Topic: Honkai Star Rail

@z0d15g0d Yes re: WuWa I said I liked the Echo/Hologram system being linked to the open world. But farming them actually sucks as the rates are so ridiculously low and upgrading them costs so much resources. I don't currently like the system. But thankfully I can obliterate all the content in the game with what I do have. E.g. I just did another 10 pull on Jiyan's banner and got 2x more Mortefi to take him to S6 and a 20% party wide ATK buff.

I'm almost done with the story. Will likely finish tonight or tomorrow. Gotta say I think it's been awful. The worst part is when you start to realise all the things they are doing to artificially extend the play time and drag it out. It just isn't good content imho. And listening to Sunday drone on worse than The Architect in The Matrix was a low point. Hopefully they finish well here and in 2.3. and then move onto something with a more coherent storyline and much better pacing. But I should finish and get my event Jades in time.

@themightyant Lol that's who Sunday reminded me of. He even has the white suit to boot. I expected Penacony to take a much darker turn when they introduced "death" at the end of 2.1. They dashed all my hopes with this update. Now with Jade arriving in 2.3 it might just go all political and a lot more drivel.

Gotta say I am a bit down on HSR at the moment.

I didn't enjoy Penacony very much overall and find introducing a new mechanic like Super-break a bit annoying as it mostly just nerfs our existing characters, we spent a lot of time building, for newer content. It hasn't really enabled older less used characters, like Pure Fiction did or Dendro did in Genshin, it mostly seems to be a tactic to get us to spend, or keep playing daily, to be relevant in some newer content.

This on top of other power-creeping I feel is going on. I finally got Bronya after 300 wishes and she's been superseded by many better buffing/debuffing units so there's likely only one team I would run her in now.

I think the biggest thing is how much of a timesink it all is and the opportunity cost of playing. E.g. I could play HSR or in the same time I could probably play all of Xenoblade Chronicles 3, Baldurs Gate 3 and Elden Ring... or dozens of smaller games.

Not giving up yet, but hoping the next world is better and more engaging, else I might tap out for everything except the story like I have done in Genshin.

@Shigurui Thanks for the code mate.

@themightyant @Shigurui - The Penacony story has been a letdown this time. Part 1 was filled with so much intrigue whilst Part 2 was filled with endless rambling. Walking back on Aventurine's fate was a cop out and ruined any emotional props they earned. The last part best be filled with more battles than conversations (I hope).

With regards to SB It does look like that's the "In" mechanic at the moment but we all know that will not last forever so we're probably in a "ride it out" phase. I'm going to stick with my current characters and keep farming for better relics. I'll build TB Harmony as I've built the other 2 and having the MC maxed is my usual RPG playstyle even WuWa MC is built even though I barely use them anymore lol.
Bronya has definitely taken a back seat to my Sparkle but only until I get an E1 for her. Robin has pretty much replaced my Tingyun as she seems to be better overall for my DPS heavy teams.

Is the next Arc going back to the Xianzhou? As the 2 new 5 stars for version 2.4 are from there.

Anyone tried the new story yet? Is it long winded as before or an improvement? So far only been doing the events for Jades and got FF on first 10 pulls. Now trying to pull for her LC as Only Fall of Aeon seems to be universal destruction LC. No one can use Blade or DHIL's LC properly They should refresh those 5* LC's in Herta's store.

@Shigurui Yea just finished it. I must admit I hammered the "next" button again. Thanks man it was 0 pity. I couldn't believe it. My last pull was Fu Xuan. I spent most of my pulls trying to get Fu Xuans LC afterwards so that's on about 60 pity now. I hope I win the 50/50. If I get another Welt LC I'll probably rage lol.

@Shigurui Looks like her LC is being elusive. At 67 pity now. Also how the hell is my TB Harmony 1 shotting Lv 82 Elites with his skill and my Acheron isn't with her ult. They still have some HP left. This Super Break business will probably get nerfed.

@Shigurui @z0d15g0d Yes finished it too. The quest itself was pretty lame, but I liked the end of it, both the fireworks video and saying goodbye. I haven't tried the new end-game content yet, but actually have some of the day off today so might give it a go. I'm trying to get on top of my gacha-game content and play it when it first comes out going forward rather than leaving it to the end.

Meanwhile it FINALLY happened... for the first time in 2024... I won the bloody 50:50 and got Firefly. I wasn't going to but I realised I already had her best team (Ruan Mei, Harmony Trailblazer & Gallagher E2+) and if you can't beat them (Super- Break) then join them. So that's a win. Which I honestly wasn't expecting having lost so many back to back, losing has become my default in this game. lol.

It's going to take me a long time to level up all those characters though, including weapons, traces, relics and more. My Gallagher was only Lv20 unlevelled and i'd only just started levelling Harmony TB nd I've realised my Ruan Mei's relics and the best.

What Lightcone are you running on Firefly? I realise I don't have any great light cones for her. I don't have indelible promise, so it's either Flames Afar or Secret Vow, currently looking for a good source for DMG numbers. I suppose I could take On the Fall of an Aeon off Jingliu but i'm not usually a fan of swapping equipment as I ALWAYS forget to change it back!

That was my complaint about Super-break, also based partly on leaks about Firefly's damage numbers which can exceed Acheron's. Super-break has currently busted the meta open.

@themightyant Yes! Congrats on winning the 50:50 bout damn time that happened lol.
I was running Fall of Aeon on her as I'm used to swapping out LC's now thanks to swapping Trend of Universal Market on my Preservation's for Acheron. I just got her LC so maxed that out straight away. The additional 60% BE is pretty handy. Her Technique pretty much 1 shots mobs now shame it can't be activated for farming.

I'm going to try and build Gallagher as the new event needs all the SB I can get for the higher levels (so many jades at stake). There's never enough resources

Do you know if Jade is SB also? I might try pulling Ruan Mei also.

@themightyant Lol yea FF pretty much tore through boss Sunday.

@z0d15g0d Nice work on the Light cone! I barely have any pulls but might try and see if I can get lucky.

I gave the new Divergent Universe a try gotta say I really like it so far. The main reason is that you can use ANY character you have even if unlevelled and it will temporarily, for this mode only, level them to 80 (or whatever the appropriate level is for the world level), make them 5/8/8/8 on with all other traces unlocked except Lv 75 and Lv 80 ones. It will also Level light cones and relics, or if you haven't got them equipped it will add them and level them to the appropriate level. This means you can try unlevelled characters out, and new teams to see if you like them. (Currently trying that Firefly, Hmny TB, Ruan Mei, Gallagher team and it SLAPS!!!)

EDIT: Firefly's technique is also hilarious at killing the trotters in the kill dozens of trotters adventure challenges. I thought Asta was OP at this but this is next level. Lol

Only early thoughts so this may change or it may get boring like SU, Swarm Disaster etc. but so far I like it.

@themightyant Thanks mate. I've added her to support if you want to check the difference between her LC and Fall of Aeon. Divergent is pretty fun but not getting the right blessings can be annoying. I'm glad they let us do this and also get SU points upon completion. Woulda sucked if we had to do both. Unfortunately Planar farm is not considered SU completion lol. I tried to use it for the daily task.

I haven't encountered the trotter domain as of yet but looking forward to setting her loose on them. This could also work for the break the barrels mini game as she destroys objects upon landing too. Yea it's pretty cool that they let us use maxed versions of characters for it. I need to confirm but can we use support characters also?

Just tried out Firefly's technique in the trotter domain and 1 shot all of them lol.

@Shigurui @themightyant - What's the purpose of the save file at the end of Divergent Universe? Can we use the same blessings on a different difficulty?

@z0d15g0d The save file allows you to IMMEDIATELY fight the final boss in Simulated Universe to make farming Planar Ornaments faster. You keep the build you had in that save file. However the save file only lasts one week, so it's only really useful if you are farming a domain over and over.

@themightyant Ah thanks just tried it out and was fun to unleash the new blessings on "Death". I shaved off 2 HP bars in 1 go with the Molten Knight fusion blessing.

I just tried out Apocalyptic Shadow. Honestly not a fan. You play the same 2 bosses up to 4 times with them getting progressively harder (/ longer) and changing their moveset slightly as the difficulty increases. The problem I had with it was the first 2 levels were too easy and the last 2 too hard. They just seemed hard for hardness sake... or more realistically hard to give whales harder content to justify spending more money. In the 3rd battle against Cocolia for instance she dropped 3 of her 'meteor stars' almost back to back before I had a chance to heal which effectively one (or three) shotted me. I'm sure there's a team combination I have that can make it work, but not sure I have the desire to do it. But I got a Free Xueyi for finishing battle 2.

One of the things I liked about the other new mode Divergent Universe is that at least you could use ANY of your team members as it levelled them up. Which gave that mode some unique fun.

Aside from that I finished the other match fruit event and got a free Gallagher, now E4 which should help my Firefly team once I build it.

Lastly I wasted around 3200 stellar jade trying to get Firefly's lightcone. Not sure that was a wise move, with my luck I don't have the jade to get characters and light cones, and I have On the Fall of an Aeon S5 I'll just swap that with Jingliu... or maybe upgrade Flames Apart to S5 through the forgotten hall shop. But I guess i'm 20 closer to pity on the lightcone banner for some 5 star weapon. Maybe try for Acheron's LC on rerun.