u/John_Jonas

Hello. I'm the guy who's played Burn on literally every single piece of content in the whole game throughout its history. I understand that status and its team better than most people.

Here's a little question.

What does Hongyuan Burn need ? As a team archtype, what does Hongyuan Burn need to have to function and compete with other statuses ?

Let me tell you about how Ryoshu's capstone ID perfectly understand its status and manages to simultaneously exploit its strengths, while also covering its weaknesses and not ending up as a leech parasiting the archtype.

First off, here's how the Burn team is going to look once HoSShu comes out (yes we're calling her that) :

https://preview.redd.it/399g636p3k0h1.png?width=1206&format=png&auto=webp&s=2e846789077d5962e854d6d4912771094b2a1398

1. Currently, Burn is only really played 1 way : The Magic Bullet way. You get Wrath, Pride and Lust resources, you make Outis shoot, you deal hundreds of damage, the end.

On the basic Magic Bullet level, HoSShu already perfectly fuels this strategy, not just by having the right 3 affinities, but also having extra action economy with a consistent extra Pride skill every turn, and an even more extra Wrath nuke every 3rd or 4th turn depending on the balancing. That extra sin resource generation matters a lot, because the biggest issue with Burn for the last year has been just how many amazing Burn EGOs exist in the game, but can't be used most of the time because Magic Bullet spam is so viable. HoSShu mostly fixes this issue, so that's one thing.

2. HoSShu's extra action mechanics make her perfectly synergize with 4th Match Flame. Every single action HoSShu can possibly take has 3 coins, 3+ attack weight, or both of these things combined. And she reliably takes 2 to 3 actions per turn.

https://preview.redd.it/qs4epwhs5k0h1.png?width=519&format=png&auto=webp&s=d560a264893a38c2ff94b2b35205d8ee5f752904

These things combined make HoSShu into a Burn potency machine, especially if you time yourself correctly with a Skill 3-2 or Great Trichiliocosm. She doesn't just rely on her entire team to build up Burn potency for her so that she can activate it again and reap the rewards, she actively puts in work.

3. With the addition of Reflectrials, PM has shown that they can and will continue to use Capped status potency as a lever for balance. I beat Rufo phase 1 with Burn and the capped potency REALLY fucks Burn over, because unlike the status damage reduction, you can't cheese bosses like a degenerate by abusing the fact Dark Flame counts as Pride damage and not Burn damage. Double fucked because Rufo and Ricardo are Pride resistant.

HoSShu brings a ton of raw damage to the Burn team by virtue of being a Poise ID, as well as having a ton of damage multipliers and resistance debuffs on her kit.

Boss has tons of protection ? Magic Bullet Cheese them. They also have Pride res ? HoSShu activate Burn 20 billion times. They reduce status damage but no cap potency ? Magic Bullet cheese. They cap status potency instead ? Go my HoSShu raw damage.

PM can't have all these balance levers pulled at the same time, it would make a fight impossible. HoSShu's addition solves the one that screws Burn over the most. And even if PM figures out they can just lower Pride Resistance to 0.2x to specifically target Dark Flame memes, it doesn't matter, because go my HoSShu Burn activation every turn.

She just covers everything in terms of offense, she's the ultimate murder machine with 0 defensive capabilities or support for the team.

When I say HoSShu is a perfectly designed ID, I don't mean the strongest one, because that depends on numbers, or her visual design (she should've had a red suit and red highlights). She's not even the best designed ID kit in the game (that's Lei Heng Meursault), but her kit, regardless of numbers and multipliers, is perfectly designed for the purposes of a Burn team specifically. It's like PM actually sat down and actually look at what Hongyuan Burn needs, even multiple seasons from now.

Her sin affinities are perfect for Burn's EGOs she has the perfect 4MF synergy, she can get Trichiliocosm buff without having to use it, she has good status infliction with 4MF passive, she has good status useage by activating Burn constantly, she has stupidly good raw damage mechanics that bypasses protection stacking, she has a fuckton of multipliers, she has extra resource generation which was what Burn needed the most-

She's perfect. For AoE situations and for single target as well. She doesn't feel like she's just exploiting the team to get benefits. NClair doesn't even work with his statuses, Capmael doesn't either. Wild Hunt Heathcliff is horribly Count negative and literally just uses his team as props for conditionals. Manager Don requires Bleed infliction that her team can't handle and Lord Hong Lu basically doesn't even interact with Rupture in any meaningful way outside of abusing how broken his bunny harem is, with Faust doing 90% of the work. You don't even need to crit with him, it's just Skill 3 spam that got hamfisted into his kit because Mao Faust ruined Deathrite for everyone.

Ryoshu participates in resource generation for the Burn EGOs and the building of a Burn stack, she makes use of the Burn stack, she makes enemies weaker to slash damage (the most common damage type in Burn with Dawnclair, Liu Sang and Leisault, and soon to be Rodion and Heathcliff).

And it's not even over. I have no doubt she will have good synergy with the Thumb Duo that's definitely coming out right after her hah hah (I will lost my mind if it's Matthias Outis I swear to Hod). Probably the deletion buff for one of them will be like Horse Yi Sang and give Ryoshu access to Tremor Burst, which would actually make her work with Scorch, which would have a real presence in the team now. Aside from that, there's 2 sinners whose House of Spiders we're sliming every time in Burn no matter what.

It's Hong Lu and Don. Like you mean she gets this buff permanently for free by just killing the dude with no good Burn ID please sign him up to the Arayashiki list Hod damn. And then Don gives extra Poise so it's always nice, since Cinq East Don is quite bad (please give us Mei Don). It'll depend on if 1 or 2 eviscerations are worth it with the buffs she gets. THIS IS ABSOLUTELY WORTH IT THO

https://preview.redd.it/sotuttukek0h1.png?width=485&format=png&auto=webp&s=c49f034489c0bd411128d4c1d2d267bcdd3358bc

Aside from that, one last thing.

It's not just Burn that's gonna be nicely impacted by this ID. The Poise team (Bleed can go kick rocks yall have had way too much thise season already), which already has a Ryoshu ID, will also really appreciate a straight power upgrade, but it also means that Ryoshu brings a genuine Burn stacking possibility to a team that never really had anything to do with Burn before. All you need to do is use 4th Match Flame to have a strong Potency application. Ren Sinclair, being a Poise ID with extra crit damage, actually goes well with Harmony too, so that's even more Burn and Bleed for Ryoshu. And unlike other House of Spiders IDs, he can mitigate the damage transfer with his own shield, so he's kind of like a bodyguard in a way.

He really is a good boy isn't he.

Wait Ryoshu no-

https://preview.redd.it/1ry15n8bgk0h1.png?width=1349&format=png&auto=webp&s=b51910c94df9cf6f13fe0cd3472af34c1a14308a

Happy Burn Season