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Sirène is a major boss inClair Obscur: Expedition 33, and one that is absolutely mandatory to take down for the progression of the main story.
She’s one of two Axons that guardThe Paintress, and you’ll either meet her immediately before or after your showdown with theVisages and the Mask Keeperas you inch closer to the conclusion of your30-ish-hour expedition.
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Sirène’s world is one of themost beautiful and unique-looking areasof the game, but don’t let this facade lure you into a false sense of security as you progress towards your ultimate showdown with this twirling, terrifying, mesmerizing beauty.
This boss featuresthree separate phases, so there’s going to be a lot she throws your way during her encounter. Still, with some nice prep beforehand, a collection of well-timed dodges/parries, and this handy boss guide at your disposal, you have everything you need to survive.
Let’s dance.
Preparing For Sirène
Even though Sirène clearly seems to have the ability to make your team swoon with her hypnotic dance moves, you’ll be able to take her down with the right party balance and skills.
To be sure, she’s an imposing boss and has been hyped up by the story since she’s one of two Axons you need to take out to access The Paintress, but if you’ve made it this far, you have what it takes to notch another victory in your belt.
Let’s discuss the best party and skill loadouts you can bring into battle.
verify you’ve defeated Tisseur, an optional boss fight just before Glissando, in order to gain theAnti-CharmPicto. This Picto is incredibly helpful and nearly mandatory for taking down Sirène.
Best Party Composition
If you’re like me, you’ve been committed to a party composition of Verso, Sciel, and Maelle. This same trio can lead you to victory against Sirène as well, so I fully endorse this lineup.
Sirène is weak to Dark attacks, so Sciel’s collection ofpowerfulDark-based skills make her a no-brainer to bring along to the party.
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Verso’s Perfection mechanic can also go a long way here in terms of dealing out some serious damage so long as you can avoid Sirène’s attacks, making him a great choice as well. He also has a couple of great support-type skills for this fight too.
Assuming you’ve already mastered getting Maelle into her Virtuose Stance by this point in the game, she’s also a wonderful contributor to dish out some heavy damage-dealing here too.
Best Skills
Since you’re now in the mid-to-late portion of Clair Obscur, you’ve likely collected a ton of useful skills for your party by this point. Still, you may need to tweak your loadout in order to be best prepared for this particular encounter.
You’ll want to consider Sciel’s strongest Dark skills, particularly ones that also add Foretell to an enemy. Building up Foretell, entering Twilight, then crushing Sirène with apowerfulmove that consumes as much Foretell as possible is your best bet overall.
There are other ways to gain an advantage with the other team members too, so let’s take a closer look at a few of the skills I’d recommend for this fight.
Party Member
Description
Searing Bond
Deals medium single target Dark damage. 1 hit. Applies 5 Foretell. Also deals damage and applies Foretell to every other Burning enemy.
Phantom Blade
Deals high single target Dark damage. 1 hit. Consumes all Foretell to deal additional damage. Can Break.
Final Path
Deals extreme single target Dark damage and applies 10 Foretell. 1 hit. Can Break.
Degagement
Deals low single target Fire damage. 1 hit. Target becomes weak to Fire damage for 2 turns.
Deals extreme single target Fire damage. 3 hits. Applies 5 Burn per hit. If in Offensive Stance, applies 2 more Burn per hit.
Fleuret Fury
Deals high single target Physical damage. 3 hits. If in Virtuose Stance, stay in Virtuose Stance. Can Break.
Perfect Recovery
Recovers 50% Health and dispels Status Effects. Gives 0-2 Perfection. If in C Rank, increased heal to 100% Health.
Marking Shot
Deals low single target damage. 1 hit. Uses weapon’s element. Applies Mark. If in C Rank, deals increased damage.
End Bringer
Deals extreme single target Physical damage. 6 hits. Increased damage if target is Stunned. If in A Rank, can reapply Stun.
You can also consider bringing alongTwilight Dancefor Sciel. However, I’d caution equipping multiple skills that require nine total AP points to cast.
BothTwilight DanceandFinal Pathare excellent for dealing Dark damage, but you likely won’t be able to use them both enough in this fight with their massive AP requirements. Choose whichever you prefer.
Sirène Attack Breakdown
This boss has more phases than most others in the game, with three progressively more aggressive movesets you’ll have to navigate to secure your win.
In addition to dealing heavy damage with both summons and direct attacks,you’ll also have to avoid being charmed multiple times.
Here’s how each phase of the fight shakes out.
Sirène does not mess around at all in her opening phase and can pummel you with hefty damage if you aren’t immediately ready for some defensive maneuvers.
For many of her attacks in general,I recommend dodges over parries, because her moves can be extremely difficult to time perfectly for a parry compared to other enemies.
Here’s what she’ll throw at you first:
Attack Phrase Indicator
Player Action
“Sirène dances with the Glissandos.”
Sirène slams two Glissando worms into the stage back-to-back, damaging the entire party on contact.
Dodge both attacks consecutively
“Sirène seduces (party member).”
Sirène surrounds a single party member with ribbons and deals massive damage upon contact. Also Charms the party member, causing them to be unable to dodge/parry and attack either themselves or their teammates until Charm is removed.
Gradient Counter as soon as possible
“A widow Ballet Charms (party member) and flies away.”
A summoned widow dancer approaches a single party member and fires a disappearing/reappearing energy ball. Deals damage and Charms party member upon contact.
Dodge energy ball just before it appears for the third time
“Sirène attacks with her dress.”
Sirène summons three separate strands of green and brown cloth and takes turns throwing one at each separate party member—middle party member first, then right party member, then left party member. There is a shorter time gap between attacks two and three.
Dodge all three attacks
The Phase Two transition happens pretty early on in this fight, typically around the point where Sirène’s health is about a third of the way down. You’ll know this is happening when you see the text prompt “Sirène’s dance becomes frantic.”
In addition to all the moves from Phase One still being present here, you’ll have the following to contend with as well:
“The Grand Ballet begins.”
Sirène summons five widow dancers, each capable of dealing a different type of elemental damage. Each widow will fly to the right of the party, then quickly attack to the left at the entire party. The timing is the same between dancers one through four, but there is a longer gap before attack five.
Dodge five times, remembering there is a delay between attacks four and five
Once Sirène has about a quarter of her health remaining, you’ll enter the third and final phase of the battle.
Sirène only has one extra move in this phase in addition to all the previous moves above, butthis one is a doozy.
“The Final Act begins.”
Sirène summons a Glissando to the left edge of the stage that shoots a shockwave at the entire party, immediately followed by a widow dancer that attacks from the right. This combo happens three times in a row. Sirène will then slam a giant building onto the entire party from above, which deals huge damage and can Curse your party members, causing them to die in the next three turns.
Jump over the Glissando’s shockwave, then perform a jump-counter. Dodge the flying widow dancer. Repeat twice more. Dodge Sirène’s building slam.
How To Beat Sirène
The most important thing you can do in order to give yourself the highest chance of success against Sirène is tohave theAnti-CharmPicto/Lumina equipped on your entire party. This boss has two separate attacks that can charm your party members, which is a recipe for disaster and a quick loss.
Once you obtainAnti-Charmfrom the Tisseur fight, make sure to immediately equip it on one of your characters so that you have a chance to fight four battles with it before Sirène, thus making it available as a Lumina for the entire party.
There aren’t four separate fights between Tisseur and Sirène, soyou’ll need to backtrack to previous enemies to grind out these four necessary fights.
Without the ability to charm you, Sirène is infinitely more manageable, and you’ll simply have to get the timings down of all her other attacks to successfully dodge, parry, and jump-counter as able.
The name of the game in terms of combat first and foremost is toapply/consume as much Foretell with Sciel as possible while only using Dark attacks. Sirène’s HP will melt away if Sciel is able to continue striking with Dark moves, and getting her into Twilight mode will only make this easier.
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Using Maelle’sDegagementskill to make Sirène temporarily weak to Fire before launching into massive Fire damage withPyrolyseis also one of your best offensive options.
From here, you’re able to also use the Burn applied fromPyrolyseto then useSwift Strideto gain some extra AP and transition Maelle into Virtuose Stance.Once in Virtuose stance, useFleuret Furyto deal some damage buffed up to 200%.
Verso actually plays more of a setup/support role in this encounter,which is a change from how I’d typically used him previously.Perfect Recoveryis super important for keeping the party’s HP up, as well as removing the Curse status that Sirène can inflict on the team as well.
Marking Shotwill set up Sciel or Maelle to do massive damage on their next move, andEnd Bringerallows Verso to finally deal some crazy damage of his own if he has the AP to spare.
Stay vigilant, nail your dodges/parries, combo Sirène into oblivion with Sciel’s Dark moves and Maelle’s Fire once the boss is weak to it, and you can absolutely win this one.
In addition to defeating one of the two Axons that are necessary for moving the story along towards your showdown with The Paintress, your dramatic victory with Sirène will grant you a collection of nice rewards for your efforts as well.
Here’s everything you’ll walk away with:
If this was your second Axon fight, all of these items will be extremely useful as you gear up for a couple of the forthcoming toughest fights you’ve yet to face in Clair Obscur.
The large XP haul here will likely be enough to level up your party a bit, and theEnergising TurnPicto is a great option to equip to ensure your team is best prepared to be able to levy your mightiest skills during the upcoming battles that await.
