The final boss on merciless difficulty is ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ frustrating.

[definitely not aragi]

It's got a TON of health, and taking it down it takes a loong time, even after exploiting the weaknesses. But the real battle starts afterwards. Those. ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. Orbs. Cannot take down even one of them without getting hit by their attacks, and once you get hit, you stay down. Switching to the item menu is half the battle. I'm sure there are people who had the patience to attempt the fight multiple times, but it's too much of a slog IMO.. If anyone got tips, please share.

Update: I defeated her. Used the 4-4-1 split and the showtime foods. Thanks for the tips people!! Now to do it 2 more times...

[Jargous]

From another thread I posted...

Last boss isn't so bad other than the orb battles. You can do the 3 3 3 setup, but I went for 3 2 4.

My 3 parties were
Ryuji, Yusuke, Makoto (or Morgana). Makoto helps give you all 3 buffs (or just go with churrasco food)
Zenkichi, Ann (Ann is extremely useful in this set with her status infliction and soul thief)
Rest is the remainder. I equipped the accessory that has a chance to not use HP/SP when using Persona skills on Zenkichi here. Heat Riser the two and Debilitate the orbs you plan to attack.

Ryuji and Zenkichi will be your damage dealers for the orbs. All you do is spam Agneystra (in the case of Ryuji buff it up with Charge) and get rid of the summon minion orb ASAP for the first set of orbs (Zenkichi doesn't need to do this because what you can do is swap to Ann to heal him and if you're low on SP you can just status the enemies for free SP) and just keep eating HP items.

The problem with the first orb battle is that you will have to avoid those attacks as much as possible and the minion is usually the mob that will finish you off. Once that orb is done, the rest can be easily taken down (especially 3 of the 6 orbs as one is weak to gun, and two will be weak to either Yusuke or Makoto).

[Pekodes]

In Group A, the orbs are weak to:

• Fire
  
• Ice
  
• Nuke
  
• Gun
  
• Wind

In Group B, the orbs are weak to:

• Electric
  
• Psy
  
• Bless

You'll want to send members with those affinities to groups with orbs weak to them. If you're only finding the orbs tough, you can send four members to each group and have Joker solo the main body. Personally, most of the final boss's attacks are heavily telegraphed and easier to avoid compared to five different orbs throwing out attacks at you.

In Group A, you'll want to target Kether first since I don't think anyone wants to deal with a mini keeper while battling the orbs. If you bring Ann, Yosuke, Makoto, and Morgana in this group, they'll be able to handle one of the orbs weak to them. Chesed is the one weak to Gun, so you can just shoot it till it dies. You can probably leave Chesed for last since from what I remember, its heals doesn't really heal much.

In Group B, Netzach (the one that charges at you while spinning) doesn't do anything if no one is near it, so you can stay away from it until you deal with the other orbs. You can also probably ignore Malkuth since all it does is summon trash mobs which shouldn't be much of a threat. Focus on the other three orbs with their weaknesses, then finish off the other two.

When any of your characters have a showtime, aim it at the center of the stage so it hits everyone. It gets immensely easier with each orb you down, so don't get discouraged since the beginning of each fight is the hardest part.

[definitely not aragi]

Originally posted by MythyDes:

You'll want to send members with those affinities to groups with orbs weak to them. If you're only finding the orbs tough, you can send four members to each group and have Joker solo the main body. Personally, most of the final boss's attacks are heavily telegraphed and easier to avoid compared to five different orbs throwing out attacks at you.

That's what I've been doing. Joker with 99 stat personas can easily take on the main body, though it does get a bit grindy and takes some time.

Originally posted by MythyDes:

In Group A, you'll want to target Kether first since I don't think anyone wants to deal with a mini keeper while battling the orbs. If you bring Ann, Yosuke, Makoto, and Morgana in this group, they'll be able to handle one of the orbs weak to them. Chesed is the one weak to Gun, so you can just shoot it till it dies. You can probably leave Chesed for last since from what I remember, its heals doesn't really heal much.

In Group B, Netzach (the one that charges at you while spinning) doesn't do anything if no one is near it, so you can stay away from it until you deal with the other orbs. You can also probably ignore Malkuth since all it does is summon trash mobs which shouldn't be much of a threat. Focus on the other three orbs with their weaknesses, then finish off the other two.

When any of your characters have a showtime, aim it at the center of the stage so it hits everyone. It gets immensely easier with each orb you down, so don't get discouraged since the beginning of each fight is the hardest part.

The battlefield becomes so chaotic it's mostly dodging to and fro, and then you notice 2 of the members are KO'd and it just becomes tiring to retry. I'd need to stock up on more revivals and healing items.

[definitely not aragi]

Originally posted by Jargous:

From another thread I posted...

Last boss isn't so bad other than the orb battles. You can do the 3 3 3 setup, but I went for 3 2 4.

My 3 parties were
Ryuji, Yusuke, Makoto (or Morgana). Makoto helps give you all 3 buffs (or just go with churrasco food)
Zenkichi, Ann (Ann is extremely useful in this set with her status infliction and soul thief)
Rest is the remainder. I equipped the accessory that has a chance to not use HP/SP when using Persona skills on Zenkichi here. Heat Riser the two and Debilitate the orbs you plan to attack.

Ryuji and Zenkichi will be your damage dealers for the orbs. All you do is spam Agneystra (in the case of Ryuji buff it up with Charge) and get rid of the summon minion orb ASAP for the first set of orbs (Zenkichi doesn't need to do this because what you can do is swap to Ann to heal him and if you're low on SP you can just status the enemies for free SP) and just keep eating HP items.

The problem with the first orb battle is that you will have to avoid those attacks as much as possible and the minion is usually the mob that will finish you off. Once that orb is done, the rest can be easily taken down (especially 3 of the 6 orbs as one is weak to gun, and two will be weak to either Yusuke or Makoto).

I did see that thread, thanks. I've equipped the no HP/SP consumption on joker since he'll need it for the grind, and we only control the other members for some time. They have enough SP to make through (whenever that happens) and I use magic sparingly (only when the orbs are about to attack, to stagger them). I use the 4-4-1 formation since joker is enough by himself.

[MegaMan]

I just did this myself. Something you may want to try - buy a lot of the Showtime Up items in the store, I think the Soulful Jelly. I stuck with a 3-3-3: Ann/Makoto/Yusuke in the first group, Haru/Ryuji/Sophia in the second. In the first group, spam the ♥♥♥♥ out of the Warden summoning Orb first with Makoto's nuke skills, use SP restoration as needed. Once that is dead, use Ann to run up to the healing orb and just pump it full of lead. It will lose shields incredibly fast and you can take it down in seconds. Take down the fire orb next, since its attacks come out the fastest. If you use showtime boosts, you can typically get the final 2-3 orbs together, and it does a chunk of damage.

I never bothered with buffs. I just threw all my SP into dealing damage via weaknesses.

For the second group, I took Sophie over and spammed the hell out of the shadow summoning orb first. I'd recommend leaving the bless/curse orb for last (since it has slow attacks that won't even reach the far platform edge) and the almighty orb for second-last (for the same reason, but the gravity effect is annoying). I used Ryuji to spam thunder skills on the wind orb then switched to Haru to cleave through the rolling one.

In short, showtimes are OP for the orbs and are honestly the best time in the game to use the showtime booster items. Go wild with them.