Finally finished the game now that I have some free time at night, I played on Inferno since I already played it until the end of chapter 3 when it was in Japanese.
Small tips against bosses (that I remember), I played on inferno so it should work on any difficulty. I also didn't inherit a single weapon ability because fuck grinding for materials. Guns are also unupgraded and I only finished Rank A (Rank S was too hard for me and I didn't want to upgrade the guns).
Arena, I forgot to do the advanced so I didn't get the last rewards. (Currently struggling Supreme boss rush. One is fine, two at the same time is hell, I lose when fighting against Weiss and Lew at the same time, I am not very good at long fights, my concentration doesn't last enough).
Remember that the idea is to chain as much skills as possible, although you can only start doing the 8 skill chain combo once you get a skill that attacks downward. Also, eat food that boost atk, it works on inferno. As soon as you get the ultimate move, start with as the opening move and go for a combo right away.
When you get the accessory that gives free sp dashing and invincibilty while dashing, use it to counter. If you timed it well, you will counter, if you missed the timing, you will dodge. Against long attacks, this is perfect and you can abuse it by dodging in the middle of the attack.
Arnold: Counter when he raises his sword. To counter the gun, do it as soon as he jumps backwards. Use this to learn how to counter properly, a lot of human enemies have the same downward slash pattern and get used at the gun firing speed.
Slime: Wait a bit when it jiggles before countering. You can also do hit and run.
Tentacle plant: The easiest move to counter is the cloth melting bubble, although you can use it to practice counters.
Hobgoblin: Hardest main story boss since you will probably only have 3 skills. It has many similar moves with different timing so countering is a bit hard, but 1 or 2 slash and per guard usually works. He is heavy so aerial combos are hard at your current level.
Hobgobling defense mission: Ignore the small goblins and fight against the hobgoblin alone at the south away from the crystals. Same strategy as the previous hobgoblin battle.
Sexbot: The shooting has to be countered as soon as it's ready, but is easy to miss in the chaos of battle.The easy way to defeat it is by countering the rocket punch. It's heavy, but you will have enough skills to at least do a 7 chain combo at this point if you plan carefully.
Weiss and friends: Annoying, your teammates can hinder you in combos, so you need to change the skills combos you normally use. Weiss likes to attack Lecia so you can drag him and do a 1 on 1 which is easier. His gun has to be countered as soon as he takes distance, but his melee are kinda easy to tell, especially the downward slashes. You can avoid his ultimte by runing away to a corner.
Sewer bug: So heavy that you have to give up on skill combo until the yellow bar break bar is opened. Stick close to it and counter his headbutts.
Weiss: He is just more spammy with his skills, but at this point you can do a 8 skill chain combo and humans have the perfect weight for aerial combo. Try to do the sweep kick skill and the first lifting skill you got to understand how to combo them.
Lew: An easier version of Weiss. Most of his attacks can be countered by doing it a moment after he lifts his sword. The earth spike attack is harder to counter because the image is counter intuitive, you have to do it before you think is time.
Double Red Hobgoblin for Misha's quest: Wait until you are lv40 so you can do proper damage. Take advantage that there are 2 enemies by abusing the sp recovery per hit.
Break both hobgoblin guard bar without too much time difference. You break it by countering and changing the target using "D" button. You can also break them with the ultimate move (first version, the second version is a bit harder) if they are close enough.
Once their guard is broken, stagger them when they are close.
Do the sweep upward kick skill, your first enemy lifting skill (the 2nd skill you learn) and spam the 4 stab skill until the hobgoblins reach the celing. This works because if you hit the 2 hobgoblins at the same time with that skill, you restore more SP than what you spent. It will also take around 40% of their hp (in inferno).
Buy a lot of atk boosting food now before entering the ruins.
The defense missions are just monster hunting. The bosses tell are pretty easy, not much advice to give here.
Gustav: Hard if you don't want Lecia to get raped by him. Equip the accessory that makes dashing free and invincible while dashing.
Morgan: You can take half of his hp if you are around lv65 and eat curry. Meteor shower: One step back from the red square or 2 forward dashes from the red square because the falling meteor also has collision damage (it killed me a lot until I got the hang of it). Incredibly easy if you know what you are doing. I even took half of his hp as soon as the battle started by doing two 8 skill chain combo.
Counter the water drop, very easy to do it. The wind guard is stupid, rush inside, as soon as the rushing ends (and you keep the X button), Lecia will guard which will trigger the counter, you can do this to quickly deplete Morgan's barrier.
Gustav 2.0: Doesn't rape anymore. Annoying if you want to get the not retry achievement since you have to do the Morgan battle again if you lose againt him, luckily, Morgan and Gustav 2.0 are not that hard. Most of his moves are the same as his previous self, but it adds 2 extra move while losing 1.
Lost move: His fire bomb that can be stopped by hitting him a lot.
New moves: Fire bomb that falls like a meteor in an area after some time.
Fire pillar.
Again, stick close to him to evade his gun attacks, he does it 3 times. You can also dodge them with rushing if you have that accessory equipped.
When he is using the fire pillar, get a lot of distance, being at his back doesn't work since he will change direction before using it. Fire at him to break his shield so you can combo him faster.
In my honest opinion, the hardest bosses were the 2 Red Hobgoblin, the Hobgoblin and the sex bot.
The rest are quite easy, especially the human enemies since they can be kept in the air more easily without needing to break the yellow bar.
My final skill loadout:
Flying Slicing
Seraphic Cross
Crescent Step
Blade Rondo
Sylphic Dance
Tempest Roll
Lunar Assault
Piercing Edge.
Combo 1 (after breaking the guard):
Flying Slicing, Seraphic Cross, Blade Rondo, Tempest Roll, Lunar Assault, Piercing Edge, Crescent Step and Sylphic Dance.
I do another Tempest Roll if I can.
Combo 2 (against humans or after breaking the yellow bar):
Flying Slicing, Seraphic Cross, Crescent Step, Blade Rondo, Piercing Edge, Lunar Assault, Sylphic Dance and Tempest Roll.
Combo 3 (against humans or after breaking the yellow bar): Is almost the same as combo 2, but I put the Sylphic Dance at the end, it hits harder and you can do another Tempest Roll at the end.
Flying Slicing, Seraphic Cross, Crescent Step, Blade Rondo, Piercing Edge, Tempest Roll, Lunar Assault, Sylphic Dance.
Small tips against bosses (that I remember), I played on inferno so it should work on any difficulty. I also didn't inherit a single weapon ability because fuck grinding for materials. Guns are also unupgraded and I only finished Rank A (Rank S was too hard for me and I didn't want to upgrade the guns).
Arena, I forgot to do the advanced so I didn't get the last rewards. (Currently struggling Supreme boss rush. One is fine, two at the same time is hell, I lose when fighting against Weiss and Lew at the same time, I am not very good at long fights, my concentration doesn't last enough).
Remember that the idea is to chain as much skills as possible, although you can only start doing the 8 skill chain combo once you get a skill that attacks downward. Also, eat food that boost atk, it works on inferno. As soon as you get the ultimate move, start with as the opening move and go for a combo right away.
When you get the accessory that gives free sp dashing and invincibilty while dashing, use it to counter. If you timed it well, you will counter, if you missed the timing, you will dodge. Against long attacks, this is perfect and you can abuse it by dodging in the middle of the attack.
Arnold: Counter when he raises his sword. To counter the gun, do it as soon as he jumps backwards. Use this to learn how to counter properly, a lot of human enemies have the same downward slash pattern and get used at the gun firing speed.
Slime: Wait a bit when it jiggles before countering. You can also do hit and run.
Tentacle plant: The easiest move to counter is the cloth melting bubble, although you can use it to practice counters.
Hobgoblin: Hardest main story boss since you will probably only have 3 skills. It has many similar moves with different timing so countering is a bit hard, but 1 or 2 slash and per guard usually works. He is heavy so aerial combos are hard at your current level.
Hobgobling defense mission: Ignore the small goblins and fight against the hobgoblin alone at the south away from the crystals. Same strategy as the previous hobgoblin battle.
Sexbot: The shooting has to be countered as soon as it's ready, but is easy to miss in the chaos of battle.The easy way to defeat it is by countering the rocket punch. It's heavy, but you will have enough skills to at least do a 7 chain combo at this point if you plan carefully.
Weiss and friends: Annoying, your teammates can hinder you in combos, so you need to change the skills combos you normally use. Weiss likes to attack Lecia so you can drag him and do a 1 on 1 which is easier. His gun has to be countered as soon as he takes distance, but his melee are kinda easy to tell, especially the downward slashes. You can avoid his ultimte by runing away to a corner.
Sewer bug: So heavy that you have to give up on skill combo until the yellow bar break bar is opened. Stick close to it and counter his headbutts.
Weiss: He is just more spammy with his skills, but at this point you can do a 8 skill chain combo and humans have the perfect weight for aerial combo. Try to do the sweep kick skill and the first lifting skill you got to understand how to combo them.
Lew: An easier version of Weiss. Most of his attacks can be countered by doing it a moment after he lifts his sword. The earth spike attack is harder to counter because the image is counter intuitive, you have to do it before you think is time.
Double Red Hobgoblin for Misha's quest: Wait until you are lv40 so you can do proper damage. Take advantage that there are 2 enemies by abusing the sp recovery per hit.
Break both hobgoblin guard bar without too much time difference. You break it by countering and changing the target using "D" button. You can also break them with the ultimate move (first version, the second version is a bit harder) if they are close enough.
Once their guard is broken, stagger them when they are close.
Do the sweep upward kick skill, your first enemy lifting skill (the 2nd skill you learn) and spam the 4 stab skill until the hobgoblins reach the celing. This works because if you hit the 2 hobgoblins at the same time with that skill, you restore more SP than what you spent. It will also take around 40% of their hp (in inferno).
Buy a lot of atk boosting food now before entering the ruins.
The defense missions are just monster hunting. The bosses tell are pretty easy, not much advice to give here.
Gustav: Hard if you don't want Lecia to get raped by him. Equip the accessory that makes dashing free and invincible while dashing.
Morgan: You can take half of his hp if you are around lv65 and eat curry. Meteor shower: One step back from the red square or 2 forward dashes from the red square because the falling meteor also has collision damage (it killed me a lot until I got the hang of it). Incredibly easy if you know what you are doing. I even took half of his hp as soon as the battle started by doing two 8 skill chain combo.
Counter the water drop, very easy to do it. The wind guard is stupid, rush inside, as soon as the rushing ends (and you keep the X button), Lecia will guard which will trigger the counter, you can do this to quickly deplete Morgan's barrier.
Gustav 2.0: Doesn't rape anymore. Annoying if you want to get the not retry achievement since you have to do the Morgan battle again if you lose againt him, luckily, Morgan and Gustav 2.0 are not that hard. Most of his moves are the same as his previous self, but it adds 2 extra move while losing 1.
Lost move: His fire bomb that can be stopped by hitting him a lot.
New moves: Fire bomb that falls like a meteor in an area after some time.
Fire pillar.
Again, stick close to him to evade his gun attacks, he does it 3 times. You can also dodge them with rushing if you have that accessory equipped.
When he is using the fire pillar, get a lot of distance, being at his back doesn't work since he will change direction before using it. Fire at him to break his shield so you can combo him faster.
In my honest opinion, the hardest bosses were the 2 Red Hobgoblin, the Hobgoblin and the sex bot.
The rest are quite easy, especially the human enemies since they can be kept in the air more easily without needing to break the yellow bar.
My final skill loadout:
Flying Slicing
Seraphic Cross
Crescent Step
Blade Rondo
Sylphic Dance
Tempest Roll
Lunar Assault
Piercing Edge.
Combo 1 (after breaking the guard):
Flying Slicing, Seraphic Cross, Blade Rondo, Tempest Roll, Lunar Assault, Piercing Edge, Crescent Step and Sylphic Dance.
I do another Tempest Roll if I can.
Combo 2 (against humans or after breaking the yellow bar):
Flying Slicing, Seraphic Cross, Crescent Step, Blade Rondo, Piercing Edge, Lunar Assault, Sylphic Dance and Tempest Roll.
Combo 3 (against humans or after breaking the yellow bar): Is almost the same as combo 2, but I put the Sylphic Dance at the end, it hits harder and you can do another Tempest Roll at the end.
Flying Slicing, Seraphic Cross, Crescent Step, Blade Rondo, Piercing Edge, Tempest Roll, Lunar Assault, Sylphic Dance.
