Ezio AuditoreBuild and Guide

Review:

Big one so get ready.

Ezio is a 6-star Assassin of the Star Afflatus. His focus is on a new [Assassination] mechanic that allows him to trigger +Final DMG Bonus for every 100 Crit Tech difference between him and his target. He is an incredibly flexible character, being able to switch between 3 Archetypes and 9 playstyles total with his unique weapon mechanic.

Let’s talk about said system first. Upon unlocking Ezio you will be able to pick between a Primary and Secondary weapon (you can switch them at any time before entering a combat stage by going to his profile). The Primary weapon will define Ezio’s Archetype and the Secondary will provide additional effects. As a general rule of thumb, follow this list:

• Venetian Falchion: Follow-Up Attack

• Condotierro War Hammer: Ultimate

• Captain’s Sword: Poison

  • Channeled Cinquedea: General

  • Butcher Knife: Single-Target

  • Sultan’s Knife: Multi-Target

To understand how these weapons alter his kit. Let’s look at it without them for a base template.

First of all, Ezio does not have any Moxie and instead uses Synchronization. He gains this whenever he triggers an [Assassination], when riposting with his [Counter] or after defeating an enemy. Note that Synchronization gain is pretty slow unless you’re running him on a War Hammer build. The moment you hit 100% Synchronization, at the start of the next turn, he will auto-cast his Ultimate.

His Insights are primarily about the [Eyes Caught] and [Fighting Experience] statuses. That first one is a debuff that will simply force enemies to pick Ezio as their primary target for attacks while that latter effect is his [Counter]. He takes reduced damage while in said state and reduces incoming damage further if enemies are affected by [Eyes Caught]. Though if he drops below a percentage of HP anyway he will gain [Shadowstalk] for even more DMG Reduction and a burst of extra Crit DMG. 

In addition, whenever he triggers an [Assassination] he gains [Apprentice Assassin] until it’s stacked 8 times, transforming into [Master Assassin]. This basically gives him a second [Assassination] effect but with a different Final DMG Bonus (this stacks with the normal [Assassination] effect). If there is another Assassination character on the team, he will grant [Master Assassin] to the entire team at a reduced potency.

“Work in the Dark” is a single-target damage tool that counts as an [Assassination]. It’s simple, effective, and most subject to change based on your equipped weapons.

“Serve the Light” is a self-counter that inflicts [Eyes Caught] on the enemy with the most queued Attack Incantations and puts Ezio in the [Fighting Experience] state. While in this, he will riposte attackers with a strong single-target attack that also counts as an [Assassination]. This will be the main way to trigger most of his Insight effects.

“Branding of Faith” will force you to select 1 target and then hit them with either “Arrow of Faith” or “Edge of Faith” 3 times (or more depending on your equipped weapons). The Edge is for when the target is above 50% HP, and Arrow is for when the target is below 50% HP. It will then finish off with “Death Be Not Unkind”, a big Reality DMG nuke. All of these attacks also count as [Assassination]s.

With that out of the way, we can cover his weapons. Most of them just require a bit of reading so we’ll explain the most important effects and the way they change his playstyle.

Venetian Falchion: Is probably his best Primary and focuses on FUAs. With this, his Skill 1 inflicts [Assassin’s Mark], which is a debuff that triggers a FUA with Skill 1 if an ally that is not Ezio hits them in some way (so buff or healing cards won’t work). The Secondary weapons here all serve to support his in some way, boosting FUA DMG and either granting Ezio: Crit conversion (100%), making him FUA with Skill 1 if an enemy dies (like Lucy FUA) or extending the duration of his [Counter] by an extra turn while inflicting the taunt effect on all enemies.

Condotierro War Hammer: Focuses on his Ultimate. It grants an extra [Assassination]-like Final DMG Bonus to every cast. In addition, when allies cast Ultimates he gains Synchronization and a stack of [Eagle’s Guidance] with each stack giving him an additional Arrow/Edge cast during his next Ult. His Secondary weapons here provide extra Ultimate Might and also: Synchronization at the start of the turn, Ultimate DMG Bonus and Synchronization if there is only 1 enemy or Synchronization whenever an enemy dies.

Captain’s Sword: A bit of a meme but focuses on Poison. It grants him extra Synchronization and causes all of his attacks to inflict a stack of [Poison] on their target. In addition, attacking an enemy deals extra Genesis DMG based on the amount of [Poison] stacks on them like Jessica, but the multipliers are unknown so good luck with that. In addition, [Assassination] changes from granting Final DMG Bonus to just dealing even more Genesis DMG. His Secondary weapons here generally provide additional Genesis DMG and also provide: 1 more [Poison] stack on attack, 2 more [Poison] stacks on attack if there’s only 1 enemy, or spreading [Poison] stacks from killed enemies to their allies.

Overall, Ezio’s flexibility is unmatched. Especially given how Archetype-oriented the game has become in recent times this splashability of his is incredibly attractive for both new players or veteran players looking to pivot their roster into other team comps. Due to his Crit Tech being a whopping 1106 at max level he’ll also easily hit 83% Crit Rate at R10 by himself, with 3+ different ways of getting massive amounts of extra Final DMG Bonus and high amounts of Crit DMG and DMG Reduction he is incredibly self-sufficient.

In our opinion Venetian Falchion will probably be his best weapon set. If played right it can set up a good amount of very hard-hitting FUAs with either straight damage, FUAs on kill or extra ripostes. It’ll also be the easiest weapon set to support with a varied number of team options like Liang Yue, 37, Flutterpage, Fatutu. It’s an interesting way to play and does ask a team that doesn’t mind active casts, but the output more than makes up for the trouble of doing the rotation right.

War Hammer is interesting, since it's focused on his Ultimate, but in this he struggles with being a Star unit. All good Ultimate teammates (Melania, Moldir, Pickles) do not match well on the Afflatus front; he also doesn’t use Moxie which makes Melania and Recoleta less effective. When matched up with someone like Melania(E) and Hissabeth he’ll do fantastic damage, but it does make his teambuilding somewhat limited (and his Synchronization generation without Ultimate-spamming characters is genuinely a struggle).

Captain’s Sword is very entertaining. It turns him into a Genesis DMG monster that can apply a surprising amount of [Poison] and deal a LOT of Genesis DMG with his [Assassination] procs; note that his Genesis DMG can Crit like 37 and Ezra’s at certain [Poison] thresholds. He’ll probably be a good swap-in for Willow if you’re tired of or don’t have her unlocked, though you’d probably run something closer to Ezio / Tuesday/ Jessica(E2) / Sotheby mostly. It’s fine as a weapon, but the lack of Genesis Crit does hurt his overall output.

Gameplay:

What in the world is going on with the Collab characters.

It is very good. End of sentence.

It’s not broken good, you’re not going to hit Nautika levels of damage unless you’re specifically running him in the AC event (he gets a really big DMG Bonus for simply existing) but it is good enough that I’d say I’m pleasantly surprised!

Venetian Falchion is a really interesting way of setting up damage. Inflicting [Assassin’s Mark] to pop with allies and trigger FUAs that either deal: massive amounts of extra damage, trigger a very long cycle of on-kill FUAs or make him effectively invincible with ripostes is genuinely the most amount of fun with a FUA character that I’ve had since Liang Yue in 2.5. Every FUA also deals way more damage than whatever feels balanced, trust me. Did I mention his Skill 1 (the thing he FUAs with most often) has a stupid high Reality DMG scaling (basically the highest basic incan modifier in the game)? 

War Hammer is… guhhh. Let me preface this by saying that I am incredibly biased against this weapon specifically because I HATE the way his Ultimate works. He auto-casts it not the moment he hits 100%, but at the start of the turn after. This means that you’ll have to make sure that you stick all the buffs that you want on him preemptively on the turn before and assume that you will hit max Synch during the turn so that you can make sure that he has the wanted bonuses when he casts it. When you pull it off? Absolute cinema, you easily triple the damage output of his Ultimate. Don’t pull it off? It still does amazing damage but you’ll just feel really bad about it.

Captain’s Sword is my baby. I have a weakness for DoT teams and was really bummed when Willow kind of just, converts all your [Poison] stacks into her [Hag’s Bane]. This issue is no longer! Every attack with this weapon will inflict stacks and also deal extra Genesis DMG scaling with the count (though not having a modifier for this is the funniest thing ever, alright Bluepoch keep your secrets). It’s definitely more limited than the other two weapons in terms of teambuilding, but it has a lot of potential for future content.