When Honkai: Star Rail 2.5 dropped, I had some guesses as to how it was going to go. For starters, I figured the same thing that happened with Aventurine would happen with Jiaoqiu and I was right. Tons of people I knew didn’t care about Jiaoqiu came out of the story wishing they’d pulled on his banner. But what I didn’t expect was for me to end the patch with my heart full of love for that loser, Moze. Moze in Honkai: Star Rail is the man I didn’t think I would like and yet I was willing to risk it all on the banners for a 4-star character.
In retrospect, it might not be a surprise. For one thing, I already liked Jiaoqiu so the patch didn’t alter my affection levels for him like it might have for others. For another thing, Moze is the same kind of character as some of my other HoYoVerse faves. Like Ratio and Alhaitham, Moze is the one who’s more stoic and doesn’t mince his words. He’s pretty honest to a fault. But in comparison to Jiaoqiu, he feels more earnest in a way that Jiaoqiu’s somewhat suspicious demeanor lacks. Moze’s text messages are also ridiculously awkward. It plays into his main appeal point for me: the fact that he’s kind of useless and bad at his job.
The Honkai: Star Rail story presents Moze as this cool assassin and spy. He’s someone who operates from the shadows and contributes to his general’s victory in more unseen ways. In practice, he’s kind of…not that. Despite reassuring Jiaoqiu that he can find his way out of the Shackling Prison, we find him lost in the labyrinthe corridors. Very understandable on Moze’s part, mind you. He’s supposed to be good at hiding, but when you find him on the Skysplitter, his disguise is so easy to see through that a toddler could probably find him.
Even from a combat lens, Moze’s not doing too hot. “The moment he reveals his blade usually spells doom for his enemies,” his official description reads. But at no point did he ever present a legitimate threat to the borisin. Even in gameplay, he can be so situational that I’ve gone battles where Moze doesn’t do anything. He’s great against bosses or enemies with high HP, since he can pull off his follow-up attacks without someone killing them first. But outside of this niche, he usually spends the majority of the match vibing. Despite these faults, the more useless this man is, the more fond of him I am.
I’m aware in terms of the borisin thing that Moze’s supposed to work from the shadows. So a direct confrontation against borisin running amok in the streets wasn’t going to pan out in his favor anyway. Hopefully in the future though, we can see him live up to his titles and expectations. Both Feixiao and Jiaoqiu had their time to shine. So it’s only fair if Moze, like Luka or Qingque, gets to spend some time in the spotlight too. I mean, just look at Yanqing. Seeing him get his redemption and a satisfying character arc was great, especially after so much time as the resident punching bag for the Xianzhou 5-stars. I’m not even a Yanqing fan and I’m happy the guy got a win. I have hope that HoYoVerse will give Moze something too.
It’s strange that I’m so fond of Moze though. Usually, these kinds of characters—the ones who receive a certain amount of hype early on, yet the real deal falls short of expectations set within the canon—annoy me. In Fairy Tail, I disliked Erza for the longest time just because the story and characters gassed her up so much that her actual fighting skills disappointed me. Moze, on the other hand, has a reputation as an assassin and intelligence gatherer. So I’m guessing that him failing in fields that don’t have much to do with his actual job makes him endearing rather than frustrating.
Loathe as I am to admit it, I have some yumejoshi tendencies in that I occasionally judge characters based on their potential in a real-life romantic relationship. For reference, a yumejoshi is a female otaku who fantasizes herself in a romantic relationship with their favorite character. Moze is “boyfriend material” indeed. I can’t deny that a huge part of Moze’s charm is that, compared to his compatriots Alhaitham and Ratio, he’s really easy to yume for.
Ratio has a lot of neuroses going on that are difficult to deal with, and I doubt he would want to deal with the average person too. As for Alhaitham, you have to self-insert as Kaveh for a yumejoshi-worthy experience… In comparison to them, we see so little of Moze’s personality, even when taking character stories into consideration, that you can take the bits we do know, extrapolate, and play Build-a-Boyfriend in your head. It’s not a surprise that I emerged from this patch with only Moze on my mind, despite how much whump HoYoVerse tossed Jiaoqiu’s way.
Back when Kaveh first appeared in Genshin Impact, so many of my friends lamented the fact that he’s a 4-star. At the time, I didn’t really understand. The idea of not getting at least one 4-star when pulling for a 5-star seemed foreign to me. They’re on rate-up, for goodness’ sake! But then, I never got a single copy of Kuki Shinobu or Chevreuse, even when they were rate-up on banners. I didn’t get Luka when he debuted until a few banners later. Heck, I almost didn’t get Moze. He only came home on my last 10-pull for Feixiao. So I now understand the pain of liking a 4-star character in a HoYoVerse game. Here’s hoping my love for him will convince him to come home in the future and that the accursed desire sensor doesn’t kick in.
Honkai: Star Rail is readily available on the PS5, Windows PC, and mobile devices. As a 4-star, you can pull for Moze in Honkai: Star Rail at any time.
Published: Sep 20, 2024 06:45 pm