Honkai: Star Rail Tier list (March 2025)

Categories

• DPS - Characters that mainly focus on dealing damage and being the main source of it in the team they are placed in,
• Support DPS - Characters that fall within this category are very rarely played as the primary or sole damage dealer of the team and instead almost always play alongside another character that fills that role instead. Support DPS are still built with the intention to deal damage themselves but also have a kit containing buffs/debuffs to bolster their team's performance and/or have abilities that are directly dependent on others in order to function.
• Amplifier - Characters that do not focus on dealing damage but instead amplify the damage other teammates deal by granting allies buffs or debuffing enemies,
• Sustain - Characters who are capable of keeping the team alive with their abilities.

Special tags

Tags are split into 3 categories: Pros, Cons and Archetype which represent the most defining features of a character's kit and the current meta archetypes they fit into. Archetype tags indicate a connection between characters with that tag e.g. Acheron requires debuffs to work and Silver Wolf applies them. Here is a full list of all current tags and what they mean:

• Break - the character belongs to the Break archetype focusing on Break Effect and Break Efficiency,
• Debuff - the character belongs to the Debuff archetype applying one or many debuffs or has a kit that directly relies on them to function,
• DoT - the character belongs to the Damage-over-Time archetype specializing in applying and/or amplifying DoT effects,
• FuA - the character belongs to the Follow-up Attack archetype benefitting from, buffing or delivering powerful Follow-Up Attacks.,
• Summon - the character fights alongside summons or other entities,
• Advance - the character can manipulate the turn order by either action advancing their allies or themselves,
• Buff - the character can apply various Buffs to help their teammates,
• Delay - the character can delay enemies and hinder their actions in battle,
• Energy - the character can recover the teammates energy,
• SP-Friendly - the character is substantially more skill point friendly than other characters in their role.
• SP-Unfriendly - the character is substantially more skill point un-friendly than other characters in their role.
• Partner New! - the character is incredibly reliant on being partnered with one specific character in order to function at the highest level. Characters marked with this tag will perform one (but sometimes even more) tiers lower than their listed position on the tier list without those characters alongside them.

Meta Lines

Meta Lines categorize each section of the tier list into a power bracket. Here are the four brackets:

• Apex Characters (T0 & T0.5) - characters in this bracket are the cream of the crop. They can do outrageous amount of damage, provide massive buffs (or debuffs) or keep the team alive no matter what the enemy throws at them. They simply can achieve the best, most consistent and accessible results in their best teams, allowing you to easily clear the content,
• Meta Characters (T1, T1.5, T2) - characters in this bracket make clearing the content a breeze, but compared to the Apex characters they require more work from your side. Either their team options are more restrictive, they require bigger Relic investment or they possess a notable weakness or downside. Still, they are all great and won't disappoint you if you give them what they need to shine,
• Niche Characters (T3 & T4) - characters in this bracket are lacking in one or many fields of their role. These characters still possess the ability to clear all content with the right build, endgame blessing, team or enemy line-up but have much lower play rates and success rates than Meta and Apex characters,
• The Forgotten Ones (T5) - characters in this bracket struggle. A lot. Either their kits simply don't work in the mode or they require a ton of investment and love to be able to work. Just avoid them unless your husbando or waifu landed here and you believe in the power of love.

Half tiers

To further define the tier list and correctly represent the power level of each character in relation to each other we have added half tiers to the higher tier brackets. Under our previous system a tier rating jump of 1 tier rating made it difficult to position characters accurately, often leading to multiple characters ending up in the same tier despite a clear power and utility difference.

Criteria

• Manual play,
• Using optimal team composition/support characters,
• Character level 80,
• All Major Traces unlocked and skills upgraded to level 10,
• Character equipped with level 80 non-limited 4★ or 5★ Light Cone (including the 'standard' Light Cones),
• Battle Pass Light Cones aren't taken into account because you can't obtain them without spending,
• Character equipped with 5★ upgraded gear with optimal Main Stats and Sub Stats (with 24 desired sub stats out of a possible 54),
• Eidolon level 0 for 5★ characters,
• Eidolon level 0/6 for 4★ characters.

Roles

We compare characters within their role - so DPS are compared to other DPS and the ratings are adjusted based on their performance within the role. Don't try to compare characters between roles (for example an Amplifier with a DPS), because their ratings mean different things.

• DPS - Rating is heavily influenced based on the characters ability to deal enough damage to achieve the 3-star objective, the easier and more quickly achieved the higher the rating,
• Support DPS - Rating is heavily influenced based on the damage they provide, the buffs and debuffs or efficiency boost these characters create or the utility they provide against certain encounters,
• Amplifier - Rating is influenced based on the damage amplification abilities of the character and the utility they provide to the team,
• Sustain - Rating is influenced based on the characters ability to keep the team alive and the utility they provide. The more utility and higher the safety, the higher the rating.

Other criteria affecting the ratings

Each tier list rates characters based on their average value in the specific game mode it represents. The higher a character is rated on the tier list the greater their power and more widely they can be used effectively in the mode, helping the players in getting all rewards every cycle. We aren't looking at 0-cycle potential. We consider:

• Flexibility - how the characters kit functions against various enemy types, amounts of enemies and their ability to perform when not fighting against enemies vulnerable to their element,
• Investment - some characters require specific limited 5★ units, heavy investment in certain relic sets or an abundance of sub-stats in order to function at the highest level. Each of these points impacts the rating in a negative way. - the more the character requires to perform well, the bigger the impact,
• Utility - recently released characters possess abilities that lie beyond their defined role, for example Amplifiers/Sustains that can deal decent damage. The more a character helps the team outside of their role, the bigger positive impact on their rating it has.

13/03/2025

This Apocalyptic Shadow Tier list update is a smaller one. We focused on adjusting the ratings of recently released characters to better reflect how they fit into the meta, alongside making a few other changes.

While this update is a relatively minor one, you can expect major changes either next phase or the one after, specifically focused on the Damage Category. The reason for this is the overabundance of characters residing in the Apex Tier for this mode. If everyone Apex, no one is. Apocalyptic Shadow is a game mode with a much wider variety of encounters than the other two and this variety allows for more characters to have stand out performances over a collection of phases. This is the reason so many characters reside in the Apex Tier currently.

With that said, based on the upcoming character release schedule and drip marketing, we’re confident that the upcoming characters have a good shot at raising - or exceeding - the current Apex power level, continuing the dominance every 3.0 character has displayed so far.

Upcoming characters:

• 
  Mydei a Destruction character releasing incredibly soon,
• 
  Castorice a Remembrance character releasing in 3.2 who is expected to be a damage dealer,
• 
  Anaxa who also releases in 3.2 and is an Erudition character who could be a strong standalone Erudition DPS or work well as a support damage dealer for The Herta (or both).

Going by the track record of 3.0, none of these characters should be weak. By waiting for more of the 3.0 cast to release, we’re confident it’ll be much clearer which characters should remain in Apex and which should not.

While we’re waiting to address the “too many Apex Characters” problem, we did some smaller changes. Here are the characters receiving adjustments this time:

• 
  The Herta T0.5 T0. The Herta has dominated every phase of every mode in endgame since the time of her release. We initially assigned her a somewhat conservative placement in Apocalyptic Shadow, but she’s proven multiple times now that she has what it takes to stand at the top. While this is the case for now, it should be noted that current phases are heavily tailored towards her kit, element and playstyle.
• 
  Aglaea T1 T0.5. Aglaea like The Herta has also has shown she’s far more capable in Apocalyptic shadow than expected, continuing the trend of 3.0 dominance. Aglaea isn’t quite as popular a choice nor as easy to play as her peers but she is certainly capable of achieving outstanding scores in the mode (some of the highest) when played right. For this reason we’re raising her into the Apex Category.
• 
  Kafka
  
  Black Swan
  
  Dr. Ratio
  
  Clara have not been performing at a level we associate with the tiers they’re currently placed in and the other characters that reside there. For this reason we’re moving them down.
• 
  Trailblazer • Remembrance added to Watchlist. Trailblazer Remembrance has displayed incredible performances in all three modes and AS is no exception. While predominantly played with The Herta, they’re also a top pick for sustainless compositions which are rising in popularity and a decent option for Aglaea teams. This combined with the suite of potential damage dealers coming down the line, all of which are expected to be playable with Trailblazer Remembrance, we’re watchlisting them to move to T0.
• 
  Firefly added to Watchlist. Firefly had a tougher time this phase as she struggles against the featured bosses that require AoE to deal with and that feature respawning trash enemies her Technique can’t easily implant Fire weakness into. As one of the most played damage dealers in AS, and a long standing powerhouse, we’re not dropping her just yet, but keeping an eye on if she can bounce back - since this was the first phase in a long time where she struggled so much. Though, if she won't recover, she will drop from T0 next update.
• 
  Topaz & Numby added to Watchlist. Topaz has been performing notably worse than March 7th (Hunt) in Apocalyptic Shadow encounters that involve frequent target swapping, invulnerability phases (that force target swapping) or AoE encounters of which as of late there have been a lot of. The reason Topaz falls behind in these scenarios is that her kit revolves around a single target mark which takes time to move while March revolves around a buff she never has to move. Ultimately, this means March’s kit is almost always fully online while Topaz’s can have downtime. While March 7th (Hunt) is pulling ahead in recent phases we’re just watch listing Topaz for now.
• 
  Seele added to Watchlist. Seele displayed an amazing performance this phase, albeit whilst only being used by very few players. We’re placing a watch list on her to see if she can pull off another convincing performance over the next 2 phases to climb herself out of the niche category of tiers.

26/02/2025

• 
  Tribbie has been added to the tier list to the Support DPS category. She could be placed in Amplifier category too, but compared to other characters there she focuses on dealing damage first while her supportive abilities are secondary.
• No other changes to the tier list have been made - her impact on other characters will be included in next tier list update once we gather the next set of data in all 3 modes.

23/02/2025

This update will address the latest phase of Memory of Chaos, the increasing difficulty associated with the mode, but also the shift in meta (caused by new enemies and buffs introduced recently).

Memory of Chaos continues to become more challenging with each phase but 3.0’s MoC is particularly brutal. The difficulty increases are the result of (but not limited to):

• Higher enemy damage numbers and more lethal battle scenarios,
• Higher HP of the enemies,
• New and much harder enemies types and mechanics,
• Encounters and buffs specifically tailored towards new characters (and in some cases against old characters),
• A need to make the game harder to justify the higher power level of new characters (powercreep).

We base our tier list on the 3 most recent phases, and MoC 2.7 served as an introduction to a heavier AoE-focus and increase in difficulty, but 3.0 doubles down on this - with a specific push via the buff tailored toward new characters. The result of this is two thirds of the phases influencing the tier list heavily, favoring new characters and leading to large shifts in categories containing them (mostly the DPS).

Tier list changes:

• 
  Aglaea T0.5 T0. We placed Aglaea conservatively on our tier list in order to observe how the community would receive her more restrictive than average requirements. Aglaea smashed 3.0’s MoC which was custom made for her but also performed great in 2.7’s MoC which wasn’t specifically made with her in mind (and she was the fastest there too). We feel she deserves to sit in Tier 0.
• 
  Qingque T4 T3. The little gambling gremlin actually thrives in the most recent phases so we're raising her up a tier.
• 
  Firefly &
  
  Feixiao T0 T0.5. Just like in the transition between 1.x and 2.x, as we move from 2.x to 3.x, we’re seeing an increase in power for new characters, new enemies/mechanics that favor them and a fall off of older characters. Feixiao and Firefly are two of the high profile casualties of this. Both characters are still absolutely strong but Feixiao is at a disadvantage in the AoE-focused phases and Firefly, while technically a Blast damage dealer, doesn’t thrive in AoE either and has particular trouble with bosses that spawn multiple enemies frequently that aren’t weak to Fire (a common occurrence of late). The combination of Feixiao and Firefly losing their usual edge due to unfavorable conditions, and The Herta and Aglaea getting exactly what they need to succeed is why we are reshuffling the highest tier.
• 
  Boothill T0.5 T1. Boothill is currently at a severe disadvantage in the latest MoC phases, being a single target character against predominantly AoE encounters. Until the focus returns to single target, we’re lowering his rating for now.
• 
  Yunli T0.5 T1. Yunli is currently not performing on par with other Apex rated damage dealers especially considering the adjustment in rating to Firefly and Feixiao. We had Yunli on the edge of the Apex tiers before but with the adjustment to other characters ratings and the higher requirements of the mode, we’re lowering her rating for now.
• 
  Clara T1.5 T2. Similar to Yunli, Clara is struggling in the recent phases as they're not as tailored to her gameplay style as the previous ones.
• 
  Blade T2 T3. Maybe Blade finally received what he dreamt of - a glorious death. But kidding aside, time wasn't kind to our berserker and he's one of the worst performing limited characters in the last 3 phases, so we're dropping him out of the Meta tier.
• 
  Tingyun T1 T1.5. Tingyun’s niche as an Energy battery has been usurped by Sunday and her amplification abilities have been powercrept, resulting in low play rates, lower scores and no best in slot teams in the meta. Tingyun is still perfectly usable and is a 2nd, 3rd or 4th pick for a lot of characters but as a result of the above we’re lowering her rating.
• 
  Asta T2 T3. She's simply not used anymore - being 3rd or even 4th pick in various teams as the limited Amplifiers just offer more.
• 
  Hanya T3 T4. Same reasoning as with Asta.
• 
  Fu Xuan T0.5 T1. Compared to Gallagher, Lingsha, Aventurine and Huohuo, Fu Xuan hasn’t aged quite as well. Her kit lacks the synergy of the aforementioned characters, and her sustain is less flexible in the face of the harder content we’re experiencing (read: she explodes too often from strong AOE attacks and you can't prevent it). Fu Xuan still maintains competitive clear times and high usage for now, but measured up to characters like Huohuo who have direct synergies with newly released units like Aglaea and The Herta via her energy gain, she doesn’t quite have the same edge.

New Watchlist additions:

• 
  Kafka &
  
  Black Swan - The rapidly increasing difficulty of MoC has been rough on a lot of characters, but the DoT archetype is one suffering more than most. Black Swan, Kafka (and by extension the DoT archetype) have not done well in the past two phases, so we’re placing both characters on the watch list but expect them to move down barring any drastic changes in 3.1’s phase.

New feature - Double Placement!

We have revamped the tier list backend which allows us now to place characters in multiple 'columns' at the same time. This change was caused by

The Herta

We've placed the new Support DPS Argenti in T1 for now, but he's close to reaching the Apex tier - pending the next phase results.

Do let us know what you think of this change and who else do you think should get it!

15/02/2025

Today we're making big adjustments to the Pure Fiction tier list. The rework of this mode is still relatively fresh and compared to last phase this one is was substantially more difficult to clear. As a result of this, expect more changes in the near future but also a number of characters to be placed on the watchlist instead of being moved right away. We also brought back the character usage over time section in the PF Analytics that showcases last 2 phases average data.

Now, let's to go over all the changes.

The first thing we want to tackle is the Break/Superbreak archetype that had a pretty rough time since the rework. Caused by the rework itself, but also the lack of Fire and Imaginary weakness and lackluster buffs for the archetype. We don't know if the trend will continue with the buffs favoring other archetypes during the 3.x patch, but for now the experience playing Break teams is pretty miserable.

• 
  Firefly T2 T3. Firefly is the biggest loser among the Break archetype under the new Pure Fiction rule set. Firefly was never outstanding in the mode but she was able to carve herself out a niche thanks to her reasonable blast damage but more importantly frequent Fire Weakness implant. In the new Pure Fiction, her blast is severely diminished and her Fire Implant potential has been slashed: Firefly is only able to implant the very first enemies of each wave with her Technique - all subsequent enemies that spawn (which is a lot) are unaffected. The result of this is less effective damage for Firefly, dramatically reduced effectiveness against non-Fire weak enemies and a drop from the “meta” tiers.
• 
  Himeko T1 T1.5. While not really a pure Break character, Himeko is commonly played with Firefly (or instead of her) so it's not surprise, she's also affected by the rework in a negative way. While she can be used with The Herta as her Erudition partner, other characters like Herta, Serval or Argenti are picked over her. We will have to wait what direction Himeko will go next, but for now we're lowering her half a tier.
• 
  Rappa (Added to watchlist) - Compared to Firefly, Rappa has suffered less but is still clearly hurting from the lack of a good themed buff and a side containing Imaginary weak enemies. With absolutely nothing going Rappa’s way we’re placing her on the watchlist but are giving her one more phase to recover.
• 
  Trailblazer • Harmony (Added to watchlist) - With Firefly six feet under and Rappa catching strays, it's no surprise than Harmony Trailblazer’s play rate and performance have both suffered as a result. With both this characters primary teammates on the chopping block, alongside the meteoric rise of Remembrance Trailblazer (a mutually exclusive competitor) we’re placing Harmony Trailblazer on the watchlist to move down.

Now let's talk about the DPS and Sub-DPS belonging to other archetypes.

• 
  Aglaea T2 T1.5. Aglaea has performed better than anticipated albeit with low representation overall (below 2%). We see the potential some players have demonstrated with Aglaea in the mode and if she continues to perform/improve we may raise her even further next phase.
• 
  Yunli T1 T1.5. Yunli, what happened to you? Despite this phase featuring a lot Phys-weak enemies, Yunli's performance is just terrible. It looks like post-rework, her counter-gameplay is just too slow for the mode where you need to kill things as fast as possible and we're dropping her because of that.
• 
  Clara T2 T3. Same reasoning as Yunli - Clara's archetype is just too slow for the new Pure Fiction.
• 
  Feixiao T2 T3. The mode rework hit her badly. Previously she could be paired with Herta and be used as enabler for her, but it's no longer the case in the new format and her performance dropped.
• 
  Jingliu T3 T4. With some characters dropping to T3, they pushed Jingliu further down. She's still struggling and hopefully will get some love from the devs soon.
• 
  Topaz & Numby &
  
  March 7th • The Hunt T3 T4. Single-target characters struggle too much post rework and we're dropping both Topaz and Stabby March because of that as they are closed to the Forgotten Ones than Meta characters.
• 
  Sampo T4 T5. DoT as archetype is struggling but while Kafka and Black Swan still have some uses, Sampo doesn't.
• 
  Acheron (Added to watchlist) - Acheron paired with Jiaoqiu has produced back to back dominating performances, rivaling even the freshly released The Herta. With that said, both phases featured Lightning Weakness and this phase features enemies that apply debuffs on death, boosting her performance. For now we’re placing her on the watchlist to move to T0 if she maintains pace or better yet improves next phase.
• 
  Jing Yuan (Added to watchlist) - While Aglaea surprised us in a good way, Jing Yuan did the opposite. He had everything going for him this phase (Weakness, Grit mechanic, buffs) and yet in both our data and in the hands of our testers, he didn't perform at the level he should. Because of this we're placing him on watchlist to see how he performs in the next phase.

Finally, let's talk about the Amplifiers.

Before this update, we placed all top Amplifiers in T0.5 together to see who would come out on top once the meta in the new PF settled. With the exceptional entrance of Remembrance Trailblazer, the current struggle of Break and the need to make a move and prevent a traffic jam of 6 of the best characters residing in T0.5, we’ve decided to follow through with some adjustments - even if we will need to modify them in the event Break recovers or other characters falter.

• 
  Trailblazer • Remembrance T1 T0. Remembrance Trailblazer’s debut performance in Pure Fiction has been impressive to say the least, being one of the go-to supports for The Herta teams. While Remembrance Trailblazer certainly saw the most play and best scores with The Herta, that’s not the only team in which they proved to be viable in. As one of the top choice of one of the best damage dealers, a huge play rate and one of the best average scores alongside the potential to be played in other comps we feel Remembrance Trailblazer has enough on their resume to be placed in T0 for now.
• 
  Robin T0.5 T0. Robin is one of the most versatile Amplifiers in the game - being able to play with virtually any non-Break DPS and improve the team's performance. Full team action advance is just too broken.
• 
  Sunday T0.5 T0. Similar to Remembrance Trailblazer, Sunday has found a place in The Herta teams but also is one of the top picks in other high meta and apex damage dealers teams. Sunday has a lower play rate, score and struggles with skill points at times in some teams, but we feel his flexibility and current performance in the reworked PF is enough to set him apart from those in T0.5.
• 
  Asta T3 T4. Asta isn't having a good time nowadays as she's usually the last pick in teams where she could be used, so we're dropping her down a tier.
• We also want to mention
  
  Jiaoqiu. Ever since his release, Jiaoqiu has performed exceptionally well in Pure Fiction achieving some of the highest scores each phase. When considering who to place in T0 in this update his placement was discussed heavily. Ultimately we feel he isn’t at a T0 level - the reason is that he is essentially chained to Acheron. He is the character closest to being a single-use character that simply has no other uses in the meta outside of being Acheron slave, and that's not enough to place him in T0 - especially if she's not T0 either.

We also have added Partner tag to two new characters:

• 
  Jiaoqiu who relies on
  
  Acheron (95-97% of JQ teams in our data use Acheron)
• 
  Serval who relies on
  
  The Herta

Why

Feixiao

Also, new MoC phase starts in 2 days, so we decided to just wait and update the tier list for this mode once we gather data for it and test the new characters there.

05/02/2025

With the release of

As we’ve flagged in our previous updates, all three modes are undergoing a shift in meta toward a more AoE focus (well, PF was already AoE-focused, but now it's AoE-focus+). We’re fully aware that some characters are rated too high - specifically characters with a single target focus or who don’t match up well against new enemy mechanics or vulnerabilities. With that said, we want to avoid repositioning a character incorrectly. To ensure this doesn’t happen, we’re waiting for the next phase of Pure Fiction (currently underway) and Memory of Chaos (coming soon) to make major changes.

That's why we have only added Aglaea to the list and adjusted the position of a single character, majorly affected by her release:

• 
  Aglaea - Under the right conditions, in the right team, with the correct build and Speed-tuning, Aglaea can be - and is - one of the strongest damage dealers in the game when it comes to raw numbers, making her quite a threat specifically in her best endgame mode - Memory of Chaos. With that said, similar to past character releases, we’ve decided to commit to a conservative placement for her initially. We’re confident Aglaea has what it takes to achieve a T0 ranking under ideal conditions but we want to see how she’ll perform in the hands of the community, with a variety of different investment, relic quality, team and tuning levels. Like with The Herta, you can expect an update on the state of Aglaea shortly after her release.
• 
  Sunday - With Aglaea, Sunday gains yet another top tier dps partner, specifically in MoC. As a character that is mandatory for some and a top choice for most others in MoC, we’re moving him up to Tier 0.

And here's the definition of the new tag:

Partner - characters with the Partner tag are incredibly reliant on being paired with one other specific character in order to function at the highest level. Characters marked with this tag will perform one - but sometimes even more tiers - lower than their listed position on the tier list without those characters alongside them.

We’re adding this tag to address and flag the weakness some characters have when played without their ideal “partner”. Characters we currently feel that fall under this category are:

• 
  Acheron who relies on
  
  Jiaoqiu
• 
  Aglaea who relies on
  
  Sunday
• 
  Jing Yuan who also relies on
  
  Sunday

Let us know how you feel about the Partner tag and if you think additional characters should be tagged with it (just remember, for the Partner tag to apply, the next best alternative causes the character to drop a rank or more when it comes to their performance).

25/01/2025

The dust after the 3.0 release has settled and with it came the release of a new phase of Apocalyptic Shadow. In this update we’re addressing the feedback to our major rework to all tier lists, the release of The Herta and Trailblazer Remembrance, and the meta shifts caused by Apocalyptic Shadow changes to be more AoE-focused.

Trailblazer • Remembrance

Serval

Herta

Jade

Argenti

Trailblazer • Remembrance

Based on feedback we’re also making adjustments to the ranking of Support DPS in the Follow-Up ATK archetype to better convey the difference in power, usability and flexibility between

March 7th • The Hunt

Moze

Apocalyptic Shadow includes changes caused by The Herta's release and the change to the mode itself that become apparent in the new mode - AOE-focus (or rather, AoE-shilling). As mentioned in our previous update, the meta is undergoing a large shift towards heavy AoE Focus (5 targets) - and AS is the first to receive the brunt of this shift. The result of this is a decline in the viability of Single Target focused characters with an improvement for AoE Focused characters. We’re being conservative in our changes for now, to see how players, teams and encounters evolve in future phases but here are the AS specific changes being made for now.

• 
  Boothill T0 T0.5. Boothill, a man who specialises in single target Toughness bar destruction, is at a disadvantage when it comes to the new AoE-focused encounters in the latest Phases of AS. It should come as no surprise he can’t quite duke it out with characters with kits designed specifically to counter the bosses we’re up against. He’s moving down a tier for now but will likely be back when Single Target returns.
• 
  Dr. Ratio T1 T1.5. Like Boothill, Dr. Ratio is similarly struggling with being single target and reliant on debuffs to function. Keeping constantly respawning enemies debuffed enough for Ratio to trigger his Follow-Up attacks, on top of having to deal with them one by one is a huge penalty compared to his competition. Ratio is struggling to keep pace with his peers, we’re lowering him a tier for now.
• 
  Argenti T2 T1.5. The AoE changes, introduction of The Herta and a new favorable AS boss have all been huge for Argenti and it shows. We’re raising Argenti up a tier as a result of this.
• 
  The Herta (Watchlist): The Herta has produced smashing results in the Apocalyptic Shadow with a boss which for all intents and purposes was designed for her by achieving some of the best scores. While her performance this phase is undoubtedly Tier 0 worthy we want to see how she performs against a boss not so specifically tailored toward her strengths. As a result we’re watchlisting her for now.

Big thanks for all the feedback provided!

15/01/2025

With the release of the 3.0 update we’re implementing a change we’ve been intending on making, and which has been much requested for many months now - the shift to having all primary damage dealers be rated in the same category.

This entails moving all characters we feel capable of serving as a “Main Damage Dealer” to the DPS Category, most of which are shifting from the Specialist Category. Here are the character’s moving:

• 
  Boothill
• 
  Firefly
• 
  Rappa
• 
  Sushang
• 
  Xueyi
• 
  Luka
• 
  Kafka

With the exception of Luka and Kafka (we’ll come back to them soon) we feel each of these characters are far more accurately represented in their new home.

In addition to the re-ordering above, we’re also renaming the Specialist Category to something else. The Specialist Category was initially intended as a home for all characters that didn’t fit the traditional damage mold. It was the solution to characters that didn’t just deal raw damage but also offered something else. It was the home of Breakers, Hybrid Support-Damage dealers and highly synergistic characters that didn’t function well alone. Over time these characters, and mechanics have evolved, became more accessible and all operate more closely to traditional damage dealers.

All this led to the decision to not only recategorize some characters but also repurpose the Specialist category into something more relevant toward how the game and meta plays today. We’re repurposing the Specialist Category into the Support DPS Category.

• Support DPS: Characters that fall within this category are very rarely played as the primary or sole damage dealer of the team and instead almost always play alongside another character that fills that role instead. Support damage dealers are still built with the intention to deal damage themselves but also have a kit containing buffs/debuffs to bolster their team's performance and or have abilities that are directly dependent on others in order to function.

As the meta has developed we’ve seen an increase in characters that are half way between damage and support as well as characters that can deal good amounts of damage but do so in a far more supportive role.

With the release of The Herta we’re moving the category of two erudition characters to better reflect their role in the current meta as Support DPS:

• 
  Herta or “Mini Herta” is already played primarily as a “Sub-DPS” in modes such as Pure Fiction and Apocalyptic shadow, serving as an incredible partner to almost all other characters, thanks to her Follow-Up spins which she relies on her teammates to help trigger. With the release of The Herta, she gains even more dual DPS synergy as she can satisfy the Erudition requirement The Herta seeks to fulfill, giving her Support DPS potential even in modes she wasn’t great in previously like MoC.
• 
  Serval - Prior to The Herta’s release, Serval hasn’t seen much play or meta relevance but now she can operate as one of the better Erudition supports for The Herta. Playing Serval normally is good enough but she can also double down on a far more supportive build involving maximum energy regeneration solidifying her for us as a Support DPS for now.

As for

Finally coming back to

Kafka

With so many changes you can treat this update as a rework to the tier list. Also, we expect a large meta shake-up over the course of 3.x, especially because all modes started morphing into being more AoE-focused - this trend started with Rappa release and got even bigger with The Herta. We will have to wait and see how long it will last, but at least for now, single-target focused characters are at a big disadvantage (with the exception of Feixiao). And as always we’re always listening to feedback so let us know what you think.

05/01/2025

This tier list update will be quite unique due a few reasons. First one is the revamp of the Pure Fiction mode and the second is the upcoming 3.0 full tier list revamp. We will go over both in the changelog.

Pure Fiction rework

Pure Fiction has received a rework. The changes to the mode include:

• The introduction of the Grit mechanic, replacing the old buff mechanic of Pure Fiction (buffs are more generic in nature so far),
• Constantly respawning non-boss enemies, resulting in the field always having 5 enemies at a time (much heavier AoE focus),
• Boss enemies now always take damage when any non-elite enemy dies (even more focus on AoE).

After testing and comparing our results against the first set of data under PF’s new rules, here is the general theme of the changes to the meta and tier list:

• Characters capable of hitting 3-5 enemies frequently are more powerful while characters with more singular focused damage are weaker,
• Characters with trigger on kill or conditional effects that scale on number of enemies in the fight are stronger,
• Supports, sustains and specialists that play into the kits of any of the characters included in the categories above are stronger.

Before you look at the updated PF ratings, here are a few things to note:

• Only one phase is currently available, one set of Grit buffs and one set of enemies, limiting the amount of testing and data that can be collected,
• Compared to pre-revamp version of the mode, this current phase is one of the easiest ever - both our testing and the data show that on average, most characters can reach way higher scores than before,
• Erudition is heavily favored in this mode even more so than before. The Herta is a new limited Erudition unit releasing in 3.0 and she looks to be very powerful - it’s likely she will shake up the DPS category,
• Apex Amplifier’s are in an unusual position right now. All of Sunday, Fugue, Robin, Jiaoqiu and Ruan Mei have strong arguments for being T0 - they each have a team that has shown it can obliterate the reworked game mode and can work independently of each other. While we feel some do have an edge over others we’re going to wait for the release of The Herta, another phase of Pure Fiction and more data before committing to placing someone in T0.

Because of all the above, there won't be a detailed changelog this time - it's more like a blank slate that is work in progress due to all the limitations and with the next phase we will know more about the direction Hoyo wants to take the mode in.

Upcoming 3.0 Tier list revamp

We already mentioned the revamp several times, but here's some more information about what we plan to change:

• The current DPS and Specialist categories will be killed,
• Specialists category is a relic from the early days of HSR where Break and other non-Crit archetypes were less popular and we created it to distinct them from each other. But nowadays, CRIT and non-CRIT DPS just fill the same role - killing things. So it makes no sense to keep them split,
• A new category will be created - Main DPS. Damage dealers of all archetypes - CRIT, Break, DoT, FUA - will all be placed there. As the name suggests, those characters are primarily used as the main damage source on the team, no matter their archetype,
• A new category will be created - Hybrid. Hybrid categories are characters that on top of doing damage, have some supportive abilities that help the team - either via buffs or debuffs. What is important, they can do both decent damage and support at the same time, without sacrificing either. Pure supporters whose damage is negligible will still remain in the Amplifier category. Here are a few examples of characters who will end up in this category: Jade, Topaz, Moze, and Black Swan (maybe even Lingsha, but she would be an exception appearing in two categories at the same time).

There will be A LOT of changes coming with that update, especially in the APEX category as we will have to change the criteria and pit the CRIT archetype against all the others. That's why we didn't make any drastic changes in the current Pure Fiction update (4x T0 DPS characters for example) as it's the last time things look like that.

Other post-Fugue changes