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Honkai Star Rail has launched right at the end of April, which means you only have a few days to claim the first batch of free monthly pulls from its in-game store.
Just like Genshin Impact, developer Hoyoverse's previous game, Honkai Star Rail lets players purchase five standard pulls and five limited pulls each month using a free currency. In this case, you can buy five Star Rail Passes and five Star Rail Special Passes using the embers you accumulate by pulling on any banner. You'll find these freebie passes under the "Embers Exchange" tab of the in-game store.
Each of these passes costs 90 embers each, which means you have until the end of April to scrounge up 900 embers. Fortunately, between launch rewards and new-player bonuses, Honkai Star Rail gives you more than enough passes to get these embers.
Pulling any weapon or character on any banner (Warp) will automatically reward you with embers, so it doesn't matter where you spend your pulls. That said, I recommend you first use your normal passes clearing out the 50 discounted pulls on the Departure Warp banner, and assuming you don't want to save your Special passes, I'd spend them on the Seele character banner since the alternatives are less impactful.
For reference, I've only played for a little over an hour and I've been able to buy nine of April's 10 free passes. So far, I've spent a total of 40 pulls on the beginner banner and 10 on the limited-time Seele banner. I'm only Trailblazer level six, so if nothing else, once I hit level 15 I'll get another 10 standard passes which will give me enough embers to buy the last free pass for April. If you need some pointers, here's how to increase your Trailblaze level in Honkai Star Rail to unlock those free pulls.
I realize this is a lot of recursive currencies. Welcome to gacha games. The important thing to remember is that if you play the game for just a few hours and cash in all your free pulls, you'll get enough embers that you should spend on some more free pulls which are going away very soon. You need to do this before reset time on Sunday, April 30, which is when Honkai Star Rail's in-game store will switch to the month of May. You'll then have all of May to save up another 900 embers, which won't be hard at all with semi-regular play. April is just a bit of a crunch due to the launch timing.
Going forward, you should always try to keep at least 900 embers in reserve so you can buy all the free passes every month. I'll probably try to stay above 1,800 just in case I end up going a few updates without doing a lot of pulls. That said, don't be afraid to spend a huge excess of embers on the character materials which are also available via Embers Exchange.
Honkai Star Rail players have crowned the game's best standard character, and you can also get her for free.
