Rabbit's Reviews #323: Constantine XI (5* Rider)

Introduction

Man, I really wanted Constantine to be good. Look at that character design! That NP art! Such a waste.

Harking back to Lostbelt 2 and Napoleon, Constantine arrives early as a sort of teaser Servant for LB6.5. The next story chapter is slated for early June, and Constantine is set to be one of the major players in that chapter. For one reason or another, we get him on his own banner, before the chapter drops.

Constantine is a Rider with a non-damaging NP. Whether he’s intended to be a defensive support or a DPS with substantial party utility (in exchange for low damage) is open to debate, but he can at least attempt to operate in either capacity. He has a number of substantial flaws both as a support and as a damage dealer, but his flaws mostly boil down to… low steroids. Constantine’s selfish damage buffs are about on-par with a typical ST Servant, which means, without a damaging NP, his damage falls way, way behind. Similarly, as a support, he brings decent (but not great) defensive value and pairs that with unimpressive damage buffs. He’s marginally better than Jeanne in some cases and substantially worse in others, which does not make him especially appealing as a limited SSR.

Constantine has a weird and unique kit. It’s clear Lasengle tried here, at the very least, but for whatever reason Constantine has been left substantially undertuned. He’s interesting, I suppose, but there’s really no reason to pull for him.

Servant Data

Rider

QAABB (Saber)

Quick Card

Arts Card

Buster Card

4

3

5

-

Attribute	Human
Alignment	Lawful Good

Stage 1
Stage 2
Stage 3
Stage 4

Max HP 13,953

HP Rank

Max ATK 10,923

ATK Rank

Base Atk	1,688	Base HP	2,046
Max Atk	10,923	Max HP	13,953
Grail Atk	11,957	Grail HP	15,286

Riding B+

Increase your Quick Card effectiveness by 9%.

Magic Resistance B+

Increase your Debuff Resist by 18%.

Independent Action C++

Increase your Critical Strength by 7.2%.

Card Hits	4	4	3	5	-
Per Hit	0.52%	0.52%	0.52%	0.52%	0.52%

	NP per Hit (%)						0.52%
	NP when Attacked (%)						3%

	Star Absorption	198
	Star Generation per Hit	8.9%

Overview

Material Requirements

Stage	Cost	Materials
2	100,000	x5 Rider Piece
3	300,000	x12 Rider Piece x22 Proof of Hero
4	1,000,000	x5 Rider Monument x10 Meteor Horseshoe x3 Warhorse's Young Horn
Max	3,000,000	x12 Rider Monument x6 Warhorse's Young Horn x5 Spirit Root

Level	Cost	Materials
1 → 2	200,000	x5 Gem of Rider
2 → 3	400,000	x12 Gem of Rider
3 → 4	1,200,000	x5 Magic Gem of Rider
4 → 5	1,600,000	x12 Magic Gem of Rider x5 Meteor Horseshoe
5 → 6	4,000,000	x5 Secret Gem of Rider x10 Meteor Horseshoe
6 → 7	5,000,000	x12 Secret Gem of Rider x15 Proof of Hero
7 → 8	10,000,000	x29 Proof of Hero x6 Aurora Steel
8 → 9	12,000,000	x18 Aurora Steel x24 Crown of Silvery Light
9 → 10	20,000,000	x1 Crystallized Lore

Level	Cost	Materials
1 → 2	200000	x5 Gem of Rider
2 → 3	400000	x12 Gem of Rider
3 → 4	1200000	x5 Magic Gem of Rider
4 → 5	1600000	x12 Magic Gem of Rider x5 Octuplet Crystals
5 → 6	4000000	x5 Secret Gem of Rider x10 Octuplet Crystals
6 → 7	5000000	x12 Secret Gem of Rider x10 Great Knight Medal
7 → 8	10000000	x20 Great Knight Medal x6 Divine Leyline Spiritron
8 → 9	12000000	x18 Divine Leyline Spiritron x24 Vision Scales
9 → 10	20000000	x1 Crystallized Lore

Servant Skills

Constantine’s skillset is decidedly unremarkable. On a DPS, it would be okay, but on a non-damaging Servant, it’s a bit rough. Recommended skill order is 3>2>1.

NP Gain Up

Hagia Sophia's Prayer C-

Increase own NP Gain (1 turn).
Apply Target Focus to self (1 turn).
Gain Critical Stars.

Show Info

Lvl	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
NP Gain +	30%	32%	34%	36%	38%	40%	42%	44%	46%	50%
Stars +	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	20
CD	8	8	8	8	8	7	7	7	7	6

Prayer is a bit of a disappointing skill. It’s a one-turn taunt and a one-turn NP gain buff. Taunts are nice in general, but this one has a few problems. For one, Constantine isn’t fragile enough to reliably die with a single turn of taunt, which limits this skill’s usefulness for support cycling. For another, Constantine’s only other defensive tool is his NP… which is partywide anyway, so taunting on an NP turn somewhat wastes the conflicting defensive tools. It’s a weird pairing, as Constantine either doesn’t need the party defense on his NP, or has no way to mitigate incoming damage while he’s taunting. The NP gain effect, meanwhile, is also a bit underwhelming. Especially on a Buster Servant, 50% NP gain up effects typically last 3 turns, not 1. This skill also begs the comparison to Leonidas’s taunt, Rear Guard’s Pride, which also pairs a taunt with an NP gain buff… but which gives 100% NP gain up for 3 turns, instead of 50% for 1. And that’s also on a Servant who uses the taunt better. In exchange, this skill does provide a burst of 20 critical stars, which can be nice for securing crits, at least.

Dmg Up

Empire's Decline EX

Increase ATK for all allies (3 turns).
Increase Buster Card effectiveness for all allies (3 turns).
Increase Critical Strength for [Roman] allies (3 turns).

Show Info

Lvl	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
ATK +	10%	11%	12%	13%	14%	15%	16%	17%	18%	20%
Buster +	10%	11%	12%	13%	14%	15%	16%	17%	18%	20%
Crit Dmg (Roman) +	20%	21%	22%	23%	24%	25%	26%	27%	28%	30%
CD	8	8	8	8	8	7	7	7	7	6

Empire in Decline is Constantine’s primary damage buff, granting small attack and Buster buffs to the party, as well as a weak crit damage buff to all Roman allies (including Constantine himself). As part of a larger offensive or supportive skillset, this could be solid. On its own, though, it’s a pretty weak support tool. Even for Romans it’s not enough damage to make Constantine a particularly appealing support. To add insult to injury, it even has a longer cooldown than a standard Charisma. There’s not a lot to like here.

Start Np

Demise Privilege C

Increase own NP Gauge.
Increase own Critical Strength (3 turns).
Gain Critical Stars each turn (3 turns).
Apply Delayed On-Death Buff (3 turns).
- On-Death effect: Increase rightmost ally's NP gauge.
- On-Death effect: Increase rightmost ally's Critical Strength (3 turns).
- On-Death effect: Grant rightmost ally [gain Critical Stars each turn] effect (3 turns).

Show Info

Lvl	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
NP +	20%	21%	22%	23%	24%	25%	26%	27%	28%	30%
Crit Damage +	20%	21%	22%	23%	24%	25%	26%	27%	28%	30%
Stars per turn +	5	6	6	7	7	8	8	9	9	10
NP (On Death) +	20%	21%	22%	23%	24%	25%	26%	27%	28%	30%
Crit Damage (On Death) +	20%	21%	22%	23%	24%	25%	26%	27%	28%	30%
Stars per turn (On Death) +	5	6	6	7	7	8	8	9	9	10
CD	8	8	8	8	8	7	7	7	7	6

Dying Privilege is a decent general performance buff, giving Constantine a 30% battery, a small crit damage buff, and stars per turn. 67% total crit up for 3 turns would be pretty nice on a Servant who already has good NP damage output, but without a damaging NP this is just not sufficient. Batteries are always nice, though. When Constantine dies, this skill also grants the same benefits to the rightmost active party member, which is… fine, I guess. Still has the issue of 30% crit up not being a lot, and then you also have to consider the fact that Constantine’s general bulk makes it difficult to use this as a sacrifice skill, but this skill does enough even without that added bonus to be at least decent.

Noble Phantasm

Theodosius Kōnstantînos B+

Increase own Buster Card effectiveness (3 turns).
Apply Invincible to self (1 time, 1 turn).
Apply Damage Cut by 5,000 to all [Roman] allies (1 turn).

<Overcharge>

Increase DEF for all allies (1 turn).

Show Info/Video

Theodosius Kōnstantînos

Vow of the Threefold Walls

	Rank	Classification	Hit-Count
	B+	Anti-Army (Self)

Effect	Increase own Buster Card effectiveness (3 turns). Apply Invincible to self (1 time, 1 turn). Apply Damage Cut by 5,000 to all [Roman] allies (1 turn).

Level	1	2	3	4	5
Buster +	30%	40%	45%	47.5%	50%
Invincible
Damage Taken -	5000	5000	5000	5000	5000

Overcharge Effect	Increase DEF for all allies (1 turn).

Charge	100%	200%	300%	400%	500%
Defense +	100%	125%	150%	175%	200%

Theodosius Kōnstantînos (Upgrade 1) B++

Upgrades after Interlude 1. (Not available, ETA 5/2026)

Increase own Buster Card effectiveness (3 turns).
Apply Invincible to all allies (1 time, 3 turns).
Apply Damage Cut by 5,000 to all [Roman] allies (1 turn).

<Overcharge>

Increase DEF for all allies (1 turn).
Increase NP Strength for all allies except self (3 turns).

Show Info/Video

Theodosius Kōnstantînos (Upgrade 1)

Vow of the Threefold Walls

	Rank	Classification	Hit-Count
	B++	Anti-Army (Self)

Effect	Increase own Buster Card effectiveness (3 turns). Apply Invincible to all allies (1 time, 3 turns). Apply Damage Cut by 5,000 to all [Roman] allies (1 turn).

Level	1	2	3	4	5
Buster +	30%	40%	45%	47.5%	50%
Invincible
Damage Taken -	5000	5000	5000	5000	5000

Overcharge Effect	Increase DEF for all allies (1 turn). Increase NP Strength for all allies except self (3 turns).

Charge	100%	200%	300%	400%	500%
Defense +	100%	125%	150%	175%	200%
NP Damage +	20%	25%	30%	35%	40%

Theodosius Constantinus is more or less a worse version of Jeanne’s NP. Instead of granting invuln to the whole party, it grants 100% defense up (scaling with overcharge). This is itself a fairly even trade: defense-ignoring NPs are about as common as invuln-piercing NPs, but ignore defense is a lot less common than pierce invuln on skills or in CQ gimmicks. That said, defense buffs stack additively with attack up and defense down, so any form of either quickly makes this much less complete and much less reliable: at 100% defense up, you’re negating all incoming damage, but if you reduce that by even 20% you’re suddenly back within range of dying to an NP or a particularly brutal crit.

The other effects are where this really starts to look worse than Jeanne’s NP, though. The NP gives a 30% Buster buff, but it’s selfish, meaning on a supportive Constantine it has basically no value. An offensive Constantine, too, benefits relatively little from it, as Constantine mostly wants to prioritize Arts cards over Busters for the NP gain. Without an offensive NP, Constantine will usually only get two Busters every three turns, which—coupled with wanting NP gain—limits Constantine’s ability to get use out of this. 30% Buster up is also pretty underwhelming when compared to the likes of Super Orion and QSH. The NP also gives Constantine a single hit of Invuln, and all Roman teammates (which in most cases will just be Constantine himself) a 5000 HP damage cut. The damage cut is a little baffling, as the defense up should be negating all your incoming damage anyway, and if it’s not, you probably don’t want to be running Constantine. If the invuln and the damage cut could last beyond a single turn, they’d have more value, but as is they’re confusing and matter very little.

Overall, this NP just looks really bad compared to other defensive NPs. Jeanne and Castoria both remove debuffs. Castoria and Skadi increase party attack. Jeanne provides a persistent defense buff and some healing. QSH skyrockets their own damage while also protecting the team. Constantine, meanwhile, protects the team for a single turn, sometimes. The only lasting value is a small, selfish damage buff on a Servant with low damage output. It’s not great.

Usage Tips

Broadly speaking, there are two primary ways to use Constantine: as a DPS, and as a support. Let’s look at DPS comps first:

DPS Constantine wants to leverage Buster Crits for damage while keeping the team safe. Without a damaging NP or particularly impressive steroids, his teams will move slowly. The natural inclination here is to look to Castoria—specifically, to the Himiko/Castoria or Reines/Castoria shells—for Buster stall. It’s true, too, that that would probably be the most reliable team Constantine can run… but in that team, Constantine’s defensive tools provide literally zero value. Solemn Defense completely obviates the need for defense up, and at that point you might as well bring someone who can actually hit things as your DPS.

So let’s assume we’re not using Castoria. Maybe we just want some diversity, or maybe we aren’t allowed to bring her for some reason. Maybe we have none of Castoria, Reines, and Himiko natively and don’t want to risk running Castoria stall without the extra overcharge boosts. In this case, we look to the Servant who is probably Constantine’s actual best partner: Merlin.

Constantine and Merlin pair quite nicely, Constantine wants a steady supply of meter to fuel his NP, and Merlin can provide that. Merlin also has invulns to cover key turns where Constantine’s NP isn’t ready, and Merlin brings healing to offset chip damage. Furthermore, Constantine will be very bursty, prioritizing Arts cards until a turn where he can safely burst, and then using NPBB or BAB to crit for decent damage. Hero Creation is perfect for these turns, and it also offsets Constantine not having remarkable steroids. A classic Merlin/Constantine/Merlin setup will be generally stable and, while likely slower than a similar QSH team, not as painfully slow as some of Constantine’s other setups. If doubles aren’t allowed, you can also swap a Merlin for a Reines without losing much, especially with Reines’s recent NP buff in play.

Support Constantine is probably weaker but is at least a bit more interesting. Every piece of Constantine’s kit is supportive in some capacity. Skill 1 protects the team, skill 2 increases damage, skill 3 provides a mix of benefits, and the NP goes without saying. Party protection capable of negating an NP is fairly rare, so pairing that with some other benefits should be great, right?

Well, it’s not that simple, and the reasons why mostly boil down to uniqueness and numbers.

For the first point: there’s not really anything Constantine does defensively that’s better than stall Castoria, and from a reliability standpoint, his NP is a sidegrade—if not a downgrade—of Jeanne’s. There are cases where an enemy will have pierce invuln and not pierce defense, but as long as Solemn Defense is not pierceable, Constantine’s NP will always be substantially less reliable than Round of Avalon. This would be somewhat forgivable if Constantine did something else unique to make up for it… but he doesn’t. Jeanne brings utility Constantine doesn’t, in the form of debuff cleanse, healing, and so on, while Castoria brings damage buffs and NP charges. There are clear cases where Jeanne or Castoria will work and Constantine will not, while the reverse is much harder to produce.

For the second point: in order to be a meaningfully useful support, you usually need good NP charge tools and good damage buffs. Constantine has weak damage buffs, and no NP charge tools aside from his on-death buff. You can make up for that with unique utility (see Sherlock for an example), but, as we’ve already established, Constantine doesn’t have that.

So without good damage buffs, good unique utility, or good NP charge abilities, what do we do with a support Constantine?

Regardless of his other failings, Constantine is a rare Servant who can protect a team from NPs. His biggest value will be to players who don’t have other options or who don’t want to run them for whatever reason. In these cases, we want to pair Constantine with a DPS who is as self-sufficient as possible and with a support who can afford to play slower. Again this points toward Merlin, for the healing and NP charges, though Jinako is also a decent option for her star gen and tanking.

The more your DPS can facilitate damage and NP charging on their own, the better off they’ll be. Quirinus is a particularly good pick here, as he benefits from Constantine’s full buff suite and can also scale his damage nicely through crits. Generic powerhouse Buster Servants such as Arjuna Alter and both of the good Nobus will work as well. Outside of that, look for Buster servants with strong in-kit damage who are comfortable playing a bit slower and taking periodic huge burst turns rather than killing everything asap.

DPS Constantine needs as much firepower as he can get. I’d suggest giving him your best card damage CE available. Golden Sumo is a good option if you have it at level 100. Standard staples like Limited/Zero Over and Victor of the Moon are also good. Support Constantine, meanwhile, probably wants either a starting NP CE (for immediate access to his NP in an emergency) or 2030 (for extra star gen). His Rightful Place splits the difference and is not a bad option. It’s also worth considering CEs that provide longer-term NP gain benefits, like Divine Banquet and Prisma Cosmos.

Constantine wants more card damage. Give him your best damage-boosting CCs and he’ll be a happy emperor. It’s that simple.

Grail Potential

Conclusion

I really wish Constantine was good, but he’s just not. His damage buffs are tuned for an offensive NP, which means as a DPS his damage output is sad. Similarly, too much of his kit is selfish for him to keep up as a support, and even if you really commit to it, his lack of real differentiating factors will keep him from feeling cool and distinct in that supportive role.

At the end of the day, everything he does can be done better by someone else, and those someones are pretty common. Castoria being so dominant means a lot of people have her, so at the very least she’s easy to snag off a friend list. Jeanne has been spookable since the game started. Leo and George are both free and are generally better tanks. There are a handful of free Servants who are much better at pushing damage. There’s just not a lot of call for Constantine, and without a substantial buff he’s likely stuck in the realm of being one of the worst SSRs to-date.

Rabbit's Arbitrary Ratings

Overall: 4/10
Single-Target DPS: 2/10
AoE DPS: N/A
Survivability: 7/10
Offensive Utility: 5/10
Defensive Utility: 7/10
Farming Usefulness: 1/10
NP Production Values: 10/10