Most underwhelming characters in Honkai Star Rail as of August 2023

Honkai Star Rail boasts a vast catalog of characters, each possessing unique abilities and playstyles that set them apart from one another. While players can employ most units to clear the end-game content, a few can be underwhelming to use in combat as of August 2023. It does not necessarily render them useless, but they are subject to power creep and will likely be replaced by better characters.

This article jots down the most underwhelming characters currently used in the game. Their overall combat efficiency without Eidolon has been considered for fair judgment, as they can grow stronger with additional copies.

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What are the most underwhelming characters in Honkai Star Rail as of August 2023?

Image showing all the underwhelming units in Honkai Star Rail as of August 2023 (Image via HoYoverse)

The following list contains the most underwhelming characters in Honkai Star Rail based on their overall performance in the meta as of August 2023.

• Arlan
• Qingque
• Natasha
• Herta
• Yukong

It is worth noting that they have been arranged in no particular order, and the reason behind their inclusion has been further explained below.

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1) Arlan

Arlan requires low HP to deal massive damage (Image via HoYoverse)

Due to his demanding playstyle, Arlan has the lowest pick rate among all the Lightning characters. He requires the lowest HP to deal damage, which directly counteracts the strong restoration provided via a meta-healer like Luocha.

Although some might argue that his gameplay is somewhat similar to Blade, however, the latter has much higher damage output and can trigger self-healing abilities to survive in battle.

Although Arlan is efficient at Skill Point management, he requires a lot of investment to really shine during combat. In fact, he requires Gepard in the team, who is a standard 5-star character in Honkai Star Rail.

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2) Qingque

Qingque drains away Skill Points during combat (Image via HoYoverse)

Qingque is a prime example of an underwhelming character that grows significantly stronger with more Eidolons. However, without any copies, she can be extremely clumsy to use since her primary ability depends on RNG to deal extra damage, which can quickly exhaust the Skill Points.

Only at the sixth Eidolon can she generate Skill Point after using her enhanced basic ATK. She can be extremely strong with a proper team setup, but players can better allocate their resources for characters that are not tied to conditional damage output.

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3) Natasha

Natasha is the only accessible healer as of August 2023 (Image via HoYoverse)

While Natasha remains the most accessible healer in Honkai Star Rail as of August 2023, her healing amount is underwhelming in the current meta. A lot of end-game enemies can unleash massive nuking damage, which cannot be completely restored by Natasha unless players use a shielder to tank the front-loaded damage.

Furthermore, Natasha has been heavily power crept by Luocha in terms of healing efficiency, and one of the upcoming 4-star characters, Lynx, will likely take away her crown for accessibility going forward.

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4) Herta

Herta's abilities have a low base scaling (Image via HoYoverse)

Herta feels extremely underpowered and underwhelming to use in the current Honkai Star Rail meta since her abilities have considerably low base scaling. Although her follow-up attack can effectively bust down Ice Toughness, she fails compared to characters like March 7th and Pela.

The other 4-star units from the element are loaded with more support power to benefit any team setup.

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5) Yukong

Yukong is an accessible Imaginary character as of August 2023 (Image via HoYoverse)

Lastly, Yukong can be extremely underwhelming to use without any Eidolon since her "Roaring Bowstring" buffs can be utilized by the next two characters on the turn order. Due to this, she can be inconsistent in the battle unless players tune the SPD of every member of a team to align with her.

Like Qingque, Yukong’s sixth Eidolon fixes her clunky playstyle as it generates the buff stack after she unleashes her Ultimate. It enables her to efficiently increase the CRIT attributes of the next unit.