Your biggest Honkai: Star Rail questions, answered

Honkai: Starrail is a new game from Hoyoverse, the people behind it Genshin effect And Honkai impact 3rd. The game features a fantasy space odyssey story with turn-based combat, and you can play it without spending a dime on gacha.

If you are not familiar with mobile gacha games or just confused by the terms Honkai: Starrail used, we’re here to help. We’ve collected some of the questions Polygon staff had during gameplay and answered them below.

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What is the gameplay loop for Honkai: Star Rail?

With a party of four characters, you fight enemies using turn-based combat and progress through main story missions and side missions.

To make your characters and light cones (weapons) stronger, you must fight specific enemies that consume your Trailblaze Power (stamina that replenishes over time). It will be a cycle of logging in, doing some daily stuff and grinding to strengthen and better equip your characters.

What is the plot of Honkai: Star Rail?

The Trailblazer (you) mysteriously wakes up after being created with a Stellaron. Stellarons are powerful sources of energy that can cause disaster, but the Trailblazer can interact with them and harness its power without doing anything terrible (or so we’ve seen so far). You join the Astral Express crew, who fly around the stars in their train, stopping any disasters that occur due to Stellarons on different planets.

Do I have to spend money in Honkai: Star Rail to be successful?

No. The whole story can be cleared with four-star characters, so you don’t need to spend money to play.

However, advanced content like Simulated Universe and Forgotten Hall will be easier with five star characters. However, this doesn’t mean you can’t beat it with lower rarity characters. There are already videos of beta players doing Forgotten Hall with only 4-star characters, so it’s not impossible. However, it will be more difficult.

Is Honkai: Star Rail like Genshin Impact or Honkai Impact 3rd?

Many similarities between Honkai: Starrail, Genshin effect And Honkai impact 3rd are due to the mobile RPG genre more than any other reason. Honkai: Starrail shares many features with mobile games (including Genshin effect), such as stamina-based farming and unlocking characters through gacha.

There are a few things that look almost exactly like this Genshin effect, such as the character screen and other UI elements. If you are familiar with Genshin already, you will quickly be able to adapt to Honkai: Starrail thanks to the UI layout alone.

Image: Hoyoverse via Polygon

The gameplay loop (as discussed above) is very similar to both Hoyoverse titles, but it should be noted that Honkai: Starrail is not an open world game and it does not have active multiplayer like how Genshin effect do.

How do I find Calyx/Stagnant Shadow/Cavern of Corrosion/Echo of War?

You can find it on your map and teleport to it, but since Honkai: Star Rail doesn’t use an open world map, it can be difficult to find exactly what you’re looking for quickly. We recommend simply using the “Survival Index” tab of the Insterastral Guide, which you can access from the main menu or by tapping the rectangle with a ring around it in the top right corner.

How do I replenish Trailblaze Power?

Be patient. It takes six minutes to charge one and 18 hours to charge the full set of 180.

You can also use Stellar Jade to replenish your resin up to eight times a day. 50 Stellar Jade complements 60 Trailblaze Power. You can also use Fuel, a reward for completing Battle Pass missions and other bonuses, to recharge 60 Trailblaze Power.

How do I load a technique in Honkai: Star Rail?

You’ll want to hit those glowing purple canisters you see around maps to refuel your tech points. Each restores two technique points.

Image: Hoyoverse via Polygon

How do I increase my balance level?

On certain Trailblaze levels (your account level), you will be prompted to increase your balance level. Doing this will make the enemies around you a bit tougher, but can also give your characters more power. Just keep increasing your trailblaze level and watch your mission log to unlock higher balance levels.

Specifically, you need to be at equilibrium level three to start farming Five Star Relics.

How do I cook in Honkai: Star Rail?

As you progress through the early game, Pom-Pom will teach you how to synthesize, that is Honkai: Starrail‘s version of cooking. After he teaches you how, you can access the Synthesize feature from the in-game menu to cook whenever you want, as long as you have the ingredients.

What does the supporting character in the profile do?

Instead of using four of your own characters, you can borrow other people’s characters as long as they are set as their supporting character. The one you set as your support character is who other people can borrow from you.

For example, if I have a fully built Bronya, I can set it as my support character, and other players can borrow her to use in their own battles.

You cannot use supporting characters in Forgotten Hall or Simulated Universe.

Do your own characters have weaknesses for certain types of battles?

No. Enemies have weaknesses, but your characters don’t, so don’t worry about being thwarted.

How do I find a monster’s weakness?

All enemies have their weak points above their heads. You can also check the enemy’s weaknesses in the database, which is accessible from the main menu.

Image: Hoyoverse via Polygon

Which character should I level up first?

It’s up to you, but most of the characters in your team should get the same amount of level. The starting characters you get are actually quite useful. The one thing we highly recommend when you start is to make sure you have a painter or healer on your team. March 7 and Natasha are both given to you for free and fit into these roles respectively.

Should I roll on Gacha Warp banner for beginners?

The consensus is rather divided on whether or not to do this. The banner for beginners is discounted (costs eight Star Rail Passes instead of 10 for 10 pulls). After 50 draws (40 Star Rail Passes) you are guaranteed to get a random five-star character from the regular banner. You can do that with the regular warp banner choose once a standard five-star character, if you draw as many as 300 times.

Based on personal experience related to Hoyoverse games alone, I’d recommend just pulling the beginner’s warp with Star Rail Passes you’ve been rewarded with. Don’t turn your Stellar Jade into extra passes – only use the passes the game actually gives you. You can then use any additional Star Rail Passes on the standard warp.

300 pulls is a lot, and if you don’t plan to spend any money in this game, it may take some time to collect the Star Rail Passes to reach this goal, even with the bountiful starting rewards Hoyoverse hands out.

Ultimately based on Genshin effectpower creep will be plentiful Honkai: Starrail. Whatever characters you get from the beginner or standard warp, they’ll be useful in the beginning, but it’s a toss-up if they’ll be useful in six months or beyond. That said, if you don’t get the strongest character to begin with, maybe the meta will shift and they’ll be more useful later on.

Whether or not you should use the 40 passes that would go to the standard warp on the beginner warp is up to you and how much you value specific five-star characters over others. Which brings us to the next question…

Which Honkai: Star Rail characters are the strongest at launch?

Most players point out that Welt and Bronya are the best basic warp characters as their debuffs and buffs are extremely useful. However, this may change as more characters are released over time and the meta shifts.

At the time of writing this, DPS calculators have Seele and Jing Yuan topping the single-target and multi-target charts, respectively. That said, you don’t have to pull for these characters, as there are four-star characters, like Sushang and Serval, who can still dish out big numbers when built correctly.

These calculators also depend on specific builds and situations that you may not use.

That said, this will all change as patches roll out, so we don’t recommend going all in on a character this early unless you really like them.

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If you have more questions, post them below and we’ll do our best to answer them based on what we know from the beta version of the game.