Rabbit’s Reviews #423: Kriemhild (4* Rider)

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Despite being an SR, Kriemhild is one of the strongest single-target Riders in the game, outdoing every SSR option except for Ozymandias. She’s mostly notable for her truly excellent steroids, but she also has pretty much everything you want out of a single-target damage-dealer: survival, crit access, crit damage, niche, and utility. Kriem doesn’t have any unique gimmicks or unusual synergies, but she is unambiguously excellent, especially for her rarity.
Kriemhild (Rider)
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Kriem has a moderately offensive stat spread, with mid-high attack and mid-low health for an SR Rider. This is a solid starting place for a damage-dealer and helps Kriem’s damage output. Her NP gain is quite good for her deck, while her active star gen is passable for a single-Quick Servant. Kriem’s only passives are Magic Resistance, for occasionally avoiding debuffs, and Riding, which slightly improves Kriem’s least-important card.
As Kriem is a 30% charger, Mana loading is her most important append, allowing efficient use of various batteries. Skill Reload is the second-most impactful, letting her stack her damage buffs on turn 2. The crit damage buff is also generically useful, while the Extra card buff is of marginal benefit and anti-Saber damage doesn’t matter much.
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Kriem requires relatively recent materials for ascension and very old materials for skills, which is an interesting dichotomy. She needs a lot of Great Knight Medals—more than is typical for a silver mat—but aside from that she shouldn’t be too hard to raise.
Kriem’s skillset is generically strong, offering pretty much everything you’d want out of a DPS and nothing beyond that. Recommended skill order is 3>2>1.
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Dignity provides a 20% 3-turn buff to Arts and Buster card effectiveness. This is a little on the low side, but Kriem’s overall buff spread is so strong I can’t really complain about any one individual skill’s values. This skill also provides a slight NP gain buff, which means Kriem’s Arts cards will generate quite a bit of NP gauge. She doesn’t really need the extra help in optimized teams, but if you’re using her with lower-end supports, this means Kriem will still be able to use her NP consistently, which is nifty. In addition to those benefits, this skill provides a hit-based invuln, which is always great for survivability, letting Kriem stave off an NP if you use this skill defensively or avoid some incidental damage otherwise.
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Shark Charisma is one of the better Charisma variants we’ve seen, providing the usual 20% partywide attack buff along with a suite of crit tools. Most notably, the skill gives 50% crit damage up to all Chaotic allies, including Kriem herself, providing a respectable boost to general-purpose crit damage. The skill generates 15 stars immediately and then another 15 stars each turn, which, paired with Kriem’s NP and her innate star weight, should let Kriem crit fairly reliably.
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Verbal Barbs is a 30% battery, and it also gives 30% NP damage up to all Chaotic allies, completing Kriem’s spread of stackable buffs in every buff bracket. The fact that Kriem gives 20% attack up and 30% NP damage up partywide can also make her a solid single-target Servant for multicore setups provided the other DPS is also Chaotic. Those two effects would be good enough on their own, but this skill also comes with AoE buff removal, a great consistency tool that can help Kriem get past defensive buffs and negate dangerous offensive buffs.
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Kriem’s NP is somewhat interesting. It’s a typical ST Buster NP, and it deals Supereffective damage against Lawful enemies, giving Kriem a fairly wide spread of targets against which she hits really really hard—but then after dealing damage it inflicts low-grade values of eleven different buffs. These buffs give Kriem ramp in CQ contexts, with both the defense and Buster resistance debuffs strengthening future NPs. As the NP inflicts all three types of card resistance down, this NP also functionally boosts all of Kriem’s cards, indirectly making her a better crit servant. 
Defensively, the NP inflicts 10% attack, crit damage, and crit rate down, each of which is small in isolation but which collectively go a long way towards mitigating incidental card damage—not enough to let Kriem survive indefinitely, but very helpful for keeping the team alive for an extra turn or two when aiming for fast clears.
Aside from that, the NP inflicts debuff resistance down, making itself more reliable. It also inflicts small poison, curse, and burn debuffs, which are mostly for flavor but which could synergize nicely with other Servants that interface with those debuffs in multicore setups. To close out the NP, it also generates five critical stars—not enough to hugely impact crit rate on its own, but very nice in conjunction with Kriem’s other crit tools.
Taken as a whole, this is a standard ST Buster NP with a good niche, and its other effects collectively function as a general performance boost for Kriem and her teams. This is a very good Noble Phantasm and it works very well with the rest of Kriem’s kit.
Power level aside, Kriem is a bog-standard ST Buster DPS. Her best team will be Koyan/Koyan/Oberon if you can clear in three turns, replacing Oberon with another support (probably Merlin or Waver) otherwise. In this setup, Kriem can easily BG loop with cards, and her damage output is very high. She’ll be an excellent Caster-killer for any fight that doesn’t force stall strategies.
Kriem is also a solid choice for multicore teams in cases where you need both an ST and an AoE NP for one reason or another—assuming, that is, that your AoE damage-dealer is Chaotic. While Kriem doesn’t offer party charge, she does have good AoE buffs, and in CQs specifically she pushes that further against a single target thanks to her NP.
At the lower-end, any of the usual free Buster supports will be great. Mash and a friend’s Merlin is still a solid shell for hard fights, and Waver’s recent buff also makes him a great pick in general if you’ve picked him as your free SSR. Shakespeare also just got a very nice buff that makes him more appealing as a partner for Kriem, and Hans is as good as always.
Kriem favors fast clears, and The Black Grail is the best damage-oriented CE for short fights. That said, Kriem doesn’t have a cardless loop setup without starting charge, so if you can’t use cards or don’t want to risk having to reset for them, you might opt for something like First Day of Filming or Aerial Drive instead.
Any crit-focused Buster DPS benefits from crit damage CCs. Star gen CCs are also a pretty nice pick for Kriem, as she innately generates almost enough stars to crit reliably, and a few extra stars from CCs can get her the rest of the way there.
Kriem is excellent and keeps up with SSR Riders even at level 90. If you’ve invested in her, there’s really no reason not to at least take her to level 90, and she’ll make good use of the extra stats if you take her to 100. SR coins are at a premium in general, though, so I would personally not bother leveling her beyond 100 and would prioritize unlocking appends instead.
Kriemhild is pretty generic, as ST damage-dealers go, but she’s also very very strong. I don’t love when we get generic Servants who are also average—or, worse, outright bad—but I’m more forgiving of the ordinary-but-powerful types. If you need a strong single-target Rider, Kriem is a perfectly good option, and if you pull for Kriem out of character affinity, her innate power will make her feel good to use. Nothing wrong with that.