Zenobia

“You must be wondering "What's up with my getup", right? Don't worry, I'm of the same opinion.”

Bikinis, whether armor or swimsuits, are supposed to provide both support and coverage. Zenobia’s, however, does not. What she does do is act as a strong Arts AoE Damage Dealing Archer with incredible critical capacity and loop potential.

Zenobia is plainly and simply a woman with strong sustained damage. For one, she is capable of looping thanks to Augusta Assumption B, even when a player is otherwise free to play. For another, she’s self-reliant with both a Guts and Crit star generation buff on Aurelianus's Siege (Resist) A, while still acting supportive with the party up and Crit resist on Glory to Palmyra A. But her real strength comes from the overcharge effect on her noble phantasm, Authentic Triumph A+ which boosts her Crit rate for three turns and stacks!

She is not without her downsides, of course. She is for one rather squishy, relying on a small Guts for hard survival. She also fails to possess a self-battery, making her reliant on supports to function well. Her burst damage is also a bit on the lower side of things for Archers.

She is still a powerful Servant, and definitely one a Master will want where Critical hits may make a difference in a fight. Let’s just hope Masters aren’t too busy staring elsewhere!

Arts Looping

With a 20% boost to her NP gauge every turn and a small Arts buff, Zenobia is able to safely loop against most standard 3-enemy Saber nodes with a traditional double Castoria setup with a Black Grail. The numbers are not perfect so she does benefit from having a maximize append skill 2 to allow for a wider range of Saber HPs she can work against. However, as her charge is a 20% per turn instead of instant, she can also manage to loop with free to play Servants such as Paracelsus and a backline Boudica, using a support Castoria and a 50% starting CE.

Supereffective Damage

Zenobia’s Noble Phantasm has an extra trait to deal Supereffective damage against King trait enemies. This covers a huge number of Servants, meaning she very likely will be effective in third waves where Servants most commonly appear. 

Critical Damage

The main issue with the Castoria meta as opposed to Quick and Buster was how it was entirely Noble Phantasm oriented and dropped the massive Critical Hits found in the others. By looping her Noble Phantasm, a critical hit on the 3rd round has a massive 150% Critical damage bonus, and if they are Arts cards, watch out! Not only that, her first skill serves as a star generator, and her second a starbomb and a forced gather to herself. She’ll have the Crits to deal and the damage to deal them with.

Squishy

Guts can be a rather effective tool for survival, but Zenobia’s is on a fairly long cooldown and has a low HP number for revival. Bikini armor can only be so effective!

Support Reliant

Without proper supports, it is hard to get Zenobia truly going. Her Critical damage may work after a Noble Phantasm for a bit, but it’ll lack the steroids to make her fearsome. 

Poor Noble Phantasm Damage

With no passives to help her and only a small Attack and Arts up boost of her own, Zenobia has one of the least damaging Noble Phantasms of all Archers, including low rarity ones. While it is sufficient while properly buffed, it may leave Masters wanting for more. She more than makes up for it with crits.

Zenobia is typically used by generating gauge, firing a Noble Phantasm, and then striking enemies down with crits. Masters will typically use her first skill to start this process, creating the star and Noble Phantasm gauge cycle, and then gather it all to herself with her second skill. Her third skill, while helpful, is rather vanilla. Suggested order is 1 > 3 > 2.

• Augusta Assumption B is by far Zenobia’s more crucial skill, giving her the Arts up to loop, the NP gain per turn to fill what’s missing, and Stars each turn to enable her Critical hits. While it has a long cooldown, most Masters will find it trivial as they will be using her in three turn setups. Masters typically pop this immediately to start their loop shenanigans. Level this first and to max, it scales the NP gain per turn. 
• Aurelianus's Siege (Resist) A provides Zenobia with a large number of stars immediately, as well as giving her a Guts and a strong increase to gather rate to practically guarantee the stars are hers to use. Masters typically want to save this skill until the turn Zenobia is ready to unleash her Criticals (typically wave 3) so they can give her all the stars she needs to guarantee a crit. With skill 1 activated, this will be 30 stars worth! This can be leveled last and left at level 6 if lacking materials. 
• Glory to Palmyra A is Zenobia’s small support, giving a partywide Attack boost and lowering the chance they are attacked by Criticals. The shame of this skill is it is party and not self, as she could benefit from a large self steroid here instead of wasting it on supports. She’ll almost always use this on turn one to boost her three-turn damage, and the Critical resist is mostly useless. This can be leveled second to level 9 if Masters lack materials. 

Zenobia is practically always used for looping, so the CEs depend on what supports a Master has. If planning to use a double Castoria setup, NP Damage Up CEs are a must. A free to play setup with a borrowed Castoria requires a Mixed Starting NP Gauge / Damage CE to work. For anyone not looping, general Starting NP Gauge CEs work best.

• The Black Grail: As the standard for Arts loop comps, a Black Grail is a no-doubt fixture for Zenobia. It provides the maximum damage gain possible per turn with a trivial demerit for farming. 
• Holy Night Supper / Ocean Flier / Golden Sumo: Boulder Tournament / Magical Girl of Sapphire: If a Master wants to play free, a composition of Paracelsus, support Castoria, and a backline Boudica will generate enough gauge per turn to still loop against Sabers. But without a Castoria of her own, she lacks 50% of the Starting charge and needs to add more through a CE. With a MLB Magical Girl of Sapphire, it is possible to only need a Paracelsus and support Castoria for this setup at the cost of even more damage. This composition just barely works, so Magical Girl of Sapphire may be the only option available. 
• Kaleidoscope / The Imaginary Element / Dragon’s Meridian: Some Masters only need a quick Noble Phantasm or two from Zenobia. Giving her a CE to simply have a starting charge is oftentimes enough to get what they need for early access.