Fate/Grand Order: Rulers / Characters

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Heroic Spirit of Arbitration

Ruler was originally an Extra Class summoned by the Holy Grail to act as the adjudicators of the Holy Grail Wars of the Fate/Apocrypha timeline, or in any instance where the authority of the Holy Grail is threatened. Rulers are typically powerful and selfless individuals who have no desire for the Holy Grail and possess the ability to be impartial: thus, most Rulers are Saints or were very close to sainthood in life. Any Ruler summoned by the FATE summoning system must meet the qualifications for this role, even if a Holy Grail War is not taking place. Rulers are granted a number of key class abilities such as True Name Discernment (allowing them to instantly know the identity, parameters, skills and Noble Phantasms of any Servant), and their own set of Command Spells for every Servant in the Holy Grail War they are summoned to.

Rulers take half damage from the regular classes (Saber, Lancer, Archer, Rider, Caster, Assassin) and deal normal damage to them, with the usual exception of Berserkers. They are strong against Moon Cancer and weak against Avengers.

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Shared Tropes

Always Lawful Good: Subverted. Most of the playable Rulers are of the Good alignment, but BB can be summoned in this class, only declining because it means enforcing and being bound to the rules. Outside of the summoned ones there are also Jeanne Alter during Orleans, the suicidal Phenex during Agartha, Andromalius in Edmond Dantès' Interlude, and Morgan le Fay in Avalon le Fae Part 2, none of which are Lawful Good. Moriarty stands out as the first official playable Evil-aligned Ruler.
Cincinnatus: The core idea behind the class. Rulers are summoned to oversee a Holy Grail War precisely because they lack any desire for the Holy Grail and therefore won't interfere, even when they have the strength to easily do so. However there can be exceptions to this rule as shown by Amakusa.
Christianity is Catholic: Significantly Played With:
- A third of the playable Servants in the class are either venerated Catholic saints or heavily-identified in medieval Catholic iconography in their respective cultures (Jeanne and Martha in France, Altria in Britain, and Amakusa Shirou in Japan—even if Amakusa hasn't been canonized by the Vatican yet).
- Some of the ones that are not (as is arguably the case with Quetzalcoatl, Astraea, Caren and Johanna) likely became so due to the cultural amalgamation of Catholic imagery and European/Latin iconography at large. This also possibly applies to Leonardo da Vinci (as much of classical Renaissance iconography—which reinvigorated Catholic cultural influence) springs in part from their works.
- Mash additionally explains that in a regular Grail War Summoning, only saints can be summoned as the Ruler class because the Grail is a Christian concept, but Chaldea's Summoning system doesn't need to adhere to that restriction.
Critical Hit Class: Almost all Rulers released after Martha have a focus on Critical Hits in their kits, to help them have an offensive edge in battle instead of just being tanks. Even Jeanne and Amakusa, who came before Martha, have skills that drop a few C. Stars. Caren, whose kit is focused on NP spam rather than Critical Hits, is still able to drop a lot of C. Stars thanks to her Quick-focused deck, even though she lacks any Critical Hit-focused skills herself.
Gameplay and Story Integration: It might feel a little random that they get a super-effective bonus against Moon Cancer Servants when BB debuted, but it makes sense - Moon Cancers (and, more widely, "Grail Cancers" as a concept) are the exact sort of aberrations against Holy Grail Wars the Rulers are meant to stop.
Gameplay and Story Segregation: On the other side of the coin, as adjudicators of the Holy Grail War, Rulers are typically given a significant power boost over the other participating Servants to keep them in line. But since Grand Order isn't an ordinary Grail War and because this would cause Rulers to trump everything in the game, they are no more effective than ordinary Servants in gameplay (their long list of class advantages notwithstanding).
Informed Attribute: Supposedly the Ruler class is composed mostly of Catholic saints as they are the Heroic Spirits most likely to meet the requirements of the class. However, out of the twelve Rulers currently playable only one (Jeanne d'Arc) is a canonized saint.^note
The Mind Is a Plaything of the Body: When they're in other classes, typically Ruler Servants are much more rash, aggressive, and mercurial, implying that the Ruler Class Container itself provides a degree of wisdom or at least restraint to the Heroic Spirits that use it.
Non-Indicative Name: One may think that this class would be comprised of servants who are associated with rulership, but as of September 2022, only five qualify for that definition: Altria, being a Gender Flip of King Arthur; Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor of a united China; Himiko and Iyo, who according to legend were Queens of Yamataikoku (pre-Chrysanthemum Throne Japan); and Scathach-Skadi, who (like Qin) was previously a Lostbelt King. The closest thing this class has to a hat is some association with Christianity.
Power Creep: In the earlier days of the game, Rulers were both a powerful Servant to have and a difficult boss to face due to their wide-ranging defenses^note. The debut of the Avenger class (which resists it and is stronger against it) and the general strength of newer Servants has led to the existing Rulers falling a bit behind - until Jeanne and Amakusa received gameplay buffs, that is. The offence oriented Astraea and Himiko who debuted much later also helped.
Rare Random Drop: For the longest time, there was really only one readily-available Ruler Servant (Jeanne), and she's a 5* to start with. Six others have been limited and Quetzalcoatl is an event-exclusive. The 4* Servant Astraea is the second Ruler to be available in the permanent summon pool, after more than three and a half years since the game launched. This makes them rarer than the Avenger class in terms of availability. Additionally, they tend to not get added as often; after Martha was added, it was a full year until Holmes was made available to players, and the year following that saw not a single one even alluded to until Qin Shi Huang appeared during the third Lostbelt.
Running Gag: It is almost a requirement for any 4* Ruler to be some kind of brawler/wrestler... at least until Ruler da Vinci came out.
Scales of Justice: Their class card depicts Lady Justice with a sword and the scales of judgment in each hand, although unlike most depictions of Lady Justice, she merely has her eyes closed instead of being blindfolded. Appropriately, Lady Justice (as part of Astraea) also exists as a Servant under the class.
Semi-Divine: To an extent, the powerset of all Servants in the class (and arguably what actually makes a potential Servant eligible for the Class in-universe). Save Holmes, all of them are identified with religious and mythological entities or full-on deities—which does suggest that all of their powers are divinely-blessed or ordained. This therefore helps justify the inclusion of Himiko and Qin Shi Huang in the class, as well as the in-game class assignment of Lostbelt Zeus.
Stone Wall: Thanks to having defensive bonuses against seven Classes, this is typically the role they take in parties. The Rulers with offensive Noble Phantasms can struggle to contribute as much as others, since despite having a passive ATK bonus (which is equal to that of Berserkers or Avengers), they only deal bonus damage to Moon Cancers and Berserkers and their ATK tends to lean towards the lower end for their rarity, while Jeanne is a bit more useful for providing healing often and also being an utter damage sponge (with the third-highest HP total in the game). However, all Rulers introduced after Jeanne have been relatively focused on offense and all of those can take the role of the DPS very effectively.
Square Race, Round Class: The Ruler's class resistance to the seven normal classes outside of Berserkers suggests that the class is designated to be for the game's Stone Wall characters, as seen with Jeanne d'Arc. If you were to actually look at the various Ruler-class Servants, however, you notice that almost all of them are either "Support Party Members with offensive capabilities" or outright offense-oriented Servants, generally through being the Critical Hit Class.
Tactical Rock–Paper–Scissors: The Ruler class resists almost all of the standard Classes (Saber, Lancer, Archer, Rider, Caster, Assassin), and deals neutral damage to them in turn. They only receive neutral damage from Shielder, Alter Egos, Foreigners, and all types of Beast to date, fall weak to Avengers, both give and receive extra damage against Berserkers and have typical "deals double, takes half" advantages over Moon Cancer.

Altria Pendragon (Ruler)

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Summer Lion King

^{Second Ascension}

^{Third Ascension}

^{Final Ascension}

^{Dream Portrait}

^{April Fool's}

^{April Fool's Fate/Grail League}

Voiced by: Ayako Kawasumi

"I am Altria Ruler, the owner of Casino Camelot and the undefeated dealer, manifested. Ah, well, my Spirit Origin may have changed a bit, but I'm originally the Lancer Altria Pendragon. Yes, this is my summer outfit. And...I'm actually in a bunny outfit... Did you notice?"

The Summer Lion King. She is the Royal Bunny of Casino Camelot, the greatest of casinos in Dazzling Las Vegas. She is the patron of the Seven Duels of Swordbeauties, watching over the battle royale for a single summer's memory. She is NOT the same Lion King who ruled over the transformed Jerusalem in the Sixth Singularity, merely regular Lancer Altria who decided to relax this summer.

Balance Buff: Her second skill Royal Card received a Rank Up Quest during the re-run of the Swimsuit Swordmasters Seven-coloured Showdown event, reducing its cooldown by one turn, giving party-wide NP Gain for one turn, and most significantly the ability to exclude one Servant's cards from appearing after the shuffle for one time one turn, making it a fantastic tool for enabling your party's main damage dealer to use their cards unhindered.
Battle Ballgown: Her 3rd Ascension is effectively a skimpy white prom dress with armor on her arms and legs.
The Beastmaster: Has the ability to summon glowing golden lions to fight on her behalf.
Big-Breast Pride: Her My Room lines if you have any of the other Summer Altrias (Swimsuit Archer, Swimsuit Maid, or MHXX) have her smugly proclaim that she will show them the "charms of being an adult".
The Comically Serious: Some of her lines are clearly meant to be stern and threatening... despite her being dressed as a Playboy Bunny.
Card Sharp: Thanks to her abilities as a dealer, she is the only Servant who can shuffle their own command cards.
Cards of Power: In addition to using cards as a weapon in some of her animations, in her 3rd Ascension the cards glow and float in the air behind her and seem to be what summon her Noble Phantasm.
Composite Character: While the Sixth Singularity already gave her lion motifs, Ruler's ability to summon a lion of light was explicitly appropriated from Ywain.
Cool Ship: She owns a white luxury cruise which appears in her Noble Phantasm. It's actually her hall, Ehangwen, transformed to be mobile. At her second and third forms, the ship flies and fires a Wave-Motion Gun in her Noble Phantasm. Demon King Nobunaga wants the ship so badly that she plans to overthrow Altria just to take the ship for herself.
Critical Hit Class: Her card shuffling skill also comes with a party-wide 50% Critical Strength buff for three turns, while her third skill gives her a one-turn Critical Star Gather Rate buff. Her multi-hit cards will help her drop Critical Stars, but she ultimately emphasizes Critical Hits by herself less than her offensive Ruler peers.
Death Dealer: Her fighting style for her first stage uses casino cards.
Defrosting Ice Queen: Is much more relaxed and friendly than her stoic Lancer self.
Expository Hairstyle Change: From an extremely uptight bun to a long flowing ponytail, showing how she's more relaxed and thus is literally letting her hair down.
Expressive Accessory: In her sprites for her first and third ascensions, the fake rabbit ears she wears as part of her Playboy Bunny theme tend to twitch like real rabbit ears.
Flash Step: Is capable of doing this in her First and Third Ascensions, dashing forward and back in a blur of gold.
Fluffy Fashion Feathers: Wears a long white feather boa.
Girliness Upgrade: Compared to the more stoic Lancer Altria, this one acts much more feminine.
Gold and White Are Divine: Her leotard and 3rd Ascension dress are both white with gold trim, likely in reference to the risk Rhongomyniad poses to turning her into a divine spirit someday.
History Repeats: Once again, a "Lion King" ends up not being a central part of Singularity's existence. She merely walked into one and created the Dazzling Las Vegas with her own powers, unaware of why the Singularity exists in the first place.
Hotter and Sexier: From wearing very practical and concealing armor in her Lancer self's first Ascensions to an incredibly skimpy bunny suit, swimsuit, and ballgown in the Summer Event. Even Hokusai calls her a "bangin' beauty" and that she could stare at her for days on end (while being pants-wetting terrified at her aura).
I Am Not Him: Her My Room lines make clear she's not the Goddess Rhongomyniad that the protagonist fought against but the playable Altria Lancer despite calling herself Summer Lion King. She even apologizes for potentially causing the protagonist some confusion.
Kick Chick: She uses her lengthy legs for attacking at her first form. Her Noble Phantasm in that form is executed through a diving kick.
Killer Rabbit: Her Bond 3 lines are a giant Shout-Out to the Trope Namer from Monty Python and the Holy Grail and seem to be the game's joking explanation for why she became a bunny girl.
King of Beasts: She summons a golden lion for her Buster attacks. The lion actually belongs to Sir Yvain.
Let's Fight Like Gentlemen: In her boss fight during the Las Vegas event, she will activate a special skill called "There will be No Cheating" which allows Saber Hokusai to deal regular damage to Rulers.
Letting Her Hair Down: Unlike the Prim and Proper Bun the other versions of Altria favor, this one is wearing her hair down in a long ponytail. Becomes even more apparent in her 3rd Ascension which is the first time any version of Altria has worn her hair loose.
Luminescent Blush: She blushes in some of her dialog, a notable contrast from her regularly emotionally restrained self.
Luxurious Liquor: Casually downs a cocktail of some sort before attacking in some of her animations.
Master of None: While she has a kit and NP meant for damage, her attack stat is too low to make her a reliable damage dealer. She also lacks much in the way of support; outside of her card shuffle mechanic, she only provides two buffs to the party, limiting her usefulness as a support character. Due to this, she's awkward to use as a result of trying to be two things at once.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: She is currently the only playable Servant that can shuffle command cards, fitting for a Death Dealer in charge of a casino. This also lends to her unique Critical Hit Class niche compared to other Rulers — if a shuffle results in mostly Altria's cards, she can gather them easily with her third skill, otherwise she still buffs the entire party's critical damage without hogging Stars from teammates.
Morph Weapon: She shows yet another example that Rhongomyniad can actually transform into various different forms beyond its Lance form. In addition to the default Lance form, its Tower form from the Camelot Singularity and Lady Reines Case Files event, the rapier in her Ceremonial Outfit Craft Essence, all the forms of Add that Gray has shown so far, and the giant laser-firing machine that Mnemosyne used, she uses Rhongomyniad as a parasol that doubles as a sword/rapier, small spear and a type of wand. There is also in-game speculation that Rhongomyniad is what allows Altria to fire a Wave-Motion Gun bombardment with Ehangwen, though she's keeping quiet about those details.
Navel-Deep Neckline: Her Playboy Bunny suit is cut down to her navel. Her next three Ascensions don't go all the way down but still expose a large amount of cleavage.
Noodle People: Her legs in her first Ascension are absurdly thin but her legs are a bit more regularly proportioned for her other Ascensions.
Obliviously Beautiful: In the story of the 4th Summer Event, she seems confused about why Gawain and Lancelot wanted to see her dressed like a bunny girl.
Parasol of Pain: Uses her Rhongomyniad Umbrella in her second Ascension like a sword or lance in some of her attacks, or a wand to launch various magical golden beams or waves.
Parasol of Prettiness: She carries a white parasol lined with elegant patterns for her second Ascension. It's actually Rhongomyniad transformed to appear as one.
Playboy Bunny: The overall theme of her first and third ascensions. She wears a very low-cut white and blue bunnysuit for her first ascension, and a fancy but still revealing ballgown for her third. It's implied to be a reference to the Killer Rabbit of Caerbannog from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, since her profile speculates that her outfit may be because of a "fearsome beast" that terrorized King Arthur long ago.
Proud Beauty: Her My Room lines if you have any of the younger Summer Variants of Altria have her smugly proclaim that she will show them the "charms of being an adult".
Reluctant Fanservice Girl: Was apparently convinced to dress this way by Lancelot and Gawain but her blush when talking about it shows her unease.
Serious Business: She apparently takes card games and swimsuit swordsmen competitions very seriously.
Showgirl Skirt: Her 3rd Ascension dress has one, being almost completely transparent in the front to better display her armored legs.
Stocking Filler: Wears blue tights with a fishnet pattern.
Stone Wall: She's a Ruler with even higher HP than Jeanne d'Arc, and has the exact same ATK as her too. Unlike Jeanne, however, Altria's skills and NP provide various buffs to compensate for her low ATK and ensure she can pull her weight.
Supernatural Gold Eyes: Her eyes maintain a somewhat noticeable gold tint, to help signify her godly powers.
Theme Music Power-Up: She has two different remixes of Goddess Rhongomyniad's Leitmotif.
- The first is a relaxed arrangement for her first Ascension as she takes a leisurely night cruise.
- The second, which plays for her other Ascensions, is a slower version hewing closer to the original as she unleashes her Wave-Motion Gun.
Thinking Up Portals: She creates portals in her Third Ascension for one of her attacks so that she can quickly surprise attack her opponent.
Victoria's Secret Compartment: She pulls out a card from between her breasts for her first Ascension when casting a skill.
Walking Swimsuit Scene: Downplayed; unlike most summer versions of Servants, she only wears a swimsuit for her second and final ascensions. Her first and third ascensions go with a Playboy Bunny motif instead.
When She Smiles: While she is less stoic compared to her original self, she makes a bright smile at her second form when casting a skill.

Amakusa Shirou Tokisada

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The Youth Saint

^{Second Ascension}

^{Third Ascension}

^{Final Ascension}

^{Phantom Thief Amakusa Shirou}

^{Travel Journal}

^{April Fool's}

^{April Fool's Fate/Grail League}

Voiced by: Kōki Uchiyama (Japanese), Max Mittelman (English)

"Ruler-class Servant. Amakusa Shirou Tokisada. Do I look like someone you know? I am sure it's only a coincidence."

A Japanese Christian that led the Shimabara Rebellion. Born in the Edo period, he was a boy of miracles who could nearly be called a saint. How exactly he was discovered, no one knows. A good half of his lifetime is wrapped in mystery. He, who concentrated on his studies since childhood, began to perform many miracles at the frontier. Having healed wounds and walked on water, he eventually began to be enthusiastically worshiped as the son of God by the peasants that believed in a prohibited religion.

He first appears as Shirou Kotomine, a Master in Fate/Apocrypha and then becomes the main antagonist, later revealed to have been summoned as another Ruler-class Servant by his True Name Amakusa Shirou Tokisada. He debuted for the White Day 2016 event and is a major character for the second Christmas event, "The Little Santa Alter". He was summoned in the "Seventh Singularity: Absolute Demonic Front, Babylonia" by King Gilgamesh as one of his eight Servants, but Amakusa was killed by Jaguar Warrior before Chaldea arrived. An alternate timeline version of him appears as an Avenger in "Pseudo-Parallel World: Seven Duels of Swordmasters, Shimousa", where he is one of the main antagonists. He is the main ally of the White Day 2021 event "Holy Grail Phantom Thief Amakusa Shirou and the Slapstick Museum".

Affably Evil: He is lighthearted and friendly, but absolutely ruthless, at least in Apocrypha.
Alternate Self: The one who appears in Shimousa province comes from another universe, and has become almost-unrecognizable as a person.
Animation Bump: His attack animations received an update with the event "Holy Grail Phantom Thief: Amakusa Shirou and the Slapstick Museum", making his attacks more in-line with his portrayal in the anime adaptation of Fate/Apocrypha.
Anime Hair: He has rather spiky hair in first and second ascension. He loses it in third ascension when he takes on his true Servant form.
Anti-Villain: He wants to use the Greater Grail to achieve humanity's salvation (and, more specifically, save his comrades from their doomed fate at Hara Castle, Shimabara in the process), even if it means he must cheat at a Grail War and betray you.
Armor-Piercing Attack: His Noble Phantasm counts as this, in that it removes all enemy buffs before dealing damage, making it unavoidable and unable to be mitigated. The only thing you can do is reduce his ATK and NP Strength to minimize the damage taken. Or you could also bring buff removal immunity, although it is rather rare.
Badass Preacher: An apocryphal Saint who kicks ass in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Balance Buff:
- Often regarded as one of the worst SSR Servants due to his pitiful damage, the Second Anniversary gives him a much-needed upgrade, mainly giving him a hefty 3-turn Buster buff with his third skill. Nowadays he's regarded as a very useful unit in Challenge Quests where the enemies have multiple buffs, as he can remove all of them in one shot.
- When the "Inheritance of Glory" rerun happened, his Revelation skill was buffed to Prayer for the Long Journey, which makes increases the number of stars drooped per turn to between 5 to 10 and increases one of his allies NP Gain by 20-30% for 3 turns.
- "Holy Grail Phantom Thief: Amakusa Shirou and the Slapstick Museum" gives him a Rank Up Quest to buff Baptism Rite to Seraphic Grail, which drops two turns off the cooldown, upgrades the NP Drain to affect any target, gives a flat 20% NP Charge on use on top of his original five-turn NP charge generation, and inflicts Buster Resistance Down on all enemies for five turns.
Becoming the Mask: Of a silly holiday variety, Amakusa continues to be Santa Island Mask every Christmas since the second despite it not being required for any reason.
Brought Down to Normal: Downplayed in "Holy Grail Phantom Thief Amakusa Shirou and the Slapstick Museum", where his ability to fight is drained away by the Holy Grail of the event to prevent him from trying to steal it again. However, he notes it only took away his "ability to fight", meaning he can't use his offensive Noble Phantasm nor properly engage in combat, but he can still use his other Noble Phantasms as long as he doesn't directly fight. It also gives him a chance to properly flex his thinking muscles as he plans the heist.
Card-Carrying Villain: As Santa Island Mask in "The Little Santa Alter". Amakusa is happy at getting a chance to play the antagonist again after so long (as he's somehow conscripted to play a mentor-turned-villain), and in the middle of the event he has a Meanwhile Scene that he "just wanted to end on a bad guy note." And when he finally "betrays" the party:
"I've led you into my dastardly, evil, villainous, wicked trap! Mwa ha ha! The hope of every Santa, the sack that contains every gift of the universe, shall be mine!"
Chronic Backstabbing Disorder:
- He would, and does in his Interlude, betray you and everyone at Chaldea if it meant giving him a shot at the Greater Grail. He's otherwise loyal and regrets what he's doing, but it's an intense obsession for him and he just can't hold back, even if the Grail in question is corrupted and likely unusable. He's called one of "Chaldea's Four Diabolical Masterminds" for this and the title gets brought up during the third Nero Fest as he works together with Moriarty purely for the Grail.
- Played for Laughs in "The Little Santa Alter", where in the first place he's working with everyone else to craft a plot to guide Jeanne Alter Santa Lily to her wish in secret, and his role is a mentor-turned-villain. He appears as Santa Island Mask after blatantly exiting an earlier scene as himself, and while he presents himself as a Santa mentor to Jeanne Alter Santa Lily, he's openly giddy at the prospect of betraying the party later in a Meanwhile Scene before doing so with a bombastic Card-Carrying Villain reveal.
Cool Mask: It's not his own, but Amakusa (and several others) has taken a liking to wearing Mozart's mask, as he wore it in the second Christmas event and during next year's Nerofest.
Covered in Scars: Beneath those priest robes, as seen in Fate/Apocrypha vol 4's illustration.
Friend to All Children: He is shown time and time again to take care of children. The "A Moment of Tranquillity" Craft Essence shows him reading a book to Nursery Rhyme and Jack while talking about how he must walk upon his path due of how precious these moments of happiness are to them, the "Little Santa Alter" has him help the Protagonist in their plan to get Jeanne Alter Santa Lily to act more like a child, the "Enma-tei" event has him appear as Mysterious Missionary A to bring some of the child Servants to the Enma-tei using his own money, and Las Vegas Official Bout event has him gambling at various casinos so that he has the money to buy gifts and hold events for the ever-increasing number of child Servants.
The Gadfly: In "The Little Santa Alter", he's happy to help Jeanne and the Master since the end results would annoy them. He excites Jack's desire to cut everyone up and climb back into her mother's womb by mentioning that "Christmas is a day when everyone is your mother", much to the protagonist's loud and audible horror. When Jeanne mentions that she'd never imagine him helping her, Amakusa laughs it off by noting there would be more Jeanne Alters that she wouldn't get along with, though she's actually quite happy at gaining a little sister.
Hidden Depths: As much as he desires the Grail and might betray you for it, he's still a good person at heart and is more than willing to help out in non-Grail situations. "The Little Santa Alter" is one of the real big examples, where he becomes Santa Island Mask in order to assist Jeanne Lily. Specifically, he is one of the primary assistants the Protagonist has in facilitating Jeanne Lily's constructed journey to the sea so that she can survive as a Servant, and mostly does it simply because she deserves to exist.
Historical Villain Upgrade: He's an apocryphal Catholic saint and he wants to bring salvation to mankind, but he's a much worse person than the historical figure he's based on. Though ironically Fate's version of Amakusa is a much better person than how he is usually portrayed in Japanese media, making this somewhat downplayed. His Alternate Self in Shimousa is far more in line with the normal portrayal, even using wicked "Jesuit sorcery" supposedly learned from Lucifer himself.
Holy Hand Grenade: His Baptismal Sacrament skill, which only works on undead and demon enemies.
Katanas Are Just Better: From second ascension on, he switches his Black Keys for a katana.
Killed Offscreen: He was one of the seven Servants Gilgamesh summoned in Babylonia, but he disappeared before Chaldea's arrival after he and Kotarou went to scout out the jungle around Ur and Eridu. It's explained in Caster Gilgamesh's interlude that he got absolutly destroyed by Jaguar Warrior.
Late-Arrival Spoiler: His identity and motives are the biggest twist of Fate/Apocrypha.
Long-Haired Pretty Boy: Third and final ascension, when he gets his Samurai Ponytail back. His ponytail is down to his ankles in his sprite.
Long-Lived: The prologue of Vol. 3 of Apocrypha stated that the reason he was able to just wait between the third Holy Grail War and the Great Holy Grail War was that one of his Noble Phantoms prevented his incarnated body from aging.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: When he was released he was the only one who's Extra Attack changed depending on if the third attack in the Brave chain left him in close or ranged combat, which also changed the number of hits it would deal (4 in close combat, 6 in Ranged). Naturally this forced players to make sure the chains ended in Ranged to improve NP and Crit star Gen. A later update kept both animations, but made both deal 7 hits.
Mystical White Hair: He actually didn't have white hair in life, but gained it when the Greater Grail forcefully incarnated him in the backstory of Apocrypha.
Name Order Confusion: His alias "Shirou Kotomine" is written in Western order (it helps that the name is written in katakana), whereas his True Name is written in Eastern order.
Paper-Thin Disguise: He mostly appears in "The Little Santa Alter" as "Santa Island Mask", a mysterious Santa mentor for Jeanne Alter Santa Lily. He looks exactly the same as usual except for wearing Amadeus Mozart's mask, and even the protagonist and Mash have to suppress some obvious suspicions on his identity.
Patron Saint: Of all Japanese Catholics, even though he's still not regarded as such by the Vatican.
Phantom Thief: In the "Holy Grail Phantom Thief: Amakusa Shirou and the Slapstick Museum" event, which also came with a Spiriton Dress costume.
- Even before that, his "Santa Island Mask" persona that he took during the Second Christmas event was a clear reference to Tuxedo Mask who was himself a Phantom Thief in the first season (and clearly a Magic Kaito reference.)
Power Copying: His other Noble Phantasm that doesn't get used in battle is "Right Arm, Predation of Wickedness — Right Hand, Evil Eater" which lets him use miracles to replicate any form of magic. And since "Phantom Thievery" is a type of magic...
Power Creep: While many other victims exist, it's worth noting that upon his initial release, Buff Removal Resistance, his primary hard counter, didn't exist.
Redemption Demotion: Since he doesn't have access to all his upgrades from Fate/Apocrypha, he's much closer to his normal strength. It's quite fitting, enemy Amakusa is an absolute nightmare for any teams, but in your hands he's not that deadly. Good, but not that good.
Samurai: For third and final ascension, he assumes his proper appearance which has him dress in samurai clothes with a few Western touches (most notably a cravat).
Samurai Ponytail: To complete the Samurai look for third and final ascension form, he trades his Anime Hair for a pony tail.
Ship Tease: Despite both somewhat-denying it, it's heavily implied that he and Semiramis have struck up a romantic relationship again post-Apocrypha, though, as he tells Nursery Rhyme during the Enma-tei event, because Semiramis is extremely bad at dealing with open affection, they are very discrete.
Storm of Blades: After his animation update he shoots several Black Keys out of magic circles this way for his Arts and Extra attacks, an attack originating from his fights with Frankenstein and Sieg in Apocrypha.
Teen Genius: He died at the ripe age of seventeen, but still had the merit and strength to become a Heroic Spirit.
This Looks Like a Job for Aquaman: His noticeable quirk with his Noble Phantasm is his Armor-Piercing Attack that removes all buffs before dealing damage. This property is incredibly useful in Boss Rush challenge quests where the bosses will often buff each other whenever they die in the field or whenever a boss comes in a buff their teammates. He's considered to be one of the best Servants for various challenge quests with this gimmick (e.g. the second and third Nerofests' final fights against an onslaught of Servants, the first Battle of New York Gilfest finale, and "The Little Santa Alter" Christmas rerun challenge quest against Santa Alter and her reindeer).
- His buff removal of his Noble Phantasm has also proven to be incredibly useful in the fight before Old Li Shuwen where the player has to face Elite Mooks that have 3 attack evade, an NP charge per turn buff, and Guts (something that is incredibly hard for most players, even for whales). Amakusa is arguably considered the best Servant for this fight to the point that he can even solo this fight himself with a right setup.
Throwing Your Sword Always Works: Very skilled in the use of Black Keys. His Quick attack animation uses this.
Token Evil Teammate: While not necessarily the most violent, or even the most aggressive Ruler, he is certainly one of the most duplicitous and ruthless.
Unrealistic Black Hole: His Noble Phantasm, Twin Arm - Big Crunch, combines the magical energy gathered by the two Noble Phantasms in his hands, Left Hand - Xanadu Matrix and Right Hand - Evil Eater, and unleashes a miniature black hole on his foes.
Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: In Gilgamesh (Caster)'s interlude, he admits that the curbstomp he received from Jaguar Man in the Seventh Singularity: Absolute Demonic Front Babylonia turned jaguars into this for him.
The Worf Effect: Amakusa is a fairly competent Servant, so him and Fuuma Kotarou being defeated by Jaguar Warrior in Babylonia is unquestionably this.

Astraea

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ruler_1_art.png

Goddess of Justice and Innocence

^{Second Ascension}

^{Third Ascension}

^{Final Ascension}

^{Festive Outfit}

^{April Fool's}

^{April Fool's Fate/Grail League}

Voiced by: Shizuka Itō

"I have come in answer to your summons. I bring the judgment of the scales and the justice of the stars. My name is Astraea, a terminal of all good in this entire realm. Even as my Master, are you prepared to be measured?"

Astraea is the Greek virgin goddess of justice and innocence and is using the distinguished heiress of the Edelfelts, Luviagelita, as her host body when summoned to Chaldea as a Pseudo-Servant.

She made her debut in the Lord El-Melloi II Case Files crossover event, with her main story debut being Lostbelt 5: Atlantis.

All Amazons Want Hercules: Astraea is amazed at how much of an Ideal Hero Kintoki is, blushing and stuttering when he decides to tackle her judgment of him head on.
Amazonian Beauty: Has a very chiseled physique fitting of someone's who's fighting style is wrestling and wears a very elaborate dress that becomes extremely revealing after her first ascension.
Armor-Piercing Attack: Her Interlude adds a 1-turn Ignore Invulnerability buff to her NP, letting her punch right through enemy evasion and invulnerability skills, especially if she has an Arts Chain to refill her NP gauge and do it all over again.
Ass Kicks You: One of her attacks has her hitting her opponent with a running butt attack.
Balance Buff: Her Interlude buffs her NP damage while also adding Ignore Invincibility for one turn. Combined with how she can quite easily chain her NP, her offensive side gets quite the boost.
Composite Character: Of course, with Luviagelita; but it is noted in her bio that her legend fused with the later Lady Justice (Dike).
Critical Hit Class: She's a Critical Hit and Arts-focused offensive Ruler. Her Mana Burst variant instantly creates up to 30 Critical Stars on a 5-turn cooldown, her Noble Phantasm spits out an additional 20 every time it's used, and her third skill consumes five Stars to give her a one-turn Critical Star Gather Rate buff and Critical Strength buff. Tying it all together, she can practically Spam Attack with her NP to further create Critical Stars since she has a +20% NP Charge skill, an NP Gain buff on her first skill, and decent Star Drop Rate and NP Gain on her Arts and Extra Attack cards. She even has Independent Action as one of her three passive skills to further increase Critical Hit damage.
Choosing Neutrality: Despite being a Servant of Proper Human History, Astraea ended up siding with the Olympians against her fellow Proper Human History Servants. Only when Chaldea proves their worth does she decide to no longer be a direct ally of Olympus, instead becoming a neutral party.
Damage Reduction: The main gimmick of her fight in Lostbelt 5: Atlantis is that she reduces all damage modifiers to the base 1.0 multiplier, meaning that class advantage is virtually useless. Thankfully, you only need to drop her first break bar to win the fight.
Death from Above: Her Noble Phantasm, Custos Morum, calls forth an immense meteor shower to lay waste to her enemies. When she say her arsenal is the stars themselves, she was being quite literal! When Mnemosyne pits her against the Demon God Pillars led by Barbatos at the Temple of Time, she mocks them for bringing her out into space where the stars are all visible, allowing her to hold them off single-handedly for a time, though it requires considerable effort and she's too exhausted afterward to stop Mnemosyne from knocking her off the false Rhongoymniad.
Friend to All Children: If you have any of the Prisma Servants, she admits she's sad that children are fighting even if it's necessary.
Gemstone Assault: As a carryover of possessing Luvia, she is able to use gems as weapons. She can either use them as projectiles or can use them to power up her punches. At her full power, she trades in her gems for a barrage of bejeweled meteorites from the heavens.
Gold-Colored Superiority: She trades her blue dress for a golden leotard in her later ascensions, and in her third ascension she gains a golden star-shaped halo in her art.
Hate at First Sight: If you have Orion (Superhuman) and Astraea, Orion says she just took one look at him then said his sins were too heavy and tried to challenge him to a fight there and then.
Heroes Prefer Swords: She's the goddess of justice and wields as sword due to being synonymous with the more modern concept of Lady Justice. That said, she initially appears as an antagonist in Atlantis.
I Choose to Stay: Instead of leaving with the rest of the Greek gods, Astraea decided to stay behind on Earth to defend humanity until the end of the Greek Iron Age.
Iconic Outfit: Her profile notes that a goddess with a sword and a balance is indicative of all modern law and courts. In fact; it's the very symbol of the Ruler class itself; shown on the back of every Ruler card shown above.
Kicking Ass in All Her Finery: She adorns herself in a very opulent dress for her first stage, which doesn't impede her fighting in the slightest.
Lady of War: She primarily fights using wrestling moves, yet she manages to retain an air of elegance and grace while doing so.
Lightning Bruiser: Almost every part of her kit is offensive-focused, but she's also a Ruler who halves damage from most of the classes in the game, she has a targetable 20% defense bonus for three turns (and can also be cast on allies as a support tool), and she builds up NP Gauge pretty quickly. Her primary weakness is a lack of a hard survival skill and limited offensive class advantage.
Muscles Are Meaningful: She puts her toned limbs to good use in combat.
Noblewoman's Laugh: Averted. Despite having one of the more infamous users of the laugh as her Pseudo-Servant host body, Astraea very rarely laughs in this way, if at all.
No-Sell: Her Protection of the Libra skill would normally grant her Nigh-Invulnerability against anyone receiving her judgment. But due to possessing Luvia, it instead manifests as an inability to die while giving her all of Luvia's wrestling skills.
Oh, Crap!: All her confidence that she showed during "Lady Reines' Case Files" evaporates once Gray fires Rhongomyniad at her, and it only gets worse when even her own Noble Phantasm can't stop it.
Ojou Ringlets: Her host's already large ones became massive upon the goddess' possession.
One Degree of Separation: In The Faerie Queene, Astraea raised Sir Artegall, then created and left behind a metal man called Talus who helped Artegall in his fight for justice. Since Artegall is the father of the Servant Britomart, she calls Astraea her honorary grandmother.
Physical God: Like fellow Pseudo-Servants Ishtar and Ereshkigal, Astraea is a Divine Spirit summoned into a human vessel. Because of this, she has roided out stats: A+ Strength and Endurance with an EX in Mana, as well Goddess' Essence B. Her Mana Burst (Star) skill also means that even other Divine Spirits must bow to her judgment should they find themselves on the other end.
Poor Communication Kills: She attempts to prevent Reines and Chaldea's Master from collecting Mnemosyne's papers during the Lady Reines Case Files event, but refuses to explain why she's trying to stop them. If she'd just sat down and told them that someone was trying to brainwash the Master with them, it would've saved a lot of grief.
Purposefully Overpowered: Astraea possesses the highest HP and ATK of all 4* Rulers, roided out skills, and an extremely strong Noble Phantasm. Given her power as a Divine Spirit, it's understandable that she'd be this powerful.
Reasonable Authority Figure: As the goddess of justice, Astraea's whole job is to cast judgment fairly and impartially. Her punishments are only as severe as the crime. This is shown in her interlude when she simply has Mecha Eli-chan give back the energy supplies she stole (after beating her into submission first) and telling Bedivere to forgive himself, as he'd already atoned for his crime of failing to return Excalibur to the lake, resulting in the Lion King. She also delays judgment for the protagonist for what they did in the Lostbelts, accepting their response that there's too much at stake for them to stop now. Astraea even judges herself when it comes to breaking her impartiality to side with Proper Human History, taking on her original Divine Spirit aspect to fulfill her vow to protect the humanity she loves.
The Rival:
- As revealed in one of her dialogue lines, the rivalry between their hosts Luvia and Rin continues, as Astraea views Ishtar as a rival and is more than ready to get her own swimsuit version.
- This even extends to the Servantverse as revealed in "Saber Wars II", where that universe's Astraea was "Ishtarin's" rival in their Queens Academy days as the "Blue Wrestler" and "Red Devil" respectively.
The Runt at the End: Of the three Lord El-Melloi II Case Files Pseudo-Servants (the others being Sima Yi/Reines and Zhuge Liang/Waver), she is the only one who is not Chinese and who does not keep the original personality of their vessel, with Astraea in complete control instead of Luvia.
Sexy Backless Outfit: Some sprites show that her outfit leaves her back bare, save for some wings for decoration.
Situational Sword: Her Noble Phantasm does bonus damage against Evil Servants. Since Astraea is a Ruler, her Noble Phantasm will hurt considerably against Evil non-Avenger enemies, but it'll be far more devastating against Evil Berserkers and BB (Summer). After her Interlude, it is possible to have her deal from 600 thousand to over 2 million in neutral damage over three turns with the right setup and supports with just the NP alone.
Star Power: In addition to being the goddess of justice and innocence, Astraea is also the goddess of the stars, manifesting in her Mana Burst (Star) skill whose power can even force other Divine Spirits to bow to her judgement.
Suplex Finisher: She finishes her NP through a suplex to the opposite side of the giant scale. Her Arcade incarnation does not have this, using a simple sword slash instead.
Western Zodiac: Astraea was identified with not just one sign but TWO. The first being Libra, due to her being a goddess of justice, and the second is Virgo due to her status as a virgin goddess and being the last god to a leave the mortal realm.
Worthy Opponent: In her interlude, she ends up taking on Kintoki and is impressed by his sheer heroic disposition and willingness to confront his flaws without them overwhelming him. He feels the same way about her, and the fight ends with both them looking forward to the next time they're able to throw down.
Wrestler in All of Us: Still retains this trait even when possessed by a goddess. Some of the moves she uses includes a flying hip attack, a running dropkick, a flying splash and a German Suplex/Backdrop Suplex for her Noble Phantasm.

Caren C. Hortensia (Amor (Caren))

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/amor_stage_1.PNG

Caren Cupid Hortensia/Amor

^{Second Ascension/Caren C. Hortensia}

^{Third Ascension/God Caren}

^{Final Ascension}

^{Devil Caren}

^{April Fool's}

^{April Fool's Fate/Grail League}

Voiced by: Ami Koshimizu

"Servant, Ruler. I am the Divine Spirit Amor, otherwise known as Caren C. Hortensia, and I have come to answer your summons. Hehe. So this is the famed Chaldea. How wonderfully busy it is. I'm not sure whether I'm fit to preach about love...but we'll have to see, won't we?"

A sadistic priestess of the Church, and daughter of Kotomine Kirei, who has merged with the God of Love.

She made her playable debut in the fifth Valentine's Day event. Her "Devil Caren" form appears as a minor cameo in the main story in the sixth Lostbelt.

Alternate Self:
- Nasu himself explained in his blog that the Caren in Fate/hollow ataraxia and this Caren are a little bit different thus she doesn't seemingly recognize Aŋra Mainiiu. As it turns out, Caren here is not at all Caren from Fate/hollow ataraxia and instead is Caren from Fate/Tiger colosseum.
- Amor (who Caren views favorably) and Eros aka Cupid (who she disdains) can be viewed this way. One could argue they're the same god, but in the event it's explained that Amor is a primordial deity whereas Eros was that myth sublimated to be the son of Venus. This is similar to how Castor was originally born a god in older myths but the later myths changed and downgraded him to being born human.
Amazing Technicolor Population: Devil Caren has hot-pink skin.
Ambiguous Situation: Does she or does she not remember Aŋra Mainiiu? Nasu specifically requested that voice lines related to him be omitted due to this Caren being from Fate/Tiger colosseum but Kirei's Valentines scene appear to indicate she may actually remember him to some extent. Additionally, she outright refuses to comment on him in her profile in the "Fate/Grand Order material XII" book. She does remember Bazett though, which raises further questions.
???^noteAŋra Mainiiu: It's Valentine's Day, so you also got one more person you need to find a present for, don'tcha?
Kirei: I leave that role to you. You have TWO more people^noteCaren herself and Bazett waiting for your company.
Baby Talk: Caren's baby version primarily talks in a very cutesy way by mispronouncing certain syllables, with lots of baby onomatopoeia thrown in for good measure.
Balance Buff: She received a Rank Up Quest for the sixth Valentine's Day event that not only boosts the base damage of her NP, it also adds Bonus Damage against Chaotic enemies.
Brown Bag Mask:
- Eros and Amor, two familiars formed from portions of her Spirit Origin who look exactly like her distribute her chocolates by wearing one of these over their heads as a "disguise". Considering that's the only real effort they put into it - they're still wearing her Second Ascension clothing and the bag doesn't even cover up her distinctive hair - the only reason she got away with it for so long is because she was the newest addition to Chaldea and because everyone in Chaldea is so used to random oddness that most just figured it's something to do with the Servantverse and didn't pry further. The main characters immediately identify her on sight.
- Even after her identity is fully outed, however, Caren still keeps the bag mask to the point she spends most of the sixth and very next Valentines' event wearing it seemingly for no other reason than personal entertainment. If she needs to show emotion while wearing it, the bag gains doodles to make cartoon faces matching her current mood. She admits she did it for laughs at first, but then kept it up to hide her identity from Manannán, who had access to Bazett's memory of her.
The Cameo: Caren-chan, her baby self from Capsule Servant has a chance of appearing in her NP animation and skill animation and is her final boss form in her Valentine's Event as "Supew Baby Cawen". It also makes an apperance in the following Valentines event.
Celibate Heroine: During her event, Caren outright says "the Lord's the only man I need in my life" while turning down what she thinks is a suitor. However, Eros does mention that she did have feelings for one man in particular at some point, though Caren proceeds to slap her.
Combat Sadomasochist: While she doesn't obviously revel in pain, Caren has a habit of intentionally going out of her way to take damage, whether it's self-inflicted from the stress of using her God Bazooka or throwing herself into the line of fire of enemy attacks because she feels she deserves to be hit. She isn't shameless enough to admit she actually likes it though.
[discussing how she deliberately jumped into an angry Medea's attacks] "Um... Yes, but, uh, I didn't have a choice... Eros's crimes are, um, mine to bear as well, you see... So even though being punished definitely isn't my thing—not...not at all—I, uh, have to take it all the same..."
Cryptic Background Reference: Her material book profile mentions that Caren has not experienced the "Aylesbury Geocentrism" yet in Tsukihime.
Cupid's Arrow: She uses these in her attack animations. Eros/Cupid, the Trope Namer, and Amor briefly speak to her at the end of her event to compare her to these, saying that they care for her just as much as their equipment and don't want to see her broken or disrespected.
Daddy Issues: While she doesn't hate Kotomine, it's implied she resents him for abandoning her.
"I can think of nothing I dislike. Though there is someone I do think should suffer a million deaths. This particular person basically committed child abandonment, and then later enjoyed his life to the fullest only to die peacefully... Does he think he deserved all of that?"
Department of Redundancy Department: The official website, the game's information as well as her Bond CE list her name as "Caren C. Hortensia (Amor (Caren))".
Discard and Draw: She originally used the Holy Shroud of Magdalene back in Fate/hollow ataraxia but has chosen to swap it out in favor of a similar-looking Mystic Code known as the Holy Shroud of Valentinus.
Easter Egg: She has a very rare chance of "Last Piece" from hollow ataraxia playing when using her NP instead of her normal NP theme.
Enfant Terrible: "Super Baby Caren" drops all ambiguous threatening syntax from her previous forms, and blatantly tells the protagonists that she's going to murder them for getting in her way.
Face of an Angel, Mind of a Demon: Caren is a beautiful young woman, even discounting how she's a Pseudo-Servant to a Love God, and it's commented on in the event itself. She's also every bit her father's daughter in terms of being a Sadist, to the point she all but has Cú Chulainn and Kid Gilgamesh as her whipping boys.
The Four Loves: Major theme with her character, Caren is "translating" the Roman god Amor into her ideas of Love (heavily influenced by her Christian faith). In particular she focuses on Agape and actively denies any interest in Lust/Eros despite literally being Eros and a Combat Sadomasochist to boot. She claims this is due to being part of the church but not everyone is convinced.
Gold and White Are Divine: Her first and third outfits feature white and gold, which helps emphasize the fact that Caren is channeling the power of a Roman god.
A God Am I: Her third ascension has Caren declaring she is a god.
The Heretic: Lampshaded when she says not to worry about possible heresy in her (a Christian) becoming Amor (a pagan/Roman god) to spread God's Love.
Hidden Disdain Reveal: Before she attacks them in her Super Baby form, Caren lets Kid Gilgamesh and Cu Cú know that beyond wanting to continue to do so after the events of her game, she tormented them as punishment for the respective ways they took love for granted while they were alive.
Hijacked by Jesus: Invoked Trope. Caren is basically taking control of the Roman god Amor to spread the Christian notion of Absolute Love via Capital G God. This is working in her first and second ascensions while the third seems to be a tie.
I Have Many Names: Her Saint Graph's name changes upon ascending. Her First Ascension starts of with the name "Amor". Her Second Ascension's name is "Caren C. Hortensia", but in battle it will be shortened to just "Caren". Her Third and Final Ascensions' name is "God Caren". Her profile lists her name as "Amor (Caren)", but the official website, the game's event and summon information as well as her Bond CE list her name as "Caren C. Hortensia (Amor (Caren))".
Interface Spoiler: Subverted. Reaching Bond 1 will show her character's origins, in which Caren's origin will be listed as Fate/hollow ataraxia. This is a lie though. Completing her debut event and reaching Bond 5 reveals she's actually from Fate/Tiger colosseum, though even then she takes more inspiration from the Caren from Capsule Servant.
Light 'em Up: Light motifs are heavily incorporated into her attacks.
Like Father, Like Daughter: Like her father Kotomine, she's a natural born sadist. Unlike him however, she easily accepted this part of herself but also didn't really put a ton of effort in trying to hide or suppress her tendencies. She makes attempts to pretend to be nice and holy while acting as Amor but this causes her come off as a bit of airheaded Jerkass who doesn't notice or care if others are caught in harm's way of her actions, when in reality she's actively trying to get people caught the crossfire.
Loophole Abuse: Her Passive Skill, Masochistic Spiritualist Disposition, increases her ATK by 20% in case she gets a Debuff. The player can easily trigger that skill by either equipping her with The Black Grail or having an Servant with the Passive Skill "Avenger" somewhere in your party, as that Passive Skill debuffs your party with a Debuff Resistance Down Demerit. The Black Grail has a Demerit that damages the user by 500 HP, but increases their NP Strength by 60-80%. Either of those Debuffs are permanent.
Magical Barefooter: Her shoes disappear while she is using her Noble Phantasm.
Mana Drain: Her kit puts a heavy emphasis on stealing NP from both enemy and allies. Her Holy Shroud of Valentinus A skill also grants allies an NP Gain Up buff so that they'll have more NP for her to drain.
Meaningful Name: The name "Caren" has a Welsh origin, giving it the meaning "to love" or "the one who loves".
Money Fetish: Loves collecting money, but not so she can spend it; to Caren, money is a symbol of power and authority, and she views God as the ultimate authority. To her, money is the ultimate status symbol.
Mysterious Middle Initial: She gains a middle initial where her alternate counterparts typically have none. According to one of her titles, the "C." stands for Cupid.
Now, Buy the Merchandise: When she turns into Baby Caren, she plugs Capsule Servant, now available for download on iOS/Android platforms. In the English release, it adds a joke about how she doesn't condone piracy, since it's now hard to get.
Powers via Possession: Caren's original power allows her to control entities that possess her, so she's doing this to Amor and Eros, which makes her a noticeable inversion of the majority of Pseudo-Servants with a deity.
Ramming Always Works: The "Noble Phantasm" of Super Baby Caren just has her driving into all active Servants at high speeds.
Religion is Magic: That members of the Church have mystic powers is firmly established in the Nasuverse; however it's the least explained as there has never been a Character Narrator with direct ties. Church Members would never call it "magic" though and the mages in the setting agree on that score.
Rogue Protagonist: From one of the main heroines of Fate/Hollow Ataraxia to the main antagonist of her Valentine event.
Spam Attack: Caren's kit is designed to spam her Noble Phantasm repeatedly, which is obvious by the fact that her all of her three skills allow her to steal NP Charge from her allies and enemies. Her Noble Phantasm also debuffs the enemies with Quick Resistance Down, allowing her to gradually grind harder through tougher enemies.
Spell My Name With An S: Caren's name is officially romanized as "Caren Hortensia". Alternate, it can be spelled as "Karen", which is the case for her Fate/KOHA-ACE counterpart Kotomine Karen, whose name is written in kanji.
Square Race, Round Class: Played With. Her first two Ascensions has her using a bow in a lot of her animations, making her seem like an Archer Servant instead of a Ruler. However, she ditches her bow completely in her Third Ascension, making her less suited for the Archer class by then.
Troll: Like father, like daughter; she takes a certain joy in pressing people's buttons, most notably Cu Chulainn and Kid Gil.
Vapor Wear: She clearly isn't wearing a bra in her First and Final Ascensions.
Western Zodiac: Aphrodite and Eros were identified with Pisces when they both transformed to fish to escape Typhon's rampage.
Winged Humanoid: She temporarily gains two sets of wings during her Noble Phantasm.

Himiko

Shaman Queen of Yamatai

^{Second Ascension}

^{Third Ascension}

^{Final Ascension}

^{Heroic Spirit Tour}

^{April Fool's}

^{April Fool's Fate/Grail League}

Voiced by: Yukari Tamura

"I am the queen of Yamataikoku, Himiko. I am a medium of the eternal heavens, as well as a shrine maiden of light. May my revelations open up a path for you... Eh? I don't look very impressive? I don't blame you for thinking that. I don't think it helps when I look like this. ...Annnd for those of you who thought that, I predict that you will immediately change your mind and say, 'Great Himiko, you're the best!!!'"

A queen said to have ruled the ancient land of Yamatai, which was believed to have existed in Japan. Appearing suddenly in the warring states of Wa, she used her mysterious magecraft called Kidou to unite the land under her rule, even establishing herself as being the friend of Wei. She lived inside a giant sanctuary, never showing herself to anyone else than to her brother who would carry out her messages. When she died, the nation of Yamatai vanished from history, making it hard to tell if Himiko was even a real person.

She first debuted as a limited servant in 2020 Gudaguda event "Ultra-Ancient Shinsengumi Biographies GUDAGUDA Yamatai-koku 2020".

Alternate Self: When Nasu talked about how GUDAGUDA Servants come from a parallel timeline, one of Servants he listed as having different characterization and lore from the proper versions include Himiko. Just exactly what is different between the "proper" Himiko and GUDAGUDA Himiko is never stated, but it might have to do with the voices she hears^note.
Amazonian Beauty: She is the beautiful, wise queen of Yamatai, and is both curvaceous and well-toned.
Beam Spam: One of her Arts animations in her third ascension has her aim her mirrors in all directions before firing a barrage of lasers.
Beneath the Mask: After she was crowned queen and worshipped for her divination abilities, Himiko put on the façade of someone much more dignified that she actually is. In private and a Servant, she's free to kick back and indulge in her true tomboyish personality.
Benevolent Mage Ruler: Himiko was able to rule over Yamatai and subdue conflicts with the use of her magecraft, mainly by the usage of prophecies. Though she doesn't seem to be above using brute force to get her way.
Blessed with Suck: Her personal opinion of her uncanny bad luck that summons rain. Sure, it's great for her subjects who need a good harvest, but it also keeps her from ever being able to have fun outside.
Call-Forward: The incantation for her final Noble Phantasm, the Eternal Mirror of the Stars, is astonishingly similar to Kirschtaria Wodime's Grand Order - Anima Animusphere. Fittingly enough, they both preside over the reading of stars and light.
"Stars; Time; Form; Forever; Distant; Mirror. By the guidance of the Sun and the Moon and the Stars that subjugate the Nine Heavens. Purify the Darkness of the Eternal World, and give form to the Truest Light, Eternal Mirror of the Stars."
Calling Your Attacks: Himiko Beam! Himiko Punch! Himiko Typhoon! Ultra Super Himiko Crush!
The Chains of Commanding: Brother Tortoise notes that she didn't really want to be queen of Yamatai, but she felt she had to for the sake of everyone's happiness after he accidentally revealed her divination abilities to the rest of the populace. In taking up the role of god-queen, Himiko was forced to hide her true personality behind a queenly mask, never got to play outside again, and solved every problem in Yamatai at the cost of her personal freedom until the day she died.
Combat Stilettos: A closer look at her sandals reveals that they have elevated soles, yet she has no problems fighting in them by punching and kicking her opponents into submission.
Cool Big Sis: According to her Bond CE, her little brother adored her and waited her on hand and foot, doing everything from giving her his food when she was hungry, solving problems everywhere for her, and giving her the mirror that would become her favorite. She laments that he helped her so much that his own name was lost to history, mostly because he felt guilty over revealing her talents and thus ending her chance for a normal life.
Critical Hit Class: Himiko's skills and Noble Phantasm focus on her Critical Hits with her Buster cards as well as supporting partywide Buster Critical Hits and she's more than sufficient with it too. She can provide herself and her teammates effects that drop 8 Critical Stars per turn (lasts 3 turns), meaning that her team will drop 24 C. Stars at the end of every turn at minimum as long as the effects last. Her second skill and Noble Phantasm increases her Buster Effectiveness, and her third skill and her Noble Phantasm increase her Critical Strength and her Buster Critical Strength and the C. Star Gather Rate of her Buster cards is increased by 300-500%.
Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: Himiko is The Ditz and a goofy tomboy who'd like nothing more than to visit the beach and gather clams. She's also a powerful shamaness from the Age of Gods who can incapacitate other Servants with a single punch each and peer thousands of years into the future with near-perfect accuracy via her mirrors.
Determinator: Kukochihiko consumed the still-living Himiko in darkness to stop her from interfering with his plans. Unbeknownst to her, she persisted in complete darkness while deprived of all her senses by using her mirror to glimpse into the future and wait for the opportunity to grasp her salvation by summoning herself as a Servant. This is why she's able to arrive to the protagonist's aid after Kukochihiko isolates them from their Servants, using her light to fuse with her Servant self to form "Super Himiko" and unravel Kukochihiko's plans.
The Ditz: At times. For instance when she and her brother first meet the protagonist, she didn't realize that her brother had been turned into a tortoise until they asked. When she meets her still-living self, she comments that she didn't know that she had a twin sister ... making her other self comment that she is surprised that she managed to become a Heroic Spirit.
Does Not Know His Own Strength: When the protagonist washes ashore at the beginning of the Yamataikoku event, Himiko decides that she's going to try and revive them with CPR. Brother Tortoise pointedly notes that she's more likely to crush the protaognist's ribcage with her strength, and she begins by winding up a punch to try and shock them awake. The protagonist manages to avoid an untimely death by jolting themselves awake and sitting up in a nick of time.
Embarrassing Superpower: Her abilities as an oracle are top-notch and incredibly useful. But she sleeps standing up while using them and drools while dozing off. She insists that she's not sleeping, but it's pretty clear to everyone that she is. This is also why she always retreated into her temple's innermost sanctum to conduct divinations to avoid embarrassing herself.
The Fettered: Nobukatsu asks Brother Tortoise why Himiko didn't simply abandon her post as queen if she wanted to get away from it all. Tortoise replies that even though she didn't want to be queen, she felt she had to for the sake of everyone's happiness.
Foil: Himiko serves as one to Demon Lord Nobunaga. Their classes are diametrically opposed as impartial observers versus seekers of vengeance. While Nobunaga appears flighty and comical, she's still a vicious warlord who mercilessly killed those opposing her conquest. Himiko puts on a queenly mask, but is secretly a silly, fun-loving tomboy. Nobunaga was feared as the Demon King of the Sixth Heaven, while Himiko was adored as the god-queen of Yamatai. Nobunaga also sought to fulfill her personal ambitions, while Himiko resigned herself to her role as queen for the sake of everyone else.
Fusion Dance: The still-living Himiko of the current era survived by allowing herself to be consumed by Kukochihiko's darkness. Once her Servant version arrives, the living Himiko bestows her powers upon her other self, creating Super Himiko to unleash her final Noble Phantasm, the Mirror of Celesial Eternity, to banish the darkness completely.
Genki Girl: She's highly energetic, gung-ho, and prefers a hands-on approach to most problems.
God-Emperor: She was worshipped as the god-queen of Yamatai for her divinations and seemingly boundless wisdom.
Gold and White Are Divine: She's decked out in a white and gold dress and headdress in her Second and Third Ascension as part of her appearance as Yamatai's god-queen.
Good Old Fisticuffs: The holy secret of Yamatai, the well-named Himiko Punch. She's naturally abnormally strong and healthy and has a lot of practice in literal bone-shattering as part of her divination duties. It's clear she can't really call herself a martial artist but her brawling abilities are nasty. After getting outright Punched Across the Room for nearly starting a fight with Hajime, Izou compares her punch to Oryou's before passing out, and Oryou is a humanoid drake with Monstrous Strength.
Gratuitous English: She has a habit of announcing her attacks in English despite the fact that her country never made contact with England in her lifetime.
The High Queen: Her profile and Brother Tortoise's stories about her say that she singlehandedly unified all of ancient Japan into the country of Yamatai, bringing peace and prosperity until the day she died.
Historical Villain Upgrade: In-universe, the GUDAGUDA folks film a TV special citing the "historical events" in which Iyo overthrew a tyrannical Himiko to bring peace to Yamatai. Given the zaniness of the cast, Demon Lord Nobbu hams it up as an evil demon lord whereas Okita Alter depicts an absentminded but heroic Iyo. When the protagonist gets sent back to Yamatai proper, Himiko is nothing but friendly, selfless, and outgoing.
Hostile Weather: Has comically bad luck when it comes to weather. When she was the ruling queen of Yamatai, all of her attempts to get out of the castle were stopped in their tracks by sudden, inexplicable downpours. This only made her even more beloved by her people, as they declared her a bringer of rain who ensures good harvests.
I Just Want to Be Normal: Played with as Himiko wanted to just be a normal girl, but because her powers allowed Yamatai and its people to prosper she didn't regret her decision to become their queen.
Impossibly Cool Clothes: The sleeves of her Third Ascension's dress seem to be made of little floating squares that dissolve away as she walks around, yet the sleeves themselves never seem to shorten.
Impossibly-Low Neckline: The kimono she wears in her Third and Final Ascensions goes past her shoulders and exposes almost all of her boobs.
Insult Backfire: China used to call Japan "Wa", which used to mean "submissive, distant, dwarf", meaning that their title for Himiko of "Shingi Waou" ("Ruler of Wa, Friend of Wei") comes off as them still looking down on her and her kingdom. Himiko is oblivious to how China used to view Japan and finds the title cool.
Kick Chick: Although she's known for her signature Himiko Punch, she also incorporates a lot of acrobatic kicks into her repertoire, striking her opponents with a backflip kick followed by a drop kick for one of her Arts animations, stomping on her opponent's head for a Quick animation, throwing a haymaker of a kick to her opponent's groin for one of her Buster animations. All of these poses emphasize her legs.
Kicking Ass in All Her Finery: Donning a luxurious dress doesn't stop Himiko from kicking ass, simply relying more on her magecraft than punches and kicks. Even then, she's not afraid to get physical.
Klingon Promotion: Though she was handed the throne due to her merits, she subscribes to the ancient practice of beating up a ruler until you manage to make them give up if you want their station.
Last Episode Theme Reprise: Her final battle in the event starts out with the same piano as its theme song and then it kicks into the Rock version of the song.
Legend Fades to Myth: Because there are practically no Japanese texts in regards to Himiko or Yamatai existing (most records about it are Chinese), some scholars have debated if she even existed in the first place. Himiko herself admits that she has no idea where Yamatai was even located as she never had the chance to leave her palace. Hilariously, her reign was so shrouded in legend that despite the event singularity taking place during the reign of her direct successor Iyo, stories about her have already spiraled out of control, leaving her having to explain to children that no, she's never fought a giant snake in single combat and she can't breathe fire.
Light Is Good: From her association with mirrors, her kind personality, and divine visage as the god-queen of Yamatai, Himiko is overflowing with light imagery and is very much on the side of good.
Lonely at the Top: Her ability to settle conflicts and provide prosperity through her divinations made the people of Yamatai worship her as a goddess. But this admiration was more towards her as a "Human Pillar" of their civilization than the person herself. She privately admits that she was lonely as queen, as only the haniwas accompanied her without asking for something in return.
"My favorites are haniwas with amusing faces that seem to be mumbling. ...I admire them lined up on the altar like this. ...Ah, you were thinking "Himiko-san's gloomy" just now, weren't you? That's right. Queens have a lonely disposition... [sighs]"
Magical Incantation: Like most Servants in the game, she recites an incantation upon activating her Noble Phantasm. But it seems to be more for Himiko's aesthetics than actual use, as she can just as easily substitute it for a sillier one, like saying her name over and over.
"O' symbol of flames, the moon, and the stars passing through the Heavens. Take on the form of the true light that sweeps away the darkness of the land of the dead. Eternal Mirror of the Stars."
Magic Mirror: Her combat and magecraft use mirrors in various ways. In her first sprite, she uses a small mirror to shoot a beam for one of her attacks and uses a larger one by smashing it over the enemy's head. She also uses it to quickly travel behind her opponent as a beam of light before kicking them in the head. In her second and third sprite, she has multiple mirrors around herself that can fire beams of light from. Finally, her Noble Phantasm has her summoning countless mirrors that project information from different times and areas, and by using herself as a medium she is able to observe the future.
Miko: One of the earliest known miko in history, as she was known as a shaman and she introduces herself as "a shrine maiden of light". Her outfits in her second and third ascensions have elements of a traditional miko's attire.
Modest Royalty: When decked out in her full regal attire, Himiko makes for an impressive queen. When off the clock, however, she likes to keep things simple, fitting her almost tomboyish personality.
The Needs of the Many: Despite her pride over being the The High Queen of Yamataikoku, Brother Tortoise spells out to Nobukatsu that Himiko was miserable and lonely as she was made into a pillar of the kingdom everyone relied upon rather than a person. But she kept smiling and serving as the perfect god-queen for the sake of everyone else's happiness.
Nice Girl: Fun-loving as she may be, Himiko always puts others first, becoming queen of Yamatai knowing full well it would mean the end of her personal freedom and happiness. Her lines and actions show her to be sweet and generous almost to a fault.
The Nicknamer: She calls the protagonist "Futuro" or "Futura" ("Mirai-kun" or "Mirai-chan" in Japanese) depending on their gender, as they're a Japanese youth from the future.
No-Sell: She has Natural Body as a passive that grants her poison and curse immunity.
Older Is Better: As a Servant hailing from a primitive version of Japan, she's physically stronger than practically every other fully-human Japanese Servant, with Izou comparing her punches to Oryou's, a being just a step below becoming a dragon. Her mirrors are also able to open a path back to Chaldea when its own Trismegistus II couldn't get a lock on such a murky time period, meaning her mirrors' computational power far surpasses anything in the modern day.
Plot Parallel: Himiko's own self-sacrificing nature (and how it puts her in The Chains of Commanding) is almost beat-for-beat similar to Fate mascot Altria/Saber's own dilemmas in her original visual novel route. While less obvious than Altria's flaws, Himiko has paralyzing flashbacks to people begging her for help when Nobukatsu demands she do something about Nobunaga being possessed by the Black Blight.
Power Floats: She's able to float off the ground for flying tackles in her First Ascension onward.
Power Tattoo: Himiko has tattoo-like patterns across her arms and legs. More and more of them appear as she ascends, finally appearing on her breasts and face by Third Ascension.
Seers: Himiko has the power to see the future and shows this when she first meets the protagonist, being able to tell they came from the future once she meet them. Her brother stated she became queen of Yamatai when the people realized her power. However, her lines indicate that her power may not be as absolute as her people believed it to be, as she mutters about what might have happened if her predictions were wrong.
Ship Tease: During her debut event, she offhandedly mentions that her love fortunes never work for herself. At Bond 4, her summoned version seems to discover why: It's strongly implied that she tries again after being summoned... and gets the Master of Chaldea as her "fated lover." Kinda hard to find your lover when they won't be born for thousands of years.
Sideboob: Her outfit in her First and Second Ascensions is sideless.
Situational Sword: One of her second skill's three effects is a Special Attack buff against [Demonic] enemies for three turns. While none of the Moon Cancers have this trait, several Berserkers do, including NPC enemies.
Sleepyhead: Her "Oracle of Light" skill pointedly says that no matter what it looks like, she's definitely not napping. Definitely not.
The Slow Path: To thwart Kukochihiko, she and her brother laid low in the abyss for thousands of year. Their joint bond and mellow attitudes allowed them to do this without going mad or despondent, although it was still very boring.
Stone Wall: Following her release, she quickly became famous among players for forming the premier stall comp strategy with Merlin and Caster Altria. Himiko's ability to increase the overcharge level of her allies' Noble Phantasms and their ability to provide party-wide invulnerability effects allow them to go through entire fights without ever taking damage. But given how all three of them are designed as Support Party Members, their damage outside of Buster crit burst turns is middling at best.
Supernatural Gold Eyes: While her eyes are brown for her first two ascensions, they turn gold for her third ascension to show her maximum power as Yamatai's divine queen.
Support Party Member: Part of her kit is focused on supporting Critical Hit-focused Buster Servants. Her first skill giving herself and her teammates the ability to drop 8 Critical Stars each while her Noble Phantasm gives partywide Buster Buff, Critical Strength buff and a one-time Noble Phantasm Overcharge Up by 2 for three turns.
Tastes Like Friendship: In her Second Ascension, she demands all disputes cease in her presence, instead asking everyone to get along over some tasty clams.
The Time of Myths: When she's from, just on the cusp before the beginning of Japan's written history. Commentary from Babylonian or Chinese Servants noting that they wrote their stuff down before then is noted and then cheerfully ignored.
Tomboy Princess: Well, queen, but it's what her real personality is like. She's a rowdy, fun-loving gal who'd rather goof off at the beach and eat clams all day if she could.
Trademark Favorite Food: She really likes clams, the bigger they are the better. This leads to some funny interactions with summer Kiara as Himiko thinks she smells delicious as Kiara ate a fossil of a giant clam youkai, and Kiara herself gets distracted thinking about Himiko's divine aura when the latter offers her fried clams.
Unskilled, but Strong: When it comes to her actual fighting prowess, Himiko is a pure brawler who gets by with mostly brute force. But being an ancient Servant from the times of Japanese myth whose exploits are shrouded in mystery also means she so absurdly strong it's all she really needs.
Vapor Wear: Quite noticeable in both her first and second sprites. It's nearly impossible for her to be wearing anything underneath that small dress.
Vocal Dissonance: She drops her voice's pitch considerably to give off a mature air in her queenly persona, but it doesn't stop her from acting silly or announcing her attacks like "Himiko Beam!" or "Himiko Typhoon!".

Iyo

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/iyoart1.jpg

Successor of Yamatai

^{Final Ascension}

^{Holiday Memories Style}

^{April Fool's Fate/Grail League}

Voiced by: Ari Ozawa

"My name is the second queen of Yamataikoku, Iyo. The priestess of perpetual night and the bastard child of the inverse moon. With dark light and brilliant darkness, I shall wish your future well. With that said, I'll be in your care for a looong time, Future-san!"

The successor of Yamatai, Queen Iyo or Toyo, was a relative of her predecessor Queen Himiko, who acquired her position after the latter’s passing. She at a young age gained massive political power, and like Himiko she was also a shaman. Very few records of her exist; however it is recorded in The Records of Wei that she wasn’t the first successor of the Queen, it was first a boorish man who caused great strife until he was disposed of and young Iyo was made queen in his place.

She debuted in the event, "Champion Tea Ceremony Battle: GUDAGUDA Neo Yamatai-koku -The Man Who Returned from Hell-", after a cameo in "GUDAGUDA Yamataikoku".

Anti-Anti-Christ: She was born to be the Priestess of Ruin, the vessel of the ancestral beast predating Yamatai and bringer of disease, famine, and destruction. But Himiko found her first and rescues her from Kukochihiko's and the beast's clutches. Iyo protests, citing the ruinous nature of her powers, but Himiko assures her that all powers can be used for good, it just depends on the person wielding them.
Ascended Extra: Went from being a character with just one cameo, with the event ending with her begging to be summoned to a fully playable servant.
Brick Joke: Her first spoken appearance was in the epilogue of Shinsengumi Legend GUDAGUDA Yamataikoku, where she complains about Himiko getting to go to Chaldea and pesters her to get the protagonist to summon her too. Two years later, Iyo finally got her wish.
Calling Your Attacks: Iyo Laser! Iyo Kick!
A Child Shall Lead Them: She was only 13 when she took the throne.
Damned by Faint Praise: Himiko casually admits that Iyo isn't as powerful as her but that she's still quite mighty and can be depended on even if she herself isn't around.
Doom Magnet: As the chosen vessel for the ancestral beast, Iyo is by nature a bringer of doom. Her birth alone triggered a series of calamities that killed her family and relatives and caused her to be shunned from her village.
Evil Counterpart: Subverted. Her alignment, skills, and Noble Phantasm, and even fighting style are all the opposite of Himiko's (Lawful Evil to Himiko's Chaotic Good, Kido (Destruction) to Himiko's Kido, et cetera). However, she is every bit as kind and friendly as Himiko is. A nod towards her origin as the Priestess of Ruin and her resolution to be good despite the circumstances of her birth.
Foreshadowing: One of her passives is Kuna's Mantra, which grants her the Wild Beast trait. This foreshadows not only her connection to Kunakoku, the kingdom Yamatai fought during Himiko's reign, but also Iyo's nature as the Priestess of Ruin and vessel to the ancestral beast.
Hero of Another Story: She is the one who summoned Demon King Nobunaga to Yamatai to stall Serizawa's plans to control the Dark Blight through Kukochihiko.
Kick Chick: Like Himiko, she often uses physical attacks; unlike Himiko with her Himiko Punch, Iyo specializes more on using her legs for her Iyo Kicks.
Moveset Clone: Being Himiko's successor, Iyo fittingly has a kit that's reminiscent of Himiko's, but not as powerful and having an Arts and offense-focused spin on it. Her Noble Phantasm is also an offensive one as opposed to Himiko's support-focused one.
Sideboob: Like Himiko, her outfit exposes her sides.
Tomboy Princess: Like her predecessor and relative Himiko, Iyo puts on the act of a graceful and wise shamaness but she's still a young girl with typical desires. Even in her short appearances in the first Yamatai event she pesters Himiko like a younger sister would.

James Moriarty (Ruler) ("Parting Memories' Manifestation Realm, Traum" Spoilers!)

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/901300a1.png

The World's Greatest Criminal Mastermind

^{Second Ascension}

^{Third Ascension}

^{Final Ascension}

^{Dream Portrait}

^{April Fool's Fate/Grail League}

Voiced by: Kent Itou

"I came in response to your summons. James Moriarty, Class Ruler. Can't believe my future is so promising that I got summoned. Guess I'm not without my worth! Huh? Supervillain active all over Europe? Whatever do you mean?"

A younger version of James Moriarty, the famous arch-nemesis of Sherlock Holmes. When you first meet him, he will try to act like he is just a math professor or a college friend who will help you while also acting rather toxic at you. But in reality, he knows that he will one day become a criminal mastermind when he grows older, so once the gig is up, he will switch gears and start acting like what he thinks his future self is like.

Think that his manifestation is strange? That is because it is. This version of Moriarty came to be when the Foreign God needed to deal with their traitorous first Disciple, Sherlock Holmes, who had been siding with Chaldea. As such it summoned a younger version of Moriarty and infused him with the three Norns, allowing him to weave his own fate, and he then contracted with the Foreign World, turning him into a Disciple. Moriarty accepted this offer because what better way to start his criminal career than to deal with his future rival before he knows it?

He appears as an antagonist in Lostbelt Chapter 6.5 "Parting Memory Manifestation Realms, Traum".

Arch-Enemy: As always, it's Sherlock Holmes. Unlike his older version, the young Moriarty has yet to even meet Holmes but is still driven to kill him because their feud is the foundation of his legend.
Attack Drones: A trio of glowing hourglass-like mystic codes floats around him and can attack with beams of light on his command.
Battle Theme Music: Bombastically malvelolent music deliberately crafted to be as dramatic as possible, befitting his showiness as a young criminal mastermind.
Breaking Old Trends: He's the first playable Ruler to have the Evil alignment.
Car Fu: He summons an Edwardian-era motor vehicle to ram into his enemies for his Extra Attack.
Chuunibyou: No, this Moriarty is not "younger Moriarty who still acts like his older self". This is "younger Moriarty who acts like what he thinks his older self is like". His overall performance is even more over-the-top than what Archer Moriarty would pull off, with his youthfulness making it so that his self-esteem is rather fragile. The older Moriarty finds his younger self to be rather annoying because of all of that.
Complexity Addiction: His multiple goals in Traum made things more complex for him, which he enjoyed.
Composite Character: Like how Disciples of the Foreign God are Alter Egos composed of different deities, this Moriarty has three Divine Spirits inside of him. In his case, he was provided with the three Norns, allowing him to manipulate fate.
Diabolical Mastermind: Downplayed. His evil genius has already begun to blossom but he lacks the wisdom that comes with age and experience held by his older Archer-class self. This is shown by the absence of both his Evil Charisma and End of the Spider's Thread skills, both of which represented his ability to entice and manipulate others into his wicked schemes. This means that despite the impressive show he puts on, he can't quite convince Kadoc to trade sides.
Didn't Think This Through: Ruler Moriarty's lack of age and experience makes him assume and do things that are driven by his dramatics, but he doesn't actually stop to think about what will happen if things don't go as he considered.
- He decided to locate his evil lair near a waterfall he named Reichenbach, seemingly so that he can have his rematch against Holmes in the place he first died. What he didn't take into account is how recreating his final battle would affect his ability to weave his own fate if his original fate is retold.
- He assumed that once Holmes recovers his memories as being the Disciple of the Foreign God, he would try to attack Chaldea, thus allowing Moriarty to save the day from the rampaging Holmes. Instead, Holmes throws himself off the Reichenbach waterfall to spare everyone else, which ties into the first problem Moriarty had.
- Instead of trying to sell himself to the Master of Chaldea so that he can take Chaldea over peacefully, he instead tries to sell himself to Kadoc so that they can overthrow Chaldea together, just because he doesn't like the Protagonist that much. Not only does Kadoc reject Moriarty's offer, but his Explosive Leash means that he is the last person in Chaldea Moriarty would try to offer his services to and get away with it.
Excessive Evil Eyeshadow: Wicked as ever and has some impressive Guyliner game going for himself.
The Fatalist: Due to Moriarty having been summoned from his college years, he isn't forced to be the criminal mastermind he was in life and could in theory choose to pursue a simpler life as a math professor. But for him, the die has already been cast and denying his destiny is meaningless so he has chosen to pursue his future earlier than he originally did.
Final Boss: He's the last enemy Chaldea fights in Lostbelt 6.5
Foil: To his older Archer self, with Holmes noting that Ruler Moriarty is much more reckless and deliberate than Archer Moriarty, which can be evident with their plans within their debut singularities: while Archer Moriarty has a mostly successful plan to outwit Holmes, Ruler Moriarty's plan has cases of Didn't Think This Through with Holmes managing to get the last laugh at Ruler Moriarty as the detective's Heroic Sacrifice ends up ruining Ruler Moriarty's plan. Additionally, while Archer Moriarty genuinely goes on to view the protagonist as a friend, Ruler Moriarty personally dislikes the protagonist as them defeating Goetia caused the Foreign God to descend.
Gaia's Vengeance: A variant as he is not a Counter Guardian to Gaia, but a Disciple of the Foreign World, sent to counteract U-Olga Marie's plans.
Hoist by His Own Petard: If he didn't tell Holmes about the detective being the first Disciple of the Foreign God, Holmes would have ultimately not made a Heroic Sacrifice, and therefore wouldn't have left Moriarty to be unable to rewrite his own fate afterwards.
Hopeless Boss Fight: His initial solo boss fight with Holmes is this as the battle automatically ends at the second turn where Moriarty ends up killing Holmes.
Idiot Hair: A thunderbolt-looking one in comparison to his older form's more sensible cowlick forelock.
Light Is Not Good: He's as unrepentant a villain as his older incarnation while shredding his enemies with dazzling rays of light.
Logical Weakness: As Moriarty's fate ended in the death of Holmes by the Reichenbach waterfall, Holmes dying by the riverside ultimately screws over Moriarty's Winds of Destiny, Change! powers as Moriarty's fate concludes in that moment, and therefore, makes him unable to change his fate from that moment.
Mad Mathematician: This is Moriarty when he was still a math professor, albeit with the knowledge of what he will become in the future and fully embracing it. Many of his animations in First Ascension involve various math formulas, and he fields a slide-rule that can morph into any weapon.
Not in This for Your Revolution: Moriarty doesn't care for the Foreign God's plans and accepted their summons only for the chance to best Sherlock Holmes.
Other Me Annoys Me: He finds his older Archer self unpleasant.
Rogue Agent: Moriarty is unique among all the Disciples in that he is not compelled to obey his Master's orders due to using his power to control the threads of fate to restore his independence.
Situational Sword: His NP does bonus damage to Good enemies while also turning enemies Evil, which pairs with his first skill that further decreases Evil enemies' Arts Resist.
A Taste of Power: He allows Kadoc to experience his power as a Servant (which translates into the player getting to use him in battle and test out his kit), in order to entice him into becoming his Master to take over Chaldea. Kadoc eventually refuses.
Token Evil Teammate: In contrast to Qin and Amakusa, who are more morally gray with good alignments and are Anti-Villains at worst, James is completely evil as indicated by his own alignment being Chaotic Evil and his role in Traum being a straightforward villain.
Villainous Breakdown: Freaks out once he realizes that the Heroic Sacrifice of Sherlock Holmes screws over his plans with no back-up plan in mind, and makes him unable to change his own fate onward.
Villains Want Mercy: With some prodding from the older Moriarty, he forgoes his pride and begs Chaldea to give him a temporary contract and postpone his death long enough so he can show them the secret of the Traum Singularity.
Visual Pun: His first ascension art shows him carrying a physical ruler.
Walking Spoiler: It's extremely difficult to talk about this version of Moriarty without revealing that he was a Disciple of the Foreign World that was sent to take down Sherlock Holmes due to the detective being the first Disciple of the Foreign God.
We Can Rule Together: He offers Kadoc the chance to become his Master so that the two can rule over Chaldea together. Kadoc rejects his offer because he is sick of being the traitor.
Winds of Destiny, Change!: He weaponizes his connection with the Norns to weave fate to always favor him, allowing him to dodge through attacks without a hitch. This all stops once he has defeated Holmes, though. As Moriarty's fate ends in his battle with Holmes by the Reichenbach waterfall, Holmes dying while falling down a waterfall means that his own fate is told and thus cannot be written further.
Younger and Hipper: About thirty years younger than his Archer incarnation. Holmes even assesses that this version of Moriarty is more reckless and deliberate than his older self.
Youth Is Wasted on the Dumb: This is the older Moriarty's view on his younger self, calling him an arrogant newbie who blunders along without realizing his mistakes. In the finale of Traum, he sees how his younger self sealed his own defeat, with the implicit boast that he would've won had they switched places.

Jeanne d'Arc

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/jeanne1.png

The Maid of Orleans

^{Second Ascension}

^{Third Ascension}

^{Final Ascension}

^Prove

^{Formal Outfit}

^{April Fool's}

^{April Fool's Fate/Grail League}

Voiced by: Maaya Sakamoto (Japanese), Erika Harlacher (English)

"I am Jeanne d'Arc, a Ruler-class Servant. I am really glad to have finally met you!"

The Maid of Orleans. Jeanne d'Arc is arguably the most famous female saint in the world. Born the daughter of a common farmer, Jeanne received a revelation from God instructing her to leave her hometown at the age of 17 and help the armies of France during the late years of the Hundred Years War against the English. Over the next two years, she was credited with a series of military victories, including ending the siege of Orléans within nine days, and eventually helped the uncrowned King Charles VII claim the throne. Her accomplishments and piety led her to become an idol to many within France.

Jeanne would eventually be captured by the English, and put on trial for heresy as a means of humiliating France for their idolisation of Jeanne. As a simple farm girl with poor literacy, Jeanne astonished everyone during her trial by maintaining an argument with a first-class theologian on equal terms, exposing the farce at the heart of the accusations. She was eventually convicted due to falsified evidence, and was famously burned at the stake; it is said that a white dove flew away from the scene after she died, and at that moment, many of those involved in her execution felt they had been damned for killing a true saint.

She was one of the main characters of Fate/Apocrypha, and the first character summoned under the special Ruler class. She was also the main ally during the First Singularity: Hundred Years' War of the Evil Dragons Orleans, and had something of a role to play in the second Christmas event, "The Little Santa Alter", before reappearing in Solomon where she's the one to unite and lead all the Servants met up to this point into battle.

All-Loving Hero: She'll do her best to save and forgive anyone, no matter how evil they are or how much they curse her. This extends to her comrade Gilles, who has become an insane Serial Killer, Jeanne Alter, who's her evil clone that wants to kill her, and Edmond Dantès, who doesn't want to be saved and gets pissed off at the idea of it. She's even willing to save Pierre Cauchon, the bishop who had her burned at the stake, in her second Interlude despite knowing it's simply an illusion, though she does add that doesn't mean she forgives him.
Animation Bump: She received sprite and animation updates with the release of "Ordeal Call II". Notably, Jeanne is the first Servant to get a special animation if attacking certain Servants, in her case poking the eyes of both Gilles variants with her Quick card.
Anti-Magic: Conceptually, she has the highest Magic Resistance of any Servant, ranked as unquantifiable at EX. She can't even be touched by magic, even if it's regenerative. However Amakusa's Baptismal Sacrament bypass her resistance. Her Noble Phantasm creates a barrier based on her magic immunity to the party, which in this game translates to a one-turn invulnerability.
The Artifact: Jeanne's status as a Saberface. It's a holdover from a plot point in Fate/Zero, where the thoroughly insane Gilles mistakes Altria for Jeanne. They do have a passing resemblance, but in Grand Order it's simple to write it off as the artist's individual style next to the sheer number of actual Altria clones like Nero, Mordred, and Okita.
Badass Preacher: A Catholic saint who fought for her country and for God; her Noble Phantasm is even named "God Is Here With Me!".
Balance Buff:
- Though powerful early on, especially given her relative ease of ascension, she was one of the worst victims of power creep due to her already mediocre to outright bad skills causing her to fall behind as more powerful Servants like Tamamo or Merlin appeared. Not helping her case was that her Noble Phantasm stunned her for 1 turn. However, she received an upgrade to her NP with the release of her second Interlude, not only removing the pesky stun, but also adding in a party debuff clear, massively boosting her power, and making her one of the best support Servants in the game. While her skills are still pretty mediocre, her incredible Noble Phantasm combined with her absurd tankiness more than make up for it. These days, she is always a welcome addition to any difficult fight thanks to the support she offers.
- Her True Name Discernment was buffed during Rank Up Campaign 13 into Reinstatement of the Brilliant Holy Light. On top of removing the limits on the NP damage decrease buff only working on enemy Servants, it now provides a double defense debuff, one for a single turn, and the other for three. This gives her more support utility.
- Her Revelation was buffed during the release of "Ordeal Call II" via Rank Up Quest into At the End of the Pure and Clear Prayers. On top of boosting the three-turn drop of Critical Stars on the skill to 5~15, it gives a party-wide NP battery from 10~20% and a party-wide three-turn Arts buff of 10~20%.
Barrier Warrior: Her banner, Luminosité Éternelle: God is Here With Me, can create a barrier using her Magic Resistance. In-game this gives the party a one-turn invincibility, heal, and debuff clear.
Berserk Button: While not shown in-game and also a downplayed example, she dislikes being referred to as a "holy maiden", as she believes it to be simply a title given to her by the church and sees herself as an ordinary girl.
Big Good: Of the Orleans chapter.
Boring, but Practical: Jeanne's main, and usually her only role is to fire off her Noble Phantasm to provide healing, invincibility, defense, and debuff clears. Is it a little bland? Maybe. Incredibly effective? Hell yes.
Braids of Action: She wears her hair in a long braid, though she wears her hair loose by her third stage.
Combat Clairvoyance: Her Revelation skill works like the Instinct skill, but also towards "reaching one's goal" like picking the right path of travel.
Crippling Overspecialization: Very much Downplayed compared to other characters, as she is pretty much good in any situation. However, her skills make her clear her main strength is fighting other Servants, due to her ability to both reduce their Noble Phantasm damage, and also do a one-turn immobilization that only works on Servants. Her Noble Phantasm is also perfectly designed to counter big AoE Noble Phantasms. Against regular enemies or special non-Servant enemies, her versatility drops a little bit. Thanks to her buff to her True Name Discernment from her Rank Up Campaign 13, she averts this trope.
Deuteragonist: She's the primary support character for the Orleans chapter, which is built around the nation's reaction to her death and revival as a Servant.
Everyone Has Standards: Her My Room dialogue reveals that while she is willing to work with former enemy Servants from Fate/Apocrypha such as Amakusa and Atalante, she still holds a grudge against Shakespeare because of how he used his Noble Phantasm on her.
Eye Scream: Played for Laughs. After her animation update she has a unique interaction if she's attacking Gilles, where she pokes him in his eyes. This is a Call-Back to the Fate/Zero omake "Einzbern Consultation Room", where Gilles explained that Jeanne would do that to reprimand him.
Family of Choice: As of the third Nerofest and Salem; has declared that she, Jeanne Alter, and Jeanne Alter Santa Lily are sisters. No one dares argue with her. (Okay, Jeanne Alter does, but nobody pays attention to that.)
Flaming Sword: La Pucelle: The Crimson Holy Virgin, although she doesn't use it in battle since it would kill her.
Gameplay and Story Segregation: There's a little bit, compared to her lore and how she was described as working & acting in Apocrypha.
- Her EX Magic Resistance is supposed to resist all magic, even of the beneficial, restorative sort. Healing spells & skills from the player Master and fellow Servants work on her just fine in-battle, though, because heals not working on her specifically would be incredibly obnoxious and would make her a lot weaker, even with her Stone Wall defenses. She's even debuffable, as her being immune to debuffs would likewise be a little too good in turn; her EX Magic Resistance just translates into a particularly high chance to resist debuffs.
- In lore (and debatable in history), she doesn't kill. In-game, she can finish off enemies just fine, as she already has low ATK for a five-star and she would hardly need the added burden of being unable to kill even the simplest mook.^note
Guest-Star Party Member: During the Orleans chapter.
Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold: She could easily serve as the banner girl for the trope, alongside Altria.
Hidden Depths:
- She's bad at mathematics. Really bad. She's also kind of a glutton, a habit she got from her host body in Fate/Apocrypha. Her country girl roots also peek out in the form of her being unable to resist the urge to take a nap in a pile of hay.
- Apparently she's also a really good artist. The 2018 summer event takes place at a Comiket parody, and according to Blackbeard the doujin circle comprised of Jeanne and Marie is extremely popular.
- The same event also reveals that she loves coming up with stories, that nothing beats the joy it brings her to bring a story to life. She goes so far as to say that if she were just a normal human, not a Heroic Spirit, she'd want to make manga for a living.
- Her childhood dream was to see the ocean, and while it's not as important to her now that she's an adult, for Jeanne Alter Santa Lily it's a huge deal and the focus of the "Little Santa Alter" event. Still, for the adult Jeanne her love of the ocean does come up occasionally such as during Summer 2018.
Identical Stranger: Though completely different in body type and hair style, her face and attitude are similar enough to Altria that Gilles mistook the latter for her in Fate/Zero, while in the Orleans chapter the opposite occurred when Lancelot mistook her for Altria. Granted, both are insane, but they did make the same mistake. This is one of the game's hidden traits, Saberface, although it's mostly reserved actual Altria variants (e.g. the Lion King) or for characters (and their variants) who are more obviously riffing on Altria's original design (e.g. Nero, Mordred, Okita).
Incorruptible Pure Pureness: It is said that she's so holy, any attempt to copy her is fated to fail because the copy is notably a downgrade to her true martyr spirit. Jeanne Alter is the result of such an attempt, and her personality is so horribly mangled compared to the real Jeanne that many of her allies feel compelled to comment on it during the Orleans chapter. Dantes later attempts to provoke her the old fashioned way, and that too fails because Jeanne is just too nice to be angered. In her NP rank-up interlude, Mephistopheles tries to corrupt her through a test. It doesn't work either. Her third interlude reveals all past three interludes have been Jeanne Alter's attempts to find any darkness in Jeanne, and the best she found is Jeanne would rather not be burned at the stake (a rather mundane thing most anyone would want to avoid).
Interquel: The first three of Jeanne's interludes turn out to be one for the Orleans Singularity and the "Da Vinci and the 7 Counterfeit Heroic Spirits" event used to explain how Jeanne Alter still exists after the grail was collected, why Jeanne's feeling for Alter softened to see her like a little sister figure and why Jeanne Alter decided to change to the Avenger class. The last line of the third interlude even alludes to the event.
Jeanne d'Archétype: She is the Trope Maker, Trope Codifier and Trope Namer. In the game, Orleans is centered around the fallout of her persecution and her rallying the good guys to beat her evil version, she leads the assault to save the protagonists from a Demon Pillar in Solomon's Temple and rallies them together with her speech, and has the Star attribute because her archetype is heavily admired by humanity as a shining example of a leader.
Male Gaze: Her current NP animation starts with a gratuitous view of her thigh-highs.
Nice Girl: She's one of the downright nicest Servants in the game.
One of the Boys: In Orleans chapter, Jeanne tells Marie Antoinette that when she was younger the boys of her village considered her this.
Red Baron: The Maid of Orleans, The Standard-Bearer who Correctly Guides the Holy Grail War and the Holy Maiden Savior.
Rousing Speech: In the final order, Jeanne makes her speech from the first trailer to all of the Servants assembled, to fight against the demon pillars and Solomon and restore the human order.
Seven Deadly Sins: Subverted. Dantès selects her to be the Lord of Wrath at the Château d'If, certain that she has to have some anger and bitterness over how she died, only to find out that she never felt any wrath regarding her death. She only came to the Prison Tower to try and save Dantès' soul. The actual avatar of wrath ends up being Saber Gilles instead.
Stone Wall: From launch of the game to the debut of Ganesha in the fourth Lostbelt (nearly four years in real life), she had the highest HP of any playable Servant at 16,500^note and still has the best defensive class which effectively gives her double that health, but also has the third lowest ATK of any SSR at 9,593^note, even lower than some SRs at level 80^note. She also grants full party invulnerability with her Noble Phantasm as well as a heal, minor defense buff, and debuff clear. She also has three Arts cards to build her NP meter quickly and her NP is Arts-based to further support Arts Brave Chains. Her skills are also designed to support this strategy, though True Name Discernment is laughably inadequate in fulfilling its intended purpose because the effects are low, single target and only affect Servants. It's completely possible for her, with a bit of proper support, to defeat any opponent that isn't a Berserker or Avenger by simply outlasting them as she wears down their HP, even if that means she needs to drag the fight out to dozens or even hundreds of turns.
Support Party Member: Gameplay wise, this is Jeanne's main function. Her three skills are centered around either debuffing the opponent or buffing her teammates and her Noble Phantasm makes her and her teammates more durable and post Balance Buff gets rid of debuffs.
Tomboy: Fate/Zero Material says that Gilles likes boyish girls, and considering how obsessed he is with Jeanne she's the only person it could possibly be referring to. Jeanne does mention to Marie that the village boys viewed her as One of the Boys while growing up.
Too Awesome to Use: Her second Noble Phantasm, La Pucelle, isn't available for player use and she hasn't even discussed using it during chapters she appears in. Though given it KILLS her as a price for its use, that's probably for the best.
Worthy Opponent: Atalante Alter absolutely hates her, but also has a kind of admiration for her at the same time, noting how she is the only one who would actively try to oppose her.
You Are Better Than You Think You Are: She assures Dantès that contrary to his claims of being irredeemable, his soul can still be saved. Dantès is not happy with her assessment, to say the least.

Popess Johanna ("Parting Memories' Manifestation Realm, Traum" Spoilers!)

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/901600a11_1.png

The Illusory Popess

^{Second Ascension}

^{Third Ascension}

^{Final Ascension}

^{Event Attire}

^{April Fool's Fate/Grail League}

Voiced by: Natsumi Hioka

In accordance with the order of the summons, I have come. Class, Ruler. This is Johanna the Popess. It's not like I specialize in combat, but... I can't help but lend a helping hand to those who seek salvation. Thank you very much.

Pope Joan, a legendary figure from the Middle Ages. The story goes that Joan disguised herself as a man and, despite hardship, climbed the Church ladder until she finally became Pope. She ruled for an unknown amount of time before she accidentally gave birth in public, leading to her being stoned to death and erased from all records. Of course, with her story only surfacing much later, it is very unlikely that she actually existed. She is depicted as The High Priestess of the Major Arcana of the Tarot deck.

First introduced in "Parting Memory Manifestation Realms, Traum" as a Servant accompanying Konstantinos XI, she made her gameplay debut as a Ruler class Servant for the Valentines 2023 event.

Actual Pacifist: She's well aware it's probably not the best quality for a Servant, but she can't help it. Even when forced into a battlefield, she will usually just pray for the others (which does admittedly grant them status buffs, in and out of gameplay). Averted in her playable self, however.
Animal Motif: Owls. One accompanies her in her first two ascensions, and her Extra Attack animation before her Third Ascension is turning herself into a giant owl to ram the enemy.
- The owl's name is "おんちょう" or Onchou; which means Grace. She herself gives him the title of "Grace of God" and "God's Wisdom."
Anti-Villain: She's only really a threat in "Parting Memories' Manifestation Realm, Traum" because otherwise she wouldn't exist in Proper Human History. Konstantinos is the primary person pushing for her to be able to be a proper Servant, and she's an Actual Pacifist.
Braids of Action: Her hair is tied in two braids, and she Took a Level in Badass as a playable Servant.
Cessation of Existence: "Parting Memories' Manifestation Realm, Traum" states that due to being the Un-person in history, Johanna is unable to be summoned in Proper Human History, a fact that motivates Konstantinos to fight on her behalf. This means that should the Singularity be destroyed, Johanna effectively ceases to exist as a Servant on account of not existing in the Throne of Heroes. Thankfully, the events of Traum and the FATE system allow her to be summoned as a Servant once again, this time in Chaldea.
Critical Hit Class: As a unit, Joan's skills focus around buffing Arts Servants, primarily by buffing Arts card absorption and damage while providing crit stars per turn thanks to her first skill. Slap on a CE that provides crit stars per turn, and she can provide at minimum ten stars for the team.
Cute Owl: She has an adorable white owl perched on her right hand in her First Ascension.
Death by Childbirth: According to her profile, Johanna died (or at least the legend she follows) upon giving birth.
Depending on the Artist: Her portrait and story CG shows her having silver hair, but the "Keep a Prayer Burning in Your Heart" Craft Essence depicts her as a brunette, eight months before it would be revealed as an alternate Ascension for her.
Foil: To fellow Traum-debuting Ruler Moriarty.
- He is a Chaotic Evil budding criminal mastermind, while she is a Lawful Good holy woman.
- He is a fictional character but treated as a real person (hence his Human attribute) while she is a real person that was purged from history (hence her Earth attribute).
- Both have damage-dealing Arts Noble Phantasms, but Moriarty's skills are self-serving while Johanna's skills all have ally support.
- During the course of "Parting Memory Manifestation Realms, Traum" Moriarty intends to take over Chaldea by force, while Johanna is a Non-Action Guy that at most only supports Konstantinos's army with prayers.
Holy Halo: Has one in her Third Ascension.
Holy Hand Grenade: Her attack animations and Noble Phantasm bombard the enemy with holy light.
Jackass Genie: Not her specifically, but she mentions to the magician at the beginning of her valentine event that "some kind of malice" usually twists wishes negatively. This makes her the second Servant to observe this. (Space Ishtar's Astarte form pointed out that wishes by Holy Grail usually have an Equivalent Exchange in her My Room dialogue.)
Magic Staff: Wields one that shoots holy light and can seemingly turn itself into an owl.
Non-Action Guy: In "Parting Memories' Manifestation Realm, Traum", she does not engage in battle directly due to her Actual Pacifist beliefs. At best she offers prayers and support to those who follow her, without fighting herself. In gameplay terms, this puts her in a similar role to some of the past Crypters like Pepe, as she buffs the enemy team.
Nun Too Holy: Johanna is pretty similar to Martha in that regard, minus the appreciation for fisticuffs. She is as kind-hearted as they come, but people regularly point out that her personality (cheerful, spunky and confrontational) is nothing like one would expect. And considering that her identity was only revealed because she gave birth, it can be assumed that she also didn't hold true to her vow of chastity.
One-Steve Limit: With her introduction, the game now has two "Joans"; Joan of Arc and Pope Joan. But the name confusion is avoided with the two by having the first one going by the French spelling of her name with Jeanne d'Arc and the latter using the commonly attributed name of Johanna.
The Red Mage: All of her skills have party support effects, but her Noble Phantasm deals damage to the enemy.
Shrouded in Myth: Aside from her attribute being Earth (which is associated with individuals arising from myths and legends), all of Johanna's skill names reference the fact that her existence is heavily disputed.
Spell My Name With An S: Her name has been spelled as both Joan and Johanna.
Stone Wall: Like other Rulers, Joan's stats focus on high HP and low Attack. In her case, she focuses on party support with some damage with her NP.
Super-Empowering: Her Noble Phantasm, Legendum Papal Thronus, is essentially her doing this to herself by creating a fictional situation where she is inaugurated as the Pope.
Suspiciously Similar Substitute: She fills a similar role to the Crypters in "Parting Memories' Manifestation Realm, Traum" from a gameplay angle by being a support character to the enemy Servants during certain boss fights. Like them, she uses Command Seal like skills to buff whoever the player is fighting during select fights.
Tarot Motifs: Pope Johanna was the basis for the High Priestess Card, which makes Johanna's crescent moon attacks a reference on how the portrayals of the card often has a moon on it. Her third ascension in particular looks similar to most depictions of the High Priestess as well to reference this. Compare it to the Rider-Waite depiction◊.
Took a Level in Badass: As a playable Ruler, Johanna packs a damage-dealing Noble Phantasm with bonus damage to Evil alignment and Man attribute enemies - a far cry from the Actual Pacifist she was in Traum.
Un-person: Like in real history, Johanna was almost completely purged from history after she was discovered, and only was found many years later. Because the Nasuverse applies All Myths Are True though, Johanna technically doesn't exist in Proper Human History, and cannot be summoned as a Servant due to that fact. The playable Johanna is created from a multitude of prayers, and her profile acknowledges that she is a fictional existence.

Leonardo da Vinci (Ruler)

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/s320_stage1_3.png

The Girl Who Dreams

^{Final Ascension}

^{April Fool's}

^{April Fool's Fate/Grail League}

Voiced by: Maaya Sakamoto

"So, I'm Da Vinci-chan after splendidly changing my Spirit Origin. Hm? I'm as cheerful as always, you say? Yep yep, that's right. After all it's a summer of adventures! That's why! My chest's bursting with anticipation. Let's have a fun summer vacation, Master!"

The welfare servant for Chaldea Summer Adventure.

Abnormal Ammo: Those gigantic cartriges on her belt are ammunition for her pistol, each of them containing one of the familiars shown in her card art.
The Beastmaster: A majority of her attacks, including her Noble Phantasm, are based on summoning familiars (or, perhaps more accurately, firing them out of her pistol) to do the attacking for her. The archaeopteryx handles Quick, the futabasaurus takes care of Arts, and the triceratops is used for Buster.
Breaking Old Trends: The first 4* Ruler who is not prone to fisticuffs; all her attacks are made with her pistol.
A Boy and His X: During the Chaldea Summer Adventure storyline, Da Vinci finds a baby stegosaurus that she names "Steggy" whom she grows deeply attached to.
Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Her familiars' colors match the colors of the normal card types they're used for (and give her Noble Phantasm full-party bonus effects derived from the specialty of their respective card type).
Random Effect Spell: Her NP has different effects depending on what bullet she loads into her gun.
Square Race, Round Class: The fact that she uses a pistol as her weapon can make people think that she is an Archer servant, and not a Ruler servant. Even more so, unlike the other Ruler servants (sans Sherlock Holmes who ironically has his own case of this trope), Leonardo da Vinci was never a saint, ruler, or deity in life. Leonardo da Vinci did however made multiple religious artworks which depicted people and events from the Bible.
Support Party Member: Works best as this as her skills include a targetable Quick/Arts/Buster performance boost for three turns, a targetable NP Charge/NP Gain Rate Up for three turns as well, and a partywide NP Damage up as well as a partywide NP Overcharge effect increase by one. Her Noble Phantasm has random chance to either gain 30 crit stars, charges the party's NP by 20%, or increase the party's attack for three turns.
We Used to Be Friends: Near the end, Da Vinci remembers that during their childhood in life they were once rivals with a boy who was heavily implied to be a young Christopher Columbus, with the two mocking each other's dreams. Young Columbus promised to one day find a dragon while Da Vinci promised to become a famous artist and buy it off of him. The two would part ways and forget about this encounter. Of course, it's also made ambiguous whether or not it really was Columbus or if it was simply another kid.

Saint Martha (Ruler)

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/fgo_martha_ruler_1.png

Dragon-puncher Saint

^{Second Ascension}

^{Third Ascension}

^{Final Ascension}

^{Festive Outfit}

^{April Fool's}

^{April Fool's Fate/Grail League}

Voiced by: Saori Hayami

"Martha has arrived once more. No matter my appearance, I am still me! Without fail, I shall save the world with you."

Having lost her holy garments and holy staff in this class, Martha has no choice but to stop conflict with her bare hands. With a single iron fist, she splits steel. With a single strong fist, she pierces dragons! This holy woman finally ended up as an unarmed dragon-slayer. Carrying the Messiah's words in her heart, she has not forgotten the oath of a holy woman. Her body surely exists for the sake of the people.

She's an alternate version of Saint Martha that appears in the first summer event, "Chaldea Summer Memory / Heat Odyssey." Unlike most Summer Servants, she's confirmed to qualify for this class normally, though she'd appear in her regular garb.

Actor Allusion: In "Summer Servant Festival", Martha (Ruler) gets to interact with Ushiwakamaru (Assassin) and they form a beach volleyball team. It's noted by the protagonist how similar they are; notably, that they are both normally Riders, but it's actually a nod to them being voiced by Saori Hayami.
A-Cup Angst: Like the other Swimsuit Servants, Martha vocally expresses jealousy towards Anne's big pair of boobs, even accusing her for using her breasts as weight to accelerate her air cart.
Badass Preacher: She beat Tarasque (a dragon) unarmed, using hand-to-hand combat of old based on Jacob's techniques from when he wrestled an angel. And during the summer event she beats a veteran monster killer, Beowulf, in hand-to-hand combat.
Balance Buff: Her Rank Up Quest not only increases the damage of her NP, but also increases DEF Debuff it inflicts first, doubly ensuring she hits even harder than before. On an interesting note, Martha is the first Summer variant of a Servant to ever receive a Rank Up Quest.
Bare-Fisted Monk: After being talked about in her Interludes and events, she finally uses her fists to punch the shit out of her enemies. Although in her Third Ascension form, she wears gauntlets.
Blood Knight: She's less composed in this form and ready and she is very eager to punch monsters or other enemies.
Covert Pervert: Like her Rider form, Martha (Ruler) does not have a pure innocent mindset. For example, she mistook Kojirou's (very suggestive) declaration of challenge as sexual harrassment.
Embarrassing Nickname: She's less than enthused that the piglets in "Chaldea Heat Odyssey" refer to specifically as "The Goddess of the Iron Fist", though she grows to at least tolerate it by the end.
Fastball Special: Her NP starts with her chucking Tarasque at a hapless enemy, before pulverizing them (and Tarasque) with Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs.
Flanderization: In-universe, Martha starts losing her saintly personality and emphasizing her rough personality the longer she's stuck on the island. She notices this and tries to keep her saintliness... and does so in a way that leaves everyone else hurting.
Good Old Fisticuffs: Apparently, Martha is the latest in a long line of practitioners of a martial art made for fighting angels, begun by Jacob and passed down through the centuries to Martha, possibly from Jesus Christ Himself. Her fighting stance is even the classic "putting your dukes up" pose seen in the page image, and the piglets call her the "Goddess of the Iron Fist".
Hime Cut: Still has it—and actually quite more noticeable considering there's no veil/ribbons on the mix.
Historical In-Joke: Her connection to water probably isn't just an excuse to have a version of her in a swimsuit. According to legend, she came to France after being set adrift on a boat, the Tarasque is a river creature she encountered, and there is also a legend in Villajoyosa, Spain that she saved the town in 1583 from Berber pirates by wiping the fleet out with a flash flood.
Irony:
- Given that most Servants that qualify for the Ruler class were literal saints in the lifetime, you'd think Saint Martha would've originally been summoned in this class instead, and the version that's on a vacation from putting up the All-Loving Hero front would be the Rider. Despite vanilla Martha being eligible for a Ruler, the classes are the other way around. That said, it's downplayed as the manga adaptation for Fate/Apocrypha implies that Martha does genuinely qualify for the class.
- Both events that feature Moon Cancer enemies take normally place on Waterside Fields, but each time you would fight a Moon Cancer, there's a chance Martha may actually be unusable due to having a forced Guest Servant preventing you from a Support Martha from a friend or the battle doesn't take place on a Waterside Field in the first place.
Kill the God: Ironically for a devout Saint, her fighting style is specifically geared for fighting and defeating divine opponents. It's such that she could fight and win against Quetzalcoatl in a one-on-one under the right conditions.
Lightning Bruiser: Compared to either Jeanne or Amakusa, Martha can conceivably tank enemies and hit just as hard due to her passive abilities, skills, and card setup (she has a three Buster Card setup, which is more appropriate for Berserkers than Rulers). Her ability to charge her NP Gauge by 20%-30% speeds things up for her, which is important given her rather slow deck composition. Ironically, this makes her a better fit for offensive teams compared to the other two.
Megaton Punch: In Quetzalcoatl's Interlude, their sparring match reveals that this is her ultimate technique: Jacob's Perishing Fist. By focusing all of her strength into a single punch and utilizing her Jacob's Limbs effectiveness against the divine, she is capable of landing a punch so powerful it could defeat even Quetzalcoatl if it connected properly. Quetzalcoatl is only able to win because she was anticipating the hit and stood perfectly still to take the hit, causing Martha to flinch and hesitate while her opponent minutely moved her head to remove force from the blow before countering, and admits it was a close thing.
Ms. Fanservice: She's wearing just a swimsuit, and while her breasts are nowhere near as big as the bustiest females in the Nasuverse, she is pretty well endowed, after her First Ascension you get a good look at her legs. Her Final Ascension art has her stretching just after swimming in the ocean, with the sun setting.
Mundane Made Awesome: When she, Mordred, Anne & Mary have an air cart race, Martha uses Tarasque as extra weight to accelerate her air cart.
Noble Bigot: Heavily downplayed. Fiercer than her Rider counterpart, she quietly discloses that she doesn't believe in reincarnation but otherwise stays mum and gets along with Servants of different faiths. She even acknowledges the pagan goddess Quetzalcoatl to be a force of good after their brutal clash during Quetzalcoatl's interlude.
Paper-Thin Disguise: During the Samba Holy Night event, Quetzalcoatl (Samba/Santa) is disabled after fighting Assassin of Nightless City, Carmilla, and Red Hare, but needs to enter another match the next day or be disqualified. Her solution is to draft her and Bradamante's trainer, Rider Martha, into acting as a substitute. True to the trope, Martha's "disguise" consists only of a mask and her swimsuit (hence the trope being listed under Ruler Martha). Only Bradamante and Jaguar Warrior actually fall for the deception.
Power Fist: Upon her Third Ascension, she is equipped with a pair of gauntlets called "Holy Knuckle". These are also her Bond Craft Essence, which increase the Buster Effectiveness of all allies by 15%.
Punctuated! For! Emphasis!: Her Noble Phantasm: "Iron Fist. Sacred. Justice."
Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs: She uses these on Tarasque to beat him into the enemy.
Situational Sword: Two-fold! Her Waterfront Saintess skill grants her an ATK bonus if she's fighting on stages classified as Beach or Waterside for three turns, and her Jacob's Limbs skill gives her bonus damage against Demon, Divine, and Undead enemies for one turn.
Spanner in the Works: Her taking Quetzalcoatl (Samba/Santa)'s place for the fifth match of the Samba Night event ends up working in Chaldea's favor, as Jaguar Warrior had planned a whole strategy explicitly meant to deal with Quetzalcoatl's style but was left completely flat-footed by Martha's different style and resulting in a rather easy win.
This Looks Like a Job for Aquaman:
- The SE.RA.PH event features BB as a boss. Being a single-target Ruler makes Martha not only an ideal damage dealer by default, but she also gains the field bonus of her first skill on top of it due to most of the battlefields in the event being classified as Waterside, which allows her to wreck BB's face in the first battle. However, since the second battle doesn't take place on a Waterside field, Martha only gains her bonus mostly in mob battles.
- The Summer 2018 event has BB (Summer) as a boss, making Martha a popular choice again, and even better now since BB (Summer) has the Divine Trait that makes her vulnerable to Martha's third skill. Martha doesn't gain her Waterside buffs yet again, however.
- The Agartha boss battles featuring Megalos and Berserker of El Dorado on a ship is perfectly suited for Martha, as she not only gains the field bonus her skill provides, both enemies have the Divinity trait and are Berserkers, allowing Martha to make use of her full damage potential.
Walking Swimsuit Scene: Even after her debut event's over, this version of her will still be running around in a swimsuit.

Mélusine (Ruler)

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/summermelusine1stasc.png

Full Armour Mode-Machine Gun Undine

^{Second Ascension}

^{Third Ascension}

^{Final Ascension}

Voiced by: Marika Kouno

"Time has finally caught up with us. Ruler-class Servant, Mélusine. I heard your summons and came flying. This time, I'm a faerie of water as well so I was thinking of changing the name of this frame. How about... Mélusine Ondine?"

As one of Queen Morgan's retainers, Mélusine came to the southern paradise to play around.

She was acting all unwilling before setting off, but as soon as they reached their destination, she awakened to her wild instincts (Life is so fun! You must enjoy yourself!) and the destiny of dragons (Create the best memories with your lover!).

Having decided so, her usual Lancer class was somewhat too boorish. Having changed to a class more suitable for a vacation, she made perfect preparations for intercepting her Master.

Alpha Strike: Her Noble Phantasm involves donning a suit of flight armor before letting loose with her gatling gun and missiles all at once.
Ascended Meme: Her use of machine guns and her Third Ascension is based on her artist Choco's design of her Full Armed mode.
Became Their Own Antithesis: Originally disdaining man-made weapons and fighting techniques as being beneath the dignity of a true dragon, she started showing very keen interest in Lancelot's arsenal of guns after coming to Chaldea, and now fully dives into the world of high-spec firearms and naval aviation protocol in her later Ascensions.
Brick Joke: One of Lancer Mélusine's My Room lines calls the Storm Border "a fitting mothership for herself", being a jet-fighter dragon and all. Come her Ruler incarnation, her Noble Phantasm grants her wish: launching from the deck of the Storm Border like a jet fighter.
The Cameo:
- A Nemo Marine shows up in her launch sequence during her NP; Mélusine calls him 'Shooter', which is an actual enlisted personnel slot on an aircraft carrier.
- Some of her My Room lines have Morgan, Barghest and Altria Caster pipe up in doubt to some of her thoughts^{To wit...}.
Clingy Jealous Girl: Even more than her Lancer version. Her main motivation for the Summer is to spend time with the Master, and is not amused at all that they team up with and support other female Servants. Not even Morgan is exempt, Mélusine stating on record that of all the things she'd do for her queen, letting her have the Master without a fight is the one concession she won't make.
Fighter-Launching Sequence: Her NP involves one similar to catapult-assisted carrier launches, complete with one Nemo Marine appearing as a flight deck man pointing her forward and blast shields deploying behind her.
Funny Background Event: Sometimes when launching her NP, an octopus (implied to belong to one of the Nemo series) can be seen clinging onto one of her missiles for dear life before being sent flying from the resulting explosion.
Gatling Good: True to her love for firearms, Mélusine wields a Gatling gun in her Third Ascension and Noble Phantasm.
Ironic Name: Mélusines and undines are a kind of water spirit, yet this Mélusine can't swim at all.
It's All About Me: During the 8th summer event Mélusine becomes convinced Morgan built the resort and private beach solely for her and Ritsuka, and that Ritsuka had come to the Singularity just to spend time with her.
Lazy Bum: She spends all her time off the clock sleeping either on the beach or in her room.
Mythology Gag:
- The fighter jet in the background of her First Ascension is the mythical SR-91 Aurora, a rather clear reference to the head of the Wind Clan who gave Mélusine her name. She's also wearing Aurora's tiara around her right thigh.
- Her Noble Phantasm is an allusion to Berserker Lancelot's Noble Phantasm, with both of them flying towards their enemies from a fighter jet, launching missiles, and firing a Gatling gun at them.
Pint-Sized Powerhouse: Mélusine is still a tiny little thing who nonetheless punches in the weight class of the greatest dragon to ever live.
Power Fist: She uses brass knuckles to pulverize her opponents with rapid punches.
Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs: Like Lancer Mélusine, she loves to dish this out.
Recurring Element: Yet another Ruler-Class Servant that is a brawler, at least in her first two Ascensions.
Shoryuken: One of her Buster animations is this, specifically the Shin variant of the move. Given Mélusine's origins, it also doubles as a literal "Rising Dragon Punch".
Solid Gold Poop: Her skin, claws, and tears all function as powerful mana resources, and she paid for the Storm Border's remodeling in her Noble Phantasm by selling them to Da Vinci.
Super Drowning Skills: The Lostbelt version of Albion drowned when it couldn't find anywhere to land and fell into the ocean, too tired to stay aloft. Mélusine inherited this weakness and can't swim at all despite Aurora naming her after a water spirit.
Suspiciously Specific Denial: She insists her aversion to water is simply because she can't stand saltwater and it's definitely not because she can't swim whenever the topic is brought up.
Tail Slap: Her Quick card animation has her rapidly whip her target with her tail before winding up for one big finishing slap.
Trademark Favorite Food: As before, soy sauce. She's even got a bottle of it in her First Ascension.
Weaksauce Weakness: As it turns out, the incarnation of the White Dragon and strongest knight of Fairy Britain... can't swim, at all. It's usually not much of a problem since she can fly, but when she gets forced underwater during a triathlon, she starts awkwardly floundering and is very handily outpaced by Suzuka.
A Wizard Did It: Mélusine is... not exactly the first person you'd expect to be a Ruler-Class Servant, and unlike other seasonal Servants, she's actually questioned about it. Her reply is basically "Human Order-san made me do it!" despite this event happening during the Ordeal Call. Naturally no one buys it, but we aren't given a real answer either.

Qin Shi Huang

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/shihuangdistage01.png

The First Emperor

^{Second Ascension}

^{Third Ascension}

^{Final Ascension}

^{Festive Outfit}

^{Event Attire}

^{April Fool's}

^{April Fool's Fate/Grail League}

Voiced by: Jun Fukuyama

"It has been a while, the ones we consider our citizens… Oh? You do not know us? Hm, it appears that chronological fate has encountered some errors of sorts. No, you mustn't worry yourself. We are Qin Shi Huang. Just bear in mind that we are now just a Servant, a Ruler."

Summon Line before clearing Lostbelt 3

"Well, you know... We may have said something else earlier, but we are just so concerned about you in your travels. So we have decided to stand alongside you to keep an eye on you. In the interest of keeping up appearances, we do not mind remaining as a Servant. In fact, you should be grateful."

Summon Line after clearing Lostbelt 3

Also known as Shi Huangdi, the first emperor of China. Born as Ying Zheng, the young king ascended to his position of power after a terrible rebellion in the state of Qin. He aspired to conquer the warring states of 3rd century BC China, and at 221 BC successfully unified China. During his rule, he would enact major economic and political reforms. His other works included the Great Wall of China and a massive new national road system, as well as the city-sized mausoleum guarded by the Terracotta Army. He also sought immortality, but all it did was lead him to insanity and finally death due to mercury poisoning.

This is a different version of Qin Shi Huang from another, forsaken history where the emperor discovered the artificial body of Nezha, allowing them to develop advanced tech and upload their consciousness into an artificial body of their own creation, finally gaining the immortality they long sought after. From there, they would go forth and conquer the world, with their ever growing empire soon being christened the Eternal Sin Empire. The world they created though, for the sake of peace, restricted freedom, restrained potential, and turned humanity into ignorant, happy animals with short lives and a sense of purpose with the society of the empire remaining at a basic farming level. Their world was then pruned by Gaia due to technology stagnation amongst everyone other than the Emperor of Qin, but was brought back thanks to the Foreign God's Lostbelts. They serve as one of the main antagonists of "Lostbelt No.3: The Synchronized Intellect Nation, SIN". Their original class is Rider.

They debuted as a limited Servant in the second pickup banner of "Lostbelt No. 3: SIN: The Synchronized Intellect Nation".

The Ace: It's worth noting that while their fellow Lostbelt Kings underwent gross physical mutations, moral compromises, and sharp perversions of character, Qin Shi Huang elevated themself to a "True Human" by choice and stayed largely true to their (flawed) values for thousands of years. They even go out on their own terms.
Adaptational Attractiveness: Their Alternate Self (seen in the Chaldea Ace magazine) from Proper Human History's immortality experiments mutated his body into a draconic hulk. Their Lostbelt version is understandably much easier on the eyes.
Animal Motif: Their design is based in equal parts on the butterfly and the phoenix, two animals that represent immortality in Chinese culture, cementing that despite the usual gripes immortals have about their condition, Qin Shi Huang is loving it.
Anti-Villain: They're made out to be a particularly nasty piece of work by Akuta, but once her identity is revealed, it's quite clear that her opinion of them is not even close to unbiased. Qin Shi Huang's actually all for humanity and actively opposes the Crypters and the Foreign God once they discover their scheme, and because they have kept their empire relatively simple, its Difference Depth is practically non-existent. Qin Shi Huang wishes, however, to maintain their globe-spanning empire and strikes down any opinions that differ from their own as "Confucian". They also don't take kindly to either Akuta or Chaldea's interference in their world, and believe only they know what the people need and want. Once they've seen how the technology they've hoarded for themself is widespread and has led to great developments in Proper Human History and are infected with a virus through a smartphone, they become impressed by Proper Human History and choose to fight them on equal terms, then side with the heroes completely after their defeat.
Assassin Outclassin': Jing Ke failed to assassinate them during life, which caused her demise. In "Lostbelt No.3: The Synchronized Intellect Nation, SIN", Jing Ke once again attempts to kill them, actually succeeding in killing their Holy Frame, but is felled by Qin Shi Huang's new backup body.
Awesome, but Impractical: While it's incredible at surveillance and communications, his new Great Wall is painfully slow for its purposes as an anti-alien Kill Sat, as extraterrestrial menaces in the franchise tend to be shockingly agile.
Awesomeness Is a Force: While they can certainly fight, all of their Skills are about exerting "pressure" on the world around them to impede movement and suppress the energies of theirtargets.
Authority Equals Asskicking: They're a ludicrously strong immortal emperor whose power and influence has allowed them to seize control of the entire world far, far before the Crypters showed up, whereupon they proceeded to completely halt any real attempt at takeover of their realm. Holmes notes before the battle that they are not only incredibly strong but just feels superior in a way a Grand Servant would. Gameplay wise, players consider them to be one of the most powerful SSR Servants, as well as one of the best Rulers in the game.
Bad Guys Do the Dirty Work: Qin Shi Huang orders Konyanskaya's torture as her punishment for the crimes she has committed, both in their and other Lostbelts and for her crimes in her past life. The torture she suffers from the mechanical dolls is something Chaldea would never inflict on her.
Badass Boast: Both of their Noble Phantasm lines are this big time.
"The conqueror who transcended the Three Sovereigns and exceeded the Five Emperors... that is who Qin Shi Huang is. In other words... that is us!"
"As a new law, we declare: humans shall exist at the threshold of heaven and earth!"
Barbie Doll Anatomy: Invoked; their new body lacks both primary and secondary sex characteristics. This means they not only lack genitals, but nipples and a belly button.
Berserk Button: Two and a half millenia and they're still not over it: it's Confucianism. Learning that Chaldea has taught the locals they made contact with a few poems and rudimentary writing is enough for them to immediately break their alliance, order their troops to take into custody everyone they don't kill outright, and then try to erase that village off the face of the Earth with a meteor. It's also the first crack in their otherwise-impenetrable emotional wall, demonstrating that the bodiless Emperor is still, in some sense, vulnerable to human frailties.
Big Brother Is Watching: Thanks to their giant technological form as well as being uplinked to the Great Wall in space, Qin Shi Huang is able to observe the entire world's surface under their eye with both sight and sound. However, there are limits as they lack the ability to penetrate any form of thick visual cover, and the audio receptors are such that they can only clearly hear people who turn their heads to the sky and speak loudly.
Big Fancy Castle: Qin Shi Huang's Holy Frame is shaped like an enormous insect and is balanced on a pillar so small there is no way it would be able to hold such a megastructure up, were it not supported by anti-gravitational devices. That's not a castle, but instead Qin Shi Huang's actual body, which is so huge because as the main beneficiary of SIN's technology there's never been a need to make it more efficient or smaller.
Bling of War: Their third ascension has them putting on a much more regal-looking outfit that makes them resemble an Emperor a lot more than whatever the hell they're wearing in the two previous ascensions.
Brain Uploading: The giant odd shaped machine floating above the capital? That's Qin Shi Huang's actual body. The humanoid body you see is a backup.
Buried Alive: One of theirSkills paralyzes their opponents reminiscent of this form of execution from their time.
Casting Gag: Their voice actor played a younger but more heroic and sympathetic version of Qin Shi Huang who goes by his personal name, Ying Zheng, in Kingdom.
Complete Immortality: They're both unaging and undying after having discovered the secret of mechanizing the human body from analyzing the corpse of Nezha, an artificial human created by the Xian Taiyi Zhenren in the Yin Dynasty. They later analyze and reverse-engineer Akuta's body, resulting in their humanoid Zhenren Framework, a body inferior to their previous Holy Frame but still described as the most perfect humanoid body possible. In gameplay, this translates to them having an undispellable buff that heals them for 10000 each turn when you fight them.
Cold-Blooded Torture: They inflict this on Koyanskaya, somewhat apologetically, reasoning that while killing her outright might let her escape the shell of her body and leaving her to stew might let her formulate a plan, inflicting constant agonizing pain while avoiding lethal damage will constantly drain her power and will and ensure she cannot flee.
Colony Drop:
- Their Great Wall, the enormous phoenix feathers you see in their Noble Phantasm, is designed to protect Earth against attacks from outer space including meteorites and comets. They can drop parts of the Great Wall (which they call Malignant Stars) anywhere on the planet to quickly eliminate problems they detect. These feathers are so destructive that Spartacus has to basically commit suicide to stop one dropped on a village that Qin Shi Huang had declared "Confucian" after one of the children of the village had discovered art and poetry thanks to Chaldea.
- Before their final battle against Chaldea, Qin Shi Huang performs another one with their own Holy Frame, in respect to Jing Ke, smashing it into the capital but avoiding striking Chaldea with it. This represents their will to confront Chaldea on equal terms, using only their weaker (but still Grand Servant level) humanoid body.
Condescending Compassion: Due to their immortality they view themself as the sole human who can act as caretaker of the world, and see no one else as an equal, thus they exist to guide humanity as their sole caretaker. If an equal were to appear, they would require them to either submit willingly or to be killed for denying them their purpose of guiding the world. Shi placing themself above the rest of humanity makes them the sole human king that could rival the non-human kings of the other Lostbelts. Not so different from a certain Evil of Humanity.
Critical Hit Class: Their Noble Phantasm facilitates this by greatly increasing their Critical Strength, allowing them to pump out some great damage despite their low ATK. This is also what makes them a pain in the ass when you fight them, as they have an unremovable Critical Chance Rate increase buff, making them able to basically one-shot anyone of any class in your party after they use their Noble Phantasm.
Darker and Edgier: Their abilities have comparable effects to what a Ruler can typically do (stuns, NP gauge generation, and defensive boosts), but the context for how they came to possess them is far more tyrannical.
Didn't See That Coming:
- They fall victim to Jing Ke using a computer virus in a smartphone because all technology in their world exists for their personal use, so the idea that someone would devise a digital weapon never so much as occurred to them.
- They views themself as a Load-Bearing Boss whose defeat would signify the total defeat and surrender of all the anti-Chaldea forces in their Lostbelt. Xiang Yu and Yu Mei-ren shock them by turning on everybody and fighting to the bitter end.
Dub Name Change: The Japanese script calls them Shǐ Huáng Dì (始皇帝, "First Emperor") while the English script uses Qín Shǐ Huáng (秦始皇, "First Qin Emperor").
Egopolis: While Xianyang isn't actually named after Qin Shi Huang, it still fits in all other aspects. It's the only center of science and the arts in all of SIN, and all of it is dedicated solely to Qin Shi Huang's glory. Every mural, every painting, every song, every poem, it's all for their entertainment alone.
Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": He's always referred to by their various titles: "Qin Shi Huang", which means "First Emperor of Qin"; "Your Imperial Majesty"; and "Most Glorious and Majestic Heavenly Emperor".
Everyone Has Standards: Even if the other Lostbelts are enemies of their own Qin Shi Huang outright rejects Koyanskaya's pleas she'll never return to their Lostbelt, noting they can't abide her unleashing untold cruelty even upon their rivals for her sick pleasure.
Extra-ore-dinary: Their attacks consist of shaping and firing condensed mercury at people, another tie-in to their immortality as ancient Taoists believed ingesting mercury was key to achieving immortality. Their later ascensions have them shape it into a BFS with some of their attacks.
Face Death with Dignity: The last time you see them is quietly going off to be with their people to await the end of the world in peace. This scene appears in SIN's reward CE.
Failed a Spot Check: Upon ending up in a Casino during the Las Vegas Summer Event, they initially thought it was in Proper Human History and didn't realize it was a Singularity until Chaldea runs into them and tells them such. When Iskandar expresses incredulity at it as Servants are supposed to be able to tell when they've been Rayshifted, Qin fires back that as Proper Human History is already so vastly different from their Lostbelt, it's hard to keep track of all the differences.
False Utopia: In the same vein as Brave New World, the global state they created isn't necessarily oppressive, per se, but it does restrict human freedom, restrain human potential, and chooses to make human beings into ignorant, happy animals rather than fully-realized individuals. Even if SIN isn't as transparently horrible as the other Lostbelts, it's not somewhere the average player would be welcome or happy either, and to their credit, even Qin Shi Huang comes to admit this later on.
Fantastic Racism: They immediately distrustful of Koyanskaya due to their nation's own bad history of being plagued by Huli jing.
Flower Motifs: Two of them as per the artist's comments, Magnolia liliiflora as according to legend they were the first flowers to be planted in China and Yulan magnolia to symbolize an emperor's love.
For Want Of A Nail: This version of the emperor succeeded in their quest for immortality, eventually conquering the entire world by the 1200's and thus achieving eternal peace, which caused the World to declare that timeline defunct since humanity stopped developing due to them enforcing illiteracy and short lifespans. In other words, Shi Huang themself is the nail.
Foil: To Koyanskaya. Qin Shi Huang's treatment of humanity is described as "treasuring humans as pets", in the exact same terms as Koyanskaya's love as a Beast is "treasuring humans as toys". Qin Shi Huang protects humans from all harm by taking away natural instincts they deem unsightly and unproductive to peace, while Koyanskaya actively threatens to incite these instincts. Both are shown as extremely disgusted by each other's practices. In Olympus, Koyanskaya as the Beast of Treasuring names her gameplay token Noble Phantasm as "malignant star", in reference to Qin Shi Huang's Colony Drop mechanism.
A God Am I: Subverted. When questioned if they view themselves as god, they answer that they are human. Which is ironic, considering that they achieved immortality by abandoning their mortal body and transferred their mind and soul into a giant, floating fortress, yet they still consider themselves human. Notably, they view themselves as the sole human capable of leading all of humanity. They basically claim to be the will of humanity.
- It's worth noting that the word "human" might be a bit loaded to a Taoist, particularly one in the Nasuverse—high-tier Taoist sages are known as zhenren or "true humans", and in the Nasuverse they are not human but basically another kind of True Ancestor (vampiric fairies).
God Save Us from the Queen!: Well, they technically don't have a gender anymore, but it still fits. His entire False Utopia is based on the idea that humans are not allowed to have any more knowledge or ways of life outside of what he permits, which basically means they have to be farm animals he adores. While normal humans cannot have access to knowledge or learning of the arts, the people in his imperial city are allowed to. But unlike any other culture that would eventually experiment or try to find new expressions or subjects to make their art about, the only art they allow is art that glorifies themselves and their reign. And if you so much as step out of these thin lines? He kills not only you, but also the city you lived in as well because you could've passed on these beliefs to other people.
Good Cannot Comprehend Evil: During the 2019 summer event, they're having fun demolishing the competition at Altria's casino, believing themself to be dealing with the statesmen of other countries. They're outraged when they learn that they've been playing against regular people who are gambling exorbitant amounts of their personal cash instead of spending it on porridge to feed their families and milk to feed their infants, threatening to demolish the entire casino with a meteor. They're only dissuaded when they learn that the casino is a singularity that would be resolved in time and cheerfully go back to Chaldea with the knowledge that this decadent place would cease to exist. The protagonist helpfully declines to mention that casinos exist in Proper Human History too.
Got the Whole World in My Hand: Their Noble Phantasm starts out with them meditating on a humble rice field in front of their enormous fortress, before a visage of their face and two long phoenix feathers encircle the Earth, giving off this image.
Graceful Loser: After Jing Ke kills their Holy Frame, they sincerely congratulate her for being the only person to ever make them feel fear twice, fully acknowledges the great potential of Proper Human History, opts to fight in their weaker humanoid form to be on equal ground with Chaldea and even sides with Chaldea to destroy their own Tree of Emptiness.
The Great Wall: Part of their Noble Phantasm involves the Great Wall of China. However, since they have eliminated all opposition from Earth, they figured that only thing that could threaten them anymore would be threats from outer space, they decided to upgrade the wall to defend against alien invasion, making the wall to be one hundred thirty-one thousand, four hundred twenty-four li long. It can detect and defend Earth from outer space threats, and allows them to observe and communicate with anyone on Earth.
Happy Ending Override: The third Lostbelt ends with a scene of Qin Shi Huang Di sitting among their subjects peacefully waiting for a presumably instant and painless erasure of their world. Their Interlude soon reveals that this did not happen right away, and their Lostbelt lingered for months, causing Qin to reconsider their surrender and send an aspect of themselves to Chaldea as a helpful and potentially traitorous contingency.
Have We Met Yet?: Like Ishtar, they have two different summoning lines depending if you have cleared "Lostbelt No. 3: The Synchronized Intellect Nation, SIN" or not. If you haven't, they introduce themself like you have met in the past before realizing you don't know them and tells you to simply see them as a Servant. If you have, they act like they cannot help but be worried about you and that they should watch over you.
Heel–Face Turn: After their confrontation with Jing Ke, they acknowledge that the world they created is not as perfect as they thought it was, and help Chaldea destroy their Lostbelt's Tree of Emptiness, knowing what it will mean for them and their people, saying that Chaldea's world deserves to live more than theirs does.
Heel Realization:
- Jing Ke's short lived victory against them proved Proper Human History's potential to surpass their own world, so Qin Shi Huang ultimately aids in their own destruction and the death of their Lostbelt, wishing Chaldea well and going to be with their people before the end, since they feel that Proper Human History deserves to live more than their own.
- They have a smaller one after hearing one of the villagers (the same ones they tried to exterminate for being "tainted" with knowledge) reciting a poem about the moon, prompting the realization that making all art be solely about themself was not such a hot idea after all.
Historical Beauty Update: Qin Shi Huang is considerably more attractive than the traditional portraits of their historical counterpart.
Hypocrite:
- Chapter 1 of SIN has them call out Alaya's Counter Force for the cruelty in not allowing its dead heroes to rest in peace. Chapter 2 has them ordering the head of their guard to thaw one of their frozen heroes for combat.
- Outlaws all forms of expression on the pain of death to keep the populace ignorant, but makes an exception for any sort of expression that extols their glory and has those creators brought directly to the capital so they can be watched over.
- Does everything in their power to preserve peace, with constant mentions of War Is Hell, and yet is as positively giddy about their war strategies and Han Xin. Not to mention the entire reason China is the only nation left on Earth is because he went out and conquered every single other country.
- Lambasts Jing Ke's supposedly close-minded views that their non-humanoid citadel body disqualifies them from being human only to kill her with a very humanoid backup body they had hidden in his throne room.
- They claim to be human, but their behavior is very much inhuman; they observe every action of all their subjects, demand that said subjects revere them above all others, and punish the slightest infraction against their desires with as much force as they can muster- all behaviors more commonly associated with gods than humans. They even ask their citizens to look up at the sky to communicate with them.
Ignorance Is Bliss: Their subjects are unfortunately this; they're all illiterate and have short lifespans, but they have access to medicine that cures any illness, self-growing crops and a sense of purpose due to their infantile nature, resulting in them all living brief, but blissful lives. Jing Ke compares them to farm-bred animals and their empire is similar to the world Goetia sought. In Qin Shi Huang's eyes, however, this is a blessing and preferable to the alternative, where wisdom leads only to conflict.
"Knowledge leads to doubt. Once people are trapped by such delusions, they inevitably begin comparing themselves to others, and resent the world itself. Without such wicked individual egotism, this world can be paradise everlasting. It is through ignorance that our people live their lives in peace and health."
I Hate Past Me: Downplayed, but their Interlude involves having to help deal with a Singularity caused by another alternate Proper Human History Qin Shi Huang's own quest for immortality that spiraled into obsession and destruction, and they're not happy at the depths their younger self would have sunk to to achieve their dream. Of course, it turns out this vengeful spirit version of Qin Shi Huang doesn't think that highly of their Lostbelt self either, as they call them "a pathetic fool who only achieved their own desired future at the expense of their world's!"
Immortal Ruler: This is a Lostbelt version of the emperor, where they successfully became immortal and managed to rule the entire world as their emperor.
Impossibly Cool Clothes: Good luck trying to put their floating outfit together.
Informed Attribute: Despite the fact that this version is still a ruthless tyrant quick to stamp out anything they consider dissidence and their Interlude revealing that they created a Singularity just so they can reproduce their empire should the protagonist fail in their task of restoring Proper Human History, they're listed as Lawful Good, likely due to them actually succeeding in creating a peaceful (albeit cripplingly stagnant and devoid of individual freedom) society. Furthermore, to their credit, after their Character Development they are not such a fanatic that actually seeing the world that existed without their total control leaves them un-moved, and they eventually reassess the False Utopia they built and aid the heroes in destroying it.
It's All About Me:
- While their actions are meant to bring peace, the way they talk about how they are the only "true human"^notethe literal meaning of Zhenren as the only person capable of upholding responsibility and how all of their subjects ultimately exist to serve them makes them come off as extremely egotistical.
- A major plot point is that Proper Human History is more advanced than their Lostbelt in certain ways because of this. Since all technology was developed for their personal use, there was never any focus on efficiency or miniaturization. That left them with a massive, flying supercomputer body that runs on regular combustion engines because they can afford to devote vast swathes of territory strictly to generating fuel. They find a smartphone to be an interesting curio, it's the revelation that humanity has made billions of them that blows their mind. They are shocked and horrified that everyone has such computational power in their possession instead of it being reserved for the rulers alone.
- Holmes notes in Olympus that Qin Shi Huang would be besides themselves to learn that every Olympus citizen has effective Complete Immortality and treats it like a natural mundane part of life, as it would be the ultimate refute of their own status.
Jack of All Stats: Their statline is B+ across the board and so is their Magic Resistance and Noble Phantasm, with all three of their skills being an A.
Leitmotif: "True Human", which is grandiose synthwave to reflect how they are emperor of China and their artificial and electronic nature as supercomputer and eventual artificial humanoid body. It's also the backing track for the third Lostbelt map to reflect how their Lostbelt is a blend of futuristic technology and traditional Chinese aesthetics.
Let's Fight Like Gentlemen: The reason why they end up confronting Chaldea directly in their their backup body rather than simply crushing them under the weight of their more powerful machine body, as they want to represent their world as the ultimate human to Proper Human History's one-of-many, challenging Chaldea to a fight to determine which form of humanity is more suited to carrying the hopes of the future. Of course, the sentiment is expressed in a... less than gentlemanly way:
"Thus, we will decide this matter by punching you! We shall also permit you to punch us in return!"
Living Forever Is Awesome: The reason they qualify as a Ruler is because they achieved their lifelong goal of immortality, thus no longer having any wish for the grail.
Logical Weakness: Uploading themself into a computer didn't make them truly immortal, it just traded the weaknesses of their flesh body for an electronic one. This wasn't a problem since they hoarded all the technology in their Lostbelt, but this makes them even more vulnerable to digital warfare since the concept of it hasn't developed. Had they not created a backup human body on a whim, Jing Ke's virus would have killed them.
Magitek: Their entire world-spanning empire runs on this, combining space-age cybernetics and bioengineering with Taoist sage techniques.
Malicious Misnaming: They assume that they know Koyanskaya's true identity and use several variants of her alias (Kominsky, Koyanskya, Koryanchihuahua, Yanyansky, Tayunskapon, etc.) to get a rise out of her.
Memorial Photo: For clearing the "Lostbelt No. 3: The Synchronized Nation, SIN", you are awarded a Craft Essence featuring them alongside one of the nameless villagers, as a reminder of their grand empire ever existing.
Mighty Glacier: Their ATK isn't exactly high at 9,977, but their HP sure is, at an impressive 15,828. However, don't let their low ATK fool you, as they become an insane damage monster after using their NP, thanks to a gigantic 50% ATK and critical damage buff, on top of giving themself taunt and 1-turn invulnerability. Thanks to this, they can flat-out ignore the usual disadvantage of Rulers having barely any Class Advantage situations by simply spamming their NP by utilizing their Arts-heavy deck and 50% NP charge skill to always have their ATK boosted.
Mundane Utility: They're appalled at the idea of the masses having calculation engines (cellphones) amongst themselves when they keep it all for themself and their calculation engine vastly outstrips them. Jing Ke informs them that is only a side effect of what it's truly used for in Proper Human History: use as a communication device. She then shows Qin Shi Huang seconds later how warfare has evolved when she infects them with a lethal virus when they scanned it.
Necessarily Evil: Part of why, despite being a tyrannical despot, they still have some sympathetic qualities is that they always hate the terrible things they do to preserve peace and security for their empire. Though the degree of necessity is disputable, to say the least.
No Biological Sex: Having abandoned their mortal body for an immortal one, they have transcended gender as they have no need to reproduce, represented them not having a gender trait. Even in their profile, their gender is listed as "Qin". Like other atypically-gendered characters, they give you two different gift CEs for Valentine's. Amusingly, they are the first Genderless Servant who does not receive extra healing from Teach's Gentlemanly Love, presumably since Teach still sees them as being a man.
No-Nonsense Nemesis: To Akuta, anyway. When she goes against his truce with them in her attempt to assassinate the protagonist, they order Xiang Yu to pull out his own heart, causing her to immediately seize up and surrender as Xiang Yu's the one thing she cares about.
Not So Above It All: The final scene in their Lostbelt has Qin Shi Huang walk among their people in person, recognizing at last that they have always been as "human" as them, and they as human as them.
An Offer You Can't Refuse: Qin Shi Huang offers Akuta a chance to reside in their kingdom as a citizen. They do this due to her being a creature akin to a True Ancestor, making her someone they see as an equal as a "true human". In exchange for that and letting them study her biology, Xin would let her be with Xiang Yu. Akuta agrees to this arrangement.
Order Is Not Good: They want to have complete stability within their Lostbelt. However, it comes at the cost of their Lostbelt being cripplingly stagnant and devoid of individual freedom.
Pay Evil unto Evil: Brutally torturing someone by drilling holes into them is typically something that shows how evil someone is. But when it's done to Koyanskaya who's spent all of her time being a cruel sadist who sent monsters from other Lostblelts to slaughter the villagers in this one for fun, it's arguably a positive.
Pet the Dog: They might be an authoritarian, but at the same time they're not pointlessly cruel, and are happy to reward their subordinates or work out mutually beneficial deals. At least, when in a good mood.
- They work out a deal with Akuta Hinako where they get to study her biology in exchange for giving her Xiang Yu once their analysis is over with. They actually remind her of this deal themselves.
- Their decision to release Han Xin and their Captain of the Guard was not because they had failed in any way, but as a way of rewarding them for holding their Blood Knight tendencies in check, as they were both otherwise too loyal to him to actually fight in the way he knew they really wanted.
- They also don't bear the defeated Yu Mei-ren any hard feelings, and actually help her pull herself out of her perpetual sorrow by suggesting she willingly enter the Throne of Heroes, pointing out that not only would it honor the way Xiang Yu tried to live, but it has a chance of finally registering him as a Heroic Spirit as she's the only person in history to know the truth behind Xiang Yu's actions, giving them another shot at a reunion. And it seems to have worked, if the two lovers showing up together in events and interludes is any indication.
Playing with Fire: Their Extra Attack animation involves creating a phoenix-shaped burst of blue flame and sending it at their foe.
Power Gives You Wings: Their hair is shaped like enormous butterfly wings, making them look at once silly, intimidating and fabulous. They also summon a pair of phoenix wings for themself during their Extra Attack, before sending a flaming phoenix at the target.
Properly Paranoid: Given the various alien threats in the franchise (Types, Velber, the Foreign God, etc.), Qin's decadently enormous evolution of the Great Wall into a planetary defence system is rather justified.
Pronoun Trouble: Despite being technically genderless, other characters refer to Qin Shi Huang by male pronouns in the English localization during the events of the third Lostbelt. By the time of the Las Vegas summer event, "they" pronouns are being used instead.
Proud Peacock: Their hair strongly resembles the plumage of a peacock, which fits with their proud and haughty nature.
Pun-Based Servant: Qin Shi Huang's most famous creation is still standing to this day, despite multiple millennia having passed since. With this, combined with their gameplay strategy of being a near impenetrable damage-redirecting tank, you can rather accurately say that Qin IS the Great Wall of China.
Purposely Overpowered: Like other Lostbelt Kings the Emperor has an extremely powerful skillset designed around a specific purpose, which in their case lets them avert the Stone Wall nature of the Ruler class. Aside from a well-rounded skillset that lets them debuff enemies, buff themself, NP Charge and clear their own debuffs, their NP grants them Invulnerability for one turn as well as a bevy of Critical Hit-focused buffs which due to their Arts-focused deck can be potentially looped, causing them to potentially be both incredibly tanky as well as hard-hitting.
Random Power Ranking: Holmes recognizes that their backup body is simultaneously on par with a Grand Servant while not being necessarily strong by a traditional metric.
Really 700 Years Old: Their Interlude states that they are two-thousand two-hundred and seventy-six years old in the timeline of Lostbelt 3.
Realpolitik: In their Interlude, this is the justification they give for preparing contingencies to take over Proper Human History and restarting their empire. While they claim that they legitimately believe in and care for the Master, they're also pragmatic to not leave things to faith alone.
Reformed, but Not Tamed: While the playable version of them are willing to help you to restore Proper Human History, they are still very critical to the world in Proper Human History to the point that even they think they should just shut up, and makes it clear that they are ready to create a new Qin if there is some failing in society that they cannot overlook, even if it means making you the enemy again. And as shown in their Interlude, they aren't bluffing. They already have fail-safes set up to take over Proper Human History, though they assure Sion, Da Vinci and Holmes (who confront them privately about this away from the Master) that this is only in the case that you fail at your mission.
Red Baron: To most within their Lostbelt, they are known only as the "Most Glorious and Majestic Heavenly Emperor."
Right for the Wrong Reasons: They apprehend Koyanskaya under the assumption that she is an evil fox spirit who will try to ruin their nation. While they have the right idea, their fear comes from them assuming that Koyanskaya is Daji who had previously ruined the Yin dynasty. Only later it is revealed that she is not Daji or even Tamamo, just someone who is pretending to be her.
Royal "We": In the Japanese version, they use the archaic Chinese pronoun "zhen" (朕; pronounced as "chin" in Japanese) for themself. Zhen was common use first person pronoun in Ancient China, until Qin Shi Huang decreed only themself would be allowed to use it. In the English localization, they refer to themself as "we" or "us" to reflect this.
Scarf of Asskicking: They have an enormous shawl of elaborately-shaped mercury around their arms that forms a sort of halo over their head, which transforms into various offensive forms as part of their attacks.
Sensory Overload: Downplayed, but when they receive chocolates for Valentine's and eats them, they're briefly overwhelmed by the sweet flavor since they haven't experienced such a thing in about two thousand years since their Brain Uploading and eventual return to a human body that can taste.
Ship Tease:
- In a similar manner to Wu Zetian, they ask in their Bond Lines if the protagonist is interested in starting a kingdom and grumble in disappointment when they answer no.
- Their Valentine chocolate equivalent (as a genderless Servant, Shi Huang can both receive and gift chocolate) is a perfected elixir of immortality, seemingly an invitation to join them in eternal life. They do warn the Master that the elixir is untested and they are not sure if it will have the intended effect, but they are confident that their poison resistance from Mash's contract will protect them from any potential toxicity.
Sophisticated as Hell: Their lofty manner of speech and high-minded platitudes seem to exhaust themselves by the time the protagonists confront their backup body, leading to their declared solution as to how they'll settle which history should survive.
Status Buff: Their Noble Phantasm, The Beginning of Domination, bombards them with these, namely, a 50% critical damage and ATK boost, a 300% star absorption buff, and a 1-turn taunt and invincibility.
Stripperific: Their outfit in their first and second ascension is quite revealing, but they later put on the outfit from their Noble Phantasm in their third ascension.
Theme Music Power-Up: A grandiose orchestral tune plays when they use their Noble Phantasm, playing up their regal authority as the emperor who conquered the world.
There Can Only Be One: Part of the reason they rule their Lostbelt with an iron fist is because they views themself as the only "true human". Nobody can be as smart, sophisticated, or learn as much as they can. If people even begin trying to take the first steps, which can be anything from making philosophies that go against what they like or even making a writing system, they kill them and everyone they might've passed on their ideals to. Even when they consider Akuta Hinako (aka Yu Mei-ren) a being like themself, they note that they would've tried killing her if she so much as had any interest in protecting the Lostbelt, as it would mean they're not the only True Human in existence and would need to kill her to keep their title.
Token Evil Teammate: Downplayed. While Qin isn't genuinely evil, they are most morally-grey of the playable Rulers with a Good Character Alignment since they are by most standards a ruthless autocrat who ruled via suppression of knowledge and individuality to the point that they deliberately crippled humanity's potential for the sake of a peaceful world with them at the top. Even as a Servant of Chaldea they don't actually regret their actions to the point that they have taken steps to restart their Empire via conquering Proper Human History on the off-chance that the Master fails.
Too Important to Walk: And eventually, to float, as they default to just teleporting anywhere they want to go once they reach their third Ascension.
Ultimate Life Form: Their profile calls them one because they achieved immortality.
Underestimating Badassery: Despite their ability to be a No-Nonsense Nemesis, they regularly fall into this while facing off with Chaldea and their Servants, as their inability to see them as equals and understand the true implications of their technology compared to SIN's causes them to hold back and view them as less of a true threat than ironically Akuta and Koyanskaya. By the time they truly start to take them as seriously as needed, Chaldea has already reunited and is barrelling through their forces right to the capital itself, and Jing Ke would have successfully assasinated them with a cell phone-delivered computer virus of all things had they not finished creating their new backup body in time.
Verbal Tic: In the Japanese version, their dialogue is written with old literary Japanese, making it rather archaic, and they use 朕 ("zhen" in Chinese or "chin" in Japanese) to refer to themself, a pronoun their real life counterpart made exclusive to himself.
Well-Intentioned Extremist: In Qin Shi Huang's mind, they've created a perfect paradise, as defined by Buddhism.^note On paper it seems as though they've succeeded, but looking beyond the surface quickly reveals their "utopia" isn't nearly as perfect as it seems. For example, as old age is considered an ill of humanity, they fix this by culling the old via drugging the food supply in a way that fatally poisons those above a certain age. They also declare any and all ideas that disagree with them as "Confucian" to be stamped out by any means necessary. The end result, which turns their people more into pampered pets than human beings, is disturbingly similar to Goetia's ideal world, which does not go unnoticed by the protagonists. Furthermore, their Interlude reveals that thanks to the tech they developed from reverse-engineering the Shadow Border during LB3 as well as their current presence in Proper Human History, they've established a way for their timeline to potentially invade and overrun the PHH, though they state that this is merely a backup if the Master fails.
Who Wants to Live Forever?: During one of his Valentine's Day scenes when he offers an immortality elixir to the protagonist, he warns them that while he has enjoyed his longevity, there are consequences to living forever as Akuta Hinako would attest.
Worthy Opponent: While it takes them a bit to remember Jing Ke, they respect her for being the only person to make them fear for their life twice, and for her ability to Go Out with a Smile.

Quetzalcoatl (Samba/Santa)

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/fgo_quetzalcoatl_ruler_1_3.png

Masked Quetzal

^{Final Ascension}

^{Festive Outfit}

^{April Fool's}

^{April Fool's Fate/Grail League}

Voiced by: Aya Endo

"This might have happened because of a little misunderstanding, but passing out presents while dancing to the samba sounds fun, don't you think? Santa and samba... this is what you call having the best of both worlds. So I leave it to you, Master! I'm going to give my all to bring proper Christmas back!"

As a new Christmas arrived, Attila the San(ta) decided that Quetzalcoatl should be next Santa Claus. However, due to the bad compatibility of two different belief systems (and her mistaking "Santa" for "Samba"), the Christmas Grail ended up splitting her into the goddess of good Samba Santa Quetzalcoatl and the fighting goddess Black Quetzal Mask, who flew to Mexico with the Grail. At first, she tried to focus on her Santa duties, but receiving reports of a Singularity in Mexico centered around a lucha tournament called Santa Tag Team Tournament has her turn her attention to solving it.

She appears in the fourth Christmas event, "Holy Samba Night," as its main companion and prize Servant.

Amazonian Beauty: Her revealing outfit exposes her six-pack abs and well-muscled arms and legs.
Animal Motifs: Her outfit is modeled after the Mexican quetzal bird which was named after... well, her.
Artistic License – Geography: While Quetzalcoatl's love of lucha and Gratuitous Spanish can get a Hand Wave for originating in what is now modern day Mexico, her samba gimmick comes from Brazil in South America.
Berserk Button: Even with her gleefulness and generosity amped up, even imagery associated with spiders can still get her riled up.
Beware the Silly Ones: Although she has her fighting aspect separated into Black Quetzal Mask during her debut story, she's still a master of lucha and combat.
Breaking Old Trends: She breaks the pattern of having a Servant from each consecutive Singularity as Santa, as they went from Septem (Altera) to Babylonia for the chosen Servant as the next Santa.
Colony Drop: Her Noble Phantasm, Yucatán Regalo de Navidad^noteYucatan Christmas Present, summons forth the infamous Chicxulub Impactor asteroid that crash-landed in the Yucatan peninsula and is thought to have triggered the mass extinction of non-avian dinosaurs. It's wrapped up as a giant present 50 miles in diameter. Jaguar Warrior even refers to it as such as part of her commentary.
Jaguar Warrior: It's a star! It's a colony! NO! It's a Christmas present!
Critical Hit Class: She managed to surprise players by being a good Critical Hit or Critical Hit support Servant: She can drop 10 Critical Stars per turn, has a targeted Star Gather Rate and Star Drop Rate buffs, has a self-Star Gather Rate buff for her Buster cards and her NP applies a 30%+ party Critical Strength buff for three turns on top of dropping a fair amount of Critical Stars by itself with the one turn 100% C. Star Drop Rate buff.
Dance Battler: As per Lucha tradition and her Samba theme, she will cartwheel, flip, and spin into her foes.
Doppleganger Attack: One of her Quick animations has her create three copies of herself that all crash into her opponent at once before they vanish.
Feather Flechettes: One of her Quick animations has her fire a barrage of feathers from her wings.
Historical In-Joke:
- Why is Quetzalcoatl of all people Santa? Because Mexico said so back in 1931.
- You may be wondering why, of all possible classes, would lucha-loving Quetzalcoatl appear in the class populated by Catholic saints (and Holmes). And then you remember that her country of origin, Mexico, had a legendary luchador by the name of El Santo—and, for that matter, "Fray Tormenta", a Real Life luchador priest.
God Is Good: The version Chaldea got after the split represents Quetzalcoatl as a goddess of good.
Good Is Dumb: Without the Black Quetzal Mask aspect of her personality, she's almost too joyful and carefree, getting easily distracted to the point of ditziness, necessitating the protagonist and Bradamante to keep her on task.
Gratuitous Spanish: She frequently peppers her dialogue with Spanish just like her Rider version and her Noble Phantasm is named entirely in Spanish.
Horse of a Different Color: She rides a Quetzalcoatlus in her Extra animation to drop exploding Christmas presents on her foes.
Improbable Weapon User: Again, her Noble Phantasm is a city-sized, gift-wrapped present box. She'll also drop exploding regular-sized presents on unsuspecting foes in one of her attack animations.
Large-Ham Announcer: Not Quetzalcoatl herself, but at random times when she uses her NP, Jaguar Warrior appears and acts like a ringside announcer.
Lightning Bruiser: She has an effective ATK of over 10,000, the best defensive class in the game and a very focused and powerful skill set. The only downside is that Ruler is one of the worst offensive classes in the game, as it hits neutrally against every class except for Berserker and Moon Cancer.
Literal Split Personality: Unfortunately after accepting the title of Santa and the Grail, her Spirit Origin split due to the incompatibility of incorporating concepts from another religion, resulting in her aspects of fighting and goodness being incarnated separately.
Running Gag: Tries to initiate dances whenever the situation gets awkward during her Event.
Sexy Santa Dress: Doesn't get sexier than a Santa bikini.
Sketchy Successor: Hilariously, both Altria Santa Alter and Jeanne d'Arc (Alter) (Santa) (Lily) both openly question her competence as a Santa and wonder what the hell Attila the San(ta) saw in her to let her be the next one.
Spectacular Spinning: One of her attacks has her spinning around with a ribbon.
Stripperiffic: Her outfit mostly consists of ribbons. Though it is in line with what actual samba dancers wear for festivals like Carneval.
Winged Humanoid: Has her feathered serpent wings on her human body in this form.
Wrestler in All of Us: She's still the same Quetzalcoatl who loves Lucha Libre, plus she also enters in a pro wrestling tournament for the Grail.

Scathach-Skadi (Ruler)

Summer Goddess of Reflection

^{Second Ascension}

^{Third Ascension}

^{Final Ascension}

^{April Fool's Fate/Grail League}

Voiced by: Mamiko Noto

"I am Scathach Skadi, and yes, I have changed into a Swimsuit Spirit Origin. An outfit directly from the Celtic Scáthach herself. I-I'm not quite used to being so revealing, but...according to Scathach, this is what is suitable for summer...You think I look good in it? Hmm. I thank you for the compliment. Now then, while I have this rare Spirit Origin, I shall first make this summer all the more exciting!"

She debuted as the third limited SSR of the 7th Summer event.

The Beastmaster: She always has several different fish floating/swimming around her, which are incorporated in her attacks.
Critical Hit Class: Summer Skadi is a mix of Quick support and Quick attacker, on top of providing some Buster Critical support, enabling incredibly powerful Quick and Buster critical hits.
Instant Expert: She can use her Runes to learn anything instantly. Such as learning how to draw doujin, much to Jeanne Alter's outrage.
Irony: The original Skadi was previously married to Njörðr, the god of the sea, but their union was a bad match. They could not stand being in each other's home, with Njörðr hating the mountains and Skadi loathing the seas. As a Summer Servant she uses water in a lot of her attacks and seems to enjoy the sea, a contrast to her Proper Human History counterpart.
Jerkass to One: In all her "My Room" quotes, Skadi is open and friendly towards other servants, even if she doesn't know them very well... and then there's Cu Chulainn Caster. Granted, she has a particular reason to have issues with him specifically, with him being an agent/medium for Odin, but her total refusal to talk to him comes off as a bit jarring or comedic.
towards every other version of Cu Chulainn: Celtic Child of Light, how are you doing? [talks in length about her swimsuit and Scathach]
to Caster: The Caster spirit origin of Cu Chulainn...? [scoffs] Don't know him.
Letting Her Hair Down: Her hair starts out in Girlish Pigtails in her First Ascension before being let loose by her Third Ascension.
Magical Barefooter: Her shoes disappear during her Noble Phantasm.
Making a Splash: Her attack animations incorporate a lot of water attacks on top of her regular ice ones.
Ms. Fanservice: Discussed. In one of her "My Room" lines, she says that Scathach told her that Cu Chulainn would find her summer Spirit Origin "overwhelming".
Mundane Utility: Upon discovering ServaFes and the wonders of doujinshi, Skadi decides to use her runes to learn how to draw and publish manga by herself, much to Summer Jeanne Alter's bewilderment.
Reforged into a Minion: In her debut event, she attempts to do this to the other Chaldea servants by forcibly changing their spirit origins to their swimsuit versions with her runes and then trying to convince them to join in her summer singularity. She manages to convice a few, but others view it as kidnapping.
Reluctant Fanservice Girl: Downplayed, but she mentions a few times that she feels a bit uncomfortable being in such revealling clothes and that her second ascension, which features a sweater dress, puts her at ease.
Support Party Member: While she can function as a DPS, Scathach-Skadi can still function like this like her original self, as her skills either affects all of her teammates or are targetable to one of them.
Trademark Favorite Food: She's eating ice-cream in one of her skill animations while commenting how tasty it is. She also mentions it in her "My Room" lines.

Sherlock Holmes

The Great Detective of Baker Street

^{Second Ascension}

^{Third Ascension}

^{Final Ascension}

^{Formal Outfit}

^{Traveling Outfit}

^{Travel Journal}

^{April Fool's}

^{April Fool's Fate/Grail League}

Voiced by: Takahiro Mizushima (Japanese), Sean Chiplock (English)

"Is an introduction truly necessary? I am a detective. If you desired a hero, I'm afraid I must inform you that you've run into a bit of bad luck, but if an investigator or a reasoner is what you wished for, you've pulled a decent card."

The eponymous protagonist of a series of mystery stories written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and arguably the progenitor of modern fictional detectives. Referring to himself as the world's only "consulting detective", Holmes was a genius who solved all manner of mysteries and crimes in Victorian London with his unparalleled skills in observation, deduction and forensic science. The "Sherlock Holmes" that exists in the Throne of Heroes could be a fictionalised version of a Scottish surgeon named Joseph Bell (who Doyle reportedly used as inspiration for the character), or a real person whose exploits were recorded by Holmes's partner, Dr. John Watson, and used as the basis for Doyle's writings. Only Holmes himself knows the answer to this mystery.

Holmes first appears in the Sixth Singularity: Divine Realm of the Round Table: Camelot and in Pseudo-Singularity I: Quarantined Territory of Malice, Shinjuku as an ally before joining Chaldea full-time as their second Servant consultant. He later hacks his own Saint Graph to change his class from "Caster" to "Ruler", and becomes a central character in Cosmos in the Lostbelt after anticipating the arrival of the Mage's Association and secretly concealing the Saint Graph signatures of the entire Chaldea roster.

Ambiguous Situation: Holmes is evasive about whether he is the "real" Sherlock Holmes (as in, there was an actual person upon whom the stories were based) or a fictional creation along the lines of Edmond Dantès, and deflects any direct questioning about his nature and motives. Other characters have noted strange peculiarities about his summoning and Saint Graph, with some speculating that he is a blended hybrid Servant (such as BB's High Servants) or a Pseudo-Servant. The answer is revealed in the "Traum" chapter: Sherlock genuinely doesn't know and has avoided probing the question because he gave himself Laser-Guided Amnesia. His true identity - which also explains how he was able to travel between Singularities in Part 1 - is that of a Disciple of the Foreign God, summoned to infiltrate Chaldea and help them stop Goetia in order to pave the way for the Foreign God's Lostbelt plan, guide them into destroying the Lostbelts, then kill them afterwards. Realising on a subconscious level that recovering his memories - and the mindset behind why he would follow the Foreign God in the first place - would cause him to turn against Chaldea, he has been forcing himself not to investigate the mystery of who he truly is.
An Arm and a Leg: Holmes get his arm cut off by Surtr, who was using Sigurd's body and also carved a death Primordial Rune into his body that will kill him if he tries to pursue.
Archenemy: Do we even need to mention him? It's Moriarty, Archer of Shinjuku.
Armor-Piercing Attack: His NP gives this effect to all party members, enabling them to ignore enemies' DEF buffs and Invincibility effects.
Ascended Extra: Goes from just being a one-off character in Part 1 (albeit one who provides some plot critical exposition) to part of the main cast in subsequent arcs.
Badass Longcoat: He puts on his trademark longcoat after his First Ascension. It seems to separate into segments and float on its own as he ascends.
Balance Buff:
- His Natural Insight was buffed during Interlude Campaign 13 to now drop a party-wide Arts Resistance Down of up to 20% at max rank for three turns, which allows him and the party (particularly an Arts-based team) to deal more damage on a whole. This effectively gives an Arts-focused team the benefits of something like Charisma, and allows Holmes's own Critical Hit-focused setup to work more naturally.
- As part of the campaign for the release of the Traum chapter, Holmes' Hypothetical Reasoning A+ has been buffed to Revealer EX, which adds an NP bar charge effect.
Beam Me Up, Scotty!: Discussed in-universe in his profile as the paraphrased "It's Elementary, My Friend" did not originate from Arthur Conan Doyle's works, but from William Gillette's stage plays, though the usage of the word "elementary" was used in the original novels, what might have lead to William creating the phrase.
Bootstrapped Leitmotif: London's map music has essentially become his Leitmotif as it plays for his appearances in several events.
Brutal Honesty: As he says himself, he doesn't hold back at all with what he says.
"Sherlock Holmes never holds his tongue, never controls himself, and never passes up a chance to annoy people!"
Cane Fu: Uses his cane several times as a weapon during his attack animations.
Cannot Tell Fiction from Reality: Enforced. He enjoys examining whether or not Servants are "real" or just legends so much that partially one of the reasons he was turned into a Ruler was to prevent him from removing the Mystery from illusions and dreams.
Composite Character: The Heroic Spirit Holmes is theorized to be one based on Doyle's stories, the many adaptations of said stories, and the living person Holmes. Surtr possessing Sigurd implies this goes even further since he refers to Holmes as a "hybrid" rather than a "proper" Heroic Spirit in a similar context to Mash's Demi-Servant status. It's revealed in Traum that's because he is a Disciple of the Foreign God so he has the requisite two Divine Spirits infused in him that all Disciples have.
Critical Hit Class: He has both a C. Star Gather Rate Up and a party-wide buff that increases the party's Critical Strength by 50%+ for three turns while ignoring any DEF, Evade or Invincibility buffs from the enemy. Put him alongside a Servant capable of dropping C. Stars, and Holmes will do some insane Critical Hits for a Ruler, and since he is an Arts-focused Servant, his NP will be out constantly to apply Ignore DEF, allowing him to kill enemies easily despite only having one class with a damage bonus against. The buff he received to his Natural Insight further helps this letting his Arts cards hit 20% more damage.
Curse: Zeus gives him one during Olympus that makes it harder for him to use deductive reasoning. The effect is still in place by the end of the chapter, but Holmes' notes it should ease up over time.
A Day in the Limelight: "Murder at the Kogetsukan" focuses on him as he presents a mystery for the protagonist, and by extension, the players to solve. He also features in the Fate/Grand Order themed escape room as participants try to unravel the mysterious puzzles in a Baker Street singularity.
Distinguished Gentleman's Pipe: He's holding one in his artwork.
Drama-Preserving Handicap: As a matter of principle, he refuses to divulge his understanding of a mystery until he is certain it's accurate. This allows him to remain the great detective who can figure out the various elements of the story well ahead of the average person, as in the player, while still preserving The Reveal for dramatically appropriate moments.
Embarrassing Nickname: In the 4th Lostbelt, Scandavinia Peperocino teases him as "Holmes-chan" while in the Summer Las Vegas event, Da Vinci jokingly calls him "Papa Holmes". Holmes is not very fond of being called with cutesy nicknames.
Enemy Mine: Sherlock teams up with Moriarty during Berserker of El Dorado's rampage in her Interlude due to it being a danger to Chaldea.
Entertainingly Wrong: His suspicions of Roman have some solid logic behind them: Roman doesn't appear in any records before the Holy Grail War in 2004, when he supposedly helped Marisbury win before the latter committed suicide. He wears a mysterious gold ring under his gloves, and gets dicey when anyone notices. He wasn't observing the first Rayshift, meaning he conveniently escaped the explosion that killed most of the staff and left him in charge. Of course, the truth is more complicated than that, and the good doctor was always on the protagonist's side.
Fascinating Eyebrow: One of his sprites has him raise one of his eyebrows quite high.
Fatal Flaw: His tendency to reveal too much or too little of what he's deduced at a time has bit him in the rear on multiple occasions. For instance, during "Lostbelt No. 2: The Eternal Icy Fire Century, Götterdämmerung" he'd already deduced that something was off about Sigurd and suspected that he was possessed by Surtr. But without concrete evidence to back his claims, he kept quiet about it until he was taken down and left comatose, allowing the fire giant to manipulate Chaldea into unleashing him by killing Sigurd.
Finger-Tenting: Holmes does it in certain actions of his sprites, but it's most visible when he's using his Noble Phantasm.
Functional Addict: His incarnation as a Heroic Spirit did absolutely nothing to shake off his various drug addictions. Notably, Da Vinci once straight up asked the protagonist if they "stole some weird stuff from Holmes' room", while believing they were suffering from hallucinations. He claims that he stashed enough to help him last a month on the Shadow Border. He's also eager to see the Benefaction drugs the residents of SIN receive, and while he does want to analyze them for scientific sake, he also admits he does have a personal desire to see what they can do.
Game-Breaking Injury: In Scandanavia, he takes a near-fatal beating from Sigurd possessed by Surtr, which leaves him down an arm, inscribed with a Death Rune, and his Spirit Core tattered and at risk of failing if he exerts himself too much. Though he loses the rune and heals up, the lingering damage to his Spirit Core is still affecting him by the time of Olympus, months later In-Universe, forcing him to primarily act as support during the chapter, and only take direct combat roles if nobody else is around to do so.
Good All Along: A variant. The Traum chapter reveals that while Sherlock was summoned as the Foreign God's first disciple, he defied her will by giving himself amnesia and intentionally avoided probing his own past afterward. When Ruler Moriaty restores his memories, Holmes willingly dies so he can't be used against Chaldea.
Good Is Not Nice: He's really kind of a dick and doesn't actually seem nearly as concerned with helping people as he is with solving mysteries. He feels briefly awkward or outright ashamed due to Mash's unwavering belief in him as actually being a good person who is just pretending to be a smug prick. Though in his Interlude, he reveals his reason of being a detective which is to fight for justice.
Good Old Fisticuffs: True to his stories, Holmes has the makings of a prize fighter with his baritsu training. He mixes it up with his cane and magnifying glasses in combat, and it's even one of his skills, so potent that under the right circumstances it has the output of a True Name-released Noble Phantasm.
Go Out with a Smile: Holmes dies smiling as he falls to death, content in his assuredness that Chaldea will succeed in stopping the Foreign God.
Hero of Another Story: He's been busy figuring out why the future stops at 201X, what Solomon's up to and jumping between singularities while doing so. In London, he found the books on the Servant summoning system and left them behind in a library for the party to find.
Heroic Suicide: Once he regained his memories that he was a Disciple of the Foreign God, he allowed Moriarty to kill him so that he wouldn't be Chaldea's enemy.
I Shall Return: He doesn't trust Dr. Roman and won't join up with the others to avoid contact with him. But he promises before they part ways that they'll meet again in a big city like London. This is fulfilled when he appears in Shinjuku and comes with you to Chaldea afterwards, and later finally becomes a playable character.
Holodeck Malfunction: Induces one on purpose in his trial quest to explore the boundary between reality and fiction.
Imposter Forgot One Detail: He borrows the Count of Monte Cristo's power and identity for a while in Shinjuku... but blows his cover to the protagonist within seconds, as he introduces himself as Edmond Dantès, something the real deal would never do. In a bit of Gameplay and Story Integration, as even with this borrowed power he is still not a very good fighter, he joins the party at a lower level than even the chapter's Mooks, in contrast to a guest party member's usually maxed out stats.
Inferred Survival: He supposedly dies by jumping off Reichenbach Falls in Traum, and the sound effect of a Servant disappearing plays, but it's not properly shown on screen. No one in-universe believes he died because surviving a fall down Reichenbach is part of his legend, and the older Moriarty in his second Interlude believes that Holmes still has a part to play.
Insufferable Genius: He loves rubbing his big brain in everybody's face, and is very aware that it pisses people off. After Bedivere spent most of Camelot saying finding the identity of Mash's Heroic Spirit is This Is Something She's Got to Do Herself, he just goes and spoils it because "it was obvious".^note
Irony: Holmes has good synergy with Archer of Shinjuku. Holmes is a C. Star generator who debuffs the enemy to take more damage from Critical Hits, while Archer of Shinjiku naturally has good star weight and one skill requires crit stars, which Holmes can provide. The irony is, of course, that Archer is actually Moriarty, Holmes' nemesis.
Kicked Upstairs: He believes the big reason he's a Ruler instead of his proper Caster class is because Ruler is the "impartial overseer" class, and the World forced him to become a Ruler so he wouldn't go off and elucidate away all of the remaining Mystery in existence.
Laser-Guided Amnesia: A self-inflicted one, as he sealed away his own memories of him being a Disciple of the Foreign God for undisclosed reasons before being summoned to London and Camelot.
Last-Name Basis: He is always called "Holmes" by other characters and by the narration box's interface. So far, the only people who called him by his first name are Moriarty (though he did this to spite him), Helena (when on the verge of death, she normally calls him Mr. Sigerson), Watson and Sion. Holmes also tends to call other characters by their last names, most notably Mash, who is generally referred to by her given name.
Last Stand: This is the reason given as to why he doesn’t join in on the adventures in the Lostbelts. If worst comes to worst and for whatever reason the Shadow Border is under direct assault, and the Protagonist and Mash are unavailable, Sherlock himself must serve as the final guard of the Shadow Border, as the rest of the crew are normal humans and Da Vinci is unable to fight while controlling the Shadow Border. This restriction eases up with the acquisition of the Storm Border, but circumstances conspire to keep him sidelined.
Light 'em Up: As a Ruler, several of his attacks have him focusing the giant lenses at his disposal to redirect beams of light at his enemies.
Limit Break: His high NP gain on top of his role as a Critical Hit-focused Ruler makes him able to throw out Noble Phantasms very quickly. For context, with one buff to his Arts card and a crit on one, he can refill his NP with nearly one hit from said Arts card.
Magic Knight: He can provide both offensive support and work as a damage dealer himself with ease. He's held back slightly as support by a lack of defensive options or healing for the party and as primary damage by a poor offensive class and a non-damaging NP, but makes up for it with amazing NP Gain.
Manchurian Agent: Inverted and defied! Holmes' original role was an apostle of the Foreign God, sent to infiltrate Chaldea to guide them into destroying all the Lostbelts then disposing them aftewards, but Holmes thinks it might have been consensual. He thinks that he himself agreed to help the Foreign God and erased his own memory (and changed himself to a Ruler) to better gain Chaldea's trust. But like Older Moriarty in Shinjuku, he came to truly love his friends at Chaldea. Before his memory came back (and he would truly obey the Foreign God) he let himself get killed by Ruler Moriarty. Sion speculates he defected before sealing his memories rather than the other way around, which the Foreign God allowed because he was still technically fulfilling his orders. But as Chaldea was preparing to destroy the final Lostbelt, the time came for the Foreign God to remind Holmes of his true allegiance and purpose via Moriarty, causing Holmes to commit suicide rather than hurt Chaldea.
Master of Disguise: Can make himself appear like other Servants, including Dantes and Da Vinci. According to the Material book, this is due to his second Noble Phantasm, Empty House: Adventure of the Empty House, which allows him to imitate the appearance and parameters of Heroic Spirits, as long as they aren't higher than his.
Mission Control: After joining up with Chaldea at the end of Shinjuku, he occasionally pops up in the remaining chapters of Epic of Remnant to deliver some exposition and comment on the situation. He gets this even more in Cosmos in the Lostbelt, becoming a major supporting character.
More than Mind Control: Holmes was originally a Disciple of the Foreign God by choice. He explicitly hates the Foreign God's mission, but something about its goals (it hasn't been revealed what) made Holmes agree with it on a fundamental level, preventing him from disobeying. His only escape was to give himself Laser-Guided Amnesia, and when Ruler Moriarty forces him to remember, he responds by taking himself off the board before he can turn against Chaldea.
Mr. Exposition: He explains to the party what he's discovered so far and correlates it with the information in the Hermes supercomputer archive. He also explains general things like what Atlas Academy is. And as Chaldea's new technical advisor by the time of Part 2, Holmes does a lot of the explaining and introductions when encountering new people and places.
Multi-Armed and Dangerous: Holmes manifests as a Servant with a harness-like contraption around his middle that sprouts many mechanical arms ending in magnifying glasses. While typically used for laser-based strikes, and Holmes himself generally one for going head-on with his baritsu techniques anyway, one of his attacks also utilizes them in a Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs manner.
Multi-Melee Master: In addition to his skills in hand-to-hand combat and Cane Fu, he's also an accomplished swordsman who'd qualify to be summoned as Saber.
Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: In Olympus, him publicly outing Koyanskaya as a Beast allows her to get around her contract with the Foreign God that had it so she couldn't reveal her Beast powers since everyone there already knows that she's a Beast.
No Celebrities Were Harmed: Physical appearance-wise, he has a passing resemblance to both Benedict Cumberbatch and Jeremy Brett, two actors who had played him on screen.
Non-Action Guy: His existence is unstable when he meets the party so he asks them to fight off the traps in Atlas for him. He also doesn't fight at all in Shinjuku. Finally averted after being made playable in the game's second anniversary.
Nothing Is Scarier: Whatever knowledge or secret that the Foreign God told him is never revealed, only that Sherlock knew that if he discovered the truth behind his own amnesia he would easily fall back into the Foreign God's influence. What makes this even scarier is the fact that the even when the Foreign God suffered a case of amnesia she too was more open to cooperation and working with her enemies, being open to forming relationships, and eventually being horrified at what ORT and Daybit were going to do to the planet. Whatever IT was that the Foreign God shared, it's enough to turn a somewhat airheaded Beast who actually had humanity's interests in mind, into a genuine threat against humanity. It was scary enough that Holmes who is a lover of puzzles and mysteries had to actively force himself not to investigate further to remember it.
Odd Friendship: Was friends with the polite, justice loving Jekyll when he was alive. He also knew Helena when she was alive and chasing Sanat Kumara's mysteries.
O.O.C. Is Serious Business: In the story about him and Jekyll, Watson notes that Holmes taking Jekyll's suicide as a personal case is unheard of due to him never taking personal cases.
Pretty Boy: One of the reasons Moriarty takes fault with him since the latter as a Servant is an old man in his fifties while Holmes as a Servant is this.
Private Detective: He was hired by Babbage to investigate whatever's been going on behind the scenes with the end of the world and declares the case to be solved by the end of Shinjuku.
Promoted to Playable: Only an NPC for the first story arc and only technically playable in Shinjuku when he's disguised as Dantès, he became a playable character to commemorate the game's second anniversary.
Reality Warper: His Noble Phantasm, "Elementary, My Dear", is considered Anti-World due to its power to create an answer or solution to any conundrum that Holmes and his allies might be facing: if it is an unsolvable mystery, his Noble Phantasm will create clues. If it is a locked box to which the key has been destroyed beyond recovery, his Noble Phantasm will bring a new key into existence somewhere. The only thing stopping this from being a Story-Breaker Power is that Holmes and his allies must still find the clues and then deduce/enact the solution. In other words, his Noble Phantasm creates a possibility, not an inevitability.
Shapeshifter: He can transform into other people, as showcased in Shinjuku where he impersonates Edmond Dantès.
Situational Sword: Compared to other supports like Waver, Merlin, and Tamamo, Holmes' applications are quite limited, as his only form of support is his specialized Noble Phantasm and some C. Star Drops. That said, there's no better Servant at smashing through Challenge Quests with enemies protected to the gills with invulnerability than him, and he trivializes battles like the Siegfried fight in Nero Fest by effectively nullifying the fight's main gimmick. A Balance Buff alleviated some of his niche gameplay by adding a party-wide Arts resistance down debuff for three turns to Natural Insight, improving his consistency in Arts teams.
Sixth Ranger: He joins Chaldea only after the first storyline ends.
Square Race, Round Class:
- Holmes really should be a Caster, but his Saint Graph was modified before he would become a Chaldea Servant to make him into a Ruler class. As such, he still has the Territory Creation skill and lacks True Name Discernment or Magic Resistance present in other Rulers (though his Noble Phantasm can function like the former). His trial quest, on the other hand, suggests this happened intentionally due to Holmes being able to adjudicate and arbitrate fairly concerning the truth. Basically his deduction skills were so good, that the World itself bumped him up to a Ruler class despite it not being his normal class.
- It's also implied that the World may have done this out of self-preservation – as a detective, Holmes's existence can effectively be summed up as Anti-Mystery, making it anathema to the continued function of magecraft. By forcing him into the Ruler class, Holmes's new role as a fair adjudicator requires him to allow at least some secrets to remain hidden.
- Then there's "Lostbelt No. 2: The Eternal Icy Fire Century, Götterdämmerung", where Surtr possessing Sigurd notes that Holmes along with Mash are not "proper" Heroic Spirits but rather "hybrids", implying that this has something to do with his strange classing.
- Following the reveal in Traum that he's actually a Disciple of the Foreign God with several Divine Spirits in his Spirit Origin, his true Class can be inferred to be Alter Ego.
Summation Gathering: Of course. At the end of "Murder at the Kogetsukan", he gathers everyone together before they leave via boat to explain who the murderer is and what motivated them to do these crimes.
Support Party Member: His skillset is designed around him building up the gauge for his Noble Phantasm over and over again so he can provide several buffs to his party members. With his good NP Gain and his third skill that increases his Arts performance, this means he can use his NP back to back. While his support is not as powerful as that of Waver, Tamamo and Merlin, he can also deal some effective damage himself with an effective ATK on par with some Berserkers and the best defensive class in the game.
Tomato in the Mirror: He is the first Apostle of the Foreign God, sent to act as a sleeper agent in Chaldea. His existence caused the Foreign God's home planet to summon Moriarty as its own Apostle to kill Holmes and take over Chaldea.
Tranquil Fury: In the Himalayas flashback from his Interlude, one of the assassins sent by Clock Tower managed to mortally wound Helena. This causes Holmes to retaliate by strangling the assailant until Helena tells him to stop.
Un-person: One of the few advantages against the Mage's Association's takeover of Chaldea in the Part 2 prologue is that they purposely left his summoning and any subsequent contributions to Chaldea out of their records to try to cover up his existence, allowing him to go about unnoticed for the time being. (Which, it must be noted, he canonically did himself before—i.e. when he first defeated Moriarty and faked his death).
Waistcoat of Style: Wears one beneath his longcoat.
What Beautiful Eyes!: Scathatch-Skadi calls his eyes beautiful and says that they remind her of Baldr's.
The Worf Barrage: Holmes's Baritsu technique is so great that it has power output equivalent to that of an activated Noble Phantasm under certain conditions. But this doesn't allow him to match the power of Sigurd and the greatest Demonic Sword, Gram. Their encounter ends with Holmes losing an arm.

Uesugi Kenshin (Nagao Kagetora)

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/s400_stage11_6.png

The Avatar of Bishamonten

^{Second Ascension}

^{Third Ascension}

^{Final Ascension}

Voiced By: Nana Mizuki

"I am the incarnation of Bishamonten and the War God of Echigo, Uesugi Kenshin! From now on, I shall protect you and destroy all that stands in your way. Yes, please take care of this Kenshin-chan - formerly Kagetora-chan - who has finally risen to her strongest, invincible, eternally undefeated perfect form, Master!"

Debuted in the GudaGuda Super Goryokaku Limited Time Event.

Amusingly Awful Aim: Even as an avatar of Bishamonten her skill with ranged weapons is awful, if somewhat improved. Anything past short range is still a no-go for her, though she's working on it. In her Third Ascension, she doesn't aim so much as spray an area with her Treasured Pagodas to ensure that something gets hit.
Animal Motifs: While Kenshin was called "The Dragon of Echigo", she also has many tiger motifs with the "tora" in her previous names coming from being born on the Year of the Tiger. Her white and black hair even resembles a white tiger's coat and sometimes she'll go "Meow!" during her Noble Phantasm.
Armor-Piercing Attack: Her Noble Phantasm removes all buffs (including defensive ones) before inflicting damage, ensuring that it is well and truly unblockable outside of unremovable buffs.
Berserk Button: If asked about her dislikes she politely, and firmly, asks "that certain story" not be brought up.
BFS: Shiratachi, her massive odachi used in her Noble Phantasm. It's as long as she is tall.
Big Ol' Eyebrows: Has a pair of short, thick golden eyebrows painted onto her face in her third ascension, though she still has her natural ones.
Biker Babe: Invoked in her second ascension, as she doesn't want to lose to Takeda in terms of Modern aesthetics. She even transforms her Cool Horse into a Cool Bike to accommodate this.
Blood Knight: Loves a good fight no matter what it is. Even in her third ascension where she's more restrained she still loves the idea of dueling a few other Servants. Ironically, being a Ruler is also a pain in the ass for her as Rulers are supposed to be neutral arbitrators, only intervening when necessary which means she can't indulge her competitive nature freely.
Born in the Saddle: Loves taking long horse rides and has taken a fondness for motorycle riding.
Character Development: Ironically, she acts more human in her third ascension where she's accepted her role as an incarnation of Bishamonten, beginning to understand what it means to be human and finally finding peace with herself. As such, she's no longer a Stepford Smiler and is able to express herself more fully with her smiles and laughs being genuine.
Cleavage Window: Her outfit has a massive opening in the chest in Third and Final Ascension.
Critical Hit Class: Just like her Lancer variant, Kenshin is about absorbing and generating stars except even stronger. Her second skill has her generating up to fifteen stars per turn while her first skill boosts her crit damage and star absorption, giving her plenty of resources to dish out massive damage.
Deity of Human Origin: Already believed to be an incarnation of Bishamonten, Kenshin has only become more deified with time with her Divinity skill even going from a C to an A.
Dual Wielding: As opposed to her Lancer variant being a Walking Armory, Kenshin has scaled back her arsenal to just a sword and lance in her first and second ascensions to simplify what to keep track of.
Foil: Like how her Lancer counterpart was one to Nobunaga's Archer variant, Kenshin as a Ruler is one to Nobunaga as an Avenger, especially their respective Third Ascensions.
- Kenshin, even as an avatar of Bishamonten, can't use ranged weapons to save her life while Nobunaga liberally uses them.
- Both embrace their reputations. Kenshin is presented as an avatar of Bishamonten, a god of war and wisdom, while Demon King Nobunaga is a god killer who compares herself to Papiyas, a demon from Buddhism.
- Kenshin's design is Gold and White Are Divine with flowing robes while Nobunaga is primarily black and red with armor. Kenshin even shows more skin while Nobunaga keeps covered, even if with some Sensual Spandex.
- Kenshin is a single target Arts Critical Hit Class whereas Demon King Nobunaga is an AOE Buster servant.
- Both use swords, but Kenshin only uses it in her Noble Phantasm while Nobunaga uses it everywhere in most of her attacks except her Noble Phantasm.
- Kenshin in her Third Ascension is personable and elegant if somewhat awkard with human interaction while Demon King Nobunaga is an aloof Cold Ham with a Hidden Heart of Gold.
- Their Craft Essences are their swords with Kenshin's being framed as descending from the heavens in sacred light while Nobunaga's is burning in the earth.
Gold and White Are Divine: Her color scheme in her third ascension is mostly this, showing she's now truly an incarnation of Bishamonten.
Gratuitous English: Sometimes during her Noble Phantasm she'll start reciting an oath in (heavily-accented) English. She explains in one of her My Room she's been studying English as she feels it's her duty to show her might as Bishamonten all over the world.
I Have Many Names: Kenshin is merely the latest of her many names, her previous ones being Kagetora, Masatora, and Terutora. She decides to keep things simple and go with her most famous moniker of Kenshin.
Insistent Terminology: She's insitent that her cannon-like weapons are not cannons but "Bishamonten's Treasured Pagodas". Her Laser Swords? "Bishamonten's Flames". Kenshin feels offended when Ranmaru suggests they could be anything else.
It Was a Gift: The longsword she uses in her Noble Phantasm, Shiodome-no-Tachi, was a gift to her from her rival Takeda Harunobu for providing salt to his domain in its time of need. Interestingly, this means the Noble Phantasm conceptually belongs to both of them, which comes in handy during the story.
Laser Sword: Rather than wield physical weapons, Kenshin can emit flame-like energy from her arms in the shape of a Gundam-esque Beam Saber to slash at her foes.
Lightning Bruiser: With an attack-focused build that emphasizes critical hits and Ruler defenses with an evasion skill, Kenshin is basically a mix of her Lancer variant and Astraea. Her Noble Phantasm's ability to strip enemies of any and all buffs (unless permanent) ensures her damage and defenses will be consistent.
Mystical White Hair: An interesting case as her hair has a top layer of white while the rest underneath it is black. Which is more prevalent will change depending on her ascension, with her first and second being similar to her Lancer's mostly white, while her third has the black underlayer being more prominent
Older and Wiser: Her third ascension, embracing her status as an incarnation of Bishamonten, has her acting a lot more level-headed and reserved than her younger, exuberant self and leaving her Sociopathic Hero traits behind. Though sometimes her more boastful, proud, and competitive nature comes through, showing she's still Kagetora at heart.
Overly Long Name: The name of her first skill in this incarnation is the names of all three of her Lancer form's skills in one description. Meaning that it's "Fate is in Heaven, Armor is on the Chest, Accomplishment is in the Feet".
Playing with Fire: Her Noble Phantasm has her wreath her sword in flames and in her third ascension she makes liberal use of fire-laced attacks.
Pun: She has trouble explaining her "Treasured Pagoda" weapons when others ask if they're cannons. This is because "Treasured Pagoda" is written as "宝塔" or "houtou", which sounds identical to "砲塔" or "gun turret" (which is basically what they are as weapons anyways).
Running Gag: In her third Ascension she often has to deal with Bishamonten's Treasured Pagodas, the massive cannon-lances she has, simply being too big for her to have indoors. She'll then ask if she can just blow up the ceiling and be denied.
Sideboob: In Third and Final Ascension, her outfit exposes her sides.
Situational Sword: Her Noble Phantasm boosts her damage against enemies with the Man attribute, which unfortunately only has one instance in the Moon Cancer class, that being BB. However, there are plenty of Berserkers and tons of other Servants that do have the Man attribute, giving Kenshin lots of extra damage while maintaining her high defenses.
Sore Loser: When told there are records of her losing battles, she'll start laughing and claiming she can't hear what was said.
Spam Attack: Naturally, being an Arts servant with the appropriate attack and NP gain buffs means she's prone to this, with her status as a Critical Hit Class making it easy for her to constantly loop her Noble Phantasm if she gets a Brave Chain.
Super Mode: As with Nobunaga, and Ryoma before, Kenshin receives an upgrade herself from a Lancer to a Ruler.
Third-Person Person: She sometimes refers to herself as "this Kenshin" or "this Bishamonten."
Took a Level in Badass: Already a skilled and revered warrior as Kagetora, Kenshin is even more powerful as a Ruler, exemplified by her Extra attack being a simplified version of her Lancer variant's Noble Phantasm.
The Unsmile: In her first and second ascensions her Stepford Smiler tendencies always make her come off as a bit unsettling. This is dropped with her third ascension where her expressions are more subdued, but also sincere and warm as she's finally begun to understand humans.
War God: As an avatar of Bishamonten, she's this in human form. However, she emphasizes that Bishamonten is also a god of wisdom.

Characters / Fate/Grand Order: Rulers

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