Medusa (Lancer)

Finally matching her sisters in both stature and divinity, Medusa Lily arrives to the game in the Babylonia chapter. Wielding the very scythe that decapitated and killed her in life, Harpe, she seems much more cold than the regular version of Medusa. Will her new form keep her from being bullied by Stheno and Euryale? Not likely.

Medusa's pint-sized Lancer incarnation packs similar traits to her regular self in spite of her different class. While her offensive power and general utility as a servant are lacking, she packs impressive durability and a rare niche in packing one of the few consistent stun NPs in the game.

However, her skill set is generally weak with unimpressive effects on long cooldowns, and her NP gain rate is a sore weakness for how good her NP is; packing acceptable Arts cards but having weak NP gain rate in her two Quicks and Extra card, she struggles to charge her gauge on the whole.

Strong Charm/Stunlocking ability

Medusa Lily is one of the few servants to have multiple charms and stuns in her kit, especially at such high success rates. While her Charm is locked to only enemies with the Male trait, her NP stun will consistently be a powerful tool to lock down key threats.

High Durability

With her large HP pool, and one time invulnerability/guts from Distant Thoughts, Medusa Lily makes herself a tough cookie to crack. This is further accentuated by her high passive debuff resistance, making her more likely to shrug off debilitating debuffs.

Low damage output

Medusa Lily's attack stat is low for most 4* servants, let alone for Lancers, who tend to pack above-average attack. Combined with her mediocre offensive steroid from Monstrous Strength, she can't exactly inflict anywhere near the damage other Lancers can manage.

She later obtains an NP interlude to help out her Noble Phantasm’s damage and also add a handy Quick Resistance Down debuff. It is essentially a Quick Effectiveness Up, but as a debuff placed on an enemy instead of a buff on an ally. However, even then her offensive power remains largely mediocre.

Long cooldowns on skills and NP

While Distant Thoughts and Medusa Lily's NP are both superb, their long cooldown periods (due to Distant Thoughts’s base 9 turn cooldown, and Medusa Lily's weak base NP gain hindering any NP spamming) mean that neither can have a significant impact in drawn out battles without team support.

While Siren Song doesn't gain too much effectiveness from levelling it up, especially considering how infrequently it can even be used to good effect, Monstrous Strength and Distant Thoughts contribute equally to Medusa Lily's offense and durability. They can be levelled more or less interchangeably depending on one's preference.

• Siren Song is a standard anti-Male charm skill, which forms part of Medusa’s enemy lockdown capability. Because even at max rank the cooldown is high and the skill can still miss, this ability can be maxed last.
• Monstrous Strength is Medusa’s main steroid, albeit one of the weakest variants of the ability in the game. Though even at max rank its value isn’t spectacular, it does benefit decently from each level. If focusing on offense, max it first, and if not, max it second.
• Distant Thoughts combines a Guts and a single-hit invulnerability to serve as Medusa’s only direct defensive ability. While only the Guts portion scales with level, reducing the cooldown may be worthwhile. If focusing on survivability, max it first, and otherwise max it second.

Medusa Lily’s strongest quality is her powerful NP effect. As such, her biggest priority should be getting her NP out faster. She can achieve this via Starting NP Gauge effects, straight NP Gain Up effects, or even Quick Up effects to improve both the damage and NP gain of her otherwise-mediocre Quick cards. Medusa Lily can also appreciate NP Power Up effects to improve the dent she puts in the enemy when she unleashes her NP.

• Kaleidoscope / Imaginary Element: Allows Medusa Lily to get her NP off in battle immediately, or close to. Converting her NP into an on-demand stun button with this option is particularly helpful if a master gets in a bad spot in a tough quest.
• Imaginary Around / Gandr / Decapitating Bunny 2018 / Dumplings Over Flowers: Increases the power of Medusa Lily's NP while also helping her Quick cards charge her NP gauge faster. Decapitating Bunny can also aid her in ignoring otherwise troublesome dodges and invulnerability.
• Little Halloween Devil / Holy Night Supper / The Classic Three Great Heroes / Knights of Marines: Alternative options for starting NP gauge if an immediate NP isn't required or if Medusa Lily is receiving NP gauge from NP charging supports.