Blade is an interesting, and a much needed wind character that consumes his own HP to give himself more damage with enhanced attacks.
This guide will cover his optimal relics and light cones, to general playstyle and best team practices.
Kit Overview
Blade is unlike any other damage dealer we have in our Honkai Star Rail Account so far in the sense that he’s technically dual scaling. What I mean by that is all of his attacks have both an ATK% multiplier and an HP% multiplier.
However, it is crucial to note that the HP% multipliers are the focal point of his damage because it scales much better numerically compared to the ATK multipliers.
The ATK multipliers are nice for adding a little of extra damage when combining your light cone stats, light cone passives, and relic substats. But as you’ll see in the relic section later, HP is a much bigger priority.
As for what exactly Blade’s abilities do, he’s actually a very simple character. Blade’s skill consumes 30% of his max HP to grant him 3 enhanced basic attacks and a 40% DMG bonus at talent level 10.
Using this skill does not grant any energy but doesn’t also doesn’t count as a turn, so he immediately gets to move again after using his skill, similar to the way that Qingque’s skill functions.
Once you get your extra move after using Blade’s skill, you’ll be locked out of using his skill again for 3 turns to consume all of his enhanced basic attacks. So, just slash away at the enemy’s health bars to your content until you can use that skill again.
His enhanced basic attack will not generate any skill points but deals a ton of damage to the target and unlike his normal basic attack. It also deals damage to adjacent targets as well.
Just like his enhanced basic attacks, Blade’s ultimate also deals big damage to a single target and extra damage to adjacent enemies.
This time around, Blade’s ultimate will always reset his HP to exactly 50% of his max HP regardless if he was below or above that threshold, and has an extra damage multiplier based on how much HP Blade has consumed since his last ultimate.
In the case where Blade hasn’t used his ultimate for that battle yet, it’s based on how much HP is consumed since the start of battle.
Last but not least, Blade’s talent stacks up to 5 times with each time he sustains damage, whether that be consuming his HP with his abilities or taking damage from enemies. Once that counter reaches 5 stacks, Blade will launch an attack that hits all enemies and restores 25% of his max HP, which is perfect for keeping him out of death’s dance.
Despite how useful Blade’s talent is for sustain, it’s usually low on the list for trace priority (at E0). That’s no knock to his talent, but the majority of his damage at E0 comes from his skill and enhanced basic attack combo. So, the first thing you want to do is level those two up, and then focus on his ultimate and talent levels afterwards.
As usual, you’ll want to unlock Blade’s extra traces at ascension 2, 4, and 6. Because the first two increase his self healing for better survivability, and his last one straight up grants a 20% DMG bonus to his talent’s AoE attack.
Relics & Planar Ornaments
With the new 1.2 patch, Hoyoverse introduced 2 relic sets and 2 planar ornaments that in my experience, feel strong and impactful.
To no one’s surprise, one of these new relic sets, 4-set Longevous Disciple, is Blade’s best set. Blade is a stat hungry character and this 4-set gives him a much needed crit rate whenever he consumes his HP or gets hit, stacking up to a total of 16% crit rate.
However, since this is a new set that players will have to slowly farm up, you can use the 2-set Eagle of Twilight Line for extra Wind DMG with just the 2-set Longevous Disciple until you are able to get a good enough 4-set with the correct substats.
The 4-set Musketeer of Wild Wheat or the 4-set Eagle of Twilight Line are some of the game’s premiere generalist sets right now that can be used on Blade, but only use it if you have the pieces ready by the time Blade’s banner launches.
There’s literally no reason to farm a full set of Musketeer or Eagle for Blade after the new cavern releases with the additional Xianzhou Luofu areas. So, again, these sets only serve as a placeholder until you get that juicy 4-set Longevous Disciple.
As for planar ornaments, both new 2-sets of Broken Keel and Rutilant Arena are solid options on Blade. The 2-set Broken Keel is a lot easier to manage on Blade because the set only requires 30% total effect res to grant the entire team 10% crit damage, including himself.
With 18% effect res from Blade’s max traces and the 2-set effect’s 10% effect res, Blade only needs 1 substat roll into effect res and he activates this free crit damage buff, making it into a fantastic low maintenance planar ornament to run not just for him but also for his teammates, which you’ll see in a later section.
A higher maintenance, more costly, and more selfish planar ornament to run on Blade is the 2-set Rutilant Arena. Although the 20% damage bonus to basic attacks looks juicy for Blade, it is locked behind a requirement of 70% crit rate which is pretty demanding.
Luckily, both the 8% crit rate from the planar ornament and the stacking 16% crit rate from the 4-set Longevous Disciple can contribute to hitting this threshold, making it feasible to hit even for players not pulling Blade’s signature Light Cone.
Just be wary that you’re going to have to try a lot harder in relic substats compared to using Broken Keel.
If you have yet to farm these 2 new planar ornaments, then the 2-set Inert Salsotto is a fantastic choice for temporary usage on Blade (at E0). Because his talent counts as a follow-up attack and gets benefit from the set bonus.
Relic stats want to focus on HP for the boots, crit for the body, wind damage in the sphere, and HP in the link rope slot.
SPD is a viable substitute in the boots but only if you really know what you’re doing and speed tuning your units for a specific order, such as with a slow Bronya to feed Blade two turns in a row. But, otherwise, HP is the safer option.
Relic substats want to focus as many crit substats as possible, then HP, SPD, and any effect res you may need to meet the requirements of the 2-set Broken Keel.
Light Cones
Moving into Light Cones, unfortunately, Blade doesn’t have many stellar options.
A lot of the Destruction Light Cones focus on ATK% buffs, which Blade cannot utilize as well as other (Destruction) characters due to the majority of his damage scaling stemming from HP.
With that said, his signature Light Cone The Unreachable Side taps perfectly into his desired stats, granting him both HP and crit rate, along with a DMG bonus whenever he consumes his HP or is attacked.
The other standout Light Cone to use on Blade is the gacha 4 star Light Cone A Secret Vow. This is one of the only Destruction Light Cones that offer a DMG bonus passive as opposed to an ATK buff passive, making it the clear choice for Blade.
Outside of these two best options, your best bet is to focus on the Herta shop Light Cone On the Fall of an Aeon, or Clara’s 5 star Light Cone Something Irreplaceable. Because they give the best stats and have better passives than any other 4 star light cone for Blade.
The battle pass Light Cone is especially worthy of mention simply because it comes at a cheap price point of 10 dollars. But that doesn’t mean it’s a standout option at all. It’s just that the rest of the 4 star Light Cones also have mediocre passives for Blade outside of A Secret Vow. And unlike gacha Light Cones, the BP Light Cone’s accessibility is guaranteed for anyone with just a tiny bit of disposable income.
For beginners, something like the 3 star Light Cone Mutual Demise can be very synergistic with Blade’s kit since he’s always hovering at lower HP values. But unfortunately, the base stats of the Light Cone do fall off slightly compared to 4 star and 5 stars as you try to break into harder content.
Best Team Practices
Blade’s team compositions are very cookie cutter, but there are a few bits of info to understand that really outline why Blade’s team comps have specific roles.
First things first, players must understand that Blade is almost SP neutral, but technically provides a net negative SP when simulating infinite turns.
As I mentioned in his kit overview, his skill will consume one skill point, while his next three actions with his enhanced basic attacks will neither consume nor regenerate SP for the team.
When invested to have strong healing, the current healers of Natasha, Bailu, and Luocha are all SP positive thanks to their ultimates for the former two, and auto healing in the case of the latter? Because Blade is almost SP neutral and your healer is SP positive (at least most of the time), that opens up the window to run another damage dealer aside from Blade that isn’t over the top with their SP usage.
Therefore, the general roles for a Blade team are Blade in the first slot, a healer in the second slot, a debuffer or buffer in the third slot, and then your other damage dealing character in the final slot.
I mentioned there are a few bits of info to understand, not just one thing. So, the second bit of info Blade players should know is that his talent does not stack if Blade is hit with a shield.
Blade must lose HP to gain a stack of his talent and replacing your healer slot with a shielder introduces some anti-synergy that we want to avoid. So, make sure this second slot only has a healer between Natasha, Luocha, and Bailu.
The third slot is reserved for a buffer that boosts the offensive stats of the team, or a debuffer that provides things like defense reduction.
Blade’s best teammate by far in this slot is Bronya for a multitude of reasons. Attack buffs find a little value on Blade. But Bronya’s ultimate also has a crit damage boost that helps increase Blade’s damage and balances his crit ratio if you’re heavy on the crit rate side for the sake of using the 2-set planar ornament Rutilant Arena.
Additionally, Bronya’s crit damage buff will also apply to the other damage dealer in the 4th slot, allowing you to get value out of two characters using the buffs as opposed to just one with the usual hypercarry team.
And last but not least, Bronya’s action advance is extremely broken for stacking Blade’s talent to get more follow up attacks. A fast Bronya with a lot of speed investment can weave in basic attacks to generate better skill point economy for the team, while a slow Bronya can be speed tuned to move right after Blade to grant him two enhanced basic attacks in a row.
The possibilities are endless with Bronya. But some other notable supports that can be used in this slot are Yukong for a similar buff to crit stats, Pela for defense reduction in AoE content, and Silver Wolf for defense reduction in single target content.
All of these characters have a utility that the entire team can take advantage of as opposed to a character like Tingyun, who is meant to buff a hypercarry and has no capability of buffing two characters at once.
For the damage dealer slot, this slot can be SP negative. But players should be wary and select a character that doesn’t always need to use their skill or is naturally less SP hungry.
Follow-up attack characters like Himeko and Herta are fantastic options for SP economy and also for players who want to feel like they’re playing Blade as a hypercarry. But otherwise standard Hunt characters like Seele, Dan Heng, or Eidolon 1 Sushang are fantastic.
If you’ve been paying attention to this entire guide, you might have connected the dots and realized that using the new Broken Keel planar ornament will also buff the crit damage of this second damage dealer.
Similar to the way that buffers like Bronya and debuffers like Pela are good for dual carry teams, running Broken Keel on Blade is not only easy to manage stat-wise, but it also allows you to double dip in value when using Blade teams with another damage dealer.
Also Read: The Best Way To Build Bronya In Honkai Star Rail 1.2! - Traces, Eidolons, Relics & Light Cones
Eidolons
Everything I’ve talked about up to this point comes through the lens of an Eidolon 0 Blade. And luckily for you, none of what I’ve said up to this point changes with any of his Eidolons.
With each new copy of Blade that you get, he just gets stronger and stronger as a damage dealer through raw stat boosts and better multipliers.
However, that means Blade’s Eidolons are lower priority compared to his Light Cone. Because without his signature Light Cone, he is hard pressed for options if you don’t have the 4 star gacha Light Cone A Secret Vow.
For those who already have his Light Cone and want to push for Eidolons, the hard stopping point is Eidolon 2. His first two Eidolons will grant his ultimate extra damage in single target scenarios and increase his crit rate when in the Hellscape state from his skill, respectively.
Afterwards at E4, he just gets an increase to his max HP after dropping below 50% HP, which is a little underwhelming (uninteresting) for an Eidolon 4 and mainly seen as a stepping stone to E6.
Of course, E6 is the Eidolon that I’d consider the closest to changing his playstyle, since it does put a bigger focal point on his talent as opposed to his enhanced basic attacks. Not only does it give his talent an additional 50% max HP scaling, but it also reduces the amount of stacks to activate from 5 to 4.
It becomes especially potent with the slow Bronya build that I talked about before since you feed so many turns into Blade and get ridiculous value out of the increased scaling that the talent gains.
Overall, his Eidolons are nice to have but never needed, especially if you have yet to pull his signature Light Cone.
