But generally speaking, Kazuha is better than Sucrose. Kazuha directly buffs elemental damage, while Sucrose mainly buffs Elemental Mastery or EM. Elemental Mastery is the extra multiplier for damage dealt by elemental reactions. Sucrose’s kit shares her EM with teammates thus further buffing their reaction-based damage. In contrast, Kazuha is great in any team that uses Hydro/Pyro/Cryo/Electro. This includes teams that benefit and don’t benefit from EM – like freeze and mono-element teams. Since he can buff any element by triggering a swirl reaction with them, he’s basically always useful. Kazuha’s team and buffing versatility pull him ahead of Sucrose. To further explain, let’s compare their character values and performance in the two game modes of Genshin Impact: Overworld (Exploration & Co-op) and Spiral Abyss (Meta). Note: All comparisons made are between a C0 Kazuha and C6 Sucrose.
In The Overworld
Exploration (Single-Player)
Kazuha and Sucrose are equally amazing characters in the overworld. Swirl is an incredibly strong elemental reaction that’s especially good against AOE. Kazuha and Sucrose’s element-infused swirls can easily kill overworld mobs. Additionally, some of their strength is packed into their elemental skills. So charging their bursts is never needed. This makes them feel better and more comfortable to play.
Co-op (Multiplayer)
Kazuha and Sucrose also perform equally in Co-op. As a catalyst user, Sucrose’s normal, charged, and plunging attacks always deal Anemo damage — so they can easily trigger swirl reactions. This guarantees a 100% uptime to the 4-piece Viridescent Venerer or 4VV set. Plus, it gives Sucrose more opportunities to swirl different elements. Kazuha can also maintain a 100% uptime on the 4VV set, but he has fewer opportunities to trigger swirl reactions with different elements. Still, he does work in more teams than Sucrose. Their performance basically evens out.
Spiral Abyss (Meta)
Double Swirl
This refers to swirling two elements in quick succession or simultaneously. Both Kazuha and Sucrose can easily do double swirls. This lets them trigger two swirl-related passives or buffs at once. The most notable one is the 4-piece Viridescent Venerer or 4VV set. Every Anemo support uses this artifact set. Its 4-piece has the following effects:
Increases swirl damage by 60%. Decreases opponents’ elemental resistance to the element infused in the swirl. This resistance shred is equal to 40% and lasts for 10s.
Through double swirling, this resistance shred effect can be triggered for two elements simultaneously. Double swirl also works for Kazuha’s passive. When Kazuha triggers a double swirl, all teammates gain an elemental damage bonus for the two elements swirled. There are 2 ways of setting up a double swirl: single-target and AOE – plus the special case of electro-charged reactions. In single-target, double swirls are done in quick succession. A great example is the setup rotation of the International team with Kazuha. This team’s rotation starts with: Tartaglia’s skill > Bennett’s burst > Kazuha’s burst Tartaglia first applies a strong Hydro aura to the enemy, and then Bennett’s burst self-infuses the active character with Pyro. When Kazuha casts his burst, he first swirls Tartaglia’s hydro aura. Afterward, his burst swirls and infuses with Pyro because of Bennett’s burst. This effectively swirls Hydro and Pyro in quick succession. In the right-hand photo above, you can also see how the team gains an elemental damage bonus for both Hydro and Pyro. This double swirl setup also works in AOE. AOE double swirls are done by swirling the elemental auras of two different opponents. This can be demonstrated in the photos above. In the left photo above, two opponents have different elemental auras – Pyro and Electro. When Kazuha casts his skill, he procs swirl reactions with both opponents. This also swirls the two different elements. In the right-hand photo, you can see its effects through the stat page. Kazuha was able to proc both a Pyro and Electro damage bonus. Hydro and Electro are the easiest elements to double swirl. They’re the only elements that can exist simultaneously in one opponent through electro-charged. Because of this, no special setup is needed. Simply triggering a swirl reaction with an electro-charged opponent will swirl both Hydro and Electro.
Team Compositions
Kazuha and Sucrose are both top meta characters. Although their buffing abilities are different, they’re still interchangeable in most of their teams. Here’s a TL;DR of who performs better in their best teams and why. National team is generally composed of:
Xiangling Bennett Xingqiu/Tartaglia Kazuha/Sucrose/Raiden
Both Kazuha and Sucrose are great units for this team. They perform equally – but they vary in setups for their different team variations. Because of this, one can outperform the other based on who can better trigger double swirls. Kazuha performs better with Tartaglia as the Hydro unit, while Sucrose is better with Xingqiu. Still, they work well in either team. Freeze teams are composed of:
2 Cryo units 1 Hydro unit 1 Anemo unit
Kazuha strictly outperforms Sucrose in these teams. Freeze doesn’t benefit from Sucrose’s EM share at all. In contrast, Kazuha’s elemental damage buff is always useful. These teams are composed of:
2 Electro units 1 Hydro unit 1 Anemo unit
Kazuha and Sucrose are amazing candidates for Taser teams – but they can outperform each other in different variations. Sucrose is great in Taser teams where she’s mostly on-field, like Sucrose Taser. In this team, Sucrose mainly acts as Beidou’s driver and the team’s buffer.
As a driver, she performs normal attacks to proc the Electro discharges of Beidou’s burst. As a buffer, she continuously triggers the 4VV set’s passive. She effectively has a 100% VV shred uptime.
Since she’s a catalyst user, all her attacks deal Anemo damage — they can easily trigger a swirl reaction. Staying on-field lets her take advantage of this. She continuously triggers the 4VV set passive while dealing massive swirl damage herself. In contrast, Kazuha’s great in ones where he’s off-field – like Ayato Taser. He simply casts his skill and burst and then goes off-field. His burst will continuously proc his passive even while off-field. This means that the entire team still benefits from Kazuha’s elemental damage bonus. Mono-element teams are generally composed of:
3 units with the same element 1 Anemo unit
The Anemo unit of these teams uses the 4VV set to buff team damage. Since no elemental reactions are being triggered, Kazuha outperforms Sucrose. Sucrose’s EM share is useless in mono-element teams – while Kazuha’s elemental damage buff is very valuable. By swirling his teammates’ element, Kazuha can easily buff all of them at once. For instance, in a mono-Pyro team, Kazuha will always proc Pyro-infused swirls. This triggers his passive and then buffs the Pyro damage bonus of the entire team. Soup teams are composed of:
1 Anemo unit 1 Pyro unit 1 Electro unit 1 Hydro unit
Both Kazuha and Sucrose are amazing units for the Anemo slot. Soup teams deal damage through chaining multiple elemental reactions. Since the Anemo unit is consistently triggering swirl reactions, they contribute a lot of DPS. Kazuha and Sucrose excel in different Soup team variations, but their performance is equal. Xiao Teams are very versatile. He simply needs the following teammates:
1 Anemo battery 1 shielder/healer
Xiao doesn’t benefit from both Sucrose’s EM share and Kazuha’s damage bonus. Still, Sucrose is a great Xiao teammate – she outperforms Kazuha in this team. This is simply because she generates more energy particles than Kazuha. This helps better charge Xiao’s burst. Additionally, Sucrose can equip the Thrilling Tales of Dragon Slayers or TTDS catalyst weapon. TTDS is a 3-star weapon that can effectively buff Xiao’s ATK by 48% every rotation. This is significantly more than what Kazuha can offer.
Who Should You Build?
Because of his versatility, Kazuha is the obvious answer. He can easily fit in more teams than Sucrose. Still, they’re both really strong units with equally strong teams – so you can never go wrong with building both of them. This is because most Abyss teams appreciate having either Kazuha or Sucrose. For instance, you can play a Kazuha Freeze team on the first Abyss half and a Sucrose Taser team on the other. Building both Kazuha and Sucrose lets you play multiple top meta teams simultaneously.
