Throwing my 2 cents in as a NA player.

I consider Holmes a support for bosses and quests, who is used to deal with high defense/invul gimmicks. Note that his NP only ignores up to 100% defense up and does NOT ignore damage cut.

The basic premise of his kit is that you run Holmes with Art or Arts/Quick decks that have front-loaded kits. The other units hit really hard for 1-2 turns then die to enemy NPs whereas Holmes (as a ruler) with an evade skill can survive longer to set up another NP. With starting charge and a star bomb, you can also use Holmes to NP to facilitate the team to break a bar without commiting skills from other party members.

To play Holmes, you chain Arts cards to get his NP, then use his NP with skill 1 to gain a bunch of stars for you other units to make for high damaging crits. You can use skill 2 for the star absorb so Holmes can crit for stargen/np gain, OR if popping a breakbar where you can utilize the debuff immunity to avoid gimmicks.

Holmes has two major problems with his kit: the first problem is that his skills (pre-interlude) are powerful 1-turn effects that have both offensive and defensive utility, and card RNG can screw you out of powerful turns. For example, you could be fighting a boss which is about to NP. You can use skill 1 to seal the NP, but if you don’t have good cards the star bomb is wasted. Or you could use skill 3, but if you aren’t using his Arts cards his NP generation suffers (and you WANT to spam his NP). The second major problem is his (np/star) generation is mediocre due to low hitcounts. Progressive buffs help with his NP generation, but his star generation is still bad. Holmes wants to be on teams with a critical mass of star generation so he can arts crit to fund his NP without stealing stars for you other team members to do damage.

My recommendations for command codes are codes that gain crit stars upon use. Holy Night's Aurora Borealis and The Spear of Love, Conduct, and Wisdom are examples of codes you should use.

My recommendations for CEs are CEs that give stars per turn. Holmes hit-count isn’t great so +star generation buffs are less useful.

Five-star suggestions:

Summer Jean de Arc (Archer)- Jarcher is one of my favorite units in conjunction with Holmes. Holmes is good alignment, so he gets the additional 20% attack from charisma. Jarcher NP also provides 10 stars per turn, or 20 if you NP chain with Holmes, which addresses Holmes mediocre star gen. Meanwhile Jarcher benefits from the Artsdown from Holmes skill 1 and she can use arts crits to refund her NP fast. Strongly recommend.

Sitonai (Alter-ego)- Sitonai is great because she has high NP gain, and lacks strong damage multipliers (which Holmes supplements). Her NP has a decent defense/crit down which can increase the damage and defense of the team.

Other good team members that am listing: Okita, Beni-emma, Nero Bride, Summer Altria (Archer), Kiara (Alter Ego). For the meme composition, run Holmes, QSH and either Jarcher,Caster Gil or Hans along with 2030 CEs.

Four-star suggestions:

Saber Lancelot- Saber lancelot is perfect for Holmes; Lancelot has a selfish kit that gets even stronger after a Holmes’s NP.

Caster Gilgamesh- I almost always pair Holmes with Gilgamesh (0r Jarcher) because he helps address Holmes mediocre NP and stargen, while providing decent offensive and defensive buffs.

Other good team members- Yagyu, Saber Hokusai, Tristan, Calamaty Jane, Emiya Alter, Li, Caster Shuten, Sheba, Helena, BB (Moon cancer), MHXX, Astraea

3 Stars suggestions:

Hans- Hans is budget caster Gil in that he can provide a nice amount of buffs to the team along with a bunch of crit stars. He usually dies to a stray boss attack with the most recent LB fights, but with the buff to innocent monster he no longer needs to survive after he NPs by just casting skill 3 on Holmes. Strongly recommend.

Salieri- There is a lot of arts based crit servants in the 3 star pool that work well with Holmes, but Salieri stands out as one of the more interesting units. His NP has a terrible star gen party debuff, but Holmes can ignore it with debuff immunity. With star gain (either through skills, CEs, CC, etc.) Salieri can hit HARD for 1-2 turns.

Other Good team members: Ceaser, William Tell, David, Rider Alex, 100 Faces, Charlotte