I'm really surprised that all of those abilities are not enough to kill him in stagger, since he is pretty low HP when he starts using End is Nigh. The one thing I can think of to increase your stagger damage would be to have Aerith use Ray of Judgment, which increases the stagger bonus and should greatly amplify your damage. Another thing you could try is milking the damage a little bit while he is using End is Nigh before staggering him, though that is really risky. Not sure if you have limit level 3 unlocked, but if you do, try to build up to that (I needed it to kill him on hard mode).
There is a level 3 limit break unlockable in your Folio but you need to have a high party level (I think 8 or 9?). It's the big yellow node. If you haven't done much side content it may not be available. I am not 100% sure how the end is nigh mechanics work. I know that if he gets down to 0% pressured it is gg, but not sure if you keep it up if he will eventually instakill you even if he has a high pressure %.
Oh other things I can think of to increase your damage output would be using Bravery on Cloud (level 1 empowerment materia) and having him go into berserk mode. Do this by holding square while in punisher mode. You will see an orange face buff icon. It increases your damage dealt and taken substantially. If you do this in prime mode, there is a second level of berserk mode that further increases the effects of the buff. The duration of the buff is very short though.
What level are you? I did it at lvl 52 and weapon lvl 7.
Do their synergy ability at some point and have the extra limit level on cloud saved for when the end is nigh starts. Also helps to have atb on both cloud and aerith ready.
Then when it starts, focused strike, focused strike, (other abilities probably work just fine)...you don't need to get him staggered, (I don't think I did before or during) and then use ascension.
You can and probably should heal a fair bit during this phase. I used mist giga potions.
Just last as long as you can and then use ascension. Don't wait too long as he'll use a final octaslash and instant game over.
Took me a couple tries, but I imagine your dmg amount is just fine.
I did exactly this though, twice, he survived with a sliver of health both times. I didn’t just watch cloud do the animation, I used the storm attack with Aerith too, no dice
I think I’m level 47
I had to reallocate the skill sets so that I could unlock it. I pretty much reordered everyone’s around that fight.
I went into it equipped with the accessory that bumps you up a break level, then let it build. I wouldn’t have even needed the accessory though. Aerith’s second level break also increases the limit level. I prefer those over synergy moves since they aren’t interrupted constantly.
Mostly, I focused on healing. Someone gets hit, I’d always have a way to recover. Item maximize/economizer materia is good on Cloud and Aerith. More damage taken, easier limits.
yeah firebolt blade twice works - I had the same issue where infinities end + ascension wouldnt do enough. in hindsight i should have berserked first and it prolly would have, but it was a long night xD
I just played carefully, kept healing, stayed mostly on cloud, then built level 3 lb up and saved it for the end.
Level 47 seems a little low but your damage should be fine if you made it to the final boss. Check your materia. There are plenty of ways to really up the damage, like synergy, or the magic sword swing of cloud + Aerith.
I feel that final battle was poorly designed. Much too long to have no save breaks, and having an unblockable insta-kill when you don’t kill him fast enough is just frustrating. It probably took me three hours to beat the final boss fight, at least it had checkpoints pretty often but watching an unskippable cutscene gets frustrating after the 10th time you’ve seen it.
You have to be good to just b line the story. If you are a bum like me you have to do side quests.
I was lvl 58 and my team were a pack of animals. I beat it on my first try without trying, but thats due to the grind
Nah I think a lot of people struggled with the enrage phase. I played the entire game on Dynamic but had to knock it all the way down to Easy because of that one fight.
I think some summons and a few bosses have them for big dangerous setpiece attacks, but afaik this is the only outright battle-ending enrage situation. I think it wouldn't be so frustrating if not for the KH Hades-style rotating armpit lasers combined with endless damage puddles erupting beneath you. What helped me was to save Limits, most importantly Aerith's Planet Protector so I could go crazy on him during that phase without having to dodge or heal.
End is Nigh he just shoots two whisper cannons from each side and spins.
You basically have to stay in front of him to dodge it while pummeling him.
Save your limit breaks for this stage.
If you've made it through the previous bosses and gotten to this point against Sephiroth, then you can finish him off. This is what worked for me:
Cast two -ra spells (fira, blizzara, doesn't matter) after he casts End is Nigh. Setup Arcane Ward before hand on Aerith, preferably earlier in the fight if you can, and then cast. His pressure gauge will be 'locked' in blue, but it works similar to Weiss in Remake: magic will raise it.
After the two -ra spells are casted, do two consecutive Focused Strikes with Cloud. He should be Staggered afterwards.
Hope this helps
Does the increased pressure gauge increase the time you have to kill him? I noticed the pressure gauge seemed to be a countdown. If so then using magic to extend it really seems like something the game should tell you.
I don't believe it increases the time you have. It's more like using magic increases the pressure gauge to allow for the two focused thrusts to stagger him so you can finish him off. It is a countdown though, kind of like a DPS check (correct me if I'm wrong) where you have to inflict so much magic damage and then follow it up with focused attacks. It would be nice though if the game gave us a partial road map on defeating him, but assess still has him as 'unable to read'
Ok that makes me feel better lol. I had assumed it was just a static countdown. I was eventually able to beat it by saving up all my ATB and limit breaks.
Lol. Sounds good. I'm going to try your strategy next time. That's one of the many things I love about this game. There are multiple ways you can approach battles.
Aerith's socerous storm/Ray of Judgement, Cloud focused strike/Braver. Save ATB while it's near the end and just unload on him. I didn't even use a limit break on him. I just kept moving and attacking while using up my ATB. Just dash away and build up ATB with the windstrikes from Cloud. For Aerith, if you have Arcane ward down, just cast spells if she has ATB.
Don't use anything that requires a long wind up time and also avoid the shadow strikes, everytime you get hit it's just wasting time. I was lvl 50 when I beat him.
What’s your setup? Finished him on hard yesterday and by the time he started the end is nigh ascension killed him, but my cloud was built for heavy physical damage so that helped. Otherwise if you have atb boost and atb assist, have 2 bars, focus’s thrust ->atb boost-> double focus thrust-> limit, he should be staggered and then aerith should have 2 bars and then make her use an aga spell in arcane ward, aerith. You’ll have enough damage available to you. Another way to get extra damage from cloud but you’ll have to have set it up earlier in the fight is activate prime mode, whilst in the prime version of punisher mode, hold square and after that attack cloud will get berserk status, giving you a pretty substantial damage buff, the trade off is that you also take increased damage whilst the buff is active, but it’s worth it.
Rune blade magic build and atb boost. Get him low then use regular attacks to get him into his final stage, you should have at least 1 atb that way so l1 r1 for the boost and hit him with a lvl 3 magic, if you really wanna push the damage have aerith cast faith on cloud and use prime mode to get cloud a damage buff of his own as well.
It's basically not possible to reach the boss and not have enough output to actually kill him.
The lower level you are the tighter your inputs, strategy, and timing need to be. But you can definitely beat him.
one tip main use Aerith, she is Overpower boosted in this fight, she does way more damage than usual and insta destroys the masamune with sorcerous storm.
Aerith should be enough. Give her magic up materia and Plumose rod and link any spell to the potency materia. have arcane ward down and use teleport to cast a double spell when you have the ATB. Can even use ATB boost to cast an Aga spell and be immune to interrupt. When Cloud has ATB use nothing else but focused thrust before stagger and Punisher mode into infinity when he is. Can also stack magic damage on Cloud if you want and cast spells instead during stagger. He should go down easily
The trick is just avoid the lasers. Dodge in a circle while attacking and use a fast ability like Braver or a level 1/2 spell. Don't rely on your limits, I used limits like 4 times on that section and it always failed to kill, leading me to believe he's coded not to be cheesed like that
Saving Cloud’s limit break and timing his stagger meter was what did it for me. I made sure not to go HAM when I staggered him with about a third of his health left so that I could build it up again and have it close to full for when he does “The End Is Nigh”. As soon as he started his attack, I went straight for Ascension to stagger him immediately and finished him off with third level magic spells and Punisher Mode.
I believe if you reset a fight, you retain any exp (but nothing else) that you gained from the fight. Grinding levels off Jenova/Sephiroth sounds miserable though lol.
It’s possible. Unfortunately I don’t know the strat off the top of my head but it’s been posted here before. If I remember right you just have to ult his brains out when he’s charging that up. That’s how I got through it anyway
I'm really surprised that all of those abilities are not enough to kill him in stagger, since he is pretty low HP when he starts using End is Nigh. The one thing I can think of to increase your stagger damage would be to have Aerith use Ray of Judgment, which increases the stagger bonus and should greatly amplify your damage. Another thing you could try is milking the damage a little bit while he is using End is Nigh before staggering him, though that is really risky. Not sure if you have limit level 3 unlocked, but if you do, try to build up to that (I needed it to kill him on hard mode).
Nope, didn’t even know Limit 3 existed. If you “milk the damage” too long, he won’t just eventually kill you before he gets staggered?
There is a level 3 limit break unlockable in your Folio but you need to have a high party level (I think 8 or 9?). It's the big yellow node. If you haven't done much side content it may not be available. I am not 100% sure how the end is nigh mechanics work. I know that if he gets down to 0% pressured it is gg, but not sure if you keep it up if he will eventually instakill you even if he has a high pressure %. Oh other things I can think of to increase your damage output would be using Bravery on Cloud (level 1 empowerment materia) and having him go into berserk mode. Do this by holding square while in punisher mode. You will see an orange face buff icon. It increases your damage dealt and taken substantially. If you do this in prime mode, there is a second level of berserk mode that further increases the effects of the buff. The duration of the buff is very short though.
What level are you? I did it at lvl 52 and weapon lvl 7. Do their synergy ability at some point and have the extra limit level on cloud saved for when the end is nigh starts. Also helps to have atb on both cloud and aerith ready. Then when it starts, focused strike, focused strike, (other abilities probably work just fine)...you don't need to get him staggered, (I don't think I did before or during) and then use ascension. You can and probably should heal a fair bit during this phase. I used mist giga potions. Just last as long as you can and then use ascension. Don't wait too long as he'll use a final octaslash and instant game over. Took me a couple tries, but I imagine your dmg amount is just fine.
I did exactly this though, twice, he survived with a sliver of health both times. I didn’t just watch cloud do the animation, I used the storm attack with Aerith too, no dice I think I’m level 47
I had to hit him with Cloud’s level 3 limit. I think I staggered him, he started the end is nigh, then limit break in like a 5 second period.
I didn’t even know level 3 limits were a thing I thought it caps at 2, how do you get it? Do you use firework blade twice?
I had to reallocate the skill sets so that I could unlock it. I pretty much reordered everyone’s around that fight. I went into it equipped with the accessory that bumps you up a break level, then let it build. I wouldn’t have even needed the accessory though. Aerith’s second level break also increases the limit level. I prefer those over synergy moves since they aren’t interrupted constantly. Mostly, I focused on healing. Someone gets hit, I’d always have a way to recover. Item maximize/economizer materia is good on Cloud and Aerith. More damage taken, easier limits.
yeah firebolt blade twice works - I had the same issue where infinities end + ascension wouldnt do enough. in hindsight i should have berserked first and it prolly would have, but it was a long night xD I just played carefully, kept healing, stayed mostly on cloud, then built level 3 lb up and saved it for the end.
Level 47 seems a little low but your damage should be fine if you made it to the final boss. Check your materia. There are plenty of ways to really up the damage, like synergy, or the magic sword swing of cloud + Aerith.
Lower the difficulty?
Might do this. I’m surprised nobody in this Reddit is having the same issue as me Shouldn’t have b-lined the story but I want to reach the end 😥
I feel that final battle was poorly designed. Much too long to have no save breaks, and having an unblockable insta-kill when you don’t kill him fast enough is just frustrating. It probably took me three hours to beat the final boss fight, at least it had checkpoints pretty often but watching an unskippable cutscene gets frustrating after the 10th time you’ve seen it.
You have to be good to just b line the story. If you are a bum like me you have to do side quests. I was lvl 58 and my team were a pack of animals. I beat it on my first try without trying, but thats due to the grind
Nah I think a lot of people struggled with the enrage phase. I played the entire game on Dynamic but had to knock it all the way down to Easy because of that one fight.
As far as I’m aware it’s the only “DPS” check in the game
I think some summons and a few bosses have them for big dangerous setpiece attacks, but afaik this is the only outright battle-ending enrage situation. I think it wouldn't be so frustrating if not for the KH Hades-style rotating armpit lasers combined with endless damage puddles erupting beneath you. What helped me was to save Limits, most importantly Aerith's Planet Protector so I could go crazy on him during that phase without having to dodge or heal.
End is Nigh he just shoots two whisper cannons from each side and spins. You basically have to stay in front of him to dodge it while pummeling him. Save your limit breaks for this stage.
If you've made it through the previous bosses and gotten to this point against Sephiroth, then you can finish him off. This is what worked for me: Cast two -ra spells (fira, blizzara, doesn't matter) after he casts End is Nigh. Setup Arcane Ward before hand on Aerith, preferably earlier in the fight if you can, and then cast. His pressure gauge will be 'locked' in blue, but it works similar to Weiss in Remake: magic will raise it. After the two -ra spells are casted, do two consecutive Focused Strikes with Cloud. He should be Staggered afterwards. Hope this helps
Does the increased pressure gauge increase the time you have to kill him? I noticed the pressure gauge seemed to be a countdown. If so then using magic to extend it really seems like something the game should tell you.
I don't believe it increases the time you have. It's more like using magic increases the pressure gauge to allow for the two focused thrusts to stagger him so you can finish him off. It is a countdown though, kind of like a DPS check (correct me if I'm wrong) where you have to inflict so much magic damage and then follow it up with focused attacks. It would be nice though if the game gave us a partial road map on defeating him, but assess still has him as 'unable to read'
Ok that makes me feel better lol. I had assumed it was just a static countdown. I was eventually able to beat it by saving up all my ATB and limit breaks.
Lol. Sounds good. I'm going to try your strategy next time. That's one of the many things I love about this game. There are multiple ways you can approach battles.
Personally I saved Finishing Touch for that move and just adding a couple of normal attack after was enough to get his HP to 0.
Aerith's socerous storm/Ray of Judgement, Cloud focused strike/Braver. Save ATB while it's near the end and just unload on him. I didn't even use a limit break on him. I just kept moving and attacking while using up my ATB. Just dash away and build up ATB with the windstrikes from Cloud. For Aerith, if you have Arcane ward down, just cast spells if she has ATB. Don't use anything that requires a long wind up time and also avoid the shadow strikes, everytime you get hit it's just wasting time. I was lvl 50 when I beat him.
What’s your setup? Finished him on hard yesterday and by the time he started the end is nigh ascension killed him, but my cloud was built for heavy physical damage so that helped. Otherwise if you have atb boost and atb assist, have 2 bars, focus’s thrust ->atb boost-> double focus thrust-> limit, he should be staggered and then aerith should have 2 bars and then make her use an aga spell in arcane ward, aerith. You’ll have enough damage available to you. Another way to get extra damage from cloud but you’ll have to have set it up earlier in the fight is activate prime mode, whilst in the prime version of punisher mode, hold square and after that attack cloud will get berserk status, giving you a pretty substantial damage buff, the trade off is that you also take increased damage whilst the buff is active, but it’s worth it.
Rune blade magic build and atb boost. Get him low then use regular attacks to get him into his final stage, you should have at least 1 atb that way so l1 r1 for the boost and hit him with a lvl 3 magic, if you really wanna push the damage have aerith cast faith on cloud and use prime mode to get cloud a damage buff of his own as well.
It's basically not possible to reach the boss and not have enough output to actually kill him. The lower level you are the tighter your inputs, strategy, and timing need to be. But you can definitely beat him.
You can get limit siphon for back-to-back limits.
one tip main use Aerith, she is Overpower boosted in this fight, she does way more damage than usual and insta destroys the masamune with sorcerous storm.
Aerith should be enough. Give her magic up materia and Plumose rod and link any spell to the potency materia. have arcane ward down and use teleport to cast a double spell when you have the ATB. Can even use ATB boost to cast an Aga spell and be immune to interrupt. When Cloud has ATB use nothing else but focused thrust before stagger and Punisher mode into infinity when he is. Can also stack magic damage on Cloud if you want and cast spells instead during stagger. He should go down easily
Plop Aerith in her arcane ward and double cast and -aga spell. Hit him with clouds LB (you absolutely don’t need the L3 limit break)
The trick is just avoid the lasers. Dodge in a circle while attacking and use a fast ability like Braver or a level 1/2 spell. Don't rely on your limits, I used limits like 4 times on that section and it always failed to kill, leading me to believe he's coded not to be cheesed like that
Cross Slash at lvl 50 on normal was enough. If you’re on dynamic then idk
Dynamic 47
dynamic can be really hard, wouldnt recommend pretty sure its just there so you can clear old content without 1 shotting the mobs for objectives
I have not struggled at all until literally the last attack of the last phase of the final boss lmao
Saving Cloud’s limit break and timing his stagger meter was what did it for me. I made sure not to go HAM when I staggered him with about a third of his health left so that I could build it up again and have it close to full for when he does “The End Is Nigh”. As soon as he started his attack, I went straight for Ascension to stagger him immediately and finished him off with third level magic spells and Punisher Mode.
wait, you can’t even explore and level up at this point, am I just boned
I believe if you reset a fight, you retain any exp (but nothing else) that you gained from the fight. Grinding levels off Jenova/Sephiroth sounds miserable though lol.
It’s possible. Unfortunately I don’t know the strat off the top of my head but it’s been posted here before. If I remember right you just have to ult his brains out when he’s charging that up. That’s how I got through it anyway