Guinaifen Full Guide: Burn Your Enemies in Honkai: Star Rail
Guinaifen is a versatile 4-star Fire Nihility unit in Honkai: Star Rail 1.4, excelling as both a damage dealer and team support.
This guide goes into her abilities, best relic and light cone builds, team synergies, and gameplay tips to help you achieve her full potential.
Let's dive in!
Guinaifen Full Guide: Best Builds and Team Synergies
Understanding Damage Over Time (DOT)
Before diving into Guinaifen, understanding DoT is crucial.
It influences how damage is calculated and how to effectively use units like Guinaifen.
For a comprehensive understanding of DOT, check out my Damage Over Time guide.
Guinaifen's Abilities: The Dual Role
Basic and Skill Attacks
- Blazing Welcome (Blast): This skill is more than just a damage dealer. It has a 100% base chance of applying a burn DOT for two turns, making it a reliable choice for initiating battles.
- Basic Attack: After Ascension 2, her basic attack gains the ability to apply burn. This makes her versatile in both single-target and AOE situations.
Ultimate Ability: Timing is Key
Her ultimate detonates all burn DOTs on enemies, dealing a huge portion of their original DOT damage.
The timing of this Ultimate is crucial, especially when you want to capitalize on multiple burns across various enemies to inflict the max damage possible.
The Debuffing Talent: Firekiss
This debuff multiplies the damage an enemy receives.
However, it can stack up to three times, meaning the more you manage to apply it, the more devastating your attacks become.
The ability to stack this debuff makes her a great choice for long battles where you can capitalize on increased damage over time.
Technique: Skill Showcase
Initiates battle by dealing fire damage and inflicting Firekiss on a random enemy up to four times. While random, this sets the stage for the debuffs you'll stack later.
Energy and Rotations: The Strategic Aspect
Five-Turn Recharge
It might seem like a long wait, but remember, her other abilities can keep the burn and Firekiss debuff up. So it's not all about the ultimate.
I’ve noticed that even without frequent ultimates, her consistent burn application keeps the enemy vulnerable, offering a good trade-off.
SP Management: The Utility of Skill Points
Guinaifen is not just about dealing damage; she's also an SP generator for your team. This is crucial in longer battles where you need frequent skill usage.
Her ability to generate skill points often is huge for her teammates, allowing other units to use their skills more frequently.
Ascension Abilities
Ascension 2: More Than Just a Basic Attack
Unlocks the ability for Guinaifen's basic attack to apply a burn with an 80% base chance.
This is not just an add-on; it transforms her basic attack into a mini-skill, turning her into a DOT machine.
With Ascension 2, I've found Guinaifen to be far more versatile. Now, even her basic attacks contribute significantly to the team's damage output.
Ascension 4: The Speed Factor
Grants a 25% action advance at the start of the battle.
This means she usually goes first, applying debuffs or burns before anyone else acts.
Ascension 6: The Burn Amplifier
Adds 20% more damage to enemies inflicted with burn.
This reinforces her role as a specialist in burn damage.
Trace Priorities
Skill and Talent are your go-to traces, influencing the burn and Firekiss multipliers.
Ultimate and Basic Attack come next, because they are less critical to her overall performance.
Eidolons: The Cherry on Top
- E1: Increases your team's debuff application chances by reducing the enemy's effect resistance by 10% for two turns.
- E2: Increase Guinaifen's base damage multiplier to an enemy affected by her burn by 40%.
- E4: Energy regeneration tied to burn triggers, potentially cutting down her ultimate recharge time.
- E6: Increases the stackable Firekiss count by 1, amplifying your team's damage potential even further.
E4 and E6 are game changers.
More energy means more ultimates, and more Firekiss stacks can turn even a basic attack into a powerful nuke.
Relic Builds: Stats and Priorities
Body Piece (EHR vs Attack%): Aim for 67% EHR (Effect Hit Rate) for more reliable debuff application. Alternatively, you can focus on ATK% for a more damage-oriented build.
Feet Piece (Speed vs ATK%): 135 speed for better turn frequency, which allows for faster energy and skill point generation. If you have speed buffs from other team members, ATK% can be a viable alternative. Speed works wonders for Guinaifen by letting her apply burns and stack Firekiss debuffs more frequently.
Planar Sphere: Prioritize Fire Damage to maximize her elemental attacks. ATK% can be a secondary option.
Link Rope: Depending on your build, you can stack more ATK% or focus on improving your ultimate uptime with extra Energy Regen.
Relic Sets: Pick Your Combo Wisely
- Two-piece combos of Fire Damage (Lava-forging Set), Attack (Musketeer Set), or Speed (Hackerspace Set) are the most flexible and effective sets. Also, two-piece combos allow you to cherry-pick the best main stats and sub-stats, offering a more customized build.
- Four-piece Musketeer could work for speed and attack bonuses but offers less flexibility.
- With the addition of Prisoner in Deep Confinement DoT set, Guinaifen gets a damage boost because it increases ATK by 12% and ignores enemy defense when target is inflicted with DoTs.
Planar Ornament Set
There are 4 sets that suit her:
- Firmament Frontline Glamoth: Increases ATK% and deals extra damage when speed reaches 135/160.
- Space Healing Station: Provides a significant attack bonus, affecting both DOT and non-DOT attacks.
- Fleet of the Ageless: A team-wide attack buff that can help support other teammates.
- Pan-Cosmic Commercial Enterprise: Offers EHR and an attack bonus based on Guinaifen's EHR stat.
Guinaifen's Best Light Cones
Free-to-Play Options
- Fermata: Obtained from the Forgotten Hall shop, offers a permanent break effect bonus and a conditional universal damage bonus that can be achieved when paired with Wind/Lightning DOT units.
- Solitary Healing: Features higher base stats and provides an energy gain after defeating an enemy inflicted with your DOT.
Gacha Options
- Good Night and Sleep Well: As her debuffs stack, this lightcone might be the best one in terms of damage potential.
- Eyes of the Prey: Great if you're lacking EHR substats.
- Pearls of Sweat: A solid team option that applies a defense shred effect on hit, which amplifies your entire team's damage at the cost of Guinaifen's personal damage.
Team Comp Synergies: The Right Squad
For DoT Teams:
- Kafka: A natural fit for Guinaifen, as she detonates any type of DOTs.
- Asta: Provides a huge attack and speed buff, making the team more efficient.
- Black Swan: Another huge DOT-focused DPS that benefits from Guinaifen's Burn mechanic.
For Non-DoT Teams:
Himeko and Hook: They benefit from enemies inflicted with burn, making them interesting teammates for Guinaifen.
Any DPS: Guinaifen's Firekiss debuffs pairs extremely well with any DPS in the game. In non-DOT teams, Guinaifen serves as a damage amplifier.
Auto-Battle: To Trust or Not To Trust
Auto-battle with Guinaifen can be inefficient in SP management and skill usage, particularly in multi-target battles.
The AI will prioritize using her ultimate, often at less-than-ideal times.
Auto-battle tends to misuse Guinaifen’s skills, making fights slower than necessary, especially in challenging content. Manual control is advised for optimum performance.
Conclusion: The Versatility of Guinaifen
Guinaifen stands as a valuable addition to both DOT-focused and general teams.
Her skill set allows for various gameplay styles, making her a versatile pick in Honkai: Star Rail.
While her auto-battle performance has room for improvement, manual control unlocks her full potential.
Ready to set the battlefield in flames? Guinaifen is your go-to unit.
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