There’s a couple of important things that need to be addressed when it comes to summon in 1.2 update. These are the 5 considerations you don’t want to miss out on.

Consideration 1: Blade’s Damage

It’s probably safe to say that Blade is definitely one of the more interesting damage dealers, although the fact that he sacrifices his own health to deal better damage is not that ground-breaking. Because Arlan can do it as well. Still, there are a couple of things about Blade that really stand out and we need to talk about.

First of all, we know that the skill consumes Blade’s HP and increases his damage output. It’s not an attack, but more like taking a turn to buff him up. However, he does gain a new turn, although I am not sure how that will work out with supports like Yukong or Bronya. Hopefully, this skill won’t waste their buffs.

Also, unlike Arlan, who doesn’t consume a skill point, Blade unfortunately does use it up. So, if you’re using him in your team, you will need to be aware about the skill point economy, which was one of the best-selling points about Arlan when you didn’t have to care about it so much.

But the biggest thing about him has to be the ultimate. No matter how much HP Blade has, he will set his own health to 50% and deal massive damage. We still don’t know officially how good his damage multipliers are.

Still, what’s exciting here is a strong synergy with Luocha. It just so happens that Luocha triggers his skill’s auto-heal when an ally drops below or to 50%, which is just perfect for Blade’s ultimate.

What’s even better, since Blade also consumes his health with the skill and then attacks afterwards, Luocha’s healing from the field will be amazing for this. Basically, the coffin courier is best buddies with this immortal Stellaron hunter.

Honestly, I could go on and keep delving deeper into Blade’s kit. But it’s pretty much clear that he will excel best when his health is constantly getting reduced. And Hoyo made sure to include a new relic set with the 1.2 update, which is basically tailor made for him. I am not sure how big the Critical Boost is going to be from the 4-set bonus. But hopefully, it’s enough that you can put on Crit DMG body on him and fish for the Critical Rate substats instead.

But what I care about the most right now is how useful Health stat is going to be to Blade. There were some hints that he might scale with it in some way. I am a bit worried when it comes to split scaling characters. It doesn’t always work out for the best, although I am basing this on my Genshin experience. But it will be interesting to see how important HP is going to be when it comes to building Blade.

Otherwise, he seems like a unique damage dealer you could go for, if you’re still in the process of building teams for Memory of Chaos.

Consideration 2: Kafka’s Team

With Kafka, a new team is going to be rising to the top if everything goes well.

Her entire kit is based around Shock damage over time. And there’s quite a few synergies you could pull off with a team like Sampo, Kafka, a healer and another flexible character, who could be Serval as well.

Now, Sampo is probably going to be one of the key team mates for Kafka because this guy’s ultimate boosts DoT damage by up to 30% if it’s raised as a level 10 ultimate.

This is pretty huge. Because both Sampo and Kafka specialize in unloading lots of DoT damage and this debuff on enemies is going to be amazing. I mean, it’s no secret that Sampo has been talked about a lot in the community as one of the best team mates for Kafka. Although even if things sound good in theory, it’s always the damage numbers that bring the clearest results.

And the thing is, from what I understand, Kafka applies Shock DoTs in an interesting way. I am specifically talking about her talent, which will trigger a follow-up attack from her when any other ally in the team attacks an enemy. That same enemy will then get attacked by Kafka and, at the same time, Kafka will also apply Shock DoT.

First of all, in order for Kafka to utilize her kit efficiently, you will need to adjust her speed so that somebody else can attack an enemy before her. And once that is done, when you use her skill, if the enemy is already afflicted by DoTs, they will receive additional damage.

For example, Sampo would need to go before Kafka, apply his Wind Shear on the enemy. Then, if you also have Serval, she would need to go next and then afterwards Kafka could benefit from all those DoTs placed on the enemy.

Obviously, there’s also Ultimates we need to keep in mind. Honestly, I really like a team that’s focused on dishing out tons of damage over time and Sampo is already a beast by himself in Simulated Universe. So, imagine how easy the runs are going to be with Kafka and Sampo together. I mean, I know Simulated Universe isn’t that challenging compared to Memory of Chaos. But even then, this new team is going to be definitely interesting when Kafka comes out.

And the funny thing is, all the DoT characters are going to be available on Kafka’s banner. So, it’s going to be extremely easy to assemble this new team if you’re going for Kafka. And what’s even better, snagging a couple of Eidolons for someone like Sampo is going to be amazing if you can get his 1st, 4th and last Eidolons.

Consideration 3: Luka’s Bleed

Speaking of Kafka’s banner and damage over time, Luka is the new 4-star Physical Nihility character who specializes in Bleeding his enemies.

His whole schtick is playing around the Fighting Will stacks. He will gain after using attacks or when entering the battle by using his technique. And just like Fire Trailblazer, he will consume his stacks and deliver an enhanced Basic Attack, which will deal increased damage against an enemy who has Bleed DoT.

But unlike the Fire Trailblazer, we can see Luka only consumes 2 stacks to deliver the Enhanced Basic Attack, which is great. Because that means he can use this attack more often and unload a lot more damage.

Still, the biggest thing about him has to be the ultimate. First of all, he will gain Fighting Will stacks. But more importantly, the enemy will receive a debuff that increases their damage taken, similar to Welt’s ultimate. And then, of course, he will do some damage.

I am not sure how good he is going to be with Kafka compared to Sampo. We still don’t know officially what his Traces or Eidolons will do. But if his damage multipliers are solid, he could be a great replacement for Serval. Because he does increase the damage the enemy takes, which hopefully also means that he helps increase the DoT damage.

Luka, Sampo, Kafka and a healer could be an interesting team to try out when the banner drops and it’s going to be exciting to see how that works out.

Consideration 4: Banner Value

Now, when trying to evaluate the banners, Blade’s featured banner is pretty decent. Although if you’re thinking of building a team with him, then it’s mostly Natasha that matters here.

However, if you do have Luocha, then you will want to pair him with Blade. So, Natasha would be used in another Memory of Chaos team.

But as for Arlan and Sushang, they don’t really have any synergy with Blade. Arlan has been notoriously nerfed before the launch. So, even if he has a similar kit to Blade, he would be better off in a team that’s built around him. Sushang is a pretty strong physical hunt unit. But all in all, this banner isn’t really that great if you’re pulling just for Blade specifically, unless you still need one of these 4-stars for your 2nd Memory of Chaos team.

Still, Natasha’s Eidolons are pretty good, especially the 2nd and 4th Eidolons. Providing some decent healing for badly damaged allies and gaining energy on hit allows her to maintain everyone’s health easily, especially since her Ultimate only costs 90. It’s the cheapest ultimate in the entire game.

And as for Kafka’s banner, as I already said it, it’s an extremely valuable banner for anyone who wants to build a DoT focused team with Kafka. Sampo’s 4th, 5th and 6th Eidolons are all really good. The 5th one allows him to raise his ultimate beyond level 10, which means more DoT damage boosting on enemies. While Serval’s 2nd and 6th Eidolons are incredibly good for improving her energy and damage output, especially the 6th one. If you’re going to be using her with Kafka, this means it’s going to be extremely easy to maintain Shocked debuff on enemies and enable extra 30% damage for her.

Also Read: Honkai Star Rail 1.2: Why Kafka Is The Next Character Worth Pulling?

Consideration 5: Future Warps

When it comes to picking which banner to wish on, honestly it really depends on you, although Kafka’s banner definitely has more synergetic 4-star units that she can utilize.

But we still don’t know much about Luka’s performance and, more importantly, we don’t know how good Blade or Kafka is going to be, despite the rumors about them.

Also, let’s not forget that 1.3 characters have been teased as well. Dan Heng’s new powerful form is going to be a 5-star Destruction Imaginary unit, so I can imagine this guy is going to be a damage dealer. If you don’t have this character in your Honkai Star Rail Account, you have to find a way to get him as soon as possible. And that’s pretty interesting since we’re finally going to be getting a dedicated damage dealer from the Imaginary element.

Fu Xuan is another unique unit we’ll be getting in version 1.3. She’s a 5-star Quantum Preservation unit, which means a new tank is joining the ranks of Gepard, Fire Trailblazer, and March 7th. To me, this is very exciting if you have Silver Wolf, because we can get one step closer to a true Mono Quantum team.

In fact, we will be able to build a Mono Quantum team thanks to Lynx, who is a 4-star Quantum Abundance unit. So, Lynx, Silver Wolf, Seele and Fu Xuan is probably going to be the ultimate Mono Quantum team, you can play in places like Memory of Chaos.

All in all, I would say that Blade’s banner is for those who want to use a cool damage dealer but are fine with 4-stars that have very little to do with him on his banner, while Kafka’s banner is for those who want to build a DoT team.

Finally, 1.3 characters I just talked about will probably have their own 2 separate banners. Hopefully, Fu Xuan and Lynx are going to be on the same banner, so those who already have Seele or QQ and Silver Wolf can build their dream team of Mono Quantum.