In the single-player RPG Expedition 33, there is an ability that instantly kills all final bosses. The developers are now intervening and taking this option away from you.
In Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, you can really let loose and experiment a lot. There are nearly endless possibilities to customize your hero team through Pictos, abilities, and combos. However, one attack was so overpowering that even the secret super-final boss of the game could be defeated 45 times with just one attack. Too strong, according to the developers – and they are now intervening.
Spoiler Alert: There are minor spoilers about Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 and the game’s endgame.
What a combo was that? Towards the end of the game, there is a combo with Maelle that is so powerful that essentially every enemy dies immediately without being able to act even once. The combo relied on the following tricks:
- Medalum: With this weapon, you start in Virtuoso stance, which deals 200% more damage.
- Last Stand: This ability reduces your HP to 1 but returns you to Virtuoso stance and restores your AP.
- Painted Power: You can deal more than 9,999 damage.
- Cheater: You always play twice in a row.
- Shortcut: If your character drops below 30% HP, they can play again immediately.
- At Death’s Door: If you have less than 10% HP, your damage is increased by 50%.
- Burn Affinity: You deal 25% more damage against burning targets.
- Confident Fighter: You deal 30% more damage but cannot be healed.
- Inverted Affinity: You inflict „Inverted“ on yourself at the start of the fight, but you deal 50% more damage as long as you are under the debuff.
- Tainted: Each debuff on you increases the damage dealt by 15%.
This is just part of the Pictos. There are others that further increase damage or boost critical hit chances. You can also incorporate Sciel into the combo, which doubles the damage dealt with a skill.
With all these buffs, you now use Stendhal, then Last Stand, and then in the third turn use Stendhal again for an absolutely devastating attack.
How strong was that? If the combo was executed correctly and all preparations were made properly, a single attack could deal a whopping 2,000,000,000 damage.
Just for comparison: The very last, secret super-final boss of the game has approximately 45,000,000 HP. This means a single Stendhal could have defeated this boss almost 45 times. That was too much even for the developers, as they are now intervening.
What are the developers changing? There will be a clear nerf for Stendhal. The damage will likely be reduced. On X, the developers write:
We did not plan to make balance changes so early, only bug fixes, unless something stood out significantly.
Well, Stendhal did it.
It was too weak for most of development, so we gave the ability a big boost in our last balance update before the release, and apparently, we overdid it. It now overshadows almost all other options.
After the change, [Stendhal] will still be a strong single-target skill with great synergy potential … just a bit closer to everything else.
When is the nerf coming? According to the developers, a small patch should be released tomorrow, on May 9, 2025. If you want to take advantage of the Stendhal super combo until then, now is your last chance.
However, anyone who is not that far along should not worry. There are still many other ways to be quite overpowering in Expedition 33, as the developers also say:
We still want you to be able to destroy the game – and you can still do that – but Stendhal made it a bit too easy.
Figuring out these methods and combinations is part of the appeal of Clair Obscur, and the developers do not want to change that – just to tone down a slightly too easy combo. If you still need a few good builds and suggestions, we have presented you with 2 strong builds for Maelle here.
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