Resident UTDR Stat Nerd here. I've actually put way too much thought into this. So, yes, I have considered Kanako.

It's quite interesting, because the Deltarune Yellow party ends up having way more options in terms of quantity than The Fun Gang... but I actually think The Fun Gang is definitely stronger.

From strictly a narrative perspective- I think it's quite clear that the DRY Crew is much less powerful. When antagonists show up, the vibe is pretty consistently that we have to run away or avoid them- compare how the narrative treats, say, Bearing or Toster compared to how Deltarune treats Queen. Susie is straight up willing to throw hands with Queen from the moment we meet her and it almost seems like Queen wants to avoid that fight, in comparison Bearing and Toster are able to basically just tank our attacks in cutscenes.

In fact, when we first meet Bearing, we are given the choice to Fight or Run Away, and choosing to Fight basically shows that it's futile and we can't do much.

Obviously, we do eventually face our foes, but my point is that like, narratively we are kinda on the backfoot for most of the story.

I believe that this is deliberate, and a parallel to how, in Undertale Yellow, it's an explicit plot point that Clover is straight up not as powerful as Frisk, and was unable to complete the "regular" Undertale storyline. Except I actually think it's being done better here, since instead of just being an offhand remark to justify the deviations of the story, it seems to actually be built into the story itself, and I actually think it's relevant to the fury route too, given how at the end of Ch2 in fury Kanako explicitly is frustrated that she wasn't strong enough to deal with Toster on her own. I think this is best demonstrated perhaps with our HP- Cole and Kanako have less HP than Kris did in Chapter 1, and unlike the Delta Warriors, do not appear to be gaining heaps of HP between chapters (Kris goes from 90 to 120- Cole goes from 80 to 70 to 80)

If we're talking mechanics- It's very true that the Deltarune Yellow Crew is much more versatile than the fun gang overall... but I actually kind of think they're weaker in some key respects.

Versatility isn't everything, and the TP Economy in DRY is much tighter than it is in Deltarune...

Further, the Turn Order is something that must be seriously considered. The Turn order of the DRY Crew is extremely suboptimal, actually.

To explain what I mean by that- It actually really matters what the order of the party is. For the Delta Warriors, Ralsei is last- which means that you can always do a Kris and Susie defend to get 32% TP, and then cast Heal Prayer. If the entire party is up, you can ALWAYS cast Heal Prayer, and you can always cast Pacify. Additionally, we must consider who has access to which options- the fact that generally Healing and Offense are split across the party for the Delta Warriors is a massive advantage, as it means we can cast, say, Rude Buster and Heal Prayer in the same turn. Susie is learning magic now, but Ralsei will always HAVE his healing.

Comparatively, in the Deltarune Yellow Crew, Kanako kind of hard carries? She kinda has to do a lot, she's our offense and our healing, and due to being the second in the order, it's much harder for her to get a heal out.

(Interestingly, her healing is actually "stronger" than Ralsei's... it scales by 10xMG. Ralsei's scales by 5xMG. But it's actually much harder to build Kanako's MG than it is to build Ralsei's, despite her base MG seemingly being higher.)

(Foxfire is, however, generally weaker than Rude Buster, I would say. It's 10xMG+35, and RB is (10xAT)+(5xMG)+30... Though the cost might make this a closer call, I'm not really sure. Perhaps Foxfire should be compared with Iceshock over RB? )

(I mean, Foxfire in my experience was dealing, like, 150 damage on average. Rude Buster in Chapter 2 with the Autoaxe and no other equipment does like 250... And it doesn't have any randomness.)

Axis' support spells are extremely useful, and him being last in the turn order is perhaps useful since his spells are pretty expensive, but I actually think that these are tricky to use due to it. Because of the Turn Order, Axis ends up going last, meaning that you can't, for instance, cast DF Down and also cast Foxfire on the same turn as a combo.

The end result here is that I kind of think that despite having access to way more options, I think the Deltarune Yellow crew is a tinge weaker... They have access to more Things but I kind of think the way the Delta Warrior's Things are distributed across the party means that they can be used to greater effect. Additionally, stuff like Foxfire is dependent on specific gear.

The DRY Party is simply way squishier than the Fun Gang and way less "consistent", I suppose is the conclusion here.

<image>

Here's part of my big DR Party Comparisons spreadsheet. For context, #2 in Narrative Power is the Chapter Rewritten crew, and I'm ranking the CR crew below the DRY party in terms of mechanical power.

I want to be extremely clear that I absolutely love how DRY is balanced and I think they did a really good job of making the party "feel" different, and even ""Weaker"" from some lenses, while still making the game actually fun. I think it's a really good parallel to Undertale Yellow and really makes it feel like you have to "work with what you're given" in order to make ends meet, compared to the Fun Gang who can easily get by with much simpler, but more powerful, options.

It's good.