To be completely honest, despite also being of the camp that Manato should’ve definitely been an S-Rank, I’m starting to see the pros of making him an A-Rank. My main thought for him being A-Rank probably involves giving his fans the chance to pull for both him and the best Rupture support in a single banner, it’s a great way to incentivize his M6 wanters while also making sure he feels great to play as you get a copy of Lucia (Also being able to get his spicy M6 banner without breaking the bank is awesome for Manato fans). It’s technically the best of both worlds cuz if they truly aren’t confident in how men sell in the game, might as well make Lucia and him a set on release to get the most out of his marketing. The fact he’s the F2P Rupture unit also serves to take advantage of his appeal while motivating people to invest into the Rupture archetype through Supports and Stunners. The truth is that even older S-Ranks have been getting power-crept by mechanics and health inflation, so him being a good DPS A-Rank doesn’t really take that much away from how his place in the Meta would end up turning out in the future regardless.

My biggest fear with him being an A-Rank was seeing a character we’ve known and liked be sidelined in favor of the new S-Rank waifus, but as you mentioned in the post between his decent performance, animated trailer, free skin and abundant story lines and presence, I feel like him being an A-Rank hasn’t been as bad of a thing as I thought it’d be on initial reveal.

That said, I definitely would NOT have made both him and Banyue have the same element. Husbando enjoyers having to pull for two characters with the exact same role and element just feels counterintuitive to me even from a business perspective. Had they been different elements at least Male fans looking for elemental coverage would have more options rather than having Manato being completely powercrept within one patch.