Sparkle, Ruan Mei, or Bronya - Who among Honkai: Star Rail's 5-star Harmony supports should you use and in which situations?

With the release of Sparkle in the second half of Honkai: Star Rail version 2.0, she now completes the trifecta of 5-star Harmony support characters alongside Ruan Mei and Bronya. Harmony characters are arguably the most valuable pulls for any Honkai: Star Rail account, and the trio of Sparkle, Ruan Mei, and Bronya all have arguments for being the best support character in the game.

While the answer to the question of who among Sparkle, Ruan Mei, and Bronya is the best will always be subjective, we can still tackle this objectively by looking at which situations each character shines the best.

After all, if you can only have one of them, it's better to have the one that will be most useful to you; and if you have all of them, it's also worth knowing which characters to use in specific situations. So, let's break down how Sparkle, Bronya, and Ruan Mei stack up against each other and the situations in which each character will excel in:

Sparkle vs Bronya, who should be your hypercarry support?

Prior to the second half of version 2.0, the position of premier hypercarry support in the game was held solely by Bronya.

However, Sparkle is looking to wrest that top spot away from Belobog's Supreme Guardian with her own powerful kit that lets her buff a her teammates' ATK, DMG%, and Crit DMG while also advancing their action forward and providing additional skill points for the entire team. Bronya provides similar buffs namely to DMG%, ATK%, Crit DMG, and DEF to go with a debuff cleanse and a stronger action advance forward mechanic.

But for a clearer picture, let's break down what Sparkle and Bronya bring to the table by the numbers when all their abilities are at level 10.

Sparkle's skill provides one ally with a 45% Crit DMG buff in addition to 24% of her own Crit DMG while also advancing the action of her target forward by 50%. Thanks to her A4 Trace, that Crit DMG buff will also persist until the start of her target's next turn, letting it buff out-of-turn actions like follow-up attacks.

Sparkle's Talent and ultimate in tandem also gives a party-wide 48% DMG buff for 2 turns while also recovering 4 skill points for the entire team. Her A6 Trace also provides a passive 15% ATK boost that gets even better when she is paired with other Quantum characters, providing an additional 5/15/30% ATK buff for every 1/2/3 Quantum characters in your party.

Meanwhile, Bronya's skill gives a 66% DMG buff to one ally while also cleansing one debuff on them and advancing their action forward by 100%. Unlike Sparkle's skill, Bronya's DMG buff will not persist for out-of-turn actions for her target unless she is E6.

Bronya's ultimate provides a party-wide 55% ATK buff and a 20% Crit DMG buff in addition to 16% of her own Crit DMG for 2 turns. Her A6 Trace also gives a party-wide 10% DMG buff while her A4 Trace and Technique provide a 15% ATK and 20% DEF buff, respectively, for the first 2 turns of a battle.

Sparkle and Bronya both occupy the same hypercarry support niche and provide close enough buffs that what makes one of them better will largely depend on which characters they are supporting.

Sparkle's ability to generate additional skill points makes her the best choice when supporting skill point-hungry characters like Imbibitor Lunae and Qingque. The bonus synergy with Quantum characters from her A6 Trace also makes her the best support for Quantum damage-dealers like Seele, Qingque, and Xueyi — essentially enabling the vaunted mono-Quantum team.

Bronya requires closer skill point management by comparison, as she wants to use her skill as much as possible and making her a skill point-positive character requires a whole lot of Speed-tuning that can be quite the hassle.

With that said, Sparkle's Crit DMG buff is only limited to one character, which lessens her value in dual DPS setups.

Bronya's party-wide Crit DMG and ATK buff from her ultimate gives her the edge in such a situation. Let's not forget that one of Bronya's best teams is the powerful dual DPS lineup with Jingliu and Blade, where she can focus her skill buff on Jingliu while still providing her Crit DMG buff to Blade and his follow-up attacks.

Of course, one of the biggest hurdles when it comes to building up a hypercarry support is Speed tuning your entire team. Bronya's guaranteed action advance forward with her skill makes her better in this regard, as Sparkle's skill only provides 50% action advance forward and can still sometimes mess up rotations.

So, we are left at an impasse; Sparkle and Bronya are so close to each other in terms of support capability that the answer for which one is better will almost always be situational. With that said, the luxury of having both makes it so that it isn't a problem anymore.

If you have both Sparkle and Bronya, then you can have each supporting a separate team in endgame content like Memory of Chaos and Pure Fiction. Heck, you can even run them both together in an ultra hypercarry team if you really want to clear everything in just one cycle.

But let's not forget that not all damage-dealers in the game are Crit based. When it comes to damage-over-time teams with characters like Kafka and Black Swan, a huge part of Sparkle and Bronya's kits are essentially wasted. So, if you're looking for a true all-around Harmony support then...

Where Sparkle and Bronya fall short, Ruan Mei shines

... look no further than Ruan Mei, who can boost her allies' DMG, Weakness Break Efficiency, Speed, All-Type RES PEN, and even extend the Weakness Break state on enemies!

Let's break down the buffs provided by Ruan Mei at level 10. First off, her skill provides a 32% DMG buff and a 50% Weakness Break Efficiency buff to all allies for 3 turns. No other Harmony support provides her Weakness Break Efficiency buff, which aids in both damage output and survivability by dealing more damage with Weakness Breaks and preventing enemies from taking action.

Ruan Mei's ultimate lets her deploy a field for 2 turns that provides a 25% All-Type RES PEN buff to all allies (basically letting them deal more damage against all forms of enemy resistance) while also extending the Weakness Break state on enemies and dealing more Weakness Break DMG.

Her Talent provides a constant 10% Speed buff to all allies while also increasing their Weakness Break DMG. Not only that, her A2 Trace gives a party-wide 20% Break Effect buff while her A6 Trace gives all her allies a DMG buff based on her own Break Effect stat that caps out at a 36% DMG bonus.

As you can see, all of Ruan Mei's buffs are party-wide, which lets her buff two damage-dealers at the same time. And because those buffs are either constant or activated by fields, out-of-turn actions like follow-up attacks will always be buffed, thereby making Ruan Mei generally the best support option for characters like Topaz, Dr. Ratio, and Clara.

While Ruan Mei doesn't buff Crit stats, this does make her the best support option for powerful damage-over-time teams featuring the likes of Kafka and Bronya.

Of course, let's not forget Ruan Mei's powerful Weakness Break Efficiency and Break Effect buffs. Not only do they serve as an additional source of damage, it also provides an additional defensive utility by preventing enemies from taking actions and letting your party continue their assault unimpeded.

And while Ruan Mei does not have the skill point generation capabilities of Sparkle, she is a skill point-positive character without needing close management unlike Bronya.

So, if your party is centered around damage-over-time, follow-up attacks, or features two damage-dealers, then Ruan Mei is almost always the better option compared to Sparkle or Bronya. With that said, nothing's stopping you from running her alongside one of those two in another ultra hypercarry lineup.

And while we can go on and on about numbers and synergies, the answer for who among Sparkle, Bronya, and Ruan Mei is better will largely be decided by player preference. Go for whichever character suits your preferred playstyle the most or whichever you find the most fun playing.

Better yet, have all of them to pick and choose depending on the situation if you have the Stellar Jade for it.

Honkai: Star Rail version 2.0 was released on 6 February and features a new planet in Penacony, three new characters in Black Swan, Sparkle, and Misha, as well as tons of other new content. To find out more about what's in version 2.0, check here.

The second half of version 2.0 features the debut of Sparkle and a rerun for Jing Yuan. If you're still on the fence on who you should pull for this banner, check out our guide here to help you decide.

After version 2.0 comes version 2.1 in late March, which features three new playable characters in Acheron, Aventurine, and Gallagher.

Yan Ku is a full-time dog parent, part-time (gacha) gamer, and part-time writer.

For more gaming news updates, visit https://yhoo.it/YahooGamingSEA. Also follow us on Twitter, as well as our Gaming channel on YouTube, and check out Yahoo Esports Southeast Asia’s Facebook page!