Hai Ba Trung

“We only want a peaceful land where everyone can live righteously. For that sake, we shall push forward as far as we can!”

Hai Ba Trung, also known as the Trung Sisters, may be unfamiliar to many people, but they hold special place in Vietnamese history as well as local worship, practically equivalent to goddesses. In Fate Grand/Order, their valiance and tenacity are represented via their gameplay as a durable and supportive Arts Damage Dealer. 

The two sisters’ skills are a mix between team support and self-buffs. Rebel Charisma B- is their Charisma variant, granting a generic attack buff as well as Arts cards effectiveness to all allies for three turns, a simple but nonetheless always useful skill. Sisterly Bond A is their answer to another sibling divinity - Dioscuri. It is a self-buff skill that further improves their two primary card types - Buster and Arts with both generic card effectiveness buffs as well as a unique effect that lets them further improve Buster / Arts cards effectiveness for one turn when they use the opposite card type. Holy King Trưng EX is perhaps their strongest skill, serving as both a personal NP battery, a teamwide NP Generation buff, and Critical Rate Resistance buff. Their supportive capacity despite being a damage dealer doesn’t stop there, as their Noble Phantasm - Let Us Walk Our Land Together B is a single target damaging NP with 3 teamwide buffs (Arts card effectiveness, Buster card effectiveness and HP Recovery every turn) packed into it.

All these effects may seem unassuming and unimpressive, but in an Arts team, these effects can rack up quickly via Cooldown Reduction effect from Servants like Tamamo-no-Mae or NP looping which is incredibly easy thanks to their high refund rate. This makes Hai Ba Trung a very reliable challenge quest damage dealer with some farming application should single target NP looping against Lancers or Berserkers is needed. 

On the contrary, as they lean toward being more supportive with their skill set, their damage output is lower as a result compared to fellow single target Arts Sabers, a niche with many powerful competitors. Furthermore, despite being challenge quest oriented, Hai Ba Trung lack any form of hard protection that can bail them out in a pinch, and rely more on constant healing from their Noble Phantasm to top up the team, which can be a problem for Masters without powerful defensive Arts support to complement their playstyle.

Overall, the Trung Sisters are definitely no slouch and can hold their own competently in a variety of situations, but in an overcrowded niche that is full of overqualified specialists - Single Target Arts Damage Dealers, they simply still have room for improvement.

Exceptional NP Refund

Hai Ba Trung’s innate NP generation rate isn’t exceptional, but when boosted by their numerous Arts cards performance in their kit and an innate NP Battery, their 9-hit Noble Phantasm has top notch NP refund capacity, especially in a dedicated Arts-team.

Provide Good Team Wide Buffs 

Hai Ba Trung’s skill set provides a multitude of beneficial effects to their team, ranging from Arts card effectiveness, Buster card effectiveness, NP Generation, HP Regeneration and Critical Resist. Standalone, each of these effects aren’t particularly impressive in itself, but together, they can improve both team offense and survivability notably given their high uptime.

No Hard Defensive Utility

Despite being both a highly durable Servant as well as improving the survivability of their team, one of Hai Ba Trung’s biggest problems is that they don’t have a powerful hard defensive option to counter hard-hitting attacks in Challenge Quests. This puts them at the mercy of their teammates when push comes to shove.

Mediocre Damage Output

Despite having a lot of self-buffs in their kit, the Trung Sisters’ damage is still relatively lackluster compared to her competitors. This is due to both low multipliers on their skill and Noble Phantasm, lack of traits bonus damage modifier, as well as essentially no Critical steroids in their kits to offer alternative forms of damage output.

The Trung’s Sisters’ skills are all pivotal to their performance, however a baseline of Skill Level 6/6/6 is enough for them to competently do their job. Of the three skills, her third skill is most important due to its being their NP Battery, but since it is only 30% even at max level, Masters can prioritize Servants with a more substantial increase from Skill Levels.

• Rebel Charisma B- A relatively basic, but good skill nonetheless. The scaling is rather poor as each level only increases 0.5% Attack as well as 0.5% Arts card effectiveness, it is not needed to get this to max level if resource constraints are a problem.
• Sisterly Bond A – This skill is the most unique part in the Trung Sisters’ kit, and is their primary form of damage boost. The base cooldown is exceptionally low as well, which can result in almost permanent uptime at max level, thus even though the scaling isn’t particularly impressive, it can be worth maxing it to stabilize their damage output.
• Holy King Trưng EX – This skill provides three beneficial effects with two affecting the entire team with relatively decent scaling and also higher cooldown compared to the other skills, thus it is recommended to be maxed first if Master wants to invest into them.

Despite their strong refund, The Trung Sisters have a ramp-up time to start dishing out good damage and accumulate their buffs, thus Starting NP Gauge should be one of the main stats that Masters look out for when choosing a Craft Essence. For damage boosting purposes, Arts Cards Effectiveness, NP Damage, Attack and NP Generation Rate are all viable secondary stats to pick, with an honorary mention to Buster Cards Effectiveness due to her dual-cards boosting buffs in their skill set.

• Ocean Flier / As Thin as a Narrow Strait / Afterimage of a Sand Table / Song Of The Cradle: These are event free Craft Essences which boost their primary card types and Starting NP Gauge, and also provided some beneficial effects to their playstyle that Masters should pay attention to getting.
• The Black Grail / Heaven’s Feel: As they lack NP Damage boost in their kit, these will offer the biggest increase in damage output. The downside of Black Grail is also completely negligible via the healing from their Noble Phantasm.
• Kaleidoscope / Winter Crystal / The Vessel of Desire / The Imaginary Element: Standard-pool NP Gauge charger Craft Essences that can work as good replacement in general plays.