Jean is one of the few currently available healers in Genshin, making her overall fairly interesting, but when you couple the inherent flexibility of Anemo as an element that can interact with essentially anything other than Geo (and Dendro, but that’s not currently available…) she becomes significantly more interesting, but elemental interactions using her specifically can also be problematic and difficult to build around.
That aside, she packs a much more interesting heavy attack than the rest of the sword using characters right now: she has a proper launcher – which more interestingly, causes an Anemo status effect that while it won’t cause swirl, will hold an enemy up in the air for longer, making it a lot easier to juggle enemies.
Basic Attack String
There’s not a lot to really say about Jean’s basic attack string other than, well, she has an awful lot of trouble actually hitting enemies that get struck by her charged attack. Real helpful, yeah, I know – but, really, there’s simply not a lot going on here besides the fact that there’s a chance for any one of her strikes to heal for an amount based off of her overall attack.
Kinda useful, but, even if you’re using Jean for healing, that’s not really how you’re going to do it. It does help in a number of situations, though.
Besides that, it’s your standard five input, five hit affair, and although visually Jean does appear to swing over her head with some of these attacks, that is not given consideration is it might be with some other characters.
Charged Attack
Now, this is much more interesting. Jean’s charged attack is a launcher, and although knockback sort of actually does launch enemies into the air, it appears to be that real launchers in Genshin have a special trait which I’ll cover shortly.
It works approximately how one would expect. Most enemies can be launched, and when they’re hit by this charged attack, there’s an Anemo effect that surrounds them, which as mentioned in the intro, makes it easier to juggle the target by slowing their descent. While I also had already mentioned that Jean struggles to hit enemies above her like this, it’s worth noting that she’s not the only one. It’s actually easier to list off what can hit an enemy in this situation in Genshin than what can’t:
- Overhead claymore swings (Beidou, potentially Xinyan)
- Archers that aren’t Fischl with their normal attacks
- Catalyst using characters
- Xingqiu’s elemental skill & burst
- Zhongli’s Jade Shield/elemental skill hold
- Keqing’s elemental burst
- Xiao’s general shenanigans
There are a few more, I’m sure, and this list is no doubt set to grow, but for now, most anything that doesn’t make list can’t. It’s rather unfortunate, given that juggling is quite fun in Genshin and in this case, it’s mostly weird and janky hitboxes that hold us back from being able to do cool things.
That being said, the fact Jean does have what the game considers to be a proper launcher, she is one of the few characters alongside the likes of Bennett right now that can actually juggle the heavier class of enemies. This ranges from larger Mitachurls and Stone Lawachurls, to Geovishap Hatchlings.
Now, what about Geovishaps, you ask? Well, in that case, it actually just launches them straight into the air prior to them taking up an element. Afterward, they can’t be launched.
Elemental Skill Press & Hold: Gale Blade
Gale Blade is probably the bread and butter of playing Jean in the majority of situations in which you might use her. It’s an excellent crowd control tool that can help prep a heavier enemy for being launched, or just, generally bully a poor fool. Gale Blade doesn’t pick up elements from Jean herself unlike the Traveler’s Palm Vortex: it can only pick up elements to create a Swirl reaction if there is an elemental effect present on the enemy it’s used on, or if the element is active in the environment near its hitbox when used.
By aiming with the skill actively held, Jean will draw enemies in, providing an opportunity to snatch more targets as well as control the direction which they will be sent flying. Sending them in a high arc can result in fall damage, but it’s also possible to send them into walls or even Geo constructs to deal fall damage, and in the right domains as well as Abyss floors, fall damage isn’t something to scoff at when used properly.
Some players have ended up using Gale Blade to drag certain enemies against the floor, dealing additional fall damage to them, but it’s not really consistent to perform and usually only works on specific enemies.
Elemental Burst: Dandelion Breeze
Dandelion Breeze creates a healing area of effect which knocks enemies out of the field when activated. When an enemy enters or leaves the AoE, they take Anemo damage, but overall, this is fairly unimpressive. The more important factor is the healing effect coupled with the behavior of friendly contacts affected by an element within the confines of the field.
A swirl effect will trigger repeatedly for the duration of playable characters being affected by an element within the zone if their currently under the effects of one. This is pretty remarkably powerful, but highly contextual as you need an elemental effect on your character to take advantage of it.
Besides that, the healing area of Dandelion Breeze is, like most AoE’s in Genshin, quite tall, so it’s unlikely you’ll end up out of it even if you’re relatively high above it such as on Albedo’s ‘elevator’ or Zhongli’s pillar. Therefore, you’re mostly looking for getting a good heal or contracting an element when you use this burst.
Conclusion
Jean seems straight forward, but a number of factors complicates that otherwise fairly standard healer-esque type character. She’s also the first healer I’ve taken a look at over the course of this and, overall, I’d say she’s one of my preferred characters in that regime, tied with Qiqi currently who’ll be looked at later (maybe next? Probably not), largely for her ability to heal characters both on and off the field, as well as offering a fairly safe environment to heal.
However, the complication of needing the character on the field to be inflicted with an element to take advantage of Jean’s burst while you need the enemy inflicted with an element to take advantage of Gale Blade can be difficult to build around. Add that in to the fact that generally, you usually don’t want to have an elemental effect on your character, and whether or not she’s desirable can suddenly be a bit dubious.
But, with the ability to inflict decent damage through fall mechanics, offer crowd control in the form of knockback and launching enemies, as well as the fact she’s an Anemo character and therefore goes for the no-brainer artifact set Viridescent Venerer with a decent cooldown on her elemental skill allowing her to be inflicting a significant debuff with permanent up-time, she definitely makes more than a decent support character. Her real main drawback is a lack of content that plays to her core strength of being a healer: not a lot of Genshin is honestly really that hard, and in good portion, depending of course on how you’re playing, it’s unlikely you’ll even need healing. Still, it’s nice to not be running through food as often simply for the convenience of not having to then go get more.
And I’ll admit, she was really useful for Theater Mechanicus.
Most any character that finds they might need healing would benefit from having Jean in the party, but as far as real synergy goes, the big factor to look for is self-infliction of an element to tie in with Jean’s burst. In this case, although the healing becomes hilariously redundant, I’d suggest Bennett for his burst. However, in order to hit enemies and do combos with Jean where she’s launched an enemy, you’ll probably end up wanting a character like Keqing more-so. Xiao is interesting as having two Anemo characters will provide a slight cooldown buff, he does typically need healing, and can effectively hit enemies in certain situations which Jean can create.
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