Nino

• Preferred IV: +SPD or +ATK / -DEF

• Weapon: Iris’s Tome (+Eff)

• Assist: Draw Back / Flexible

• Special: Glimmer / Moonbow

• Passive A: Atk/Spd Solo / Fury / Life and Death / Swift Sparrow

• Passive B: Desperation / Special Spiral

• Passive C: Odd Atk Wave / Even Spd Wave / Hone Atk / Flexible

• Sacred Seal: Even Def Wave / Heavy Blade / Atk/Spd +2

Nino’s flagship set is very effective in combat, not reliant on support, and can be cheap to build, making Nino an excellent offensive magic user.

Nino will ideally want either a Speed or Attack Asset with a Defense Flaw to maximize Nino’s offensive prowess with this tome. Iris’s Tome is an amazing weapon and needs no replacement. A more powerful Blade tome with self-buffing is a fantastic overall package. For Assist, using her default Draw Back is perfectly acceptable, but it can be replaced with something such as Reposition if desired. Glimmer makes for a great special with the Blade tome due to the damage values Nino can reach if buffed. Moonbow is also a good option, particularly if Nino won’t always have easy access to buffs.

Atk/Spd Solo is a fantastic A slot skill, granting Nino with a huge offensive boost whenever she has no adjacent allies. As a budget alternative, Fury is a great A slot skill with Nino, increasing all of her stats and the recoil damage also helping Nino to reach Desperation range more safely. Other options include Life and Death to increase Nino’s offensive power at the cost of her defenses while Swift Sparrow gives Nino a nice offensive boost, though only on player phase. Desperation makes for the ideal B slot for this set, allowing Nino to perform any follow-up attack immediately after her first, helping her to fight DC units she can sometimes struggle with. Special Spiral is a much more expensive but also powerful alternative. The two free points of Special charge provided allow Nino to have Glimmer or Moonbow immediately ready to go after any round of combat where her Special activated, which is especially powerful when Nino is given Pulse support.

The cream of the crop for this set is using Odd Atk Wave as the C slot and Even Def Wave as the Sacred Seal. With these two skills plus her personal weapon, Nino gets an amazing 18 damage boost on every even-numbered turn and a still noticeable 12 damage boost on every odd-numbered turn without any need for support at all. Alternatively, one could run Even Spd Wave instead, allowing Nino to instead get a staggering 24 damage boost on even turns. On top of all this, Nino can also utilize all of these Waves to support her teammates with buffs.

However, Wave skills are very expensive and if one is confident that they can provide Nino with consistent buffs, they are not as necessary. In these cases, the C slot is very open to one’s personal preference. Sticking with her default Hone Atk is an option, but with Even Atk Wave on her weapon, she might find better use out of something else. If Even Def Wave is really not available for Nino to use, then she can also make great use of Heavy Blade for more consistent Special activations. She can also make fine use of a simple stat boost instead, such as Atk/Spd 2.

• Preferred IV: +ATK / -DEF

• Weapon: Iris’s Tome (+Eff)

• Assist: Draw Back / Flexible

• Special: Blazing Wind / Blazing Special

• Passive A: Life and Death / Fury

• Passive B: Special Spiral

• Passive C: Odd Atk Wave / Flexible

• Sacred Seal: Heavy Blade / Flashing Blade

Nino is also capable of running an extremely strong AoE Special set.

The philosophy behind an AoE set is to ensure that the AoE Special is ready to go at the start of combat for every Player Phase fight. As such, this set functions at its peak when Nino can be provided which support from Infantry Pulse and similar skills to get her Special ready immediately. For this set to function properly, it is mandatory to use Special Spiral in the B slot and Heavy/Flashing Blade in the Sacred Seal slot. Assuming her Special is ready to go, she should use it when attacking, get half the charge needed from her attack thanks to Heavy/Flashing Blade, then fully charge it again thanks to Special Spiral. While Flashing Blade can work absolutely fine, Heavy Blade is the much superior choice thanks to the extra damage from Iris’s Tome increasing its activation chance. As for the AoE Special itself, Blazing AoE is recommended over Growing AoE as Blazing does more damage. While Blazing Wind is the recommendation, whichever Blazing Special one picks is ultimately a matter of personal preference.

The remainder of the set is about maximizing Nino’s damage. An Attack Asset is the way to go here. Nino wants to ensure activation of Heavy Blade and should really be taking out her opponent in a single hit following her Special, so putting everything into that single attack is advised. Iris’s Tome is a perfect fit and does not need to be swapped out at all. The extra damage that the weapon grants, while not effective her AoE Special’s power, will substantially increase for OHKO potential and Heavy Blade activation chance. The Assist is up to personal preference. Nino comes with Draw Back by default and is a great choice for mages overall.

In the A slot, Life and Death is an excellent choice. The extra Attack will increase both the damage of Nino’s regular attacks and AoE Special while the extra Speed will help if she needs to perform a follow-up attack. Fury is another strong choice, providing a lesser Attack and Speed boost than Life and Death, but also providing a substantial amount of bulk in comparison in case she is forced to take a hit. Finally, Odd Atk Wave is the perfect C slot fit. With this in conjunction with Iris’s Tome, Nino will receive 12 extra damage at all times without any need for any support at all. Outside of this, the C slot is up to one’s own choice.