Vanessa is not as difficult as other bosses you may have faced or will face in Octopath Traveler but if you are not careful, the fight can get out of hand.
Vanessa is an Apothecary, just like Alfyn Greengrass. In the beginning, Vanessa and Alfyn were good friends but Vanessa got greedy and started to give medicines with side effects.
Vanessa would charge a fortune for the cure for these side effects. After Alfyn found out what Vanessa was doing, he tried his very best to stop her.
Vanessa location
Vanessa can be found in the Caves of Azure which you will go to in Chapter 2 of Alfyn’s story after finding out about her whereabouts. You just need to speak with her to start the boss fight.
Vanessa weaknesses
Vanessa is a simple foe and only has one set of weaknesses but with a twist. When the battle starts, she will summon two Sellswords. You cannot exploit her weaknesses until you have defeated both the Sellswords. She will also recall more Sellswords when her turn comes and there are no Sellswords left.
The Sellswords have less health than Vanessa but deal more deadly blows. Sellswords’ weaknesses are Sword, Bow, Ice, and Light. Once you are ready to target Vanessa, her weaknesses are Spear, Axe, Fire, Wind, and Dark.
Vanessa special attacks
Vanessa is an Apothecary and deals in concocts. She does not even deal more damage than the Sellswords she summons but she does inflict a lot of concocts which can do a variety of curses, stuns, or even enhance the abilities of herself and her minions.
| Special Attacks | What Do They Do |
|---|---|
| Concoct Stimulant | Gives a buff of Increased Physical Attack to Vanessa and all Sellswords for 4 turns. |
| Concoct Sedative | Enchanted on one character and has a chance of inflicting Sleep. |
| Concoct Poison | Cast on a single character to give a chance of inflicting poison. |
| Concoct Explosive | Cast on the entire party and deals Fire damage |
| Concoct Restorative | Used to call more Sellswords when previous ones are defeated. Can either call Sellswords or not. |
| Huff and Puff | Targets one enemy and deals more damage than her normal attack. |
Special Attacks of Sellswords are as follows.
| Special Attacks | What Do They Do |
|---|---|
| Slice | Deals physical attack on one character |
| Sideswipe | Deals physical attack on all characters. |
How to defeat Vanessa
Vanessa can only be defeated if you have defeated her minions. Try to stun her when you have defeated the Sellswords so that you can defeat her more easily and refrain from calling in more Sellswords.
Best party for Vanessa
For good party combination, try to keep H’aanit for her hunter job and Cyrus Albright for his scholar job. You will already have Alfyn in this fight by default. You can keep Ophilia for her Cleric job.
In this party, H’aanit will be useful as it will use her Arrowstorm or Rain of Arrows. This can prove useful against Sellswords and easily kill them without much effort.
Cyrus will be useful as he can inflict high fire damage to Vanessa with the Fire Strom. Ophilia can be used for her Luminance spells which will inflict high light damage to Sellswords. Also, Blizzard can be useful to remove shields from all enemies.
What else to bring to the fight?
The fight against Vanessa is not as hard as many other fights and with the team above and the spells, there is rarely a hard time that you might face. But for safekeeping have a Wakeful Stone with Alfyn so that he does not sleep when Vanessa uses the Concoct Sedative.
