Background
Barbara is a 4-star Hydro catalyst user from the region of Mondstadt. She is currently the deaconess of the Church of Favonius and sister to the Acting Grandmaster of Favonius Jean. Barbara first appeared within the story when the Traveler must steal the Holy Lyre der Himmel to calm the raging Stormterror.
Barbara is a well-loved figure in Mondstadt because of her cheerful personality and love of the people she helps. She has garnered many fans because of her charming personality and singing abilities. Barbara would sing for the people of Mondstadt, brightening up their day and clearing away their worries and doubts. At first, the people of Mondstadt weren’t a big fan of her songs, but grew to love them over time. She even has a dedicated fan club now that would do anything to make her day better.
Fun Fact: Barbaras has a love of spicy food.
Barbara often feels that she is in the shadow of her sister Jean. She still loves and cares for her sister, but wishes to be recognized by others to an extent. As a deaconess of the church, it is Barbara’s job to heal any injured person she sees. She has become a powerful healer sought out by many because of her Hydro vision. She received her vision due to her great faith and desire to heal the wounded through her songs. Barbara is also known to be a hard worker, often taking up the hard task at the church just by herself.
Barbara Skill Talents
Barbara is a natural healer as a skill set allows her to keep herself and the party healthy. She has a weaker Base ATK than other characters, but that doesn’t impact her ability to heal your team. Barbara is also great to apply the Hydro element to enemies and trigger reactions. She can be used as your Main DPS, but will struggle against Hydro slimes and enemies with Hydro elemental auras. As a Main DPS, her normal attack will be your main use, as both her elemental skill and burst do not deal a lot of damage.
Barbara’s normal attack, Whisper of Water, will deal up to 4 Hydro attacks to the enemy. Her charged attack will deal Hydro DMG in an AoE. The base damage output is on par with other catalysts users, besides Klee who has a higher damage in her normal attack. Barbara’s normal attack will be needed to heal the party after she uses her elemental skill. You can ignore leveling it up if you are focused more on her healing output than her damage with he normal attack. At C4, Barbara’s charged attack will also generate energy for her when she hits an enemy with it.
Barbara’s elemental skill, Let the Show Begin, will summon music droplets to surround her for 15 seconds. When first cast, her skill will form a Melody Loop to deal Hydro DMG to enemies and apply Hydro to nearby enemies.
The Melody Loop will give Barbara the following buffs:
- Barbara’s normal attack will heal the entire party and nearby allies. The healing scales off her Max HP
- Barbara’s charged attack will heal four times as much as her normal attack
- Restores a set amount of HP at regular intervals to the active member of the party
- Applies the Wet status to the active character and nearby enemies that come into contact with the loop.
This elemental skill is a great healing ability, but it comes with a 32-second cooldown. It also requires Barbara to stay on the field and attack to heal the team. However, you can also switch out and have her timed intervals heal another member. If you switch out, the max health tick another character can have is 3, because Barbara will use one on yourself. This can change to 4 ticks when her ascension 4 effect is active. Each continuous health tick will occur every 4.75 seconds. The skill can deal damage, but its main use will be to heal. Barbara’s elemental skill is also great to apply the Wet status to nearby enemies.
Players will also need to be cautious of their surroundings because it will also apply Wet to your character with every tick. This will mean that characters will be frozen if they are affected by Cryo or be dealt Electro DMG if Electro-charged is triggered. It can be used to self-clean your active character of any element as well.
Barbara’s elemental burst, Shining Miracle♪, will heal nearby allies and your entire party by a large amount. Like her elemental burst, Barbara’s healing from her elemental burst will scale off her Max HP. It does not deal damage to enemies and will only heal. Her elemental burst has a cooldown of 20 seconds, but an energy cost of 80. This high energy cost can be minimized by adding another Hydro character into the team or by unlocking her constellation levels.
In co-op, Barbara is best used as the healer of the team to keep the damage dealers healthy. If she falls, the team will have a hard time keeping their healths up. She can also be used to apply Hydro to enemies for reactions.
Barbara Passive Talents
Barbara’s passive talents allow her to cook more healing dishes and boost the healing output of her elemental skill.
Barbara’s first passive talent, With My Whole Heart♪, has a 12% of obtaining another product when she is used to perfectly cook a healing dish. This talent is great to get more dishes, but it will not always take effect. Barbara shares similar talents with both Diona and Jean, so her talent is not unique if you have the other characters.
Her first ascension talent, Glorious Season, reduces the stamina consumption of any character within her elemental skill by 12%. Barbara’s elemental skill will surround the active character for 15 seconds. While under the effects of her elemental skill, characters will be able to sprint for more distance without running out of stamina. It can also help decrease the burden of using a charged attack. Barbara will heavily be relying on this talent, as her charged attacks will be the main focus for her DPS output. She will also need her charged attack to heal at a higher rate, as her elemental skill will boost the healing effectiveness of her charged attack. Glorious Season works on other party members, making it a great support skill for those who rely on stamina for their charged attack like Hu Tao.
Barbara’s ascension 4 talent, Encore, will extend the duration of her elemental skill when the active party member gains an elemental orb or particle. The skill’s duration will increase by 1 second for each elemental particle/orb collected, and the maximum duration increased is 5 seconds. This ascension talent will extend the number of ticks that will heal your character by 1 if the maximum duration is reached. It does require characters to collect an elemental orb or particle, but it works on any active party member. If used on Barbara herself, this passive talent will increase her time she can heal the party with her normal and charged attack.
Barbara will get a boost to her HP% based on her ascension rank.
| With My Whole Heart♪ Unlocked Automatically When a Perfect Cooking is achieved on a dish with restorative effects, Barbara has a 12% chance to obtain double the product. |
| Glorious Season Unlocked at Ascension 1 The Stamina Consumption of characters within Let the Show Begin’s Melody Loop is reduced by 12%. |
| Encore Unlocked at Ascension 4 When your active character gains an Elemental Orb/Particle, the duration of Let the Show Begin’s Melody Loop is extended by 1s. The maximum extension is 5s. |
Barbara Constellations
As a healer, Barbara will not need her constellation levels to be viable as her main role will be to keep your team healthy. However, it will be useful to improve her overall energy output and decrease the cooldown of her elemental skill at C2. If she is used as a DPS, she will need her C2 that will give her a 15% Hydro DMG Bonus.
At C1: Gleeful Songs, Barbara will regenerate 1 energy every 10 seconds. Her burst costs 80 energy, making it even more important to invest in her energy recharge. 1 energy every 10 seconds is rather low, but is a nice passive boost that will work in the background as your Main DPS attacks the enemies.
C2: Vitality Burst should be the minimum constellation your Barbara should be at to be viable as a DPS. This constellation will decrease the cooldown of her elemental skill by 15%. This will bring her elemental skill cooldown from 32 seconds to 27.2 seconds. That is roughly about 4.8 seconds you will save. The main use of this talent will be the 15% Hydro DMG Bonus to any active party member while her elemental skill is in effect. This will boost the Hydro DMG of Barbara or any Hydro character on your team like Xingqiu or Childe. Barbara’s C2 allows her to become a support character for any Hydro DPS character. This constellation will only work for your character in co-op.
At C4: Attentiveness be My Power, Barbara will regain 1 energy for any enemy she hits with her charged attack. The maximum amount of energy she can regain with a charged attack is 5. The effectiveness of this constellation will depend on the number of enemies around Barbara. It will also be helpful if Sucrose or Venti pulls in the enemies for Barbara to easily hit them. Ultimately, this constellation will help recharge Barbara’s burst faster, allowing her to heal the team more often.
C6: Dedicating Everything to You will only work if Barbara is not the main character on the field, so it will be useless in co-op when she is the only character you are playing as. This constellation will automatically activate when one of her characters falls in battle. At C6, Barbara will revive that character to 100% of their Max HP. This effect is great to save you from a tough battle like in the Abyss or a boss fight. It is also helpful to revive you when you accidentally fall from a high place. However, this effect can only occur every 15 minutes, so you can’t overuse it.
| Constellation Levels | Effects |
|---|---|
| C1: Gleeful Songs | Barbara regenerates 1 Energy every 10s. |
| C2: Vitality Burst | Decreases the CD of Let the Show Begin by 15%. During the ability’s duration, your active character gains 15% Hydro DMG Bonus. |
| C3: Star of Tomorrow | Increases the level of Shining Miracle by 3. Maximum upgrade level is 15. |
| C4: Attentiveness be My Power | Every opponent Barbara hits with her Charged Attack regenerates 1 Energy for her. A maximum of 5 energy can be regenerated in this manner with any one Charged Attack. |
| C5: The Purest Companionship | Increases the level of Let the Show Begin by 3. Maximum upgrade level is 15. |
| C6: Dedicating Everything to You | When Barbara is not on the field, and one of your characters in the party falls: Automatically revives this character. Fully regenerates this character’s HP to 100%. This effect can only occur once every 15 mins. |
Recommended Builds
Healer Build
This build for Barbara focuses on her healing output and her role as a healer on your team. She will not be able to heavily damage the enemies, but will make sure your team is alive. This build can work for any constellation level for Barbara. The talents you need to level up are Barbara’s skill and burst. Her normal attack is optional as her damage output doesn’t affect her healing.
As a healer, Barbara can work in many teams. The team I have laid out will rely on the Electro-charge reaction with Keqing as the Main DPS. She can be replaced with any character for your own team like Diluc who can trigger Vaporize. Sucrose is a great support character with the power to boost the reaction damage of the team. Xingqiu and Barbara will be in charge of giving the Hydro element to enemies with Keqing and trigger Electro-charge. He can also act as a healer, but Barbara should be enough to heal the team. Having two Hydro characters will also raise the Max HP of the entire team and help Barbara and Xingqiu recharge their bursts faster.
For Barbara’s recommended weapon, I wouldn’t go for a 5-star weapon because it would be wasted on a Healer Barbara who isn’t meant to deal damage. You should go for the 4-star Prototype Amber or the 3-star Thrilling Tales of Dragon Slayers. The Prototype Amber is a craftable weapon and increases Barbara’s Max HP. Using her elemental burst will regenerate energy for 6 seconds every 2 seconds. This weapon will also recover the HP of all party members during the duration of its effects. This weapon works great to increase Barbara’s healing output with both its passive boost and skill.
Your second option is the 3-star Thrilling Tales of Dragon Slayers. This weapon will also increase her Max HP. It will give any character that Barbara switches to an attack buff for 10 seconds. This buff is 48% if you have the weapon at refinement 5. Although it is a 3-star weapon, this weapon helps boost Barbara’s healing and provides support for your DPS. It won’t heal as much as the Prototype Amber, but will allow Barbara to support her team. It is also great for the early game.
The 4-star Sacrificial Fragments is another great option for Barbara. This weapon will increase her elemental mastery, allowing her reactions to deal more damage. Damaging an enemy with her elemental skill has a chance to reset the cooldown of her elemental skill. This weapon counters Barbara’s long elemental skill cooldown, allowing her to use it more often.
If you have a +50% Crit Rate on your artifact’s sub-stats, the 4-star Favonius Codex may be a viable option for you. This weapon has an energy recharge sub-stat and will allow Barbara to gain energy for the team when she lands a critical hit. This weapon works for Barbara because she is required to hit the enemy with her normal attack to heal with the effects of her elemental skill.
For Barbara’s recommended artifact set, you will want to go for a 4-piece Maiden Beloved. This set will boost her healing, allowing her to keep the team alive. It is meant for a full-healer and will not be useful if you want to deal damage with Barbara.
For the early game, use the 4-piece The Exile to gain an energy recharge boost and restore energy for the entire team when Barbara uses her burst.
The stats on Barbara’s artifacts should be:
- Sands: HP% or Energy Charge
- Goblet: HP%
- Circlet: Healing Bonus% or HP% or Energy Recharge
The sub-stats should be HP, Energy Recharge, & EM. Crit Rate, Crit DMG, ATK% are decent, but won’t be fully utilized with this build. The main things you need to focus on are Barbara’s HP and energy recharge.
DPS Build
Barbara’s elemental skill and burst aren’t designed to deal damage. However, you can still build up your normal & charged attack if you want to go for a DPS Barbara. You will also want to prioritize reaction damage as that will be the best way for Barbara to deal damage. A C2 Barbara is recommended to maximize her damage output as a DPS character.
For her teammates, I recommend using two Pyro characters to get the Pyro team resonance that will give the team a 25% ATK increase. Bennett has a great support burst that will increase Barbara’s ATK and heal her as well. Xiangling will serve as a battery for Bennett’s burst, but can also be used to create Pyro actions with Barbara. Lastly, Sucrose will serve as reaction support for the team because she can share her elemental mastery with Barbara and increase the power of Vaporize.
For her recommended weapon, the 5-star Lost Prayer to the Sacred Winds will help increase Barbara’s Crit Rate. It will also increase her movement speed and elemental damage when in a battle. The elemental damage boost is great for Barbara to deal more damage with her normal attack. This bonus can stack up to 4 times and occur every 4 seconds. The buff will last until Barbara falls or leaves the field. Another great 5-star weapon for Barbara is the Everlasting Moonglow, which increases her healing bonus and HP. Barbara’s normal attack will also be increased by a portion of her Max HP and will also restore a bit of energy for 12 seconds after she casts her burst.
The 5-star Skyward Atlas can also be a viable option and will increase her ATK instead of Crit Rate. It will boost Barbara’s elemental damage and can summon a cloud that will attack the enemies. The 5-star Memory of Dust will also boost her attack, but requires a shield generator like Zhongli on the team for it to be effective.
The Widsith is Barbara’s 4-star recommended weapon. This weapon has a passive increase in Crit DMG and allows Barbara to take on one random effect for 10 seconds when she enters the field.
- Recitative: Increases Base ATK
- Aria: Increases all Elemental DMG
- Interlude: Increases Elemental Mastery
The amount of the buffs will depend on the refinement level. Although it is random, each boost still increases Barbara’s damage output. However, it can only occur every 30 seconds, which makes it less useful in battle. A decent substitute for this weapon is the 4-star Blackcliff Agate from the shop. It will help increase her overall critical damage. However, this weapon requires you to defeat an enemy first before its passive effect can activate. This makes the weapon useless in a boss fight, but it can still increase the power of her critical damage.
The 4-star Solar Pearl from the battle pass is decent for Barbara and increases her Crit Rate. Using her burst or normal attack will increase her normal attack and vice versa. The only downside is that her burst and elemental skill can’t be used too often or you will waste the heal. The increase in damage to her burst and elemental skill will also be hindered as they don’t do damage to the enemies.
For craftable weapons, go for the 4-star Mappa Mare. This weapon will boost Barbara’s elemental mastery and give her an elemental damage bonus when she triggers reactions. You can also use the Frostbearer, but that will require a Cryo character on the team to fully utilize its icicle effect.
For Barbara’s recommended artifact set, go for the 4-piece Heart of Depth. This set will increase the wearer’s Hydro DMG and increase Barbara’s normal & charged attack damage after using her elemental skill. You can also use the 4-piece Wanderer’s Troupe to boost her elemental mastery and charged attack. The Heart of Depth is more situational as you will have to wait for the cooldown of her elemental skill for the effect to take place, but will increase Barbara’s normal attack as well. Go for the Wanderer’s Troupe if you want an unconditional boost and will mostly use Barbara’s charged attack.
The main artifact stats should be:
- Sands: ATK%
- Goblet: Hydro DMG Bonus%
- Circlet: Crit DMG or Crit Rate
The sub-stats should be Crit DMG, Crit Rate, ATK%, EM, & ATK.
Sub-DPS Barbara
As a sub-DPS, Barbara will make use of the Ocean-Hued Clam to deal physical damage on nearby enemies based on the amount of healing she provides the Sea-Dyed Foam. This artifact set allows Barbata to focus on healing her team while also providing additional damage. You will want to build up her skill and burst while leveling up the amount of healing she provides the team.
In this team, Xingqiu will help Barbara activate the Hydro team buff to increase healing within the party. Ayaka will be used to freeze the enemy with her Hydro supports and Kazuha will help increase elemental damage and spread Cryo or Hydro to enemies.
Barbara’s main artifact stats should be:
- Sands: HP% or Energy Charge
- Goblet: HP%
- Circlet: Healing Bonus% or HP% or Energy Recharge
You can also focus on Crit Rate, Crit DMG, and ATK% in your sub-stats to boost Barbara’s own damage.
Recommended Party Members
Sucrose will serve as crowd control to pull enemies together for Barbara to hit them all with her charged attack. She will also increase the reaction damage of her teammates.
Keqing can deal powerful Electro DMG with her elemental burst. She is a great Electro DPS that can make use of Barbara’s ability to apply Wet to the enemies and trigger Electro-charge.
Xingqiu will provide the Hydro resonance with Barbara and charge their bursts faster. He can also act as a burst support to deal Hydro attacks with your Main DPS.
Xiangling will provide Pyro support for reactions. She and Bennett will give the entire team the Pyro resonance, boosting their ATK by 25%.
Bennett’s burst can increase the ATK of anyone staying inside and heal them.
| Advantages | Disadvantages |
|---|---|
| Can heal the entire party with both her elemental skill and burst | Burst and elemental skill does little to no damage |
| Healing scales off on Max HP | Elemental skill can harm the active member if another element is applied to them while it is active |
| Can apply the wet effect to enemies | Useless against Hydro slimes and enemies with Hydro auras |
Recommended Domains: As a healer, Barbara can go into most domains to heal the party, instead of dealing damage. I would caution her going against Hydro enemies or anywhere with Cryo and Electro enemies as she can accidentally freeze or trigger Electro-charge on herself.
Conclusion
Barbara is a great healer that will be sure to keep your entire party healthy. As a catalyst user, her normal attack will deal Hydro damage to enemies and apply the wet status. However, her main use lies in her elemental and burst that will heal her teammates based on Barbara’s Max HP. She can be built as a DPS, but will require her constellation 2 effect to be viable in battle.
What do you think of Barbara? Is there anything I missed? Let us know in the comments below! You can also reach out through our Twitter or my Discord handle Seyfrid#2589.
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The Informal Gamer 