Sigurd

“If you praise evil, I will praise good and reject you.”

Sigurd had quite a life, both slaying a dragon and getting murdered by Brynhild for tricking her into marrying another man. He returns from the annals of history to continue his anti-dragon rampage and unleash a fury of critical hits upon his foes, all while wearing glasses!

Sigurd truly lives up to his name as a dragonslayer, with his single target Buster type Noble Phantasm, Bolverkr Gram A+, dealing supereffective damage against a single dragon type enemy. This damage is further boosted with his Dragon Modification EX buff, which increases his Buster card damage and further grants him a bit of survivability with Guts. However, where he really shines is with critical damage, gaining a whopping 100% damage on Critical hits with Primordial Rune (Warrior) B and increasing an ally’s star drop rate with Crystallized Wisdom A for a turn.

While his dragon damage is nice, there are rarely situations where Sigurd ends up being the best choice in a practical sense. Most dragon enemies are Riders, and most single target Assassins can outperform him against such enemies (including some that are readily available in the friend point summon pool). When not facing a dragon, his damage drops off considerably, becoming a middling single target option at best. His critical boost can also prove to be disappointing, given how he does not have a Critical star gather skill to ensure his Criticals hit.

If one is in need of a decent Single Target Dragonslayer for the rare Lancer-class dragon enemy, Sigurd is your best bet. He also could work with the right Critical build. However, another great reason for a Master to roll for him is because he is one of the only Servants in the game rocking vision-correcting glasses proudly!

Anti-Dragon Trait

True to form, Sigurd wallops dragons with a supereffective mod which increases with overcharge. With anti-trait bonus, this gives him one of the strongest Noble Phantasm bursts in the game.

Strong Criticals

Primeval Rune (Warrior) gives Sigurd a huge burst to Critical Damage, with a massive 100% increase for 3 attacks over 3 turns, whichever comes first. With extra buffs, this can lead to some devastating Critical hits, possibly on par with standard Noble Phantasm damage. If facing non-dragon enemies, a Master may want to consider using his Buster boost to further boost his Criticals thanks to the sheer damage they gain.

Multi-Trait

Sigurd comes with a number of traits such as Divine and Dragon which can result in extra damage boosts from other Servants with trait-specific buffs, such as Jeanne d’Arc (Alter) or Stheno. This comes at the cost of also being more susceptible to damage from enemy Servants with special traits supereffective modifiers.

Rare Trait

While the game is rife with dragon type enemies, the vast majority of them are Riders. When they are not Riders, there is almost always another Servant in their anti-class who can do more damage against them than Sigurd. Even against Lancers, he does not provide too much of a benefit over Siegfried who is capable of doing similar damage against all enemies as opposed to a single one.

Low Off-trait Noble Phantasm Damage

Sigurd has wonderful critical hits, but his Noble Phantasm is on the weaker side for his rarity and class. He is out-damaged by several free Servants, and his Noble Phantasm also does not provide any other beneficial effects. He has decent NP gauge gain rate, but a Master will often feel underwhelmed by his damage when not facing a dragon.

Difficult Criticals

While Sigurd can deal heavy Critical Hits, it is hard to gather Critical Stars to him. He has a middle to low gather rate, and no skill to ensure he gathers the stars to boost his cards. This is partially compensated for by his 1-turn Critical Star drop rate boost, but it’s still not enough at times to make full use of his critical capacity. This weakness can also be offset notably by his lorewise companion, Brynhild, who can provide a Star Gather boost to an ally of choice.

A Master looking to make the best usage of Sigurd in all situations should not focus on his Noble Phantasm damage, but instead focus on boosting his Critical hits. Once he has maximized his Critical potential, the Master can worry about other damage boosts.

• Primordial Rune (Warrior) B provides a huge boost to Critical hits, boasting 50% at minimum and a whopping 100% at maximum, all at a modest 5 turn cooldown. This buff is limited to the first three Critical hits in the three turns after activation, but even three hits is enough to decimate most enemies. This is Sigurd’s bread and butter and should be leveled first to as high as a Master can afford.
• Dragon Modification EX provides Sigurd with a one turn 50% Buster boost as well as a 3-turn Guts. Contrary to other Servants, Masters would likely want to use this with his Critical buff to accentuate the damage on his Buster Critical hits as opposed to his weaker Noble Phantasm damage. While a nice skill, it scales worse than his first and should be leveled after it.
• Crystallized Wisdom A is nice in that it can boost critical star drop rates and apply debuff immunity, but it is only effective for a single turn. Scaling wise it boosts Critical star drops 50%, but this does not stack as well as it should. It has a much rarer application compared to his other skills, so it is best left for last.

Sigurd is primarily a Critical based Servant without an ability to gather stars for himself, so Critical Gather Rate CEs solve most of his problems. Should one have other ways to get stars to him, he benefits mostly from Critical Damage CEs to boost his general damage on Critical Hits. If one is mostly concerned with his Noble Phantasm for dragon enemies, easier access to an unleashed Noble Phantasm can be gained through Starting NP Gauge CEs.

• Conversation on the Hot Sands / Story of Love and Hope / Seal Designation Enforcer: Without a doubt, Conversation on the Hot Sands is Sigurd’s go to CE, quadrupling his gather rate and giving a 20% Critical damage buff. If one does not have access to that, they need to choose between less attack and lower gather rates for bonus critical damage and some starting gauge (A Tale of Love and Hope), or just sheer gather rates (Seal Designation Enforcer).
• Victor of the Moon / Joint Recital: Some Servants and Mystic Codes have ways to focus stars onto a single Servant. If Masters have access to this, the best option is to boost up Sigurd’s Critical damage, as well as his Buster Critical damage.
• Kaleidoscope / The Imaginary Element: Sigurd’s Noble Phantasm is still strong against dragon enemies, and the faster a Master can get it charged up, the better. Starting NP Gauge CEs will help with accomplishing this.