How to play Ruan Mei in Honkai Star Rail

Ruan Mei is one of the coveted 5-star characters in Honkai Star Rail who follows the Harmony Path, and takes on the role of dedicated support across various team compositions. She can imbue allies with a bunch of powerful enhancements that can significantly increase their combat prowess. That said, her abilities primarily scale on Break Effect, unlike any other buffer in the game.

Although her kit might seem quite straight-forward, there is a bit of a learning curve required to use it optimally. Therefore, this article will discuss Ruan Mei’s gameplay elements and explore the best ways to play with her in Honkai Star Rail.

---

What are Ruan Mei’s abilities in Honkai Star Rail?

The following list outlines Ruan Mei’s abilities in Honkai Star Rail:

• Basic ATK (Threading Fragrance): Inflicts Ice DMG scaling on Ruan Mei’s ATK stat.
• Skill (String Sings Slow Swirls): Obtains Overtone, which increases DMG Weakness Break Efficiency of all allies.
• Ultimate (Petals to Stream, Repose in Dream): Ruan Mei activates a field that increases the All-Type RES PEN of allies within the radius. Their attack applies Thanatoplum Rebloom, which prevents the enemy’s Weakness Break recovery and delays their action. She further inflicts Ice Break DMG on target.
• Talent (Somatotypical Helix): Boosts SPD for the entire team and deals Break DMG on enemies when they are afflicted with a Weakness Break.
• Technique (Silken Serenade): Ruan Mei obtains Silken Serenade upon entering battle, which activates her Skill once. Within the Simulated Universe, the Silken Serenade effect triggers a Weakness Break when an ally attacks an enemy to engage in the fight. The Toughness-Reducing damage of the attack is further boosted for every Blessing in possession.

---

Ruan Mei’s optimal playstyle in Honkai Star Rail explained

Image showing Ruan Mei using her Skill to obtain Overtone (Image via HoYoverse)

First up, build Ruan Mei with sufficient Break Effect since most of her abilities scale on this particular stat. It also increases her Ice Break DMG, which adds to the overall damage output of your team. Ideally, you will want to maintain more than 180% Break Effect in her stat to benefit from her abilities.

Optimizing her turn is also important to ensure that your DPS is able to benefit from her Overtone effect. Thus, it is advised to build her with more SPD than the damage dealers in your team.

Now, engage your fights with Ruan Mei’s Skill to boost Weakness Break Efficiency of the entire team. This will allow your characters to deal additional damage to the target’s Toughness bar and quickly crack it down to stagger them.

Make sure to use your Ultimate whenever it is available to increase the All-Type RES PEN of all allies. With the amplification active, any party member should be able to bypass a portion of the opponent’s DEF to deal additional damage. Save your Ultimate for use only against bosses or in domains with multiple phases. Use the ability when your opponent has maximum HP to inflict maximum damage on them.

---

For more news and updates on Honkai Star Rail, follow Sportskeeda.