Should You Pull? The Scent & Sights of Autumn

If you're looking for a healer, some unique Spirit Power support, or Wood or Metal Breaks, this is a pretty alright banner. Minoriko Aki is a healer who has Wood and Metal Breaks in spades, with the rare asset of having a kit of only All targeting Spell Cards and Last Word - useful for some three wave farms. Shizuha Aki provides Spirit Power to the entire team on a skill, which is unique support, and otherwise provides Wood and Metal Breaks in spades too. 

+Both Spell Cards as well as her Last Word are All targeting, making her fantastic for three wave Full Auto
+Possesses the rare ability to All Break Paralyze Barriers
+Can partner with Medicine to brute force past fights with Abnormal Barrier Recovery
+Slightly above average access to both Metal and Wood
+Solid healing and Barrier recovery support
+Has Power Link, which is always great

-Low damage & mixed scaling
-No offensive team support

+Access to Wood and Metal element attacks
+Provides team-wide accuracy support
+Provides team-wide P support
+Applies an Electrified Barrier on her first Spell Card

-Low overall damage

Among the myriad of gods within Gensokyo is a fairly minor harvest goddess named Minoriko Aki. Whilst far from the most powerful, Minoriko is still rather popular, to the point of being called to the Human Village every year as a special guest for their harvest festival. Due to her minor status, her ability to bless a harvest is reserved for only crops that ripen in autumn. She also has something of an inferiority complex about how minor a god she is. Overall, she’s a friendly god, and she’ll still greet any humans with open arms and a plentitude of blessings for their harvest - so long as they give her the appropriate worship of course.

In LostWord, Minoriko’s roles are that of a healer with solid Break support (especially Paralyze Barriers) and having a kit consisting of only All targeting Spell Cards (which includes her Last Word). The most notable part of her kit is definitely her second Spell Card, Bumper Crop: Promise of the Wheat God, as it can break Paralyze Barriers - which are in abundant enough supply that, with the proper teammates, she can perform a Full Break against many enemies. It also possesses 1/2/3 Wood Breaks for 0/1/2 Spirit Power, which is above average, and heals your party for 50% of Minoriko’s Max HP - making it overall a very versatile and useful Spell Card. 

Her other Spell Card, Autumn Sign: The Autumn Sky and a Maiden's Heart is also notable for a Anomaly Break - in this case, Poison. Whilst it may seem a bit strange as the only relevant Poison Barrier inflictor is Medicine, who can already break her own Barriers, Medicine runs into an issue where she can’t Full Break an enemy team that has Barrier Anomaly recovery, as they recover before she can use her Last Word. However, if you use one of Medicine’s Poison inflicting Spell Cards, and on the same turn use Autumn Sign: The Autumn Sky and a Maiden's Heart, then you can completely bypass this issue as you’ll inflict and break the Poison before the opponent can heal it. Additionally, it also possesses a above average 1/2/3 Metal Breaks for 0/1/2 Spirit Power.

Her Last Word, Toyosuki's Hainuwele Legend, is a bit of an odd Last Word. Whilst it’s a All targeting Spell Card with two elements, it’s slanted towards 4 Wood Breaks and 2 Metal Breaks at 3 Spirit Power, which isn’t as universally useful as if it’d be 3 Breaks each, but it’s still a fantastic source of even more Breaks. It will also recover 100% of Minoriko's Max HP to your entire party.

Lastly, Minoriko’s skills also give her a lot of extra healing. Eager Wait gives your whole party 25% of Minoriko’s Max HP on a 4 turn cooldown, Autumn Enshrining Day can be excellent support for Yin Hard attackers due to its 2 Levels of Yin DEF UP for 2 turns for the whole party with a 80% chance for 1 more level (and can be good defensive support against heavily Yin-focused enemies), and Prayer for Abundance is 1 Barrier restored to the party every 8 turns with a 50% chance for one more. 

Unfortunately, all of this combined does mean Minoriko is rather lacking in damage herself (and scaling her can be rather difficult as her Last Word is heavily mixed between Yin and Yang), and she lacks offensive support. Still, her Break potential is top notch, she provides a lot of healing, and her kit consisting entirely of All targeting Spell Cards and Last Word can be useful in 3 Wave Farms (or just to let you breeze past Normal and Hard mode event stages on full auto). 

Overall, Minoriko’s a rather potent Friend. Just make sure to agree with her that Autumn is the best season, and never pass up one of her sweet potatoes.

The goddess of autumn leaves, Shizuha Aki is an even more minor goddess than her sister, Minoriko Aki. It’s a rather niche thing to be a god of, after-all - though since it’s so niche, Shizuha doesn’t really have competition, and thus gets a monopoly on faith for the rare person who needs a goddess of autumn leaves. Like her sister, she detests winter, and acts in a rather smug fashion about her role. She’s responsible for painting the leaves for Autumn (which she does by hand, which is why the color of the trees is so uneven), and scattering them (which she accomplishes by just kicking the gosh darn tree). 

In LostWord, Shizuha is notable for being the only unit in the game currently to be able to grant the entire team Spirit Power thanks to her third skill, Autumn Poem giving the entire team 0.8 Spirit Power. Whilst a bit of a niche value, this can help teams fire off their Last Words at full power quicker, or simply give them the extra Spirit Power they need for boosting their Spell Cards for Breaks or other effects. Additionally, her second skill Autumn Wind gives the whole team 1 level of Accuracy and Evasion UP for 2 turns with a 50% chance for another level of each - unfortunately, it is rather inconsistent, and thus is reserved for only hard fights where you won’t mind attempting them a few times to get the high roll of 2 Accuracy UP. 

Outside of this, Shizuha is also a fairly solid breaker. Her first Spell Card, Leaf Sign: Falling Leaves of Madness, has Solo targeting and not only has a average 1/1/2/3 Wood Breaks for 0/1/2/3 Spirit Power, it also inflicts 2 Paralyze Barriers to a foe with a 60% chance for one more for 3 turns. This pairs well with her sister Minoriko, who can break Paralyze Barriers, though it is somewhat let down by its Solo targeting compared to other options for Paralyze Barriers. 

Her second Spell Card, Autumn Sign: Falling Blast, not only boosts her party’s Yin ATK and DEF by 1 level for 2 turns with a 80% chance for an additional level for each, it also has a 30% chance to inflict 1 Layer of Poison Barrier to all targets - whilst a rather annoying low chance, if you’re willing to retry a fight a few times it can certainly add even more Yin damage to the team’s output if not going for a Full Break. 

Finally her Last Word, The Sorrow of the Banana a bit of an odd Last Word. Whilst it’s a All targeting Spell Card with two elements, it’s slanted towards 4 Metal Breaks and 2 Wood Breaks at 3 Spirit Power, which isn’t as universally useful as if it’d be 3 Breaks each, but it’s still a fantastic source of even more Breaks. It also applies some Evasion UP, but due to being on a Last Word this isn’t very useful. 

Unfortunately, Shizuha’s support is finicky, rather niche, and her damage is low (and hard to scale due to a somewhat mixed Last Word). This all combined makes for a unit who is overall average, although she’s definitely a very solid Friend when you’re in need of what she provides. Just make sure not to scoff at the idea of autumn leaves being important - she takes her job very seriously, as narrow as it might be.