Honor of Kings’ Hou Yi can be considered one of the most beginner-friendly marksman heroes of the game, as he is even one of the choices the player will get, on which first hero they will unlock. His skills are simple but have a certain degree of difficulty that may separate new players who are learning the game for the first time from those who learned how to play Hou Yi. In this guide, we will talk about Hou Yi and his abilities, his best team compositions, best builds in Honor of Kings.
We have previously discussed how to master playing with other Honor of Kings marksmen heroes like Hou Yi, Alessio and Fang. So make sure to check these hero guides as well. For now, let’s focus on Hou Yi.
In the game, he is one of the rare-shredding type marksmen with the most marksman in Honor of Kings being regular-range damaging types that excel in dealing more damage to squishier targets. This gives importance to Hou Yi, especially in situations where there are tanks in the enemy team and there is no other damage dealer that can shred them down.
Skill Analysis
As with most other heroes, Hou Yi also has four skills to learn. With these four skills, there is a total of three Active skills and one Passive skill that is just there, from the beginning of the game to the end without needing of upgrade. In this Hou Yi guide, let’s see what are his abilities in Honor of Kings, and when you can use which skill to get the best out of him.
Passive – Chastising Shot (Enhance)
Chastising Shot is the passive of Hou Yi. This gives him the ability to shred enemies, which gives him the ability to gain more damage, as he continues to attack. The passive gives 4% attack speed per attack to Hou Yi to up to 3 stacks of a total of 12% attack speed, but not just that, but after 3 stacks, Hou Yi’s attack will have 130% damage and will deal 50% more on hit effects, which when paired with other on hit items will add up pretty nicely.
Skill 1 – Arrow Volley (Enhance)
CD – 10 seconds
Mana – 60
This skill is also a huge buff to Hou Yi, as it enhances his basic attack to deal more damage, and when the passive is fully stacked, it will affect this skill to produce a total of 3 arrows, instead of one, which will deal a total of 130% damage of the 130% damage that the fully stacked passive will do, which adds up to a total of 169% damage.
Skill 2 – Afterglow (Damage, Slow, Vision)
CD – 5 seconds
Mana – 60
This skill can be considered the main kiting skill for Hou Yi, as the Afterglow skill is an AOE skill that reduces the movement speed of enemy players hit by around 30-50%. Although as a marksman, it does not give the most damage potential, it is still a necessary skill, as players would need to hit it to kite effectively against enemies and to give pokes to the enemy marksman in your lane in the early game and gain an advantage in farming and the laning phase.
Skill 3 Burning Sun Arrow (Crowd Control, Slow, Damage)
CD – 40/35/30
Mana – 130
This is one of the skills that separates Hou Yi from other marksmen. This not only gives a kite option to Hou Yi but also gives him the ability to become the marksman of the team and its initiator. Hitting this long-range skill will stun the enemies hit from -.75-.5 seconds depending on how far the arrow flows, and also reduces the movement speed of people around the explosion.
The skill also deals a fair amount of damage. Hitting this against enemy carries will almost guarantee the win of team fights anytime so it is important to target squishy carries that can be burst by your team once stunned.
Best Arcana build and Spells for Hou Yi in Honor of Kings
Arcana Build
The best Arcana Build for Hou Yi as a marksman would be:
Hunter, Eagle Eye, and Calamity
Hunter would help you to kite with its movement speed and would help you gain more attack speed, next would be the Eagle eye which generally helps with dealing more damage to enemies with its physical attack buff and physical piercing buff, and lastly is the Calamity that gives a critical rate that would give the 75% total critical rate from the items a total of 100 when upgraded fully.
Battle Spells
As one of the highest DPS characters in the game, Hou Yi will surely have his drawbacks in using. One of the biggest drawbacks in the game would be his mobility. Knowing this the best battle spell to take would be to flash at it giving Hou Yi an additional option of kiting enemies backwards when the situation gets dicey and/or seeing an assassin trying to make a dive for you.
Best Builds for Hou Yi in Honor of Kings
However, this build order is not set in stone, as players can build around the enemy team compositions. This is an overview of what builds Hou Yi at his best, without considering the enemy team composition and/or laning phase match-up.
We have set out the following template in our guide to try out with Hou Yi on the Honor of King’s battlefield considering his role as a marksman.
- Boots of Dexterity: This boot is mainly known as the attack speed boot, which gives the player the 60-movement speed bonus that all other boots give, but has an additional 25% attack speed given to Hou Yi which he needs to get stronger.
- Doomsday: Doomsday is one of the most compatible items with Hou Yi so far, as it gives him good stats which are 60 attacks 30% attack speed and 10% physical lifesteal which the hero needs, but also, an additional 8% current health damage to enemies on hit effect on the enemies, which is a great fit for the passive which will make it a total of 12% current health damage that would shred tanks.
- Deepfrost Siege: This is not recommended by the game, but for me, it should be. Deepfrest siege gives slow to the basic attack of the hero which effectively boosts the kiting capability of Hou Yi in the game, as being a high DPS marksman with little kiting capabilities this is a huge plus, it also gives 30% attack speed and +600 max hp making this the best defensive item. With additional on-hit of +60-139 damage that is amplified by the passive.
- Daybreaker: Another on-hit item that gives an additional 100 on-hit damage to range heroes, and a physical piercing of 40% that is sure to shred tanks out of the game. It also gives the player, 50 physical attacks, 35% attack speed, and 10% critical rate.
- Eternity Blade: This item is a high critical hit-reliant item that serves the high attack speed of Hou Yi well, this will help Hou Yi deal more damage as it makes Hou Yi do a critical strike every 1 of 2 shots which will boost the damage output significantly, especially for squishy targets like the mages, assassins, and the other carries.
- Sparkforged Dagger: This is an optional item that you can get when you are winning your laning phase as it allows the players to snowball harder in the mid-game due to its damage potential. However, this item falls off the late game so when playing for the late game this is not a recommended item to buy.
- Shadow Ripper: If the enemy wins the laning phase it is better to buy the other core item first and before buying the eternity blade buy the shadow ripper which will boost the critical rate sky-high to up to 75 per cent which means that Hou Yi will crit 3 out of 4 times. The item gives 35% attack speed, 25% critical rate, and even a 5% movement speed. The item also has a passive that increases basic attack damage by 40 and increases attack speed and movement speed when landing a critical hit.
Honor of Kings Hou Yi Guide: Gameplay Tips
Hou Yi is the type of hero that should be easy as he is a very straightforward character with easy-to-understand mechanics, However, this is not the case with most beginner marksmen in most games, to use them efficiently, the player must have a real understanding of the game mechanics, and how to use them to their advantage, especially positioning and learning when to strike and hide.
Our Honor of Kings Hou Yi guide includes the perfect game plan for the early, mid, and late games of the game. However, a player must have a good understanding of the map to get the most out of any hero.
Early Game
At level 1, it would be better to unlock your second skill first as this will allow you to trade pokes with your laning enemy. You should also go to the farm lane with your support as being a late-game marksman you would be very vulnerable in the early game.
Try keeping your distance as much as possible from the enemies, and let your support do the peeling for you while you focus on farming and scaling without getting hit by the enemy. When the enemy lakers try to come closer to you it would be better to use your second skill to poke than run away as you do not deal as much damage as most marksmen in the early game, especially when having non-burst support.
Mid Game
In the mid-game is where your damage begins to ramp up, although you will still need major assistance from your support, it is here where you will begin to see why Hou Yi is considered to have one of the highest DPS dealers in the entire game.
In this phase, it is important to keep your distance from the enemy mages and assassins that are sure to burst you in less than a second or two. The main goal is to stay with your support and only deal damage when you are safe and have the option of a free hit.
In team fights, when you can find an enemy carry or mage that is lying around, you can use your ultimate skill to engage them as hitting the skill will stun them for a few seconds and let you burst them making the breaking out of the team fight heavily in favour of your team.
Late Game
In the late game where Hou Yi shines when having all of his core items, the damage Hou Yi takes off, he can destroy tanks and bruisers in little to no time and even be able to deal with other carriers and targets that cannot kill him instantly. It is here where it would win the game for your team as long as they just protect you and do not let anyone burst you out as you will be able to deal tons of damage against enemies by just standing and using your auto attacks against enemies.
Hou Yi is a very squish marksman with little to no escape mechanism that depends highly on the battle spell flash which takes a total of 140 seconds to recharge. The best counter to him would be to use high-mobility assassins that can get to him before the support can react to peel them away.
But to be able to counter this you would need to know the position of every threat in the field and position under this information and always try to stick behind the support or tanks’ backs for them to be able to protect you once the enemy assassins try to attack you.
Final Thoughts
Hou Yi is one of the easiest characters to use. But to be able to play him at the highest level where he is viable, it would take the game sense of what to do and where to go. He is a very squishy target for other players that would just make your experience in the game painful when dying 3 consecutive times to the assassins without being able to do anything for your team in the team fight.
Using Hou Yi would depend highly on the overall game mechanic and the proficiency of the support. It would work, if players have teamwork with support and players will be able to trust them to peel for them, in case of the player being targeted by the enemy assassins and/or fighters.
However, one must always take note that there is never a single distinguished way of playing the game, so it would still be better to explore and discover new things about the game while having fun. Maybe, one can even make a more streamlined approach to the gameplay of Hou Yi than I had. That would be all and always remember to play hard, and have fun!
Read more of our Honor of Kings articles:
That’s all for today’s Honor of Kings Hou Yi Guide. Do you prefer to use Hou Yi in any other way? Let us know in the comment section below!
For more Mobile Gaming news and updates, join our WhatsApp group, Telegram Group, or Discord server. Also, follow us on Google News, Instagram, and Twitter for quick updates.
