Finale build with good stats will outperform a 4pc HoD build with worse stats. To help you out, here’s a ranking of his three best artifact builds: For substats, it’s best to prioritize CRIT, ATK, Elemental Mastery, and Energy Recharge. Just use the build with better mainstats and substats.
