(1) Well, all I can say for now is that my week of playing wasn't enough to be able to say whether this is even possible at all. Maybe there will be more unlocked characters from regular questing later in the game, but so far I only got a single dendro character (Collei) from a random pull. And I think there were some open world mini-puzzles activated by dendro. I don't think there were a lot of them though. Also they are definitely optional and not a big deal. Could also be possible it was intended for later game players going back with their dendro characters unlocked organically in the later questlines.

[–] Vipsu@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

https://www.zleague.gg/theportal/genshin-impact-no-wish/#%3A%7E%3Atext=By+avoiding+spending+money+on%2CImpact+without+impacting+their+wallets. (Probably some a.i article)

Seems like this is already a thing in Genshin impact and some players have been succesful with it.

Reddit and Hoyoverse forums seem to have handful of people doing this.