Top five 4-star characters that deserve a buff in Honkai Star Rail 1.2

Honkai Star Rail is a new game, and as it is with relatively new gacha games, there are usually only a handful of characters. Just like in Hoyoverse's earlier game Genshin Impact, certain 4-star characters dominate Honkai Star Rail, while some are lackluster in comparison. Most of the 4-star characters are usually given out for free, so it is not surprising that they don't perform as well as their more exclusive counterparts that can only be obtained through gacha.

Some of these characters aren't even able to keep up with the difficulty of the game’s main content, which is the Memory of Chaos, while some are mostly viable and only need a simple buff in their kit.

In this article, we will tackle five underwhelming characters in Honkai: Star Rail, including their current kit, what’s wrong with it, and why they need to be buffed.

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Arlan and four other 4-star characters that need to be buffed in Honkai Star Rail

1) Arlan

Honkai Star Rail - Arlan (Image via HoYoverse)

Arlan is one of the less common characters in Honkai Star Rail right now as he is yet to be featured in a character banner. His gameplay consists of keeping his HP low, and to capitalize on this, the team sustaining support has to be a shielder and not a healer.

One of the main problems that Arlan has in Honkai Star Rail is that he does not have enough self-survivability and has to completely rely on his shielder to keep him alive. His trace Repel and fourth Eidolon Turn the Tables are only available at the start of the battle, which makes them useless in a typical boss fight that lasts at least five turns.

With enough uses on his skill, it is possible to lower his HP to one, and he can easily die from DoT (Damage over Time) debuffs that take effect whenever it’s the character’s turn. Although he has a trace called Endurance that increases his resistance to DoT debuffs by 50%, it still isn’t enough to justify his lack of survivability, especially since DoT is the type of damage that can kill him.

Arlan is SP-positive, which means that he doesn’t take up too many skill points, as his skill consumes HP instead of a skill point. His potential for toughness-breaking is pretty much average, and his ultimate uptime isn’t that high. His damage pales in comparison to Serval, and he also lacks the DoT that she can provide.

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2) Herta

Honkai Star Rail - Herta (Image via HoYoverse)

Herta is one of the free 4-star characters and the only character whose Eidolons are given for free in Honkai Star Rail, as long as you progress in the Simulated Universe. She is yet to be featured in the rate-up character banners, and this is unlikely to happen in the future, as a new World in the Simulated Universe is going to be released with a new Eidolon for Herta.

Her gameplay in Honkai Star Rail is the average Erudition gameplay where the character is expected to deal remarkable amounts of multi-target damage or Area of Effect (AoE) damage.

In many tier lists that various sites are making for Honkai Star Rail, Herta, along with Arlan, is usually in the lowest tier, which is to be expected given her weird traces that have little to no value for her. This includes the trace Puppet, which gives her an additional 35% chance to resist Crowd Control Debuffs, which is clearly a Destruction trait, and not for an Erudition character like Herta.

This can be considered useless as typical teams usually already have a Preservation character that would either take the aggro and damage for the team or shield other characters. Another trace that’s almost useless on her is Icing, which increases the damage she deals to Frozen enemies by 20%. Although she can freeze enemies on her weakness break, she does not have an innate ability that has freeze at all, unlike March 7th, who has freeze on her ultimate.

Additionally, Herta also has bad scalings, as even her skill has a lower damage percentage than Serval’s, and although Herta has a higher scaling than Serval on her ultimate, it is plain and does not have any other effect other than its damage. On the other hand, Serval has Shock, which is a DoT Debuff that she can extend indefinitely.

Also, her talent can be said to be near-useless, especially in Honkai Star Rail boss fights, as it only procs once per enemy, when their HP drops below 50%. Her Eidolons, although mostly free from the Simulated Universe, are mostly subpar. Even her E6 is very underwhelming, with just a 25% ATK increase when using her ultimate.

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3) Hook

Honkai Star Rail - Hook (Image via HoYoverse)

Hook is a 4-star character in Honkai Star Rail who was featured together with Seele in the first limited rate-up character banner in the game. Her gameplay includes making sure she can capitalize on her Burn DoT, while still dealing heaps of damage to a single target with a little bit of splash.

One of the reasons why she feels underwhelming in Honkai Star Rail is that she is a Destruction character, but she doesn’t feel like one. Characters of this path are known to deal outstanding amounts of damage while also possessing great survivability. Although she can dish out decent damage, her Technique, Skill, Ultimate, and Talent do not do anything for survivability.

She does have some survivability traits from her traces, but they are mediocre at best. One example is Innocence, which gives her a 5% HP heal whenever her Talent is triggered, and another is Naivete, which increases her chance to resist Crowd Control Debuffs by 35%.

On the other hand, she offers decent toughness-breaking capacity but is outshone in this aspect by the Fire Trailblazer, who is free for everyone to play. Serval also outperforms her in DoT application as she can only apply her burn to a single target and can't extend it like how Serval can with her ultimate. She is better than Arlan, another destruction character in terms of damage and versatility, but she still can’t stand on her own without good sustaining support.

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4) March 7th

Honkai Star Rail - March 7th (Image via HoYoverse)

March 7th and Dan Heng are the first 4-star characters in Honkai Star Rail, and they're both given to Trailblazers for free. She was previously featured along with Jing Yuan in his rate-up character banner. Her gameplay mainly revolves around being able to shield an ally while also providing a decent amount of aggro value to the shielded character.

She has a good shield with enough uptime but lacks AoE support for team survivability, so she’s usually not enough to solo sustain the whole team, unlike Gepard, who can easily do so with enough speed and energy regeneration.

March 7th offers little except for a big shield with cleanse and freeze from her ultimate, which doesn’t even have that good of a chance to be inflicted at a 65% base chance. The crowd control debuff triggered by her ultimate ability presents a challenge as it counteracts one of her most effective synergies with Clara, who needs enemies to attack her as much as possible.

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5) Qingque

Honkai Star Rail - Qingque (Image via HoYoverse)

Qingque, referred to as QQ by some in the community, is a 4-star character currently featured in Luocha’s character banner. She is also free once you reach a certain point in the main story quest. Her aesthetic revolves around mahjong, where even her gameplay heavily relies on luck, especially if you play her as your main damage dealer. Whenever an ally’s turn starts, she randomly draws one tile from three different suits, holding up to four at one time.

When all four tiles are finally of the same suit, she can then use her Enhance Basic Attack called Cherry on Top! She is very SP-negative in the sense that when she gets unlucky in drawing tiles, it could take her five Skills to draw tiles, and it’s still possible to not complete a set of four.

She is a Quantum character, but with almost everyone having Seele, as there were a lot of free pulls during the game’s release, she was overlooked and barely used by players. She can deal AoE damage, but Seele can do just as well against multiple enemies through her Resurgence. Additionally, another free 4-star character, Serval, beats her in terms of stability, as Qingque’s damage output can be unreliable at times because of her kit.

Overall, she can be good, but some of the best boosts to her damage are locked behind her Eidolons, more specifically, her fourth Eidolon, which gives her a big damage boost but is still locked behind her gacha gameplay. Meanwhile, her sixth Eidolon makes it possible to use more versatile teams as it makes her recover one SP after using an Enhanced Basic Attack, considering her Skill consumes a lot if she gets unlucky in drawing tiles.

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Although rare, HoYoverse can buff characters they have already released, just like in the case of Zhongli from Genshin Impact, where they had to buff him following the backlash from players. Alternatively, Honkai Star Rail Trailblazers can also wait for future characters that may have surprising synergy with these underwhelming characters that would make them viable or even better than the current promising characters in the game.