MMM - Mechanized Minions Make themselves a Menace on Motors, from Mikawa to Mino, Militants Muster their Might! (Gudaguda Super Goryokaku)

It’s honestly pretty surprising with how much preference has been given to Japanese Servants compared to other nationalities that we didn’t get the completion of the classical Dragon-Tiger rivalry established in the Sengoku period which endures in Japanese culture to this day. Well, it probably started with Chinese mythology somewhere since a lot of Japanese mythology tends to piggyback off of it (Looking at you, Byakko and Seiryuu.)

With so much of his profile locked behind event progression I can hardly comment on FGO’s depiction of him, but well, there’s a reason none of the big name Daimyou of the Sengoku period were around once Tokugawa Ieyasu ushered in the Edo period.

Shingen is something of a mixed bag for his base stats. As an SSR Rider, he’s never going to have an incredible statline in the first place, but among his competition he ranks 6th lowest for Attack, and has the 6th highest HP in turn. It doesn’t help that much of his competition are Riders with far better overall parameters than him such as Achilles or Odysseus, and as such don’t lose out much in terms of HP for their far superior attack.

Things may sound bleak, but Shingen does have some compensation for his middling base stats. He packs the standard class skills of Riding and Magic Resistance, giving his sole Quick card an appreciated boost, and a decent passive resistance to debuffs, but he also packs a unique class skill in Territory Creation (Takeda), providing a small boost to his Arts card, and a more-important 10% Critical Resist at all times, making him essentially immune to critical hits from most enemies, or significantly less likely to be struck by one.

So at the very least his durability is nothing to scoff at, and he gets some respectable boosts to his lesser card types.

With a BBBAQ card deck, Shingen is gonna need those boosts to his Arts and Quick cards to shore up lack of quantity with quality instead. With his base NP gain of 0.57%, his 4-hit Arts card comes out to 2.394 base Arts gain, solidly above average even for a Servant with only 1 Arts card. His Quick card is similarly pretty decent at NP generation, though not on the level of most 4-hit Quicks due to his low base NP gain.

The real weakness lies in his Extra card, which produces a decent amount of NP gauge, but ultimately is still fairly poor in the grander scale of things. As his Busters won’t be particularly dependable for NP gain (Well, they produce 2% in Arts or Mighty chains, 4% on a crit), he’ll need to milk the most out of his Arts and Quick card for NP gauge, though that isn’t too difficult with a Rider’s star weight.

Shingen has a much better profile for stargen. With all of his card hitcounts being 4 or higher, pretty much any chain from him produces a notable sum of stars, especially with the Quick chain stargen bonus. It’s a particularly abnormal quality for a Buster Gorilla to have, so he can reap the benefits of meaty Buster crit chains while not having to depend too much on his allies for stargen.

How does Takeda Shingen shape up overall? Well on the one hand, he’s as fast as the wind, quiet as a forest, daring as fire, and immovable as the mountain:

However, he’s also as weak as a fart, unwanted like a fungus, goes up like a light, and interesting as a rock:

I’ll be the first here to admit, Sengoku Rance was one of my first forays into the more risqué side of weeb culture, and the experience of seeing all those famous Japanese Daimyo from the period, even in their bizarre Rance-ified forms, was quite the trend-setter for me. I have fond memories of crushing more difficult fights in that game with Uesugi Kenshin by my side, and Takeda Shingen, as her rival, left an impression…because he literally didn’t exist. He was just a fake figurehead made up by the generals of the Takeda clan because they essentially didn’t trust themselves to govern the clan properly individually, and needed an inspirational figure.

How’s that for some Fate-like lore bending?

But I’m getting off topic. The reason I went down that diatribe is because I’m a fan of Takeda Shingen as a historical figure, so it pains me when he’s not respectably good, but not comically bad, either, just so middle-of-the-road it’s hard to even remind myself what a typical Servant should be.

He’s certainly better than Servants I’ve lambasted before in a similar position like Europa, but not to a degree that makes me feel wholly comfortable. Being able to farm his class advantage but with great investment in team and time, having solid tools for difficult content but not really the damage output to match, and with a great stargen profile but no critical damage buffs to capitalise. Many of his flaws can be covered by supports, but other Servants can simply have those flaws be their focus instead, and become even greater at what they do.

But in the grand scheme of things he’s…passable. Shingen will accomplish what you expect him to do, and has some rarer tools at his disposal which will give him a time in the sun should the circumstances be favourable, but he’s certainly not a stand-out Servant that you’ll call upon time and time again, should you have him. If you’re considering pulling him for gameplay reasons, then uh, I’d check if you own Castoria and Habetrot then ask yourself again. If not, he’s a decent pick. Rath™ Seal of Approval.

I have to say, it’s a real rarity to see a heroic spirit in Fate who was directly involved in deadly combat, actually existed with very detailed documentation of their deeds, but died of old age rather than battle, assassination, or some disease at a young age.

As a result, Shinpachi was a rare first-hand witness to the biggest events of the Bakumatsu period, living on to give interviews about it in the Meiji Restoration, and dying shortly after the beginning of the first World War. It’s only about 25 years ago now that his memoirs were uncovered and published, too, so he’s one of the few historical figures in Fate you can get a very personalised understanding of.

And obviously, this old man looks cool as hell with his oni-like forehead protector, believe it!

The 4* Berserker class lineup has been a mountainous peak and a billion Sisyphus’s since its inception. Heracles’s incredible parameter lineup has left him the gold standard for the Berserker statline since inception, with the highest attack stat and a good HP stat to boot, and Shinpachi is…obviously not going to break that streak.
He’s a modern-era Japanese Servant - he never had a chance! Regardless Shinpachi isn’t doing too bad for himself - With the 9th best Attack stat and 6th worst HP stat, he might look a little weak on paper, but for Berserkers the minute 100-point differences in HP don’t matter that much due to their inherent frailty. Shinpachi does at least pack a solid Attack stat, reaping the maximum benefits of the Berserker class’s naturally powerful offence.

As for passives, he’s not anything special sadly, with a low-ranking Madness Enhancement that boosts his Busters slightly and probably makes him prone to beating your ass with a cane if you call him a boomer.

This gacha appears to be one for the Buster gorillas, with Shinpachi also packing the BBBAQ card deck. With a base NP gain of 0.67%, Shinpachi’s Arts card comes out to a very typical 2.01 base Arts gain, slightly below the average for a 1-Arts card deck.

While his Arts card is a little less than ideal, his other cards are thankfully quite solid - his 4-hit Quick is more or less average for NP gain, his Busters put in a reasonably amount of NP gauge with the Arts first card bonus, and his 6-hit Extra produces a good amount of NP gauge, a welcome break from what feels like a long streak of Servants with low base NP gain and middling hitcounts on their Extra cards.

On the other side of things, Shinpachi is reasonable for stargen. While his Busters don’t have a superb number of hits behind them for producing stars, his Quick is good enough, and that 6-hit Extra card will produce a bunch of stars when it gets the chance to, but ultimately with his lack of Quicks and Berserker-class base stargen he’s unlikely to make a big splash of stars to begin with.

So ultimately Shinpachi is pretty average in both aspects, but not really weak on either front.

So how is Shinpachi overall? On the one hand, he’s a fearsome captain of the Shinsengumi, the fury of a dragon in his sword blows:

However, he’s also a washed-up old man who needs to realise the age of swords has long-since passed. Get with the times:

As often as I’ll call Berserkers the best class in the game, it’s worth bearing in mind you can’t be a powerful Servant just by being a Berserker. The offensive benefits of the class are overwhelmingly strong, but they only bear fruit when applied in a way that’s effective in the game’s meta. Shinpachi is a pretty good example of that problem. Fundamentally the numbers in his kit aren’t underpowered, and they work together for a straightforward game plan. It’s just that the game plan doesn’t really have a place in the part of the game it’s meant to work on - high-difficulty content.

I’ll make it clear that this isn’t me just spreading anti-Buster propaganda or something. Some Buster Servants like Draco or Superhuman Orion are really strong for a number of reasons, but usually that’s because they adapt to the conditions of the game in ways that single-crit turn glass cannons don’t.

Shinpachi takes too long to build up to his big damage turn, the damage output he has is usually excessive in a bad way, and after that he takes too long to reach the same peak again. And when you’ve got a kit focused on tackling bosses in difficult content but can’t even overcome the basic gauge break mechanic stopping your game plan, there’s a clear issue. He might be fun to use given how big those numbers can get, but he shouldn’t be your first choice for a Berserker, given how much he’s outclassed by alternative options and their superior playstyles.

the fight over Japan, most of the important factions by that point respected the power of the weapon, or even fielded it themselves. Takeda Shingen himself famously declared firearms the most important arms in the future of warfare, and commanded his men to trade their spears for matchlock guns where possible.

As a result, it’s unsurprising that there are famous mercenary groups like Saika Magoichi’s Saika Ikki in the Sengoku period, who sold both information and their expertise in firearms. The name of our Servant in question is actually a title, handed down to the leader of the clan, and mercenary group by extension. Due to the actual little information about the personal lives of the individual holders of the name over history, it seems like it was the perfect chance to do some Fate-ification and make them into a girl.

Though considering there were troops of all-female riflemen (riflewomen?) during the period, maybe it’s not that out of hand.

With the 4* Archer lineup as competition, Saika starts off with her statline being…pretty awful in relativity. Possessing the tied 4th worst Attack stat of the class/rarity bracket, she only has the 8th best HP stat in return, getting a double whammy of awful by having both a low attack stat and just poor stat distribution overall.

She does get some compensation for it in her passives, at least. Her typical Magic Resistance and Independent Action provide some basic debuff resistance and a solid boost to critical damage, while her unique passive Item Construction (Gun) grants a useful boost to both Arts cards and their critical damage. Given she has only 1 Arts card, it’s not that crazy, but any bonus to compensate for the poor Attack stat she’s been dealt with is useful.

Finishing off the trifecta of Arts card deprivation this event, Saika has only one Arts card in her BBAQQ card deck. With 3 hits on it, and a base NP gain of 0.75%, she clocks in at a very solid 2.36 base Arts gain with her passive factored in, a fair bit above average. While having a great Arts card is a strong point, that’s not all, with her outstanding 5-hit Quick cards carrying the entirety of her NP gain on her back. These Quicks provide as much NP gauge as some weaker Servant’s Arts cards do, while simultaneously being obviously incredible for stargen.

Her Extra card’s solid hitcount is similarly quite effective at producing NP gauge, as it’s piggybacking off her decent base NP gain, and her Busters aren’t the worst, either, with the Arts first card bonus behind them.

The real star here (heh) is Saika’s stargen, though. With the spectacular Quick cards at her disposal and high hitcounts where it matters, Saika can practically shower herself and the team as a whole with stars, fueling her critical damage output and improving her NP gain by proxy. With the Archer class’s good star weight at her back, she really won’t have an ounce of trouble filling her NP gauge.

Where does this place Saika, overall? Well on the one hand she’s a veritable bulletstorm, a fury of lead, the mercenary everyone wants to buy and be:

However, she’s also incapable of shooting the broad side of a barn without touching it first, and…isn’t she supposed to use an arquebus? No, her crime is that she ignored me! I am Arquebus!

Even if I’m personally not as interested in her as a Servant compared to the men of this event, Saika makes for a very dependable welfare Archer to have at one’s disposal. Her critical damage output is some of the best in the game for a freebie, and paired with a clean game plan and a handful of useful utility tools, she certainly can be a potent damage dealer when deployed in the right content.

It’s a little sad that, in spite of her possession of solid NP refund and a gauge charger, she can’t do ST farming in the same way people like Summer Hokusai can, but she remains a very solid Archer despite it, especially if you have access to Summer Skadi to max out her potential, for both NP and critical damage alike. I didn’t mention it earlier, but it’s also worth noting Saika has the rare append skill anti-Berserker class bonus, making her also exceptionally good at killing that class with both it and the natural class advantage in tow.

Saika simply makes for a strong Archer at zero cost that can dish out more than enough damage to clear difficult content and also provide a number of utility effects to get past individual mechanics or gimmicks to a fight. So far as welfare Servants go, she’s well worth raising and keeping in your back pocket. Rath™ Seal of Approval.