The Last Hurrah: Conquering The Amane Route's Final Skirmishes v1.0

-Pepsiman

• Dyne-level spell
• Dyne-level spell
• Elemental (read: non-holy) dance spell

• Elemental jump corresponding to one dyne spell in the command set
• Elemental jump corresponding to the dance spell
• Victory Cry, or a similar auto-HP and/or MP regenerating ability

• Blitzkrieg, or a similar auto-power and/or magic-boosting ability

If you're like me and you're going into these battles using your main character as the boss killer, then you're free to relegate everyone else to supporting roles. Because of that, their levels can safely stay in the 60s. Non-boss demons only appear during the fight with the first Babel form, meaning you only have to worry about making everyone fight during that phase, which will be discussed momentarily. How you specifically have them set up is largely up to you; if the setups you had prior to Babel have worked fine, then you'll probably continue to be okay, too. Just be sure of the following two things:

• Your healers are equipped with Samarecam and fully or nearly fully-healing spell such as Affection (in the case of demons), Prayer, Diaraharn, or Mediaraharn. You're up against seven consecutive bosses with, again, no breaks whatsoever. Everybody needs to stay in tip-top shape, especially for the final fight against Babel's true form. As such, the healers and their demons should also have a large amount of MP at their disposal. You probably won't be healing after every turn, but the higher tier healing spells eat up a lot of MP and you can't particularly afford to run out of any. Having a Blood Wine+healing spell combo may be handy for the healers as well, although it isn't necessary if the fights are going smoothly enough.
• Most, if not all, of the demons you bring with them are in the 60s for levels. This is for continued survival without a need to revive constantly more than anything else. The battle with Babel's first form in particular can be taxing on the other characters since lesser demons can keep coming again and again in waves if things aren't ending quickly enough. Once you've crossed that hurdle, you can breathe a little bit easier, but in the meantime, your demons should be properly prepared to take some abuse and also dish out plenty with the right elemental spells. By this point, it should be a given that dyne and Jump spells are your best friends for these times, especially when coupled with passive null elemental abilities that eliminate any damage that may have to be bounced back.

While you'll probably get the most mileage out of your magic-using characters, don't be afraid to bring in someone whose main emphasis is physical attacks, especially if they have Physical Drain equipped as one of their passive abilities. That sort of character is actually quite handy for the first Babel phase for reasons that will be detailed later.

The first form of Babel is different from all of the other bosses which come after it in that it still has other demons coming after you. None of the other bosses afterwards, including Babel's actual form, force you to contend with additional demons, making swiftness in defeating the boss itself your main priority so the other demons don't bother everyone for long. Babel's first form is also the only opportunity you have to set up your party one last time. Once you get down and dirty, you're stuck with the spells you give them, excluding any that you might go for at the last minute via skill cracking, so be sure that everyone is set up in precisely the way you like before you hit that "Dispatch" command.

It should also be noted that this fight is the only one where you can pre-determine where on the field your teammates start; the rest are either pre-determined (Beldr and Belial) or simply have everyone positioned in the same spots they were at when the previous boss is re-defeated (everyone after Beldr and Belial). Because of how the possible positions are set up for this first Babel fight, you'll have to put at least one team member on the opposite side of everyone else. For the smoothest ride, I recommend putting the main character and all healers on the right side of the field and then placing anyone else on the left. In fact, if you have that physical fighter with Physical Drain equipped that I mentioned earlier, then definitely put them on the left side. The reasoning for doing this is a bit unconventional, but very handy nonetheless: Most of the leaders of the demon teams on the left side are prone to resorting to physical attacks when their teammates are conquered. You can use this to not only keep your physical fighter alive for quite some time, but also to actually delay the respawning time for all the demons to reemerge onto the field. If there is either one or no demon team left standing, they'll automatically respawn again after a few turns, forcing you to keep them occupied again so they don't impede your main character. To prevent that, you can use your physical fighter to keep two of them continually busy by simply guarding and letting them mainly hit you with harmless physical attacks, as well as occasional force ones that shouldn't do that much damage. This isn't a necessary strategy by any means, since it's definitely possible to defeat Babel's first form before the respawning, but it can help quite a lot.

As for everyone else, up until you reach Babel itself, operate as efficiently as possible when taking down demons that get in your way. This may mean you'll have to rely on the main character a lot, but that shouldn't be a problem if he's equipped with HP and MP-regenerating skills already. Once you take down the three demon teams that are on your path, your main concern is naturally going to be Babel. Unlike previous bosses, this form of Babel only has a range of three spaces, which limits its attack area to the upper area in front of it and the slope immediately attached to that. This makes it pretty easy to position your healers close to the main character if they have spells like Affection at their disposal, so place them on the lowel level right next to the slope and keep them there for as long as possible. Try to avoid having them get on the slope or on the upper platform with the main character as much as possible; not only does that make it probable that they'll accrue unnecessary damage, but it also allow Babel to have a free heal, since it automatically regains around 300 HP after every fight.

As for the main character, have him use his elemental Dance attack exclusively and ideally have the demons do the same as well if they have Dances equipped, although dyne attacks will also work fine. You should be able to take off at least several hundred HP from Babel per fight, which prevents its auto-healing from being much of a problem. Of course, Double Up will also ensure that you finish off Babel in a timely manner. As long as the main character and his demon's HP and MP stay afloat with the help of their own abilities and the healers' spells, Babel should be pretty tolerable to deal with. So long as everything goes down fairly smoothly, it only takes a few turns to make it go away.

I also want to mention that while you can crack the Anti-All skill from Babel and get strong resistances to all conventional attack types (ie: not almighty), it's probably best to not equip the main character with it. He's best set up to be as offensive as possible with his magic and equipping Anti-All means that one of his already vital Passive Skills has to probably go. At his level anyway, the damage he gets shouldn't be so terribly dramatic that Anti-All is required anyway; just keep focusing on beating the other bosses quickly with what you already have so you can take on Babel's second form at full throttle.

All right, now for the real fight you came for in the first place. In terms of sheer level and power, he's a much more serious customer than everybody else you've just fought; the thing is level 77, comes packing with Megidolaon, and can also physically attack everyone on your side of the field simultaneously. Oh, and his range is limitless, meaning he can pretty much attack anyone he pleases if you inadvertently let him. The odds aren't stacked in your favor and this is especially true if you've reached this point with little HP and MP left. However, the great thing is that this Babel form actually has a weakness, which you need to absolutely exploit and the reasoning is two-fold: In battle, Babel automatically gets an extra turn and taking advantage of his weakness deprives him of that. But also, as long as you're continually successful at exploiting that weakness within battle, Babel's turn will keep getting pushed to the end of the line, especially when you have a demon with Double Up, preventing Babel from attacking first and going after whomever it pleases. This allows you to make the main character go on the offensive for the entirety of the battle and makes the issue of keeping everyone alive a much easier issue than initially expected.

So what is Babel's weakness? It actually depends. When you're first allowed to fight it, its weakness is lightning and it can stay that way as long as you never let Babel get a turn to attack first. In fact, if you did equip your other demons or yourself with Ziodyne or Electric Dance beforehand, that's all you should ever use while fighting, even if a Jump spell isn't attached to it. You need to exploit that weakness to prevent him from ever being able to have his turn and as long as you're consistent with it and can keep the HP and MP afloat, it should be doable. This is imporatant because it's ultimately the strategy that needs to be employed in order to ensure your healers stay alive and are able to assist you at a moment's notice.

If Babel does get a turn, his weakness will change to something else soon afterwards; typically it's to fire. In that case, then it's a matter of abusing that weakness and then ensuring Babel never gets another turn. Persevere with the weakness and use healers whenever necessary; that should be enough to beat it once and for all. Also, don't worry about sending any of your other party members in to fight Babel as well. As long as the main character is properly prepared for the fight with both offensive spells mixed in with MP-regenerating passive ones, he should be sufficient to take Babel down on his own. Once you've beaten this form of Babel, congrats, because you've finally beaten the game on the Amane route. A huzzah is probably in order, especially for those who suffered in making it through entirely in one piece. I, for one, know it took me more attempts than I'd rather recall. But now you've made it, so you can sit back and see what happens to everybody afterwards and then get access to New Game Plus perks.

I've attempted previous gameplay guides in the past, but they've been far too large for me to really find the motivation to complete them, which is why I'm glad I could at least write a smaller-scale one for one of the more troublesome areas of Devil Survivor. The Amane ending route is probably one that's not intended to be experienced on your first run through the game and its difficulty is very indicative of that. I, unwittingly, learned that the hard way and thought that I should churn out a guide for it, since finding specific strategic information about it so soon after the game's release can be a fairly hard endeavor. To that end, I thank you for reading this and if this work helped you conquer that dastardly final area of the game, then I'm pleased to have helped. I know I couldn't have managed it myself without some online help, however scarce it was at the time.

Until next time,

Pepsiman