Honkai: Star Rail’s massive 4.0 update introducing the new Planarcadia and characters will be dropping very soon. While there isn’t too much confirmed information about the map and the new unit kits, we do know a lot about their lore. With Yao Guang and Sparxie already having made appearances in the HSR storyline before, here’s all the questline lore we know so far.
Table of Contents
- 🗓️ When Will Version 4.0 Finally Drop?
- 👑 Yao Guang’s Lore
- 🎭 Sparxie’s Lore
🗓️ When Will Version 4.0 Finally Drop?
Version 4.0 was originally promised to drop a lot sooner than now, but due to some reasons for delay, several changes needed to be made before the finished map and characters release. Instead of following the usual weekly cycle, version 3.8’s third phase is going to be running a lot longer than usual. If there’s anything you want from the current rerun banners, you still have plenty of time to pull from them before the new version comes around. Need some more materials and currency to prepare for Planetarcadia? Get a Honkai star rail top up cheap now!
The first phase for version 4.0 will be released around February 12th. This is just an estimate considering that it might be different depending on where you live and your timezone. The first phase is confirmed to have Yao Guang as the first debut unit too. As for the second phase that headlines Sparxie as the new character, that will be released around March 6th.
👑 Yao Guang’s Lore
Yao Guang will be the first character part of the Elation Path in Honkai: Star Rail. This Path specializes in increasing the damage acquired from Follow-Up attacks. This makes units in this Path pretty effective Sub-DPS units with multiple other DPS party members. We don’t know what Yao Guang’s kit looks like yet, but her Path specialization gives a good hint to how she’d play.
There’s quite a few small details about Yao Guang that hint to what role she’ll play when she debuts storywise. The biggest fact we know has to do with the interrogation of Luocha and Jingliu. She was actually the one who facilitated the interrogation right after the Stellaron Crisis. Doing so proved to be a very smart move, as Luocha and Jingliu ended up revealing the Godslayer Protocol plan for the Trailblazers to stop.
Considering her genius interrogation plan and facilitation, Yao Guang has already been proven to be a very intelligent and driven character. Her official title is the Seer Strategist of the Xianzhou Yuque, and that couldn’t be anymore true. Other characters have described her to be very sophisticated and bold with her actions. Sometimes, she can be viewed as being cold and radical with her decisions similar to that of other General characters in Honkai: Star Rail.
Even before being debuted in the game, Yao Guang has already made some major leadership decisions in the storyline. Her official appearance now in the new Planetarcadia map hints to us seeing more of her leadership skills in future missions. Her kit also promises some more Sub-DPS mechanics that make Yao Guang an effective team supporter and buffer. Depending on her potential team synergies, she’s looking to be a top-tier unit already.
🎭 Sparxie’s Lore
Sparxie has a surprising amount of lore that can already be figured out thanks to her similarities with another character. Sparkle is a member of the Masked Fools faction that believes that the truth of the world is nothing important. That instead, the members find more joy by laughing off their worries and spreading that around to others. While that sounds innocent enough, the faction is a lot more cunning than many might believe due to their trickery and masks covering their true intentions.
While Sparkle is known to be a master of theatrics and protecting her real personality and identity from others, Sparxie looks to be a more friendly version of her. Some fans believe that Sparxie is just one of Sparkle’s many personas that make her appear more trustworthy and innocent. This would make sense considering how Sparxie is designed to look more like a magician or performer in Planetarcadia. She’s even styled after something you might see in Alice in Wonderland!
Unlike Yao Guang, who is looking to be a Sub-DPS with her Elation kit full of buffs for her team, Sparxie will surprisingly play as a Main DPS instead. By looking at the basic Elation Path description itself, our first thought was that it fit better for a Support or Sub-DPS unit. However, Sparxie is looking to prove us wrong with her powerful follow-up attacks and high skill-point consumption.
Despite Sparxie’s very interesting lore and connection to Sparkle, we don’t know what role she’ll play in the future Planetarcadia storyline. What we do know for sure is that she’ll play some kind of role, especially in a map all about theatrics. She has the potential to be a super interesting character with lots of exploration into Sparkle’s too!
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