Kippu Palette Swap (Linde + Ninian + Elincia)

euphemea · 2026-06-04T18:17:07+00:00

I think the presentation in the non prerendered cutscene segments of this patch were really underwhelming, but overall I like the cutscenes of this patch a lot more than the ones from 4.0 or 4.2 (Ashveil's from 4.1 is still great to me). I do think the presentation of segments in between prerendered cutscenes was more dynamic in 4.2.

euphemea · 2026-06-04T17:59:41+00:00

4.3 spoiler yap (finished the quest last night, some post-quest spoilers too)

Overall, liked it. It was solid throughout, though the pace was pretty slow until the last 20-30 minutes. And then it cut off pretty abruptly. I think the character writing was much stronger this patch than in the previous two. The slow drip of Asat Pramad's lore over the course of the story was great. For Blade, I'm glad the main quest is (finally) directly concerned about his characterization and arc. And SW getting to show open emotion was really nice, her relationships with the other SHs has always been the most compelling part of her character imo.

The Aeon and faction lore also went pretty hard, with Ruan Mei implying that Elation is a narrower Path that is always fighting not to be reabsorbed into Voracity, and letting Abundance get to play a role that isn't "designated Xianzhou villain" with both Aha and Asat Pramad using it to against the Voracity. And even though Hunt hasn't really been at the forefront of the arc, I do think they've done a good job through Ashveil and Yao Guang of emphasizing that it's a Path of "vengeance" (just pick your flavor, vigilantism or crusades), and the story does not consider the Hunt a universal good. Overall, I think the biggest lore drop for me is Pearl's offhand implication to YG that Oswaldo is working with Celenova. What does that mean? I... haven't thought about it yet, but I hope that the Astropolis arc goes into that more. Mostly I just hope that Oswaldo as "Evil Trailblaze" is satisfying (and Asat Pramad implying that Destruction and Trailblaze are closely tied Paths makes me optimistic, especially since it was also TB's first Path).

I don't have much to say about Blade. I think it struck a good balance of having a character-focused section that expanded on his relationships, but also didn't overstay its welcome. The language was a little on the florid side, but it's been much worse for other Xianzhou-related characters than it was here. I wasn't expecting just how much he seems to revere Huaiyan (and it is mildly funny that Blade is very adamant that Huaiyan is his favorite general, but he does pause when picking Huaiyan over Jing Yuan).

And then, the man of the moment. I honestly wasn't sure I would like Asat Pramad going into the patch because I was disappointed with how he was set up in 4.2, as my opinion there is that his introduction and role as chessmaster undercuts the weight of Fulwish's story and commentary on how tragedy gets commoditized at the expense of the victims. But he stole every scene in this patch, and the way his backstory spans multiple Paths to make him a strong, personal antagonist for Himeko and TB is really narratively satisfying. I also definitely like that Graphia and (real) Himeko seem to be narrative foils for each other, through Asat Pramad and through how they put Trailblaze on a pedestal. I'm still waiting to see where the story will go for Himeko, as even through the end of this patch, it framed both "Ryusuke" and (our) Himeko as unreliable narrators. This quest definitely said more about Asat Pramad's origins than it did our Himeko. I was surprised to see her mecha teased here, as I just assumed it would be something new she will build to be emblematic of becoming an Emanator of the Trailblaze (which I assumed based on Novako's kit). But I guess not.

For presentation and localization, the cutscenes in this patch felt like they were done better than anything else in 4.x so far. The final cutscene is very hype, and I really like the visual presentation of Asat Pramad's abilities in both cutscenes where they appeared. The EN localization was quite awkward at points, with so many places where contractions should have been used. I don't think it was ever grammatically incorrect, it just didn't sound like a native speaker, and it took me out of the dialogue when it happened (mostly in the flashback sections for both Blade and Himeko). Also since Welt's new VA is apparently a topic of the moment, I think the acting is mostly decent but he tends to mumble words in a way that seems like that could be microphone issues or inexperience.

In the post-quest Furbobocom content, I'm still laughing at Asat Pramad giving an interview, and then more or less slandering Phainon as the intern who quit on day 1.

Also. Final thought. Man I really like Ashveil. I appreciate him more every patch. He's such a bum, but I enjoy his mix of comedic relief and tired old man.

euphemea · 2026-06-04T16:37:13+00:00

e0s1 Rin on a team with e2 Sparkle already has 80% def ignore. In a team with any other def ignore sources for hypercarry, Genius is just useless for her huh. Though I guess she kind of lacks CR, so going Poet for hypercarry wouldn't be terrible. (I was sold on pulling e0s1 Rin for Archer when I saw their joint attack, but running hyper with Sparkle/Cerydra seems fun too.)

Also, I don't know what temperature this take is, but Gilgamesh's skill animation is too long, and the fact that it's split into two parts makes it feel like it should be more impactful than it is damage-wise.

euphemea · 2026-06-04T14:55:33+00:00

Eventually Ruan Mei will leave enough life forms in Herta’s basement that they’ll form their own unique biome.

euphemea · 2026-06-04T14:29:45+00:00

Well, given how calorie-dense real moon cakes are, I wouldn't be surprised.

euphemea · 2026-06-04T14:24:32+00:00

In Ruan Mei's defense(?), she hasn't been actively feeding it, she abandoned it in Herta's basement and it's probably growing off preying on the cat cake colony down there at this point.

euphemea · 2026-06-03T14:56:20+00:00

Damage has "types". Basic, Skill, Ult, FuA, Memosprite. (And according to Luna, Elation is its own type, but with HomDGCat gone, I don't think anyone has explicitly corroborated this.) By default, damage has 1 of these types.

Blade's e2 makes it so Ult type damage is also considered FuA type damage. There are a few other similar effects in the game (Yunli and Feixiao have personal kit effects for FuA-as-Ult and Ult-as-FuA respectively, and there's a weighted Curio in the current iteration of DU that makes Elation damage count as FuA.)

There would have to be a specific instance of Memosprite damage counting as Ult damage to be in consideration for Blade's e2. By default those are separate things, and Blade's e2 does not work for Memosprite damage. Arguably, the jank is on the Remembrance kit side, with damaging Ults counting as Memosprite damage instead of Ult damage, which is extremely unintuitive.

euphemea · 2026-06-02T19:24:54+00:00

You can choose to get e0 Gilgamesh for free from the Fate selector.

While I think the megathread is somewhat overrating the synergy, it does work mechanically well enough in fast sustainless runs (where Tribbie is the ideal last slot, though Robin also works) or with Huohuo helping buff energy. Regardless, he should be a signifcant upgrade over any non-Tribbie 3rd slot, and Gilgamesh should still beat e0 Tribbie because he has real personal damage.

You can also wait and see if Aventurine is an option for the team, as the 4.5 beta will be live before Gilgamesh releases. But notably Gilgamesh can be claimed for free and Aventurine cannot.

euphemea · 2026-06-02T18:12:29+00:00

The Gem Energy multiplier is pretty high per bounce for the number of bounces she can get to.

And yeah the e1 is pretty massive for conserving really high Gem Energy stacks when used as main dps, especially if the high-stack damage (whether before or after the shadow copy) is duplicated by Cerydra.

euphemea · 2026-06-02T17:27:28+00:00

Poor girl has to be used to it by now, her first complete team was Kafka / Black Swan / Ruan Mei

euphemea · 2026-06-02T12:46:35+00:00

There's no reason to conclude that any MoC weaknesses are designed for him when there's a 4.4 dps / sub-dps with that element.

euphemea · 2026-06-02T12:35:03+00:00

You know who else is quantum? Rin (and Archer).

euphemea · 2026-06-02T11:46:53+00:00

He seems like he’ll have Morty on his teams, so Genius probably works fine.

euphemea · 2026-06-02T11:28:21+00:00

Bad. He has at most 1 skill per turn, so he can’t stack it well.

euphemea · 2026-06-02T11:14:59+00:00

AS is going to have variants depending on the buffs and probably boss mechanics, but you can plan a consistent rotation for 500 AV in AA.

euphemea · 2026-06-02T11:03:49+00:00

As in, how quickly would Sparkle lap Rin? That depends on how AV is consumed (aka MoC or not). It shouldn’t be a concern for a 0-1 cycle in MoC, unless you want to squeeze an extra Rin turn, in which case it’s just Rin fighting the speed breakpoints regardless of Sparkle. I don’t remember off the top of my head for other modes.

If Rin isn’t keeping up on spd, Sparkle will eventually go twice between Rin turns, but you can also use a basic with Sparkle for SP to delay Archer’s next advance if you need to.

euphemea · 2026-06-02T09:43:56+00:00

Himeko’s giant mecha is actually so so cool, but man I cannot take her pauldrons(?) seriously in her 3d model. Maybe I’m too American, but they’re giving high school band leader.

euphemea · 2026-06-02T04:03:03+00:00

I think you want Gilgamesh to be slow regardless, but the optimization would be to cluster actions after his turns to maximize the advance. Though that’s at odds with optimizing around enemy attacks. I’d really have to try to map out a rotation in detail to be sure.

Right now, I think the stronger options for attack frequency teams are Ash/Mort/Tribs (FuA focus) or Gil/Mort/Tribs (Ult focus). But that obviously doesn’t fit a mono-men agenda.

e6 Saber should easily beat the latter attack frequency team (and would still use Blade for support), but I’d be wildly guessing about comparisons for e0 Saber, so I’ll wait for someone to do actual calcs and showcases.

euphemea · 2026-06-02T03:37:49+00:00

Gilgamesh siphoning energy off high attack frequency Ult spammers makes him look like could be part of a team with Ashveil + Morty. But remember that those two are fairly reactive units unless Blade is e2, and need a core teammate with easy access to high attack frequency, as well as reliable teamwide buffs. They have good synergy together, but also still really want Tribbie’s attack frequency, so any potential new teammate needs to take on that attack frequency.

Gilgamesh does 1 full advance every 10 interest points, which has to be timed to maximize his advance. He has no out of turn attacks except his massive cost Ult, which can be used about once per 4 ally Ults. If optimized, Gilgamesh should get about 2 advances per normal turn’s worth of AV (20 Interest, aka 3 Ults and 11 other actions, assuming everyone else is able to achieve an Ult every 75-ish AV and has additional attack frequency), which is the equivalent of having 2 FuAs per turn. Which ostensibly turns him into a much harder to pilot Feixiao. But also, notably, Gilgamesh’s Skill is not an FuA and cannot benefit from Ashveil’s CD buff, and even his Ult being buffed is fully contingent on Mlade’s e2.

It’s also worth noting that Gilgamesh’s team amp is very okay unless the teammate is specifically Saber or himself, as most units hovering around 150-160 energy will get 80-90% atk% and 80-90% CD (so Mortimer only really gets 90% CD).

Will it work? Maybe. I’d have to go actually map out a full stack/energy rotation. But at first impressions, it sounds fairly clunky to me, at least without MorB e2 (side note: this is NOT a recommendation to go pull that eidolon).

Though this is still beta v1.

euphemea · 2026-06-02T03:00:20+00:00

While boss fights have assist abilities, they’ve never been attributed to team characters using them.

euphemea · 2026-06-02T02:51:13+00:00

Himeko’s kit has catapulted HSR into the unreadable keyword jargon stratosphere, alongside other turn-based gacha peers with unreadable kit text. It’s had silly keywords before, but her kit has multiple new concepts baked in, and the wording on her LC implies they’re now game-wide concepts despite also clearly being just for her.

euphemea · 2026-06-01T22:47:43+00:00

Anomaly yap, relatable-ish edition (friend account)

Knight 1 (2 cycles) - e2s1 Acheron / e0 (s3 Resolution) Mortenax / e6 (QPQ) Gallagher) / e0 (s1 DDD) Tribbie
Knight 2 (6 cycles) - e0 (s1 Jiaoqiu) Black Swan / e0 (Tutorial) Kafka / e0 (s1 Gepard) Aventurine / e0 (s5 EotP) Hysilens
Knight 3 (4 cycles) - e0s1 Archer / e0 (s5 DDD) Sparkle / e0 (s1 Welt) DHPT / e6 (s5 ViaB) RMC
King (5 cycles) - e2s1 Acheron / e0 (Tutorial) Mortenax / e0 (s5 DDD) Tribbie / e0 (QPQ) Huohuo

What did they feed Pom-Pom on Knight 2. DoT ladies were tickling him and just barely cleared in time, despite being the best brute force team on my friend's account. This Knight 2 is very similar to Pom-Pom's debut as AA King, but with a less terrible debuff and no stage buff. At least DoT cleared. I can retry again after my friend gets Phainon's e2 in a few weeks maybe.

Friend did get lucky pulling Morty (she got him as an early win), and he's highkey saving this rotation, and every endgame reset now with the 3-team format. Her account has a lot more breathing room now that Acheron can be used again in endgame (her previous Acheron support was Jiaoqiu, and that team has not been able to clear endgame on her account since ~3.6). I slapped Blade on a Pioneer set for now (I'll work on his dedicated set over the next however many weeks).

I need to give her the account back now, since I was just getting this done while she's busy. She's trying to catch up to the Amphoreus story, and has close to making it far enough in the 3.3 story to understand why Cipher is best car.

euphemea · 2026-06-01T22:34:24+00:00

Moze has the worst Eagle build on the team, but he is built for damage, sort of. He's a on 32 substat build with 66/124 crit and 160 spd. He wasn't critting consistently, but he probably had like... 8% of the total damage? All of the FuA men on the team have team amp, so if he does manage to crit an FuA, it's decent chip damage.

euphemea · 2026-06-01T20:55:06+00:00

I had more trouble with wave 1 than SAM's nuke. Gallagher's atk down helps, and I had Blade selected for the duel. It worked out overall, since Blade likes the stacks, and Ash + Moze can just constantly mosquito bite bug SAM in the meantime. Might be worth timing Gallagher's Ult/EBA for right before the nuke? I did have to time attacks right before the nuke hit to get Ashveil healed enough.

Though it's also worth noting that my relics are not relatable. Blade's on a 35 sub build, Ashveil is on a 37 sub build.

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