With phase 2 of version 1.00 of Honkai: StarRail, finally jingyuan has joined the cast of characters of the Hoyoverse JRPG and is ready to unleash the fury of lightning on the unfortunates on duty. In this guide we will give an overview of his skills and what we believe are his better builds in terms of Light Cone, Relic and the team to support them.
Jing Yuan is a 5-star character who uses the Lightning element and is part of the class The Erudite. We are talking about a fighter specialized in hitting multiple targets with a very high offensive potential thanks to his Lightning Lord, a sort of fifth man on the field who attacks at regular intervals. In our opinion it is one of the best DPS in Honkai: Star Rail, as also highlighted in our tier list with the best characters.
Overview of Traces' abilities, stats, and priorities
NB: whenever we talk about values and statistics of Skill, Ultimate, Talents and so on we will always refer to the basic ones at Lv.1. Clearly the more developed the Traces the higher the multipliers will be.
Jing Yuang's mechanics revolve around his Talent "Prana Extirpated" which invokes the Lightning-Lord, which we can briefly describe as an extra ally that autonomously attacks random targets by inflicting a number of hits that varies based on the actions performed by Jing Yuang before his turn. Said like this, how it works might seem complicated and random, but in reality once you try it in game it is much simpler than it seems. But let's go step by step.
The Lighting-Lord has a starting speed (SPD) of 60 and when it acts It basically performs three attacks to a random enemy, which are considered "follow-ups" (important to keep in mind for example for synergies with some Light Cones and Simulated Universe bonuses). Each deals damage equal to 33% of Jing Yuan's Attack and 25% of that damage to enemies adjacent to the primary target.
Every time Jing Yuan uses his Skill or Ultimate, the Lightning-Lord's number of attacks per action increases by 2 and 3 respectively, with a maximum limit of 10 hits. Not only that, with each additional stack the Lightning-Lord's speed increases by 10 (thereby reaching a maximum of 130), which means that his turn will activate earlier. No complicated calculations are needed to understand the offensive potential of this capable ally hit up to 30 times in a single turn in the best possible conditions.
Some clarifications: the number of extra attacks and bonus speed accumulated by the Lightning-Lord they reset after each actionFurthermore, it cannot act if its owner is under the effect of a "crowd control" malus (e.g. confusion) or if he is knocked out.
Also keep in mind that cannot receive direct buffs and debuffs from allies and enemies with its stats affected primarily by Jing Yuan's attack, Lightning damage bonus, and critical hit damage chance and percentage. What does it mean? For example, Asta's Ultimate increases the SPD of the entire team but not of the Lightnig-Lord, while using Tingyuan's Skill to increase Jing Yuang's ATK indirectly also this invisible ally receives part of the buff.
To maximize Jing Yuan's damage it is therefore necessary that the character act as frequently as possible to "charge" the Lighting-Lord as much as possible. In this regard, it is important to mention the bonus passive ability "Battalia Crush" which increases the critical damage of this spirit by 25% if it has accumulated at least six attacks, which therefore should be the minimum to aim for every time.
Leaving aside the effects related to Lightning-Lord, too Jing-Yuan's Skill and Ultimate they do good damage. The first hits all opponents on the field with a strength equal to 50% of its Attack, while for the Ultimate the damage rises to 120%.
With regard to the Trace priorities to be developed, we suggest you pump Jing Yuan's Talent as soon as possible, followed by Ultimate and Skill. All the bonus skills are very useful, in particular "War Marshal" which boosts the CRIT Rate by 10% for two turns after using the Skill, and in general we recommend you unlock them as soon as possible also to obtain the bonuses linked to the statistics. Specifically, thanks to the Stat Bonus nodes it is possible to increase the ATK by 28%, the CRIT Rate by 12% and the DEF by 12,5%.
The best Light Cones for Jing Yuan
The best Light Cone for Jing Yuan is without a doubt "Before Dawn", since it is basically tailor-made to his abilities. Increases Crit DMG by 36% and Skill and Ultimate damage by 18%. That would already be phenomenal, but there is also another additional effect: every time the character uses the Skill or Ultimate he gets the Somnus Corpus bonus, which boosts the Lightning-Lord's next "follow-up" attack by 48%.
Clearly 5-star weapons are out of the question for many players given the investments required, but fortunately there is no shortage of valid 4-star alternatives. The best in our opinion is "The Birth of Self", which boosts the damage of follow-up attacks by 24%, a bonus that doubles if the target hit is at 50% health or less.
Alternatively there is the "The Seriousness of Breakfast", which increases Jing Yuan's damage by 12%, while his ATK increases by 4% each time he defeats an enemy (for a maximum of 12%). Not only that, since it is a free Light Cone (you can obtain it with Forgotten Hall points) it is also possible to upgrade it to the maximum at no cost and double its effects.
The best Relics for Jing Yuan
As for the best Relics for Jing Yuan, it must be said that at the moment Honkai: Star Rail offers a limited number of options, which will clearly increase from update to update. For those in the Cavern category we suggest the complete set "Band of Sizzling Thunder". The 2-piece bonus increases Lightning damage by 10%, while the 4-piece bonus increases the user's ATK by 20% for 1 turn each time he uses his Skill. Alternatively, you can mix 2 pieces from this set to those of "Musketeer's Wild Wheat Felt Hat" which increases attack by 12% but without imposing particular conditions.
For Relics from the Planar Ornaments category, we suggest "Inert Salsotto", which increases the CRIT Rate by 8% and furthermore if this statistic exceeds 50% overall it also increases the damage of the Ultimate and follow-up attacks by 15%. Less effective but still valid is the "Space Sealing Station" set which offers a 12% bonus to ATK, plus an additional 12% if SPD reaches 120 or higher.
With regard to main statistics of the Relics the priorities are clearly CRIT Rate / DMG for the "Body" and Lightning DMG for the "Planar Sphere" to maximize damage, while for the "Link Rope" you can choose between ATK% or Energy Regen Rate to activate the Ultimate of Jing Yuan more often and charge Lightning-Lord more. If you choose the second option for "Feets" we recommend ATK%, otherwise it might be worth choosing SPD, to make Jing Yuan act more often.
for secondary statistics more or less the same principles apply, so pump CRIT Rate / DMG, ATK% to increase damage and SPD to make up for the character's low base speed. In the middle, if there's a bit of Break Effect, it won't hurt.
The best teams for Jing Yuan
As we have seen, Jing Yuan is a phenomenal DPS for facing multiple enemies at the same time, but the truth is that he doesn't do badly at all even when there is only one enemy on the field. Indeed, considering that the options are limited at the moment, it is generally the best Lightning character offensive of Honkai: Star Rail in virtually all situations.
Consequently the ideal would be build a team around its characteristics and in particular that allows him to act more frequently to accumulate the Lightning-Lord's stacks. For example, Tingyun is practically an obvious choice, given that he can constantly recharge Jing Yuan's energy and boost his ATK. Bronya is also an excellent character to pair with him thanks to the offensive buffs to her Skill which makes an ally act immediately. Asta isn't bad either as he boosts the entire team's SPD and ATK.
Below we offer some examples of an ideal team for Jing Yuan, clearly to be adapted according to your availability and tastes.
- jingyuan
- Tingyu
- Bronya / That
- Bailu/Natasha
o
- jingyuan
- Tingyun / Bronya / Asta
- Gepard / Trailblazer (Fire) / March 7th
- Bailu/Natasha
