A Comprehensive Early Game Progression Guide

Are you a newcomer to Honkai: Star Rail seeking strategies to hit the ground running?

This detailed beginner guide is tailored to help you start strong in the game!

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Honkai: Star Rail - A Comprehensive Early Game Progression Guide

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Before We Start

This guide is designed for players who are already familiar with the basic concepts of Honkai: Star Rail such as stats, character classes, elements, skill points, and relics.

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Post-Tutorial Steps

After completing the roughly 30-60 minutes tutorial, you've been introduced to the game's basic systems.

However, once you unlock Warping and make your first pulls, the game truly begins.

Before setting off to explore Herta Station, it's recommended to continue with the Main Story quests.

This is because various game systems including Daily Missions, Leveling Rewards, and Trailblaze Power (stamina) are still locked behind the main story progression.

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Understanding Missions

Upon opening your Mission log, you'll be greeted with various types of missions:

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• Trailblaze Missions (Gold): These missions progress the story and should be prioritized whenever available. Sometimes, the main story can be gated by your Trailblaze Level, which is when you'll start tackling other missions to gain experience and level up.
• Companion Missions (Purple): These missions delve into the backgrounds of your team members. They're story-heavy and, while not as long as the Trailblaze missions, they do require some time to complete.
• Adventure Missions (Blue): These are quick side-missions that provide experience and additional rewards.
• Daily Missions (Green): These missions aren't visible in the image above but are even faster than Adventure Missions. You get a random set of Daily Missions to complete each day.

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Further Progression

Now that you're familiar with the mission types, let's refocus on the Main Story.

The subsequent Trailblazer Mission introduces Herta and the Simulated Universe.

The Simulated Universe is a roguelike mode where you select a team of four characters to venture inside a simulated world, collecting random buffs to enhance your team against the enemies inside.

After your trial run in the Simulated Universe, you will unlock Herta, who isn't very strong, so it's best to keep her benched for now.

As you progress, you'll discover Operation Briefing - a series of mission sets that provide a variety of rewards. There are nine pages in total, each packed with their own missions and principal rewards for completion.

In tandem with this, you'll unlock Trailblaze Level rewards. From this point forward, you can return to Pom-Pom to receive gifts each time you level up!

As you delve deeper into the story, you'll journey to a new, colder planet. Here, you'll encounter your first Calyx and unlock your Trailblaze Power. This essentially serves as your stamina in Honkai: Star Rail.

You'll come across various types of Calyx, but initially, you'll only be able to farm the Bud of Memories, which grants Character EXP Materials. To prevent your Trailblaze Power from being capped at 180, run a few Calyx rounds to kickstart its regeneration and use the materials you've earned to level up your primary team.

With the majority of systems now unlocked, you have the freedom to either return to Herta Station to embark on side-missions or continue the Main Story on Jarilo-VI. The choice is yours - enjoy the game!

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Practical Tips for Progression

Now, let's take a look at some invaluable tips and tricks to streamline your early game progression:

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• General Gameplay: Prioritize the Main Story and only start exploring when you need to level up to unlock the next Main Story mission. Be sure to level up your characters to the current level cap. The increased stats and damage formula changes (based on level differences between you and the enemy) will significantly impact your gameplay. Equip Light Cones with a matching Path to the character to unlock its passive bonus. Meanwhile, make sure to level up the Light Cone to the current level cap. Resources are initially scarce, so be mindful not to spread yourself too thin. Focus on upgrading Traces for characters you plan on using long-term.

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• Resource Management: Be mindful not to let your Traiblaze Power (stamina) exceed its 180 TP cap. As you generate 240 TP daily, it's essential to use it efficiently. For instance, hold off on your three weekly Echo of War runs until the last day before reset (usually Tuesday) for better rewards. Also, remember to check out the Region Shops for important materials and even Eidolons for the Main Character. You can earn the currency to buy items in the Region Shop by completing missions in the zone where the shop is located. To maximize resource gathering, send your characters on Assignments, and don't worry - you can still use them in combat. Lastly, don't forget to do your Battle Pass Daily and Weekly missions for decent free rewards.

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• Exploration and Combat: Exploring is rewarding in Honkai: Star Rail. Each map is filled with Treasures, special enemies, puzzles, and quests that yield experience, Stellar Jades, Relics, and various Materials. If you're stuck on a challenging fight, remember that you can always borrow a character from a Friend. To increase your Equilibrium Level, complete the Trial of the Equilibrium missions, but don't rush! If you don't have sufficient EXP and Ascension materials saved, you might struggle in the new world tier as monsters will be tougher.

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• Relics and Warps: Be cautious with your Relic upgrades as the materials required are limited. Also, don't waste stamina on farming Relics in the early game. Similarly, save your Stellar Jades for rate-up banners (or stamina refreshes) and use only the Basic Passes you earn from rewards and missions on the General Warp.

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Stamina Usage

During your first couple of weeks, focus your Stamina on three key areas:

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• Golden Calyx: Bud of Memories and Golden Calyx: Bud of Aether for Character and Light Cone EXP Materials.
• Crimson Calyx for materials needed to level up your Traces.
• Stagnant Shadow for materials required to ascend your characters.

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Remember, only farm the Golden Calyx when you need the EXP Materials. If your main team and their Cones are already at the current level cap, bypass the Calyx until you increase it again. This means your main focus will be Traces and Ascension materials.

Once you reach TL 40, start farming CoC and SU as you've just unlocked Gold rarity.

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Leveling Up Fast

Is the next Main Story mission just out of reach? Fear not! Here are some sources of EXP available to you in Honkai: Star Rail:

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• Complete Daily Training for 1000 EXP a day.
• Accomplish Adventure and Companion missions for additional experience (100-400 EXP per mission) and bonus rewards.
• Spend your Traiblaze Power on any activity to earn a set amount of experience.
• Complete Operation Briefing missions for additional EXP.
• Explore the Open World. Treasures, monsters, and random encounters all provide additional experience. Even though you can open treasures only once, the monsters respawn daily. This means you can roam around the maps and kill the daily respawning monsters for more experience and Ascension materials after finishing all other daily tasks and depleting your stamina.

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Remember, success in Honkai: Star Rail isn't about speed, but strategy and enjoyment!