Ethereal Queen is the final boss of the Maze of Tribulations and the ultimate boss of the game. She is similar to Gabriel Celeste, in that, once you defeat her, she will power up on your second and third visits. The first time you face her, Ethereal Queen will be level 180 and it’s a good idea to be around that level as well. If you need to level, the Metal Scumbags in Indra’s Return will be more than sufficient enough to do the job. On subsequent visits, EQ will be level 220 and 255, respectively.

Equipment Preparations¶

Preparing for this boss will require you to do a bit of augmentation, as stock armor and accessories probably aren’t going to do wonders. If you haven’t done so yet, go to Alcazar of the Golden Age and purchase four Mythril Meshes from the vendor, as well as three Mystic Robes. These will be your base armors for all of the characters, as they have eight Augmentation slots, decent stats and don’t come with any Factors on them.

You’re also going to want to make a bunch of Elemental Leathers, around seven for each character, which honestly shouldn’t take too long, considering you can use six Wires (purchaseable on the ship). You’ll probably get a bunch of Solid Protectors from doing this, which will be used as a base for putting Factors onto the other armors. One of the better Factors for armor is from Heroism Potions, something you can easily farm from Kronos Commanders inside of Alcazar of the Golden Age (20% chance to reduce damage by 20%).

Basically, you put augment four Heroism Potions on a Solid Protector, then augment that onto a Mythril Mesh/Mystic Robe. After doing that, you can use the remaining seven slots to just put Elemental Leathers. This should have everyone with +38 in fire/ice/earth/wind resistance, and +10 in light/dark. For accessories, you will want those that have eight augment slots, which are as follows: Energy Crest, Arcane Crest, and the Energy/Arcane/Attack/Mind/Fortuity/Acuity Amulets. If you want to keep the one factor on those, feel free; otherwise, use a Nil Paint to remove it.

As for what factors to put on your accessories, that’s entirely up to you. For characters like Victor (who will be a tank in the battle), it might be a good idea to stack some DEF +% on them. For characters who will be attacking, ATK/INT +% are something you should use. A character like Miki could probably use something like more DEF, too. Note that Faerie Bands are good accessories for Miki and Fiore, as the MP regen is nice to offset their spell use (and the MP regen factor is unique to those accessories).

The last thing you will need is weapons to fight Ethereal Queen. Miki’s best weapon will be the “Ultimate” weapon building listed in the Augmentation section, as she should be doing nothing but healing. The character you control could have something like Fill Reserve Gauge +7 on his/her weapon (Heroism Potions), allowing you to use Fidel’s Reserve Rush more often. A character such as Fiore could have an elemental build, depending on which spells you use (EQ has slightly less resistance to ice); putting four Icicle Swords on her Dragon’s Den will make her ice spells do a lot more damage, especially if her INT is high.

Role Suggestions¶

Equally as important as equipment is the roles you equip to your characters. Each one will have a predefined set of roles that will make their AI play out much better, and should match the overall role your character will play. For example, if you opt for an ice build with Fiore, you could put Emissary of the Blue Sphere on her, which will increase her ice damage even more. The following are roles that fit the build for the battle in the video:

Battling Ethereal Queen¶

The battle against Ethereal Queen is a bit similar to Gabriel Celeste, with her having a lot of skills that can kill your characters, as well as a power up that happens whenever her health gets to a certain point. As with the majority of the bosses in the Maze of Tribulations, you will want to move your ranged characters away from EQ at the beginning of the battle. This will ensure that they stay alive during the initial onslaught, although she should stick to Victor with both Instigator and Princess, unless he happens to die.

Ethereal Queen has a few skills to watch out for at the start of the battle, one of which is Divine Wave . This is the same as Miki’s, although if you’ve never seen it, she’ll conjure light barriers around her that will shoot out in a straight line. While ranged characters should be more than fine if they get hit by one of the projectiles, melee characters might get smacked by more than one, dealing a lot more damage to them. The good thing about this attack is it’s guardable, so if you feel like someone might be in danger of dying, switch to them and hold down the guard button.

She also has access to Fire Bolt in her 2-winged form, which fire off three fireballs that will track the target. Since they only hit one character and they should be well-equipped with resistances, this shouldn’t hurt too much. Note that this attack is upgraded to Volcanic Burst and Explosion in the second and third battles with Ethereal Queen, which are much deadlier than the first tier version.

Another thing you will want to keep an eye on is if EQ uses Enshelter , Reflection and Enhance , as they will buff her. Use Fiore’s Void as soon as possible to remove these buffs. In the third iteration of this battle, she opts out of the previous moves to use Angel Feather . Seraphic Wings is similar to Divine Wave, in that, Ethereal Queen surrounds herself with feathers that will deal constant damage to those in range.

Empress Massacre is a single-target physical attack, so it shouldn’t be too bad since it only hits a single person. Sliver of Ruin is another physical attack, except this one hits three times, but it can be guarded against, making it a lot less threatening than Empress Massacre. Lastly, Sapphire Perdition is a blue laser beam that she will fire across the battlefield, but since it travels in a straight line, it can be easily avoided if you know who it’s targeting.

The biggest problem with the entire battle will come when Ethereal Queen’s HP drops to around 35% or so, as she will bring out her big guns. These two skills are called Celestial Star and Supernova . Celestial Star will have her summoning pillars of fire around her that deal massive damage; those far away and right next to her are safe. Supernova is similar to Gabriel’s Brutish Bolt, except it has a lot shorter range. Those caught in Supernova will most likely die, so get ready to revive them.

With a whopping 39 million HP, it will take a decent while to whittle down Ethereal Queen’s life bar. Emmerson is a good candidate for Berserker and your primary damage dealer, since you don’t have to be in harm’s way. Should characters start going down, you’re going to want to prioritize reviving Miki, Fiore and Victor over anyone else, in that order. With a proper setup, you should be able to easily bring down Ethereal Queen in no time.