History ThatOneSidequest / GenshinImpact

* The "In the Mountains" world quest. This is the first "flagship world quest" which is necessary to fully unlock an area, but unlike later ones, it also which is needed to unlock both the "Peak of Vindagnyr" Domain (which contains Blizzard Strayer and Heart of Depth Artifact sets) and the Cryo Hypostasis boss. This quest takes quite a long time to complete (comparable to the "Chi of Yore" world quest), especially when compared to the effort it takes to open the other domains in the game. The biggest roadblock in this quest is the ice shard in Starglow Cavern, which requires beating a three-minute combat challenge over a partially frozen pond with nothing but Cryo Hilichurls and Abyss Mages, making it the most frustrating part of the quest by far. If that's not bad enough, you have to deal with falling icicles that crash into the ground at regular intervals for no discernable reason. The difficulty of the challenge arguably stems not from getting frozen (since you can avoid this as long as you don't touch the water), but getting hit constantly, which will disrupt your attacks. When fighting the second wave of enemies, it is very easy to accidentally walk right into the near-invisible barrier blocking the ice shard, which will knock you back. You will be in for a bad time if you don't bring a character that can generate shields to nullify hitstuns, whereas if you did, then the fight goes from hairpullingly difficult to somewhat manageable.

* The "In the Mountains" world quest, which is needed to unlock both the "Peak of Vindagnyr" Domain (which contains Blizzard Strayer and Heart of Depth Artifact sets) and the Cryo Hypostasis boss. This quest takes quite a long time to complete (comparable to the "Chi of Yore" world quest), especially when compared to the effort it takes to open the other domains in the game. The biggest roadblock in this quest is the ice shard in Starglow Cavern, which requires beating a three-minute combat challenge over a partially frozen pond with nothing but Cryo Hilichurls and Abyss Mages, making it the most frustrating part of the quest by far. If that's not bad enough, you have to deal with falling icicles that crash into the ground at regular intervals for no discernable reason. The difficulty of the challenge arguably stems not from getting frozen (since you can avoid this as long as you don't touch the water), but getting hit constantly, which will disrupt your attacks. When fighting the second wave of enemies, it is very easy to accidentally walk right into the near-invisible barrier blocking the ice shard, which will knock you back. You will be in for a bad time if you don't bring a character that can generate shields to nullify hitstuns, whereas if you did, then the fight goes from hairpullingly difficult to somewhat manageable.

* The Inazuma update brought the "Sacred Sakura Cleansing Ritual", which easily dwarfs every other quest in this section so far as the most annoying sidequest in the whole game. For starters, despite being a World Quest, it's necessary to unlock a significant amount of the Inazuma map, including one domain and one teleport spot, unlike previous quests that only unlocked small areas, such as the hole in Sal Terrae. To add insult to injury, some of those places are blocked by purple barriers, similar to the ones that players have to use Electrograni to pass through, fooling people into thinking that those places will be unlocked as you level-up the Sakura Tree, while in reality, [[GuideDangIt you have to do this quest]]. The quest itself is also absurdly long, almost comparable to some Archon quests, and is split into many time-consuming subsections filled with puzzles that make the whole affair extremely tiresome, not to mention that some of the puzzles may confuse the player, whether by its own rules (such as not realizing there is more than one Mysterious Shadow in the Konda temple), whether because it forces the player to find hidden caverns and spots in a map that's still new for them. And after purifying the five roots... you have a final battle in the center of the Narukami Island, which adds BossArenaUrgency with the Balethunder effect, forcing the players to run around grabbing the Electrograni while fighting mobs, dodging the core's attacks and solving [[FinalExamBoss variations of the puzzles you had already spent your last hours solving]], lest you want to spend your entire food supply. Oh, and after all of that, you STILL have to do more puzzles to unlock the last domain and teleport. About the only redeeming thing this questline has to offer is Hanachirusato, the quest giver and [[EnsembleDarkHorse fan-favorite NPC]] who accompanies you and [[TearJerker whose story]] is considered to be ''one of the best-written quests'' in Inazuma, if not the entire game.
* Inazuma also brings us the "Tatara Tales" questline:

* The Thunder Manifestation drops the world boss ascension materials for the Raiden Shogun and Kujou Sara. However, to even unlock the thing, you have to go through the "Seirai Stormchasers" questline, which sees you running all over the island to activate four Warding Stones by touching the paper talismans associated with them, then turning the stone so it matches the talisman patterns. The first and second sets aren't that bad, even with the [[FieldPowerEffect Balethunder]] gnawing at your health, but the third and fourth ones are where it ''really'' sucks. The third stone has you use a Phase Gate to get up to a series of floating islands, which you traverse by spawning a series of temporary Thunder Spheres you can zap along with the summoned Electrogranum. However, the islands the talismans themselves are located on are somewhat far apart, and lack Electro Spheres, meaning that you have to leap between them and hope it sticks. And if you fall, you have to use the Phase Gate to get back up, and you have no choice but to watch as the little Electro ball ''slooowly'' floats along the track until it gets where it needs to be. Needless to say, this gets annoying quickly. The fourth and final stone ups the ante by reusing the P Switch-like Electrograna, but this time it ''also'' adds crumbled platforms [[SceneryAsYouGo that get pulled back together by the Electrogranum.]] Take too long and the Electrogranum despawns, disassembling the platform and sending you on a long fall. At least you also get a pair of Precious Chests after beating the Thunder Manifestation for the first time and completing the questline.

* The Aranyaka quest chain is infamous among the playerbase for being the longest and least linear quest chain to date. What starts as a bog-standard side quest helping a forest ranger named Rana eventually becomes a side-quest fractal with side quests branching into another set of side quests, some of which ''in turn branch off into another set of side quests'', all of which are nontrivial and often introduce new mechanics and puzzles. The entire chain takes more time to complete than ''all of the main story content'' launched at the same time! Like "Sacred Sakura Cleansing Ritual", these quests unlock overworld content and mechanics, including some Dendroculi, songs for solving puzzles around Sumeru, unveiling two regions of the map, the tree for spending Dendro Sigils and the Sumeru craftable weapons. The quest chain is so long and complex that the game gives you a logbook called "Aranyaka", so that you can keep track of what quests you need to do next to progress. The developers likely realized how absurdly long and drawn out the "Aranyaka" quest chain is by sidequest standards, as (I) later released sidequest chains necessary for unlocking world content in Sumeru, namely "Golden Slumber", "The Dirge of Bilqis" and "Khvarena of Good and Evil", are significantly shorter and more linear by comparison, (II) Yoimiya's second Story Quest requires progression of Aranyaka to unlock, but only up to just before the side-quest fractal, and (III) Fontaine's lore content is split into multiple interlinked world quest chains of more limited length, which were delivered over multiple patches. If it is of any consolation, this quest chain allows players to meet and bond with the Aranaras, who won over many fans for their [[RidiculouslyCuteCritter design]] and their interactions with the player.

* The "Khvarena of Good and Evil" World Quest chain is disliked by a good portion of the playerbase for its excessive and over-embellished dialogue and lore. While the proper nouns in the dialogue are well-researched Zoroastrian references that contribute to Sumeru's positive cultural representation, the large quantity of such nouns are hard to read, remember and pronounce for a Western playerbase. In addition, the main character, Sorush, is arrogant and insufferable until she receives CharacterDevelopment - a far cry from the likeable Jeht and Rana from the previous three Sumeru flagship World Quest chains. The cherry on top is that the World Quest chain is the flagship World Quest for Sumeru's third desert expansion in a row, with the playerbase already fatigued from two large areas' worth of desert exploration.

* As of Version 4.2, there are 16 Local Legends scattered across Fontaine, and be prepared for a world of hurt when fighting any of them. Local Legends are significantly buffed regular enemies, sometimes with new attacks or mechanics. 9 of these are underwater, and require specific Xenochromatic Creatures to defeat lest these fights go on for an eternity. The other 7 are on land, and are capable of one-shotting your units on top of having around 3 million HP to boot. It says something when you get an achievement just for beating a ''single'' Local Legend.

* The "Dangerous Haul" Daily Commission. The player must destroy an Anemo slime-powered balloon before it delivers dangerous goods to a Hilichurl camp. Not only is there a time limit, the balloon is also very sturdy and the player is constantly under fire by the Hilichurls. To make things worse, most of the commissions take place near bodies of water, so getting hit by a Cryo or Electro attack will greatly hinder the Traveler while the balloon is drifting further towards the Hilichurl encampment. Better have maxed out equipment or food that buffs up attack. For most players, Xiangling is probably the best character for this, since her Elemental Burst can deal a ton of damage to the balloon as long as you can stay next to it for 10 seconds; but if you don't have her yet or haven't powered her up, this can be a stressful mission. Having the rare Yoimiya, who specializes in single target damage at range, makes it much easier. Of course, it becomes much easier the stronger your team is.
** On the other end is the “Rules of Safe Transportation.” The problem lays less with protecting the balloon as it is ridiculously durable and more with how boringly long the mission takes, due to how ridiculously slow the balloon is, taking a lengthy amount of time to reach the goal, even with no obstacles in the way. For example, the rendition in Nazuchi Beach, if you eliminate all the obstacles (and you likely will if you know the path and how much of a slog the balloon is) takes about ''2 minutes and 50 seconds'' to finish, longer than most story-based Commissions. You’ll likely just be waiting at the end every time the Commission pops up, waiting for it to finally be over with as the enemies pelt the balloon to no avail.

* The "Khvarena of Good and Evil" world quest is disliked by a good portion of the playerbase for being the most notorious example of a world quest with too much exposition and lore-dumping, writing padded with PurpleProse and the constant use of proper nouns in dialogue. While the proper nouns are well-researched Zoroastrian references, and contribute to the positive cultural representation found within the Sumeru region, keeping track of all of them can be very difficult, especially since they are unintuitive to read and pronounce for a Western playerbase. In addition, in contrast to many other world quests with memorable NPCs, the cast of this quest is unlikeable, with the main character, Sorush, being arrogant and insufferable for most of the quest until she receives CharacterDevelopment. The cherry on top is that the quest was released with the third desert map in a row for Sumeru, with the playerbase having already been fatigued by desert exploration.

* The Aranyaka quest chain is infamous among the playerbase for being the longest and least linear quest chain to date. What starts as a bog-standard side quest helping a forest ranger named Rana eventually becomes a side-quest fractal with side quests branching into another set of side quests, some of which ''in turn branch off into another set of side quests'', all of which are nontrivial and often introduce new mechanics and puzzles. The entire chain takes more time to complete than ''all of the main story content'' launched at the same time! Like "Sacred Sakura Cleansing Ritual", these quests unlock overworld content and mechanics, including some Dendroculi, songs for solving puzzles around Sumeru, unveiling two regions of the map, the tree for spending Dendro Sigils and the Sumeru craftable weapons. The quest chain is so long and complex that the game gives you a logbook called "Aranyaka", so that you can keep track of what quests you need to do next to progress. The developers likely realized how absurdly long and drawn out the "Aranyaka" quest chain is by sidequest standards, as (I) later released sidequest chains necessary for unlocking world content in Sumeru, namely "Golden Slumber", "The Dirge of Bilqis" and "Khvarena of Good and Evil", are significantly shorter and more linear by comparison, (II) Yoimiya's second Story Quest requires progression of Aranyaka to unlock, but only up to just before the side-quest fractal, and (III) Fontaine's main lore is split into multiple interlinked world quest chains of more limited length. If it is of any consolation, this quest chain allows players to meet and bond with the Aranaras, who won over many fans for their [[RidiculouslyCuteCritter design]] and their interactions with the player.

* Getting the [[TwentyBearAsses total of 40 Rusty and Golden Koi]] needed for The Catch, while tedious due to the fact [[AntiPoopSocking it takes three real-life days for fish pools to refill,]] is otherwise nothing to write home about. Getting the Raimei Angelfish, on the other hand, is an ''entirely'' different [[JustForPun kettle of fish.]] First of all, they only spawn at night on a remote shipwreck off the coast of Tatarasuna Island. Due to Tataragami influence, the water's turned [[GrimyWater electric,]] and there aren't that many footholds, so expect your active character to lose health quite a lot in the process of jumping from wreck to wreck. Compounding the issue is that the place is ''crawling'' with Cryo Slimes and Electro Abyss Mages, to which the aforementioned electrified water isn't a problem (the former can walk on water due to automatically freezing it, while the latter floats,) and the way their elements react mean that they'll be slapping you around with Superconduct. Just ''getting'' to the island is an issue in and of itself, as the Slimes and Abyss Mages can deal enough damage to ''sink the Waverider'' if you try to park too close. They're also too tanky to be killed with the Waverider's armaments, so your only choice before you can get to fishing is to take them out on foot. The fish themselves are also some of the hardest ones to catch, with their Ideal Tension Zones constantly shifting and requiring a lot of effort to reel in. And to top it all off you need to fish a total of ''18'' to obtain The Catch and the necessary refinement material (while only 5 spawn every 3 days), meaning you'll have to endure the entire ordeal 4-6 times. Crafting the End of the Line in Sumeru [[SalvagedGameplayMechanic is much less irritating,]] as the Peach of the Deep Waves spawn in an easily accessible area free of enemies.

* The Aranyaka quest chain is infamous among the playerbase for being the longest and least linear quest chain to date. What starts as a bog-standard side quest helping a forest ranger named Rana eventually becomes a side-quest fractal with side quests [[JustForPun branching]] into another set of side quests, some of which ''in turn branch off into another set of side quests'', all of which are nontrivial and often introduce new mechanics and puzzles. The entire chain takes more time to complete than ''all of the main story content'' launched at the same time! Like "Sacred Sakura Cleansing Ritual", these quests unlock overworld content and mechanics, including some Dendroculi, songs for solving puzzles around Sumeru, unveiling two regions of the map, the tree for spending Dendro Sigils and the Sumeru craftable weapons. The quest chain is so long and complex that the game gives you a logbook called "Aranyaka", so that you can keep track of what quests you need to do next to progress. The developers likely realized how absurdly long and drawn out the "Aranyaka" quest chain is by sidequest standards, as (I) later released sidequest chains necessary for unlocking world content in Sumeru, namely "Golden Slumber", "The Dirge of Bilqis" and "Khvarena of Good and Evil", are significantly shorter and more linear by comparison, (II) Yoimiya's second Story Quest requires progression of Aranyaka to unlock, but only up to just before the side-quest fractal, and (III) Fontaine's main lore is split into multiple interlinked world quest chains of more limited length. If it is of any consolation, this quest chain allows players to meet and bond with the Aranaras, who won over many fans for their [[RidiculouslyCuteCritter design]] and their interactions with the player.

* The Aranyaka quest chain is infamous among the playerbase for being the longest and least linear quest chain to date. What starts as a bog-standard side quest helping a forest ranger named Rana eventually becomes a side-quest fractal with side quests [[JustForPun branching]] into another set of side quests, some of which ''in turn branch off into another set of side quests'', all of which are nontrivial and often introduce new mechanics and puzzles. The entire chain takes more time to complete than ''all of the main story content'' launched at the same time! Like "Sacred Sakura Cleansing Ritual", these quests unlock overworld content and mechanics, including some Dendroculi, songs for solving puzzles around Sumeru, unveiling two regions of the map, the tree for spending Dendro Sigils and the Sumeru craftable weapons. The quest chain is so long and complex that the game gives you a logbook called "Aranyaka", so that you can keep track of what quests you need to do next to progress. The developers likely realized how absurdly long and drawn out the "Aranyaka" quest chain is by sidequest standards, as (I) later released sidequest chains necessary for unlocking world content in Sumeru, namely "Golden Slumber", "The Dirge of Bilqis" and "Khvarena of Good and Evil", are significantly shorter and more linear by comparison, (II) Yoimiya's second Story Quest requires progression of Aranyaka to unlock, but only up to just before the side-quest fractal, and (III) Version 4.0's flagship world quest series is split into three independent chains. If it is of any consolation, this quest chain allows players to meet and bond with the Aranaras, who won over many fans for their [[RidiculouslyCuteCritter design]] and their interactions with the player.

* The Aranyaka quest chain is infamous among the playerbase for being the longest and least linear quest chain to date. What starts as a bog-standard side quest helping a forest ranger named Rana eventually becomes a side-quest fractal with side quests [[JustForPun branching]] into another set of side quests, some of which ''in turn branch off into another set of side quests'', all of which are nontrivial and often introduce new mechanics and puzzles. The entire chain takes more time to complete than ''all of the main story content'' launched at the same time! Like "Sacred Sakura Cleansing Ritual", these quests unlock overworld content and mechanics, including some Dendroculi, songs for solving puzzles around Sumeru, unveiling two regions of the map, the tree for spending Dendro Sigils and the Sumeru craftable weapons. The quest chain is so long and complex that the game gives you a logbook called "Aranyaka", so that you can keep track of what quests you need to do next to progress. The developers likely realized how absurdly long and drawn out the "Aranyaka" quest chain is by sidequest standards, as (i) later released sidequest chains necessary for unlocking world content in Sumeru, namely "Golden Slumber", "The Dirge of Bilqis" and "Khvarena of Good and Evil", are significantly shorter and more linear in comparison, (ii) Yoimiya's second Story Quest requires progression of Aranyaka to unlock, but only up to just before the side-quest fractal, and (iii) Version 4.0's flagship world quest series is split into three independent chains. If it is of any consolation, this quest chain allows players to meet and bond with the Aranaras, who won over many fans for their [[RidiculouslyCuteCritter design]] and their interactions with the player.

* The location of Enkanomiya released in the 2.4 update has "Hyperion's Dirge", which is required to finish the "The Phaethons' Syrtos" quest as well. First, the seals at three separate locations have to be unlocked, so you need to search almost the entire map of Enkanomiya to acquire 5 different types of key sigils. After unlocking each set of seals, you will be put into a timed combat trial. The fights at The Evernight Temple and Serpent's Heart each last 60 seconds and have Rifthounds and Abyss Mages respectively. However, the one at The Narrows is exceptionally difficult for an overworld encounter. You need to fight three Primordial Bathysmal Vishap Hatchlings that are mobile and tanky (totaling approximately ''450,000 HP'' at [=WL8=]). Their signature attack shoots an orb which can bypass shields and drain energy from your characters (followed by HP once your character is out of energy). And [[SarcasmMode to make things even better]], that fight has a 30-second time limit. This trial's difficulty is on par with ''3-starring Spiral Abyss Floor 11 chambers'' and is near-impossible, even with food buffs, without a Spiral Abyss-capable team that can deal large AOE damage [[note]]a popular [[EasyLevelTrick trick]] does exist for this battle - namely, [[https://www.reddit.com/r/Genshin_Impact/comments/s1dd0u/spoiler_if_you_fail_the_narrow_inquiry_dps_check/ luring the Vishaps off a nearby cliff]] - but even that is a challenge to execute, as the player has to make sure that the Vishaps don't simply land on one of the many outcroppings below, not to mention pushing all three Vishaps and having them register as dead within the time limit. Still, "tricky" is a step up from "nigh-impossible"[[/note]].

* The Aranyaka quest chain is infamous among the playerbase for being the longest and least linear quest chain to date. What starts as a bog-standard side quest helping a forest ranger named Rana eventually becomes a side-quest fractal with side quests [[JustForPun branching]] into another set of side quests, some of which ''in turn branch off into another set of side quests'', all of which are nontrivial and often introduce new mechanics and puzzles. The entire chain takes more time to complete than ''all of the main story content'' launched at the same time! Like "Sacred Sakura Cleansing Ritual", these quests unlock overworld content and mechanics, including some Dendroculi, songs for solving puzzles around Sumeru, unveiling two regions of the map, and the tree for spending Dendro Sigils. The quest chain is so long and complex that the game gives you a logbook called "Aranyaka", so that you can keep track of what quests you need to do next to progress. The developers likely realized how absurdly long and drawn out the "Aranyaka" quest chain is by sidequest standards, as (i) later released sidequest chains necessary for unlocking world content in Sumeru, namely "Golden Slumber", "The Dirge of Bilqis" and "Khvarena of Good and Evil", are significantly shorter and more linear in comparison, and (ii) Yoimiya's second Story Quest requires progression of Aranyaka to unlock, but only up to just before the side-quest fractal. If it is of any consolation, this quest chain allows players to meet and bond with the Aranaras, who won over many fans for their [[RidiculouslyCuteCritter design]] and their interactions with the player.

* The location of Enkanomiya released in the 2.4 update has "Hyperion's Dirge", which is required to finish the "The Phaethons' Syrtos" quest as well. First, the seals at three separate locations have to be unlocked, so you need to search almost the entire map of Enkanomiya to acquire 5 different types of key sigils. After unlocking each set of seals, you will be put into a timed combat trial. The fights at The Evernight Temple and Serpent's Heart each last 60 seconds and have Rifthounds and Abyss Mages respectively. However, the one at The Narrows is exceptionally difficult for an overworld encounter. You need to fight three Primordial Bathysmal Vishap Hatchlings that are mobile and tanky (totaling approximately ''450,000 HP'' at [=WL8=]). Their signature attack shoots an orb which can bypass shields and drain energy from your characters (followed by HP once your character is out of energy). And [[SarcasmMode to make things even better]], that fight has a 30-second time limit. This trial's difficulty is on par with ''3-starring Spiral Abyss Floor 11 chambers'' and is near-impossible, even with food buffs, without a Spiral Abyss-capable team that can deal large AOE damage [[note]]a popular [[EasyLevelTrick trick]] does exist for this battle - namely, luring the Vishaps off a nearby cliff - but even that is a challenge to execute, as the player has to make sure that the Vishaps don't simply land on one of the many outcroppings below, not to mention pushing all three Vishaps and having them register as dead within the time limit. Still, "tricky" is a step up from "nigh-impossible"[[/note]].

* The Daily Commission "Supreme Hookshot?" has you get one of three possible items, with the worst of the three being egg fetching. Getting eggs involves you climbing up a massive tree to fetch three of them. There's no easy way to immediately get up the tree from within the village, and the closest convenient teleport point is at least 200m away, so you're shortest way to it is gliding for roughly a minute. Climbing the tree isn't the easiest thing to do exploration wise, and you have to reach two different spots far from each other. Also no, the thousands of eggs you are already carrying don't count towards the commission, it explicitly has to be the three sitting in the massive tree over the village. If it's the first time you've done the quest then it may not even be apparent you're supposed to climb the tree because your view is obscured by something it's resting on and there's several, much easier to reach trees in the area where Paimon mentions the tree you need to climb. You can put a temporary teleport near the tree, but then you're spending resources every week on something that may not see use for the week even if you set Daily Commissions to Sumeru only. And worst of all, [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking the quest ends with the fisherman failing to catch anything but a wet package no matter what he sends you to get in the first place]]!

* The "Dangerous Haul" Daily Commission. The player must destroy an Anemo slime-powered balloon before it delivers dangerous goods to a Hilichurl camp. Not only is there a time limit, the balloon is also very sturdy and the player is constantly under fire by the Hilichurls. To make things worse, most of the commissions take place near bodies of water, so getting hit by a Cryo or Electro attack will greatly hinder the Traveler while the balloon is drifting further towards the Hilichurl encampment. Better have maxed out equipment or food that buffs up attack. For most players, Xiangling is probably the best character for this, since her Elemental Burst can deal a ton of damage to the balloon as long as you can stay next to it for 10 seconds; but if you don't have her yet or haven't powered her up, this can be a stressful mission. It becomes far less so the stronger your team is, though.

* The "Made to Order"/"While it's Warm" event quests are basically the delivery quests you'd often receive for Daily Commissions made much, ''much'' harder. The time constraints are much stricter, and the game forces arbitrary conditions onto you such as no sprinting, no making contact with elements, or no gliding or climbing to make it even more difficult to reach the customer on time. [[note]]The game isn't picky about what constitutes touching elements either, so much as dipping your ankle into water somehow ruins the food. Rain also counts, so a sudden downpour can ruin an attempt, even if you already reached the customer and started talking to them![[/note]] It doesn't help that most of the customers [[UnsatisfiableCustomer complain about how long their order is taking]], even if they set themselves up in particularly remote locations such as cliffs, islands, and within the proximity of a Hilichurl camp. To top it all off, [[FakeDifficulty the timer keeps ticking through loading screens]], so if your load times are longer than average, you'll have even less room for error. In some cases you may have no choice but to [[CuttingTheKnot cheese the mission]] with a portable teleporter, though setting one up costs crystals and other resources.
* Any sidequest that is locked behind Daily Commissions is sure to frustrate players. Even if the quests themselves aren't all that hard, what drives many players insane is completing the commissions they are locked behind at least once in order to access them. This would be fine and dandy, except for the fact that Daily Commissions are RANDOMLY ASSIGNED each day. There are players who have been playing since launch that still haven't ever received "Tales of Winter" as a Daily Commission and thus are completely unable to mark "Equivalent Exchange" off their list of Mondstadt quests, which is absolutely infuriating for completionists. This is even worse with quests locked behind multiple Daily Commissions such as how "Storytelling Method" requires the completion of both "This Novel... Seems Familiar?" and "This Novel Seems... Problematic?" which both in turn require the completion of "Is This Novel Amazing?" ''several times'' in order to get either one of them. This attracted so much criticism that a "commission cycle" system appears to have been quietly introduced, making sure that every unique commission will be eventually encountered.

* The Thunder Manifestation is the new boss introduced in the 2.1 update, which gives out ascension materials for certain Electro characters. However, to even unlock the thing, you have to go through the "Seirai Stormchasers" questline, which sees you running all over the island to activate four Warding Stones by touching the paper talismans associated with them, then turning the stone so it matches the talisman patterns. The first and second sets aren't that bad, even with the [[FieldPowerEffect Balethunder]] gnawing at your health, but the third and fourth ones are where it ''really'' sucks. The third stone has you use a Phase Gate to get up to a series of floating islands, which you traverse by spawning a series of temporary Thunder Spheres you can zap along with the summoned Electrogranum. However, the islands the talismans themselves are located on are somewhat far apart, and lack Electro Spheres, meaning that you have to leap between them and hope it sticks. And if you fall, you have to use the Phase Gate to get back up, and you have no choice but to watch as the little Electro ball ''slooowly'' floats along the track until it gets where it needs to be. Needless to say, this gets annoying quickly. The fourth and final stone ups the ante by reusing the P Switch-like Electrograna, but this time it ''also'' adds crumbled platforms [[SceneryAsYouGo that get pulled back together by the Electrogranum.]] Take too long and the Electrogranum despawns, disassembling the platform and sending you on a long fall. At least you also get a pair of Precious Chests after beating the Thunder Manifestation for the first time and completing the questline.

* In its initial state, the daily commission "Hey, Come Out!" was criticised as being disproportionately difficult for a daily commission. This commission requires the player to follow a burrow containing a Weasel Thief as it and a few other burrows moved around. Originally, the burrows would change positions around 4 to 5 times, virtually mandating that the player carefully follow the correct burrow on foot. Eventually, the difficulty of this daily commission was severely nerfed in version 3.3, reducing the number of burrows to 3 and reducing the number of times the burrows would change position.
* The daily commission "Supreme Hookshot?" has you get one of three possible items, with the worst of the three being egg fetching. Getting eggs involves you climbing up a massive tree to fetch three of them. There's no easy way to immediately get up the tree from within the village, and the closest convenient teleport point is at least 200m away, so you're shortest way to it is gliding for roughly a minute. Climbing the tree isn't the easiest thing to do exploration wise, and you have to reach two different spots far from each other. Also no, the thousands of eggs you are already carrying don't count towards the commission, it explicitly has to be the three sitting in the massive tree over the village. If it's the first time you've done the quest then it may not even be apparent you're supposed to climb the tree because your view is obscured by something it's resting on and there's several, much easier to reach trees in the area where Paimon mentions the tree you need to climb. You can put a temporary teleport near the tree, but then you're spending resources every week on something that may not see use for the week even if you set daily commissions to Sumeru only. And worst of all, [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking the quest ends with the fisherman failing to catch anything but a wet package no matter what he sends you to get in the first place]]!

* The "Dangerous Haul" daily commission. The player must destroy an Anemo slime-powered balloon before it delivers dangerous goods to a Hilichurl camp. Not only is there a time limit, the balloon is also very sturdy and the player is constantly under fire by the Hilichurls. To make things worse, most of the commissions take place near bodies of water, so getting hit by a Cryo or Electro attack will greatly hinder the Traveler while the balloon is drifting further towards the Hilichurl encampment. Better have maxed out equipment or food that buffs up attack. For most players, Xiangling is probably the best character for this, since her Elemental Burst can deal a ton of damage to the balloon as long as you can stay next to it for 10 seconds; but if you don't have her yet or haven't powered her up, this can be a stressful mission. It becomes far less so the stronger your team is, though.

* The "Made to Order"/"While it's Warm" event quests are basically the delivery quests you'd often receive for daily commissions made much, ''much'' harder. The time constraints are much stricter, and the game forces arbitrary conditions onto you such as no sprinting, no making contact with elements, or no gliding or climbing to make it even more difficult to reach the customer on time. [[note]]The game isn't picky about what constitutes touching elements either, so much as dipping your ankle into water somehow ruins the food. Rain also counts, so a sudden downpour can ruin an attempt, even if you already reached the customer and started talking to them![[/note]] It doesn't help that most of the customers [[UnsatisfiableCustomer complain about how long their order is taking]], even if they set themselves up in particularly remote locations such as cliffs, islands, and within the proximity of a Hilichurl camp. To top it all off, [[FakeDifficulty the timer keeps ticking through loading screens]], so if your load times are longer than average, you'll have even less room for error. In some cases you may have no choice but to [[CuttingTheKnot cheese the mission]] with a portable teleporter, though setting one up costs crystals and other resources.
* Any sidequest that is locked behind daily commissions is sure to frustrate players. Even if the quests themselves aren't all that hard, what drives many players insane is completing the commissions they are locked behind at least once in order to access them. This would be fine and dandy, except for the fact that daily commissions are RANDOMLY ASSIGNED each day. There are players who have been playing since launch that still haven't ever received "Tales of Winter" as a daily commission and thus are completely unable to mark "Equivalent Exchange" off their list of Mondstadt quests, which is absolutely infuriating for completionists. This is even worse with quests locked behind multiple daily commissions such as how "Storytelling Method" requires the completion of both "This Novel... Seems Familiar?" and "This Novel Seems... Problematic?" which both in turn require the completion of "Is This Novel Amazing?" ''several times'' in order to get either one of them. This attracted so much criticism that a "commission cycle" system appears to have been quietly introduced, making sure that every unique commission will be eventually encountered.

* Getting the [[TwentyBearAsses total of 40 Rusty and Golden Koi]] needed for The Catch, while tedious due to the fact [[AntiPoopSocking it takes three real-life days for fish pools to refill,]] is otherwise nothing to write home about. Getting the Raimei Angelfish, on the other hand, is an ''entirely'' different [[JustForPun kettle of fish.]] First of all, they only spawn at night on a remote shipwreck off the coast of Tatarasuna Island. Due to Tataragami influence, the water's turned [[GrimyWater electric,]] and there aren't that many footholds, so expect your active character to lose health quite a lot in the process of jumping from wreck to wreck. Compounding the issue is that the place is ''crawling'' with Cryo Slimes and Electro Abyss Mages, to which the aforementioned electrified water isn't a problem (the former can walk on water due to automatically freezing it, while the latter floats,) and the way their elements react mean that they'll be slapping you around with Superconduct. Just ''getting'' to the island is an issue in and of itself, as the Slimes and Abyss Mages can deal enough damage to ''sink the Waverider'' if you try to park too close. They're also too tanky to be killed with the Waverider's armaments, so your only choice before you can get to fishing is to take them out on foot. The fish themselves are also some of the hardest ones to catch, with their Ideal Tension Zones constantly shifting and requiring a lot of effort to reel in. And to top it all off you need to fish a total of ''18'' to obtain The Catch and the necessary refinement material (while only 5 spawn every 3 days), meaning you'll have to endure the entire ordeal 4-6 times.
* Any sidequest that is locked behind daily commissions is sure to frustrate players. Even if the quests themselves aren't all that hard, What drives many players insane is completing the commissions they are locked behind at least once in order to access them. This would be fine and dandy, except for the fact that daily commissions are RANDOMLY ASSIGNED each day. There are players who have been playing since launch that still haven't ever received "Tales of Winter" as a daily commission and thus are completely unable to mark "Equivalent Exchange" off their list of Mondstadt quests, which is absolutely infuriating for completionists. Even worse with quests locked behind multiple daily commissions such as how "Storytelling Method" requires the completion of both "This Novel... Seems Familiar?" and "This Novel Seems... Problematic?" which both in turn require completion of "Is This Novel Amazing?" in order to get either one of them. This attracted so much criticism that a "commission cycle" system appears to have been quietly introduced, making sure that every unique commission will be eventually encountered.

* The location of Enkanomiya released in the 2.4 update has "Hyperion's Dirge", which is required to finish the "The Phaethons' Syrtos" quest as well. First, the seals at three separate locations have to be unlocked, so you need to search almost the entire map of Enkanomiya to acquire 5 different types of key sigils. After unlocking each set of seals, you will be put into a timed combat trial. The fights at The Evernight Temple and Serpent's Heart each last 60 seconds and have Rifthounds and Abyss Mages respectively. However, the one at The Narrows is exceptionally difficult for an overworld encounter. You need to fight three Primordial Bathysmal Vishap Hatchlings that are mobile and tanky (totaling approximately ''450,000 HP'' at [=WL8=]). Their signature attack shoots an orb which can bypass shields and drain energy from your characters (followed by HP once your character is out of energy). And [[SarcasmMode to make things even better]], that fight has a 30-second time limit. This trial's difficulty is on par with ''3-starring Spiral Abyss Floor 11 chambers'' and is near-impossible, even with food buffs, without a Spiral Abyss-capable team that can deal large AOE damage [[note]]a popular CheeseStrategy does exist for this battle - namely, luring the Vishaps off a nearby cliff - but even that is a challenge to execute, as the player has to make sure that the Vishaps don't simply land on one of the many outcroppings below, not to mention pushing all three Vishaps and having them register as dead within the time limit. Still, "tricky" is a step up from "nigh-impossible"[[/note]].

* The location of Enkanomiya released in the 2.4 update has "Hyperion's Dirge", which is required to finish the "The Phaethons' Syrtos" quest as well. First, the seals at three separate locations have to be unlocked, so you need to search almost the entire map of Enkanomiya to acquire 5 different types of key sigils. After unlocking each set of seals, you will be put into a timed combat trial. The fights at The Evernight Temple and Serpent's Heart each last 60 seconds and have Rifthounds and Abyss Mages respectively. However, the one at The Narrows is exceptionally difficult for an overworld encounter. You need to fight three Primordial Bathysmal Vishap Hatchlings that are mobile and tanky (totalling approximately ''450,000 HP'' at [=WL8=]). Their signature attack shoots an orb which can bypass shields and drain energy from your characters (followed by HP once your character is out of energy). This trial's difficulty is on par with ''3-starring Spiral Abyss Floor 11 chambers'' and is near-impossible, even with food buffs, without a Spiral Abyss-capable team that can deal large AOE damage [[note]]a popular CheeseStrategy does exist for this battle - namely, luring the Vishaps off a nearby cliff - but even that is tricky to execute, as the player has to make sure that the Vishaps don't simply land on one of the many outcroppings below. Still, "tricky" is less difficult than "nigh-impossible".[[/note]].

* The location of Enkanomiya released in the 2.4 update has "Hyperion's Dirge", which is required to finish the "The Phaethons' Syrtos" quest as well. First, the seals at three separate locations have to be unlocked, so you need to search almost the entire map of Enkanomiya to acquire 5 different types of key sigils. After unlocking each set of seals, you will be put into a timed combat trial. The fights at The Evernight Temple and Serpent's Heart each last 60 seconds and have Rifthounds and Abyss Mages respectively. However, the one at The Narrows is exceptionally difficult for an overworld encounter. You need to fight three Primordial Bathysmal Vishap Hatchlings that are mobile and tanky (totalling approximately ''450,000 HP'' at [=WL8=]). Their signature attack shoots an orb which can bypass shields and drain energy from your characters (followed by HP once your character is out of energy). This trial's difficulty is on par with ''3-starring Spiral Abyss Floor 11 chambers'' and is near-impossible, even with food buffs, without a Spiral Abyss-capable team that can deal large AOE damage.

* The Aranyaka quest chain is infamous among the playerbase for how long and spread out the questline is compared to previous, more linear quest chains, making the "Sacred Sakura Cleansing Ritual" chain look like a Daily Commission in comparison. What starts as a bog-standard side quest helping a forest ranger named Rana eventually becomes a side-quest fractal with side quests [[JustForPun branching]] into another set of side quests, which ''can then branch of into another set of side quests'', all of which are nontrivial and often introduce new mechanics and puzzles. The entire chain takes more time to complete than ''all of the main story content'' launched at the same time! Like "Sacred Sakura Cleansing Ritual", these quests are necessary to unlock world content as well, including some Dendroculi, songs for solving puzzles around Sumeru, unveiling two regions of the map, and the tree for spending Dendro Sigils. It is telling that the quest chain is so long and complex for sidequest standards that the game gives you a logbook called "Aranyaka", so that you can keep track of what quests you need to do next to progress. The developers likely realized how absurdly long and drawn out the "Aranyaka" quest chain is for sidequest standards, as later released sidequest chains necessary for unlocking world content in Sumeru, namely "Golden Slumber", "The Dirge of Bilqis" and "Khvarena of Good and Evil", are significantly shorter and more linear in comparison. If it is of any consolation, this quest chain allows players to meet and bond with the Aranaras, who won over many fans for their [[RidiculouslyCuteCritter design]] and their interactions with the player.
* Finding all ''76'' Aranaras across the ''entirety of the initial map of Sumeru'' (yes, you read that right) can be a staggeringly painful experience, especially if you are not relying on a guide to locate them. While some Aranaras can be easily found in freeroaming or while doing sidequests, some of the little guys can be located in very obscure locations such as deep within caves, and there is no item or in-game progress tracker that can help indicate where they are located. Finding and helping the Aranaras in the open world is required to unlock the 15 treasure chests (one for every 5 Aranaras, with the last three chests unlocked simultaneously with the final 5 Aranaras) located in a cave near Vanarana, which itself can only be unlocked by completing part 1 of the Static Views quest and finding the first ten hidden treasures (the tenth one being in ''the Chasm'' instead of Sumeru) shown in the "Mysterious Clipboard" section of your Aranyaka book.

* The location of Enkanomiya released in the 2.4 update has "Hyperion's Dirge", which is required to finish the "The Phaethons' Syrtos" quest as well. First, the seals at three separate locations have to be unlocked, in which you need to search almost the entire map of Enkanomiya to acquire 5 different types of key sigils to do so. After unlocking the seals, you will be put into a timed trial at each location where you have to fight some of the most difficult enemies in the game to pass each trial. The fights at The Evernight Temple and Serpent's Heart each last 60 seconds and have Rifthounds and Abyss Mages respectively. However, the one at The Narrows is the most frustrating as it only lasts 30 seconds and you will need to fight Primordial Bathysmal Vishap Hatchlings that are not just annoyingly fast and tanky with a lot of health, but are constantly shooting orbs which can bypass shields and drain energy from your characters (followed by HP once your character is out of energy). This can make the trial at the Narrows almost impossible to beat due to the short timing and with such difficult enemies, unless you have a very strong team that can deal large AOE damage in addition to having some food buffs.

* The "In the Mountains" world quest, which is needed to unlock both the "Peak of Vindagnyr" Domain (currently the only domain with artifacts that boost Cryo and Hydro damage) and the Cryo Hypostasis boss. This quest takes quite a long time to complete (comparable to the "Chi of Yore" world quest), especially when compared to the effort it takes to open the other domains in the game. The biggest roadblock in this quest is the ice shard in Starglow Cavern, which requires beating a three-minute combat challenge over a partially frozen pond with nothing but Cryo Hilichurls and Abyss Mages, making it the most frustrating part of the quest by far. If that's not bad enough, you have to deal with falling icicles that crash into the ground at regular intervals for no discernable reason. The difficulty of the challenge arguably stems not from getting frozen (since you can avoid this as long as you don't touch the water), but getting hit constantly, which will disrupt your attacks. When fighting the second wave of enemies, it is very easy to accidentally walk right into the near-invisible barrier blocking the ice shard, which will knock you back. You will be in for a bad time if you don't bring a character that can generate shields to nullify hitstuns, whereas if you did, then the fight goes from hairpullingly difficult to somewhat manageable.

* The "In the Mountains" world quest, which is needed to unlock both the "Peak of Vindagnyr" Domain (currently the only domain with artifacts that boost Cryo and Hydro damage) and the Cryo Hypostasis boss. This quest takes quite a long time to complete (comparable to the "Chi of Yore" world quest), especially when compared to the effort it takes to open the other domains in the game. The biggest roadblock in this quest is the ice shard in Starglow Cavern, which requires beating a three-minute combat challenge over a partially frozen pond with nothing but Cryo Hilichurls and Abyss Mages, making it the most frustrating part of the quest by far. If that's not bad enough, you have to deal with falling icicles that crash into the ground at regular intervals for no discernable reason. The difficulty of the challenge arguably stems not from getting frozen (since you can avoid this as long as you don't touch the water), but getting hit constantly, which will disrupt your attacks. When fighting the second wave of enemies, it is very easy to accidently walk right into the near-invisible barrier blocking the ice shard, which will knock you back. You will be in for a bad time if you don't bring a character that can generate shields to nullify hitstuns, whereas if you did, then the fight goes from hairpullingly difficult to somewhat manageable.

* Any sidequest that is locked behind daily commissions is sure to frustrate players. Even if the quests themselves aren't all that hard, What drives many players insane is completing the commissions they are locked behind at least once in order to access them. This would be fine and dandy, except for the fact that daily commissions are RANDOMLY ASSIGNED each day. There are players who have been playing since launch that still haven't ever received "Tales of Winter" as a daily commission and thus are completely unable to mark "Equivalent Exchange" off their list of Mondstadt quests, which is absolutely infuriating for completionists. Even worse with quests locked behind multiple daily commissions such as how "Storytelling Method" requires the completion of both "This Novel... Seems Familiar?" and "This Novel Seems... Problematic?" which both in turn require completion of "Is This Novel Amazing?" in order to get either one of them. This attracted so much criticism that a "commission cycle" system appears to have been quietly introduced, making sure that every unqiue commission will be eventually encountered.

* Yae Miko's "Anti-Raiden Shogun Training", a required part of the Archon Quest, puts you against a machine that tests you on Raiden Shogun's attack pattern. The first part requires you to dodge its blasts and rings, while winning requires you to destroy an Electro orb it spawns before the attack hits you. Unfortunately, this takes place over grass and Pyro damage taken from burning grass if trying to destroy the orb with the use of a Pyro character like Bennett or Diluc will count as you getting hit by the machine's finishing move and failing the challenge. It may take a player a long time to realize that Pyro is failing the challenge for them because the game designers seemingly failed to account for the fact that other things besides the machine could hurt the player while in the arena.