Honkai: Star RailArcherBest build, teams and other guides

Archer is a true limited character in the Fate collab. He is a Quantum Hunt unit who specialises in intense focus-firing and large SP consumption in exchange for absurd ability multipliers and damage per turn. Archer's Skill lets him shoot up to 5 times a turn and gets stronger with every shot, consuming SP per shot. He gains Talent Charges that allow him to launch Follow-ups when allies attack enemies, restoring SP in the process, and his Ultimate is a massive single-target nuke that restores Follow-up charges. He is being given for free in the collab, and his Signature Light Cone is 'free' with 200 pulls on any banner.

The Fate collab brings with it Saber and Archer, two very well-known and beloved characters from the Fate franchise. Archer is quite a simple and effective character, both qualities that are abundant among our existing top tier DPS characters. He's also being given for free, serving as a beacon of hope for all the bricked accounts out there, much like Dr. Ratio was back in 1.6. He's also the first ever male Quantum character.

Please remember that he is a true limited character; once he's gone, he's gone for good.

Archer's gameplay revolves around his Skill and maximising the number of uses of it he can get. Upon using his Skill, Archer enters the Circuit Connection state, and deals 360% ATK to a single enemy. When using his Skill in the Circuit Connection state, his turn does not end, and instead the DMG dealt by Archer's Skill increases by 100%, stacking up to 2 times and lasting until Circuit Connection ends.

Each use of his Skill will cost 2 Skill Points instead of 1, and he may fire arrows off consecutively up to 5 times, or until he is out of SP. Using his Skill again when you reach the limit of either uses or SP will end Circuit Connection. This state will also end when all enemy targets in a wave are defeated.

This is an absolutely nuclear ability. You get to fire off potentially up to 5 arrows per turn, dealing a maximum of 1800% ATK to a single enemy, and that's before factoring in that one of those arrows has a 100% DMG bonus and the last 3 arrows have a 200% DMG bonus. You can switch targets between shots as well, and you can manually cancel Circuit Connection if you choose to.

Important to note as well, each time you fire an arrow with this Skill, you are getting the full benefits of having used a Skill, meaning you get 30 Energy and dealing 20 Toughness damage each and every time you fire, leading to colossal shredding of enemies' Toughness bars as well as huge amount of Energy back for Archer.

Archer's Talent lets him throw his knives at enemies as a Follow-up attack; whenever allies attack an enemy target, Archer will immediately Follow-up with 200% ATK, also restoring 1 Skill Point in the process. This Follow-up attack restores 5 Energy. It's good extra damage, but definitely the important part is that this restores SP for the team, something he definitely wants to be maxed out for when it gets to his turn again.

Archer's Ultimate is Unlimited Blade Works. Yes, for real, and yes he does the full chant. He will deal 1000% ATK (yes really) to a single enemy, 1% for each blade he has conjured, and will also restore 2 Charges of his Talent, up to a maximum of 4 Charges. This Ultimate costs 220 Energy, generally quite high, but for Archer this is really not a concern at all with how many Skills he'll be using.

His Bonus Traces are similarly simple but effective. His A2 will increase the SP limit for the team by 2 for as long as Archer is on the team, for a new maximum of 7 Skill Points. This is additive with a certain Masked Fool's passive that also increases the Skill Point limit. His A4 will give Archer 1 Talent Charge when entering combat. Lastly, his A6. After allies gain a Skill Point by any means, if there are 4 Skill Points or more when this happens, Archer will gain 120% CRIT DMG for 1 turn.

That's it. Yeah I wasn't joking when I said he's not that complex. You load up on Skill Points and then you start blastin'. All that really matters is the team you build for him to be able to make the most of his Skill's ramping DMG boost and get the maximum number of fully buffed shots off, preferably with the A6 CRIT DMG bonus active as well. Having said that, the mini-game of maximising his Skill can become increasingly more involved, depending on the context.

It's important to note that Archer's Talent Follow-up can actually be triggered during his Circuit Connection state, meaning that if you have allies who are able to act outside of their turn, either from a condition being met or from their own Ultimates, it's possible to have Archer throw his knives in the middle of Circuit Connection.

This is potentially quite useful in a pinch, as it means that there is a way for you to regain SP during his Skill spam, and especially since using his Ultimate gives 2 Charges, if you can find a way to have both of those be used, you will guarantee enough SP for at least one more Skill shot.

Even with this, however, it is impossible for Archer to get 5 Skills off entirely on his own (the most he can do entirely on his own is 4), so let's talk about how you get the last shot off consistently. It's Sparkle. Please, everyone try to act surprised for the thumbnail, we surely had no way of knowing that the Quantum DPS character who likes to use exorbitant amounts of SP would end up being good with the Quantum support character who gives lots of SP and further benefits for multiple Quantum teammates.

She is pretty much perfectly designed for a character like this. As alluded to earlier, Sparkle's passive stacks with Archer's to create a team SP cap of 9, making it much easier to play around for the purposes of maximising Archer's Skill spam. The CRIT DMG and DMG% buffs that Sparkle provides are also greatly appreciated and are basically permanently active on Archer.

In addition to this, due to Sparkle's Ultimate being able to instantly restore 4 Skill Points for the team at any point, this means you will have a very easy time getting 4 to 5 shots with Archer, since if you run out of SP during his Skill spam, no you didn't, here's two more shots' worth of SP for free, and even more damage while you're at it, why not. You may not always guarantee 5 shots every time, but you’ll get close.

The ATK bonuses Sparkle provides through her A6 are also extremely appreciated by Archer, as he doesn't have any natural ATK increases in his kit besides some minor Traces, and thanks to his laughably high ability multipliers, any increase is going to have a significant impact. Even with just Archer and Sparkle together, that's a permanently active 30% ATK increase for the entire team.

Usually Sparkle falls flat when compared to the other Action Advancing supports, but that's just the thing: we're not using Sparkle for her Action Advance. The fact that it's only a 50% advance is irrelevant because we're already not looking to give Archer that many more turns — we simply don't have the SP to sustain it, so it's much better to seek to maximise the power of the turns we do get on Archer, and instead spend the extra time making damn sure we have the SP to turn whatever's on screen to ash.

A particularly speedy Sparkle (think 160 SPD) will have no trouble pulling Archer's Action Value up through the Turn Order and still having the time to get some SP back as well. Her overall Energy cost is only 110, meaning it's going to be quite easy to have this available when you need it.

Playing around Archer's A6 can become a little bit annoying if your team isn't naturally regenerating a large amount of SP, or if you have supports who need to use SP often to reap their benefits. It's imperative that you have it active when it comes time to use Archer's Skill, as without it, you'll be missing out on an immense amount of damage. This shouldn’t be that difficult, but please keep an eye on it just to be sure.

You want to plan your SP expenditure such that it's very nearly maxed out when Archer's turn begins, so it's very often a good idea to be looking at what's happening around Sparkle's turn to adequately prepare for this, since one Sparkle Skill will usually mean it's Archer's turn next, and you need a Skill Point to advance him anyway, so ideally one of your other two teammates have already successfully activated Archer's A6 CRIT DMG bonus.

You do not NEED Sparkle, but she is quite literally a perfect partner for Archer, and alternatives are going to feel worse.

Sunday can also be a decent option for Archer, but it's a bit sketchier to make the most of since you lose out on the increased SP cap and SP injection that Sparkle has. It's also a bit harder to make up the SP you need due to Sunday having a full 100% Action Advance, and even though he doesn't use SP to advance his Beatified, it puts a lot more strain on your other teammates to be ultra fast to restore SP in time for Archer's turn.

This can be offset by giving Archer more non-SP-spending turns. If you simply choose not to commit to his big burst and restore SP instead, you can make sure that you'll be fully maxed out for when it is time to go big, and a hyperspeed Sunday can accomplish this very well. The issue you may run into is that again, the timing for Archer's A6 Trace may be a little bit off depending on the exact turn order, so you will need to very deliberately activate it beforehand if you want to be sure.

Sunday's Signature Light Cone can also greatly help with reducing SP variability, for both Sunday and Sparkle, so this can be a strong option if you have access to it. Just remember that more and faster SP generation is better, especially since you want your Advancing unit to always have the SP for their Skill as well.

So that brings us to the sustain we never have any qualms about glazing. You know it. We know it. Coming straight from your house, it's everyone's favourite follower of Enigmata, the GOAT himself, Gallagher. It's almost a summoning ritual at this point, that whenever a conversation about needing SP comes into play, he just materialises into existence.

Gallagher is already a very fast character that can be built to be even faster. His Ultimate provides him with a 100% Action Advance that lets him double up on the SP he restores while still performing his duties as a sustain. With enough SPD, Gallagher already solves most of the SP issues for every other 'normal' team. While Sparkle and Archer have it mostly handled, the SP Gallagher provides is really nice. Oh, and he's the best user of Quid Pro Quo by a mile for this reason too, making guaranteeing Ultimates for the team easier and more consistent.

The last super notable support options are Silver Wolf and Cipher. Silver Wolf just got omega buffed and is flying high as a superb generalist debuffing support who can also enable going against off-element matchups extremely easily. Her old issues with SP are far less pronounced and she can now go a lot more SP positive, especially if she's built with a large amount of SPD. The DEF reduction is also extremely powerful due to the prevalence of the ol' classic Genius of Brilliant Stars relic set making Archer ignore 20% DEF against Quantum-weak foes, and since Wolfie can always guarantee a Quantum Implant now after her buffs... Yeah let's just say Archer is going to be boring holes through anything in front of him.

Cipher is a phenomenal final slot for Archer. She's laughably speedy by default and encourages people to build her with as much SPD as possible, easily allowing her to act the most out of almost any support character. This coupled with Cipher never needing to use Skill Points means you have extraordinarily fast SP generation that alongside Gallagher can solve your SP concerns entirely. Not only this, but Cipher's passive Vulnerability is very strong, and her Ultimate damage accumulation allows her to swoop in and steal the kill after Archer's finished with his Skill spam, letting her deal her own nuclear strike in the downtime between Archer's turn (or just to one-shot a Boss's final phase).

Both of these characters have compelling reasons to be played alongside Archer, and better yet both of them are also Quantum, meaning that having either alongside Archer and Sparkle will fully max out the ATK% boost from Sparkle's A6 Trace. Whichever one you choose will depend on the content you are doing, the specific enemies you are fighting (and what their Weaknesses are), and whether or not you're struggling for SP. They're largely interchangeable.

Tribbie can work... but she's definitely better spent elsewhere, especially since the lack of AoE damage on the team means she's not going to be getting her Ultimate anywhere near as often as she would in other teams. Her overall slow SPD also does nothing for the contribution of SP to the team, and she still needs SP occasionally to refresh her Skill's field. However, it's still definitely a strong option (it's still Tribbie, let's not pretend), and especially with a high superimposition Dance Dance Dance, Tribbie's still relatively frequent Ultimates can lead to improved action rates for the entire team.

Lastly, of course, is the Remembrance Trailblazer. Similar reasoning as always, the 100% Action Advance and True DMG buff from Mem is extremely potent, and though the advance isn't really as consistent or controllable as from Sparkle or Sunday, it can still essentially give free additional turns that can be used to restore SP before going to town with the Skill spam. Also since Archer's Max Energy is 220, he fully maxes out Mem's buff, meaning he gets the full value of the True DMG amp; Archer's Energy restoration from his Skill spam will also provide a lot of charge for Mem's Ultimate too.

So, I mentioned earlier that things can become a little trickier depending on how things go with the Skill spam. Your goal is to ensure that the most SP is being spent on the Skill when you can ramp up past the first two shots: remember that the first shot has no DMG bonus, and the second shot has 100%. Every subsequent shot has 200% DMG bonus, so this is where you want to be concentrating your SP expenditure.

In the event that you do not have enough SP to go all out on a single turn, it may be more beneficial for you to hold off completely and just use a Basic ATK instead to better prepare for the next turn. This way you make sure you're clearing the ramp up section of the Skill every time, and you can avoid missing out on the most impactful damage amp within Archer's kit.

There's also some minor things about decision making within actual combat, such as using the weaker first two shots to deal with side enemies before committing to the primary Elite or Boss, or by doing the reverse and ramping up on the Boss to be able to delete some stronger adds in one shot for that sweet sweet Energy.

It's a wonderfully simple kit that lends itself excellently to further optimisation should you choose to do so, but the best part about it is that it's largely optional. As long as you're meeting the SP thresholds for when it comes around to being Archer's turn again, you're going to have a really good time pretty much anywhere. I mean, sure, he's not likely to be winning any awards in Pure Fiction any time soon (single-target DPS moment), but outside of that Archer is an absolute force of nature, and he's immediately entering the hall of fame. He could even get better over time...

He is the Bone of his Sword, Steel is his Body, and Fire is his Blood.

… You know the rest.