Trails of Cold Steel 3 Boss - Magic Knight Direwolf [Rean Solo/Nightmare/No Items]

#trailsofcoldsteeliii #trailsofcoldsteel3gameplay #reanschwarzer #kiseki
0:00 Cutscene
0:20 Magic Knight Direwolf
5:34 Victory
At last, my first proper solo video is here! Beginning with the first proper boss of the game, Direwolf, one of several Magic Knights in the game. Now, Direwolf isn't too challenging, but has some things that can give you issues if you don't prepare accordingly.
Strategy: The first being the debuffs it can inflict on a character. It has a Craft called Ground Buster, which will inflict a MOV and Speed debuff on a character and induce AT Delay when it hits. Getting a MOV debuff is about the worst thing that can happen to a character in this battle since all of the Magic Knight's attacks will push a character back by a decent margin. To account for this, Rean is equipped with a Yellow Pendulum to negate the stat lowering and a Dark Pendulum to the make the AT Delay a non-issue.
As I said before, all of Direwolf's attacks will push a character back a decent amount. So using Crafts that allow you move around the arena are excellent for this problem, especially if you're able to move before it's Ground Buster goes off.
Once it's HP reaches 50%, it'll enter it's Enhanced State, where it becomes much more dangerous and where the real battle begins. During it's Enhanced time, it'll use Dark Roar which grants it a buff in it's STR, ATS and SPD plus a self heal of around 1800-2000 HP which on it's own isn't a problem.
It doesn't hit too hard normally, but thanks to the buffs it gets from Dark Roar, that does change. So using a setup that's built for tanking damage was key here. Rean is equipped with the Impenetrable Shield quartz which gives him Earth Pulse to heal some HP even turn and La Crest to increase his DEF. He's also equipped with the Steel Bell quartz to decrease the delay after using Earth arts.
Iron Will is also good for tanking the damage if you're low on HP and need to stall so you can heal or setup other arts, but I didn't do that for this run.
Like I said before, it's Enhanced state allows it to buff and heal itself, but it also becomes much easier to break, so using Crafts that deal a lot of damage are useful during this time. Just be mindful of Crafts that have a long delay afterward like Helix. It's also weak to Earth arts, so be sure to utilize them if you have offense ones on hand.
But once it's down to around 5000 HP, feel free to buff your Attack and pop off and S-Craft to finish it off.
Modifications:
Used CE to make Rean the only party member
Background music edit
System: PC
Music: Swipe of Sword (Devil May Cry 4)