Nicole

Hexerei Teams

Varka

Varka - Prune or Venti - Durin - Nicole

• Durin can be replaced by another consistent off-field Pyro applicator, such as Thoma or Mavuika, however they will typically be a very significant downgrade. Instead, if you don't have Durin you should opt to use Bennett or Chevreuse at C6 in that slot.
  
• Prune or Venti can be replaced by other competent Anemo supports like Sucrose, Kaedehara Kazuha or Faruzan, but at a decent downgrade.

Arguably the team Nicole was mainly designed around. She’s a substantial upgrade to this team over Bennett even under optimal conditions for Bennett, and unlike him does not require any condition to be met (such as Bennett’s infamous circle). Significantly buffing Durin and the Anemo slot is another major perk over Bennett and any other ATK% buffer.

Example Rotation:

1. Durin Skill Binary Form: Convergence and Division + Skill + Burst Principle of Purity: As the Light Shifts
   →
2. Nicole Skill + Burst
   →
3. Prune Skill Ring-A-Ding-Ding! Hexhunter Chime + Burst The Bell Tolls! The Hunt Is On!
   →
4. Varka on-field combo

Lohen

Lohen - Xilonen or Citlali - Durin - Nicole

• Xilonen or Citlali can be replaced by units like Prune and Sucrose to maintain the team's form, or Emilie to turn it into a BurnMelt team focused around Lohen's personal damage.
  
• Nicole can also team with Lohen in non-Durin teams, such as in a Stellar-Conduct team with Yae Miko. Currently, Stellar-Conduct requires Sandrone to be in the team in order to be activated, but that is likely to change in the future.

Nicole is near irreplaceable for any Lohen team. Lohen demands decent Sub-DPS to be in his teams, and Nicole is uniquely good at teamwide buffing. She is also a particularly good partner to Dark Mode Durin, who is central to the Melt team example.

Example Rotation:

1. Nicole Skill + Burst
   →
2. Durin Skill + Normal Attack + Burst
   →
3. Xilonen Skill + N2
   →
4. Lohen on-field combo.

Other Hexerei carries

Nicole tends to be BiS for every other Hexerei carry as well. Venti has her as a significant upgrade in his teams, while for Klee and Razor she tends to compete with Durin or Chevreuse. She will still generally come out ahead, but not as much as for Venti, where her competition is Bennett. Example teams include:

• Venti - Faruzan - Durin - Nicole
• Klee - Chevreuse - Fischl - Nicole
• Razor - Durin - Fischl - Nicole

Non-Hexerei Teams:

Nicole tends to be either the outright best option, or about as good as Bennett for most of any Attack carry. Whether she's slightly better or slightly worse will depend on the character, and whether she possesses at least C1 or her Signature Weapon.

Attack-scaling Characters and Teams where Nicole is BiS:

• Arlecchino

Arlecchino - Chevreuse - Fischl - Nicole

Easily of Arlecchino’s best teams, particularly with vertical investment into either Arlecchino or Nicole. Nicole’s Burst can be worth using when there’s rotational downtime, every other rotation or so. Nicole is also a great option for Arlecchino Melt with Citlali and Arlecchino Vaporize with Mona.

Example Rotation:

Nicole Skill → Fischl Skill or Burst → Chevreuse Hold Skill + Burst → Arlecchino on-field combo

• Kinich

Kinich - Emilie - Durin - Nicole

Nicole is a major upgrade over Bennett and Iansan for Kinich in both damage and as a defensive option. Kinich is very vulnerable without a shield and has strong Sub-DPS, making Nicole a massive upgrade for his teams.

Example Rotation:

Nicole Skill → Emilie Skill or Burst → Durin Skill + Skill + Burst → Kinich on-field combo

• Chasca

Chasca - Nicole - Durin - Iansan

Nicole is one of Chasca’s best options if she can make use of Celestial Gift, particularly with Durin, but she can fit into just about any Chasca team well.

Example Rotation: Nicole Skill → Durin Skill + Skill + Burst → Iansan Skill + Attack + Burst → Chasca on-field combo

• Nicole is also outright BiS for other ATK-scaling DPS like Gaming, Ganyu, Wriothesley (both Stellar-Conduct and Melt teams) and more.

Attack-scaling Characters and Teams where Nicole is one of the BiS options

• Mavuika - Citlali - Iansan - Nicole

Nicole is an excellent option for Mavuika, particularly with a slight delay or a Charged Attack while on Mavuika. She is typically better than Bennett with her Signature Weapon, but not without.

Example Rotation: Nicole Skill + Burst → Iansan Skill + Burst → Citlali Skill + Burst → Mavuika Burst + on-field Melt combo

• Sandrone - Yae Miko - Escoffier - Nicole

One of the best 4th slots for Sandrone. Sandrone's Energy will hurt a bit in this team, so make sure to bring Favonius on the second Cryo slot and feeds their particles to Sandrone.

Example Rotation: Nicole Skill → Yae Miko Skill x3 → Escoffier Skill → Sandrone on-field combo

• Varesa - Durin - Iansan - Nicole
• Raiden Shogun - Chevreuse - Durin - Nicole

For such teams and others like them, Nicole is not necessary the singular best slot, but tends to be a very competitive option.

BiS OptionL: Angelos' Heptades

Nicole’s Signature weapon and clear Best-in-Slot has the highest possible Base ATK for a Weapon in the game alongside an ATK% secondary. This makes maxing out Nicole's Buff trivial, able to do so with very few substats. The DMG% she gives to both the on-fielder and the rest of the team make it one of the strongest support Catalysts in the game, although Nicole is the only one able to make particularly good use of it. Very powerful weapon. Can be a team DPS upgrade of up to 10%.

Limited 5 star alternative: Starcaller's Watch

Citlali’s Signature can be a strong option if you can meet Nicole’s Attack and ER requirements despite the low Base ATK. It only buffs the active character, meaning it gets stronger the more investment the on-fielder has, however that buff is about equal to the buff of Angelos' Heptades for the on-fielder. Good if you have it around.

Standard 5 star: Skyward Atlas

Lets Nicole eaily max out her Buff thanks to the very high Base ATK and ATK% secondary stat. An easy option should you have it around, and typically the best available if you don't have Angelos' Heptades or Starcaller's Watch.

Best 4 star: Oathsworn Eye

Very good, particularly in teams where Nicole uses her Elemental Burst. Only available through the 2.5 flagship event, so it is impossible to acquire if you weren't playing at the time.

Best free option: Flowing Purity

The Fontaine Craftable Catalyst is an alright option if nothing else can be used. Decent stats for her, it is essentially a worse version of Oathsworn Eye.

Niche alternatives:

Thrilling Tales of Dragon Slayers

If the team has a long enough rotation of 21 seconds or higher so Nicole can always give this passive to the on-fielder, it can be a decent option despite the way it hampers Nicole's Buff. Typically not the best option, but it is sometimes usable in select Varka setups.

Favonius Codex

Sort of usable if Energy is a major concern for herself and the team, but will hurt her buffing capabilities. Not recommended to put on her instead of another team member unless absolutely necessary.

BiS Option: Celestial Gift

The artifact set essentially made for Nicole and the only support set she can make proper use of. The Energy Recharge 2pc is useful for Hexerei teams, and the 4pc passive makes it one of the strongest team buffing sets in the game. The only reason to not use this on Nicole is if the 4pc passive is useless, such as in a Sandrone team.

If Nicole finds herself in a team where Celestial Gift isn't a good option, she should likely opt for a 2pc ATK % combination to make the most of her Buff. Other support sets are typically wasted on her.

1. Elemental Skill
2. Elemental Burst
   >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
3. Normal Attack

Nicole does not typically want to use her Normal Attacks in any situation. Her Attack Buff is entirely reliant on the Talent Level of her Skill. Her Burst is worth leveling if you find yourself using it, but it's not a particularly high priority.

Overview

Nicole is a Pyro Support with no Sub-DPS or Elemental Application capabilities. She buffs the team's ATK through her Elemental Skill, which also provides a Shield, and enables the currently active character to do more damage through the 'Projections' of her Elemental Burst. Her Elemental Burst can often be skipped, and is not a core part of her power budget.

Elemental Skill & Celestial Gift

Ocast, Nicole's Elemental Skill will generate 5 Pyro Elemental particles and provide a teamwide Flat ATK Bonus based on a percentage of her own ATK. At Talent Level 10, the maximum Flat ATK Bonus is 600, which Nicole requires 4000 ATK for. Note that Nicole's buff does not count towards itself.

• Additionally, if the current active character has spent 3 seconds on the field or if they’re a Hexerei character, they gain an additional 300 Flat ATK. If the currently active character swaps out again, they lose the additional 300 ATK. Essentially, Nicole buffs off-field characters by up to 600 ATK and the on-field character by up to 900 ATK. She also provides one of the stronger shields in the game alongside this ATK buff.
  
• Notably, Nicole has access to the Artifact set Celestial Gift – this set’s baseline effect provides the team with 20% DMG Bonus of the user’s Element, provided they’re a Hexerei character. If the holder is a Hexerei character and Hexerei: Secret Rite is active, this 20% upgrades to 40% DMG Bonus, and the party additionally gains 40% DMG Bonus of the current active character’s Element. Using teammates that use the full extent of this buff is one of Nicole’s core team-building requests, and if fulfilled, makes her one of the most potent buffers in the game.
  
• With the Secret Rite effect active, she provides the on-field character with buffs rivaling Bennett’s whilst granting off-field characters a very significant portion of the same buff. On top of being teamwide, Nicole’s buff lasts for 20 seconds (the same as Celestial Gift) and is on a 16 second cooldown, making full uptime trivial to maintain.

Elemental Burst

Nicole’s Elemental Burst costs 60 Energy on a 15 second cooldown. On cast, it will deal AoE Pyro damage and give a novel mechanic to the team: when the current active character performs any attack, Nicole will summon an Arcane Projection to perform a coordinated attack using the currently active character’s stats. The damage of this attack scales with Nicole's Elemental Burst Talent Level.

This effect lasts 20 seconds, can trigger up to 4 times and comes with a 3 second cooldown in-between triggers. The base scaling on these coordinated attacks is low, but Nicole’s Hexerei passive (obtained upon completing her Witch’s Homework quest) adds a massive additional multiplier to this value. Because of the difference in value for Hexerei and non-Hexerei Projections, her Burst does not add as much value if the team doesn’t have a Hexerei on-fielder. It is generally not worth using unless meant to fill out rotational downtime, occasionally relevant for Arlecchino or Kinich.

Arcane Projections and Rotation Order

Because the Arcane Projections have a 3 second cooldown and a few Hexerei teams have a different character that prefers going directly before the on-fielder (such as in Varka teams), you will occasionally have to let that character consume one of the Arcane Projection charges. It also means that you might not want to use Nicole before Durin takes the field, which will worsen his Energy requirements and ease Nicole’s – the difference with doing so is generally not major, but it is something to note, as you’d prefer the Arcane Projections only proc when all buffs have gone up.

Teams without Hexerei: Secret Rite

Without the Hexerei Resonance effect active, Nicole loses surprisingly little. The main downside is no longer having access to the upgraded version of Celestial Gift. Owing to her inability to make proper use of any other Support-focused Artifact set, she becomes far less noteworthy for non-Pyro on-fielders. An example of a Pyro on-fielder she can support well even without Hexerei is Mavuika, where she remains fairly competitive with Bennett and even becomes better than him with Angelos' Heptades.

Nicole was officially released as a playable character in Genshin Impact on May 20, 2026, during the Version 6.6 update.