Party/Makoto Niijima



This article covers information about Makoto Niijima as a party member, uses and strategies in Persona 5.

Persona 5
Makoto first becomes playable on June 20, the day before officially beginning infiltration on Kaneshiro's Palace. She starts at Level 21. She specializes in Nuclear skills, defense support, and utilizing Technical damage.

Makoto's stats are mostly evenly distributed, only taking away lots of luck in exchange for a bit of Strength, Magic and Agility. However, this is enough to make Makoto the most agile party member available. This makes her more precise with her attacks and makes her very evasive in the process.

Makoto excels in sustainability, most notable through her ability to use Rakukaja and Marakukaja, which can buff defense for 3 turns, whether it's on a single ally or the entire party. Aside from granting safety to the party, it also gives them more room to strategize and use other supporting skills in general. Makoto can also can give herself Rakukaja at the start of the battle when she learns Defense Master. On the other hand, she can negate all debuffs from the opponents with Dekunda. Both can support against fainting in combat. When using defense buffs for the sake of defense, planning ahead is recommended.

Generally, her defensive stance allows for an emphasis on offense, as it reduces the need to heal or protect the party to begin with, letting the party switch to an offensive stance easily. Most importantly, Rakukaja is an effective countermeasure for attackers with Physical skills which rely on HP to use, essentially making them more vulnerable in combat. (For reference, using roughly 28% of the user's remaining HP for attacks while protected with Rakukaja will leave the user with the same defense as having used up no HP while without Rakukaja. This example compares the user's remaining HP, rather than the overall HP they have: in spite of Physical skill costs comparing the user's MAX HP to estimate costs, the actual HP cut becomes much more significant the less remaining HP the user has, and minimizes the defensive effects of Rakukaja. For example, using 28% of the user's HP while they're fully healed cuts the user's defense the same way as using 14% when at half HP.)

Aside from defense, Makoto's also efficient in healing: initially, she's able to restore Medium amounts of HP to an ally, only being able to fully restore the group's HP later on. This healing can help enhance her defensive abilities, which not only makes it easier for her to put her defensive buffs to use even if a party member is low on HP, but also allows her to be efficient back-up support for Physical attackers.

Makoto is strong against Nuclear skills, and is weak against Psy. With her Nuclear skills, she'll be able to perform Technical damage against enemies that have been inflicted with Burn, Freeze or Shock. Makoto has a strong emphasis on subsequently exploiting Technical damage from the after-effects of Fire, Ice and Electric skills, which all have a small chance of inflicting their respective ailment.

Although Makoto herself remains as support, she can adapt to the situation from an offensive perspective as well, especially via her ability to exploit Technicals. Although Makoto needs other party members to be able to fulfill her offensive role, if not busy she is able to rely on secondary abilities from miscellaneous options: Flash Bomb, an offensive multi-target skill that has a minor chance to inflict Dizzy, is a useful substitute to both Freila and Mafreila whenever she cannot rely on Technical damage, and spending time using it may leave the enemy prone to Technical damage from any attack, the entire party may single out the enemy and take them down in one fell swoop.

The skill doesn't take away from dealing much damage either, as not only are Makoto's Strength and Magic stats nearly identical, Flash Bomb, Freila and Mafreila have even attack power. In terms of damage and range, it is only overwhelmed by Mafreidyne, which forces Makoto to emphasize on either damage or a secondary ability.

Otherwise, Makoto may be able to rely on her melee weapons safely as damage isn't badly mitigated, especially if her tools have secondary abilities.

However, despite being generally defensive, her low Luck makes her prone to getting hit by Criticals, status ailments and instant-death skills, as well as being less than likely to serve those in return, which can disable her movement as a supporting party member and even get her to faint. Criticals in particular can overwhelm the effects of Rakukaja, as the enemy will get an additional turn via a One More. As she also cannot do anything should any allies faint, it is recommended to be careful and plan ahead for these risks.

Makoto is especially vulnerable against mental ailments, as this leaves her prone to Technical+Weak damage from Psy skills. Although Makoto can protect other allies from mental ailments with Energy Shower and the successive Technical damage, since those ailments disable her movement, she cannot use it to protect herself.

If the protagonist maxes out Makoto's Confidant, her Persona will transform into Anat, making her resistant to Curse skills, and block out Nuclear skills. She will be able to learn Evade Psy as well, making her more evasive against Psy skills.

Makoto has two separate weapons for her strongest melee weapon. Sabazios is her overall strongest melee option as it has 8 more points in Attack than Vajra and it gives her a +Critical Rate up buff. To create this, an Electric Chair Execution must be performed on Cybele. Vajra requires Asura and has a high chance of inflicting a random ailment on a foe. Her strongest ranged weapon is Judge of the Dead, which is created through an Electric Chair Execution on Michael.

Persona 5 Royal
In Persona 5 Royal, Makoto will know Makajama upon joining: this skill has a high chance of inflicting Forget on one foe and will come in handy against the Bael boss fight, as the Technical Damage induced by status is mandatory for bypassing his bodyguards in order to prevent a daunting drawn-out fight.

Makoto can perform Showtime attacks with Ryuji Sakamoto and Haru Okumura separately. Her Showtime with Ryuji can be unlocked from June 22, while Haru's is on October 30.

Makoto's Persona Trait is Gaia Pact, increasing allies' chance of inflicting Burn, Freeze or Shock by 25%, making it easier for her to perform Technical attacks.

With new abilities to customize guns at Untouchable, all party members may be able to have their guns enhanced to afflict Burn, Shock or Freeze, giving all party members room to support Makoto in afflicting Technical damage. This is especially useful when Makoto's Persona trait is put into consideration. The camos that can be given vary depending on the weapons, but all of Morgana, Goro Akechi and Sumire Yoshizawa's guns are open to all options, opening up for chemistry with other party members as well.

If Makoto's Confidant has been maxed out, starting from January 17th, a special Third Awakening scene will become available, where her Persona will merge into Agnes, granting her the skill Checkmate, which debuffs the attack, defense and agility of all foes for 3 turns. In addition, her Persona Trait will change to Gaia Blessing, making it much more likely for Burn, Freeze and Shock to be inflicted by allies.

Makoto's strongest weapon options remain the same, though the use of the fusion alarm will create the strongest variations. Vajra becomes Unparalleled Vajra with the same effect as before. Gordios is the upgraded version of Sabazios. The difference between the two weapons are only 5 Attack instead with Sabazios having the higher Attack. Judge of Hell's variant is Judge End.

Persona 5 Strikers
Makoto's stats and skills in Persona 5 Strikers are nearly the same as those in Persona 5, meaning she functions in battle the same way as in previous installments.

Makoto & Ryuji
Ryuji's ability to afflict enemies with Shock, with Makoto generally being the key source to exploiting Technical damage on Shock, as she can do so as many times as necessary without having the ailment be passed down to her. This especially applies to Shock, as otherwise, other characters can afflict potentially higher Technical damage on Freeze and Burn without consequences.

After reading Knowing the Heart, Ryuji is able to exploit Technical damage with Electric skills on enemies afflicted by Forget, which Makoto can inflict via Makajama.

In Persona 5 Royal, Makoto can initiate Showtime if she's in battle with Ryuji.

Makoto & Haru
Makoto and Haru both have an adaptive playstyle, with Haru having an emphasis on offense instead.

Haru can help protect Makoto from ailments with Amrita Drop and Amrita Shower, especially against ailments that disable her movements and those that leave her prone to Technical damage, especially against mental ailments.

Makoto is able to inflict Forget via Makajama, which Haru can easily exploit for a Technical with any Psychic skill.

In Persona 5 Royal, if Makoto and Haru are together in the party, they can initiate Showtime.

Makoto, Morgana & Ann
Makoto can team up with Morgana and Ann to both inflict Burn and exploit the Technical outcome that comes out from it. This combination emphasizes on afflicting as many enemies with ailments as possible, due to Ann's high Luck stat, as well as exploit it with multiple party members. The protagonist can also join in should he have his Personas set up with Fire, Wind or Nuclear skills.

In Persona 5 Royal, with Makoto's trait supporting the affliction rate of Fire skills in general, Morgana can be equipped with a Fire skill accessory and teamed up with Makoto to afflict Burn: otherwise, he cannot learn Fire skills and Burn Boost simultaneously. In turn. Ann can also be equipped with a Wind skill accessory, allowing all three to participate in dealing Technical damage while making use of Baton Passes. Makoto cannot increase her own affliction rate, leaving for creative freedom.

Morgana can also have his ranged weapon customized so that it afflicts Burn, which lets him both inflict and exploit. Makoto might also be able to have her revolver customized, but only during Okumura and Shido's Palaces.

Makoto, Morgana & Haru
As the set-up establishes that Makoto cannot rely on Technical damage from the other party members, she might be set to rely on Flash Bomb during battle, which gives the party an opening to single out any afflicted enemy.

In Royal, as Morgana's slingshots can all be customized to either Burn, Shock or Freeze, for this set up it is highly recommended to enhance his weapon to afflict either Burn or Shock. Burn is appropriate for Morgana since he can follow-up with his Wind skills, but in terms of Shock, both Makoto and Haru will be able to exploit Technical damage with their Nuclear and Gun skills. Otherwise, ailments can be stacked with Morgana's Pulinpa and Haru's Tentarafoo, which allow the two to deal with them using Psy, as well as Wind and Gun if Knowing the Heart has been read.


 * Stacking Burn and Confuse will allow Makoto and Morgana to act, so it is recommended to have Haru prioritize Tentarafoo and have Morgana follow up with an all-out Wind attack from Morgana.
 * Stacking Shock and Confuse guarantees Makoto and Haru are on the offensive when Shock's afflicted, so it is recommended for Morgana to continuously rely on Pulinpa to Confuse 1 enemy. This arrangement is recommended for smaller groups of enemies.

Makoto, Ann & Haru
The three girls excel in support, with Ann having an emphasis on sabotaging enemies while Haru serves to protect allies with shields and by curing ailments. Makoto rounds off the trio as the team's healer and providing a defence boost via Marakukaja.

Offensively, Ann and Makoto inflict Sleep & Forget respectively, allowing Haru to exploit Technical damage. Ann is also able to Burn enemies with her Fire skills, granting Makoto an opening to exploit Technical damage.

The only downside is that Ann and Haru alone may have reduced agility in their attacks, although Haru can always cover for Makoto's weakness to ailments, and Makoto can cover up for their reduced agility once she switches to exploiting Technical damage.

Persona 5 / Royal
Note: These are the base stats for Level 99.

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Melee Weapons
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Ranged Weapons
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 * ↳ (P5) - Ranged weapons marked with this symbol are a customization of unmarked weapon above.

Armor
List does not include dirty/sooty armor. Persona 5= Persona 5 Royal=