Arknights: In-depth Review - Luo Xiaohei

Luo Xiaohei is the future 4★ Lord Guard welfare Operator from the The Legend of Luo Xiaohei event. The most direct comparison point for this new Operator is the other Lord Guard in his same rarity bracket, Arene, with whom he shares some overarching similarities in their skills. Still, Luo Xiaohei has some unique abilities seldom seen in other Operators, warranting a more in-depth look at how he handles these gimmicks at once.

Luo Xiaohei can be obtained through the The Legend of Luo Xiaohei event store. You can buy Luo Xiaohei from the event store for a total of 100 event currency, which can be obtained by completing any regular stage, even outside the event. This store does not include Potential tokens for Luo Xiaohei, and he does not accept generic tokens (much like Conviction).

As previously mentioned, Luo Xiaohei borrows multiple rare gimmicks from other Operators and condenses them into a single kit. He inflicts the Critically Wounded effect via his Talent like Saga does, and his Skills carry either a Stance Change effect which resembles SilverAsh’s Rules of Survival or a low HP culling effect like La Pluma’s or Dusk’s.

Regardless of these varied effects, Luo Xiaohei is still (for the most part) an offense-oriented Operator, as Lord Guards tend to be.

Compared to the other two Lord Guards of his rarity, Arene and Frostleaf, Luo Xiaohei shows a slightly higher Attack stat and an average Defense, but has to pay for it with his HP, which is the lowest amongst all Lord Guards with the exception of Midnight, who still beats him before Elite 2. He also has a lower DP cost to make up for his lack of access to Potentials, but the aforementioned Operators will still beat him in this regard at their full Potential.

Overall the higher offensive stats do help Luo Xiaohei in comparison to the other Lord Guards, and the lower defensive ones can be alleviated via his archetype, which confers him a longer range with which he can take care of enemies from afar. Still, these differences in stats are rather low and, overall, rather inconsequential. 

When dealing fatal damage to enemies, Luo Xiaohei will instead inflict the Critically Wounded effect. Critically Wounded enemies have their Movement Speed reduced by 80%, cannot be blocked and will die on their own after 10 seconds, but will grant whichever Operator deals the finishing blow 2 SP. Luo Xiaohei himself will not attack Critically Wounded enemies.

The Critically Wounded effect is extremely rare, only being used by Saga before this Operator came along, and it’s also not that great overall. While it may help some Operators (such as Blaze or Thorns) get critical skill activations quicker, the actual SP boosting effect is irregular and quite low, rarely benefiting any noteworthy Operator and being unattainable as soon as stronger enemies start coming out and end up being too strong for Luo Xiaohei to kill or killstolen by any of the other Operators who might benefit from the extra SP. This status effect is also designed rather weirdly, as Critically Wounded enemies will still be able to enter the Protection Objective and subtract HP if they are wounded close enough to it, and they can still perform attacks regularly, meaning enemies with ranged attacks will still pose a threat even after what should be their death.

Luo Xiaohei can change between his regular stance and this one, and viceversa. While in this stance, Luo Xiaohei’s range is changed to the 4 surrounding tiles, his Attack Speed increases by 40 (down to 0.92 seconds per attack), gains 45% Physical Evasion and can attack enemies within range equal to block count. This Skill has an SP cost of 10.

This Skill provides Luo Xiaohei with a decent “panic” option in case enemies get too close to him, granting a decent enough evasion chance paired with an increase in target count and a good increase in Attack Speed. Still, this Skill does not provide Luo Xiaohei with any outstanding abilities or even a single Attack boost, essentially forcing him to rely on somewhat faster normal attacks to handle threats already very close to him.

Overall this Skill provides little benefit to Luo Xiaohei’s combat capabilities, and doesn’t give enough for it to be considered a viable defensive or self-sustain Skill as it lacks both direct, reliable tankiness and any form of self sustain. The offense aspects of this Skill are also severely overshadowed by both his second Skill and traditional Centurion Guards, such as Estelle, who even beats him with her generic Skill in Average DPS.

When activated, Luo Xiaohei’s Attack will increase by 70%, will attack an extra target and his ranged attacks will no longer receive a damage penalty. When attacking a target with less than 50% HP, Luo Xiaohei will deal an additional instance of damage that ignores 200 Defense. This Skill has an SP cost of 35 and a 20 second duration.

This Skill provides Luo Xiaohei with much better bursting capabilities,  both via the increase in target count, the Attack boost and the culling effect. It can be used to both clear larger waves of enemies and to focus down single dangerous targets from a distance. The uptime is not amazing at just 36%, but the cycling is quick enough that it is able to focus single threats down and waste Skill uptime.

The culling effect is rather powerful, essentially doubling the damage of Luo Xiaohei’s attacks (plus a little more from the Defense ignore), but it can be hard to gauge how often it will remain active especially without any prior help from other Operators to get enemies into that sweet spot. In a direct comparison with Arene, the latter's Arts damage conversion will put him ahead of the curve the moment enemies start having any noticeable Defense, while the former will have a significantly better DPS the moment his conditional culling effect is triggered.

As a result, whether Luo Xiaohei or Arene are more fit for a team almost entirely depends on the enemy itself and the map situation around the Operator. If the enemy is Resistance-heavy, Arene may struggle to beat out Luo Xiaohei even without the conditional culling effect, while Luo Xiaohei will need that additional oomph of damage if he wishes to beat Arene against any enemy past 300 Defense.

So, should I build Luo Xiaohei? Is he powerful enough as an alternative to Arene? Is he as powerful as the other Lord Guards in the game? The answer is MAYBE. Of course, in a direct comparison with all other Lord Guards in the game it’s quite difficult to recommend Luo Xiaohei, as he just cannot compete with the 6 or even 5★ of the archetype, but he’s still a really solid option for those who wish to use 4★, particularly newer players. 

Luo Xiaohei is a strong and reliable low rarity Operator that all players should be able to play as long as they were playing during his event, so keep him in mind if you are a new player!