Beating the Gigantuar in Final Fantasy 13 is one of the most challenging experiences many players have encountered. Going against this giant cactus will require developing the right strategies while maintaining maximum stats to survive. This mini-boss devastates the entire team by dealing 10,000 damage only in one hit while inflicting pain and fog with it.
Winning this fight not only is a satisfactory experience, but it also rewards you by unlocking the Floraphobe achievement, adding a great addition to your achievement list. Here are some interesting strategies to adopt that might help you win it while facing this tough mini-boss.
There are several strategies that you can adapt while facing this enemy. Choosing the right team impacts your ability to withstand the fierce foe. Moreover, if you play the cards right, you can defeat Gigantuar quickly, so focus on our suggested strategies.
Staggering Gigantuar
The first thing you should do is to give your characters the right equipment that might give you the random instant chain synthesized ability, which grants a free stagger. To get this ability to trigger efficiently, you must equip the Commandos with Pain Dampeners and Medics with White Capes, and it will help prevent Gigantuar from disabling the party.
Instant Chain combination can activate randomly while your character is equipped with a stagger while targeting the enemy. Although Gigantuar deals significant damage, it does not have much HP, so staggering this rival can get you to victory.
The Sazh Strategy
This strategy is just an expansion on the first one to make it even easier. For this, you have to make Sazh a leader along with sentinels for the other two roles. With this arrangement, when you start attacking the Gigantuar, an auto chain attack gets triggered and starts a combination of attacks, making Sazh move backward along with each strike and eventually move him outside Gigantaurs range of 10,000 needles attack.
As long as you are out of this mini-boss’ range, you will not receive damage. This strategy works for low-level teams, too, as it is more straightforward and effective if used properly.
Choosing The Right Party
Another tactic to eliminate Gigantuar is entering the battle with the COM/SEN/MED party setup. In this way, the boss can concentrate on attacking the Sentinel while the Medic will heal and the other party member will attack. This strategy will work efficiently as each character plays its specific role while dealing with this Gigantuar.
Hope or Vanille are recommended for the role of Medic, as they have access to Curasa and Curaja. Hope will also assist in removing Fog and Pain along with healing.
You can also use a combination of different teams, such as making a party of Hope/Snow/Fang with Paradigm Deck: Entourage: Rav/Med/Sen Tortoise: Sen/Sen/Sen.
You can also choose Hope as the leader and then make the following two Paradigms: Protection Hope: SYN Snow: SEN Fang: MED Solidarity: Hope: MED Snow: SEN Fang: COM Pop an Aegisol and a Fortisol, build up a good party and get into battle.
Using Daze Spell Strategy
Lastly, if you have tried the strategies mentioned above and still did not manage to beat Gigantuar, then the daze spell strategy should be your last resort. You should always set the character with the Daze spell as the leader and put them in a paradigm along with MEDs. After that, spam the Daze spell on the enemy until its effect gets triggered. Wait for a full ATB gauge and switch to Cerberus (COM-COM-COM). Then, quickly return to the second paradigm, casting the Daze spell again.
Keep repeating the cycle until the monster falls. This should get you a victory with a five-star rating, unlocking the Floraphobe achievement/trophy.