Aniimo starters: Helion or Lunara, and which one to pick

Meet the two Aniimo starters

The Aniimo starters are Helion, a sun-themed lion, and Lunara, a moonlit fox. Both are Light-element attackers with the exact same stats, so the choice isn't about power. It's about range: Helion fights up close with physical hits, Lunara fights from a distance with magic. This guide is for anyone about to start Aniimo and deciding which partner to take, and the pick matters: your starter carries your first hours.

This is the pre-launch picture, built from the official Aniimo index and what players saw in the closed betas. Aniimo, Pawprint Studio's free-to-play creature-catching RPG, launches on PC, console and Xbox cloud gaming on 16 September 2026, and on mobile on 23 September. Below: what each starter does in a fight, where each one can reach, how their evolution works, why the fox's name is confusing, what players say so far, and which one I'd pick.

You don't pick on the title screen. In the closed beta, Pixelkin's Eric Watson caught his first few Aniimo, then walked into a temple where the two starters waited, and went straight into a boss fight with his new partner. That fight is also where he learned to Twine, Aniimo's system for becoming one of your Aniimo and using its abilities yourself, in fights and while exploring. Several beta reports add that the one you leave behind goes to your rival. Pawprint hasn't said that itself, so treat it as beta behaviour.

You don't get the whole kit at the start, either. Beta testers say you unlock the skills as you progress, so for some time early fights lean on the basic attack, and Helion's self-heal only arrives with the upgraded version of his signature skill, and only while his Solar Halo is up.

The official index describes Helion as “enthusiastic and confident”, the kind that stands up for its friends at critical moments. The fox gets the quieter line: “The soft moonlight running through their fur gives them an aloof and rational look. But they can also be sentimental.”

The two are set apart from everything else in the index. They carry the special numbers 9998 and 9997 instead of a place in the regular list, and Pawprint's own beta FAQ names them together as special Aniimo.

Identical stats, so range decides

Both starters share one stat line: 90 HP, 116 ATK, 85 BREAK, 65 physical and 65 magic defence, 83 REGEN, 504 in total. Not one point of difference. The index files both under the DPS role, its label for damage dealers. Every Aniimo there carries an element and a combat role, such as DPS, support, heal or BREAK.

They also share half of their trait. Both read: “When not attacking with an advantageous element, final damage increases by 20%.” In practice, your starter hits harder exactly when you don't have the right element for a fight. That's a safety net for the early game, when your team doesn't cover many elements yet.

So the real question is how you like to fight. Helion's basic attack strikes “at close range”, Lunara's “from a distance”. Everything else in the two kits follows from that.

What element are the Aniimo starters?

Both starters are Light, the element the official index files as holy. That makes them rarer than they look. The index sorts every Aniimo into nine elements, Fire, Water, Grass, Rock, Wind, Dark, Electric, Ice and Light, and Light has exactly two species: Helion and Lunara. Water, the most common element, has 19; Fire and Ice have nine each.

That's where their shared trait earns its keep. The index doesn't publish a matchup chart, but both traits add 20% whenever you're not hitting with an advantageous element, so a Light starter stays useful against Fire, Ice or anything else you meet before your team covers it. One beta tester calls Helion a solid anti-Dark attacker later on. That's a player's read, not an official chart.

Your first catch comes before the choice. Beta players describe a Fire Aniimo, Emberpup, as the opening partner, and several of them take Lunara for exactly that reason: a short-range Fire attacker plus a ranged Light one covers both distances.

Helion: the close-range pick

Helion is the straightforward one. Every hit is physical, and the kit rewards staying in the fight.

The rhythm comes from its trait, Solar Grace: every four basic attacks grant Solar Halo, which enhances your next skill. Hit, hit, hit, hit, cast. Holy Roar is the cheap skill at 10 EP and stacks up to three times, each stack adding 6% Light damage amplification for 20 seconds. With Solar Halo, it applies all three stacks at once. Holy Storm spins Helion into a storm that hits everything around it and pulls enemies toward the centre, which makes it your answer to groups. Beta testers count it as his BREAK skill: it costs and hits exactly like Lunara's Lunar Eclipse, although the index text doesn't say BREAK. Light Bombardment is the dive: Helion drops from the air and explodes on landing, 30% harder with Solar Halo.

When you run dry, Sun-Kissed restores 20 EP, and 5 more if Solar Halo is up. The Ultimate, Helios' Judgment, hits everything nearby for “massive damage”, turns Helion into Soleon until the fight ends and hands him a fresh Solar Halo.

Lunara: the ranged pick

Lunara plays a longer game. Her damage is magic, and her kit sets up targets before it cashes in.

Lumin Bolts sends out three projectiles, each aimed at a different target, and marks every one it hits with a Fox Mark: 5% less Light resistance per stack, up to three stacks, for 10 seconds. Since everything Lunara casts is Light, she softens enemies for herself. Moon Impact drops a full moon on a target and splashes the area around it if the target carries a Fox Mark. Lunar Eclipse deals “heavy extra BREAK damage”, the tool for cracking a guard.

Her trait, Lunar Power, runs Helion's rhythm the other way round. Casting a skill or the Ultimate grants four Silver Moon Marks. Each basic attack that lands spends one, deals 100% extra damage and heals Lunara for 0.5% of her HP. Cast, then four charged shots. Moon-Washed restores 20 EP. Her Ultimate, Selene's Judgment, turns her into Fennelun and refills the four marks.

The two kits side by side

Same numbers, opposite rhythms. Here is everything that separates them, straight from the two index entries, plus the one line beta testers had to fill in.

The index lists Light Bombardment twice for Helion, and the two entries are two levels of the same skill. The first adds 30% damage while Helion holds Solar Halo, which the index also calls the Ring of Kim Sol. The second, the upgraded version, adds a 4% heal and a 75% chance to keep the halo. That's the only self-heal Helion gets, and it needs both the upgrade and an active halo. His Ultimate grants the halo straight away, so the heal is most reliable right after it.

One more limit from the beta: you took only two of the four combat skills into a fight. Cheep Tamer, who played both starters for over 100 hours, pairs Lumin Bolts with Moon Impact on Lunara and calls Helion's BREAK skill the more optional pick. Pawprint hasn't confirmed the slot count for launch.

Exploration, flying enemies and damage type

Outside a fight, the two starters are the same. Both carry Hustle, the index's sprint: it raises movement speed and costs stamina.

In a fight, where an enemy is matters. Some Aniimo have Take Off, which lifts them into the air to dodge ground attacks but makes them take more damage while airborne. Others have Tunnel, which makes them immune to ranged attacks while underground, and the index adds that pound skills can knock them back into the air. Cheep Tamer's read from the beta: Lunara's ranged attacks reach flying enemies more easily, and Helion's Light Bombardment can hit enemies that have dug in.

Damage type is the other filter. Helion hits physical defence, Lunara hits magic defence, so each does well against targets that are low on the defence it hits. The examples from that video all check out against the index:

Evolution: Soleon and Fennelun are a mode, not a stage

Aniimo does have evolutions. In the official index, 222 of 224 forms sit on an evolution line. Emberpup, the first entry, evolves into Flameruff and then into Scorchhowl, for example. The two exceptions are the starters. Their evolution is their Ultimate.

Helios' Judgment “evolves into Soleon, increases its own damage by 15% until leaving combat”. The loop runs once per fight:

Selene's Judgment “evolves into Fennelun, and increases its damage by 15% until combat ends”, and it refills Lunara's Silver Moon Marks on the way:

So Soleon and Fennelun aren't a level you reach and keep. They're what your starter turns into for the rest of a fight, and they turn back once it's over. Beta players on Steam noticed the same after using the Ultimate.

It wasn't always like this. In earlier betas the evolution was permanent: Lunara became Fennelun for good, and Helion became a form ZakkuVerse remembers as the Blazing Sun Lion. The third beta switched both to the temporary form, and players who wanted to keep their small partner got their wish.

For the evolution lines of every other Aniimo, the Crit Pick Aniimo Dex keeps them per creature.

Lunara or Fennelun, and what else isn't confirmed

If you check the fox in the official index, you'll find her as Fennelun, number 9997, and the picture on that entry is the grown fox. The small Lunara artwork sits unlinked on the same official image server. Lunara has no entry of her own. But that entry's own Ultimate says it “evolves into Fennelun”, and Helion's entry evolves into Soleon, not into Helion. An Aniimo can't evolve into itself.

Pawprint's Bond Pact FAQ from the July beta names the pair as “Helion, Lunara”, and every beta report calls her Lunara. Beta guides from Kybuza and ZakkuVerse also describe Lunara transforming into Fennelun. The likeliest reading is that the index files her base kit under the name and picture of her Ultimate form. That's a reading, not a confirmation, until the launch build is out.

Whether you can get the other starter later isn't stated anywhere official. Neither is whether the choice can be changed, or that the rival takes the one you leave. Those come from beta reports only. ZakkuVerse notes that trading was locked in the betas and there was no way to catch your rival's starter, and two beta players say the developers hinted at trading one day. Neither is a confirmation.

One thing is settled: a beta starter doesn't come with you through the Bond Pact. Pawprint's FAQ lists Helion and Lunara among the special Aniimo that can't be sealed and carried into the launch.

What players say about the starters so far

Beta players lean Lunara, and not only for the looks. In an r/Aniimo thread from 6 Aug 2026 asking which starter people will take, 12 of 15 answers said Lunara, and a Steam discussion in early September went four to one the same way. The reasons mix taste, the fox and the moon theme, with play: several testers who tried both call Lunara the easier start, because her ranged, auto-targeting attacks let you kite and her marks keep her topped up.

Helion has his defenders, and they make a different argument. Testers who ran him in the third beta say he “hits like a truck”, holds up well under pressure and cleared solo Nightmare Egg Heists and Holobattles on the back of his BREAK damage. If you want bragging rights in those modes, that's his pitch. In a thread from 17 Aug 2026, one detailed post names the catch on both sides: Helion has no self-heal until you upgrade his signature skill, while Lunara falls off later because her passive wants four basic attacks between skills, when her skills hit harder. That player expects both to be replaced by stronger DPS Aniimo in the late game anyway. Another soloed the whole open world of the third beta with Lunara and only built a real team for the elite battles and the last entries in the collection log.

YouTube guides from beta players land in the same place. Cheep Tamer says you can't go wrong with either, while Kybuza and ZakkuVerse call Lunara the safer, more beginner-friendly start and Helion the more satisfying one if you like aggressive melee. Pixelkin's preview called the skills flashy and singled out Lunara summoning “a miniature moon to slam down on foes”.

The advice that comes up most is the simplest: pick the design you like, because your starter talks to you in cutscenes for the whole game. It's a small sample from beta builds, and none of it says either starter is a trap.

Building a first team around your starter

Your starter begins far ahead of the Aniimo you catch next to it. A 504 stat total is higher than the final-stage Stellarys (485) and within a few points of Pawney (512), while early catches like Emberpup (371) and Celestis (412) start well below. For the first hours, your starter carries the fights and your catches cover what it can't.

What each starter can't do tells you what to look for. Helion barely heals before that upgrade, and his BREAK skill competes for one of two slots, so a healer and a BREAK specialist fill the gaps. Flutternym, which evolves into Gracewing, is the index's clearest healer: Healing Dance heals the whole team for 9% of its max HP over 8 seconds, and its trait adds passive healing, a little HP whenever another Aniimo casts a skill. Helmut is listed with the BREAK role and evolves into Pawney.

Lunara already brings BREAK, which makes Pawney an interesting partner for her. Its trait deals 30% extra damage to targets affected by control effects or BREAK, and Lunar Eclipse sets exactly that up. Pawney brings some crowd control of its own, too: Elastic Sword pulls enemies back in when the sword returns. Stats and skills for all of these sit in the Crit Pick Aniimo Dex.

Which Aniimo starter should you pick?

Pick Helion if you like melee, want the simplest rhythm in the game, and expect to fight a lot of small groups. Pick Lunara if you'd rather stay out of reach, want to hit flying enemies with ease, and like a partner who heals a little with every shot.

My pick for most players is Lunara. Range buys you time while you learn to dodge, and the Fox Mark makes her own hits scale and boosts every other Light attack on the target, a co-op partner's included. Helion isn't worse. Either way, with identical stats, you're choosing a playstyle, not a tier.

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