Utsumi Erice

“I must kill even more evil Servants.”

The welfare Servant for the Fate/Requiem Collaboration event, Erice is an AoE Arts Lancer with good damage and good NP gain. She also arrives at a time when Arts Lancers are fairly rare, meaning she is likely to provide a tool Masters do not already have. Unfortunately, she is not a great farming Servant, but she at least has plenty of nice tools to help with hard fights.

As a welfare Servant, Erice’s NP, Amenosakahoko, is automatically NP5, provided her event is cleared. That, plus the Arts buff from Evil Spirit Medium and the anti-Servant damage on Reaper, gives Erice strong overall NP damage, especially when compared to NP1 Servants. As an AoE Arts Servant with good base NP gain, she also has good NP recursion when properly supported. Furthermore, Reaper provides a critical damage buff, and all of Erice’s damage buffs also apply to normal attacks, meaning she has better normal attack damage than many single-Buster-card Servants.

All of the above strengths apply primarily to hard fights. In farming, though, Erice is a lot weaker, in large part because the Instant-Kill effect on her NP activates before damage and makes her NP refund unreliable. Erice also has little useful utility, meaning even in hard fights she is dependent on supports to deal with gimmicks. Furthermore, while Erice can deal decent damage with critical attacks, she has no good way to generate critical stars, making actually executing on that potential tricky.

Erice is a straightforward Servant. She mostly just deals damage, and she is pretty good at doing that. Especially for Masters without strong AoE Arts options, Erice can be a good pick for difficult fights.

Strong NP Damage

Erice comes at NP5 by default, and she has a 3-turn Arts buff and a 3-turn power mod buff that applies to all Servants, which means it will be active against most difficult enemies. Altogether, these make Erice good at outputting sustained damage over multiple turns.

NP Recursion

Erice has good base NP gain on her Arts cards and on her NP. As an AoE Arts Servant, she can loop her NP reasonably easily with proper support, especially in hard fights where Erice can count on using normal attacks.

Strong Normal Attacks

Erice has multiple buffs that apply to her normal attacks, including critical damage buffs. Der Freischütz (Imitation) also increases Erice’s star gather rate, helping her to access critical attacks more reliably if critical stars are available. Together, these mean Erice has unusually good damage output with normal attacks compared to typical AoE Arts Servants.

Instant-Kill NP Refund Issues

Erice’s NP has an instant-kill effect that takes effect prior to damage. When this happens, Erice does not gain NP from the instant-killed enemy, making her NP gain somewhat unreliable. This is especially problematic for farming and is the biggest thing keeping Erice from functioning effectively as a farmer.

Limited Hard Fight Utility

Erice’s only ways to handle the types of gimmicks typical of hard fights are the Sure Hit effect on Der Freischütz (Imitation) and the buff removal effect on her NP, which only applies to defensive buffs and activates after dealing damage. For fights with lots of annoying buffs or debuffs, Erice will have to rely on supports to handle them.

Limited Critical Star Generation Options

While Erice has critical attack damage buffs and a star gather buff, she has no good way to generate critical stars. As such, in order to effectively leverage her critical attack potential, she needs her team to provide critical stars.

Evil Spirit Medium is Erice’s primary damage and NP gain buff, and it’s also a good defensive tool on top of that, so it should be leveled first. Reaper is also a useful damage buff that is usually (though not always) applicable, so it should be leveled second. Der Freischütz (Imitation) provides less value and can be safely saved for last. Erice really wants her first and third skills maxed in order to operate at maximum effectiveness as a DPS, but her second skill brings less value and can be left at lower levels unless Masters want to fully maximize Erice’s performance.

• Evil Spirit Medium increases Erice’s damage and functionally increases her NP gain by way of buffing her Arts cards. This is an important piece of Erice’s damage output and helps her a lot. The 2-hit Evade effect on this skill is also very nice, as it lasts three turns and is unlikely to be wasted even if Erice uses this skill offensively.
• Der Freischütz (Imitation) is a niche utility skill. Erice will generally save this skill for times when she needs to pierce an Evade effect or when she has some stars available and needs to crit. While the skill is not especially powerful, it is on a short cooldown, so Erice can safely use it whenever she needs it.
• Reaper increases Erice’s damage against Servants, which covers most threatening enemies Erice will encounter in hard fights. The skill also increases Erice’s Instant-Kill rate, which is mostly for flavor (as Instant-Kill is very rarely a reliable strategy). The critical attack damage buff on this skill is fairly low as critical attack buffs go, but in conjunction with Erice’s other buffs, it will let Erice’s critical attacks output reasonable damage.

NP Damage Up craft essences provide the largest damage increase, which make them good for Erice in hard fights. Attack Up craft essences are also nice due to Erice’s lack of in-kit attack buffs. Arts Card Performance Up and NP Gain Up craft essences increase Erice’s performance and NP recursion over time, making them good for long fights. Critical Star Generation craft essences are also nice for helping Erice have access to critical attacks when she needs them.

• The Black Grail / Heaven’s Feel / Holy Night Supper: As always, the Black Grail is the largest damage increase available, and Heaven’s Feel and Holy Night Supper offer good alternatives for Masters who do not have it.
• Golden Sumo: Boulder Tournament:  This CE gives Erice starting NP gauge, as well as a useful attack buff. While this won’t increase damage as much as an NP damage CE, power mod fills the same bracket as NP damage, so this fills a damage bracket Erice does not otherwise have the ability to innately access.
• Formal Craft / Painting Summer / Mark on a Smiling Face: Formal Craft is the largest single Arts buff on a CE, while Painting Summer and Mark on a Smiling Face increase NP gain as well. All of these CEs are good for Erice in long fights, as they increase damage and stabilize her recursion.
• Meeting of the Heirs / Welcome Bunny / His Rightful Place: These CEs give critical stars each turn while also providing other benefits. Meeting of the Heirs increases Arts performance and NP gain, while Welcome Bunny increases Arts and Crit damage, and His Rightful Place gives some starting NP gain. These help Erice work more effectively overall, while also giving her some stars to grant access to critical attacks.