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« on: December 26, 2024, 12:15:25 PM »
My own character evaluations, also a request from Tide-kins:
Yukari Takeba: Well, let the age of glow-ups begin. Yukari opens up by answering the question "what if a dedicated healer was also a ticking time bomb?". Yuka-tan's theurgy conditions are very synergistic with her basic strategy and open up a scary-ass win condition, since Concentrate'd Cyclone Arrow is a 1.8x PC HP nuke she can unlock by turn 4. So, I really hope you can OHKO her or 4-3 and 2HKO before then! This sounds pretty reasonable off her junky durability (eeeeew sub-0.7x pc hp on a fucking healer) and kinda sketchy speed, but she has extra options to force you into giving up those turns: Pulinpa in particular is a death knell of a status even before accounting for her game and she can sacrifice damage in order to pump confuse's accuracy into 90% territory. Oh noes, she only nukes you with 1.35x PC HP instead of 1.8x PC HP with Cyclone Arrow now, how will she ever cope with blowing you up slightly less on her danger turn when she just forces you to daze off into the void for 3+ turns in the meantime. Sukunda in a vaccuum would be pretty neat, but spending a turn for a three-turn debuff that only makes her evade turn two doesn't feel like a great proposition off that concrete durability spread, which is kind of a pity. Alternatively, she can also 2HKO the magically frail since Conc'd Garudyne => Garudyne in the early fight is about 80% PC HP, so it's not like if she can't fine-tune her venues into victory a bunch of ways. The lightning weakness is very scary and will cost her fights, but she also gets Fire immunity as a consolation. Regardless, Yukari starts out showing what kind of shenanigans the P3R cast is up to by being the cast's probable third-worst dueller and still having an easy slot-in for Heavy. Not bad for a build that started out as a quintessential crappy healer all the way back in 2007.
Junpei Iori: Poor Stupei, once again he got the short end of the stick in the transition. His in-game rework from original Persona 3 is one of the best of the cast: Junpei went from being an awful physical specialist in a game where physical damage was infinite trash to a crowd-control-heavy crit machine in a game where not only physicals are your preferred neutral offensive tool, but criticals allow for a massive snowball effect in your offense due to One Mores and stacking damage multipliers. Sadly, though, he doesn't get quite the same options for fine-tuning his critical rate in the DL, so instead of easily accruing 60-70% crit by lategame, he's stuck with a 31% rate and decidedly average stats across the board. It's not all bad, since he's still averaging a crit on turn 2 and a single lucky roll will open him a venue to pump out about 1.13x PC HP that turn, which is still fairly scary and miles better than his trashy offense in the original! But man, the lost potential. Junpei also doesn't like facing high Luck, which will eat into his crit rates, and evade is the usual problem it always is for Persona physical sluggers, but there's at least a semblance of a strategy there. Not a bad Middle, but undoubtedly the big loser of a remarkably strong PC cast.
Akihiko Sanada: So, uh, back to the MASSIVE glow-ups. Akihiko's initial game plan is slugging like a champ off insane durability, strong evade and powerful damage off the auto-Heat Riser turns, where he looks like a high Heavy boss slugger. That sounds good, but surmountable, right? After all, he only gets that good a statline for those turns. Weeeeeeeell, once those turns are up, you're left with a Heavy-calibur staller sporting a nasty damage debuff, full healing and an evade buff for good measure. Oh, and his Theurgy gauge is probably full by now, so I hope you like eating 90~% PC HP with shock status attached right after dealing with a 2x PC HP, near-50% universal evade and 2HKO-slinging brick wall. Having to surmount two very powerful and very different win conditions in order to manage Akihiko is a very tall task. Granted, he doesn't like dispel, that ice weakness always presents a potential problem even with his evade against it, status he can't block are also an issue and his statline past those initial Heat Riser turns is just okay. So it's not like he lacks exploitable holes in his game. That's still a very scary package, though, and cements Sanada as quite possibly the best non-wildcard Persona dueller in the series. Heavy/Godlike, a far cry from the generic healer with average damage from P3o.
Mitsuru Kirijo: EXECUTE THEM! On her rework for P3R, Mitsuru fully leans into the memes and makes a game plan out of them: between 100% freeze attached to 2HKO damage, Rakunda, Concentrate and two other equally deadly and almost as accurate status options just in case Freeze isn't an option, the win condition is very clear. Disable, setup and eviscerate, merci beaucoup. Even with zero prep time, the freeze venue allows her to pump near-OHKO damage per turn once the status lands. MARIN FUCKING KARIN and Neuro Slash are frightening alternatives that require distinct blockers and also instantly slot Mitsuru for victory, additionally allowing her to set up explosive damage even if Ice is initially walled. She does feel the loss of Diarahan from the original game (it especially hurts her against bosses), but letting her get a turn became just SO dangerous if you're status-vulnerable at all that she definitely prefers her new strategy. The survivability and speed are knocks against this game (below average speed and shoddy across the board durability are never fun), of course, but may Jesus have mercy on your soul if you give Mitsuru even one opening, 'cause ya ain't getting seconds. Potentially very scary Heavy, as it's more or less the norm with this cast.
Aigis: In a sense, Aigis is the least changed character from the original, sporting a very similar (and straight-forward) strategy: outlast enemy while juggling healing, Tarukaja and Rakukaja, rely on physical damage to win, cower in fear from thunder damage. However, everything about her game plan was amped up: her damage took a notable notch up, P3R -kajas are much better than their P3o counterparts, she gained physical resists across the board in addition to the pierce immunity, she became very hard to status out and Theurgies provide an additional long-term goal (Orgia Mode in particular is a really funny all-in button past the near-OHKO damage opening) for her. So, unless you can hit that lightning weakness, you're dealing with a bit of a brick wall who will eventually just tear you down. Bad first-turn speed and slow Theurgy charge are kind of bummers, but she's just so well-geared for playing the long game and very few statuses are real options against her thanks to her default equips and Insta-heal. Her main lingering problems end up being the physical reliance and that lightning weakness. Still, nothing that keeps her from hanging around in High Heavy. Fear the roboto meido.
Koromaru: Koro-chan's game got frankly weird in the transition to P3R. The damage sucks, the instant death is barely turn two (which is a HUGE improvement compared to P3o's turn-four trash, but still), the durability is pretty middling... but Debilitate. Debilitate is both a notable buff to his offense and durability and he keks off good turn one speed to stick it ASAP. Sure, he's still relegated to killing in four turns whenever Mudoon isn't an option, but man he's a pain in the ass to take out during those turns, also thanks to the HP/SP regen stacking with the accuracy, damage and durability debuffing. He's also the only character in the cast who can spec to negate his elemental weakness, and spoiling three elements simultaneously isn't a bad perk. He has a more coherent gameplan than his original form, for sure, and it's definitely better, but it doesn't feel as much of a glow-up in the larger context as what the rest of the cast can now do. Good doggo probably makes it to Low Heavy anyway, but I'd like to put him up in proving grounds or the likes to test out his win conditions.
Ken Amada: Amada-kun also got the Yukari treatment, in that his basic gameplan both got amped up and he gained new toys to eke out wins. For starters, Heat Riser is a healer's wet dream, substantially boosting his durability, evasion and damage while it's up, making him even manage above average damage while buffed. Healing and instant death in the same package also rules, though the ID being just turn two is kind of not ideal. I always say Tetra and Makarakarn are more gimmicks than truly coherent options, but they do feel a lot more useful when complimented by a more comprehensive defensive skillset around them, especially when part of Ken's strategy revolves around farting off until he can unleash his Theurgy to end the fight right there. Speaking of which, being able to buff the offensive Theurgy for a souped up finisher is cool (1.25x PC HP under Tarukaja is niiiiiiiiice), but even Divine Intervention might find uses with it being a free shot of full healing that also grants both Tetrakarn and Makarakarn. It all depends on how long Amada needs to stay up. And, of course, with SP regen, he can keep his game going for a very long time indeed. And, to make things better, he's even got decent turn one speed, so he can immediately dig in and gain momentum. Kinda sketchy durability and needing to somewhat juggle his many conditionals feel like the main issues regarding Ken, along with him not having an immediate turn one win button to pop like Yukari and Mitsuru have, but Ken turned into a top-of-the-line healer-buffer and deserves a High Heavy nod. Don't mess with the elementary school kid, folks.
Makoto Yuuki: Hoo, boy, saving the nastiest for last. So, Makoto has the usual wildcard package, right? Ultimate variety, huge ways to mix and match his resistances to wall threats and tools to deal with just about any situation, the works. What separates him from his peers Yu Narukami and Ren Amamiya, though, is the statline: while Joker and Yu carried around at least one overcentralizing Persona that alone was capable of propelling them into Godlike (Yoshitsune, you fucker), Makoto has to rely on properly juggling his many skillsets and resistances/weaknesses because he doesn't get an easy point Persona to just make everyone miserable from the start. For starters, his fastest practical Persona is barely above Akihiko speed, and he actually averages pretty slow builds. Also, his damage isn't as overwhelming either, he ain't dropping overkill Hassou Tobis for days like Yu. Heaven's Blade is an option that opens up insane damage potential against the crit vulnerable, but that comes with the caveat of both crits and physicals in the DL, along with eating into his HP real hard. That said, the variety is still obviously there, with plenty of fatal, accurate status to choose from, the usual buffing/debuffing Persona goodness with Debilitate and Heat Riser, and the healing plus defensive passives unique to him. This last option is the most dangerous in a long fight to boot, since, like Yuka-tan, Makoto is ultimately a ticking time bomb: his Theurgy gauge takes forever to fill up, but once it does, you're eating 9999 Persona 3 Reload unresistable, defense-ignoring damage in Armageddon. That's somewhere in the vicinity of 8.7x PC HP, and I'm pretty sure you can count how many people survive this much damage in one hand. This said, he has to constantly juggle between builds (he can't have Personas that both can do high-level stalling and high-profile offense, for instance, and outside passives like Firm Stance and Enduring Soul, his durability is decidedly a pile of whatever), and having to shuffle between sets can open him up for down turns the top echelon of Godlike will make him pay dearly for. But that's still a hell of a package to chew through. As usual for the modern Persona main, easily High Godlike.
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