Orphan (boss)

The first form of Orphan is the penultimate boss of Final Fantasy XIII. After Barthandelus is defeated, Orphan's shell emerges from the inky fluid and attacks the party.

Strategy One
While the battle starts directly after the previous battle with Barthandelus, the player can pause the game and select Retry if they wish to adjust their paradigms or equipment. Combat Clinic (Sentinel-Medic-Medic) should be the party's starting paradigm. Creating a paradigm for Evened Odds (Medic-Saboteur-Synergist), Relentless Assault (Commando-Ravager-Ravager) and Aggression (Commando-Commando-Ravager) is also recommended. As Orphan utilizes Instant Death attacks, equipping the party leader with a Seraph's Crown is recommended. Since Cherub's Crowns do not stack completely, equipping 3 will only result in a 66% resistance to death, whereas a max level Seraph's Crown will provide you with 60% resistance. Equipping 3 max level Seraph's crowns will provide the player with a 94% resistance.

Orphan is susceptible to poison, so it may be wise to have a character who can cast it as the party leader (Vanille, Lightning or Sazh). It will take a couple of tries to stick Orphan with poison, but it should happen eventually. The player will probably need to do this twice in the battle. This will make the battle much easier, because of the way poison works in Final Fantasy XIII: it removes a constant percentage of the target's maximum HP, meaning the more HP the target has, the more effective poison is.

In the first half of the battle, Orphan switches between Consummate Light and Consummate Darkness. During Consummate Light Orphan only has access to a slap attack which hits all nearby party members for moderate damage, and also regularly heals itself for around 2,500 HP per turn. Its Consummate Darkness mode is more dangerous, as its laser attack inflicts a fair amount of damage to a single party member, while also inflicting a large array of debilitating status ailments. Whenever Orphan switches form, it uses the powerful Merciless Judgment attack, dealing fractional damage to all party members and leaving them with dangerously low HP. Players cannot perform actions or paradigm shift while this attack is in action. Though Merciless Judgement normally cannot kill, it may kill if the characters are poisoned. Player should make sure to use Esuna as soon as the party are debuffed with it. Merciless Judgement also resets Orphan's chain gauge, so the player should make sure not to wait too long with attacking again after he uses it, or his bar will be reset before the party can stagger him. Orphan uses Merciless Judgment as its first attack, which is why using Combat Clinic as the first paradigm is recommended. After the party has recovered from the attack, they should shift to Evened Odds. Orphan has low resistance to many status effects, including Slow and Imperil. The Synergist will concentrate on placing Haste, Protect, Shell, Veil and Enfire on all party members while the Medic should heal when needed. Once all these status effects are in place, the party should shift to Relentless Assault. With the party's Enfire status, coupled with Orphan's Imperil, it will not be long before Orphan is staggered, but the player should remember to shift back to Combat Clinic whenever healing is required. Once stagger occurs, the party should shift to Aggression and attack. Depending on how powerful the party is, Orphan will have lost around half its HP once the first stagger period ends. If this happens, one can skip the following paragraph. After the stagger period ends, Orphan will immediately use Merciless Judgment, so the party should shift to Combat Clinic before this happens.

After Merciless Judgment, if Orphan still has over half his HP remaining, it will switch to its dangerous Consummate Darkness form. The longer this form lasts, the more dangerous it becomes, so it is best to ignore any status ailments inflicted on the party and shift to Relentless Assault and aim to stagger the foe as quickly as possible. Once stagger is achieved, the party should shift to Evened Odds to reapply any expired buffs on the party and debuffs on the enemy, then shift to Aggression to inflict as much damage as possible. Again, the party should shift to Combat Clinic just before the stagger period ends to protect against Merciless Judgment.

Once Orphan's HP is reduced to below half, Orphan will combine both forms into one. From now on, Merciless Judgment will happen without prior warning and it also gains access to Progenitorial Wrath. This affects all party members and has a small chance of inflicting Instant Death, potentially ending the battle if the death effect takes affect on the party leader. The Cherub Crowns equipped prior to battle should lower the chances of this happening, but do not remove the threat entirely, so speed is still of the essence. If any other party members are inflicted with Instant Death, the leader can use a Phoenix Down as it is quicker and restores more HP than Raise.

During this stage, the party should use Relentless Assault and aim to stagger Orphan, remembering to shift to Combat Clinic if a party member's HP bar turns yellow. Again, once staggered, the party should switch to Aggression and aim to finish the battle. Orphan may cast Doom at random whenever its HP is low, though it has a very rare chance of occurring.

Strategy Two
This will not take more than thirty minutes. Recommended party is Fang, Vanille and Hope with each having Crystarium Level 8 with Vanille at least having learned her special attack skill.

Vanille is the recommended leader, with these five paradigms:
 * Evened Odds: Vanille (Medic) - Hope (Synergist) - Fang (Saboteur)
 * Smart Bomb: Vanille (Ravager) - Hope (Ravager) - Fang (Saboteur)
 * Relentless Assault: Vanille (Ravager) - Hope (Ravager) - Fang (Commando)
 * Diversity: Vanille (Ravager) - Hope (Medic) - Fang (Commando)
 * Combat Clinic: Vanille (Medic) - Hope (Medic) - Fang (Sentinel)

Starting up with Evened Odds, the player should let Fang debuff Orphan with at least four status effects: Deprotect, Deshell, Imperil and Slow, and Hope buffing the party with Haste, Protect, Shell, Bravery and Faith, with Vanille healing. The player should switch to Smart Bomb after the entire party is buffed, so that Fang can continue casting negative effects. With at least four negative effects on Orphan, the chain gauge will be filled quickly, and the party can switch to Relentless Assault when Orphan is staggered to quickly drain its HP. When the gauge is close to being empty the party should quickly switch to Combat Clinic as Orphan will use Merciless Judgement next. Once the party is restored of its HP, they should quickly switch to Evened Odds to restore any lost buffs, and then repeat the same process.

It is recommended to stick with the same setup for the next fight, but one might want to use a paradigm with Vanille as a Saboteur.

Strategy Three
This strategy will take a minimum of 10 minutes with the recommended party of Lightning, Hope, and Vanille, Lightning being the party leader. It is recommended that each party member has their Crystarium up to level 4. Hope and Vanille should have the abilities Curaja and Curasa. This strategy should take at maximum three staggers. Each character should have at least an HP above 4000. Lightning should be equipped with one Cherub Crown, because Orphan will most likely not use Instant Death with this strategy.

Recommended Paradigm Shifts:


 * Tri-Disaster (Ravager-Ravager-Ravager)
 * Salvation (Medic-Medic-Medic)
 * Evened Odds (Medic-Synergist-Saboteur)

The party should start off with Salvation, because Orphan will begin by using Merciless Judgment. He can also use this any time within the battle, so the player should be prepared to switch to Salvation. Once Orphan is done using this move, Salvation will come in handy.

Once the party is fully healed, or at least mostly healed, the player should switch to Evened Odds to buff and debuff. Once done, the party's buffs should include Veil, Faith, Bravery, Shell, Protect, and Haste. The Debuffs Orphan should have are Deprotect, Deshell, Poison, and Imperil. After this, the party is ready to switch to Tri-Disaster.

Poison should have done some damage, so the party should hit him with all they've got. When the stagger is over, Orphan should be at half of his health, or below half. The player can then repeat the steps. It is up to the player to decide whether to kill Orphan themselves, or let the Poison do the job.

Strategy Four
At the start of the battle, Orphan will use Consummate Light which will heal Orphan and he'll use Merciless Judgment. Create the paradigm Tortoise(Sentinel-Sentinel-Sentinel) and use it as your active paradigm at the start of the fight. When Merciless Judgment hits all party members on the field, everyone's life bar will not be in the red, they'll be in the yellow instead. Use Tortoise to weaken Merciless Judgment. This can be useful for when he uses Consummate Darkness, switch to Tortoise if your not using that paradigm, and Merciless Judgment will not do so much damage.

Music
The music played during this encounter of Orphan is "Born Anew".

Trivia

 * One of Orphan's abilities, Dies Irae, is a lyric from the song "Fighting Fate". It is Latin for 'Day of Wrath'. The Nodes on Vegnagun's Leg in Final Fantasy X-2 also use a move called "Dies Irae."

Related Enemies

 * Orphan (Final Boss)
 * Anima
 * Dahaka
 * Barthandelus