u/Huge-Swing-7137

Pulcinella has a splash art from the Travail trailer. It would be a profound tragedy if they changed his design, but when would you expect him to be released? To figure this out we need to look at patterns, but Hoyoverse often breaks these patterns; we will look at them nonetheless.

Travail characters:
- Diluc (released at 1.0)

- Ningguang (1.0)

- Ayaka (2.0)

- Cyno (3.1)

- Lyney and Lynette (4.0)

- Iansan (5.5)

I have baseless speculations about Iansan's role changing throughout the years, but its clear to see that each of the Travail characters bar one are released very early on. But, considering that Pulcinella is a harbinger, there is also a sort of trend that we can try to figure out.

Childe was 1.1, Scaramouche was 3.3, Arlecchino was 4.6, Columbina was Luna 4, and Sandrone is Luna 8. The first two harbinger releases don't follow a set pattern, and Columbina is the archon stand-in. Sandrone, Arlecchino, and someone like Skirk are late-patch player-pullers that have a bit of effort given to them in order to sell more.

But recently in Nod Krai, with the release of Varka, they have started to increase the big character releases.

Pulcinella's release is highly dependent on his role in the story. He can be an extreme plot-relevant gigachad and make the players fall in love with him even though he has a non-standard design. But, I don't see him fulfilling the late Fatui spot since they might give that to a shade, hexenzirkel member or other big lore relevant character.

And observing the Snezhnaya teaser, we can assume what early conflicts might happen in the story and how this MIGHT reflect releases.

HIGHLY SPECULATIVE

Alyosha (4 star), Vodyanitsa (5 star), Odette (5 star)

- These are probably 7.0 characters. Vodyanitsa could be a 4 star, but Odette's probably a 5 star due to her having a Stellar Linchpin and Vodyanitsa only having a vision.

Valeriy (5 star)

- 7.1 coded.

Anastasya Feodorovna Snezhnaya (5 star), Lantern Rite? 4 star?

- 7.3, not sure if lantern rite falls in the .3 patch this year.

Vesna (5 star)

- A stellar Linchpin, so a 5 star. Feels like a 7.2, 7.4, or 7.7 release.

Danica (5 star)

- Feels like a Clorinde situation, not a big lore relevant character, and will probably be pulled for by people who like her design. 7.5, or 7.7 release.

Mitya (4-5 star)

- I won't be surprised if he was a 4 star, but he does look really good if this is the case. Maybe 7.2, 7.5 release?

Noy (5 star)

- The Varka, a big character release, but they might still be keeping the super lore relevant character under wraps. 7.5, or 7.6.

Where does that leave Pulcinella?

Sadly, Pulcinella is not the most lore relevant character (yet), and so at the earliest, he could be a 7.1 or 7.2 character if we're basing on appearances in the teaser alone. He also could be a 7.5 or 7.7 late release character coming before or after the major late patch release. He is more than "filler" but less than the major releases.

So I want to preface this by saying that I started "writing" as a hobby. I put writing in parentheses because I more of... started haphazardly jotting down the scenes in my head on the page. Disjointed, a wall of text, it was a while before I started writing more "properly". And because of this, my writing has been built on shaky foundations.

For example: head hopping. Almost every sentence switches between character POVs. (My fault for only spotting this now...) And many of the chapters are dedicated to long past sequences that do inform the narrative, but cut in between the present plot. It took me a day to edit a single 3,000 word chapter.

Ugh...

Anyway, this is just a bit of whinging on my part.