Board 8 > Persona 5 Confidants+ Ranking Topic (Spoilers) [Writeups]

(+) Yeah! (+)

I did this for P3P and P4G when I played them a couple years back, so I think I'll do it again for Persona 5. Just to be clear, these are based on the strength of the Confidant meetings themselves, not the quality of the characters. Though of course being a good character will (almost) inevitably make the confidant better and being a bad character will (usually) make the confidant worse, that’s not always how it goes. Overall, I think Persona 5 has the best social links of the series by a long shot. Not in the sense that the best ones are better than the best ones in 3 and 4 - I think those are all in the same tier - but in the sense that there’s not a single bad link in the game, and every one of them is enjoyable. I’d rank every link in this game over the worst four links in P4, and all but last place over the worst 7 or so. The quality is just incredibly consistent. Some of them are still incredibly flawed, but even those ones have a lot of great rank ups. If anyone else wants to join in (probably no one will, but eh), feel free
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20. Strength - Caroline and Justine
Basically a retread of Margaret’s S-Link from P4. That wasn’t good then, and this isn’t good now. I don’t see why they don’t emulate the way they did Elizabeth in Persona 3 and have you go outside of the room, or at least have conversations beyond making new Persona. I do think this is better than Margaret’s for a few reasons though. You get more of a conversation with these two every rank up than you did with her, and they also get quite a bit of development as the story goes on since you spend so much time in the Velvet Room. I also like both of them more than I liked Margaret. Having rank 10 be such an anticlimax was annoying, but at least they delivered on that story-wise later on. I’m curious how different things are if you don’t complete Strength first....
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19. Justice - Akechi
I really don’t like Akechi, but most of that is due to his presence in the game after he joins your party. Before that, he’s a bit of a neat rival who has some good potential, and his Confidant rank-ups are all neat little scenes. I like how he gradually befriends Joker throughout the game - this really sets up the scene where he sacrifices himself for the party, and talks about how similar he is to Joker. Unfortunately they kind of forget about that stuff in between him joining your party and that scene happening, but the links with him were all fun. The main reason he’s this low is that there isn’t very much to them. All the other mandatory confidants are pretty hefty, but Akechi’s scenes are really short, and while they’re good, they’re not in any way exceptional. I think they were trying to copy Adachi from P4G here, but while that one offered a lot of insight into the character and was insanely cool to play after already finishing the game once, I don’t think Akechi would benefit that much from a replay, and his link scenes are way shorter anyway
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18. Lovers - Ann
I found most party member Confidants in P5 to be disappointing in one way or another, and Ann’s is the worst of the lot. It starts out very promising. I very much like everything involved with Shiho, and this aspect shines throughout the link. I also love that she’s having some problems with her modeling job, but she doesn’t really give a shit, since it’s just a part-time job to her that she does to make a few extra bucks. They even go in an interesting direction with this - Shiho inspires to half-ass her life less, so she decides to find something she truly cares about, and wants to be an action movie star. Up to this point I’m down with every part of this link. Unfortunately after this it kinda goes down the toilet, as she forgets about her action movie dreams, decides that she really loves modeling, and focuses on that again for the rest of the link. This is boring and cliche and I didn’t enjoy any of it. A disappointing link is in some ways worse than one that’s bad from the start, I think. Incidentally, I romanced all the girls in my playthrough, and Ann was pretty weak in that respect too, especially since she’s the first girl you can romance. There should’ve been more scenes throughout the game with her that are influenced by whether you romanced her or not, IMO. The other characters don’t suffer from this as much because you get them much later and/or they aren’t party members so they don’t get as much screen time in general.
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17. Star - Hifumi
I think I’d say that objectively, Hifumi’s link is the worst in the game. Not that it’s particularly bad, but she has the most tenuous connection to the party of all the confidants, with you having to go way out of your way to even meet her (Tower and Fortune are at least in locations you’d otherwise go to anyway). And then her story is probably one of the least novel in the game as well, with no real twists, other than the fact that she’s not actually good at shogi - she just thinks she is because her mom rigs all the games in her favor (this is actually a fun twist). There are a few fun things about the link though. I love her chuuni-esque playing style, where she plays the games as is they’re real life, but is still fully self-aware of this. She’s pretty cute in general, but doesn’t really make a super strong impression, unfortunately. Her romance is solid (playing a match alone for a long time is probably the best sex euphemism in the game), but not amazing either.
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I love when Mac makes topics because it reminds me that for some unknown reason, Mac is literally the only user on gamefaqs I have highlighted aside from myself
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You honor me
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the weird thing is that I have no idea exactly when I did this or why. it would have happened in like 2015 I guess, or earlier.
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Mac Arrowny posted...

20. Strength - Caroline and Justine

*Goes back to topic list*

That is not actually a joke in this case, but the reason is because I'm only halfway through and am not risking spoilers anymore than I already have. (The only reason I clicked on this topic was to search for the twins at the bottom and to get upset if they were lmao)

At least we agree on Ann though. I actually liked her character a lot until I started doing her Confidant...
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go go Futaba

go go Becky
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pyresword posted...

Mac Arrowny posted...

20. Strength - Caroline and Justine

*Goes back to topic list*

That is not actually a joke in this case, but the reason is because I'm only halfway through and am not risking spoilers anymore than I already have. (The only reason I clicked on this topic was to search for the twins at the bottom and to get upset if they were lmao)

At least we agree on Ann though. I actually liked her character a lot until I started doing her Confidant...

I can see the good in most links, but not really in Strength. Other than Caroline and Justine being awesome, of course.
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Note: I missed one of the numbers while I was doing this because Fool is 0, so shift everything before this up by 1.

17. Chariot - Ryuji
Though Ryuji may be the worst, he actually starts out pretty good, and his Confidant is part of that. I like basically every part of it. He starts training again, not out of some desperate desire to get back on the track team, but because he likes being in good shape, and wants to be able to fight better as a part of the Phantom Thieves. His involvement with the ex-team members is never overdone either. It’s not incredibly painful and dramatic, but it’s not like it’s completely easy for him. He solves the team’s problems in a way that’s a little more reminiscent of the past games too, recording the teacher rather than using Mementos to take him down. He’s really smart about it, too! The way Ryuji was initially introduced, he was kind of like a delinquent character finally discovering a purpose in his life and turning over a new leaf, and this link fit right in with that. It’s just too bad they forgot about that later in the game.
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The best part of Ann's confidant was Ryuji calling her out on her bullshit.
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It's unfortunate Ryuuji in Confidants is like 2-3 tiers better than he is later in the game but oh well..
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16. Devil - Ichiko
Ichiko’s link is consistently intriguing, with the mystery of what happened to her friend resolving in a way that I wasn’t really expecting (I really thought she’d be dead), and the involvement of Shido in the whole affair tied it back into the main story in an extremely cool way. I love that this link hypes him up before you even see him in the main story too, since it gives yet another personal reason to fight against him. The setting is pretty enjoyable too, with Lala being a less stereotypical character than I’d expect from a JRPG like this. I also highly enjoyed all the links that had you do a Mementos mission to continue them (which is all the NPC links, which is one thing that gives them advantage over the PC links), along with them figuring out that you’re a Phantom Thief. Ichiko’s romance is pretty cool too, since she’s probably the worst person of the adult social links, and therefore gives the fewest shits about sleeping with a 17 year old boy. I tried out a date or two with her post-link as well, and they were fun. A neat atmosphere of a previously despondent woman learning how to take true pleasure in the world again, rather than merely finding solace in alcohol
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15. Empress - Haru
I really enjoyed almost every part of Haru’s link. She has a lot of reason to be emotionally torn, probably more than any party member but Futaba (and Futaba’s already had a year to recover). Haru’s naturally a pretty together person, which makes her a bit different from some of the confidants. She actually feels a bit more like a Persona 4 character in some ways, since her link is largely about expressing her true feelings and finding her own way in life. She has no idea who to trust at first, and perhaps my favorite thing about her link is that the new president of the company actually is trustworthy, with the same ideals for the future of the company that she has. Her arranged marriage is a less interesting subject, but at least it’s resolved in a simple and easy way. The gardening stuff is kinda whatever too, though I guess that’s more for the gameplay parts. The romance is probably fairly low tier, and doesn’t really affect my opinion on the link. The one thing that annoyed me is in the level 10 rank up. After all this cool stuff where she figures out who to trust in the company and develops her own vision of what she wants for Okumura Foods...she just decides to open a coffee shop and sell coffee (even though Okumura Foods is already creating a chain like this!). It’s out of nowhere and, IMO, pretty dumb. Though they’ve gotten (somewhat) better about this over time, a lot of JRPGs and anime are still pretty sexist, and this has that sort of feel to it. Let the girl run the little cafe rather than the major corporation. I mean, it’s possible it’s not that simple, and it’s perfectly fine for people not to want to run big companies (I’m sure it’s pretty stressful, and she’s super rich so she really can just do whatever the hell she wants to do, so why would she subject herself to the hardship?). Still feels regressive
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Uh...I was under the impression that Haru was planning on running the cafe thing that Okumura Foods was setting up.
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That's not quite how I interpreted it, but it'd be cool if I were incorrect.
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Yeah, she intended to run THEIR coffee chain.
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14. Magician - Morgana
I find that Persona 5 does the auto-advancing confidants quite a bit better than the other games. The group links in P3 and P4 were good, of course, but the individuals who had them felt really lacking. Here, I suppose it helps that the characters who have them are among my favorites in the game (except Akechi), but more importantly, they actually feel somewhat substantial to me. Morgana’s pretty much the best in general, and while you could say that his link shows a side of him you don’t really see in the game, that’s not quite true. There are a bunch of hints throughout the game about his self-doubt with regard to whether he’s human or not, and the rank ups just go deeper into that. Morgana hanging around with Joker all the time is one of my favorite parts of the game. Kinda like a Zelda game in a way when you think about it, heh. And these deeper heart to hearts are uniformly excellent. Only reason they aren’t higher is that none of them are really mind-blowing, but I don’t consider that to be a weakness. P5 confidants so good. <3
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I was a bit put off that like 4 of his rank ups eye basically the same scene.

I think I may like Morgana a lot less than most to begin with, though.
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LapisLazuli posted...

I was a bit put off that like 4 of his rank ups eye basically the same scene.

I think I may like Morgana a lot less than most to begin with, though.

Morgana is pretty hated due to the constant "YOU NEED TO GO TO BED" (which is a silly thing to hate on since P3 and P4 forces you to go to bed on certain days they just have narration that does it instead)

Sounds like people just need a scapegoat to vent their frustration on not having freedom on a bunch of days
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They may be a little bit samey, but I wasn't being totally objective with this list or anything. It's based on my memories of the game - I didn't go back and rewatch any of the rank ups to see how good they actually are when you see them all at once. Morgana probably benefited from his confidant being so spread out, so none of it feels repetitive, because you go many hours before seeing a new part each time.
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13. Fortune - Chihaya
Chihaya’s story is one of the best in terms of building up throughout the links. While a lot of the other confidants have two or three stories running parallel that intersect at times, Chihaya’s basically starts small and grows a bit with every conversation. This allows for a neat flow that the other ones don’t really have. I like the story that it tells, too. The contrast of her having real powers and believing that the cult leader actually has powers is a fun dynamic, and it’s entirely believable how she could be caught up in a scam like that. Her beliefs about how you can’t overturn fate allow for some good progression as well, and tie in perfectly with the main story. And then finally taking the cult leader is really satisfying too. There are quite a few confidants with Mementos missions, but I think this one’s on a bigger scale than any of those are, so it feels almost like a main story mission in some ways. All the while Chihaya is developing and becoming more assertive too, so it just feels really good. I think she feels more into the MC than the other confidants too, as far as romance goes. Most of them don’t really go far one way or the other in terms of friends vs. romance until Joker asks them out. Chihaya, however, expresses her interest long before you even get the choice. It’s pretty adorable
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12. Tower - Shinya
Along with Hifumi, Shinya is the game’s least important confidant. I actually like Hifumi better as a character, and her charms are basically the saving grace of her link. On the other hand, Shinya’s actually pretty unlikable most of the time. Persona in general is good at making interesting social links with unlikable characters though. First, hanging out with a kid is a great way to do a social link. Maiko was one of the best in P3 too. Allows for a different dynamic from the other links, and gives you a good feeling that you’re making a difference in his life. The other thing I love is the way his life is framed in terms of wars/battles, where everything is about winning and losing. Parents like his are definitely a thing, and while I’m not so sure kids like him are, it only makes sense that he’d be influenced by his mother. You expect him to be the victim in all of this, since that’s how stories work, even though he’s basically been an ass right from the time you met him. But then no, he goes around beating up kids and stealing their money. It’s fantastic seeing this sort of thing from the other side. Plus, because this is fiction and it’s a confidant, we get to reform him too, and stop the bullying. They took a pretty simple idea for a link and turned it into something really compelling. Bravo, Atlus
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11. The Fool - Igor
I’ve seen other people say that this is something of a nothing link because you go to the Velvet Room and see Igor in all the Persona games, but I don’t think that’s really the case. There’s way more involvement from Igor/Justine/Caroline in this game than any previous game, even before the twist. You never ended up seeing them this often in 3 or 4. This one builds up more of a personal connection as well, I think, and I really enjoyed that part. In the previous games Igor never had an S-Link, and just existing made me feel like I was closer to him. Going to the Velvet Room was something I looked forward too whenever I went to sleep after some story development, because it meant seeing more of him and the girls. Of course, the twist at the end just made all of this even better, and was probably my favorite sequence in the game. Taking a basic element of the series and building it into something deeply related to the plot is usually a pretty nifty technique, and it pays off perfectly here
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I'm a bit surprised Makoto has cracked the top ten, as her link was probably one of the weaker aspects of her character in my books.
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Well, she just barely made it!

10. Priestess - Makoto
One of the themes I noticed in a few of the confidants is them ending up where they started after trying new things. This doesn’t always work, since their starting points aren’t always all that good (Ann). Makoto starts out pretty awesome though, so for her it works out just fine. All the stuff with her trying to hang out with one of the cool kids was pretty unique, and a neat twist on showing a sheltered kid the real world. It’s a bit of a shame things had to go wrong in the criminal fashion they did, rather than it being more down to earth, but that worked too. I kept expecting them to use the metaverse to solve the boyfriend problems, too. Not sure whether this was the better choice or not. Makoto’s romance was kinda cute with the fake boyfriend thing throughout. I like how there was basically nothing to it at first (she didn’t get embarrassed about the fake boyfriend thing or whatever), and it gradually just built up over time. And one of the coolest parts is where she ends up in terms of finding who she wants to be. Makoto’s link is basically focused entirely on this at its core, and while the result is natural (Makoto was interested in the criminal justice system right from the start), wanting to be Japan’s police commissioner is a pretty unique goal for someone to have. Of the party members, this is basically the deepest connection any of the links has to the main story too, since it’s about her wanting to take on the same problems the Phantom Thieves attack every day. Great stuff.
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9. Emperor - Yusuke
Yusuke has by far the best character turnaround in the game. Haru’s pretty good too, but she comes later and doesn’t have as much post-awakening screentime, plus she’s not even on the same level. When Yusuke’s introduced, he’s basically a piece of shit. They tried to do some things to make him interesting, but they were all kind of boring. After his awakening, however, he’s just this hilarious random guy who’s always making comments and doing things that are completely inappropriate for the situation. The group chats usually aren’t that great, with the exception of Yusuke’s comments often being a highlight since they have little to do with the meh conversations everyone else is having. This also applies to his confidant, I think. It’s by far the funniest one in the game. In fact, none of the others are even really that humorous? Not as a focus, at least. His pretentious art nerd stuff could possibly be annoying, but it’s so over the top that it always at least made me smile. The boat scene was wonderful, as were most of his other rank ups. The only disappointing part is that the final couple are a bit more serious, but they’re still nice, and I liked all his paintings. Will be cool if future games have more strong comedy links like this.
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Well first off, obligatory 'lolmactopic'

Shadow Dino posted...

Uh...I was under the impression that Haru was planning on running the cafe thing that Okumura Foods was setting up.

LapisLazuli posted...

Yeah, she intended to run THEIR coffee chain.

That's not at all true. Haru ceded control of the company and is planning on opening an independent place like Leblanc. She outright says that after talking with the people at her company she agreed she wasn't going to be able to handle running it.

Just rewatched Haru's confidant ranks and you're right, she does mention wanting to open her own private cafe. But then her Valentine's date mentions her getting an unofficial offer from Okumura Foods, so...buh? Work experience prior to striking out on her own?
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There's no need to be rude...

Also, both interpretations could still be correct. It wouldn't be too surprising if she wanted to work in a small shop and figure things out before moving up to the big time management work.
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My interpretation was her own private one separate from Okumura but connected to Sojiros in some way
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Rewatching Yusuke's...he kind of reminds me of a male Yukiko in some ways.
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8. Judgement - Sae
My personal favorite of the auto-links. The flashforwards to Sae are a really cool mechanic in general, but they’re a bit overly brief and samey sometimes? Mainly the ones relating to the confidants (on a side note, what happens if you start a new confidant after 11/20? Does it flash back to Sae, or do you just miss that part?). I would love for those to have more meat to them. Thankfully, they decided to give us that meat when they started her actual confidant section out. I pretty much freaked out when the confidant section started, because it was such a cool idea, having a link to someone from the future. I mean, sure, you don’t get the benefits until 11/20, but I don’t think I fused any Judgement Personas until then so I didn’t realize that anyway, and it’s neat regardless. Talking with Sae was great because it really felt like you were winning over one of the enemies onto your side, which hasn’t really happened in any other S-Links, even the ones that are with villains (maybe Tanaka is an exception? But of course, Tanaka was one of the greatest too). The buildup was phenomenal, and then the payoff is all there too, when she decides to help you out in the main story. There are some other things it might’ve been nice to see from her - they could’ve made her a party member to replace Akechi, or they could’ve made her a romance option. Having an adult party member would’ve been a great step forward for the Persona games, and being able to two-time the Niijima sisters would’ve been the best (future Persona games need sibling romance options…). Still, those are minor. Sae is great
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I started Caroline/Justine after 11/20 and just got the "I am thou" with no flashback to Sae
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You don't get a flashforward for Fool or Strength anyway.
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I started Haru's after the game caught up and didn't get the scene
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7. Moon - Mishima
Ah, Mishima. The most hated confidant in the game. I can mostly understand this way of thinking. Mishima’s a bit of an annoying character, and is partially responsible for a lot of the obstacles the main characters run into throughout the story (without the Phansite, the Okumura thing wouldn’t have blown up...though I mean, they were going to target Okumura because of the information on Sae’s laptop anyway, so nothing would’ve really changed). He’s also kind of a bad guy in some of his appearances, is pathetic a lot of the time, and is generally a loser. But for me, all that was what made his confidant so great. You get to see someone formerly powerless growing drunk with power, and attempting to abuse that power. This definitely had the potential to go off the rails. I’ve seen similar situations that ended up being really annoying, since this idea is often executed poorly. Thankfully, Joker just totally denies him and you shut down all of his attempts at abuse. He’s also the first character where you manage to change his heart without actually Changing His Heart (Sae being the other), which was a neat twist from the usual. The story’s all about people who went bad - I think most of the changes of heart imply that the villains used to be decent human beings, and something happened that led to them becoming corrupt over time. With Mishima, we got to see that happen in real time. He would almost have made for a neat party member too, though he might be a little too serious for the rest of the group. On a final note, it’s great that his rank ups have nothing to do with affection points, so you can just be a total asshole to him every time. Calling him out on his bullshit made him so much more entertaining.
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I wish I knew about auto rank ups for him, I may have been less nice to him in some choices
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Mishima was okay until he said kek. It was all downhill from there.
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6. Hanged Man - Iwai
From this point on, every Confidant is both an awesome character and has awesome confidant conversations, which is definitely a perk. I’m not sure how much I can say about Iwai without repeating myself, since his link is basically just uniform excellence. He actually reminds me of Kurosawa from Persona 3, though they’re just about opposites in a few ways. I always thought it would’ve been neat to have a Kurosawa S-Link, and this is the next best thing. The criminal atmosphere of everything goes on in his shop and link makes for a bit of a surreal contrast with the fact that he’s just selling model guns instead of real ones. Anyway, it’s great having a confidant who’s a bit on the criminal side in a game like P5, where the main characters are up to questionably legal activities as well. Doing jobs for him is excellent, and I love that in order to get more points you often have to insult him or pick a negative response rather than flattering him. His actual storyline is interesting as well. His problems with his son never dip into melodramatic territory. Kaoru is pretty much cool with everything that happens, and there’s no major argument between them or whatever. The stuff with him having a little bit of trouble getting out of the Yakuza makes sense too, and helping him through Mementos is extremely satisfying.
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DOnt forget the swag music in Iwais shop

Makes it worth C linking or buying stuff from him alone
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So this makes the top five Sun, Death, Hermit, Hierophant and Temperance in some order?

Your top six matches mine, though I enjoyed Hanged Man a bit more than Temperance.

Futabas so great she gets to star in 2 top 5 C links and be a major party member with the best main story development
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5. Hierophant - Sojiro
Sojiro’s link starts out as just okay, since he’s pretty distant from you at the start. Gradually getting closer to him and getting good at making coffee is okay, but I have no interest in coffee so that part suffers a little bit. It really gets good once you get past the time lock and Futaba gets involved. I love it when social links involve other characters, and this one involves the best of the PCs, which is to its enormous benefit. I actually think it would’ve been nice if more P5 confidants involved other characters, though it’s not very common for that to happen in general…the only ones I can think of that do are Nanako/Dojima and Marie in P4G. Anyway, the family scenes with Futaba are all fantastic. I love learning more about their family and how they got together, and the scenes with the three of them as one big family. Makes it almost regrettable to do the romance with Futaba, but eh. It’s all heartwarming stuff, and even the Mementos mission is neat, since it’s (I think?) the only one that you actually do as part of the link, rather than doing it as a quest later on (not counting Mishima since you don’t actually take his treasure…). It’s also really cool because you do it by talking to Futaba rather than Sojiro, and unique because it’s just the two of you. Having unique events like that really makes a confidant feel special. Winning Sojiro’s favor over time and bringing the family together is one of the best parts of the game, IMO. You kinda do the same thing with Nanako and Dojima, but they’re already a pretty close family. Sojiro and Futaba barely even know each other, so it’s almost more like they’re becoming a family, like in those series where a man adopts a girl or finds his long lost daughter or whatever. Heartwarming confidants are always high tier in Persona games, and this is in the same class as the ones from P3 and P4.
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Reg posted...

So this makes the top five Sun, Death, Hermit, Hierophant and Temperance in some order?

Your top six matches mine, though I enjoyed Hanged Man a bit more than Temperance.

Yeah, that's right. Cool that our top 6 is the same. They're definitely in a tier above the rest.
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Mac Arrowny posted...

do the romance with Futaba

https://19818-presscdn-pagely.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/062/68/aabe4e0fe635e508-e1490304349905.jpg
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Quit datin' middle school kids.
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Futaba finished middle school a year before the story began, bro
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