Rabbit’s Reviews #433: Kondo Isami (5* Saber)

22whiterabbit22
Kondo is a pretty good AoE Arts Saber. He’s not quite on the level of top-end counterclassers like Noah and Tez, but when you set aside the utility and flexibility those two bring, he’s not all that far off—a level 90 NP2 Kondo can counterclass 90++ Lancer nodes with Black Grail and Castoria, which is better than a lot of AoE Servants. On top of that, Kondo has some party utility that makes him alright for multicore setups, and he has some nice survival and consistency tools. His kit is just a little more restrained than the best of his direct competition, but he’s totally respectable.
Kondo Isami
loader-2
loader-2
Kondo has almost exactly average stats relative to SSR Sabers as a whole. Sabers have pretty good stat spreads, so even as an “average” Saber, Kondo has decent attack—could be better, but not bad. As an Arts Servant, Kondo isn’t good at active star gen, but his hit-counts are high enough that he can generate some stars with a star gen buff in play. His Arts card NP gain is really bad, and his Quick card NP gain is low, too, so he’ll have to rely on batteries and NP refund for NP access.
Kondo’s only passives are Magic Resistance and Riding, neither of which does much. He’s a 30% charger, so Mana Loading is his most important append. Aside from that, Skill Reload enables a specific synergy with Kondo’s third skill, Anti-Berserker attack up makes Kondo a good Berserker-slayer, and extra critical damage is nice for Tiamat teams. The only append that isn’t particularly helpful is the Extra Attack buff—Kondo’s cards are so bad that a boost to his Extra doesn’t do much.
loader-2
Kondo’s mat asks are pretty reasonable for ascension and skills (though I at least am often out of Lanterns)—but each of his appends needs 72 of two different bronze mats, plus 44 of another, which can be rough.
Kondo’s skillset is pretty solid, but it’s not particularly unusual. Recommended skill order is 3>2>1.
loader-2
Kotetsu is mostly just a standard 3-turn 30% attack buff. It also grants three turns of pierce invuln, which is really nice for consistency in CQs, and it gives a 30% crit damage buff. 30% isn’t enough to be particularly meaningful as crit damage boosts go, and Kondo isn’t likely to be critting outside of Tiamat teams anyway, so this is pretty forgettable… but honestly the attack buff alone is enough for this skill to justify its own existence.
loader-2
Tennen Rishin-ryu is a Buster and Arts buff, increasing Kondo’s functional damage and NP gain—also great, but also not particularly noteworthy. This comes with a two-hit dodge, too, to help Kondo stay alive in hard fights.
loader-2
Devotion is Kondo’s one interesting skill, combining a party attack buff with party NP charge. The NP charge gives 30% to Shinsengumi allies (including Kondo) and 10% to everyone else. Kondo’s selfish charge capping out at 30% is a bit unfortunate, and in most situations his party charge is limited to 10%, which together make him less appealing for multicore setups than his direct competition… but any party charge is helpful, so this isn’t a bad skill by any stretch. This skill also gives Kondo’s allies the Shinsengumi trait (after the battery triggers), which sets them up to benefit from the buffs on his NP—and if you have any form of cooldown reduction, such as from Tamamo or from Skill Reload, subsequent uses of this skill can provide the full 30% charge to the whole party.
loader-2
Flag of Sincerity is an interesting AoE NP, in that everything it does aside from damage supports all Shinsengumi allies. It removes debuffs from the party, which can be nice for consistency in CQs, and then it boosts all three card types by an amount that scales with overcharge. In most cases, this just amounts to a modest form of selfish ramp—but in multicore setups, this lets Kondo provide some extra damage to allies.
This is a pretty restrained NP overall, but since he can apply Shinsengumi to allies, the whole party benefits from the NP’s non-damage effects. At its worst, this is an NP with a consistency tool and ramp, which isn’t bad—though the lack of a damage niche is a little unfortunate in this day and age.
The most notable thing about this NP is that its refund is much higher than is typical for an AoE Arts Servant. Kondo pays for this with his terrible cards, but once he starts NP-ing he should be able to use his NP almost every turn.
Kondo has a lot of things that in theory should make him a good candidate for Tiamat teams: party buffs, party charge, and a solid Overcharge effect… but because he’s light on batteries and heavy on NP refund, he actually doesn’t farm well in Tiamat setups. He can do it, in theory, but if you want to guarantee crits on turn 3, you need a 3/x/x node, high-NP Tiamats, and overkill. If you’re not relying on turn-3 crits for extra damage stretch, you’re better off just running Castoria.
In a traditional Castoria/Castoria/Oberon team, Kondo can loop anything other than 1/1/x. Kondo refunds about 30% per enemy with all Castoria buffs in play. On turn 1, Mana Loading plus both Castoria 30% batteries plus one Castoria 20% battery lets you NP. On turn 2, you use the other Castoria 20% battery, plus Kondo’s 30% battery, and you can plug Oberon in for his 20% battery if needed. On turn 3, you use the rest of Oberon’s skills to secure the loop.
If you slot in two Castoria NPs and run an MLB BG, an NP2 Kondo deals well more than a million damage against Lancers, which puts him in fairly rare company. An NP5 level 120 Kondo under the same conditions deals just under a million damage at neutral with NP1 Castorias, and he clears that threshold if either Castoria has NP levels. He’s not the best generic farmer out there, but he can work in that role, which is neat if you really like him.
Outside of farming, all the usual Arts setups work, from Castoria fastplay to Castoria stall to multicore teams to low-end Mash-and-Xu-Fu approaches. Kondo’s lack of charge is also less of a problem in CQs, since you can use cards, so Tiamat teams are an option here—Kondo likely won’t be able to use his NP as frequently, but in exchange you’ll have access to powerful crits.
The one thing to note about Kondo is that he benefits strongly from having cooldown reduction, as being able to use his third skill more than once per five turns functionally makes it a larger party battery. As such, Tamamo is an unusually good support for Kondo, and you might consider bringing her over the likes of Lady Avalon for Castoria stall.
If you have enough batteries available to get Kondo to his first NP, there’s little reason not to use The Black Grail—especially since Kondo has no in-kit NP damage buffs, it’s a huge boost to his overall damage output. If you don’t have the batteries to make this work, though, a starting charge CE like Painting Summer might be a good pick, as Kondo will have trouble accessing his first NP without help.
Crit damage CCs are a solid generic pick for most damage-dealers, especially when they have low in-kit crit buffs, as Kondo does. Aside from that, you might consider star gen or star weight CCs instead, as Kondo likes to crit but doesn’t have great ways of managing crit access.
Kondo is in a slightly odd place grails-wise. An ungrailed NP1 Kondo cannot counterclass Lancer 90++ nodes—but either grails and gold fous or another NP level can get him there. If you have an NP2 Kondo, grails won’t likely help him much in most cases, but if you have an NP1 Kondo, they can hugely increase his usability.
...And then at NP5, things change again. Between NP2 and NP5, Kondo doesn’t hit any notable break points, but an NP5 level 120 Kondo can feasibly farm even non-Lancer nodes effectively.
What this means is you might consider grailing Kondo if he’s NP1, or if he’s NP5… but you won’t get much value out of extra levels anywhere in-between that. An NP2-4 Kondo is already strong enough for counterclassing and will never be strong enough for neutral farming, and therefore isn’t a great grail pick.
Kondo has good damage, great refund, and some nice utility. He’s held back a little by his limited batteries, and he doesn’t have anything particularly unique or exciting in his kit… but he’s solidly “good.” We’re late enough in FGO that this means Kondo likely won’t be appealing to most players—lots of people have Servants who are well above “good”—but especially if you just want to bring him for the occasional CQ, or if you want to have him handy to counterclass Lancer nodes, it’s not hard to get him up to speed. He’s solid if you like him and easy to ignore otherwise. Nothing wrong with that.