Since I didn't get access to the Honkai Star Rail beta, I decided to analyze the gameplay. First, let's take a look at how the combat works. I will be referring to this screenshot from the official website since I can't take any myself:
Entering Combat
Enemies appear on the overworld and running into them initiates combat. You can first strike the enemies with either a basic attack or a skill, dealing damage to all enemies. The skill provides special effects based on the character. It doesn’t seem like there is any disadvantage to always using the skill, so I don’t know why that is even a separate option. Enemies can also get a first strike on you if they hit you with an attack, giving them a free turn at the start of battle.
Combat Mechanics
Overall, the combat system is most similar to Octopath’s Break/Boost system, although much simpler. Like in Octopath, hitting enemies with enough attacks that they are weak against will Break them, allowing you to deal much greater damage to them and interrupting some of their abilities. However, one notable difference is that the enemies’ weaknesses are displayed from the very start, so you don’t need to try to figure out their weaknesses yourself.
There are 7 elements in the game: Physical, Fire, Ice, Thunder, Wind, Quantum, and Imaginary. All characters are one of these elements and physical is treated as an element unlike in previous games. There are no elemental reactions, but elements are instead used to Break enemies. In the screenshot, all of the enemies are weak to Fire and have not been broken yet. Note that enemies may have more than one weakness. If an enemy is broken, the white diamond to the left of their health bar will disappear. The boss Cocolia also has a Break meter shown above her health bar which must be fully destroyed before she can be broken, while her two minions do not, meaning they can be broken in one hit.
Every character has access to 3 moves in battle: a basic attack, a skill, and a special move. More detail on how these are used will be explained later. Every attack deals elemental damage corresponding to the character’s element. Different attacks can target enemies in different ways, such as single-target, AOE, or random targeting. Some skills can also be used on allies to give them various buffs such as stat boosts, shields, or even manipulate the turn order. Under the character portraits we can see some of the buffs, though I don’t know exactly what they are.
Combat Flow
Turn order is determined using a speed-based independent system, meaning that characters move in accordance of their speed stat, faster characters can get multiple turns before slower ones, and commands are issued to characters after their turn comes up. As you can see, Seele gets to take 2 turns before Bronya gets hers. In the bottom right there is a bar which is similar to the BP system used in Octopath/Bravely series. The main difference here is that BP is shared by the entire party. Basic attacks replenish 1 BP while skills cost 1 BP and cannot be used when at 0 BP. Here we can see that we have 1 BP and we have selected the skill, so it will be consumed (shown in red). If the basic attack was selected, a blue point would appear instead in the second slot indicating that 1 BP would be replenished. Meanwhile, the special meter can be found next to a character’s portrait, and it fills whenever they are deal or take damage. Once this meter is full, that character's special move can be used at any time, similarly to a Bravely Second, so you can even use it in the middle of an enemy turn.
That covers everything I could find out about the combat system for now. It has a lot of potential but is mainly held back by the fact that each character only has access to 2 moves most of the time. However, the shared BP pool and ability to disrupt combat flow with special moves means that the gameplay could be more strategic. Hopefully, characters can learn more skills later on to add the proper amount of depth to make this combat system engaging. If you were lucky enough to play the beta, let me know if I missed anything.
Next analysis: Part 2 (Characters and Classes)
