[Discuss] Kurosaki Ichigo's playstyle, strengths, weaknesses, and team-building

Let's discuss Kurosaki Ichigo

[ Hollowfied, Ichigo Kurosaki ]

[ Balanced Type ] [ Devil Type ]

Active skill: Change all orbs to Fire, Water & Wood & Light & Dark & Heart orbs. Increases time limit of orb movement by 1.5x for 1 turn.

Leader skill: ATK x2.5 when attacking with 4 of following orb types: Fire, Water, Wood, Light, Dark & Heart. ATK x0.5 for each additional orb type, up to ATK x3.5 for all 6 matches. Fire, Water, Wood, Light & Dark attribute cards ATK x2.5, RCV x2.5 on the turn a skill is used.

Awakenings:

[ Two-Pronged Attack ] [ Skill Boost ] [ Resistance-Skill Bind ] [ Extend Time ] [ God Killer ]

Useful subs:

EDIT: I've updated the sub list based on the results of the discussion below + added some sample team comps, in case folks return to this thread when building Ichigo later.

Full Board Change:

[ Blazing Goddess of Power, Kali ] [ Anti-God Machine, Ragnarok Dragon ] [ Hollowfied, Ichigo Kurosaki ] [ Capricious Summon, Fat Chocobo ] [ Crystal Wind Dragon Queen, Linthia ]

Burst:

[ Awoken Loki ] [ Placating Founder, Okuninushi ] [ Chaotic Flying General, Lu Bu ] [ Awoken Tsukuyomi ] [ 11th Division Captain, Kenpachi Zaraki ] [ Renegade Hero, Sephiroth ]

Gravity:

[ Awoken Zeus Stratios ] [ Loving Heavenly Deities, Zeus & Hera ] [ Awoken Sakuya ]

Bind clear:

[ Awoken Isis ] [ Awoken Sakuya ] [ Black Beast Demon's Servant, Aamir ]

Shield:

[ Awoken Isis ] Pacifying Yomi Goddess, Izanami ] [ Awoken Susano no Mikoto ] [ Heaven-Shaking Thunderdragon, Indra ]

True damage: Required for Arena 2.0, Killua’s HP is too low to work here though.

[ Awoken Ra ] [ Cerberus Rider, Jize ] [ Godspeed, Killua Zoldyck ]

Delay:

[ Awoken Viper Orochi ] [ Placating Founder, Okuninushi ] [ 11th Division Captain, Kenpachi Zaraki ]

Orb changers: Use as a burst on a full board change for 2+ dark TPAs on a 5-color match activation (56x)

[ Ominous Moon Dragon Caller, Satsuki ] [ Awoken Anubis ] [ Reincarnated Chaos Dragon Knight, Voice ] [ Black-Winged Goddess, Valkyrie Claire ] [ Destruction Palm Mechanical Star God, Castor ]

Sample Team Compositions:

The general composition for running Ichigo will look something like "Board changer + Burst + Shield + Bind clear", with a preference for a least one low CD sub. Below is an example, but you can mix and match using the subs mentioned above:

[ Hollowfied, Ichigo Kurosaki ] [ Blazing Goddess of Power, Kali ] [ Awoken Loki ] [ Pacifying Yomi Goddess, Izanami ] [ Awoken Isis ] [ Hollowfied, Ichigo Kurosaki ]

Dark heavy:

[ Hollowfied, Ichigo Kurosaki ] [ Placating Founder, Okuninushi ] [ Blazing Goddess of Power, Kali ] [ Black Beast Demon's Servant, Aamir ] [ Ominous Moon Dragon Caller, Satsuki ] [ Hollowfied, Ichigo Kurosaki ]

End Edits

So Ichigo has been out for a few days now, so a number of folks will have rolled him and been working on him. What’s the experience so far? On his preview/release there was a lot of hype about him—DKali active, Godkiller awakening, easily scaling multiplier ranging from 6.25x-76.56x, absurd RCV. All sounds (and is!) very good, but there are definitely some challenges in his play style that are worth discussing.

I’ve switched over to playing him to get a feeling for his damage parameters (in endless and in some multiplayer rushes). He didn’t play the way I expected him to, so to understand Ichigo better, let’s take a look at the scaling of his leader skill multiplier:

Orbs Activated	Active skill used	Multiplier	Total
3 or fewer orb types	Yes	2.5	6.25
4 orb types	No	2.5	6.25
5 orb types	No	3	9
All orb types	No	3.5	12.25
4 orb types	Yes	6.25	39.06
5 orb types	Yes	7.5	56.25
All orb types	Yes	8.75	76.56

One significant challenge facing Ichigo teams is his reliance on active skills. He’s similar to Awoken Ra in that regard, but Ra can still pump out a respectable 25x without burning an active. Matching all six orb types without using an active skill results in a rather pitiful 12.25x for Ichigo. Although a low cooldown sub can help Ichigo output damage more consistently, the real reason that you want one is to help Ichigo stall. An Ichigo team’s RCV isn’t great, so he needs to burn an active skill to get that delicious 6.25x RCV modifier to heal up to full. Isis is the ideal candidate, although if you need true damage Jize is a reasonable option. Hastes are also welcome.

Another challenge facing Ichigo is HP. His team, Hypermax, is looking at around 25k-28k HP, depending on your subs, which is fine for everything until you get to current end-game content, at which point shields become a necessity to survive high damage preemptives or to stall through bigger hits. He is also susceptible binds, and skill delay really ruins his day (no activation for 2-3 turns doesn't just stop you from dealing damage--it also prevents you from healing/stalling). Basically, Ichigo teams are fragile and need a lot of utility to take on endgame.

On the other hand, Ichigo is a lot more flexible than other Rainbow leads. His leader skill is objectively better than Awoken Horus, as his activation includes hearts and his multiplier is a bit higher at identical levels of matching (Horus @ 36x vs. Ichigo @ 39x; Horus at 45x vs Ichigo at 56x). He has rather precise control over his damage, and his ability to heal to full is on par or even better than the Yomi Dragon and Ra Dragon. This is a big advantage for Ichigo over the other rainbow leads--Awoken Ra, Awoken Sakuya, Light Kali, U+Y, Durga, etc.

But its harder to compare him in terms of damage output to the more serious rainbow leads with higher multipliers, especially Ra Dragon, largely because Ichigo’s higher-end damage is based on his God killer awakening (which is only situationally applicable) and his multiplier is comparatively low. A further problem is that Awoken Ra and Sakuya can pack orb changers (e.g., Chibi Valk for Ra or Elia for Sakuya) to stack on-color damage because they only require matching 4-5 orbs for their full multiplier, while Ichigo needs all six. Even with a team filled with mostly dark subs, Ichigo is going to have trouble getting 2+ dark combos/TPAs while activating.

start of experimental theory crafting that I could totally be wrong about: With that said, Ichigo can hit a pretty high multiplier off matching 5 orb types (56.25x ) rather than all 6 orb types (75.56x). Compare with, for example, Ra Dragon’s match-5 multiplier (20.25x). Ichigo may benefit from fixing his own active by breaking one of his colors and settling for a match-5 rather than a match-6 activation of his leader skill. The ideal candidates would be:

Satsuki: 3 TPAs, Haste

Anubis: 2 TE, 8 turn cool down

REvo Voice: 3 Dark OE, 2 TPA, 5 turn cooldown

I’ve been able to hit approx. 17 million in endless using Ichigo -> Loki -> Satsuki, and that's before taking into account Ichigo’s god-killer awakening—it would be 27 million taking that it account, making it enough to burst Dark Kali below 65%. end theory-crafting

What are your thoughts on Ichigo? Anyone playing with him have a similar or different experience?

tl;dr: Ichigo is very good but there are some challenges to his play style need to be thought about by people planning to use him.