Honkai: Star Rail is the latest addition to the HoYoVerse, featuring a turn-based combat system that sets it apart from its predecessor, Honkai Impact 3rd as well as Genshin Impact. The game boasts a unique blend of action-packed gameplay and strategic decision-making, giving players the freedom to customize their team with a plethora of available characters and plan their moves carefully. As a brand new entry in the Honkai series, Honkai: Star Rail promises to bring exciting new content and challenges for players to enjoy.
Honkai: Star Rail, like its predecessors, incorporates elements into the gameplay. These elements include Fire, Wind, Lightning, Ice, Physical, Quantum, and Imaginary, each with their own unique effects on enemies. However, unlike Genshin Impact, there is no Elemental Reaction system. Instead, the game utilizes a Toughness and Weakness Break system, which allows for more flexibility in team composition and offers several advantages in battle. As such, players should pay close attention to this system to maximize their chances of defeating enemies.
What Is Toughness?
Once players engage in combat in Honkai: Star Rail, they will immediately notice the red and white bars on enemies. While the red bar indicates the enemy's HP meter, the white bar represents the enemy's Toughness Bar. Additionally, players will notice elemental logos on top of these bars, indicating which elements the enemies are weak to. Typically, enemies are weak to multiple elements, which allows for more flexibility. Players can also check the enemies' elemental weakness before engaging the combat, by checking the enemy info. This can allow players to enter the fight even more prepared. As such, in Honkai: Star Rail, there is no inherently set "weak against" system, unlike many other games such as Pokemon, where players need to memorize which element is weak to another. Instead, weaknesses are based on the enemy itself, making it more challenging and dynamic for players.
However, the game makes it easier for players by always displaying the weaknesses on top of the bar so that they can strategize and adjust their team composition accordingly. This means that players cannot rely on a single team composition or element to succeed in every combat situation or challenge, but rather need to adapt and be flexible in their approach. Overall, the Toughness and Weakness Break system in Honkai: Star Rail allows for more diverse and engaging combat experiences.
How To Deplete Toughness?
Some players may mistake Toughness mechanic for an immunity shield. Although the Toughness meter may resemble a shield system, it does not provide complete immunity to the enemy. Players can still deal damage to the enemy's HP bar and defeat them even without depleting their Toughness bar. However, the Toughness bar can only be depleted by attacking the enemy with a specific element that matches their elemental weakness. To make it easier for players to identify the appropriate element, on top of indicating the elemental logos, the toughness bar and the elemental logo will also glow when the player selects a character and targets the specific enemy. This indication will assist players in determining which elemental attack will be most effective against depleting the enemy's toughness.
It's important to remember that each character and their corresponding skills will have a different level of toughness depletion value. Some characters will naturally excel at breaking the toughness bar, so players should take note of their abilities and plan their team composition accordingly. Additionally, players should keep in mind that ultimate skills will typically be more effective at depleting the toughness bar than regular attacks or skills.
It's worth mentioning that the game encourages players to strategize and switch between characters to effectively exploit enemy weaknesses and break their toughness bar. This means that players should experiment with different characters and their abilities to find the most effective combinations for each battle. Some enemies may have a higher toughness bar than others, so players should pay attention to their weaknesses and choose the appropriate elemental attacks to break their toughness. By doing so, players can deal more damage and defeat enemies more quickly.
What Is Weakness Break?
Depleting the toughness bar in Honkai: Star Rail serves an ultimate purpose of triggering a weakness break, which can prove to be highly advantageous, especially when taking on challenging bosses. Once the toughness bar is entirely depleted, the weakness bar is activated. This results in the enemy taking a significant amount of damage and losing action points, ultimately delaying their turn. Moreover, their planned attacks are interrupted, and they take additional damage over time based on the element used to break the toughness meter. It's worth noting that certain elements may trigger additional effects, making it essential for players to pay attention to which element they are using to break the toughness meter.
Although players can benefit from weakness breaks, they should not solely focus on depleting the toughness bar of enemies. For instance, it may not be efficient to hold back on using a character's ultimate skill just to plan for a toughness break, as waiting for a weakness break will not compensate for the lost energy gain and potential damage dealt. In some cases, it may be better to prioritize dealing damage to the enemy's HP bar and use the ultimate skill at a more strategic moment. This is especially important to consider in later gameplay where enemies may have higher HP and toughness values. Players should strive to find a balance between dealing damage and depleting the toughness bar to effectively defeat enemies.
Every Elemental Weakness Break
In addition to dealing damage over time (DoT), each element in Honkai: Star Rail also has unique additional effects that can be applied to enemies. Notably, Ice, Quantum, and Imaginary elements can cause additional delays, allowing players to finish off enemies without taking much damage. It's important to keep these effects in mind when planning team compositions and strategies for battle. Below are the lists of weakness break effects for each element:
- Fire: Additional Fire DMG and applies Burn effect, dealing Fire DoT
- Wind: Additional Wind DMG and applies Wind Shear effect, dealing Wind DoT
- Lightning: Additional Lightning DMG and applies Shock effect, dealing Lightning DoT
- Ice: Applies a Frozen effect that prevents the enemy from taking action, dealing Ice DoT
- Physical: Additional Physical DMG and applies Bleed effect dealing Physical DoT
- Quantum: Applies an Entanglement effect that delays enemy actions, dealing Quantum DoT
- Imaginary: Applies an Imprisonment effect that delays enemy actions and reduces Enemy SPD (No DoT DMG is mentioned)
Honkai: Star Rail is released on April 26th for PC and mobile devices. PS4 and PS5 versions are in development.