Honkai: Star RailSparxieBest build, teams and other guides

Sparxie is an Elation DPS and with supportive abilities for the archetype that will allow her to function as a sub DPS as well. She is very good at generating Punchline for the team at the cost of being extremely SP hungry, though she has some limited SP sustaining for when she uses her Skill. With more Elation units in the team, Sparxie will be able to generate even more Punchline, and can also provide teamwide CRIT DMG buffs based on the Punchline she has owned. She greatly accelerates the game plan of Elation, and can ramp up the Elation DMG being dealt significantly.

[Intro]

This is getting out of hand, now there's two of them. Sparxie is the second entrant into the new Elation archetype, and she's here to consume all the Skill Points you have to ragebait the enemy into violently exploding.

Despite being part of this attention deficient archetype, Sparxie's actual kit is very simple to understand, and so this makes my job a lot easier. She's pretty good for the archetype as a whole as well due to how much she can boost the generation of Punchline, so it's probably not a far shot in the dark to say that she'll likely be quite an important part of teams in future, but it's impossible to say for sure for all the usual reasons.

Even still, for right now she's very strong as a main DPS, especially in combination with Yao Guang. Should another dedicated Elation DPS emerge later on, Sparxie's kit will allow her to seamlessly transition into a sub DPS role, so you shouldn't (fingers crossed) be boned that soon if you choose to go for her.

[Abilities]

Sparxie's main selling point is the impressive rate at which she can generate Punchline points for the Aha Instant, and this is from her Skill.

It's very much like Qingque's Skill, with a confirmation to start it. Once you're in the highly questionable Skill animation, further uses of Skill will continue to increase the power of the final attack. You can end the Skill and attack at any point, or continue to ramp up the power level until a maximum of 20 Skill Points have been consumed.

Her Basic ATK gets Enhanced during the Skill, and it deals 100% ATK to one enemy, and 50% ATK to adjacent foes. For every SP you consume during the Skill, the DMG multiplier of the Enhanced Basic is increased by 20% (10% for adjacent). You can get one of two gifts when expending SP, and these effects are in addition to the DMG multiplier increase above. An 'Unreal Banger' (yes awful naming I know, but it's the brainrot path) will grant 1 Punchline. You can alternatively get 'Straight Fire' which will grant 2 Punchline instead, but will also restore 2 SP immediately.

Now you see why they had to put a cap on the SP you can use to buff the Enhanced Basic. While it's still terribly unlikely to hit that by yourself, it could happen with adequate SP support from others, such as the OG Sparkle, and if you're very very lucky, it could end up going that way anyway.

This is a Punchline generating machine, and can very quickly add a lot to the pot to strengthen the ensuing Aha Instant. This is then compounded by the Certified Banger points you hold and can result in extremely high damage being dealt.

One last thing to note about the Enhanced Basic is that it will always recover 40 Energy, again similar to Imbibitor Lunae. Think of it as reimbursement for the many SP you will have to expend in a single turn.

Sparxie's Ultimate will immediately gain 2 Punchline and will deal damage to all enemies on the field. The damage is equal to (0.6 x Elation + 50%) of Sparxie's ATK. Yeah I know, maths jumpscare, but if you paid attention at school, you'll know the order of operations, and the Elation in question here is the actual stat the Sparxie has. It costs 160 Energy, so the extra Energy you get from the Enhanced Basic is going to be very much appreciated here.

Sparxie's Talent describes her Certified Banger state. When she uses her Enhanced Basic ATK, she will deal additional Elation DMG; 40% to the primary target and 20% to adjacent. In addition to this, for every SP you consumed during the Skill, the Enhanced Basic ATK will deal an extra instance of 20% Elation DMG to 1 random enemy in the Blast AoE. This will result in a comical amount of damage numbers, and the actual damage being dealt will also be very impressive. Remember as well that the Elation DMG being dealt is affected by the amount of Certified Banger points Sparxie holds, and it's not going to be a small amount with how much Punchline she can generate.

Her Ultimate will also deal an extra 48% Elation DMG during this state as well, so it can also ramp up very nicely. Don't be surprised when subsequent uses of your attacks suddenly start jumping up in strength. This archetype is very much a ramping one.

Last one to cover is the Elation Skill. During the Aha Instant, Sparxie will deal 50% Elation DMG to all enemies, and then deals an additional 20 instances of DMG. These 20 instances are Bounces, with each one dealing 25% Elation DMG to a random enemy. This Elation Skill will also grant 2 points of Thrill to Sparxie, allowing her to consume them instead of SP during her Skill's Enhancing (this counts as consuming SP for relevant effects).

The participant id for this is higher than Yao Guang's, meaning that Yao Guang will always use her own Elation Skill first, and then it will be followed up by Sparxie's Elation Skill. This order won't change, so you won't need to worry about missing out on Yao Guang's buffs.

[Bonus Traces]

Sparxie's A2 is a converter. For every 100 ATK she has that exceeds 2000 ATK, she gets 5% Elation. This can grant a maximum bonus of 80% Elation, achieved at 3600 ATK, which is very reasonable. It can be difficult to get this in addition to maintaining the CRIT stats that you likely want, but as far as requirements go, this is quite tame.

The A4 is a team check. Sparxie's Ultimate will get buffed based on the number of Elation units in the team. 1 Elation character grants an additional 2 Punchline and 1 Thrill; 2 Elation characters will grant an additional 4 Punchline and 1 Thrill; and 3 or more Elation characters grant an additional 8 Punchline and 4 Thrill.

As of the time of writing, there's only two Elation characters, and that's Sparxie and Yao Guang, so the 3+ bonus isn't attainable yet, but it's pretty insane. It'll let Sparxie generate 10 Punchline instantly, and get 4 Thrill which lets her offset the same amount of SP, making her even better as a Punchline generator for the team. Really damn strong.

Lastly, the A6. For every 1 Punchline owned , increases all allies' CRIT DMG by 8%, up to a maximum bonus of 80%. This is going to be fluctuating a bit during actual fights, but it's still incredibly good to just be getting for free, and to the whole team as well, meaning it'll buff other future Elation characters too.

I love seeing actual improvements instead of just ways to remove arbitrary limitations.

[Eidolons]

The usual disclaimer: no you do not need Eidolons, but they're a nice boost and here's why you might consider it.

• E1 will grant 5 Punchline after Aha Instant ends. For every 1 Punchline owned, the All-Type RES PEN of all allies will increase by 1.5%, up to a maximum increase of 15%.

• E2 will grant Sparxie an extra turn after the Aha Instant ends, as well as 2 Thrill. For every 1 Thrill consumed, Sparxie will gain 10% CRIT DMG for 2 turns, stacking up to a max of 40%.

  • This is probably the big one that'll draw your eye. Getting an extra turn after the Aha Instant is good for the obvious reasons why extra turns are busted, but remember that the Certified Banger points duration is limited to 2 turns for anyone other than Yao Guang; this will let you essentially get a third fully powered turn out after the Aha Instant, letting you not only deal more damage, but also generate even more Punchline for the next Aha Instant.

• E4 gives an extra 5 Punchline when using Ultimate, and increases Sparxie's Elation by 36% for 3 turns.

• Lastly, the E6 will grant a permanent 20% All-Type RES PEN. For every 1 Punchline taken into account by the Elation Skill, the number of its additional DMG instances by 1, up to a max of 40.

I have no strong opinions on any of these. You may be drawn to the E2, but I believe it's a little bit too early to be gassing it up; without the extra Thrill stacks from the 3 Elation teammate bonus, it's probably not going to reach its peak just yet, but if you value the effect and think it's going to be good later on, then it's your choice.

[The Rest]

Sparxie is a pretty good character. Coming out alongside the Novaflare of Sparkle is excellent timing, and you can use both of them together without issue. In fact, that's probably the intended design.

Not that this is a bad thing, especially since buffed Sparkle is completely cracked, and also free potentially if you chose her from the selector. The extra damage buffs and vulns you get from pairing them together is extremely potent, and granting Sparxie more turns allows for even greater Punchline generation for the entire team, resulting in even greater Elation DMG from the team.

Naturally, Yao Guang is also going to be present for her own lesser but consistent Punchline generation, her generally good buffs, and most of all her ability to immediately trigger an Aha Instant. Using these three together should result in an absolutely hilarious amount of Certified Banger being stacked, especially on Yao Guang since she holds it for 3 turns instead of 2.

This leaves a spot for a sustain, or for a second support of your choosing, and the options are many and varied. It really depends on what you're after from the team or what you're trying to counter, so just experiment and see what works and what you like. Even with the good SP regeneration of this basic team of 3, there's still a lot of SP you want to be using with Sparxie, so I'd recommend not committing too hard to another sustain or support who are SP negative to fulfil their duties (not unless you really know what you're doing).

As mentioned before, Sparxie has a kit that can function as a sub DPS as well should a different more dedicated main DPS Elation character come out. You may be inclined to make a comparison to Evernight in this instance. This would be a somewhat insane take at this point in time I think. While it's undeniable that Sparxie is already very strong and has actually very solid room to continue, Evernight is just built different in her entirety — plus, Evernight came out after her intended main DPS partner, much like Anaxa did as well.

Seeing as this isn't the case here, it's far too early to tell if Evernight's situation will happen again for Sparxie, and if you've been paying attention for the past couple years, the majority of attempts at predictions are usually woefully inaccurate.

So here's what matters: Sparxie is really good right now, and her kit is good enough that she will stay that way for quite a bit. While she may be waiting to become a partner for someone else, or maybe even waiting for a partner of her own, she does not currently lack for good options, and she is not in an underpowered state praying for a new unit to save her.

What about Yao Guang? Well, without her, Sparxie is still usable. This isn't necessarily saying much, as you still definitely want to have Yao Guang on the team (it's kind of the whole point of Elation at the moment). Luckily, you can still get Yao Guang as of the writing of this, since she has an extended banner, so if you're looking to go big for Elation, this might be the time to do it.

You should not expect Sparxie to be super competitive without Yao Guang. It's just how it is. This team archetype is still fresh, so it's fully expected that it's not going to be fully competing with the established archetypes with all their members in them just yet, and it's already throwing hands quite well, but this is contingent on having both Yao Guang and Sparxie.

[Wrap up]

The more time that passes, the less I feel like I have to say about characters. Not because people are getting better at deciding what's good and what's not, god no, could you imagine?

No it's mostly just that things are mostly variations on things we've already seen, so it's not hugely surprising about how things work. Even the Elation system as a whole is essentially just an offshoot of the Follow-up archetype but with more flashing lights and colours.

Definitely not said as a negative, nor as a positive. Merely an observation. At the very least, the visual design and vfx continues to impress, so really the only thing that matters past a certain point is vibes, and boy howdy, does Sparkle have those in spades.