Rule Breaker Character Review

https://rulebreaker.rpg-board.net/t398-holy-grail-war-7-player-characters
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Here's my review of each of the Grail War 7 Masters. I will criticize both stats and back story.

I notice that there are 3 primary kinds of builds people used:

1. Coward - You made a weak squishy Master who is entirely reliant on their Servant to fight. You're built for scurrying around, trying hard to not die from all the heavy firepower being thrown around, and pussying out of battles. This is the worst type of character IMO.
   
   
2. Bruiser - A character obviously built for fighting. High level armor, high level weapon, the works. Whether a Bruiser build is good or not is highly variable.
   
   
3. Gimmick - Almost like Coward, except you have a single 'trump card' ability that almost makes up for all the suckage.
   

Tsukino Yuuki - By Aelms: Coward Build
Your character sucked badly. I think it's the worst of the bunch. Seriously, you put all your points into general stat gain? What good is that if you don't have anything that utilizes the stats? Agility scales really badly with movement speed, and if all you have is a weak sauce baseball bat(Weapon 12 is low compared to other Masters' weapons)...you can run away slightly faster than the other Masters. It's like you expect your Servant to lose most engagements. Obviously you can't outrun a Servant, so that speed is pointless anyway. Your backstory has a bit of a bland tone and is not written well, but that's fine, not everyone can be Nathaniel Hawthorne.

Gabriel, the Collector - By Belmont: Bruiser Build
All around, this guy is probably the best Master in the game. Proven successful in battle numerous times, he could stand up to even Berserker without faltering. Good armor level, usage of Alternate Form, and damage output to match a Servant. According to grimwind having regeneration keeps you from dying, so that's a plus too. His abilities are nicely integrated with the story. He does have low prana, but he's not prana intensive anyway. If I could say he has any weakness it would be that he is bad against ranged attacks.

Robert Kane - By BobbyKah: Bruiser Build
You made a decent character. I don't think he was ever in an actual battle, but his abilities are pretty sweet. You could stand to add more armor though, level 10 is a pittance. Healing can't be used for when your own body is damaged severely, but if your intention for taking it was to help out others, then it's all good.
Backstory is um.....straight and to the point, albeit short.

Matou Bengoshi - By Sandow: Gimmick Build
You basically did a double medic thing with the companion. Admirable but you can't heal faster than most characters deal damage. Your companion's channeling ability was an epic trump card that could have been the most OP in the game, but the way you intended to use it was incredibly stupid. Basically you just kept her at home as an extra life. What kind of idiot actually intends to get killed? The tactic of tricking the enemy into think you are dead, it's a good one, but probably not worth actually dying for. And don't get me started on his backstory. You are so unoriginal when it comes to these things. coughHE'S PHOENIX WRIGHTcough

Satoru Tohsaka - By Me: Bruiser Build
Of course, this being my character, I must espouse how cool all my ability concepts are and how I explained things so scientifically. As you can see I prepared for almost any combat situation. My attacks are ranged unlike Belmont's so I can trade off against other ranged opponents. It doesn't do the maximum damage allowed for a Master though, I failed at reading the rules there. I really don't know actually how good my character would be because I DIED BEFORE ACTUALLY BEING ABLE TO DO ANYTHING. :(
I wrote a backstory kind of like the Einzbern's. I could write a story a lot better than that, so I feel kind of bad.
I understand that we usually see flaws more easily in others than we do in ourselves, so I'd like your take on my character.


Mary (Alias) Supervisor - By Father Vincent: Gimmick Build
This is what I like to call Crippling Overspecialization. Literally, she's in a wheelchair. This split personality chick is absolutely divine for what her role is, but nothing else. The Supervisor isn't supposed to fight anyway so I can't really comment on how 'good' the build is for this game. She has the most detailed and well written back story.

Dan Reet - By Isonar: Bruiser Build
By far the weirdest character, not including mine. The main tactic I see this guy built for is to grab onto an opponent and burn them with your Alternate Form aura thing. Ignite is weak in damage.
Your hp regen cut defect is really bad for you, it kinda cancels out the regen perk you took? Whatever.
Your back story is really random, and there are a lot of spelling issues.

Hana Arisoto - By Kaede
I must ask, why do your characters always have the Medication defect?
She actually does not fit any of the 3 build types, sort of a half medic, half assassin. With some adjustment she would be pretty good in battle. Background is unfinished in grimwind's post.

Masato (Shounen) - By Meroy: Coward Build
Your combat abilities are not up to fighting Servants but otherwise are decent. Recon and scan abilities are really nice, that's what makes you unique from the others. The reason I designated Masato as a Coward is the stealth abilities. I'm sorry, it is GOOD, for recon and stuff, but in battle it's basically a way to avoid being instagibbed by a Servant. I think your back story is second best.

Hai Jiang Mo - by RMX: Gimmick Build
Your character is pretty much a subpar Bruiser, but that Alchemical sword is a trump card that can seal your victory in a 1v1 encounter. Seriously how did you manage to lose with all of that stuff and the OP as hell Rider?

Game Master Commentary
Tsukino Yuuki
With combat aimed character designs I think one major problem was that players had no idea of the servant stats beforehand, so they couldn't measure how well they would manage against them in a fight. Well it's like that in the real series too but game-wise kinda annoying I can assume.

Gabriel, the Collector
Was obviously built with a single idea in mind — going melee against a servant. His first servantless character sheet was even more capable of doing that.
Character concepts that focused on one or two gimmicks, as Corenat said, worked better than character that knew a bit of everything.

Robert Cane
Servantless, didn't have much to do with the war.

Matou Bengoshi
If I remember right the first character name was blatantly Phoenix Wright and his assistant Maya Fey. I decided to let him keep his character as long as he changed the most obvious stuff. Nothing special on perks, just the gimmick companion. Might have been useful for channelling other masters on her body.

Satoru Tohsaka
First thing that comes into mind from back-story is Amnesia: Dark Descent - but lets skip that. Only character capable of flight. I had doubts about this ability cause it didn't seem to fit nasuverse and would be hard to balance. Might have been viable option to escape from couple servants, kinda depends. Can't find much of a use for the items. Rifle might have been useful if you cooperated with someone. You have decent combat capabilities as well.

Mary (Alias) Supervisor
Sushi wanted to use almost all of his points to the Omniscience gimmick. The initial idea was that he could see anything happening in the town with great detail. It was nerfed on the process to its current form. He also had bad luck being matched with Berserker as their characters don't work well together.

Dan Reet
Not much to say. Weird character concept all together. Conflicting perks and defects.

Hana Arisoto
Support character as I see it.

Masato
Stealthy character, actually would have been possible to remain stealthed around couple servants. This character concept would have worked well with the knight classes. People were walking alongside with their servants most of the time. Servant challenges enemy to battle alone and draws their attention. Masato makes a stealth attack against the unguarded master. In most cases free damage or force to burn a command seal.

Hai Jiang Mo
Probably the strongest combo of this war. Also a very good back-story.

Now that I take a second look at the above writing it doesn't add much to Corenats review. So I'll just make couple tier lists and leave the writing to him.

Favorite Characters
The character concepts I liked the most this game. I'm measuring the tiers by how original the character and abilities were, but also how related they were to nasuverse.

• A: Gabriel (Belmont), Mary (Father Vincent), Masato (Meroy) and Hai Jiang Mo (RMX)
  
• B: Tsukino Yuuki (Aelms), Satoru Tohsaka (Corenat Rovarnus)
  
• C: Hana Arisoto (kaede)
  
• D: Robert Cane (BobbyKah)
  
• E: Matou Bengoshi (Capitalist Pig), Dan Reet (Isonar)

Strongest Pair
The strongest master and servant pair listed by their character details alone, not how they actually managed in the war. This takes into account their characters abilities, but also their personalities. The one thing that made me sad was that nobody paid much attention to the servants and their personalities. So much potential for roleplay was lost.

1. Phantom Trader + Rider
   Strong servant and a decent master to back it up. Their personalities do not conflict with each other either.
   
2. Collector + Caster
   This is like Kuzuki Caster combo from Fate all over again. Their tactics aren't dependant on Territory Creation which is a huge plus. However if they were fight on their territory, people would need to team-up to defeat them. No conflicting personalities.
   
3. Medic + Saber
   Strong servant, high damage noble phantasm. Master has some supporting skills and would probably get fine along with her servant. However the master is a definite weak spot in a fight if brought along. Their combo still earns the third place mostly due to Saber.
   
4. Einzbern + Archer
   One combo that actually might have some teamwork problems, but nothing major. Also Archers kit was stronger than anticipated due to a simple miscalcuation on her Noble Phantasm armor values. If it weren't for that I would have placed Shounen + Assassin combo on this spot.
   
5. Shounen + Assassin
   I feel like with right tactics this combo could have overcome Lancer and Archer. Shounens character would have had stronger synergy with the knight classes. Combined with Assassin, Shounen has three major information gathering methods.
   
6. Matou + Lancer
   Matous character isn't meant for battle at all and he doesn't have any other useful skills to cover that up. Also Lancer this time around is very situational about who he could beat. Also due to Lancers personality the combo with most teamwork problems.
   
7. Mary + Berserker
   The worst combo of this war. Crippled character and a servant that can't handle complicated actions. Archer or Assassin would have been far more suitable character for her. Mary shouldn't have much problems controlling Berserker however.
   

I have to ask, why do you rate the Einzbern Master so highly? He had 3 straight up stat boosters and a pretty bad weapon, which I don't think is very original.

As for strongest pairs, why not comment on hypothetical pairings that weren't in the game too, like Shounen + Knight or Me + Berserker? I'm not suggesting you list every single possible pairing, just ones that you think would be particularly good or bad.

As for loss of roleplay, I believe it has to do with the nature of the game. They did not make their Servants, they don't really care as much about acting them out properly. You'll either have to enforce it or roleplay the Servants yourself.

Corenat Rovarnus wrote:I have to ask, why do you rate the Einzbern Master so highly? He had 3 straight up stat boosters and a pretty bad weapon, which I don't think is very original.

As for strongest pairs, why not comment on hypothetical pairings that weren't in the game too, like Shounen + Knight or Me + Berserker? I'm not suggesting you list every single possible pairing, just ones that you think would be particularly good or bad.

As for loss of roleplay, I believe it has to do with the nature of the game. They did not make their Servants, they don't really care as much about acting them out properly. You'll either have to enforce it or roleplay the Servants yourself.

Regarding Einzbern I thought the stat boosters were somewhat an interesting idea, especially Evasion Burst. His character doesn't use the premade character perks at all. And baseball as a weapon, how awesome is that. Backstory is nasuverse related albeit it wasn't explained how the renegade group knew about Tsukino Ayane. The ranking criteria doesn't take into account how the kit actually managed in war.

Hypothetical pairings sounds interesting. I'll do that today later.

I could have enforced a set of rules for each servant. Things that they'll do and what they won't. Loyalty meter that affects their combat capabilities. Would that have been a good or bad mechanic I don't know.



EDIT:
Other Strong Pairs
Here are other pairs that might have made a good or bad combo on the war. I'll do this by listing each servant and trying to choose which master would fit them the best or worst. I'll also comment on the servantless character what would have been their best or worst servant. On this listing the servantless character have been nerfed a bit to reflect on the master character sheet limitations. The pairs are ranked between E-A.
C is just strong pair without any synergies.

Robert Cane, fairly powerful spell damage but easy to track down due to the Police Officer job. I'm going to assume that it would a top priority to keep up with his job rather than abandon it to win the war, at least for the first six or so days.
He doesn't have any expectational synergies with the servants so his best pair would be Saber (C). His worst pair would be Berserker (D) who would limit his actions during day time.

Satoru Tohsaka, isn't a hinder on battles and has some interesting tools available.
His strongest pair would be Caster (B). He could enhance your combat capabilities more and make use of the fractal generator. As for your worst combo there isn't really anything — you could work with any servant.

Dan Reet, his kit was built around the fact that he was going to remain servantless the whole war. He works pretty much with anyone expect Lancer (D), the pair would be too melee oriented.

Then we move on the other pairs.

• Archer
  Works well by herself. If left roaming the city can launch surprise attacks all day long to enemies while gathering information with her familiars. I feel that her best combo would be Supervisor (B). Although this would leave Supervisor open for attacks, there shouldn't be a problem unless she makes herself known as a master rather than the supervisor. The amount of information to work would be a huge asset. As Archer works fine by herself, the only bad pair she could have is someone who drags her down during real battle while Supervisor fills this spot as well, there is the Medic (D) who has the lowest AGI of all the masters.
  
  
• Assassin
  Again the Supervisor (B) with her information gathering abilities would be a strong pair. But also Matou (B) if he could pull the Assassins master is dead trick. Assassin hates teamwork and the Church which is minus to the Supervisor. While Matou has the Will not betray an ally defect, which in my opinion is very limiting when having Assassin. Her worst partner would be Collector (D) with both Never betrays an ally and Always keeps his words defects. Also their straight up to face combat synergy feels like a mess. Gabriel has potential to fight defensively against servants, but that also matches for Assassin. I feel that their only chance would be to pull Assassin noble phantasm over the battlefield.
  
  
• Caster
  Collector (A) definitely. They cover both melee and ranged combat exceptionally with their combat. Tohsaka (B) giving Caster more prana to work with, while also being a good offensive master. Supervisor (C), while both character focus on camping tactics supervisors inability to move hinders the combo somewhat. Maybe if the focused camping the grail spawning site they could force the enemy come to their territory. Caster works at least (C) rank with the other masters.
  
  
• Saber
  Shounen (B+) maybe. (A) might not be too far off either. Saber takes all the attention during fights and Shounen attempts to make stealth attacks to the unprotected master. Success depends on the servants awareness, their covering range and the environment. Saber works at least (C) rank with the other masters.
  
  
• Lancer
  Very situational servant this time around. A very strong duelist with his mystic eyes. I can't think of any exceptionally strong partner for him. However Matou (D), and Supervisor (D) would drag him down a bit during combat.
  
  
• Berserker
  Supervisor (E), worst pair of the game. Supervisor can't make use of his gimmick at all and they are confined to a single location through the whole game. This is another good pair for Shounen (B+) — their tactic works without instructing Berserker. Robet Cane (D) explained previously.
  
  
• Rider
  Works well with all masters. Tohsaka (B) for providing more prana for his noble phantasm. Robert Cane (C+) for having highest prana capacity.

Those are the combos that come in mind after putting in some thought. There's room for debating of course.

If Rider works well with all Masters and Tohsaka works well with all Servants, wouldn't that make the pairing A?

There's not strong enough synergy between them imo. A rank might not be too far off though.

Corenat pulling no punches in calling my character terrible ;_;

But yeah. I really foiled my character making by trying to set all these unrealistic goals that I had no idea how to fulfill. Ended up just putting my points into stats that 'seem' like they would be useful. Also underestimated how it was completely impossible to set up a Master vs. Master scenario.

It was fun as hell trying to bluff my character into being anything remotely threatening though. I'm pretty sure Grim realised how crappy my character ended up being and gave me the only Servant I had synergy with :P

All the servants were randomized unless you had a perk which matched you with a servant class of your wish. I think only kaede took that perk for Saber.

Aelms wrote:It was fun as hell trying to bluff my character into being anything remotely threatening though. I'm pretty sure Grim realised how crappy my character ended up being and gave me the only Servant I had synergy with :P

As soon as you took out that baseball bat I immediately thought "Watch out, we got a badass over here." And not in a sincere tone. In a hypothetical 1v1 you would lose to even Matou without his companion(who is pretty pitiful), he could basically just punch you to death as he can run away, heal himself and then come back while you were still injured.
I'm sorry for the harshness though, I'm just pissed that you were the one who I was at the mercy of right before the game ended.

I took the rifle in case I didn't have time or it wasn't necessary to transform into Alternate Form that my main weapon was locked up in. As it turns out I didn't have time to do anything because of the retarded turn order.

Corenat, the character I was planning yo use for your game was basically using the same concept I was using here, with improvements on what I see didn't work.
But I never heard about that game again

It's still running right now, it is Day 5 and you can join in as a servantless(or police officer/businessman etc. whatever) if you want.