Ten Things I Wish I Knew When I Started ‘Clair Obscur: Expedition 33'

Forbes

12-05-2025

Expedition 33
This may be the latest I've written one of these advice articles about a new game, but with how word of mouth is slowly spreading about GOTY frontrunner Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, I figured this may still be relevant enough to its increasing slate of new players.
I've put close to 80 hours in now and beaten the entire endgame, and I have some advice to share. Here are ten things I wish I knew when I started Clair Obscur: Expedition 33:
1. Dodge Is Training Mode, But Still Acceptable Long Term – There are two forms of live-action defense in Expedition 33, dodging and parrying, the latter requires much tighter timing than the former, but allows for powerful counter-hits. If you're not used to this style of combat, I highly recommend only focusing on dodging for a while, as it will make you far less frustrated, especially as enemy movesets become more and more complicated. I will also say you can play the entire game doing almost nothing but dodging, and while you'll lose counterattack damage you will…be alive. This is what I did and it was fine.
2. Use Sound Cues, Not Just Visuals In Combat – This took a while to learn, but sure, you can dodge or parry when a swing or spell is about to hit you, but I'd argue it's almost more important to get used to the sound cues the game will give you, reflecting the moments where you can time things properly sometimes based on that alone, helping you with the rhythm of a moveset.
Expedition 33
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3. Build A Support Character – It can be easy to want to make everyone have max DPS to try and do as much damage to bosses and teams as possible. But while that can work, I would suggest investing in at least one character that serves mainly as support. The best options for this, I'd argue, are Sciel, Verso or Monoco, funneling buffs into either each other, if one has a DPS build. But I mainly used them to buff Lune and Maelle (even after Maelle's giant nuke move got nerfed).
4. You Can Come Back To Almost Everywhere – I know there's always some amount of stress when it comes to a game like this that you think you need to explore every inch of every location lest you be unable to return. You can in fact return almost everywhere later (not a version of Lumiere as you unfortunately miss a thing or two), and while I do not discourage exploring when you make a first run, know that you may run into puzzle or enemy walls you need to do later. And you can.
5. Weapon Upgrades Are Key – While upgrading your moves is important, and getting the right Pictos set up is as well, I think that too often weapons themselves are neglected, as everything scales off that damage, and even just a handful of upgrades can jump your damage anywhere from 20-50% within tiers, it's not just for unlocking new perks. There will be places you can farm weapon materials later on if you want, so I would not hesitate to invest heavily in a current favorite.
Expedition 33
6. Pictos And Stats – You need to pay attention to which Pictos you put in your main set and which you simply use as passives. When they are active, they will give you health, defense, speed or crit bonuses that are mandatory for boosting your characters besides normal stat points. I would say defense especially is overlooked in this regard, and if you're struggling I'd pick ones to boost that, definitely early in the game.
7. Passive All Pictos/Luminas – There is essentially no reason to ever not passive a Pictos you get as you might use it for a build later. The way I would do this is just throw any random three on three different characters, so nine at a time, and win four very easy fights at some early zone you return to. Get the full set.
8. When You Pass The Damage Cap – You may be wondering when you can start doing more than 9999 damage, as eventually you will hit this cap and it will start being annoying as it hard limits fights. The answer to this without spoilers is essentially after the second-to-last boss where you will then get a Pictos (that you can easily make passive) that takes you past that cap.
9. When You Hit The Damage Cap – However, there's an additional piece of advice here when you are stuck on the damage cap. At that point, you want to be using as many multi-hit moves as you can to do more damage per attack. As in, a single attack that hits the 9999 cap is much worse than a five hit attack that can do 5000 damage for a total of 25000, working within the damage cap. Very key for some of the later bosses.
Expedition 33
10. Finish Story Before Fully Exploring – The end gets sort of weird as you will return to the main map and be tasked with fighting a 'final boss,' but it makes it seem like you should do all your exploring then before head to that fight. While you may want to power up a bit before that (at this point you will be past the damage cap), I recommend doing that fight as soon as you can both for story reasons at that finale, but also as it directly leads into other story stuff in the endgame you'll want to see. There's just no real reason to wait.
Bonus: Maelle Tournament - Pretty early on you will be thrust into a tournament for a story beat that will ask you to pick one character to play. Pick Maelle. You will win her best sword in the game, and even if it was recently nerfed in a patch, it is…still probably her best sword. You can get it later on but it is much, much harder then.
Enjoy. I cannot wait for you to experience this whole game.
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