Persona 5 Royal includes a ton of changes to the base game's various palaces, essentially making them into an entirely new dungeon crawling experience. While Kamoshida's Castle may be a glorified tutorial, for the most part, there are still instances where you'll have to be on your guard to not get wiped out by a Berith or Archangel.
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Gaining Personas in Kamoshida's Castle is quite easy due to the number of tutorials and hand-holding, but there are certainly a few that will give better results than others. Royal's various balance changes have made it easier to use any Persona you like, but here are the 5 best and worst choices for your first Palace romp.
10 BEST: Cait Sith
This puss in boots is a returning character from various Shin Megami Tensei titles, making its first foray into Persona within Royal. Cait Sith can be found in most areas in Kamoshida's Castle and can be obtained starting at level 5.
This persona comes equipped with Cleave, Agi, and Tarukaja, and later learns Resist Sleep, Sukukaja, and Media. All of these skills are quite useful to have in most situations, with Tarukaja, Sukukaja, and Media being the stars of the show. Its stats are fairly decent as well if you're not looking to fuse it, or it can otherwise be fused into useful Personas such as Mokoi or Koropokkuru.
9 AVOID: Mandrake
Mandrake has some of the lowest stats of any Persona available in Kamoshida's Castle and doesn't have any particularly useful skills. The skills that it does have, like Pulinpa or Sukunda, are much better off being passed onto Personas with much better stats and resistances.
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In terms of fusion, it makes just as many good Personas as other far more viable options, so they're best left for EXP or money fodder when you encounter them.
8 BEST: Angel
Angel is one of the higher-level Personas that you'll be encountering during the later areas of the Palace and provides some of the better fusion possibilities during the early game. It comes equipped with Hama, Baisudi, and Dia, making it a useful supporting Persona for Joker to heal with.
It learns Curse Evade and Dekunda later on, which are great to pass onto newer Personas. Angel can be fused into Personas such as Kodama, Succubus, Obariyon, Jack Frost, and Kusi Mitama. Angel's Trait Skill is Chained Technique, which raises damage dealt after a Baton Pass, which will always be a useful option for your team.
7 AVOID: Pixie
During the battle tutorials, you'll receive a free Pixie to teach you the ins-and-outs of negotiation and recruiting. Pixie by herself has a few useful skills like Zio and Dia, but your other party members will quickly learn these and can use them with far better results.
Pixie is encountered quite frequently in random encounters, but you'll never really need to acquire her again after the fusion tutorial where Pixie and Arsene are fused into Agathion. She simply doesn't have the stats or skill list to thrive as well as the other options presented.
6 BEST: Succubus
Due to status ailments being far less useful that attacks or stat buffs in vanilla Persona 5, Succubus was quite underwhelming and mostly forgotten. However, the changes to ailments and technical damage turn Succubus into quite the formidable Persona, and she learns some particularly useful skills as well in the form of Rebellion and Dekaja.
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Succubus has possibly the best fusion pool available in Kamoshida's Castle and is able to be fused into Angel, Saki Mitama, Ame-No-Uzume, Slime, and Jack Frost. Giving her magical attacks is a great choice as well, as her innate 7 magic deals suitable damage, made even better with 8 agility. This is the best Persona to use in the Torn King of Desire miniboss for the third Will Seed.
5 AVOID: Bicorn
Along with Pixie, this is one of the first enemies and recruitable Personas available and quickly becomes outclassed by most other Personas. Its stats are pretty low, so it doesn't really excel in any area except for using Tarunda, which is also available on far better Personas.
Since you'll be obtaining Bicorn very early, it's best to fuse it into something actually useful. It can be fused into some pretty decent Personas, but it's still not going to be the optimal choice due to its lackluster skill set.
4 BEST: Genbu
Genbu is one of the best defensive options around for the early game and can be created from a bunch of different fusions. It comes equipped with Bufu and Rakunda, further boosting its defensive potential, and is one of the few Personas this early on with an elemental nullification.
It cannot be obtained from recruitment, so it is best obtained from fusing Persona pairs such as Slime and Pixie, Bicorn and Silky, or Obariyon and Incubus to maximize its defensive potential or give it more spells to attack with.
3 AVOID: Archangel
This may seem like a weird Persona to avoid, as it's the highest level Persona in the Palace, but it's simply not needed by the time you're ready to fight the boss, even on Merciless difficulty. Archangel cannot be obtained until level 14, and the boss can be easily taken down by level 10 or 11 even on the highest difficulty.
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Archangel is mostly an optional Persona up for grabs if you're wanting to grind to level 14, but you'll likely be around four levels short by the time you reach the end of the Palace, making grinding for those extra levels simply not worth it. Archangel can be easily obtained in the next Palace, so it's far more time-efficient to wait until later.
2 BEST: Slime
The final boss in Kamoshida's Palace uses a ton of physical attacks, and Slime's physical resistance is the best choice for Joker to equip during the boss fight as it makes it miles easier to stay alive. Having physical resistance is great in most situations during gameplay, and Slime has some suitable attacking prowess to go along with it.
Tarunda and Evil Lunge are its two most useful skills, and it can be made even better with some careful fusion choices. It does have two elemental weaknesses in Fire and Wind, however, so be careful when deciding to use Slime in battle.
1 AVOID: Kelpie
Kelpie is the definition of the most average Persona up for grabs in Kamoshida's Castle, as they have an average stat spread, a decent skill list, and an okay Trait Skill. It'll never end up being the worst option in a situation, but it'll also never be the best option either.
If you're in need of a Wind-based Persona or a physical-based one, there are simply much better options to go with, and fusing Kelpie gives some pretty good results.
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