Honkai Star Rail 4.2 Novaflare Character Buffs – Buffs Analysis

With the release of Honkai Star Rail version 4.2 and its 3rd anniversary, a brand new wave of Novaflare character buffs has been released for players to activate and buff old characters up to allow them to be somewhat better in the current meta. 

However, not all buffs are made equal and some of these character buffs will help some more than others, therefore before players build these old characters up because of their buffs, let’s go over and analyze what each characters’ Novaflare buff do and if it is good enough to justify players investing in them.

The characters that are getting Novaflare buffs during this update patch includes: the 5-Star Quantum Hunt Character Seele, the 5-Star Fire Destruction Character Firely, the 5-Star Wind Abundance Character Huohuo and the 5-Star Imaginary Nihility Character Welt. 

Seele

Seele is a 5-Star Character of the Quantum element and Hunt path. She specializes in dealing single target damage to enemies and gaining special extra turns whenever she defeats enemies, allowing to take constant actions and clear out enemies one by one. However, due to her outdated damage modifiers and speed-reliant skill kit, she is generally considered a very bad DPS character that isn’t used in any contents.

With her Novaflare buffs, Seele gains an overall update to her damage modifiers in addition to several brand new effects that boost her damage output and effects. Firstly , Seele’s Skill Damage modifiers have been massively increased and gain an additional trigger effect whenever an ally attacks an enemy with 50% or less HP, allowing Seele to potentially come in and steal the kill in order to trigger her extra turn effect. 

Secondly, all of Seele’s traces have been updated drastically, from generically bad Traces to traces that actually can help Seele with her damage output. Her first trace now grants her a 50% Damage increase whenever she defeats an enemy, stacking up to 3 times and lasting for 3 turns, amounting to a 150% overall damage increase. 

Finally, some of her important eidolons have also been changed: her first eidolon level now allows her to ignore a portion of the enemies’ defense when attacking and her 6th eidolon now last for 3 turns, grants her an additional instance of true damage and allow her to gain an extra turn if any allies defeat the enemies inflicted with her mark, massively reducing her extra turn activation requirement.

Novaflare Buffs Impact Rating: 8/10. An Overall Massive Damage Improvement For Seele As A DPS Character.

Build Rating: 6/10. Still Not Worth Building As A Dedicated DPS Character.

Despite her novaflare buffs granting her various important damage buffs and defense ignore effects that she severely lacks to deal good damage, Seele’s damage output is still relatively below par when compared to other Main DPS characters in the game like Firefly or even Acheron. Her buffs help to improve her damage and make it so that players can use her as a potential sub DPS character, however, she is still not that worth investing in.

Firefly

Firefly is a 5-Star Character of the Fire Element and Destruction Path. She is one of the best Main DPS in the game and is the premium DPS option for a Break team. So it is quite surprising that Firefly got a Novaflare buff despite her high status in the game, however, another surprising thing is that her Novaflare buff actually has quite an impact on her overall performances.

Firefly’s Novaflare buffs are relatively simple, with some minor changes to her talents and skill effects: Firefly Skill now applies the Fire Weakness to all enemies she attacks instead of only the main target, Firefly’s 1st Bonus Ability now grants her some additional Break Effect when she enter her Ultimate Mode and allow her to delay the Ultimate Mode’s end time whenever she apply the Fire Weaknesses onto the enemies and her 2nd Bonus Ability now basically triples the damage modifiers for her Super Break Damage.

The final change for Firefly is a small change to how her 2nd Eidolons works, where the actual effect is relatively the same with her gaining an additional turn whenever she break an enemy’s break bar, however, it has now been changed into a charge system instead of a normal cooldown system, allowing Firefly to trigger this effect every turn instead of every 2 turns.

Novaflare Buffs Impact Rating: 8/10. Minor Changes But Grants Massive Impacts To Firefly’s Performances

Build Rating: 10/10. The Buffs Elevates Firefly To One The Top Main DPS In The Game

Despite how small the changes to the Firefly are with her Novaflare buffs, the fact that she can now apply Fire Weakness to all enemies she attacks and her Super Break damage modifiers are now essentially tripled massively improved her damage output overall, allowing her to keep up with the best DPS characters in the game like Castorice and Silver Wolf Lv.999 easily.

Huohuo

Huohuo is a 5-Star Character of the Abundance Path and Wind Element. She specializes in providing the team with passive healing and has the ability to grant the entire team an attack buff and energy recovery effect with her Ultimate.

Huohuo’s Novaflare buffs essentially address the main problem with her initial kit – her low healing and lack of sustainability for the team. Like with Firefly, her buffs are only some minor changes that don’t change her skill kit that much: Huohuo’s Divine Provision effect now heals 2 allies whenever it is triggered and can be gained through both her Skill and Ultimate instead of only on her Skill use. 2 of Huohuo’s Bonus Abilities have also received changes, with Huohuo now automatically gains the Divine Provision effect for 2 turns and 30 Energy at the combat start and also grants all allies with an Ultimate Cost of 160 or more Energy an additional passive Attack boost.

Finally, her 1st eidolon now also grants her an additional Outgoing healing boost in addition to its old effects, helping to improve her healing further.

Novaflare Buffs Impact Rating: 6/10. Minor Changes That Mainly Helps Huohuo Heal More.

Build Rating: 9/10. Huohuo Became An Even Better Sustain Support Character Than She Was Before.

Huohuo herself has always been a very good Sustain Support unit to bring to many different teams thanks to her Attack and Energy Granting effect for the entire team in addition to her healing. Now that she got a buff to her healing as well, Huohuo has become even more of an all-rounder Sustain character that can both protect and buff the team at the same time.

Welt

Welt is a 5-Star Character of The Nihility Path and Imaginary Element. He mainly serves as a character that can constantly debuff enemies and slow them down, making it so that the enemies can’t act while being controlled by him. However, this playstyle of his is very flawed once enemies with the abilities to completely ignore speed and can immediately action advance all allies become more common in the game. Therefore, his novarflare buffs have steer him into another direction as a debuff character.

Welt’s Novarflare buffs massively changes the way players use Welt, turning him from a character that can delay enemies and slow them down into a character that can massively reduce the enemies resistances, defenses and allow the entire team to deal powerful damage to the enemies. Firstly, Welt’s Damage modifiers have been improved and his Skill now automatically bounces 5 times between enemies. 

Secondly, instead of inflicting the Slow debuff on enemies with his Ultimate, Welt now inflict a special “Weightless” debuff and enemies under this debuff have their speed and defense stat massively reduced. Additionally, Welt gains a bunch of energy at the start of the battle and after he uses his Ultimate, allowing him to spam his Ultimate much more effectively.

Thirdly, whenever allies attack enemies inflicted with Weightless, they will gain a stackable damage increase that lasts for 2 turns, massively boosting the damage output of the team. Additionally, when attacking enemies, Welt’s attacks will deal additional instances of damage and his attack is increased proportional to his Effect Hit Rate.

Finally, Welt’s Eidolons have also received a massive overhaul: His 1st Eidolon now allow him to deal an additional instance of damage ot enemies with Weightless, his 4th eidolon now reduce the all-type resistances of all Weightless enemies by a massive 30% and his 6th Eidolon now grants him a massive critical damage and critical rate buff when attacking enemies in the slow state, including Weightless enemies.

Novaflare Buffs Impact Rating: 10/10. Completely Changes The Way Players Build And Play Welt Moving Forward.

Build Rating: 9/10. Welt Became One Of The Strongest Debuff Characters In The Game.

Not only does this Novaflare buff massively boost the damage output of Welt, it also turns Welt from a niche delay debuffer character that is not used much into an extremely powerful defense-reducing debuffer for any teams. Welt’s buffs now make it so that any team can use him if they want to improve their damage output thanks to his ability to massively reduce all enemies’ defenses and resistances in addition to slowing them down. This makes him extremely worth considering if players want to invest in an easy to use generic debuffer.

Conclusion

With that, we have analyzed everything players need to know about Honkai Star Rail version 4.2 Novaflare buffs and how they affect these old characters in the game. If you want to get your hands on these characters to test these buffs out yourself, then don’t hesitate to get extra funds by topping up Honkai Star Rail with the help of Enjoygm- the cheapest top up site on the web!