Should You Pull? Festival: Gods of Clay & Chickens

Maybe, veering toward Yes. The banners of LostWord Global’s 1st Anniversary are starting to slow down a bit (at least, for now…), leaving space for these two downright great Friends to be left in a good position. 

Kutaka Niwatari is a mix of good HP and Barrier support while mainly elementally breaking with Water and Wood. Even with a sudden mainly-Sun Last Word, her spells hold some above-average breaks for General Friends. She has some Agility support as well for Friends needing the extra buff for Slice scaling. 

As for Keiki Haniyasushin, her kit does several things, from hitting hard to breaking barriers with Earth bullets and Poison anomaly breaks, to being a decent CRIT and Yang support. She isn’t doing everything, but the effort in all of her attributes and her final damage numbers solidify her a top spot in Lost Word’s meta.

Along with the two Friends is the new 5* story card, Idola-Deus. This mainly serves as a great Earth spell buff, giving a 40% damage increase to any Earth bullet. It also gives 2 levels of Yang ATK UP, but note it only lasts for a single turn, or just for the spell it is used for. Still, the card stands out for its very good Yang stat sticks, both for offense and defense.

The main competition in terms of other banners is the continuing B3 Kaguya Houraisan, as well as the now-rerunning B3 Watatsuki no Toyohime, who can definitely be higher-tier threats compared to this prayer’s features. Outside of the Ultra Festival Friends are the A10 Sanae Kochiya and Mononobe no Futo Prayer, along with the soon rerunning A12 Byakuren Hijiri and A6 Cirno. Compared to the Ultra Festivals, though, Kutaka and Keiki can definitely compete against these pairs in terms of viability. Additionally, while all 4 of these Friends leave the 19th, this prayer remains until June 24th, giving a very long time to pull!

From least to most expensive in exchange points, Idola-Deus will cost 50 Exchange Points, Kutaka 100 Exchange Points, and Keiki 150 Exchange Points due to their status as a 5* story card, General Friend, and Festival Friend respectively. If you are still hesitant on pulling, there is always an Ascending God Crystal Step-UP if you want to push your luck with only 60 God Crystals! And as part of 1st Anniversary, there is still a 2x Fortune Dust boost in effect for an easy 20 Fortune Dust.

+0P Wood Focus Shot
+Tons of healing and barrier restore throughout Skills and Spell Cards
+Some party wide speed buffs, and personally benefits from Slicing scaling
+Immune to poison, freeze and burn
+Spirit Power UP switch-in effect

-Middling damage without speed support
-Weak passive skills
-Weak Yang ATK buffs gimp damage further

+ 0P Earth on Focus shot
+ Amazing Earth, Star, and anomaly breaks on spells
+ Poison on second spell can be immediately broken at 2P
+ Incredible setup damage via Last Word
+ Team utility in the form of CRIT and Yang support
- Underwhelming turn 1 damage

Idola-Deus
[Numbers in brackets are buffs at Max Limit Break or stat sticks at Max Enhance]

• Earth Power 20% [40%] UP (1T)
• Yang ATK 1 (2) level(s) UP (1T)
• Yang ATK +30 [+100]
• Yang DEF +30 [+80]

Kutaka Niwatari is the one of the lesser of the eight million gods, being a god of chickens, and works in Hell as a subordinate to Shiki Eiki, Yamaxanadu. Her memory is pretty poor, and she sometimes forgets her orders (likely due to being part bird in some way), but she still carries out her duties to the Yama faithfully. Her ability, “to cure throat illnesses”, is a perfect match for the Yama, and she spends most of the day talking as a part of her judge duties, so Kutaka can heal her throat when it runs dry or sore. This birdbrain is an A Tier Friend.

Kutaka joins us in Lost Word as a Recovery type Friend, which are rare as things currently stand. She’s nothing crazy, and not exactly on the levels of B3 Toyohime or anything, but she’s still a solid healer with party wide healing, barrier restore and barrier cleanse throughout not only all of her Skills but also her Spell Cards. She also has a decent amount of party wide Speed UP support, allowing for her to be slotted into Speed type teams as a tank with some synergistic benefits, not to mention Kutaka has a good bit of Slicing scaling herself, upping the damage of her own Spell Cards.

Starting with her Spread Shot, Delivery, it’s really pretty solid. Has some Water, Wood and Sun, self Dodge UP allows her to dodge-tank a little in tandem with her healing, and it even has a little Slicing. Her Focus Shot, Three-Wheeled Foot, has Wood at 0P, is sure-hit, and also has a chance for some Speed UP, synergizing with her Slicing scaling throughout her kit. Then, just like the Spread Shot, there’s some Sun and Water elsewhere in the bullet lines.

As mentioned in the previous section, Kutaka’s Spell Cards are pretty straightforward and what you’d expect from a Recovery class Friend: lots of pre and post-effect healing and barrier restore with some Dodge and Speed UP sprinkled in there too. Her first Spell Card, Water Sign: “Water Sharing (Ultimate Tribulation of Mikumari)”, is AoE, with Pre-Attack effects of party wide Heal 30% and increase Barrier by 1. Its elements are 2 Water and 2 Wood, and it has a good bit of Self Dodge UP, playing off of her Focus Shot’s same ability. Her second Spell Card, Bloody Battle: “Oni Passage Highly Spirited Oniwatari”, is ST, with 3 Water and 3 Wood for elements, and its Pre-Atk effect is target Dodge 2 levels DOWN (2T), which is a little strange, but it’s technically team support, so it’s not useless or anything, so long as your party capitalizes on it. The interesting part is how it has Thawing at 3P, allowing for Kutaka to synergize with a whole set of Friends in those who apply Freeze barrier anomaly to enemies. And her Last Word, “Kamitori Chomei”, has 4 Sun, 1 Water and 1 Wood for elements, Pre-Attack effect of party wide Speed 3 levels UP (3T), Post-Attack effect of party wide 75% Heal, a bunch of Slicing (present on 4/6 bullet lines), and more Thawing, but this time at 2P. Don’t expect insane damage out of her Spell Cards or anything, but they might hit surprisingly high numbers if you’re running a speed-based team that gives out a lot of boosts just like she does, due to the Slicing.

Kutaka’s personal ability makes her immune to Burn, Freeze and Poison, which is certainly welcome in her role as a healer. As for her Skills, they are just about as straightforward as you could imagine for a Recovery type Friend. Skill 1, "Please Move!", has party wide 35% Heal and Speed 2 levels UP (2T). Skill 2, "Don't Run On Stairs!", has party wide 45% Heal and 1.5 Barrier cleanse. Skill 3, "The Line Ends Here", has party wide 1.5 Barrier restore and self Yang ATK 2 levels UP (2T). There’s a little bit of Speed and Yang ATK mixed in there, but for the most part, it’s Heal, Barrier and more Heal, which is pretty much what you’d expect. Not that that’s a bad thing.

Kutaka is a healer through and through, but with the spice of being a bit nice for Speed-based teams as well. While it’s not necessary to run her in them, it’s a nice option that has a little bit more synergy with her kit than just outright healing. Otherwise, she will get the job done for healing, making her a solid choice for when you might happen to need one.

Keiki Haniyasushin is commonly titled the Sculptor God for her ability to create idols and similar sculptures. Of course, a divine spirit’s power wouldn’t just end there, as she can animate her figures and make them fight for her own cause. During the incident in which animal spirits from Hell invaded Gensokyo, Keiki would use her powers to fight against the animal spirits and liberate the human spirits, creating the haniwa Mayumi Joutouguu in the process to serve as the head of her army. This doesn’t mean Keiki herself can’t fight back, which she shows when confronting the animal-possessed protagonists as the final hurdle in the conflict between the spirits of Hell. While she does look down on the animal spirits, she holds more respect for humans, seen from her position of protecting and assisting the human spirits.

Starting from looking at her offensive attacks and spells, Keiki has a lot going for her. A 0P Earth break in the form of her Focus shot, Perfect Circle Sculpting, is always a great start for spamming elemental breaks. The rest of her elemental breaking is very above average as well, from the 4 Earth breaks on her first spell, Haniwa: Horse-and-Rider Idol Sculpting Art, 3 Earth breaks on her second spell, Oni-Shaped Sculpting Art, and Earth-only Last Word, Transhumanize. Her spells even get a small mix of Star breaks, which is always a good element to have, especially when it doesn’t get in the way of her Earth breaking potential. She holds one more purpose in barrier breaking, that being Poison and Burn anomaly breaks on Oni-Shaped Sculpting Art. At 2P, the spell is capable of breaking all foes’ Poison anomalies, a feature that is rather convenient for a spell whose pre-ATK effect is to apply 2 Poison anomalies on all opponents. She has the chance to get an extra Poison anomaly off when boosting, with the extra one ensured at 3P, giving good reason to go all out on this spell and get an easy 3 breaks on all enemies. And even if you don’t want to break with anomalies, the Poison serves as Yang support for all of your Yang nukers as long as the foe isn’t Full Broken.

Even outside of breaking, Keiki’s spells serve purpose in offense and support. First off, Transhumanize is just a very powerful Last Word. Being backloaded, you want to make sure it’s fully boosted before unleashing, but being fully boosted is rather easy for a character with a second skill such as [Skill 2], which increases Spirit Power by 1.50. With this as well as a fully Earth, Yang, and Heavy Last Word, Keiki’s final attack is very easy to support and optimize in terms of damage. Haniwa: Horse-and-Rider Idol Sculpting Art’s pre-ATK effect of 2 levels of Yang ATK UP (3T) helps her own damage as well. Oni-Shaped Sculpting Art goes for a more team support focus, as it decreases all targets’ CRIT DEF by 1 or 2 levels (3T), based on Keiki’s boosts, just like her Poison anomalies. Since Transhumanize has a good Killer bullet type in the form of Human, this buffs both Keiki’s damage output as well as any Friends that need good CRIT support as well.

As for skills, Keiki mainly does more of what makes her spell effects so good. Her first skill, [Skill 1], is 3 levels of Yang DEF UP (3T) for all allies as well as some accuracy support, though she already gets a good amount of that from Transhumanize’s pre-ATK effects. Skill 2’s great Spirit Power restoration was already stated, but Keiki heals 1 layer of her barrier as well to help her Graze more, which makes up for the skill’s long 6-turn cooldown. Her third skill, Skill 3, is a return to good team support in the form of both 2 levels of Yin ATK UP (1T) and 3 levels of CRIT DEF DOWN (3T) on all foes, along with her own 2 levels of Yang ATK UP (3T). While the teamwide support buffs and debuffs are only for a turn, the 4-turn cooldown makes this a support option that can easily come back over a longer fight. 

Keiki’s support is one that mainly benefits CRIT attackers and Yang Friends, especially with her character ability to increase Yang ATK for each Graze used in a turn, but Keiki at least gets to help Yin-based Friends for maximum coverage. With the ability to cover a lot of bases already damage-wise, breaking-wise, and defensive-wise, Keiki is definitely a Friend that makes you want to go “Oh!” if you ever make the mistake to underestimate her.