Touhou 19: Unfinished Dream of All Living Ghost/Reimu Hakurei

Reimu is seen as the strongest shottype for story mode, arguably tied with Chiyari. After reading what her level 1 and her level 2 (Skill) charges do, one may realize why.

Shottype, Scope and Bomb:

Reimu's shottype is the usual needles + amulets combination. However, in this game, needles are as if you are using Touhou 18 Reimu at 2 power, and her amulets do not have high firerate. Although the amulets are not very strong, the needles have great damage.

Her scope is a small circle around her, and her bomb follows her around. The bomb is not amazing in terms of damage, but it is also not bad. The scope, while not very big, is decent at catching spirits for high hit counts, or in other words, chains. It is not great for defensive play, but she has another tool for that, and it is extremely powerful.

Level 1 Charge:

Spawns 4 piercing amulets that stop in front of her for about a second, then accelerate. What makes this charge so powerful is that the amulets deal good damage, and they still deal damage when they stop. This means the player can put the amulets on the bosses, shreding their healthbar.

Level 2 (Skill) Charge:

As if level 1 charge wasn't already good at dealing with the bosses, her skill, level 2 charge, spawns the level 1 amulets and 3 Fantasy Seal orbs. These orbs rotate around the player, cancel most (but not all) bullets, and deal a lot of damage. One level 2 charge placed next to a boss is enough to kill a nonspell and severely damage the spell. In short, this charge decimates bosses when used next to them, while cancelling bullets, granting the player an easy way out of most situations. However, you do not get any iframes, so the player still needs to keep uncancellable bullets or anything getting through in mind, although this is hardly an issue.

Level 3 (Extra Attack) Charge:

Reimu sends big yin-yangs to the opponent that curve, bounce, and are uncancellable for a few seconds. This is a deadly pattern for the AI, as the big yin-yangs cover a lot of space, and the AI tends to get cornered very often. This extra attack can be used to efficiently kill the AI, although this is pretty much unnecessary in story mode, due to her level 2 charge.

Level 4 (Boss) Charge:

Her nonspell spawns amulets in the style of her Hundredth Black Market nonspell, but in this game, the amulets directly aim at you, instead of aiming at you in a scattered way. It is a pretty easy pattern to deal with since it is pretty easy to stream, and it is a very milkable pattern.

Her spell spawns yin-yangs and pellets that have gravitational effect and bounce from the edges, except from the bottom of the screen. At higher boss levels, this spell can get pretty chaotic. For story mode, this charge has next to no uses, other than to advance the stage. However, a level 3 charge should be used for this purpose.

Story Mode Route:

Aunn Komano: Your level 2 charges will decimate the bosses while keeping you safe. Aunn's regular and extra attacks are uncancellable, but they are not dense, so they are easily dodgeable. Moreover, the regular attacks are aimed, so you can stream them.

Nazrin: Your level 2 charges will decimate the bosses while keeping you safe. Nazrin's blue pendulums can spawn on you if you are too high on the screen, but this is not a big issue. Neither yellow nor blue pendulums are cancellable.

Marisa Kirisame: Your level 2 charges will decimate the bosses, but make sure you are reading the lasers. If you are not low enough on the screen, the level 2 charge will not cancel the lasers. For the cancel to happen, the Fantasy Seal orbs need to hit the laser spawnpoints. Another important note is that this does NOT despawn the laser, so if the laser is still active after your level 2 charge is over, it might snipe you. An easy way to counter this is spamming two to three level 2 charges near the bottom.

Suika Ibuki: Your level 2 charges will decimate the bosses and mini Suikas while keeping you safe. The boss dies even faster since the spell has much less health compared to other characters' spells.

Hisami Yomotsu: Your level 2 charges will decimate the bosses while keeping you safe. Try not to stay too high on the screen, as the curvy lasers might spawn on you.

Zanmu Nippaku: Your level 2 charges will decimate the bosses. The spears are uncancellable, so you still have to dodge them. However, since every pattern will die very quickly with level 2 spam, the final two spells end up being not a problem at all. If for some reason the player fails to kill the first unique spell, "Insentient Pure Spirit Shot", they can still spam level 2 near the bottom to cancel the bullets. Watch out for any spears coming from the top while using level 2 charges on the final spell, "Kingdom of Lost Sheep".