Hassan of the Shining Star

“Assassin, Hassan of the Shining Star. My true name is Hassan-i-Sabbah. …We meet again. No, I’m just talking to myself.”

Predecessor of the Serenity, the Hassan of the Shining Star is an AoE Arts Assassin introduced during the Ordeal Call II: Id chapter. He is a capable NP looper who also is an adept at Star generation, with great Critical potential.

His skills are offense-focused, with his first skill, Dark Night Martial Mastery A, being a self Quick/Arts/ATK buff for 3 turns. The ATK buff effect notably only triggers when on a battlefield with the Darkness trait, which applies to many nighttime nodes among others. His second skill, Combat Acceleration (Shadow) A+, is his primary defensive skill, which also doubles as a Crit buff skill. In addition to providing him with 2-time, 3-turn Evade, he also can gain a minor Crit Damage buff with every Quick Card used, and also buffs his own Star Drop Rate for 3 turns. Finally, his third skill, Black Blade C+, gives all-around buffs to both his Crit performance and looping capability, giving him both Crit Damage and NP Gain buffs for 3 turns, along with an additional 10% NP charge whenever using Quick Cards. With 3 Quick Cards in his deck, he will have ample opportunity to take advantage of his Quick Card-related buffs.

His NP shares the same name as all Hassans’, Zabaniya. His version, however, provides an anti-Human attribute niche via a supereffective damage multiplier. It also buffs his own NP Damage, Quick, and Arts performance before dealing damage. In exchange, however, it has the demerit of dealing a flat 1,000 HP damage to himself. In the case of his NP, the self-damage does not have the qualifier that says his HP cannot drop below 1, so it is technically possible for him to die after using his NP if his HP is low enough. Given its high hit counts, along with his own Arts and NP Gain buffs, Hassan of the Shining Star is capable of looping his NP relatively comfortably, especially with premiere Arts Supports.

Overall, Hassan of the Shining Star is an excellent AoE Arts Assassin for the niche that is relatively sparsely populated otherwise. His looping capabilities are excellent, and his damage is good when hitting Human attribute targets, which are quite common. He does have steep competition in the form of the summer Welfare Servant, Ortlinde, Thrude, or Hildr (Assassin), but he is an excellent general pool stand-in for Masters who may have missed the prior event. Even otherwise, he is a capable damage dealer who satisfies a slightly different niche, and is particularly effective under the cover of darkness.

Arts Looping vs Human Attribute

Hassan of the Shining Star boasts great hit counts on his NP, a total of Arts +50% in his kit at Overcharge Level 1, and NP Gain +30% for himself. Combined with any Arts Supports gives him potent NP looping capabilities. His damage output is further bolstered against Human Attribute targets as well.

Excellent Star Generation

With three Quick Cards in his deck, a Star Drop Rate buff from both his second skill and passive, and a great 6-hits on his Quick Cards, Hassan of the Shining Star has little issue dropping a generous sum of Stars every turn where his Cards are used. This allows him to then capitalize on his Crit Damage buffs and further improve his Card NP and Star generation.

Unable to NPAA Chain

His NP is Arts type, but he only has a single Arts Card in his normal Command Card deck. As a result, he is unable to take advantage of the extra bonus provided by a triple-Arts chain on his own NP turns. However, the high hit counts on both his NP and Quick Cards more than makes up for the lost NP gain. This is not particularly a deal-breaker, but his increased difficulty with forming Arts chains can sometimes be notable when running him with other Arts Servants. He is designed to hit hard and quickly, and is less tailored towards stall team compositions.

Self-Damage on NP

Further accentuating his hard-and-fast playstyle, Shining Star can burn himself into the ground by repeated uses of his NP since he takes 1,000 HP damage every time he uses it. It may not entirely be a bad thing if he manages to kill himself with his NP since it can bring in backliners. However, since the damage amount is relatively small compared to his HP pool, it is also difficult to build a team composition around him causing self-death.

Lacks NP Gauge Charge

Despite being primarily an Arts AoE farmer, he lacks an NP charge skill of his own, making him dependent on Card usage or allies / CEs to provide him with missing charge. Although he is more than capable of performing the role, it can make his CE choices more restricted.

Masters planning to do NP loop farming with Hassan of the Shining Star will want to focus on his first and third skills. His second skill’s offensive benefits are more conditional on Card usage and is generally lower priority. The general recommended leveling order is 1 > 3 >> 2.

• Dark Night Martial Mastery A – His primary offensive steroid, both the Quick and Arts buff scale with level. The ATK buff unfortunately does not scale with level, although it is also conditionally tied to Darkness battlefield types, so it may not always be applicable. Since this skill affects both his NP refund and NP damage, this should be prioritized first.

• Combat Acceleration (Shadow) A+ – This is his main defensive skill. The only effect that scales with level is the Star Drop Rate buff, which is relatively unused in farming contexts, but can be useful when in battles that last longer and require his Critical performance to come in play. This skill can be safely left for last, and if Masters are lacking materials, it can be kept at level 1.

• Black Blade C+ – This skill provides both Crit Damage and NP Gain buffs, along with a conditional buff that gives him 10% NP gauge every time he uses a Quick Card. The Crit Damage and NP Gain buffs both scale with level. The NP Gain buff in particular is what makes this skill worth leveling in farming contexts, since it directly improves his NP refund.

Generally, Hassan of the Shining Star’s role is as an AoE Arts farmer, so CEs that support this role, such as Starting NP Gauge, Arts Effectiveness, ATK, and NP Damage are the most suitable for him.

• Kaleidoscope / Winter Crystal / The Imaginary Element – These CEs provide a pure NP Gauge boost and allow Hassan of the Shining Star to use his NP more quickly. Since he has no NP charge skill, he will need his 2nd Append Skill maxed with a non-MLB copy of Kaleidoscope to use his NP from battle start. Either Winter Crystal or The Imaginary Element require further support for him to NP out the gate.

• Golden Sumo: Boulder Tournament / Ocean Flier / Mission Start / Cradle Song / Battle Olympia / Grand Puppeteer / Chaldea Anniversary / Dive to Blue / Painting Summer / Star’s Day Off / Holy Night Supper – These are hybrid Starting NP Gauge CEs that also provide an offensive boost of either Arts, ATK, or NP Damage. Hassan of the Shining Star technically has access to all three types of buffs, although his ATK buff is conditional on Darkness field types so Masters may wish to favor Golden Sumo to provide an ATK buff in case the field type is unfavorable.

• The Black Grail / Inverted Rain of Mud / Heaven's Feel – These are CEs that provide the highest NP Damage boost available for Hassan of the Shining Star. However, since he has no NP charge skill, if using these CEs, he will need additional support to fill his NP Gauge.