Phantom of the Opera

“Any who lay eyes upon me will certainly come to know fear.”The man or monster who lurked in the darkness of the Paris Opera, bellowing for his beloved Christine. When not bellowing or madly professing his love, Phantom is a Quick-based Assassin with an AoE Arts NP who excels at facilitating debuff strategies or low-key generating critical stars.

Low rarity Servants often have a special, unique niche to themselves. Phantom is no different, although his might be a bit hidden at first sight. Phantom’s NP Christine Christine is in that regard his most worthwhile asset, as post-Interlude it reduces all enemies’ debuff resistance by at least 50% for 6(!) turns. This grants Phantom the ability to make normally unreliable effects such as Shakespeare’s and Zhuge Liang’s stuns land consistently, and virtually guarantees any basic debuff skills stick to the target.

In addition, Phantom is capable of providing the team with a decent sum of critical stars through passive critical star generation from Innocent Monster and easy access to Quick Chains by virtue of his QQQAB deck. He can also be part of any anti-female stalling team, as his Mental Pollution skill boosts the odds of his charm Siren Song landing - if his NP hasn’t yet debuffed the enemy. As disabling skills such as charms or stuns often have trouble hitting the target, Phantom’s NP ensures even low ranked disables land.

However, utility and critical stars are basically the core of what Phantom provides. His upgraded defense-ignoring NP’s damage remains very lackluster, and his Assassin modifiers and low base attack ensure his overall damage is decidedly poor too. His hit counts and NP generation also frustrate building up his NP, and his NP generation noticeably trails behind that of his peers. His poor hit count distribution are also reflected in his 2-hit Quick card, and his critical star generation is very substandard once Innocent Monster is on cooldown or Quick chains are inaccessible.

In the end, Phantom can provide some measure of critical stars, but he is not well suited for a role as main Assassin damage-dealer. Instead, Phantom has some unique potential for teambuilding with low-hit chance debuff Servants such as Shuten or Zhuge Liang - although many would consider that very niche indeed.

Highly Potent AoE Debuff Resistance Down

After his Interlude, Phantom’s NP lowers the debuffs resistance of all enemies by at least 50% for 6 turns, scaling with Overcharge. While the debuff itself can still be resisted by enemies, it greatly boosts the success rate of oft-forgotten additional effects such as Chevalier d’Eon’s charm or Lu Bu’s stun on their respective NPs.

Decent Critical Star Generation

Phantom is capable of passively generating a small sum of critical stars with his Innocent Monster skill. By itself, the supplied critical stars are rather paltry, but with either a Quick chain or an additional boost in passive critical star generation from CEs, Phantom can do a decent job. That Phantom can supply critical stars without using his Command Cards is a great boon considering his otherwise poor generation performance.

Anti-female Stalling Potential

With Mental Pollution buffing his own charm’s success rate, and his NP greatly boosting the odds of landing debuffs for allies, Phantom can serve as a lynchpin in an anti-female stalling team. Charms and stuns often have a lower success rate, especially after factoring in debuff resistance passives.

Low Damage

By far Phantom’s largest and most overt problem is his low damage. Between Assassin 0.9x damage modifiers, his own low base attack, the complete lack of any steroids, his QQQAB deck and the difficulty in charging his NP quickly, damage simply isn’t Phantom’s forte. Even after his Interlude, his NP damage still falls behind easily accessible competitors such as Fuuma Kotarou or Berserkers such as Spartacus.

Poor NP Generation Performance

With three Quick cards that have lackluster NP generation and only 2 hits, Phantom isn’t capable of actively generating critical stars very well and noticeably trails behind his fellow bronze Assassins in charging his NP. Still, his single Arts card is rather formidable especially if used last in a chain or under the effect of Overkill.

Fragile & Long Cooldown on Siren Song

With no measures to protect himself directly, a defense down demerit on Innocent Monster, and with low rarity base stats, Phantom has difficulty surviving against stronger enemies by himself. His charm can help him survive indirectly by stalling enemies, but its cooldown is long at 7-9 turns depending on skill rank.

Enemy Bosses’ Debuff Resistances, Cleanses and Debuff Immunity

Unfortunately for Phantom, powerful enemy bosses have a habit of receiving potent immunities or hidden resistances. In addition, Phantom’s NP can fail to land the debuff resistance down debuff, enemies could cleanse it the same turn, a Broken break bar might cleanse it, or they might even possess a debuff immunity skill. Any of these mechanics make Phantom more difficult to use.

Unfortunately, none of Phantom’s skills directly aid in improving his unique debuff niche. Nonetheless, additional critical stars are always welcome, and putting some levels in his Siren Song will ensure it has a decent chance of landing before Phantom uses his NP. Landing that charm may be crucial to prevent an enemy from cleansing his debuff resistance down after all.

• Innocent Monster D is Phantom’s most widely useful skill, but its values aren’t spectacular. The defense down component can be dangerous, and Masters would do well to time it properly against strong opponents. Level this first for both the cooldown reduction and increase in critical stars, although some levels do not scale at all.

• Phantom’s charm skill, Siren Song B, only works against members of the opposite sex. Its cooldown is long, and at base the success rate leaves something to be desired. Nonetheless, a few levels greatly improves its consistency at low cost, especially in combination with Mental Corruption. Level this second.

• Mental Corruption A is Phantom’s final skill. It not only boosts the success rate of Siren Song, but also provides him with a substantial amount of mental debuff resistance. Since mental debuffs are limited to charms skills, Confusion (Fuuma’s NP) and Fear, its use is not very powerful in practice. Level this last, and Masters could consider leaving this at level 4 for a low cost improvement to Siren Song’s success rate.

While one could try to patch up Phantom’s damage, Masters should first consider boosting his utility and support. Additional Passive Critical Star Generation greatly boosts his overall support potential, while either Starting NP Gauge or NP Generation Per Turn, are most useful for landing his NP either quickly or multiple times. In addition, Debuff Success Rate Up might seem redundant, but will help ensure his NP actually sticks to the target (if they have debuff resistance). For Masters who do wish to improve Phantom’s damage, NP Damage Up works best, especially since those CEs stack well with the common support picks.

• His Rightful Place / Fragment of 2030: An additional heaping of critical stars helps patch up the poor star generation on his Quick and synergizes well with Innocent Monster. His Rightful Place provides a perfect inbetween for his star generation role and launching his NP quickly.

• Kaleidoscope / Dragon’s Meridian / Prisma Cosmos: Launching Phantom’s NP quickly to start any debuff-chaining is often ideal. Prisma Cosmos is only more ideal for very long, very niche strategies.

• Record Holder: The common Shinji CE spook is actually rather potent against Magic Resistant enemies who might not be hit by the debuff on his NP. Generally one of the options above are more useful though.

• Black Grail/Holy Night Supper/Golden Sumo: For Masters who insist on using Phantom for damage, these options are the most useful. After all, any Servant can be made viable by the most dedicated Masters.