Rurouni Kenshin Collab Review
Kenshin returns for another round, this time featuring buffs, new cards(including a REM version of Shishio) and a tradable Fujin in Hiko Seijuro. The lower rarities vary in usefulness, but Kenshin is one of the easiest places to roll a double row maker(Kaoru) for all your farming needs.
Regardless of your rolls, you should make a few Anji
who is a special sort of button that voids defense and then applies a multitarget nuke. He’s often used in special descended dungeons so be sure to grab at least one.
Note: The rates for 4 Stars and 5 Stars is very close so they are practically the same tier of rolls.
Double row makers are very important for farming, as they can be used with full color boards to break combo shields or set up VDP boxes. Kaoru also does a 50% heal, which is annoying for various low HP conditional leads/actives but great for high HP conditional leads like Zeus Verse
and for tanking preemptives in general.
Yahiko’s active is almost identical to Rei Sirius
except he spawns right column instead of left. He can stack devil killer latents but there are much better options available.
Sanosuke is notable for having 2 , a , and physical + machine killers, two relevent types in machine descends. His active is a unique 50% suicide, defense void, and single target damage. Defense break sweeps forward when there’s no preemptive, so he can button a 1 enemy floor then allow a non true damage nuke to button the next one.
Megumi is a decent bind clear inherit that clears 5 turns of binds and remove hazards. Sadly it does not remove awoken binds and does absolutely nothing offensively.
Aoshi is a mediocre combo/tpa sub. His active is similar to Sarasvati
but the skyfall buff is only 2 turns for 8 CD such that you cannot chain it.
Misao is a decent red devil/attacker killer sub, able to stack latent killers of both types thanks to her balanced typing. Her active creates reds, clears jammers, and recovers 30% HP. It’s one of the few red self-heal actives, useful for an Enra
team.
Sojiro has a 3 CD 99 single target true damage active that makes 2 light orbs. It is often 1 CD too long to be recycled like Jize
in Zaerog Infinity, but otherwise it is just as useful for button ADKZ
and such.
Kamatari has 3 and a 8 CD multitarget 99 damage active, making him easy to sub directly when buttoning. His active also adds 3 turns of green skyfall, helpful for overriding unfavorable enemy 99 turn skyfall while still taking care of PreDRAs
in arena.
Nenji clears 3 turns of binds, removes hazards, and adds dark orbs. It’s not a terrible active but not amazing either.
At 9 CD, Yumi is the second lowest CD 75% shield active, after Kushinadahime
at 8 CD. Her random generation of 3 hearts can be annoying for some teams though.
Her leader skill is an unconditional 50% resist(75% with two leads) equivalent to 4x HP/RCV leads with added benefit of tanking gravities more easily, so you could use her for grind/cheese clears.
Jin-e has a 2 turn delay active and a balanced killer, but there are better farmable alternatives(Glavenus Hunter
for delay, Younger Toguro
for balanced killer) in both niches.
With her strange awakenings and mediocre base stats, Tomoe seems unimpressive at a glance. However her 8 turn 30% shield active at 13 CD can be chained to add a significant amount of bulk to any team. With two Tomoes in the team you also get full jammer resistance and 20% red and dark damage reduction. She lacks SBR but that can be amended with Sumire Equip
or Zinogre Equip
, as you will be using her base active all the time anyways. Here’s an example with two Tomoe subs on Edward Elric
in Alt Arena.
Aside from directly subbing her, Tomoe is one of the longest duration inheritable shields. Her row making component is also very useful, since it spawns on the 2nd row and allows a easy VDP box similar to Rathalos hunter
.
Note 1: You lose limit break and super awakenings(SA) when switching between different ultimate evolutions!
Note 2: Everyone recieves about 200 more weighted stats at level 110.
SA: 
Cross Kenshin is a good color cross lead thanks to high damage, decent bulk via a 43.75% shield based on a easy condition of matching red and light, and a good array of red light subs and boards to choose from including Ilmina
for 7×6 swap. His awakening lineup isn’t particularly good, but having full red OE and almost full light OE just from leaders allows you to be flexible with subs.
His active creates 2 lights 2 reds and adds 15% skyfall of both colors. It’s low impact but also low CD and useful enough to be spammed.
Bind resist is generally the prefered super awakening when leading with Kenshin, though team HP adds survivability and cloud resist is situationally good.
SA: 
7×6 Kenshin is a very orb hungry leader, requiring 5 fire combos or a minimum of 15 red orbs to reach his full multiplier. He does provide a 1.5x HP multiplier but it’s not high enough to justify using him over something like Awoken Antares
for 7×6 swap.
He is a decent sub as Red subs with 2 time extends are uncommon and Kenshin can get another or FUA via super awakenings.
The active is an ok burst option that adds 1 turn of 25% red skyfall. However it’s only x3 for 12 CD, somewhat underwhelming when compared to Nerva
at x5 for 15 CD.
Both Saitos have the same active: 200k single target true damage and 5 random dark orbs. There aren’t many high defense things that with HP between 100k and 200k damage and the random orb generation is not usable for swiping.
SA: 
Cross Saito is awkward as he requires skill use for full multiplier but there aren’t any dark versions of Tardis
available. He also only has RCV for defense and can only use 1 color, greatly reducing his damage potential.
As a sub he functions as a dark OE stick similar to Eschamali
, though his non OE awakenings are slightly better.
High HP boost is usable as a damage awakening and cloud resist is useful support awakening. Bind resist is good if you do want to lead him for some reason.
SA: 
From a pure leader skill point of view, Row Saito is a better Meridionalis
as he has higher multiplier, 2 , and . However dark farming’s lack of full board options prevented him from actually being great until the release of Satan Void
, an inheritable full dark board that’s also a HP to 1 suicide and x300 nuke. Dark farming is still lacking in options (like a full board with less animation time) but the potential is there. Saito is too orb hungry to be used as a standard leader since he needs 11 darks to activate full multiplier
As a sub, Saito is notable for having VDP super awakening. However he isn’t particularly notable in that role.
Both Hikos have a 20 CD damage absorb void active with secondary effect of +2c. +2c is alright as a small damage boost but Fujin’s haste or Uruka’s board are more generally applicable.
SA:
Balanced Hiko has, well, a more balanced stat distribution, access to all killer types, and a (plus a possible 2nd via super awakening), making him the better general sub and oncolor inherit. He’s the only fujin active sub thus far with double SBR , which eases up team building.
As a leader he’s tanky with 2.25x HP/RCV and a decent 144x multiplier for 3 light combos. A bit too orb hungry for low return at endgame but good enough for content like Arena 1.
SA:
Attacker/Dragon Hiko’s stats are heavily skewed towards attack, leaving his HP at an awkward place. However he is the first fujin active sub with 3 , making him the prefered fujin sub in 3P support teams. This Hiko is also the first fujin active sub with FUA (via super awake), which can help condense team slots.
He’s a slightly better leader than balanced Hiko, with 2.25/6.25 HP/RCV tankiness, requires only 6 light orbs to reach his full 100x multiplier, and has a 16x unconditional attack for times when you don’t have enough lights. Still not an endgame leader, but good enough in midgame.
SA: 
Enishi is notable for his 4 CD no skyfall and green row make active. 4 of him on a team means 6 green orbs in a neat row every turn. This combined with a decent leader skill allows him to swipe long content like A3 or be used in Ganesha lead swap builds for MHera.
As a sub Enishi brings 4x green rows and super FUA . Green rows are nice for his own team and other farming situations, but super FUA is generally impractical due to needing 9 hearts vs regular FUA’s 5. His super awakenings aren’t great, with low HP boost being mostly useless and the other two being nice but inconsequential.
SA: 
Shishio is a great farming lead due to his ability to hit full multiplier on 5 orbs and the fact that he uses red and dark. Red is probably the best farming color thanks to actives like Sado
and subs like Tsubaki
, and Shishio’s ability to use dark orbs opens up options like Satan Void
as well. He is essentially a direct upgrade of Yamamoto Genryusai
, trading row awakenings for Unbindability, , a 43.75% shield, and additional flexibility with dark subs.
Aside from farming, he can be considered a better version of Yomidra
for A1/A3 speedruns. Much like Yomidra, Shishio is able to sub Tsubaki
along side regular dark subs to snipe dragon spawns. Whereas Yomidra suffered from lack of HP and inability to use VDP as a sparkle lead, Shishio has a shield and is able to use VDP since he’s a blob leader.
Shishio’s active is a double row maker with a x2 burst. It’s an excellent active that can be used to clear 2 floors on his own team or be used as a combo maker on other colors.
As a sub Shishio is unimpressive. L-attack has poor distribution, making him likely the only sub relying on that awakening for damage on the team and he usually doesn’t bring enough team support to justify a slot.
Anji has a unique niche for farm builds, since he combines defense void with a multitarget nuke, effectively doing the same thing as true damage buttons. Defense void sweeps forward to next floor, so one can Anji a floor then use a non-true damage nuke like Goemon
to take care of the next. Scar
does something similar, but he has twice as much CD.
You should get an Anji or two even if you do not skill him up right now, just so he’s available when farming builds inevitably requires him.
SA: 
Farmable Shishio isn’t as unique as Anji, but he’s a god killer sub with ability to use more god killers and a delay + 1 target nuke + 50% suicide active. Limit break gave him respectable weighted stats at lv110 and a choice of 2nd killer between devil, machine, and dragon.
Irreplacable? No. Useful in some weird build? Probably.
DO I ROLL?
Kaoru, Kamatari, and Sanosuke have usefulness in farming and Tomoe’s chainable shield active adds a great amount of tankiness to a team when two of her is subbed. The 6 stars are all fairly good too, featuring one of the best rates for a Fujin active if you want to roll for Hiko instead of trading.
The rates are 7.5% for each 4 Star (52.5% total), 7% for each 5 Star (35% total), and 2.5% for each 6 Star (12.5%).
DO I TRADE?
Get Hiko if you don’t have a Fujin active, though be advised that Boma
and Panera
are upcoming farmable fujin active subs, even if neither are inheritable.
Disclaimer: Everything in this guide is my own opinion, if you feel that I am wrong or overlooked anything, feel free to comment and discuss!
Bonus: Other Authors’ Thoughts/Invade!
[speech name=aFireBlaze]Since I already have most of the farming component desired subs like Kaoru and Sanosuke, I’m not too inclined to whale hard in this one, with Tomoe as my prize roll. However my most desired card in the REM is Shishio, so if I do not get him I will acquire him from the monster exchange. He’s a very good farming leader and essentially a free Yamamoto for me. It also works wonders that he can even activate off of dark matches, extending his flexibility in the farming department through dungeons.[/speech]
[speech name=Reni]When JP got the 3rd return I only rolled until I got 2 Tomoe for my Light teams. I’ll most likely do the same for NA, since I have almost everything necessary from the previous 2 returns (minus Hiko). This time, Hiko and Shishio will be my ideal rolls, but I would not be rolling packs of stones just for them. If I didn’t have anything Kenshin and rolled this as a newer player, I’d be just rolling a few times hoping for 1 Kaoru and call it a day.[/speech]
OMG ITS FIREBLAZE WHATS UP BRO