Unlike Genshin Impact, Elements in Honkai: Star Rail doesn’t interact with each other and creates Elemental Reactions. Instead, enemies have Toughness with a couple of Elemental weaknesses and players can use those Elements to break them.
Of course, each Element still has its own uses outside for breaking Toughness. Physical characters are unique for their Bleed DoT, which deals continuous Physical DMG to the enemy. Unlike in Genshin Impact, having the Physical Element doesn’t make a character a DPS. For example, Natasha is Physical yet is mostly a healer in Honkai: Star Rail.
4 Sushang
While occupying the bottom of the ranking, Sushang is not weak at all in Honkai: Star Rail. Her kit allows her to deal a decent amount of damage that can carry her team throughout the battles. Her Skill hits hard, especially against enemies with Weakness Break since they will trigger Sushang’s Sword Stance, adding an extra attack that inflicts half her Skill damage. The main utility in Sushang’s kit is her Ultimate. Other than its high ATK scaling, it advances her action forward by 100% and buffs her Skill. That gives players the ability to play Sushang’s turns up to three times.
Sushang’s damage can be also increased from her Traces and Eidolons in Honkai: Star Rail. Her A4 Trace keeps increasing her Sword Dance DMG by 2.5% up to 10 times, which can further improve its effectiveness. As for her A6 Trace, Sushang becomes much faster as long as there are enemies without Toughness on the field. Combine her A6 with her Ultimate and Talent passive, and Sushang becomes an incredibly speedy DPS. Finally, since most of her kit revolves around Weakness Break, her fourth Eidolon grants her a whopping 40% extra Break Effect, which will increase her DoT damage and cause her to hit harder when she deals Weakness Break on the enemy.
3 Natasha
Since she heals based on her Max HP while having a solid Base HP, Natasha is definitely a good healer in Honkai: Star Rail. When using her Skill, Natasha heals a single target, in addition to continuously healing them for their next two turns. As for her Ultimate, it enjoys a low Energy cost, which allows Natasha to cast it more frequently while she keeps healing her entire team.
One of Natasha’s best features is her ability to cleanse once players unlock her A2 passive from her Traces. Additionally, the buffs she gets from her Traces don’t end here, Natasha’s A4 and A6 add more healing to her kit by improving her outgoing healing and increasing the continuous healing she triggers from her Skill by one extra turn. Finally, even if players acquired more copies of Natasha, her Eidolons keeps on improving her survivability and healing. As of version 1.0, Natasha occupies the third-ranking on the list due to her being the only F2P healer available in the game.
2 Trailblazer
As a Destruction unit in Honkai: Star Rail, Physical Trailblazer is a solid Single and AoE target character. Their Skill hits in an AoE and can decently break the enemy's Toughness. Meanwhile, the Physical Trailblazer's ultimate has two versions; AoE and Single target, allowing players to adjust their attack based on the current situation.
As for the Talent, their passive adds a decent amount of ATK% when the Trailblazer inflicts Weakness Break on an enemy, up to two times. Some of the best passives the Physical Trailblazer can have are the ones they get from their Traces, specifically their A2 and A6. The A2 passive grants the Physical Trailblazer the ability to get their Ultimate early in the battle. As for their A6, it will buff the Trailblazer’s Skill and AoE Ultimate unconditionally. While simple and easy to use, the Physical MC remains one of the most effective DPS in Honkai: Star Rail.
1 Clara
Clara enjoys one of the highest Base ATK stat in Honkai: Star Rail. Just like her animation, Clara’s kit is so unique as she heavily relies on Svarog’s protection and counterattacks. By using Clara's Skill, she deals damage to all enemies while Svarog deals an additional amount of damage to the marked ones. Enemies will be marked if they hit Clara, which means her gameplay revolves around being attacked.
This is why, unlike typical Ultimate that deals damage, Clara's simply causes enemies to be more likely to attack her. When enemies attacked the girl, Svarog will immediately Counter-attack and mark the enemy. If she's under Ultimate's effect, Svarog's Counter-attack damage will be enhanced up to two times. This makes Clara an excellent tank and team protector while also being a great DPS. Her constant Physical attacks will also deplete the enemy's Toughness slowly, eventually leading to a Weakness Break.
Since Clara is going to keep Taunting enemies, it’s better to build her to withstand most of the damage she would receive, making her A2 and A4 Traces somewhat useful to her playstyle. As for her A6, it further increases the DMG of Svarog’s follow-up attacks by 30%, which proves Clara to be a very reliable 5-star character in Honkai: Star Rail.
Honkai: Star Rail is now available on Android, iOS, and PC. A PlayStation version is in development.