Should you pull Barbara?

You should pull Barbara if:

• You want a versatile support who generates cards for allies and manipulates their ranks.
• You value someone who has strong Defensive Utility with shields and healing.
• You have a Mental DMG dealing main attacker.
• You have a character that would like to cast a lot of incantations.
• Baaaaaah. OMG SHES SO CUTE IMMA PULL FOR HER (This is the writer’s opinion).

Barbara is a solid addition to any Timekeeper’s roster, especially as a 5-star. Her main appeal lies in generating cards for allies and being able to manipulate their ranks. Additionally, she provides general support by boosting Mental DMG and reducing the damage the team takes.

She is a strong character with a fairly interesting niche, and as a 5-star, she’s not particularly difficult to obtain. However, I wouldn’t consider her a must-pull, as her slot could be better utilized by a stronger survival-focused character or a more specialized utility character, depending on your team’s needs.

Another new addition to the 5-Star survival character list, which already features consistent characters like Balloon Party to keep you alive and Yenisei, who boasts great defensive utility in general. However, Barbara is looking to carve out a different type of niche.

While Barbara still excels in defense by providing shields to allies through her Ultimate and Skill plus Damage Reduction and healing from her passive, all of which are very effective at keeping your team alive. She brings something unique to the table. One of the statuses she can activate is [Visiting Dreams], which limits her moveset to just her Ultimate and special incantations. While in this state, her carried cards are automatically converted to one of your other allies at random, and she gains Moxie every turn for herself.

Not only that, but she also generates [Jumping Sheep], which can modify the ranking of incantations. The way it works is that the rank of the incantation in front of the card increases by 1, while the rank of the one behind decreases by 1. This means it’s not a completely free rank-up, but if you plan carefully which card you want to boost or reduce, it can be highly beneficial.

This makes her pair well with AP-hungry characters, as she won’t be using too many of her own cards, since they will either be converted to allies or enhanced with [Jumping Sheep] to rank them up. Combine this with her ability to increase the damage enemies take from Mental advantage, and she works perfectly with any Mental DMG characters in general. For example, someone like Melania who eats a lot of AP and needs a lot of her own cards to be played.

Pros & Cons

Completely fine at P0.

Nothing significantly important as they are all stat increases. Though increasing the duration at Portray 5 for [Visiting Dreams] is useful. But pulling for Portray 5 is not an easy task even for a 5 Star.

Barbara’s general defensive utility makes her a viable option in most cases where you need a healer or survival character. Since she’s a Spirit Afflatus character, she’s easy to fit into most teams if you simply need a defensive character or someone to provide healing. However, in terms of sheer defensive utility, she falls behind Yenisei, and in raw healing output, she’s outclassed by Balloon Party. Which is why you should try to pair her with someone who can use the Utility she can provide.

She works best in a team that features a Mental DMG character who can be a bit more AP hungry. Melania, mentioned earlier in the review, is a perfect choice, as she benefits greatly from having her Ultimate available as often as possible. Marcus, whose entire focus is dealing huge damage with high ranking incantations, would benefit greatly also in Barbara’s ability to rank up and produce more cards for them.

Top-tier damage dealers like Windsong also pair well with her. You can still use her with characters like Lucy also. Even though Lucy doesn’t benefit from the Mental DMG boost, she doesn’t really need it. She can benefit powerful DPS characters just by giving them more incantations.

Notable synergies include:

Marcus

Melania

Lucy

Windsong

Future notable synergies:

Anjo Nala

Here are the best Psychubes you can use on Barbara:

Beyond Wonderland

The Fighter's Best Wishes

That Inquisitive Dear

Long Night Talk

Beyond Wonderland works great for her, as she scales off health and can apply debuffs that increase her healing rate, all of which synergizes perfectly with her kit. She should be able to utilize every aspect of it.

The Fighter’s Best Wishes ensures that if her health drops below 60-80% (depending on the amplification level), she’ll take reduced damage.

The Inquisitive Dear boosts her healing capabilities and provides another way to heal without needing to activate the [Visiting Dreams] status which requires her ultimate.

Long Night Talk allows her to adopt a more damage-focused/shield-focused approach by increasing her damage dealt and ATK. Her shield scales off of ATK. However, it takes the longest time to set up compared to any of the psychubes mentioned here.

Level 7

Level 9

Level 10

Resonance Pattern Recommendations:

Recommended for using all aspects of Barbara.

This is the best build for an Ultimate/Heal build

A few suggestions are listed below. 3-People teams are highlighted, with the 4th slot added at the side to provide a 4-P variation of the same team or even insights on possible variations of the 3-P team.

Standard Teams

Damn Thief got a Sheep[GLB]

Damage Dealer

Support - Debuffer

Sustain

TEAM EXPLANATION

• 4th slot options: Lopera, Pickles
• A team centered around Melania’s continuously getting her Ultimate to do DMG witth the other supporting her and not using too much AP.
• Melania’s kit requires her to gather Moxie as quickly as possible to continuously use her Ultimate. This means she can be quite AP-greedy and needs teammates who don’t use too much AP.
• Barbara is great because not only does she not use much AP, but she can also produce cards for Melania, allowing her to gain cards even faster. Her Mental DMG increase also directly supports Melania (and in this case, her other teammate Argus), and her general survival/healing can benefit anyone, including Melania.
• Argus is here to simply increase the hell out of Melania’s Ultimate. She’ll apply debuffs that will allow Melania to function great as the team main damage dealer. Argus herself also functions great as the 2nd damage dealer.
• The damage is already quite strong, but if you need any one for a 4th slot you can go with some more buffers. Lopera in this case fits perfectly with Melania as she buffs Ultimate Buff. I didn’t pick her only because I wanted to take advantage of Barbara’s Mental DMG boost since this is a Barbara team page.

Don’t need to be mental[GLB]

Damage Dealer

Support

Sustain

TEAM EXPLANATION

• Barbara’s Mental DMG increase is useful but far from the most important part of her kit. Here’s a team that still utilizes it but not for the main damage dealer.
• Lucy is one of the strongest characters in the game, a fairly simple damage dealer who can be played in most ways. Press buttons, deal damage, and gain Dynamo. Barbara functions well in her role as a shielder and produces more cards for Lucy to do even more damage. Lucy is a Reality DMG character, but she doesn’t really need the Mental Buff.
• Mercuria is a perfect pairing for Lucy, and she also benefits from Barbara’s Mental Buff. She can dispel both negative and positive effects from enemies, gain rank-ups for allies, provide a mass crit rate boost, and increase allies' damage through sheer percentage thanks to Cosmic Energy.
• This team is fairly straightforward. For a fourth member, you can choose from numerous other characters, and they should contribute well. Ezra can help generate Moxie and provide additional survival. Lopera’s buffs can help Lucy, and she can convert excess Crit Rate into Crit DMG, which can be useful. Any one should work and you should just pick as needed.