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Once you pull a character through the Gacha System or get them for free in Honkai: Star Rail, you'll have to farm a lot of resources to upgrade them. Each character has six ascension phases and four of their Traces can be upgraded up to level ten. You'll also have to upgrade a suitable Light Cone for them.
All these upgrades require a ton of materials that can be farmed all over the world. Some materials are shared between two types of upgrades, and you have to spend a ton of Trailblaze Power to get most of them.
Updated on August 10, 2023, by Sanyam Jain: With the Version 1.2 update, two new areas called Alchemy Commission and Scalegorge Waterscape were released to The Xianzhou Luofu planet. These areas came with a new Stagnant Shadow and Echo of War drop.
All Stagnant Shadow Drop Locations
Stagnant Shadow is the equivalent of world bosses in Honkai: Star Rail, and they're required to ascend a character from the third phase onward. A bunch of Stagnant Shadows are scattered on various planets in the game and here's how you can find and defeat them all:
Drop Name | Planet | Region | Combat Style |
|---|---|---|---|
Void Cast iron | Herta Space Station | Base Zone | This boss is known for performing a charged attack almost every turn. It's recommended to break its Weakness when it's charging this attack to cancel it. It doesn't spawn extra enemies so you can use single-target DPS characters against it. |
Golden Crown of the Past Shadow | Jarilo-VI | Backwater Pass | The mage that you go against in this fight has a special attack that gives her nine stacks of a certain effect. One stack decreases with each attack she receives. You take damage based on the stacks left when she gets the next turn. Moreover, she's also great at Imprisoning your allies. |
Storm Eye | Jarilo-VI | Rivet Town | This boss is similar to the first one above. The only difference is that the charged attacks from this boss can target up to three allies at the same time. It can also apply a ton of Wind Shear effect on allies, which deals Wind DoT DMG every time the ally gets a turn. |
Broken Teeth of Iron Wolf | Jarilo-VI | Great Mine | The Automaton you'll face in this Stagnant Shadow is known for its high single-target damage. It can also lock on some of your allies at times. This lock-on isn't removed even if you break its Weakness. You'll need to have a healer or shielder for this fight. |
Endotherm Chitin | Jarilo-VI | Silvermane Guard Restricted Zone | The boss will constantly buff itself during its attacks, which will keep increasing the damage taken by your allies. It also applies a ton of Burn. It's recommended to have a cleanser against this boss if you want to prevent extra DoT on your characters. |
Lightning Crown of the Past Shadow | Jarilo-VI | Corridor of Fading Echoes | For this mage, you'll have to carefully save your Skill Points as she can punish you for using Skills or Normal Attacks at random times. This punishment deals a ton of damage, making it essential to use your Skill Points efficiently. |
Horn Of Snow | Jarilo-VI | Corridor of Fading Echoes | This boss spawns a couple of Fragmentum monsters on each side once every few attacks, and it consumes them in the next attack. If you defeat both the guards before it does the consuming action, its DEF will be decreased for a couple of turns. |
Gelid Chitin | The Xianzhou Luofu | Cloudford | This enemy has a high chance of Freezing your characters with all its attacks, but it's quite easy to defeat if you have a cleanser. |
Shape Shifter's Lightning Staff | The Xianzhou Luofu | Stargazer Navalia | This is one of the hardest bosses to defeat as it spawns Mara-Struck soldiers beside it and heals itself with its attacks every few turns. The Mara-Struck can also revive themselves once after being defeated. |
Ascendant Debris | The Xianzhou Luofu | Alchemy Commission | This boss looks similar to a couple of bosses from Jarilo-VI, but it has a special attack that takes away 30% of your characters' health permanently. This health can only be regained when the effect runs out or if you clear the debuff. Preservation characters are great for this fight. |
You can get up to five drops from each run of Stagnant Shadow at the highest difficulty.
Traces And Light Cone Material Locations
Golden Calyxes are unlocked after you progress the main story for quite a bit, and they can give you the materials required to upgrade Light Cones and Traces of a certain path. All characters of that path take these drops, which makes it a decent resource to pre-farm.
Path | Material Names | Planet | Calyx Location |
|---|---|---|---|
Destruction | Worldbreaker, Lifeless, Shattered Blade | Herta Space Station | Storage Zone |
Preservation | Safeguard of Amber, Oath of Steel, Endurance of Bronze | Herta Space Station | Supply Zone |
The Hunt | Arrow of the Starchaser, Demon Slayer, Beast Hunter | Jarilo-VI | Outlying Snow Plains |
Abundance | Flower of Eternity, Sprout of Life, Seed of Abundance | Jarilo-VI | Backwater Pass |
Nihility | Obsidian of Obsession, Desolation, Dread | Jarilo-VI | Great Mine |
Erudition | Key of Wisdom, Knowledge, Inspiration | Jarilo-VI | Rivet Town |
Harmony | Stellaris Symphony, Ancestral Hymn, Harmonic Tune | Jarilo-VI | Robot Settlement |
These items will take most of your Trailblaze Power while you're farming for a character as you don't even have a guaranteed chance to get one purple drop at the highest difficulty. It takes up to 14 purple drops to upgrade one Trace from level nine to ten.
All Mob Drop Locations
Mob Drops are the only upgrade items that don't require you to spend Trailblaze Power to get them. You can simply go to the correct locations on the map and defeat the overworld mobs to get any mob drop you want. Of course, this also means that you'll need much more of them.
Much like the Trace and Light Cone materials, you can convert lower rarity mob drops to higher rarities. Moreover, the number and rarity of drops you get from different mobs increase with your Equilibrium Level.
You can also get Lost Trotters randomly when you start a battle with the Overworld mob.
These Trotters will give you some extra drops of the same type as the mob you're fighting.
Here's how you can get every mob drop in Honkai: Star Rail:
Drop Names | Enemy To Farm | Planet | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
Squirming, Glimmering, Extinguished Core | Fragmentum Monsters except for Everwinter and Incineration Shadewalker | All Planets | You'll find most of these drops from bird-like and Imaginary Weaver enemies found on every planet in the overworld. |
Conqueror's Will, Usurper's Scheme, Thief's Instinct | Antimatter Legion | Herta Space Station | There aren't a lot of enemies on the Herta Space Station as there are only three areas that you can find enemies in. This might make it harder to farm these drops quickly. |
Silvermane Medal, Insignia, Badge | Silvermane Guards, Vagrants, Everwinter/Incineration Shadewalker | Jarilo-VI | You can't farm the Silvermane Guards in the overworld apart from when you're doing a quest, but the other mobs are quite common. |
Ancient Engine, Spindle, Part | Automatons | Jarilo-VI | You'll find Automatons in all the underground Belobog areas where you can find enemies and Robot Settlement. Sometimes, robots can be found when you start fights with Vagrants as well. |
Immortal Lumintwig, Aeroblossom, Scionette | Abominations of Abundance | The Xianzhou Luofu | All types of Mara-Struck enemies found in all the unsafe areas of the planet can drop these items. Some of these enemies can revive themselves while others can deal heavy damage to your characters when they're defeated. |
Artifex's Gyreheart, Cogwheel, Module | Entranced Ingenia | The Xianzhou Luofu | If you see an enemy that doesn't look like Mara-Struck or Fragmentum Monsters, you're looking at the required enemies for these drops. They're small enemies that are usually floating around. |
You can also get these mob drops from Simulated Universe, Assignments, or by buying them in the Embers Exchange shop. It's recommended to only spend Embers if you have over 900 since you need that many to buy passes every month.
All Weekly Boss Drop Locations
Weekly Boss drops can be farmed from various Echo of Wars located on different planets. These domains will have you fight some formidable bosses that you had to fight during the main story. You can only farm Echo of War domains three times every week cumulatively, so choose your battles wisely.
These items are required to upgrade Traces past a certain level, which makes them very important:
Drop Name | Boss Name | Location |
|---|---|---|
Destroyer's Final Road | Herta Space Station (Supply Zone) | |
Guardian's Lament | Jarilo-VI (Everwinter Hill) | |
Regret of Infinite Ochema | Phantylia (Divine Seed) | The Xianzhou Luofu (Scalegorge Waterscape) |
You can get up to three weekly boss drops every time you finish Echo of War at the highest difficulty.