#artist: vegetablenabe

[300iqprower]

Hypothetical Rank Ups No. 24-26: Mata Hari (Rework)

Disclaimer/Notes: Mata Hari’s first and only official rankup that she got years too late is exactly the level of boost in performance all rank ups should be giving these early servants. It’s a fantastic all around support skill for crit and blah blah fucking blah it’s not enough it never is they roll these things out slower than a sloth taking a shit. So we’re making Mata Hari’s entire rest of her kit dramatically buffed in one very specific area: Charm, ya know, that thing she’s supposed to be a master of yet both her two charms are low RNG. On top of her niche being something she’s long overshadowed in by everything from Euryale to Kama, Charm is just shit now thanks to it being gutted post Babylon and now being further nerfed by proxy when Nasu and Clowns threw a shitfit about their own powercreep and made Debuffs in general worse in response to Alterjuna. So yeah, expect massive performance increase in this specific niche for both her and a certain other year-1 bottom-tier bronze-assassin who has only had one half decent appearance that was in a pseudo singularity. Oh and flavor wise this is based on the portrayal of her in FGO specifically which has a couple key distinct differences from her historical self. Allegedly.

Pheromone B -> “Heartaches by the Number”

Chance to Charm all enemies^ (1 turn). Decrease DEF for all enemies (3 turns). + Increase NP Gauge depending on Crit Stars.

Yes I’m totally using that name. My friend in the cult of Mata Hari approved it, so HA! Now first off get out of her with that garbage gender lock that makes it useless against the majority of the cast, second off give it a rather unique effect based on a scaling NP gauge that functions sort of like NotJane’s trademark skill. For every 10 critical stars Mata Hari gains a certain amount of NP gauge that goes up with the skill’s level, being 10% at level 1 and 20% at level 10 [Important Note: Because this is something that would require actual testing to balance it, it may be needed for the scaling to go lower or higher; I see the max possible scaling at 25%]. The NP gained also does not cap at 50 stars meaning thanks to Mata Hari’s teamwide 100% 3t Crit Star Generation buff, with the right teammates (Kotarou/Atalanta/Jack/etc) she can generate an absurd amount of NP in one burst. However, while you might think to use that varying battery after something like a QQQ Extra turn or to help pop off Mata Hari’s NP this skill is ideally used within 3 turns of when Mata Hari has ALREADY used her NP for reasons that’ll become clear later. Meanwhile flavor wise the obvious reference is obvious but also justified given the song’s subject matter being about 1 sided love and disillusionment as someone dependent on that love for survival finds themselves closer and closer to without it. Effect wise it’s based on the immense wealth she received from her suitors that only served to reflect how shallow their love was as she was admired solely for the beauty she used to deceive others, which of course is what her Noble Phantasm embodies.

Double-Cross B -> Double-Cross B++

Inflict Skill Seal to a single enemy (1 turn). Decrease DEF for a single enemy (5 turns).^ + Inflict NP Seal to a single enemy (1 turn).

Now this is way simpler. Increase the def from 3 turns to 5 and its scaling from 10/20% to 20/30% making for a maximum of only 1 turn of downtime on a sizable defense down and an NP seal that frankly should have always been there even if it meant no skill seal considering the big thing about stuns and charms is that they don’t stop that turn’s enemy NP gain.

Mata Hari A -> Mata Hari A+++

Medium chance to inflict Charm for all enemies (Activates first).^ + Decrease Charm Resist of all enemies (3 turns). Decrease your Skill Cooldowns by 1 turn. <Overcharge> Decrease ATK for all enemies (2 turns).^ Decrease DEF for all enemies (2 turns).^ + Gain Critical Stars for each charmed enemy. [9/11/13/15/17]

Anyone else notice Kama is the only unit in the game with Charm Resist Down, and that very useful niche is just randomly thrown onto a 50% battery that already has a very powerful anti alter-ego class effectiveness niche AND crit stim? Yeah that irks me ever so slightly. Anyways, Mata Hari’s max would be the same of 40% down at level 5, which everyone would have since she’s an FP 1 star. This is important because all AOE charms cap at 60% including both Mata Hari’s own AOE charm skill and her NP, aside from MRX with a flat 40% chance and Summer Kama who is badly designed and should go away anyhow. That said I am boosting her NP from 60% to 90% chance as this crosses some major thresholds in regards to Debuff Resist Down support and general Debuff Resist passives. In the absence of heavy DRD support luke Katarou or Kiara though, this charm resist down and  is why ideally you save her new NP battery until AFTER you’ve used her NP, or set it up so it will be available again within a couple of turns of using her NP, because then you can guarantee the skill’s success while setting up yet another NP. On that note let’s talk about the other two effects. I had to wrestle with several different combinations of effects to find something that would make charmlock more viable without setting off an unabashedly OP loop. In the end I decided against teamwide CDR with modifiers (example: Reduce cooldown for all charm skills) with a flat reduction of all Mata Hari's skills by 1; I especially can’t go higher than 1 because her absurdly good 1st skill is on a 5 turn cooldown. Overall though when given a team dedicated to her she’ll be able to keep that 3 turn buff up near perpetually which would in turn make up for building around her. As for the stars, obviously those will help with the fact that Mata Hari has no real star generation on her own and ensure if you pull off the NP -> Charm Skill combo you’ll have stars to boost the battery going in. Charmlock or not, however, the name of her game is AOE charm, so the scaling on how many stars per charmed enemy was scaled back from an original 10/15/20/25/30 to 9/11/13/15/17. No these numbers are not randomly scaled either, I made them with 10 star interval thresholds in mind and the fact that Mata can acquire overgauge practically by default as a 1 star. Oh and lastly the attack and defense debuffs have been extended to 2 turns since a 1 turn attack down on a skill that charms is obviously an issue. You could totally end up with it being both turn if running charmlock, of course, but at that point your goal is clearly to outright prevent damage rather than mitigate it. (and again: A certain other rankup I have in mind pairs further with this)

So to recap in full: Mata Hari’s pure support is enhanced and hyperfocused on by sidelining any potential changes that would give her damage or survivability in favor of making her charm far more reliable and making her entire team’s charms more reliable, especially in regard to AOE charmlock. Her defense buffs are overall buffed as well to make her a unit who lowers enemy defenses and boosts overall critical potential practically just from being fielded, with slightly better stall tactics to boot. The crux of these shifts however becomes a new battery that is based on stars but as such requires dedicated teammates to get the most use of due to Mata Hari’s atrocious personal star gen even with her own AOE crit based buffs. All in all you’re left with a very good but very reliant pure support who uses charm and sheer utility to make up for a complete lack of damage or survivability, and when built around the right team comp can bring AoE charmlock to the table in a BIG way.