Since its introduction, Honkai Impact 3rd has seen a handful of characters and weapons absolutely dominate in both its Story mode and the competitive areas at one point or another.
Unmarked spoilers ahead!
Early years
- Dimension Breaker (Bronya), one of the very first S-rank Valkyries, was one in the early versions of the game for one reason − her ability to inflict the "time lock" debuff on all enemies just by entering the field or parrying an attack. Since that ability has the side effect of extending other debuffs, inluding freeze, she became the queen of the original Infinite Abyss, whose mobs could one-hit kill your valks in the upper stages. But as the meta evolved, bosses became more resistant to time lock, defense became less of a priority and keeping enemies immobilized was becoming less viable as a strategy (since a lot of newer valkyries needed to dodge attacks to maximize their damage), DB fell off until she was considered one of the most useless valkyries in the game. This video
sums up her (d)evolution. - Celestial Hymn (Theresa) was considered the prime physical damage-support character in the game by many tier listings. Many of her skills inflict the "impair" debuff (decreasing the enemies' defense) that lasts for a generous 10 seconds, longer than most other impairing skills in the game. Her Ultimate Skill gathers enemies and repeatedly hits them with flying blades that also impairs them; this also synergizes with Stigmata effects that require her to hit her enemies, so that she can keep applying those effects even after she's switched out, giving her even more edge as a support with the right Stigmata. Her only issue was that said Ultimate Skill costs 125 SP, which her signature weapon - the PRI-ARM 11th Leitourgia - rectified by allowing her to regenerate SP after using it, even while off-field. Said weapon can hit all enemies in its range (as opposed to just a few at a time) and also support other characters while it's active. Despite being one of the oldest battlesuits in the game, CH was still considered indispensable until Herrscher of Sentience was released in 4.6, and even then she remained a good support for her if you played HoS as a DPS. Only when a larger variety of physical supports came out (namely Carole and Griseo) did she become niche.
- The Fu Hua suit Shadow Knight was loaded with self-applying Status Buff abilities and carried massive damage multipliers and resistances, together with a brutally powerful burst mode with high-damage high-coverage attacks, making her a character designed to work as a One-Woman Army. Shadow Knight did suffer from being an elemental Valkyrie in the later stages of the old Abyss mode Explanation , but she was so strong that she remained a good Valkyrie even then for an appreciable portion of an Abyss trek. Her main weakness was ironically that she was too good on her own; although her Leader skill was powerful, by design she was not much of a team player.
- Provided you had the pockets to outfit her, one of the greatest ones was Kiana as Herrscher of the Void. With her full set, she used to be the strongest Valkyrie in the game bar none.The Rundown In short, this Valkyrie battlesuit was intended to be able to utterly crush anything in her way as long as she was properly geared (she is, unfortunately much less effective without the optimal setup). But the meta eventually caught up with her and she’s considered the weakest Herrscher by far nowadays.
Versions 3.0 to 4.0
- Version 3.2 (July 2019-ish for SEA/Global) introduced Seele Vollerei's first battlesuit, the A-rank Swallowtail Phantasm. It was really neat, being the first Quantum-type battlesuit, and quickly proved to be an absolute master of sweeping out enemy groups (as she ignores the typical Mech/Bio/Psy attributes while being especially strong against other Quantum enemies) while being okay-ish at bosses (foreshadowing what Stygian Nymph would become), and more importantly was capable of rendering the early content of HI3 something of a joke as those enemies were not designed to fight someone with as much natural AoE and ability to disjoint and "shuttle" as Seele. Especially since, with the 3.8 anniversary patch, newbies were given Swallowtail Seele completely for free and fully early-game kitted. While she’s no longer a favored option against bosses, she’s still very good at swiping the quantum mobs even in lvl 81+.
- Stygian Nymph, Seele's S-Rank suit. This character is actually a "dual Valkyrie"; two characters in one, with the Ultimate being an Area of Effect blast that 1) can be activated with no SP at all, 2) if she does have SP when she uses it, will become more powerful, at the cost of depleting it, and that switches depending on which one you're using. "Light Seele" or "Saule" specializes in dealing melee physical damage to groups of enemies, while "Dark Seele" or "Veliona" specializes in dealing massive amounts of single-target melee physical damage and breaking shields. In this manner, Stygian Nymph is both a dedicated mob killer and a dedicated boss killer, instead of being only one or a less effective hybrid of both. Both halves of Seele also possess the ability to trigger their Ultimate Evasions on demand by dodging through an enemy, something that only Herrscher of the Void could do previously. Additionally, the suit is Quantum-type, meaning it’s equally effective against the vast majority of the game's enemies while being especially effective against the rare but dangerous Quantum enemies of Q-Singularis. Stygian Nymph's only weakness was being very gear and support dependent, because otherwise she was once so powerful and so simple to use that you could obtain a high score on a maximum-difficulty endgame boss by doing nothing but spamming the attack button. Not so much so nowadays obviously, as more powerful Quantum Valkyries were released afterwards, but she’s still the most powerful S-rank physical quantum Valkyrie… being the only one.
- The augmented version of Bronya's Yamabuki Armor, Drive Kometa was easily the best defensive support unit in the entire game for a long time. To put it simply, she does a lot of things for a single character: she can heal, provide her whole team with a shield that scales off her own HP, restore SP to the whole team by blocking attacks (which also triggers a very long time fracture), apply a 15s crippling field to the ennemy that considerably weakens their shields, can gather enemies with her Ultimate, and her PRI-arm Briareus-EX allows her to impair the defense of all enemies inside it while reapplying stigmata effects after you switch to your DPS. All this for an easily farmable A-rank battlesuit. Even after being outclassed by more recent units, she’s still no slouch against SS bosses in Memorial Arena.
- Valkyrie Accipiter (Fu Hua)'s augmented version, Hawk of the Fog, quickly rose to a high tier position after she was introduced (in patch 3.5, in the various international versions). She has a Criss-Cross Attack that deals multiple hits in a wide radius, makes her invincible for a few seconds, fills SP quickly and plows through shields quickly, and another more spammable attack (her A-B or A-A-B chain that ends with a Roundhouse Kick) that easily paralyzes enemies. Her Ultimate Skill can only be used after her Criss-Cross Attack or her Ultimate Evasion, but it deals potent lightning damage that can be easily boosted with supports' buffs or debuffs. Maximizing her damage output requires quite some practice and good use of supportsnote , but if you can, you have a powerful lightning-elemental character who can take out both mobs and bosses in a breeze with her various attacks. Her strongest weapon is the same as Shadow Knight's, which also has a PRI upgrade and since she's an augmented version of an A-rank Valkyrie, she's available completely for free and isn't even terribly hard to farm. While she’s no longer a top-tier Valkyrie, she still remains a very potent f2p option for early game and mid-tier Exalted Abyss.
- Bronya as Herrscher of Reason. A melee-oriented Ice element character who can output absurd amounts of damage by rotating her powerful normal combos and her Charged Attack to lay waste to her surroundings with a massive outpouring of explosive Ice-based ranged damage. Her crazy SP charge speed facilitates usage of her Ultimate, whereupon she boards a Cool Bike, nukes the field, and becomes literally unkillable while building charge meter simply for existing and gains several new attacks, including auto-guns that raze the field when you drive and Area of Effect bike spins that steamroll anything in your path. Unlike Herrscher of the Void, HoR has been kept competitive by the introduction of her PRI-arm Domain of Revelation, the Ana Schariac and Willows stigmata sets (farmable for free) and finally her divine key Star of Eden − World. Not to mention 5.8 gave her free to new captains that leveled up enough, making her another potential Disc-One Nuke.
- Azure Empyrea (Fu Hua, awakened Phoenix) was intended to be the top support for elemental teams, and it shows: she has a special attack that gathers enemies, immobilizes them, and gives the active character Regenerating Mana afterward; and another special attack that makes her targets take increased elemental damage for a few seconds. 2 of her passive skills make the whole team deal increased fire and ice damage just by hitting the enemy with any of her special attacks. She also can generate SP quickly through alternating her special attacks, which fuels her Ultimate Skill: a much stronger version of her "gathering" special attack that not only activates her fire and ice buff skills, but also gives increased lightning damage and - most importantly - the unique "elemental breach" buff that lets your whole team ignore a portion of the enemies' elemental resistance. All these buffs last for a generous 15 seconds. Her signature weapon, Nebulous Duality, also helps her regenerating her SP more quickly (even while off field) by sacrificing health, and buffing her teammates' total damage by doing her special attacks and then switching out. Her prominence was reduced by the introduction of specific elemental supports, but even then she remained the primary support for fire teams until version 6.3, making her one of the most enduring units in the game’s history.
- When the Captain-verse character Zhuge Kongming became playable as Starlit Astrologos, her unique ability to launch support skills from off-fieldnote rapidly became invaluable. Not only can she buff physical damage with her weapon Zither’s Lament and her ultimate just by activating her QTE, allowing her to support physical Valkyries that need to stay on the field a lot, said QTE can also trigger the effects of support stigmatas that boost total or elemental damage. Add to that the fact that her damage output made her a pretty decent secondary DPS on top of that, plus the fact that she’s entirely farmable (though her signature weapon and stigmata set are not) and she was easily up there with Celestial Hymn and Drive Kometa as a support unit − but was eventually outclassed the same way.
4.1 to 5.0
- Patch 4.1 introduced the long-awaited S-Rank Awakening of Lightning Empress, the Herrscher of Thunder. She’s essentially Hawk, but stronger and easier to use. She dishes out a lot of lightning damage very quickly and her attacks have a fairly wide area of effect, making her effective against mobs and bosses. Of particular note is her ability to gain Herrscher Charge quickly in order to unleash her special Combo Move, which deals massive damage in an area, applies her Narukami Mark debuff's special effects and grants her bonus SP. Which leads into her ridiculously overpowered Ultimate Skill: the ability to summon a dragon and ride it to devastate the battlefield. When the burst is almost over, she can perform a Finishing Move for one last nuke on the enemy… OR, she can switch out before the Ultimate Skill ends, have her team set up for the next rotation and then switch-in and carry on with the finishing move of the Ultimate as if there had been no interruption at all. Having a permanent passive that allows her to ignore a portion of the enemy's elemental resistance also helps. And like HoR, she gained a divine key (Seven Thunders of Retribution) and was handed out for free in version 6.2.
- In version 4.6, Herrscher of Sentience joined the club of physical powerhouses. Long story short, she can do anything − her Stance System allows her to switch between three weapons that can attack at short or long range, gather enemies in a large area and briefly stop time − she was the first valk who could freeze the Abyss’ timer, which is unaffected by time fractures −, all while rapidly building up her SP gauge. Her ultimate is a burst mode that massively impairs the enemies' physical resistance and activates a fourth weapon, a huge blunt sword that can crush enemies repeatedly (also called the "bonk attack"). As such, depending on how you equip her she can work either as a deadly DPS or as an effective support, making her an incredibly flexible unit. While she has somewhat fallen off as a DPS (although she’s still very strong), she remains the undisputed top support for physical teams. She and gear made for her can be gotten from the trio of Starter banners.
- Kiana as the Herrscher of Flamescion. First off, she is the first Valkyrie able to leave the ground and fight in mid-air, aerial raves included. On top of that, her charged attack is very powerful and has the option to easily gather enemies into one spot, meaning that enemies being far away isn't really all that much of a problem. Her Ultimate is also very far-reaching, and drops two DPS nukes, and is enhanced if she's in Herrscher mode, and on top of that, restores HP if it's low. Did we also mention that her Ultimate Evasion is triggered by literally just tapping the button? Some players have used this to get zero-second runs on certain activities. Also, despite her abilities consuming HP, she is far from a Glass Cannon - she has a barrier seperate from her HP that absorbs 100% of all healing outside of her ultimate - in essence, this barrier is her new health bar, with the regular HP bar being more or less a meter for how much damage you can do. She and gear made for her can be gotten from the trio of Starter banners.
5.1 onwards
- In 5.5, Palatinus Equinox (Durandal) was released as the first Imaginary-type DPS and remained the only one for a long time, which makes her de facto indispensable against IMG bosses and enemies, as her ultimate allows her to damage those enemies’ cores directly without breaking their shells first. Not only that, but her Stance System ("Knight" where she’s riding a giant horse and "Guardian" where she fights on the ground with a shield) give a variety of very powerful charged attacks, time fracture triggers, impenetrable defense and an insane amount of invincibility frames, which makes her a powerhouse even against non-IMG enemies.
- Pardofelis’ battlesuit Reverist Calico, introduced in 5.6, is mostly designed as an ice support with an emphasis on freeze trauma, but her combos and stigma offer total damage bonus as well as sp regeneration for the full team, making her one of the most polyvalent support units in the game, used for every element and even sometimes physical teams.
Weapons
- The Oath of Judah is the most famous example, a Cross weapon so powerful that it was regarded as its own character by the fanbase. Usable by any Theresa, the weapon restricts enemies to a limited area in which they are pelted by heavy lightning damage. By building a team around this one weapon, it was possible to do ridiculous amounts of lightning damage in record time—enough to utterly destroy the vast majority of the game's enemies in seconds, including high-level bosses. It did fall off considerably in later versions though, especially after the introduction of the "exalted" tier in Memorial Arena and of powerful lightning DPS characters like Hawk of the Fog and Herrscher of Thunder that relegated Judah to a support weapon at best.
- While it doesn't have as much memetic reputation, Blood Dance also used to be this, with its ability to give a huge debuff to elemental resistance on enemies; it was a big support to most elemental teams and usable on any greatsword wielding characters.
- Most PRI-ARMs are this by default in regard to their dedicated Valkyrie. Each PRI-ARM is an upgraded version of a 5-star gacha weapon. These weapons possess incredibly high attack values and new abilities which are tailor-made to cover the weaknesses of the suits intended to use them while enhancing their strengths. The ones initially made available were "MAG-Typhoon" note , "Frozen Naraka" note , "11th Leitourgia" note and "Positron Blasters" note However, the weapons do have restrictions. They require an entirely separate set of upgrade materials which take extensive amounts of time (or money) to farm, and the ability to upgrade the weapons into PRI-ARMs as well as open most forms of farming for the materials was initially locked to captains above lvl 80 (later reduced to lvl 50).
Other
- In the Schicksal HQ Open World, once you get the Iskandar mech, you can trivialize practically all missions, almost every timenote . Its firepower is off the charts—it has a Charged Attack where it shoots a quick laser that paralyzes everything in its line of fire, then fires 2 volleys of very powerful rockets that can kill Elite Mooks in one hit and most bosses in two hits. It can also make the one-time challenge side quests—where you fight super-buffed bosses, and later groups of two of them—much easier. Its Ultimate Skill is a lengthy Macross Missile Massacre that keeps going on until its SP is depleted or you stop it manually. However, it (or any other mecha) cannot be used to fight "adventure rank bosses".
