Candace Quick TL;DR Support Build Guide

UPDATED FOR 3.1 😁!

PSA #1: Supports are the shields that protect you from harm! A good defense makes a great offense!

PSA #2: Both Candace’s abilities scale off HP and she really loves her HP… She also has a cool spear + shield combo, so A+ for design 👏

Candace’s E has two variations: Tap and Hold

Tap:

• Deals Hydro DMG in a small cone in front of her
• Has a 6 second CD
• Generates 2 energy particles

Hold:

• Holds her shield up in front, blocking incoming damage in front of her
• Blocking a set amount of DMG or after charging for 3s will deal AoE Hydro DMG in front of her
• Has a 9 second CD
• Generates 3 energy particles

Her charged E will only activate if the shield breaks, the hold duration expires, or if you release E. Candace’s E Hold shield is scaled off her Max HP, as well as her E’s damage overall being scaled off Max HP.

Her shield can also absorb a decent amount of DMG. At Level 8, it’s 19.2% of her Max HP + 2166.82 – so if you had 30,000 HP on Candace, her E can tank a total of 7926.82 damage. 

However, there is no point in really holding her shield to fully block all that damage. Realistically you just want to tap to quickly apply Hydro and generate energy. 

Q Breakdown:

• Characters gain a 20% Elemental DMG buff with their NA
• Sword, Claymore, and Polearm users gain Hydro infusion, dealing Hydro instead of Physical
• Changing characters deals AoE Hydro DMG, but can only occur 3 times
• Has a 9 second duration with a 15 second CD

Candace’s Q is what makes her a good off-field Support. An overlooked effect of her Q are the waves spawned when you swap characters. Not only does it deal an instance of Hydro DMG to nearby enemies, but it also applies Wet. This allows for the current character to immediately trigger a Hydro-based reaction, allowing for a great chain of damage/buffs to occur. For example, for characters like Cyno, not only do they gain the additional 20% Elemental DMG buff for their Q form NA’s, but they can immediately trigger 4x Gilded Dream’s effect thanks to the wave spawned when they swapped in.

By the way, this is also strong for characters like Ningguang, since her NA are entirely elemental.

So if Candace were to have 30,000 Max HP, that means the A4 Passive would provide an additional 15% DMG Bonus for NA that does Elemental DMG (30,000 / 1,000 = 30 x .5 = 15%). It’s a strong (and essentially free) DMG bonus that can be easily achieve since Candace will be stacking HP.

Talent Leveling Order: Q > E > NA (don’t really need to level NA)

PSA #3: PLEASE READ THIS IF YOU HAVE C6 CANDACE!!!

If you have seen other guides/builds recommend weapons like The Catch with 4x Emblem of Fates, then you most likely were misguided. The reason those guides recommend those weapons and artifacts is due to Candace’s C6, which turns her Q into a Hydro version of Thoma’s Q.

The reason why weapons like The Catch and 4x Emblem are recommended is because they buff the Q damage. The waves sent out during Q for C6 Candace count as burst DMG, hence why those builds are recommended.

HOWEVER, for Support/Buffer Candace (or people without C6), those builds do practically nothing other than provide her with a little bit more ER%. Thanks for reading!

WEAPONS (Recommended for best Buffs): Black Tassel

How do I get it D: ? – It’s time to roll boys (gacha)

Black Tassel is a 3-star weapon that provides amazing value to Support Candace, even more than 5 or 4-star polearms, for one specific reason: it’s insane HP% scaling. At max level, it provides an additional 46.9% HP. That is basically the equivalent of running an additional HP% artifact set, bolstering her Max HP by an insane amount. Keep in mind that for Support off-field buffer Candace, Max HP is king.

Staff of Homa is purely recommended just for the 20-40% HP buff it provides. Since Support Candace will be heavily focused on HP%/flat HP for stats, she gains zero benefit from any of the CRIT values provided by Homa. The ATK% gained is also useless, as everything (other than her NA) scales strictly from her Max HP. However, if you are planning on running her as a main DPS, Staff of Homa works incredibly well.

Other than that, the only other polearms worth mentioning are The Catch and Favonius Spear for their ER% due to Candace’s poor energy generation. Boosting Burst DMG doesn’t work the way you think, as it affects her initial cast and Wave DMG. It does not affect her 20% Elemental DMG NA buff. Keep in mind that if you are planning on running Favonius to allocate some CRIT% for substats (or just run a CRIT% Circlet). 

ARTIFACTS (Recommended for best Supporting): Noblesse Oblige

How do I get it D: ? – Clear Pool and Mountain Cavern Domain (AR 35 Locked, 20 Resin per run)

4x Noblesse is the optimal set for Support Candace as it now also turns her into a buffer. The 20% ATK buff after she uses her burst works great in tandem to her play style, as she will immediately swap to a teammate. While she does struggle with energy generation, her burst only costs 60 energy, which can be remediated by a battery. 

Alternatively, a combination of 2x Emblem + 2x Tenacity works great as well. 2x Emblem provides 20% ER, which can go a long way for Candace in terms of squeezing out as much energy as possible per particle. 2x Tenacity also buffs her HP by 20%, further increasing her damage for her E and Q.

For early players, 4x Exile will do perfectly well since at earlier stages your main focus should just be getting her burst off.

Main stats:

Sands	Goblet	Circlet
HP% (ER% if no battery)	HP%	HP%

Substats: HP% = flat HP > ER% > EM > CRIT Values

If you want other characters let me know. Hope this helped. Bye.