Lune’s already a boon to us all for being the person to shake Gustave out of his post-massacre fugue state and get this Expedition on the road. But now that you’re a dynamic duo, you have a whole new set of options in battle.
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But you might be wondering just how best to synergize elemental attacks, what this whole Stain thing is about, and how the hell that woman’s bare feet aren’t covered in enough grime to turn off Tarantino. Still, as always, we have you covered, we’ll give you everything you should know about how best to utilize everyone’s favorite elemental floaty girl.
1. Basic kit
2. Special mechanic: Stains
3. Recommended builds/synergy
4. Skills to aim for
Basic kit
Lune’s primarily a magic user, but her melee weapon is this wild magical dreamcatcher thing that holds all of her elemental Stains and can be shaped like anything from Chinese bagua mirrors to the straight up Cenobite thing pictured above.
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As for skills, well, it varies. Generally, for the vast majority of the game, when you step into a new area, most of the enemies will all be weak to one specific element.You’ll want to build around that. Of course, you could find yourself up against an elemental weakness that Lune doesn’t have at her disposal.
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When Verso joins the party, for example, his first major plot area features enemies weak to Light. In those situations, 90-percent of the time, the best move is to lean towards Fire. Burning is just nearly universal in being useful. The 10-percent situations where it’s not? That’s when you’ll put Lune into Healer mode with Healing Light which can restore health and remove any status effects.
Special mechanic: Stains
While the Stain system isn’t as fundamental to Lune as Overdrive is to Gustave, for longer fights (with bosses in particular) it can be a complete game-changer and is very much worth keeping an eye on in the early game.
Here are the basics: Every one of Lune’s skills create an elemental Stain on her primary weapon, viewable on the right when you open her Skill menu. In addition, every skill also can activate a modifier for itself depending on if particular Stains are on the board.
For example, Immolation is Lune’s bread-and-butter Fire Skill. It generates a Fire Stain, but if you have Ice Stains on the board, you do extra damage. In addition, some skills will generate a more generic Light Stain that can be used like a wild card.
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Building up useful Stains often means using a Skill that doesn’t do jack shit to the enemies in a particular area, and that’s a bigger problem as you progress and start running into enemies that outright absorb specific elements. But you’re easily 20 hours in before you have to factor that in. In the early going, it’s best just to get familiar with which Pictos to pain up to maximize weaknesses. Speaking of…
Recommended builds/synergy
In the early going, Lune will be drowning in Fire-focused Pictos/Lumina, so by all means, build Pictos/Lumina around that up through the Gestral Village. Keep at least three burns on at any given time and you’ll be doing your part. The Lighterim Weapon allowing you to build up Burns without a specific skill is also going to be a huge help, especially when Maelle joins and a single burning enemy is all it takes to put her in Virtuose mode. Even later, though, Fire is gonna be your go-to element.
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While Ice won’t do much to damage every enemy, it does generate Stains that boost Fire attacks, and even better, Ice actually slow enemies down no matter what they’re weak to, which is a huge help when facing off against baddies fast enough to schedule two turns in a row. That also means speedsters are a damn fine excuse to get a board of four Ice Stains, then unleash Hell at your leisure. Way later, that can be very literal, but, we’re here just to get you on your way.
All this stuff does cost quite a bit of AP, though, and Lune’s base attack isn’t always able to generate enough. Energizing Attack and Dead Energy Pictos/Lumina can help with that, especially the latter since an enemy that dies from Lune casting the spell that set it on Fire still counts, giving her a nice AP bonus when you least expect it.
Skills to aim for
If there’s any one skill you want to get your hands on as soon as possible, it’s Mayhem. This skill allows you to do non-specific elemental damage using every Stain on the board. So even if you’re in a fight where you don’t have the exact weakness/synergy going on, you can still put that stuff to good use.
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In addition, you’ll start with Ice Lance, but later on, Thermal Transfer will be able to replace it, trading Ice damage for the ongoing perk of easily generating AP. Thunderfall is another good one to have in your back pocket, just because it can come in clutch in those situations where nobody can capitalize on all the Burns going around and you want to take an enemy off the field.
Lastly, you won’t be able to take it until way, way later, but Revitalization is your ultimate target as far as Lune’s healing skills go; it’s a skill that heals and casts Regen on the whole crew. Once you’ve got the other stuff mentioned, start saving up to grab this ASAP.
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is available now on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and Windows PCs.
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