Honkai: Star Rail – Ruan Mei build and ascension guide
Combine science and elegance with the best Honkai: Star Rail Ruan Mei build and lead your team to success against familiar and unknown foes thanks to the abilities of this genius. Ruan Mei, a member of the Genius Society, is a 5-Star character dealing Ice Damage and following The Harmony, which makes her a support unit for your party.
Her Skill, String Sings Slow Swirls, applies Overtone on Ruan Mei for three turns. As long as she has Overtone, all allies deal more damage and have their Weakness Break Efficiency boosted.
Ruan Mei’s Ultimate, Petals to Stream, Repose in Dream, deploys a field lasting two turns. All allies in this field gain additional Resistance Penetration against all types and will apply the Thanatoplum Rebloom on targets they hit. Thanatoplum Rebloom triggers when an enemy recovers from Weakness Break, extending the duration of Weakness Break and delaying their next action by an amount of time depending on Ruan Mei’s Break Effect stat. It also deals Break Damage based on Ruan Mei’s Ice Break Damage. Thanatoplum Rebloom can’t be applied on an enemy again until after they’ve recovered from Weakness Break.
Ruan Mei is an excellent addition to your roster of support characters.
HoYoverse
Her Talent, Somatotypical Helix, increases the Speed of everyone on the team aside from Ruan Mei and deals additional Break Damage based on her Ice Break Damage to any enemy who has been inflicted with Weakness Break by an ally.
Eidolon Levels, which are obtained through getting additional copies of Ruan Mei, have some improvements in store. Eidolon Level 1 allows allies in her Ultimate’s field to ignore 20% of the enemy’s Defense. Eidolon 2 provides a powerful passive, boosting all allies’ Attack when dealing damage to targets with Weakness Break by 40%. Eidolon 4 boosts Ruan Mei’s Weakness Break by 40% for three turns whenever an enemy is inflicted with Weakness Break. Finally, Eidolon 6 extends her Ultimate’s duration for a turn and increases her Talent’s Break Damage modifier by 200%.
Honkai: Star Rail – Ruan Mei: best Light Cones
Ruan Mei’s premium Light Cone is, of course, her signature item: Past Self in Mirror. Providing a Break Effect boost, it also increases all allies’ damage for three turns after the wearer uses their Ultimate. If the wearer has 150% Break Effect or more, a Skill Point will be recovered after the Ultimate has been used. In addition, it regenerates ten Energy for all allies at the start of each combat wave.
This one checks all the boxes for Ruan Mei and pretty no one else at this point, so at least there will be no fighting among your characters for access to this Light Cone. From the 4-Star line-up, Memories of the Past is a really solid option for her.
Best Light Cones for Ruan Mei:
- Past Self in Mirror (5-Star)
- The Battle Isn’t Over (5-Star)
- Memories of the Past (4-Star)
- Carve the Moon, Weave the Clouds (4-Star)
- Past and Future (4-Star)
Careful, or those eyes won't let you go anymore.
HoYoverse
Honkai: Star Rail – Ruan Mei: best Relics
Maximizing Ruan Mei’s contribution to the team requires her to have a high Break Effect stat (you'll want to reach 180% to make full use of her capabilities). In addition, you’ll want her to have good Speed and bolster her defensive stats to ensure that she can survive being targeted by enemies without going down in a single hit. Energy Regeneration for faster Ultimates is good as well.
Best Relic Sets for Ruan Mei:
- Watchmaker, Master of Dream Machinations (4) – +16% Break Effect, +30% Break Effect for all allies after the wearer uses their Ultimate for two turns.
- Messenger Traversing Hackerspace (4) – +6% Speed, +12% Speed for all allies for one turn when the wearer uses their Ultimate.
- Thief of Shooting Meteor (4) – +16% Break Effect, +16% Break Effect and regenerates three Energy when the wearer inflicts Weakness Break on an enemy.
Best Planar Ornaments for Ruan Mei:
- Penacony, Land of the Dreams (2) – +5% Energy Regeneration, +10% damage increase for all allies of the same Type as the wearer.
- Talia: Kingdom of Banditry (2) – +16% Break Effect, +20% Break Effect when Speed is 145 or higher.
Prioritize the following Relic and Planar Ornament stats for Ruan Mei:
- Head – HP (Primary), Break Effect %, Speed, HP %, Defense %
- Hands – Attack (Primary), Break Effect %, Speed, HP %, Defense %
- Body – HP % (Primary), Break Effect %, Speed, Defense %, Effect Resistance %
- Feet – Speed (Primary), Break Effect %, HP %, Defense %, Effect Resistance %
- Planar Sphere – HP % (Primary), Break Effect %, Speed, Defense %, Effect Resistance %
- Link Rope – Energy Regeneration % (Primary), Break Effect %, Speed, HP %, Defense %
Ruan Mei is for all intents and purposes a bard.
HoYoverse
Honkai: Star Rail – Ruan Mei: best teams
Ruan Mei is fantastic on most teams – very similar to Bronya or Tingyun. The big difference between her and the two mentioned characters is that Ruan Mei’s abilities affect not just one allied character, but several, which makes her the preferred choice on teams with two damage dealers in lieu of a single carry. You can find some examples below, but don’t feel bound by them – Ruan Mei is a flexible character.
Lots of Weakness Break means lots of opportunities to inflict DoT effects, making Ruan Mei the perfect addition to a composition focusing on that. Feel free to replace Guinaifen with Sampo or Luka for this team build.
- Jingliu (Main DPS), Ruan Mei (Support), Bronya (Support), Huohuo (Support)
Nothing stops you, of course, from packing both Ruan Mei and Bronya into a single team, which will greatly enhance the damage of its Main DPS. As always, you can replace Huohuo with other sustain characters such as Natasha, Lynx, Bailu, Luocha, Gepard, March 7th, or Fu Xuan.
Ruan Mei is a powerhouse without taking away the usefulness of similar characters.
HoYoverse
Honkai: Star Rail – Ruan Mei: ascension materials
Here’s everything you need to know to get Ruan Mei ascended to the maximum level and upgrade all of her talents.
Ruan Mei requires the following ascension materials to get to level 80 in addition to the necessary XP:
- Credits x308,000
- Immortal Scionette x15
- Immortal Aeroblossom x15
- Immortal Lumintwig x15
- Gelid Chitin x65
You can collect Immortal Scionette, Aeroblossom, and Lumintwig from enemies on the Xianzhou Luofu as well as the Simulated Universe. You can create or exchange them through the Omni-Synthesizer on the Astral Express, too. Immortal Scionettes are one of the materials you can easily farm through the Daily Assignments to your characters, making for a steady income of the material. Gelid Chitin is dropped by the Stagnant Shadow in Cloudford. The best source of Credits are the Golden Calyxes found on Jarilo-VI, the Xianzhou Luofu, and Penacony.
Ruan Mei isn't just a science genius.
HoYoverse
Ruan Mei requires the following materials to upgrade her combat abilities and Traces:
- Credits x3,000,000
- Immortal Scionette x41
- Immortal Aeroblossom x56
- Immortal Lumintwig x58
- Harmonic Tune x18
- Ancestral Hymn x69
- Stellaris Symphony x139
- Past Evils of the Borehole Planet Disaster x12
- Tracks of Destiny x8
For the materials already mentioned, check above. Harmonic Tune, Ancestral Hymn, and Stellaris Symphony can be farmed in the Crimson Calyx at the Robot Settlement in Belobog’s Underworld. As usual, you can create the high-level materials by using up lower-level materials in the Omni-Synthesizer on the Astral Express.
Past Evils of the Borehole Planet Disaster is boss material only gained from the Echo of War (Seclusion Zone) domain on Herta Space Station, while Tracks of Destiny can be obtained during time-limited events, the Embers Exchange, the Nameless Honor, or as a Simulated Universe Points Reward.
