Nihility characters are one of the most interesting units in Honkai: Star Rail. Their ability to apply debuffs, whether it’s DoTs or weakening debuffs, makes each Nihility character completely different from the others in the role they play. For example, Pela’s main role is to reduce the enemy's defense and Support her team, while Sampo fully focuses on dealing the most amount of damage through his and his teammates’ DoTs.
This uniqueness in one Path brings so much variety into Honkai: Star Rail's team building and grants players enough choices to enjoy its combat. Of course, even if they’re unique, there are still Nihility characters who perform better than the others. So, to understand these characters better, here’s a r anked list of every Nihility character in Honkai: Star Rail.
4 Sampo
- Rarity: 4-Star
- Element: Wind
- Scaling: ATK
- Damage Source: DoT
Sampo attacks all have a chance to apply Wind Shear DoT, and that’s where all his damage comes from. Sampo also has a unique ability to increase the damage enemies take from all the DoT applied to them through his Ultimate. With such ability, it’s crucial to include him in a DoT team where the main focus on the entire team is to apply as many DoT as possible.
Unfortunately, being able to only operate in DoT team comps puts Sampo in a niche position. He’ll still perform but not as well as the other Nihility characters in Honkai: Star Rail.
3 Pela
- Rarity: 4-Star
- Element: Ice
- Scaling: ATK
- Damage Source: Skill and Ultimate
Pela is an incredible partner to take into any battle, especially if players paired her with another Ice character in Honkai: Star Rail. She’s mainly responsible to keep enemies’ defense reduced in order to notably increase the team’s damage. On top of that, she removes enemies’ buffs with her Skill, which is super useful against some bosses that crazily buff themselves (although it's worth noting that some buffs can't be removed).
With her Eidolons, Pela can greatly improve her Energy regeneration and further shred enemies’ resistance to Ice. Her simplicity and how effective she can be during combat make her a top choice when players need a good debuffer on their team comps. Pela can easily be among the best Nihility units of Honkai: Star Rail if weren’t for the next two characters that are filled with tons of abilities.
2 Welt
- Rarity: 5-Star
- Element: Imaginary
- Scaling: ATK
- Damage Source: Talent, Skill, and Ultimate
Welt is an all-rounder unit that can perform as both a DPS and debuffer. He's often underestimated by the players as many don't expect him to deal much damage, but he actually works just fine as a damage dealer. Welt gets most of his damage after slowing enemies through his Talent’s passive effect, and he also gets a small increase in damage through his A6 Trace when attacking enemies inflicted with Weakness Break.
Welt excels in depleting the enemy's Toughness since his Skill is a bounce hit that can deal damage up to three times. If there's only one enemy on the field, all three attacks will hit this enemy, which will take a decent chunk of their Toughness. Combine this with the fact that Welt can Slow, deal additional damage to Slowed enemies, delay the enemy's turn, and apply the Imprisoned effect when he triggers Weakness Break (Imprisonment will further delay the enemy's action and reduces SPD), and players are bound to have a battle where the enemy barely moves.
Furthermore, Welt’s A2 Trace debuffs enemies by increasing their damage taken by 12%. All these debuffing abilities existing in one character’s kit are deadly and very helpful for any team Welt would join.
1 Silver Wolf
- Rarity: 5-Star
- Element: Quantum
- Scaling: ATK
- Damage Source: Skill and Ultimate
As an underrated Nihility unit, the number of debuffs Silver Wolf can apply to enemies is insane. Most of her debuffs come from the bugs that her Talent passive implements upon her dealing any kind of damage. But that isn’t what makes Silver Wolf special as a Nihility character in Honkai: Star Rail. Silver Wolf can add one Weakness to a target enemy that matches one of her teammates’ types. This makes her a viable Support unit to take into any Honkai: Star Rail content, where she can carry any DPS into breaking enemies’ Toughness.
Players should have one type of element to accompany Silver Wolf to ensure she always applies the desired Weakness, and many people think that this is limiting. In truth, though, it actually enables players to take their best characters into any battle, which is a continuous comfortable advantage.
Honkai: Star Rail is now available on Android, iOS, and PC. A PlayStation version is in development.