Grim Grimoire: Okay so rant time!
Plot was damn well pieced together except for the ambiguity!end w/ Lillet Squared and even that closed more plot than it opened so I'll take it. Really, the plot is just neat and well-executed and bow tied and yeah.
General character thoughts:
Lillet 'Queen Of The Morning Star, Dragon Empress And Biggest Badass In The Universe' Blan: Just... just see the nickname. Lillet goes from studious awkward to I WILL KILL YOU WITH DRAGONS AND OWN EVERYTHING IN MY PATH with a remarkable, -believable- ease, and easily gets some of the best moments of the game. Just fucking awesome overall.
Margarita Surpris'ingly Isn't The Lesbian Option' + Surely 'Hypnotoad': Is probably the one major character weak point. How many times did she get told that what she was doing was stupid because she'd -die-? How many times did she do it anyway? Regardless, also sympathetic and understandable.
Amoretta 'Oh, Wait, This Is Why Margarita Isn't The Lesbian Option' Virgine: Well, manages to own the Big Bad twice, but otherwise is kinda just there for Lillet to hit the Lesbian Orgy button for. Which, mind, is hardly a -bad- thing.
Bartido 'Lillet's Beard' Ballentyne: Gets some neat moments when assisting Lillet. Also acts as an excuse for the Lillet Is Not Bisexual/A Lesbian crowd. Poor deluded folks.
Hiram 'Kenji' Menthe: Uh... his nickname says it all. He has nothing else to his personality.
Really the student cast could have used more time but it's understandable why they didn't get it.
Gammel 'I'm Sorry, I'm Supposed To Be Competent?' Dore: Well, the one fight you see him seriously in, he's damn good. Buuuut there's never any ingame proof of this. Granted, you beat the Big Bads by tricking them and thus they could easily just be stronger than Gammeldore, explaining his incompetency, but... Oh. Bonus points mega for BELIEVING LILLET BLAN. CONSISTENTLY.
Advocat: Second-best character in a game, and in a game with Lillet Blan that's -not an insult in any way-. Probably the most important NPC, too, and... he has the plot presence to underline this. A lot of the awesome lines come from him.
This being said, he merits a side note: I was going to hit the DL for what hype I'd seen about him at first, due to the fucking creepy interaction you see between him and Amoretta near the start. This being said the game does damn well at pointing out -there's something else to it- afterward, and managed to de-creep it. So yeah.
Professor 'I'm The Person You Keep Goddamn Fighting, And I Wish My Lovely Lion Were A Zombie' Opalmeria: And yet she's definitely a good guy. What the hell? Anyway, yeah, she's the one that keeps getting into fights with Lillet due to the situation at hand. Her personal plot is... well, it wasn't what I really was expecting! At least it got resolved okay, thanks to Hiram. (Yeah...)
Dr. 'ELLIOT, THE TRUTHINESS IS OUT THERE!' Chartreuse: Not much to say here. He's okay but not imprTRUTHessive; has a single-minded foTRUTHINESScus but isn't a dick outside of it, Opalmeria's just stupid in love. Uh... yeah.
Spoilers 'Become A Great Lesbia- I Mean Magician, Lillet Blan' McSpoilery: A barrel of exposition, also gets a few other lingering questions wrapped up. Really kinda cool to see, and they didn't waste the sprite so.
I'm kinda bitching about everyone here but that isn't my intent; the characters all work together so damn well it's not even funny, and the plot is very solidly done. Gameplay is... gameplay is "Summon two dragons + supporting force, win". I wish I was joking. Dragons, Homunculi (12x Psychic Storm SMAAAASH), and Morning Stars are a solid little core; there's a few other solid units (Unicorns, Demons, Phantoms, Golems) but those three are all you really need, ever (and Morning Stars can be dropped if needed). Fun game to smash through just for awesome plot. Probably an 8 or so?
Oh, right, one final thing: GAMEPLAY AND PLOT SYNTHESIS, THIS GAME ACTUALLY REMOTELY DOES IT. Having the cast acknowledge Lillet is freakishly good after the events of the game start unfolding is awesome to see (as is breaking the latter-game "30 Minutes" missions by killing them all first). Just really refreshing.