Table of Contents
Overview
- B2 SR Wind Supporter with unconventional support abilities, especially for Little Mermaid. (Siren)
- Incredible Wind DPS ability if built for it, but would love B3 allies to support her DPS, flipping team meta on its head.
- Can be played On-burst or Off-burst effectively with the right team setup.
- Desireable for Wind-weak bosses and raids in any context. (Solo, Co-Op, Union)
Should You Pull?
Honestly, she has incredible potential for wind DPS, regardless of context. You don’t even need to build her very much for her to buff your Wind DPS vs bosses in single team context. (Union Raid, Co-Op raid, Anomaly Intercept) However, with the Lycoris Recoil collab coming up, those incoming units will only be available for a limited time, whereas Velvet will eventually be added to the Wishlist, Tetra Molds and High Quality Access Records.
If you want to increase your Wind DPS potential in raids or are severely lacking in Wind DPS (such as missing all the Wind Pilgrim units), I’d consider trying to get her. Otherwise, you can feel free to skip out on her and hope to get her later. She is undoubtedly a very good unit at what she does, but she will only particularly specialize in Wind-weak content, so if you feel you don’t need the boost, then it should be fine to pass for the time being and hope to get her later.
Newbie/Incomplete Box Section
Velvet is a B2 SR Wind Supporter unit with unusual support abilities and really good DPS potential. If played off-burst, the caster ATK buff on S2 is pretty low, but the charge damage she provides to all allies is honestly really big; while normally, Charge Damage isn’t that useful to buff for most SR and RL allies, there are certain Nikkes that can utilize the buff incredibly well.
If allowed to use Burst, she becomes a very capable DPS unit, all thanks to her transforming her sniper rifle into a powerful Machine Gun with a strong proc effect on S2. However, since she isn’t Burst re-entry, and Burst II is the usual slot where the biggest buffs are at, it leaves the B3 with little buffs to make use of. This means if using her Burst, it should ideally be in a situation that calls on her to deal DPS, while B3s support her through their own buffs.
Regardless of how she is played, she makes use of an ‘Ammo Pouch’ mechanic, which will be explored further below, but in short, she ‘consumes’ more ammo than any other unit in the game, which synergizes incredibly with units that check for ammo consumption, namely Siren.
Basic Information
- Skill 1: Sticky Fingers
- Skill 2: Bullets of Love
- Burst: Perfect Execution
- Cooldown: 20s
- Rarity: SSR
- Burst: II
- Weapon: SR
- Class: Supporter
- Element: Wind
- Manufacturer: Tetra
- Squad: Maid For You
- Weapon Name: Femme Fatale
Skill 1: Sticky Fingers
Activates at the start of battle and when entering Burst Stage 2.
Bullet Snatch:
Function: Steals the enemy’s bullets and keeps them in her ammo pouch.
Effect 1: Affects all enemies. Removes 5% of bullets.
Effect 2: Affects self. Fills the ammo pouch with 6000 round(s), up to a maximum of 6000.
This effect is continuous and cannot be dispelled.
Activates when attacking with Full Charge while not in Full Burst. Affects self.
Function: Strengthens self by expending ammo from the ammo pouch.
Effect 1: Expends ammo from the ammo pouch. Amount: 100 round(s).
Effect 2: ATK 30.5% for 3 sec.
Effect 3: Attack Damage 30.5% for 3 sec.
New character, new mechanic. Velvet makes use of a unique mechanic called Ammo Pouch. It is not actual ammo she can use, meaning she doesn’t actually have virtually infinite ammo. However, for the purposes of skills that check for ammo expenditure, Velvet’s virtual ammo does count for it; this primarily concerns Siren, who has three parts of her skills that check for total ammo expended by allies. There aren’t any other Nikkes that can make much use of this yet, but Siren is such a strong unit, that it’s worth supporting her with Velvet in Wind-weak context.
Her actual ammo count is still visible on the crosshair and above her character portrait when focus is away from her.
Anyway, at the start of combat, Velvet will fill her ammo pouch with 6000 virtual bullets. She will also steal up to 5% of an enemy’s max ammo. It should be noted that the latter effect only occurs in PvP, as Raptures do not have ammo to worry about. She will also perform both of these effects when entering Burst Stage 2, meaning with enough burst gen rotation, she will never run out of ammo for the ammo pouch.
When outside of Full Burst, whenever she shoots a fully charged shot, she will give herself a strong buff and expend 100 bullets. The buff is honestly really good… were it not for its short duration. It will not be particularly useful for her in dealing DPS because she doesn’t have a strong burst move at the start that it could buff. The 100 virtual bullets expended help trigger Siren’s S1 for faster burst generation and S2 for more DPS, if using her alongside Siren.
Skill 2: Bullets of Love
Activates when attacking with Full Charge during Full Burst.
Function: Strengthens allies by expending ammo from the ammo pouch.
Effect 1: Affects self. Expends ammo from the ammo pouch. Amount: 300 round(s).
Effect 2: Affects all allies. ATK 25.2% of the caster’s ATK for 3 sec continuously.
Effect 3: Affects all allies. Charge Damage 100.8% for 3 sec.
Activates after landing 50 normal attack(s) during Full Burst.
Function: Expends ammo from the ammo pouch to deal additional damage to the enemy.
Effect 1: Affects self. Expends ammo from the ammo pouch. Amount: 300 round(s).
Effect 2: Affects self. Attack Damage 15.03% for 5 sec.
Effect 3: Affects the target. Deals 400.92% of final ATK as additional damage.
Velvet’s S2 provide her with two mutually exclusive effects. If used off-burst, the first effects will activate. If using her burst, the second effects will activate. If Full Burst is entered, and Velvet didn’t activate her burst, every Full Charge will give allies a caster ATK buff and a big Charge Damage buff. If Full Burst is entered and Velvet did get to Burst, she becomes a strong Wind DPS with a powerful MG.
The caster ATK buff is okay, but the Charge Damage buff is great. Even though Charge Damage is one of the weakest ways to buff SRs and RLs through OLs, since it’s adding to an already high multiplier, usually 250%, this much Charge Damage given away so freely is a lot to make use of, averaging a 40% damage increase to a SR/RL’s normal attacks, assuming no other source of Charge Damage. (350/250 = 1.4)
It should be noted that while it improves normal attack damage, Charge Damage only affects normal attack damage. That means units reliant on an additional damage effect upon hitting an enemy with a Full Charge attack to deal DPS with their basic attacks don’t benefit as much from Velvet’s Charge Damage boost, such as Cinderella, Bready or Maiden: Ice Rose. Units that give themselves a lot of Charge Damage also benefit very little, such as Snow White, Ada or Emilia.
The second version of S2 empowers Velvet if she uses Burst. Every 50 bullets fired triggers a strong damage effect on the target upon taking the 50th bullet and gives herself a bit of Attack Damage. Since she uses a MG with 999 ammo upon using burst, and MGs fire at 60/s at 60 FPS (especially with firing adjustment active), the Attack Damage buff is active at all times, which complements the damage effect and her burst well as a whole.
Regardless of whether she gets to burst or not, as long as it’s Full Burst Time, she will consume 300 of her ‘ammo’ from her unique Ammo Pouch if she meets the conditions declared by either of her S2s. Off-burst, every Full Charge shot will, whereas with Burst active, every 50 bullets fired will. This increase in ammo consumption is incredible for Siren regardless of how she is played.
Since by default, it takes a second to fully charge a shot, if left on auto play, Velvet will ‘consume’ 300 ammo every 1.3 seconds, taking into account how regular snipers take cover every shot. In terms of ammo consumption, this is the equivalent of just under 5 machine guns active for Siren’s effects, resulting in a major DPS boost. With Burst active, and stable 60 FPS, Velvet is effectively 7 machine guns for Siren, when considering the virtual ammo consumption, and her actual MG usage.
It should be noted that Charge Speed and Max Ammo increases from OLs improve the performance of Velvet’s off-burst ‘ammo consumption’, as well as manual play to prevent the ‘cover’ animation.
While she has high ammo consumption for Siren by default with Burst active, it’s impacted by performance. I barely miss on the last proc possible due to unstable FPS, even with Firing Adjustment On.
Note on ammo consumption for Burst Active
Due to her Burst lasting precisely 10 seconds, it’s not possible for Velvet to achieve 12 activations of her S2 in MG mode within Full Burst. This is because even with the fastest possible Burst Activation, Velvet’s Burst will have already been active for a few centiseconds. (i.e. When Full Burst begins, Velvet has 9.9 seconds of Burst remaining)
This means the most a stable 60 FPS PC can hope to achieve is 11 activations of S2 per usage of Burst, with the last theoretical S2 activation just out of reach. As long as you can achieve at least 10, then you’re good, which is thankfully possible even at 30 FPS, with Firing Adjustment option active.
Burst: Perfect Execution
Cooldown: 20 seconds.
Affects self.
Change the weapon in use:
Damage: 7% of final ATK.
Duration: 10 sec.
Additional Effect
Attack Damage 34.52% for 10 sec.
Whenever Burst is used, Velvet swaps out her Sniper Rifle for an incredibly strong Machine Gun with 999 ammo that is instantly firing at max firing rate, and gives herself a good Attack Damage buff. While she doesn’t give herself infinite ammo to take advantage of with Miranda (Treasure), her default DPS potential is so high, that it would’ve been beyond broken if this were possible.
Its 7% final ATK ratio makes it one of the strongest machine guns on paper; compared to MG’s default 5.57% final ATK ratio, it’s about a 25% improvement. Even when you consider how Supporters have lower base ATK compared to Attackers, Velvet’s MG is still stronger than an Attacker’s MG with default stats. Since it’s firing at max fire rate upon cast, has no ammo issues and has no heat-up time, Velvet transforms into an MG with none of the downsides.
Since she gives herself 999 ammo for her MG upon using Burst, she has zero need for ammo OLs for when she is needed to deal DPS. Combined with the damage activation effect per 50 bullets, 20 second cooldown and Attack Damage buffs from Burst Active and S2, Velvet is honestly such a powerful DPS unit for a B2. All of these things combine to give her great DPS potential; it is no exaggeration that her Burst weapon is powerful enough to make her the most powerful non-Pilgrim Wind DPS as of this writing.
The issue with her Burst is opportunity cost: Meta at the moment has it that B2 is where the most impactful buffs are for the team. This means if Velvet is Bursting, the B3s in the team do not get to achieve higher DPS potential, since Velvet’s Burst is entirely selfish, and her S2 Charge Damage buff to allies doesn’t occur if she has Burst active. This means that optimally, Velvet should only be Bursting if she absolutely HAS to deal DPS.
Campaign
Velvet makes an acceptable off-burst unit for campaign if supporting units that can make use of the Charge Damage she provides while off-burst, or increasing the amount of damage activations Siren outputs. However, it should be noted that not all units can use the Charge Damage buff equally. There’s certain units that make greater use of the buff compared to their counterparts:
If Velvet isn’t supporting these units in a campaign setting, then it’s more likely better to use a tertiary buffer unit, such as Mast: Romantic Maid (mMast), or an off-burst DPS unit over Velvet, who in that situation, provides an okay caster ATK buff and a charge damage buff that other meta SR/RL units that see good use in campaign just don’t use very well, if a SR/RL is even being used.
Examples of such units are Bready, Vesti: Tactical Upgrade, Cinderella, Red Hood (RH), Ein or Alice. Bready, Vesti and Cinderella are more reliant on damage activations from Full Charge shots over the damage of their bullets to deal DPS, while Red Hood, Ein and Alice have higher than average charge damage whether through buffs or by default, making the Charge Damage buff less impactful.
While Velvet can function with Burst, it’s way too single target for campaign, and the lack of buffs to B3s could be problematic; it should only be considered if she is needed to deal DPS vs Wind-weak maps, especially alongside Siren. The amount of virtual ammo consumed by Velvet, especially with Burst active causes Siren’s S2 to activate so much, it can become an incredibly reliant screenwipe in campaign, as long as the deficit is not too high to make their DPS too weak, since this setup would be reliant on them being the main DPS units, leaving the B3 units in the dust.
It should be noted that for Tetra tower, she is currently its best Wind DPS unit, even with little investment into her burst, against regular enemies and bosses. However, she is also able to buff the SR-heavy Tetra Tower if used off-burst. It’s recommended to use her off-burst until you get to a portion where enemies are Wind-weak. Then it’s time for her to deal DPS; bonus points if you have Noir to support her.
Arena
Even though Velvet has a unique effect in arena where she ‘steals’ ammo from the opponent at the start of the match and when entering Burst Phase 2, 5% at max rank S1 is just too little, even with it rounding up to a minimum of 1 against low base ammo weapons, like SR, RL and SGs. At most, it can disrupt units that are reliant on precise ammo counts, like certain Scarlet setups, or Vest: Tactical Upgrade with few ammo upgrades, but 5% is nowhere near enough to be a very disruptive force against all opponents.
Aside from that, Velvet suffers from the average issues SR units without Pierce have; mediocre burst gen, low DPS and too single target. Her Burst is also neutered in Arena, due to it running at 30 FPS, resulting in halved effectiveness. It’s not worth running her to improve Siren’s DPS in Arena either, since Siren’s primary role in Arena is not necessarily to deal DPS.
Special Interception | Union Raid | Solo Raid
Velvet provides such amazing buffs to the bulk of the meta Wind DPS units, and is such a powerful Wind DPS herself that she is meta vs Wind-weak bosses in any context. She’s so good at what she does, that she’s actually capable of taking Crown’s place as an off-burst unit for single team setups, such as Union Raid when hitting the Wind-weak boss, or Anomaly Interception’s Kraken. This is especially valuable in Union Raid, since it makes units such as Crown or mMast available for other teams to make use of.
Note on a slight optimization
It is recommended to manual Velvet to hold a charge shot just before FB begins and release as soon as the yellow FB text appears. This will immediately activate the charge damage buff for your allies and count for the boosted 300 ammo consumed for Siren to deal DPS with, maximizing the buff uptime, and increasing ammo expenditure over the course of FB.
For Solo Raid, she should ideally be played as DPS unit to boost Siren’s DPS, while the remaining three units contribute to buffing their DPS. This opens up team compositions for the other Wind DPS units. This completely flips the team meta on its head, since the role of buffing unit DPS is usually for the B2; for that reason, there are comparatively few B3 units that can buff the DPS of the team… that doesn’t mean they don’t exist, though. These are the units that should be considered if running Siren + Velvet for a solo raid team, from best to worst.
Burst 1
Burst 3
Something to note is that this was with Velvet at 4/7/7.
My Velvet’s Overload lines, helping make her DPS possible.
For a B2, she has amazing DPS, but just like any other DPS, she has to be built and supported for it.
Strengths
- Great boost to Wind DPS as a whole, whether she’s using Burst or not.
- Provides two novel ways to boost DPS. More units could appear in the future that make greater use of either Charge Damage or Ammo Expenditure.
- Provides such a strong buff to all the meta Wind DPS Pilgrim units when used off-burst, that she supplants Crown specifically for Wind-weak content, especially Union Raid.
- Has incredible DPS potential, with the caveat that it means the B3s have to support her to make the most of it.
Weaknesses
- S1 buff duration is so short, which somewhat gets in the way of her DPS capability. It’d be so good if she could use it in DPS mode.
- Is an incredibly selfish B2 if using her Burst as she turns into a DPS unit, so standard team setups don’t work well for her.
- Even though SRs and RLs are a common weapon, a lot of them don’t actually make great use of the huge Charge Damage buff.
- Ammo Expenditure is currently used only by Siren (Elegg: Boom and Shock doesn’t count), reducing Velvet’s potential if she is not paired up with Siren in any content.
Rating
Note: If Siren is in the campaign team, her Story rating goes up to S tier.
| Category | Rating |
|---|---|
| Overall | S |
| Story | A |
| Bosses | SS |
| Arena | C |
Recommended Cubes
If using her as an off-burst unit to buff the team, it’s recommended to give her the Resilience cube, to minimize downtime in how many Full Charge shots she can output within FB, which will increase Siren’s overall DPS.
Since she doesn’t have any ammo needs when using her Burst, she should stick to Destruction Cube in the instances she’s allowed to Burst, especially if the boss has parts. Otherwise, she should use whatever cube is the highest level to increase her ATK stat.
Doll Priority
Due to how high her personal DPS is, her Doll Priority would be High. However, this is only immediately true for those that are going to use Velvet as a DPS unit right away. If using her primarily for off-burst with no immediate plans to increase her DPS potential, then she doesn’t really need the doll; it’ll barely make a difference for the caster ATK buff as well. Overall, this makes her Doll Priority Medium.
Expected Skill Priority
| Nikke | Budget Skill Investments | Recommended Skill Investments | Skill Priority | Notes | Investment Priority |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Velvet | Skill 1: 1 Skill 2: 7 Burst: 4 | Skill 1: 4 Skill 2: 10 Burst: 7 | S1 << S2 | S1 is honestly not very good. Since Velvet lacks any sort of big burst move, its short duration is mostly wasted on her, since the bulk of her attacks mid-FB can’t make use of it. If using Maxwell in the DPS setup, though, it’s recommended to level it to 7 to maximize the chance she secures Maxwell’s S1 buff for herself. S2 is where she gets a large portion of her power, especially off-burst. Not only is it where her unique, high Charge Damage buff to allies is from, but it also empowers her damage activation whenever she goes Burst mode. While Burst is amazing for her personal DPS, it is also not necessary to level if not using her for DPS purposes. It can be left at 1 until you really need to make her a DPS unit. Since the MG is uniquely powerful at max rank, leveling it to 10 is eventually recommended, as it’ll add up over the course of a fight for each bullet fired. | Medium-High |
Overload Gear Priority
Gear Priority = Head > Gloves > Chest > Boots
| Attribute (Sub-Stat) | Priority | Recommended | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Increase Element Damage Dealt | ★★★★★ | 4x | Wanted for Union Raids and Solo Raid content. |
| Increase Hit Rate | ☆☆☆☆☆ | 0x | — |
| Increase Max Ammunition Capacity | ★★★★☆ | 1-2x | While she doesn’t need ammo with Burst active, it is vital for her if used as an off-burst support for Siren. Any reload during FB would reduce the amount of virtual bullets she consumes for Siren, and max ammo reduces the occurence. |
| Increase ATK | ★★★★☆ | 3 – 4x | Simply more damage. While 4 ATK lines would be amazing for Velvet, especially in DPS mode, it does relatively little for her in off-burst mode. |
| Increase Charge Damage | ☆☆☆☆☆ | 0x | She herself IS the giant Charge Damage OL for the team, at least when off-burst. |
| Increase Charge Speed | ★★★★★ | 3 – 4x | While it is luxurious in a way, it is highly recommended to get Charge Speed OLs if using her for Siren. While it is useless for her in Burst mode, Charge Speed OLs are incredible, since they allow her to consume more ammo within FB, to boost Siren’s DPS. |
| Increase Critical Rate | ★★★☆☆ | 0 – 1x | While Velvet makes great use of Critical Rate with Burst, it is almost useless if using her Off-burst. It’s more of a luxury than an actual necessity for Velvet, especially if it comes at the expense of her off-burst potential. |
| Increase Critical Damage | ★★★☆☆ | 0 – 1x | Ditto. It would seriously be amazing to get either critical line, but it’s best to increase her power in both modes, instead of just going all in for one version of Velvet. |
| Increase DEF | ☆☆☆☆☆ | 0x | — |
Thanks for the testing and reviews, i think i can safely skip her because of i have every wind type except her only. man this collab gonna be exciting ><
yeah, i wouldn’t call her a must get, even if a wind solo raid is coming up, you don’t really need her unless you seek the highest of scores, which, let’s be real, most players shouldn’t bother.
the only time i’d consider her a must get is if you completely lack any wind DPS, cuz she’s the best non-pilgrim wind dps atm, about tied with asukaW.