Recommended
Rookie Sprint Units

CHALDEA (Nenookasi)

DPS / Brawler / Self-Sufficient / Off-Turn Actor / Evasion

Nenookasi AKA Neno was originally called Chaldea before her name was censored.

Chaldea is a potent off-turn evasion brawler who Counter-attacks every time she evades an enemy attack.

Being a Grass Element, this makes her incredibly strong against Water Element units, because of the +50% evasion chance from fighting against a weak element. 

She also has a self heal and cleanse, improving self sufficiency and solo potential. She can regularly clutch up and win 1v1 scenarios in PvP due to her incredible staying power.

Not only is her skill set useful for PvP, she can SOLO CLEAR the Anubarak (Blue) Hunt with the right gear. This means that you can bring 3 ungeared, unleveled units with her to get free EXP and Affection while you farm Blue Hunt (shepherding). This potentially makes you dozens of free Skill Mods from passively farming Affection. A “Big Picture” investment that pays off big time.

IF you select Chaldea, you should get her “Candid Affection” bond as well! Otherwise, use the Necessary Enhancements bond that you can find elsewhere.

HEROIC

DPS / Debuffer / AOE / CD Push / Dispel / Stealth

Heroic is a high-speed opener with a relatively rare ability to increase the skill cooldown of the target (Cooldown Push). Her Skill 2 can remove 2 buffs and CD Push 2 turns on a single target. Her Skill 3 is a self-buffing high-damage AOE that partially penetrates the enemy defense. The fact that she buffs herself before the attack greatly increases her damage potential.

While she is intended to be a PvP-focused unit, Heroic has surprising value as a versatile problem solver in beginner PvE. Her AOE skill is good at clearing minions quickly, and the ability to cooldown push bosses can be invaluable in certain story or virtual reality stages.

In addition, Heroic gets a whopping 23% of free crit rate from her passive and discipline, making her that much easier to build earlygame. Casters tend to have a wide selection of versatile bonds, and if you're lucky enough to find one, Heroic's bond, Backstreet Friction, provides even more crit rate and damage.

NOCLYN AKA Noc

Healer / Team Heal / Team Cleanse / Team Buff / Team Push / AOE Dispel

Noclyn is an interesting healer who brings a more offensive tempo compared to other healers. She is consistently rated very high for PvE because she helps with offense and defense at the same time.

Noclyn's key attribute is that she starts the battle with her ultimate under an 8-turn cooldown.

Until she gets her ultimate, Noclyn is a very mundane healer, with a single-target heal on Skill 1 and an AOE heal on Skill 2. Every time she uses a skill, her ultimate cooldown is reduced by 1, meaning that she needs 4 turns to “spool” her ultimate under normal circumstances.

When Noclyn finally ults, she enters "Idol Mode" which changes her skills for 3 turns, fully heals herself, cleans all debuffs from allies, and gets an extra turn.

Idol-Mode S1 will dispel all buffs from the enemy and force a flanking attack from your strongest ally.

Idol-Mode S2 will heal, ATK UP buff, and gauge-push her allies, setting them up for a strong attack.

Given enough time to spool her ultimate, Noclyn is a very strong healer. However, in places where she has no time to prepare, she is severely limited in usefulness. Noclyn cannot be used in every PvE, and she is totally useless in PvP.

UNLESS…

NARANTHIR AKA Nara or Naranth

Debuffer / AOE / Dispel / Reduce Gauge / Nullify Damage

Naranthir is a utility-focused opener with a kit that is disjointed, yet full of potential.

In PvE, her ability to remove buffs, apply Unhealable, Unbuffable, and reduce a target's gauge by 100% makes her invaluable in trickier stages where hindering the boss is crucial. She isn't always useful, but when she is, she tends to be very useful at her job.

Naranthir is normally not used in PvP due to there being "better options," but her high base speed, her S2 being incredibly cheap to soulburn (10 Astrogen to Ignore RES when all other similar skills require 20), her flexibility in being able to choose whether to go for the AOE or the single-target denial, makes her an underappreciated opener especially for newbies. Beginners who love an aggressive playstyle can start cleaving early and effectively with Naranthir.

And finally, Naranthir's signature bond - Allure of the Toetip - is one of the best bonds for Erica. If you can either get lucky or buy her bond using the Rookie Sprint tokens, you can give Erica an insane team utility by letting her heal her teammates.

*Naranthir is NOT obtained from Filter Recruit (one where you get Celeste and Joyce from) because having Celeste is much, much more important & useful for newbies.

JANIS

DPS / AOE / Nuker / Stealth / Extinction

Janis is an annoying little brat who can catch enemies off guard in PvP.

First, Janis’ Skill 1 is a single-target attack, but if the enemy is below 50% health, she follows up with an additional AOE attack. Being a follow-up attack, it cannot be countered.

Second, Janis never takes more than 51% of total health in damage at a time, meaning she can never be killed in one shot. Paired with a Tank holding Backwards Glance in her team, she can never be killed in two shots either.

Third, Janis cloaks herself once per turn when attacked, meaning she can’t be continuously targeted with single target attacks, making her even harder to mark down and kill.

And finally, Janis’ ultimate is one of the highest-damage attacks in the game, with a devastating effect: If the ultimate kills the target, the target cannot be revived, and the rest of the enemy team takes a huge amount of “splash damage” as well. This is often enough to wipe a flimsy team or bring a brawler team to their knees.

Janis can be used offensively and defensively in PvP, provided that you have the right units to support her. In addition, her attacks apply Unhealable debuff to enemies, which makes her a great choice for Blaze Wolf (Red) Hunt as well.

DAWN

Healer / Team Heal / Team Cleanse / Team Push

Dawn is not as strong as others on the list but are considered a sleeper pick by some, due to two main advantages:

First, Dawn's pure healing amount is nearly unrivaled. Due to her excellent base HP and her high multipliers, Dawn can bring almost anyone from near zero to full health with her ultimate. Not only that, her basic attack (S1) also heals an ally. This can be exploited by fitting her with a Counter set letting her heal an ally whenever she counters.

Second, she can boost her allies' action gauge. Not only does her S2 boost an ally's gauge by 50%, Her ultimate, an AOE cleanse and heal, grants a gauge boost proportional to the amount of debuffs removed. Against a debuff-heavy PVP team, Dawn can instantly turn the tide of the battle if she can just grab a turn (which may prove difficult, but still).

Dawn's biggest weakness is her very long cooldown. When her S3 and S2 are depleted, Dawn is mostly useless for several turns, which is enough time for the enemy team to damage and kill you again.

There is a rumor/leak that Dawn is possibly getting a buff in the future where she gains an AOE revive ability; this mirrors her skillset in E7 (Destina). While nothing has been confirmed regarding this matter, some players are holding onto Dawn in the hopes that she becomes even stronger in the future.