Gideon has a rather dark backstory in Octopath Traveler. He uses the blood of his kidnapped victims to create blood crystals as part of a dark ritual.
Gideon learned this technique from an abridged version of the tome Cyrus is searching for. Hence, it falls upon you to defeat him and save the people when you encounter Cyrus in Chapter 2 of Cyrus’ storyline.
Gideon location
You will face Gideon at the end of Cyrus’ Chapter 2 in Octopath Traveler. You will come to know that he has already captured several people in the Quarrycrest Mines. You will chase him into the Quarrycrest Sewers where the boss fight will take place.
Gideon weaknesses
Gideon can be easily exploited if you have different melee weapons. Gideon is weak against Blade, Dagger and Axe and he is also weak against elemental Light damage.
Gideon also summons his minions called Dancing Bones. These need to be defeated if you want to deal damage to Gideon. Dancing Bones are weak against Axe, Staff, Fire and Light.
Gideon special attacks
Gideon sometimes attacks directly but the damage is a lot and it is dealt to all the characters of your team. He also deals dark damage which can be devastating to the team. The Special Attacks Gideon Deals are as follows.
| Special Attacks | What They Do |
|---|---|
| Animate Bones | Summons two Dancing Bones which protect Gideon. They lock Gideon’s weaknesses until they are alive. |
| Hands of Darkness | Deals Heavy Dark Damage to the whole team. Chance of afflicting Blindness |
| Creepy Laugh | You do reduced physical and elemental damage. |
| Executioner | A single-target attack that does a lot of physical damage. |
The Dancing Bones deal three special attacks which are as follows.
| Special Attacks | What They Do |
|---|---|
| Terror Claw | Deals heavy damage to a single character. Chance of inflicting Curse status |
| Skull Toss | Deals heavy Damage to one character. More powerful than Terror Claw. |
| Bone Toss | Randomly hit three characters with moderate damage |
How to defeat Gideon in Octopath Traveler
Gideon has 7 shields and his lackeys have 4 shields. When the boss fight begins, Gideon will summon two Dancing Bones that will lock his weaknesses until they die.
Most of the damage coming to you from the enemy will be done by the Dancing Bones. Gideon will act as a backup by debuffing your characters or dealing Hands of Darkness and dealing Dark damage with a chance of inflicting Blindness.
In the fight, firstly defeat the Dancing Bones. They have less health and fewer shields than Gideon and can be easily defeated if you have team damage-dealing skills with you.
After the Dancing Bones are gone, the fight becomes easy. Because Gideon is weak against physical weapons, you can use BP to deal damage a maximum of 4 times and break Gideon in 1 turn without receiving any damage.
When he is broken, deal as much damage to him as possible but try to keep some Boost points available to break him again when he regenerates his shields. Repeat this cycle of breaking and dealing damage multiple times to defeat the Octopath Traveler Gideon easily.
Best party for Gideon
For the best party combination in this boss fight, Gideon and the Dancing Bones deal a lot of damage and you will need to rely heavily on healing items or healers. Thankfully, you can bring Ophilia into the fight as she will not only heal your teammates but deal light damage to Gideon. You can also summon a townsperson using Ophilia and he will deal physical damage aiding in breaking Gideon.
You can also bring Haanit with the axe in the fight. She is a hunter and can deal a lot more damage than Cyrus or Ophilia and is a key component in your fight.
Lastly, have Therion, with either Sword or dagger, in your team. He is useful because of his physical as well as heavy fire damage. This elemental damage can be useful in bringing down the Dancing Bones. He also inflicts debuffs on the enemies which will help a lot in the fight.
What else to bring to the fight?
In the fight, you can bring Healing Grapes with you because the enemy team deals a lot of damage. Also, Olive of Life can be a great help because Therion does not have much health and may fall because of the heavy damage of the Dancing Bones.
In this boss fight you will not need Soulstones and just defeat Gideon by Breaking him multiple times.
Gideon drops
- 2800 Leaves
- Gideon’s Dagger
- 2x Energizing Pomegranates
- 500 EXP
- 320 JP
