Stuff like Yukari's Shikigami +, Kanako's Virtue of Wind God, and even Sanae's Night of Bright Guest Stars (thx to lvl 9 skills^^) really start hitting VERY hard once you get into those levels. Indeed, I'd be curious to test Youmu (lvl 9 skills ftw) and Yuyuko (396% Nirvana :-O ) at this point, I wouldn't be surprised if they turned out to be MUCH stronger than we considered them to be.
Getting off the Nitori boat for a minute (altho yeah, half the reason she's OP isn't just the damage- she scores huge durability and speed too OKAY MOVING ON), let's explore that. Yukari might! There was a video of someone using her most of the fight in Winner, recently. It's hard to tell without literally doing it because I don't know what Shikigami + formula upgrades to; that's something to test for sure. And Youmu has a top-class awakening that almost got her in my team, she's definitely really good in endgame. But Yuyuko, Sanae, and Kanako... hmm.
Yuyuko is still the most disappointing of the set. Her poor leveling+library make her magic honestly a little low, and poor library cost makes a big difference in endgame, along with no damage-boosting passives. She does boast awesome DTH for the corridor and irresistable gauge-draining, though, and SFN isn't -disappointing- by any means, it's just not as glorious as you'd hope. And she did, thankfully, get a damage buff in the last patch to help out. Her poor speed becomes less of an issue over time as well, so she's workable, she's just not... ideal? The Youmu synergy is good since Youmu rocks in endgame, though.
Kanako is solid as she always was, and if you charge up her awakening passive she gets a huge damage boost that should make her quite impressive. I don't like "use this specific attack to get stronger" gimmicks, but she gets a potent boost for sure, and after Sky Creation her damage is effectively doubled, with good durability. Pair that with 4 elements, Majesty+, and a team synergy, and you can't really go wrong. Sanae is just "adequate" in terms of high damage, because she gets roughly a 50% damage boost compared to average moves for Guest Stars, and 30% on Moses Miracle if Sorc subbed. It's honestly just average for a good attacker (many attackers can get almost that much boost or more) but considering her support moves and team synergy, that's very respectable. She doesn't want to sub for Heavenly Demise because of it's delay and lower max level. Suwako is sort of included since team, and she's got good potential with her awakening and kinship boosts, and can afford to be tweaked for enough HP/Affinity to swap into tank slot, take one hit, and fullheal on swapout from her passive. Since glass cannons aren't really Plus Disk meta, she's more of a kinship choice- but charging her Awakening damage-doubler with another Boost effect and full kinship does result in very impressive numbers.
cut by Nitori discussion. Yeah, that's what it looks like at that point in the game. She easily gets double the atk of most party members, considering that's Flan. Later, the Attack stat evens out some, but you put on a Regalia and she obtains ENORMOUS durability for still having top-class ATK that surpasses everyone else, whilst also probably being super fast. Attack balances out at the 2000+ point, where it's the doubled affinities and overheat left shining along with Super Scope. I'm kind of concerned for Miko at that point, where her abysmal library will -really- hurt and maintenance is mostly about affinities and base stats. Ah well... she should still be good enough? There's always tomes of reincarnation...
Like, Byakuren can dole out 56% buffs, but Sanae can put out 42% (48% with Enhancer) buffs while also buffing Youkai damage by 39%, SPI damage by 30%, restoring 1-3 MP per turn to the whole frontline, and she packs the strongest ST healing spell card.
Sanae is definitely someone I've considered replacing Byakuren with. She could even upkeep buffs with World Shaking Rule by using her mp refill passive to make Murakumo's MP Drain free, and it's other passives to keep her durability high whilst refilling party power herself... and boasting a heal and great passives over Byakuren. Since I was satisfied with Byakuren I never made the change, though. I don't really care about the attacks because I'm looking at a full-time-support role who wants to upkeep buffs or heal/formswap every single turn. But yes, when it comes to bulky attacker builds, she doesn't really cut it; her attack stats are somewhat poor due to level and library cost, and her self-buffs only offset the lack of damage boost passives, not her poor stats themselves. Sanae pulls that role off much better.
If I was interested in moving in the Moriya team I'd absolutely swap to Sanae. Kanako is very good and Suwako is quirky, but with strong potential application.