As with all games, Honkai: Star Rail too has consumable items that the player can use to enhance their battles or simply to just screw around with its (de)merits. In my opinion, consumables in Honkai: Star Rail isn’t important, especially if you already have very well-built characters. Their purpose to strengthen your characters before a battle is rendered rather moot if you use a well-planned Technique but they also act to guarantee maximum success. Here are ten consumables you should know and use regularly.
10) Trash
Yes. You heard me. In Honkai: Star Rail, it is a running gag that the player character, Trailblazer, is captivated by the allure of trash cans. Within the fandom, artists even draw comics where the Trailblazer is depicted dumpster-diving to the point that it is also a meme for artists to draw Trailblazer’s gaggle of ladies being extremely mad at him for giving more attention to garbage than them. Due to how there are three specific items named “Trash” with their unique effects, I will be listing them all. “Trash” by itself is a special consumable with negative effects—using it will immediately decrease an ally’s health by 15%, as one would expect of trash. However, the two other consumables—“Pleasant-Looking Trash” (pictured) and “Sanctity of the Trash Can”—somehow have positive effects; the former instantly recovers four technique points to your team (techniques being abilities any character can use outside of battle to immediately attack with an advantage, support the team, or create unique field effects) while the latter increases defense of all allies by 20% for the next battle. Unfortunately, the chances of obtaining the legitimately useful trash bags (or cans, in the case of “Sanctity of the Trash Can”) is rather small which is why this is at the bottom of the list.
9) Enhancement Pastes
While not particularly important to the game, Enhancement Pastes are consumables that increase a specific element’s damage in your team by 24%. For example, “Enhancement Paste: Ice” increases ice element damage. In Honkai: Star Rail, dealing the most damage is largely more dependent on your ATK, crit rate, and crit damage modifiers and less so elemental damage—while yes, these do add up to the final numbers, they aren’t so important to the count. Instead, keep reading to focus on the following consumables in this list.
8) Bottled Soda
Nothing like a fresh can (in this case, a bottle) of soda to keep you active! Now, like with many other things on this list, there are a few items called “soda” but this entry will specifically focus on one of them. “Bottled Soda” is an item that gives all allies plus 10% max HP on top of an additional numeric increase of 210. With the release of Fu Xuan, this item has in my opinion gone up in utility as Fu Xuan is a character whose greatest strength is a boatload of HP—with this item, you can push her HP even higher, making her even more viable.
7) Fried Rice
Aside from visiting fast travel points and using physical Trailblazer’s techniques, the only other way to heal HP is via consuming Fried Rice. There are two (technically three) different kinds—“Cosmic Fried Rice” heals a single character by 24% of their max HP plus 300 and “Diet Fried Rice” heals a single character by 28% of their max HP plus 250. If you have somehow gone through all of the free healing given out by fast travel points (I will judge you as a joke as to how you consumed all free healing), chowing down on some delicious fried rice ought to keep you healthy.
6) Energy Drinks
In-game Gatorade—that’s honestly all I’m going to say about these. The regular “Energy Drink” recharges your energy by 30% while the sugar-free variant adds another 20%. It does nothing else but what it says on the tin—it really is just in-game Gatorade. There are a few other energy regeneration consumables too (Scalegorge Spring Water and Whale-Tide Water come to mind) but it would be best to stick with the in-game Gatorade.
5) Trick Snack
There are a few consumables that recover technique points but the “Trick Snack” is so far the most reliable one. It is one you can craft right from the beginning without any restrictions unlike the others. While it only recovers two, it serves as an excellent first aid to ensure that you can keep spamming those techniques (many—and I mean, many—players only use techniques because they are so aesthetically pleasing and not for the fact that they help out in battle).
4) Protective Gear
If you don’t have either Gepard or Fu Xuan, then you might be lacking in terms of your team’s defense (unless of course, you main Preservation Trailblazer). Fear not, stellar traveler, take these for they shall help you in your journey. “Simple Protective Gear” already increases defense for all allies by 25%, however, if you obtain the recipe for “High-Tech Protective Gear”, you will get a lower defense increase of 15% but it will enhance deployed shields, increasing the maximum damage they can absorb by 18%. Imagine Gepard’s godly shielding abilities enhanced by 18%—you’d be wondering if “damage” is a myth.
3) Mung Bean Soda
A local specialty of the Xianzhou Luofu, it is purchaseable from its many vending machines. While there are a few of its type, it is in my opinion, the most reliable one despite its low modifiers. It increases all attack by 5% plus 170 for the entirety of the next battle. Most of the other ones of this type is unreliable in the sense that they are rather hard to obtain with “Mung Bean Soda” being incredibly easy to get. So yes, go and partake of the Xianzhou’s most famous drink (it’s rather… unique, as many characters who drink the soda in-story put it).
2) Topological Acceleration Band
Is this a scarf designed like a Möbius strip or a Möbius strip designed like a scarf? Either way, the “Topological Acceleration Band” is the best of its kind, an item that increases speed—by a whopping 24%! Combine this with a speed-tuned Bronya and you can essentially stop all enemies from taking turns whatsoever as you simply keep taking turns. Of course, as expected of such an item, its recipe is obtained from an in-game shop and uses rather high-rarity materials, making it so that it leans to the rarer side of consumables.
1) Disposable Kinetic Arm/Disposable Kinetic Cannon
Finally, if you simply just have terrible luck with relics and just can’t get that crit rate and crit damage, the “Disposable Kinetic Arm” and its companion the “Disposable Kinetic Cannon” has got you covered. Not only does it increase attack by a combined total of 680 but it also enhances crit rate and crit damage by 12% and 20% respectively. This buff is party-wide, making it in my opinion the most valuable consumable. Unfortunately, both are locked behind companion mission quests and both use a high-rarity material to synthesize and as such, are among the most difficult consumables to open.
CONCLUSION
There really isn’t much to say about consumables in Honkai: Star Rail. Unlike other games, they aren’t that important—in fact, if I hadn’t been told to write this article, I would have completely blocked consumables from my memory. I have quite a massive amount of consumables just sitting around in my inventory because I simply have no use for them; the characters I have can do the jobs they do far better. These consumables are really only useful for casual reading sessions (the descriptions of some of these items elicits a magnificent chortle) or in emergencies when you’ve exhausted all other options—unless, of course, you’re a player like me who uses the worst consumables with negative effects for laughs.
