Honkai Star Rail's new banner has one of its strongest characters, and I'm not talking about Jing Yuan

For the first time, one of the best characters in Honkai Star Rail will appear on a limited-time rate-up banner starting tonight, May 17, and no, I'm not talking about Jing Yuan, much as I expect him to fly up the Honkai Star Rail tier list. I'm talking about Tingyun, who's already one of the strongest support characters you can possibly have. 

Jing Yuan is easy to explain: he's a big five-star guy who does big AoE damage with his big lightning friend. The four-star Tingyun is a little more unassuming, but she's extraordinarily powerful. Her skill provides a three-turn damage buff to one ally, and her ultimate can give an ally a bigger damage bonus plus 50 energy to put toward their own ultimate. On top of that, because her skill adds extra damage to her own hits based on the attack value of the ally she's buffed, she does relevant normal attack damage despite being a four-star Harmony character. 

See more

Tingyun uses very few skill points and can instantly refund about half of anyone else's ultimate, adding invaluable flexibility to basically any team. You can use her to double down on DPS ultimates like Seele and Jing Yuan's, reinforce your defense with someone like Gepard, or cheat out extra healing with Bailu or Natasha. Tingyun has her own buffing benefits built-in and she's essentially duplicating half of the other three ultimates in your team. I'm no mathematician, but 2.5 ultimates in one character sounds like a good deal. 

The only downside here is that there's no way to guarantee Tingyun during this entry in the Honkai Star Rail banner schedule even if she is a rate-up on Jing Yuan's banner, so if you do specifically want to roll for her, hope for the best but prepare for the worst. Naturally, you also shouldn't roll on any banner with a five-star you don't like.

The good news is Sushang is also a rate-up four-star here, and while she's a strong Hunt DPS to begin with, her very first Eidolon takes her to a whole other level by refunding skill points, making her duplicate copies extra potent. Jing Yuan is debuting with some strong company, making Honkai Star Rail's second banner mighty hard to resist.

Like America's healthcare, Honkai Star Rail is being carried by an overworked physician.

Austin Wood
Senior writer

Austin has been a game journalist for 12 years, having freelanced for the likes of PC Gamer, Eurogamer, IGN, Sports Illustrated, and more while finishing his journalism degree. He's been with GamesRadar+ since 2019. They've yet to realize his position is a cover for his career-spanning Destiny column, and he's kept the ruse going with a lot of news and the occasional feature, all while playing as many roguelikes as possible.

Read more
Honkai Star Rail banner schedule
Honkai Star Rail banner schedule, current and upcoming
Honkai Star Rail Twitch Drops
How to get Honkai Star Rail Twitch Drops and claim rewards
Honkai Star Rail codes
All Honkai Star Rail codes (Mar 2025) and how to redeem them
Zenless Zone Zero Jane Doe rat Thiren twirling a knife
Zenless Zone Zero is still aggressively horny, but basically everything else has changed and now it's a much better action RPG with some legit roguelike sauce
Magik slashes with her magic sword while Black Panther pops out of one of her portals in Marvel Rivals
Marvel Rivals seems to make good on its DPS surplus as dataminers discover The Thing and Ultron in files
Genshin Impact screenshot of Citlali looking surprised opening a door
Genshin Impact announces a huge change for update 5.5: your custom-made artifacts can't be absolute trash anymore, so hold onto your Sanctifying Elixirs
Latest in RPG
Avowed
Avowed has a Skyrim Easter egg that pokes fun at the RPG's most memed about companion NPC
Starfield
Bethesda breaks silence as Starfield fans hope for an update: "We have a lot of exciting things planned for the game this year"
A painting shows a woman sleeping as a demon with three eyes bites her chest.
Final Fantasy 7 concept artist Yoshitaka Amano's new gallery exhibit summarizes everything I love about the Square Enix games, even though he might have stood me up
Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 screenshot of Henry wearing a fancy coat, hat, and spectacles
I'm terrible at the combat in Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, so I'm beating the RPG as a medieval rizz master instead
Four adventurers journey into a dim dungeon
Dark and Darker's legal battles are far from over as the popular extraction RPG has been pulled from the Epic Games Store again
Monster Hunter Wilds
Monster Hunter Wilds art director and 20-year series vet says the new game intentionally leans into a question fans have debated forever: "What is a hunter?"
Latest in News
Avowed
Avowed has a Skyrim Easter egg that pokes fun at the RPG's most memed about companion NPC
The two characters in Split Fiction holding their hands up in surrender in a futuristic city
Split Fiction director says he'd "really appreciate" winning GOTY again, but if GTA 6 comes out in 2025 "it's going to be really tough" and he's fine with that because he's "a huge fan"
Grand Theft Auto 3
A GTA streamer is trying to beat every single 3D entry without dying, and in 33 hours he's made it as far as San Andreas but keeps getting caught in Vice City purgatory
Monster Hunter Wilds Nu Udra Palico
Monster Hunter Wilds players are so obsessed with Palico armor that turns your cute cat into a freaky little octopus that even Capcom is sharing fan art of it
Charli XCX
Charlie XCX is in talks to star in Greta Gerwig’s The Chronicles of Narnia movie - and that is so Brat
Spider-Gwen: The Ghost-Spider #12
Gwen Stacy and Loki team-up for a cosmic adventure in Spider-Gwen: The Ghost Spider #12