Mysterious Alter Ego Λ

“Rejoice, for the most beautiful swan in the world has arrived!”

Who could this mysterious Alter Ego be? Ready for the stage, Mysterious Alter Ego Lambda (or, alternatively, Summer Meltryllis) debuts as a Lancer, despite her stated name. AoE Arts Lancers were a rarity for a long time, and Summer Melt is the beginning of the end of that trend. She has an odd skillset that makes her difficult to use in slow Arts teams, but once Altria Caster arrives, she comes into her own as a strong Arts Servant for both challenge quests and farming.

Melt’s biggest strength is her ability to loop her Arts Noble Phantasm, Blue Summer Palladion. In addition to dealing DEF-ignoring damage, it generates a healthy sum of stars, and can also remove Evade buffs when the field is Near Water. Melt has strong refund on her NP, plus a potential 60% NP charge skill in Melt Envy, which lets her use her NP repeatedly, especially with the help of Altria Caster. Melt also has Swan Lake, an unusual Arts Effectiveness buff that lasts for more turns than it takes to cool down, effectively giving Melt a permanent damage boost that occasionally spikes higher. Complete Fluidity gives Melt some useful utility to increase her stability as well, with an Invincibility effect, Buff Removal Resistance, and the ability to set Near Water field to enable further specialized effects.

In exchange for these powerful tools, Melt has some unfortunate negative synergies with stall-oriented Arts teams. Her NP charge skill drains NP gauge from her allies, which makes it more difficult for support Servants to use Noble Phantasms that protect or strengthen the team. Additionally, while Melt Envy gives Melt strong damage output for a turn, her damage is less impressive outside of her burst turn. Melt also has relatively weak NP gain on her normal attacks, which means she may struggle to gain access to her NP without the help of NP charge skills.

Melt is a Servant who is ahead of her time at release. She’s an Arts unit intended for farming and fast challenge quest clears, which makes her difficult to enable in the year immediately following her release. She does have strong skills and a good NP, though, so dedicated Masters can find good ways to use her before Altria Caster releases, and once Altria Caster is available, Melt becomes one of the better farming units Arts has and an all-around valuable pull

NP Loop Potential

With an AoE Arts NP, good NP refund, and a potential 60% battery, Melt has everything she needs to use her NP multiple times in a row when properly supported. She is particularly useful in this respect for dealing with Archers, both in tricky farming nodes and in challenge quests, and her ability to function in this regard only increases when Altria Caster releases.

Long-Lasting Arts Buff

Swan Lake provides an Arts buff that lasts for 5 turns on a 4-turn cooldown, which means Melt should almost always have at least one Arts buff active. This helps Melt’s overall NP gain and damage, letting her contribute effectively even while her other skills are on cooldown.

Varied Utility

Melt has a mix of several situationally useful utility effects. Buff removal resistance can keep a Servant alive even against dangerous enemies that remove defensive buffs before powerful attacks. Melt’s NP pierces defense buffs, and it also removes evasion buffs on Near Water fields, which makes her damage hard to block. To make that better, Melt herself can set Near Water field for 3 turns, ensuring her own NP is maximally useful and potentially assisting allies who also benefit from that field.

Critical Performance

Blue Summer Palladion generates at least 20 stars upon use, ensuring a healthy sum of stars that can be otherwise difficult to come by for an Arts damage dealer. In combination with the Crit Star Gather buff on Melt Envy, she can capitalize on the generated stars rather consistently, putting her Independent Action passive to good use, while also boosting her NP gain on post-NP turns. She does lack buffs to Critical Strength in her own kit, however, and benefits greatly from supports that provide boosts to Critical Strength.

Ally Demerits

Prior to Altria Caster’s release, Arts teams typically favor slow, safe strategies. With her focus on damage and looping, Melt does not fit naturally into these types of teams. Melt Envy, in particular, causes problems, as it drains NP charge from Melt’s allies, which can make the skill unappealing in teams that are relying on Merlin or Tamamo NPs to keep the party alive and moving. Furthermore, the nature of the NP Drain means that for her to reach the maximum NP Gain on Melt Envy, it requires her allies to have at least 30% NP Gauge each. If all allies have 0% NP Gauge at the time of her move usage, she will not gain any NP Gauge herself.

Low Damage Outside of Burst

Melt has strong AoE damage on the turn she uses Melt Envy, but the attack boost on Melt Envy only lasts one turn, so Melt may struggle to output strong enough damage outside of that turn, especially at lower NP levels and without optimal supports.

Low Normal Attack NP Gain

Melt’s NP gain on her Arts and Quick cards is unusually low relative to her card deck. Once Melt gets going, her NP refund and NP charge skill help to offset this, but especially early in a fight, Melt may have trouble gaining access to her NP without help.

Melt Envy is Melt’s most powerful skill, and all of its bonuses scale with level. It should be leveled first in order to maximize Melt’s damage output and NP gain potential. Swan Lake is a persistent increase to Melt’s overall performance and should be leveled second so that Melt can fully benefit from it’s better-than-100% uptime. Complete Fluidity gains the least from levels and can be leveled last, but in cases where Melt needs the Buff Removal Resistance, Masters will want to have this leveled. Ideally, Masters should try to bring all of Melt’s skills to max level, as each skill relies on either the shortened cooldown or the increased effectiveness to work fully as intended.

• Swan Lake provides a small Arts performance boost and is notable for being able to stay permanently active at higher levels. At level 10, Melt can actually stack this skill with itself, briefly increasing her Arts performance to 40%. It can be difficult to time this increased boost with Melt’s NP usage, which makes this overlap less practical than one might expect, but the short cooldown is still much appreciated.
• Complete Fluidity is Melt’s main survival skill. The combination of Invincibility and buff removal resistance can allow Melt to survive through attacks from enemies that rely on removing buffs, which makes her a little more reliable defensively than many other units. The skill can also be used to set Near Water so that Melt’s NP can remove Evasion buffs.
• Melt Envy is Melt’s NP charge skill and also her largest damage boost. The skill drains up to 30% NP gauge from each of Melt’s allies and charges Melt’s NP by the amount reduced. If an ally has less than 30% NP gauge, Melt will only drain (and charge) as much as the ally has. As such, in order to gain the full benefit of this skill, both of Melt’s allies must have 30% NP gauge. Masters should carefully consider when to use this skill, as it can prevent allies from using their NPs. The skill also makes it easier for Melt to access critical attacks and significantly increases her Attack for a turn, which means the skill as a whole prepares Melt for a single turn of significant damage.

Starting NP Gauge Craft Essences are useful for Melt, as they help her gain access to her initial NP quickly, circumventing her weak base NP gain. NP Damage Up Craft Essences are the best option for increasing Melt’s overall damage output, as Melt herself has no NP Damage buffs. Arts Performance Up and NP Gain Up Craft Essences are also useful for increasing Melt’s damage output and making it easier for her to loop her Noble Phantasm.

• Kaleidoscope / The Imaginary Element / Golden Sumo: Boulder Tournament / Jeweled Sword Zelretch: These CEs make it easier for Melt to access her NP quickly. Golden Sumo provides less starting NP than Kaleidoscope or The Imaginary Element, but in exchange it increases Melt’s damage output. Jeweled Sword Zelretch is notable because it is an easily accessible 3* CE, and at max limit break it provides exactly enough NP charge for Melt to immediately NP using Melt Envy, while also increasing Melt’s NP gain.
• The Black Grail / Heaven’s Feel: These CEs provide the largest increase to Melt’s damage output. The Black Grail, in particular, is usually the best CE for Melt in farming teams that use Altria Caster, as Melt can still loop her Noble Phantasm while equipping it, which allows her to reliably defeat enemies with much higher HP than would otherwise be possible.
• Formal Craft / Projection / Painting Summer / Mark on a Smiling Face / Dive to Blue: These CE’s increase Melt’s Arts Performance, increasing both damage output and NP gain. Painting Summer and Mark on a Smiling Face provide direct NP gain buffs as well, which makes them particularly appealing. Painting Summer also gives starting NP charge, letting Melt use her NP right away.