u/Character-Sense4990

HSR Character Paths by Source of Power

HSR Character Paths by Affiliation

Hi, I was bored and wanted to try and categorize every HSR character by their lore paths in terms of what they affiliate with and where they source their powers from

My knowledge on HSR lore isn't that deep, so there were many I wasn't sure about and there are definitely multiple that I am wrong about, for all I know maybe my concept of powers being derived from paths is entirely wrong, so I encourage readers to correct me!

(Also after making the lists I realize in hindsight I probably should've added a "No Path" section to both lists)

Some that I'm not sure about:

Asta and Arlan - I wasn't sure what to count Herta Space Station as so I just categorized them as Erudition in both lists

Belobog - I placed all the Belobog characters in Preservation for both lists even though some of the characters probably don't affiliate themselves with or even heard about the Preservation

Jingliu and Luocha - I was also confused about them and just put them where I felt like

Fuxuan - I placed her source of power in Erudition due to her third eye granted by Nous

4* Tingyun - I treated her as Phantylia

Dan Heng Imbibitor Lunae - I treated DHIL like he is Dan Feng so I chose to put him in affiliation with the Hunt

Vidyadhara - I placed their source of power with the Permanence, though maybe I'm wrong and they still are path striders of the Hunt

Astral Express - For source of power I wasn't exactly sure where to put them and chose to keep Dan Heng and March 7th there

Misha - I put him as a part of the Trailblaze in both lists, but I'm not sure maybe he is Harmony either or both of the lists

Sunday - For affiliation I consider him as part of the Astral Express already so I placed him as affiliated with the Trailblaze, as for source of power I was considering putting him in Order but decided to go with Harmony in the end

Chrysos Heirs - I put them all as Destruction as part of their affiliation since the primum mobile of the Amphoreus Scepter was Destruction when they were created from my understanding, but I'm not too sure so please correct me if I'm wrong

Cyrene - I chose not to place her affiliation with Destruction, but I'm honestly still confused about how she became a Pure Child of Anasrava despite being part of the simulation so if someone could explain that to me that would be much appreciated

Evernight - I think she affiliates herself with the Enigmata? Not sure

Dahlia - I put her in Remembrance due to her affiliation with the Cremators, but I'm not sure if she should have went to Destruction due to her time with the Ever-Flame Mansion but from what I understand she wasn't really a part of the mansion and always intended to betray them

Blade - I wasn't too sure about the source of his power so I chose to put him in Abundance, again could be wrong

Kafka - I had no idea for her source of power, it likely isn't Finality but didn't know where else to put her

Mortenax Blade's Ultimate

TGCF Book 1's Cover

Blade always reminded me of Huacheng, so guess how hyped I was when I realized the colors in his ultimate matched the cover of TGCF Book 1 almost perfectly

https://preview.redd.it/xamn63jfaoyg1.png?width=2266&format=png&auto=webp&s=7af4ddb51509e91bee74a8ad83d2a2e9fa03e63b

https://preview.redd.it/narx43jfaoyg1.jpg?width=2266&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4916c503e0056f524a237351372e1668d443154d

This is my first time doing this kind of post, but here's how I barely got S+ for at least the 6th time in a row in Shiyu Defense as an F2P on mobile (you can see my clear history in the upper screenshot)

Season 1 characters still got it! Although the only real reason I'm using Season 1 DPS characters is because I simply didn't pull any Season 2 DPS other than Banyue (unless you count Cissia but I consider her a support for my Harumasa)

If you want to know the costs:
Stage 1: Hugo M0W1, Lighter M1W1 (Qingyi's W-Engine), Lycaon M2W0 (W5 Fossil A-Rank) - 5 cost
Stage 2: Harumasa, M0W1, Trigger M0W1, Cissia M0W0 (W5 Anton's W-Engine) - 5 cost
Stage 3: Miyabi M0W1, Yuzuha M0W1, Burnice M0W1 - 6 cost

Discussion:

Stage 1: Yeah, Hugo is not in a great state right now, he requires incredibly precise timing to perform well in Shiyu and his reliance on certain stunners is very obvious. I'm lucky enough to have an M1 Lighter (pulled cause he's my husband), but if you don't have Lighter or Dialyn then your Hugo simply feels unusable (though it seems like Norma might provide another option although it still isn't that great). In terms of timing, due to the backloaded nature of Hugo's kit I had to reset many times in order to get my Hugo's ultimate within the 1 minute mark to have it receive 5.0x score multiplier, which was able to increase my score from 28k to 33k all on its own (and maybe also because of slightly better playing). This is especially apparent when when you use Hugo's totalize ability and it just misses the next multiplier bonus which feels really bad. Hopefully Hugo will get the potential awakening he deserves soon.

Stage 2: Despite the stage buff favoring dual electric attacker compositions, Harumasa didn't have that great of a performance. Why? Because Harumasa and Cissia's small mob clearing ability isn't that great, especially in the 2nd wave of mobs where the elite enemy has a random miasma shield for some reason that isn't even removed when it is shocked. I can't verify because I don't own her, but I don't believe Seed has this problem as her mob clearing ability seems to be much better than Harumasa's with her larger AOE, and also because her kit incentivizes the dual attack compositions this stage is clearly trying to promote. Despite all this, I still want to say that Cissia was one of the best investments I made for my Harumasa as her ability to contribute a good amount of daze, apply a decent amount of electric anomaly (which is especially good since I use thunder metal on Harumasa), and her defense shred stacking well with Trigger's W-Engine all make her a great partner for Harumasa, and all this makes me believe that she is better than the Astra side-grade and hypercarry Harumasa downgrade some people claim her to be (at least for people like me who don't have Dialyn).

Stage 3: Something interesting I've noticed is that Burnice is simply a better character to pair with Miyabi than Vivian in Shiyu Defense (at least from my experience). For every Shiyu since Burnice got her potential awakening, she has always performed better than my Vivian when paired with Miyabi even in this Shiyu Stage 3 where there is 25% increased ether anomaly application and ether weakness on enemies. The reason for this may simply be that my Burnice has her signature W-Engine while my Vivian doesn't, but I also just think that Burnice's disorder application is superior enough to make Miyabi prefer Burnice over Vivian. I remember people discussing Burnice's potential and saying that there is never any reason to use her over Vivian unless there is fire weakness and ether resistance, which I simply believe isn't true. I feel like the only reason there are so many people who think Burnice is weak is simply because there are so many fire resistant anomaly bosses in Deadly Assault!

If you read this far, thank you for reading my yap!