I’ve already gone over some of the best Servants in Fate/Grand Order, but knowing which Servants to use is only half the battle. Setting up a team of Servants that work well together is crucial, especially for harder content. Outside of some of the tougher event bosses, most fights in Grand Order are easy enough that you don’t need too much in the way of tactics beyond knowing class advantages, but that won’t always be the case. A lot of the later fights that have come out in JP are much harder than anything out right now, and you’ll need a solid strategy to overcome them. That doesn’t necessarily require rare Servants, but it does require being able to build a team with strong synergy. To help with that, I’ll be going over some strong team types and compositions you can build with Servants currently available in NA (including JP would amount to spamming “buster Merlin” over and over). This list is by no means absolute or exhaustive, but hopefully it’ll help you learn what makes a strong team.

Pure Buster Team

Composition: Main attacker+support+secondary attacker/support

A buster team is about as straightforward as they come. The main goal is to just do as much raw damage as possible, which is quite a lot thanks to the 150% damage modifier on buster cards. Buster teams won’t generate a lot of crit stars or NP, but make up for that with consistent damage output. With that in mind, your best bet for a main attacker is usually going to be a buster focused Berserker like Sakata Kintoki, Heracles, or Lu Bu. Kintoki has the most raw damage output, Heracles has the best survivability, and Lu Bu has the lowest cost, so which one you should use will mostly depend on who you have and what your priority is. Berserkers mostly have high attack stats and high damage from their 1.1% class modifier and class advantage against all other classes. Of course, they also take extra damage from all classes, so they’ll need some kind of support to keep them alive long enough to do some real damage. It may seem counterintuitive, but support Casters are best for this role. Waver can buff attack and defense while also charging everyone’s NP, Tamamo can heal and reduce skill cooldowns, Medea Lily can put out a ton of healing, and Hans can buff attack and defense while also doing healing. All of them are viable options for keeping your main damage dealers alive, so you can pick whichever one suits your play style. Looking outside the Casters, you can also use Mash for her defense buffs, or Georgios to draw enemy attacks off your squishier Servants. The third Servant in a buster team should be either another attacker with a bit more survivability than a Berserker, or another support with better damage output than a Caster. Nero Bride is great in this role since she can put out decent damage while also supporting your team with a lot of targetable buffs. If you’re going for more raw attack, another buster attacker like Altera, Karna, Romulus, Saber Alter, or Gilgamesh works just as well. You can use two Casters or two Berserkers instead, but your team might suffer a bit in damage or survivability.

Pure Arts Team

Composition: main attacker+support+Tamamo no Mae

An arts team won’t do as much consistent damage as a typical buster team, but makes up for that by spamming their NPs and outlasting most other teams. Before building one, there’s one thing you’ll need: Tamamo. You can use one from your friend list if you don’t have her (I don’t), but she’s a game changer in arts teams. The big disadvantage on an arts team is a lack of damage compared to a buster team, which is why Tamamo is so important. Fox’s Wedding is a targetable arts buff that lasts for three turns and only has a five turn cooldown at max level. With that active, arts Servants can do as much damage as buster servants, if not more. Her NP also heals and reduces skill cooldowns by one turn, which can be crucial since arts Servants often rely on their skills to be most effective. For your attacker, any offensive arts Servant will work. Eurayle, Medea, Orion, Nero, Nero Bride, and Robin Hood are all well suited for this role, but the absolute best arts attacker is Vlad. Vlad normally does less damage than your average five star Berserker thanks to his arts deck and low attack, but Tamamo makes up for all of that with Fox’s Wedding. At max rank, you can keep it active on him more often than not to raise his damage output beyond most even most buster Servants. Nero Bride is once again your best option for a third slot. Her buffs can make up for Vlad’s low survivability, low attack, and low NP gain, making her essential if you have her. Otherwise, another support like Mash, Jeanne, Hans, or Waver works nearly as well. In case you haven’t figured it out, the ideal arts team is mostly having two supports babysit Vlad, but it can put out a surprising amount of damage. They can be more difficult to use than a buster team thanks to their high reliance on skill usage, but arts teams are no less useful for it.

Pure Quick Team

Composition: star generator+star absorber/generater+star absorber/generator/support

If you’ve been following the JP Grand Order community, you’ve probably heard something about quick teams being dead. While this isn’t completely true, quick teams do struggle with consistent damage compared to others. Quick cards do 80% damage, meaning they do 20% less than arts cards, and 70% less than buster cards. This is a problem, but not an insurmountable one. With enough constant star generation, you can regularly generate enough stars to guarantee crits on all of your command cards, and the huge damage from these crits is enough to balance out the weak base damage on quick cards. Knowing that, you’ll first need a star generator to base your team around. The ideal Servant for this role is Jack. Her high hit counts, three quick cards, and A+ Presence Concealment allow her to generate a huge amount of crit stars for your team, and her single target NP does far more damage than most Assassins. If you don’t have Jack, your next best alternative is Hassan of the Cursed Arm. Hassan doesn’t do nearly as much damage as Jack, but he still generates a ton of crit stars for your team and does a solid job filling her role. Next you’ll need two quick Servants who can generate additional stars and absorb stars to actually do damage. Scathach and Okita Souji are perfect for this role. Both have high damage, quick buffs, star absorption buffs, crit buffs, and single target quick NPs. They also generate a lot of stars on their own, especially Okita. Okita is arguably the best non-Assassin star generator currently in the game, and she can almost fill in for some Assassins while also doing a lot of damage on her own. If you don’t have Okita or Scathach (understandable since both are limited), Anne Bonny and Mary Read are a good alternative. They won’t do as much damage, but they have similar skills and can also generate more stars than most. Lancer Alter is also a great choice for a star absorber, although she won’t generate as many as some of the other options. Alternatively, you can use Caesar, Ushiwakamaru, or Atalante for the same role, although Atalante has extremely low attack for her class and rarity. You could also use Hans or Waver for their buffs, although they’re not as necessary as they are on an arts team.

Buster Crit Team

Composition: main attacker+star generator+secondary attacker/support

Buster crit teams are largely what’s replaced quick teams in JP. The basic idea is to have a buster servant with high star absorption paired with a star generator to feed them crit stars. Thanks to the higher damage modifier on buster cards, these teams do far more damage than quick teams, even when you don’t have a lot of stars. For your main attacker, the best option is Gilgamesh. Gil has one of the highest attack stats in the game, high base star absorption, and a skill to boost his star absorption even further. Feed him crit stars from an Assassin like Jack or Hassan, and his buster cards will do more damage than some weaker NPs. He can also generate more crit stars than his single quick card would imply thanks to his high hit counts. If you don’t have Gil, you can pretty easily replace him with Oda Nobunaga, Brynhildr, Lancer Alter, Francis Drake, or almost any other Rider or Archer. If you don’t mind losing a bit of survivability, you can also use Lancelot. He’s a Berserker, but he has a skill to boost his star absorption and can generate a lot of stars from his NP. The one disadvantage is his abysmal survivability, so you’ll need some kind of support to babysit him. Your third Servant could either be another star absorber to increase damage, or a support Caster to buff your team. Waver and Hans are once again your best bet if you choose to go that route for reasons I’ve already discussed at length. You should also equip at least one Servant on your team with A Fragment of 2030 if you have it, since that guarantees you’ll have at least eight crit stars every turn. Victor of the Moon is also great for its buster and crit buffs.

Stall Team

Composition: tank+support+support

Stall teams may not be as flashy as offense teams, but that doesn’t make them any less effective. The entire point of a stall team is to stay alive through pretty much anything and slowly chip away at the enemy’s health. For that, you’ll need a tank to absorb damage, and two supports to keep the team alive. Right now, your best option for a tank pick is Jeanne. She has the lowest attack out of all five stars and her skills are mostly useless, but she’s incredibly hard to kill. Her Ruler class gives her resistance to every normal class, which can keep her alive for a long time since she also has the highest HP in the game. The self-stun on her NP is pretty bad, but the rest of its buffs make up for that in the right team. She’s able to heal, raise her team’s defense, and make her entire team invincible for one turn. This allows you to absorb even enemy NPs and recover after if you’re low health. The best support picks are your typical Waver, Hans, and/or Tamamo. Hans and Tamamo can both heal, and Tamamo’s arts buff works great with Jeanne’s three arts cards. Waver is Waver, and pretty much automatically makes any team better just by using his skills, so he’s a great pick if you have him. Medea Lily also works quite well as a dedicated healer for Jeanne. I should also note that this team has a total of nine arts cards (not counting NPs) so you’ll be guaranteed at least one arts chain every three turns, and likely two or three. In other words, you’ll be able to spam NPs almost constantly to buff your team and generally keep them alive. If you don’t want to use Jeanne, Mash, Georgios, and Chevalier d’Eon both fill a similar roll. Mash is especially good for buffing her team’s defense and using her taunt to take the heat off of the other supports. Stall teams won’t be doing much in the way of damage, but it’s almost irrelevant. With how long they can survive, their damage will eventually add up and wear down even the strongest bosses.

Free to Play Boss Team

Composition: Mash+Asterios+Hans

This team is a tad more specific than the others, but I still wanted to include this for anyone who’s entirely free to play or has had bad luck with the gacha. The beauty of this team is that it’s made up of Servants that are extremely easy to get, but extremely potent in the right combination. The basic concept is similar to a stall team in that it involves outlasting the enemy, but it’s a tad more complicated than that. The secret to this team is how much synergy it has. Mash has the ability to taunt enemies and absorb attacks, while also giving the team a lot of defense buffs from her first skill and NP. Hans can generate some crit stars and buff attack, but his main role is keeping his team alive with the heal and defense buff from his NP. Asterios is going to be your primary attacker, and he can put out a surprising amount of damage for a one star. His class bonus and first skill are enough to put his attack on par with some three stars, but his real strength is his NP. After his interlude, Asterios’ NP can debuff pretty much any enemy into the ground. It gives a massive penalty to the enemy’s attack and defense for one turn, and a pretty big penalty for six turns. In that much time, you should be able to recharge it and keep the buffs active almost constantly, especially with support from Mash’s second skill and Hans’ three arts cards. Between his debuffs and Mash and Hans’ team buffs, this team can survive even against end game bosses if you use it properly. It might take a while, but these three Servants are great for outlasting bosses. The best part of this team is that it requires absolutely no Saint Quartz to get, so it’s perfect for anyone who goes entirely free to play or hasn’t gotten anything good in the gacha.

Like I said before, this list is far from exhaustive. These aren’t the only team compositions that work, and aren’t even the only possible types. The beauty of Grand Order is that almost every Servant is viable in some way. If you’ve struggled to figure out how to build a good team, hopefully this guide will help you get started.