Bravely series

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Red Mages vs Chapter 1 bosses:


Ba’al Urchin:  Some Specials stocked up from grinding levels worked well, along with Drain spells.  Drain has 25 power, which is slightly stronger than Fire, Blizzard, and Thunder.


Jackal & 2 minions:  The minions are weak to Thunder.  Revenge gave me BP to take out Jackal’s friends with Thundara, and Chainspell Cure provided the healing.  Jackal went into -4 BP to use his HP draining physical attack Steal Breath, which took out Edea and Magnolia.  Don’t underestimate the Thief class in this game just because it’s weak in FF5.  Thieves are the best physical attackers you can get for a while if you equip Bows that take advantage of DEX instead of STR.   The level 1 Rod Special Piercing Bolt is overpowered on any class that has a high Rod rating, and Red Mages can use its Magic Attack buff!
(I wanted to fight DeRosa in Chapter 5 instead of 1.  You all want to see Red Mage vs. Red Mage at their maximum potentia!)

 
Norzen:  Astrologian is one of the worst classes in the game considering only its own abilities and stats.  It’s slow, it’s frail, and all of its spells are single target buffs.  Sure, its innate ability gives those buffs priority in the turn order, but when later bosses Dispel those buffs, what have you got?  At least Performer can buff your whole team at once.  Professor Norzen is false advertising for the Astrologian class.  He makes you think you can take out enemies with one punch after using Physical Boon.  His other attack is a Wind spell that hits your whole team.  You can survive that one by Defaulting at least.  Norzen has no weaknesses, so Red Mages win this fight by casting random –ara spells, chugging Ethers, and using Piercing Bolt when it’s available. 
 

Kamiizumi & 3 minions:  Kamiizumi was the first fight that required a change of tactics in this playthrough.  His minions are fast and can Confuse your party members with their attacks.  Don’t try to Default to 3 BP during this part.  Kill Kamiizumi’s allies with Thundara on turn 1 instead.  After they’re dead, you need to be more cautious.  Kamiizumi tends to alternate between two Swordmaster counter moves.  Nothing Ventured activates when someone hits him for physical attacks, and Before Swine is the magical version.  If you attack him with only one party member per round, you reduce the risk of him countering your team to death.  Sometimes he will Brave into negative BP and use his regular attack with the Multitask passive that gives Swordmasters a chance for extra hits. 
   
 
 
Minette & Bismarck:  The Red Mages were about level 16-17 when the recommended level range for the Harena Sea Caves is 17-21.  Normally, this is one of the more difficult bosses in the early game.  Red Mages made it easy, but that's due to having -ara spells before you normally get level 4 magic.  Bismarck the lion was the first priority, because it can hit with powerful physical attacks and inflict Dread status on your party.  A character with Dread cannot Brave or Default.  “Oh no, I have to take one action per turn like a normal RPG!”   Minette tries to put your characters to sleep, but making sure to equip store-bought Clothespins nullifies that.

Status ailments are almost useless against most Bravely Second bosses.  If you’re using Patissiers, you’ll usually want to go with debuffs instead.  However, their minions are sometimes susceptible to ailments, and so one of the Red Mages poisoned Bismarck with an added effect from a Piercing Bolt.  A few Firas took him out.  For some reason, Minette the Catmancer is weak to Water.  Unlike Final Fantasy, Water and Ice are the same element.
 

Amphisbaena:  Come to this fight loaded for bear.  That means preparing your highest level physical Special for mages and buying attack items for physical jobs.  Amphisbaena has two heads that are healed by either physical or magical damage, and they’ll switch places if you take too long to kill one.  If only one head is alive, it will revive the other after a couple of turns.  Both heads can hit your party with an attack that inflicts poison, so equip Star Pendants.  It took two attempts with the Red Mages, and in both fights, Edea died on turn 1.  It’s probably because she changed her name’s pronunciation to sound like “idiot” without the “t”.  Both heads are weak to the Ice element, so set up your Specials accordingly.  Because my short-term memory is terrible, I forgot to change my Specials and I didn’t switch from bows to rods when the physical head was dead.  Red Mages only have C in bows, but they have higher DEX than STR.

If Red Mage with all its spells early sounds silly, consider Time Mages that don't get their starting magic until Chapter 4!  That, and fixed damage attack items like Pantheon's Wrath are stronger than Chainspell -ara spells at this point.  Attack items are the Bravely version of breaking elemental rods in Final Fantasy 5.

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Chapter 2 update time!

Profiteur & 3 minions:  He says he’s “in ze red” after you beat him, but I didn’t equip that ability.  I should have, considering I went into negative BP towards the end of the fight.  Profiteur’s allies can put you to sleep, which I had forgotten.   Thundaras and a leftover Holy Weapon special knocked them out.  Profiteur has no elemental weaknesses, and his Takeover move is a fixed 400 damage attack because it’s based on character level.  Throwing money at the problem should be left to Final Fantasy 5 Samurais.  The Merchant is probably the worst class in Bravely Second after it lost its Low Leverage buff skill from Bravely Default.
 
Aimee:   Red Mages have a tough time with her until you figure out what to do.  Aimee starts the battle by using Condor, a buff that makes her attacks ignore Default.  Maverick hits a single target at the end of the turn hard enough to for a one hit KO most of the time.  Sidewinder is the most dangerous of all, and can easily wipe out your whole team at once if combined with Condor.  Of course, Sidewinder is underwhelming when the player uses it.  In my Hawkeye playthrough, I used Sparrow most  of the time instead, which is a physical attack that deals magical damage.

My party was destroyed the first few times, then I decided to level up into the recommended range for that dungeon and prepare my Specials.  It would be a bit corny to kill her with 4 Holy Weapons at the start of the fight, so I made a compromise plan that would work with the Red Mages’ abilities.  Withering Wave, the level 2 Rod Special, was the answer.  If you have the right parts from Fort-Lune, you can add physical attack reduction and elemental weaknesses to your debuff Specials.  After casting Fira many times, the Red Mages beat Aimee.  This may be the key to the rest of the playthrough.  When a class normally gets its endgame spells halfway through Chapter 2, you have to learn a few tricks. 
 

Artemia & 3 Bone Hunters:  Everyone in this fight is weak to Fire, so have everyone cast Fira on the first turn to wipe out the 3 undead enemies.  Artemia will often Default and then either use Targeting on one of your characters, or use Multiburst, a watered-down version of X-Fight from Final Fantasy 5.  Near the end of the fight, she may Multiburst twice in a row, so be sure to Default if you see her with BP above zero.  No Specials were required for this fight, probably because Ranger is a bad class.  Most of the Ranger’s abilities are attacks like “Bug Slayer” and “Plant Slayer” that only apply to random encounters.

 
Geyser Grotto: The Baths of War in Geyser Grotto-East is the worst part of the game for single class playthroughs.  It puts your entire team in Berserk status against enemies that can often kill one of your party members in one hit.  This is a case where I’d say it’s okay to break the rules if you don’t want to be overleveled for the rest of the game.  After dying with Red Mages at level 30 with bows and the best physical armor at that point, I switched to Thieves. . .and died again.  The second time I tried with Thieves, I forgot to change their equipment.  The Thieves were whacking the enemies with Noxious Rods, and then it turned out that the enemies could take about 260 damage per turn if hit with its poison effect.  Out of pure spite for the developers, I leveled up the Red Mages to 36 and decided to take a crack at the “berserk room” using my variant rules.  Yew and Magnolia survived the fight!   



Janne:  Janne without Nikolai’s healing is just another physical boss.  Withering Wave and Fira defeated him quickly.  Unfortunately, Magnolia decided not to go first that turn, so the first few Firas couldn’t take advantage of the Special.  Semi-random turn order is a bad idea.  Why do RPGs keep doing it when Pokemon got it right?     
 

Angelo:  He may think he’s being clever by putting Magnolia into Ghost status, but that made her an invincible Red Mage!  Ghost status is unique to Bravely Second, and prevents the use of anything but spells, Brave, and Default.  Those afflicted by it are considered at to be at zero health and dead, so 4 Ghosts means Game Over.  Finding the cure for it is the main plot in Chapter 2.  Defeating him was simple with Withering Wave and Firas.


 
“Heinkel” & 3 minions:  I got a Game Over on my first attempt because I didn’t go all out on Turn 1.  Much like the previous game, Heinkel’s weak to Thunder.  No need for Withering Wave when you can have everyone Brave 4 times on the first turn and take advantage of In The Red bonuses.  By the way, it’s not actually Heinkel, but Whitson impersonating him.  The same thing happens if you fight “Kikyo” instead.
 


Superd’nought Baël, Sergeant Sapp, & Private Piddler:  This was a tough boss on my first playthrough because I wasn’t used to the game mechanics.  Bravely Second is a lot like Final Fantasy 5 where it can be challenging until you know what the overpowered skills are.  Sapp and Piddler will be revived after a few turns when you knock them out, but it’s still a good idea to keep them out of the fight to avoid extra attacks per round.  Withering Wave and In The Red boosted Firas did the job again.  Defeat Baël quickly, or it'll charge up a powerful physical attack late in the fight.  Bravely Second favors offensive play in general.

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Chapter 3 update!


3 Imperial soldiers in Florem:  They’re nameless enemies, but they can hit hard with physical attacks if you’re not prepared for them.  The usual Withering Wave and Fira tactic worked.  You can buy Fire-enhancing rods in Florem too.
 

Barras Lehr & Swetti Tracsute:  My first attempt ended in failure because I killed Tracsute first.  Kill Barras first, because he’ll use Invigorate to kill your whole party when he’s low on health if you don’t.  Tracsute has much less HP, and is susceptible to status ailments if you have those skills.  Monks are almost the same as they were in Bravely Default, but a Monk challenge would be much more viable in this game.  Bravely Default is stingy with Elixirs, and in Second they’re merely expensive.  For a high health and low defense class, that gives much more survivability.  You don’t reset your Special triggers when you switch weapon types in Second either, which lets them use healing and buff moves without sacrificing power.  Fist triggers were really annoying in Default since they required X number of critical hits per use. 


 
Barbarossa & 2 Death Pirates:  Trying to rush Barbarossa made my first attempt fail.  This pirate is too sturdy to be taken out with one round of 4 Brave Firas.  He uses physical attacks that debuff your stats, and Double Damage is usually enough to KO a character in one hit.  He often Braves into negative BP when he attacks, which renders him helpless for a turn or two afterwards.  The Death Pirates are undead and can be killed with Raise or Phoenix Downs.  This has a chance to fail, so Raise only killed one of them on my successful second attempt.  The Red Mage BP gaining passives and In The Red helped as usual.  Red Mages are meant for a risky playstyle if you look at their abilities.  If you’re doing a normal playthrough, try combining Red Mage passives with the Freelancer’s Stand Ground or Ghost status.      

 
Geist:  If you’re using hyper offense up to this point, Geist will make you rethink your strategy.  He is an Exorcist, which is a gimmick class by the standards of other RPGs.  Exorcists can “Undo” previous actions in combat.  This can range from healing themselves to killing party members revived on the previous turn.  Their level 11 ability undoes HP and MP loss at the end of every turn, which sounds overpowered enough to make a solo run viable with only this class’s abilities.

On the first phase of the fight, hit Geist as hard as you can on turn 1.  He heals himself after he loses a certain amount of HP, and this triggers the second phase of the battle where your HP and MP are fully restored.  To make up for his lack of direct attack power, Geist has 3 sniper minions that can respawn after a few turns when he uses Reinforcements.  Use a Magnifying Glass on him to keep track of his HP.  Once you get below a certain threshold, Brave 4 times with every character and go all-out.  For my Red Mage party, this meant Withering Wave, In the Red, and Firas.
 


Vucub Caquix:  A transforming mech that’s healed by elemental damage ought to end any mage challenge, right?  Private Piddler and Sergeant Sapp didn’t account for debuffs that turn immunities into weaknesses!  Use Withering Wave and Brave 4 times with In The Red Chainspell Fira on the next turn.
 


Nikolai, Kaiser’s Defender, & 2 Kaiser’s Lancers:  This fight was more annoying than it should have been because I had one of those days where everything feels off.  Be sure to heal right after the Vucub Caquix fight, since you run into Nikolai when you try to leave the Water Crystal room.  I discovered on one of my failed attempts that Nikolai can be poisoned, but 200 HP per turn isn’t worth the risk.  The Bishop’s Good Measure passive ability lets him use “Lightning Lightning” to deal heavy damage to your whole party.  He will Default on the turn before doing this.  I had forgotten that he regains all his health once he loses 30,000 damage to him, which was a nasty surprise when I Brave rushed him on an early attempt.  He also loses any elemental weakness you applied to him, so you’ll need at least 2 Withering Waves prepared.  Physical parties have to make sure that he doesn’t have Holy Night status before they attack to avoid healing the boss for thousands of HP.

CORRECTION:  Holy Night heals Nikolai if you attack him when he's Defaulting.  I only learned this later when I checked the spell description in the shop because I used White Mage more than Bishop in my first playthrough.

 


Alternis Dim & 2 Dark Squires:  It took a few tries to set up my Specials properly because I never realize my mistakes until it’s too late.  Grandship sells rods that increase Ice damage, and I thought adding a Speed reduction part to Withering Wave would help.  When attempting to fight Alternis Dim at about level  41, the semi-random turn order got my party killed even with the Speed debuff.  The recommended level range for the Skyhold goes up to 49, so I grinded until the team was at 47.  Alternis Dim becomes more powerful when he loses health and can use Dark Nebula to hit your entire party.  The Dark Squires have Minus Strike, known as ???? in Final Fantasy 5.  Minus Strike is a fixed damage move that hits a single target for the amount of HP that the user has lost, so don’t leave a Dark Squire alive for more than one round when you choose to attack.

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Here's the update for Chapter 4 and the beginning of Chapter 5.

Revenant & 3 minions:  Guardians have a unique “Soul Power” gauge.  Soul Power increases whenever an enemy hits a Guardian, and it’s used for their physical attack skills.  They can also possess other characters to gain HP, MP, and Soul Power.  This doesn’t work on bosses, but Revenant used it on me like Wrexsoul from Final Fantasy 6. 

A Blizzara exorcised Revenant from one of my possessed party members.  The staff-wielding minion can cast Stop, which was annoying when he used it on Edea.  The Red Mage party used Withering Wave and Blizzara as usual, and took out Revenant before the second wave of minions.
 
Janne:  It was mostly the same as the previous fights with Yew’s rival, but he hit harder this time.  He used Fencer stances to buff his stats and then attacked with Goring Aurochs and Wolf Fang.  Goring Aurochs sometimes knocked out a character from full health, but Defaulting blunted his other moves.  After Braving twice, he was stuck at negative BP and could do nothing that round.  I used that opportunity to heal with Curada and debuff him with Withering Wave.  A few Blizzara rushes with In The Red bonuses defeated Janne. 

 
Anne:  This is a point of no return.  If you need to grind, buy items, or prepare Specials, go back and do it now!  Anne will turn all random encounters into Ba’als at the end of Chapter 4.  Weaker classes will have a lot of trouble if you don’t follow this advice.  I learned that the hard way in my Hawkeye challenge. 

Anne attacked the Red Mages with physical attacks such as The Pointy End and You Sicken Me, which has a chance to poison.  Dark Flare was weaker due to the Red Mage's Magic Defense.  She created shadow clones that would attack every time a fake Anne took damage.  To identify the real one, I looked for the one that had buffs and debuffs.  My first attempt ended in failure because I didn’t go all-out with Yew.  On the second try, it turned out Anne had less HP than I expected for a climactic boss.
 

Chapter 5


Kaiser Oblivion:  The prologue built him up to be an unstoppable super boss.  He was so pathetic in Chapter 5 that it’s a wonder Agnès, Alternis Dim, and Braev Lee lost to him  Kaiser Oblivion used Noble Eagle on the first turn, which gave him 200% Physical Attack and Magical Attack.  Kaiser abilities affect the entire battlefield, so he buffed my party too.  This gave me a free turn to use Withering Wave.  On the second turn, the Red Mages Brave rushed him.  It only took two party members to kill him with Chainspell Blizzaras.  If the fight lasts longer than it did for the Red Mages, Kaiser Oblivion will mostly hit you with his regular attack.
 
Bella & Cu Chulainn:  My Hawkeyes had a terrible time with this fight due to their weak defenses and slow speed, and that was with their overpowered level 11 ability Crossfire.  Red Mages fared better.  If you let the battle drag on too long, Bella will use Spirit with the Mist Spellcraft on your party, which makes you take non-elemental magic damage at the end of each round.  The Red Mages never gave her that chance, because on the first turn, she decided to use Spirit with Wall Spellcraft instead.  Silly Bella!  Did you really think Red Mages would use physical attacks on Cu Chulainn?  Cu Chulainn used single target physical attacks like always.
 
Chapter 5 Sidequests

In Chapters 1-4, you choose which Asterisk Holder to fight in each sidequest.  Chapter 5 resets the timeline so you can take the alternate route of a sidequest and fight the hard version of its boss.  Chapter 5 is enough of a difficulty spike that I make an exception for every variant playthrough to save time and sanity.  To grind levels, JP, and money quickly, go to Grapp Keep, equip either the Patissier’s Items For All ability or the Freelancer’s Halfsies, and use Phoenix Downs on the undead enemies to get win streaks.  This also helps to prepare Special moves, since Defaulting 20 times against prologue enemies isn’t going to work anymore.
 
Mephilia, Legion Impaler, Legion Mage, & Legion Archer:  This is the boss you fight if you side with Kamiizumi in the Gho Gettar sidequest.  Mephilia’s minions can inflict confusion and silence, so I took them out with area of effect Blizzaras first.  Mephilia attacked the Red Mages with either regular attacks or the Dark elemental summon Susano-o.  Mephilia could only respawn 2 minions at a time, which made the fight a bit easier.  She had enough health and resistance to magic that I needed to use a Magnifying Glass on her to know when to Brave rush.  It took several failed attempts for me to get that right.

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Praline a la Mode, Praline Enthusiast, Praline Devotee, & Praline Admirer:  Bravely Second continues the Japanese video game tradition of naming characters after food.  If you say that Praline should not have the rights to Arca Pellar’s song, you fight her instead of Barbarossa. 
 
Praline is a Performer, a job that specializes in buffing the party like Bards in Final Fantasy games.  Peace Rings saved several of my characters from being confused by the fans’ attacks.  A Withering Wave followed by Blizzaras will take out the minions, and Praline will fall to a few Brave rushes.  She can respawn her allies with Adoring Fans and her physical attack can knock out a party member if she buffs her offense.
 
Einheria & Rhea Veeling:  The translators misnamed Rhea Veeling.  She’s too conservatively dressed for that pun to work.  If you agree with Swetti Tracsute’s co-education policy in the Florem school sidequest, you get this boss fight instead of Berras Lehr.  Einheria is a Valkyrie, the equivalent of the Final Fantasy Dragoon.
 
She often used High Jump to dodge my attacks, and was impossible to target a character in the air.  Einheria was slow enough to prevent High Jump from making the fight too difficult.  I took advantage of High Jump and knocked Rhea out during Einheria’s absence.  Rhea cast Shadow on the party for Dark elemental damage.  When Einheria was low on health, she cast Spirit Barrier to make my attacks drain her MP instead of her HP.  Chainspell Blizzaras punched through the Spirit Barrier quickly.  Einheria’s most dangerous move was Crescent Moon, which hit all party members for physical damage at the cost of 1 BP.
 
Kikyo:  If you say Sholmes should be a police inspector in the Starkfort detective case, you’ll fight “Kikyo”, who’s really Shomes’s sidekick Whitson in disguise.  The Ninja Asterisk Holder was one of the easiest fights in the game for the Red Mage group, even with his Chapter 5 upgrade.  On the first turn, he Defaulted, giving me a chance to use Withering Wave and one Chainspell Blizzara for the other three characters.  Then a Blizzara In the Red Brave rush defeated him on turn 2.  Ninjas are a much bigger problem for physical jobs because Utsusemi is guaranteed to block one of their attacks.
 
Ominas Crowe & Bahamut:  No, it’s not the Bahamut from Final Fantasy!  Ominas Crowe will fight you if you side with Artemia in the Grapp Keep sidequest.  He was durable for a Black Mage!  Bahamut was already weak to Water without having to apply a debuff, and he seemed to have less health, so I knocked him out first.  Both were too sturdy to take out with one Brave rush.  Equipping the Icefire Shield on Magnolia let her heal the rest of the team safely with Curada while Ominas and Bahamut were pelting the team with Fire spells and breaths.  Ominas learned a trick from Sullla and other Final Fantasy 5 variant players, and sometimes healed Bahamut by casting Firaga. 
 
Holly Whyte & 2 Nurses-in-Training:  If you convince one unmemorable sidequest character to sell his land to Profiteur, you’ll fight the White Mage Asterisk Holder.  The Nurses-in-Training can be defeated with 3 area of effect Chainspell Blizzaras after using Withering Wave.  Holly hit the Red Mages with her staff and occasionally used Holy.  Holy wasn’t as strong as its Final Fantasy counterpart, and only succeeded in putting the Red Mages in critical HP.  Curaga only healed her for a laughable 2200 HP or so.   Magnolia was the designated healer as usual.  Being slightly faster than the other characters tended to relegate her to support duty.  If I were smart, I would have equipped Magnolia with the Lustrous Shield to make her immune to Holy.
 
Khamer & 2 Khamer Footmen:  If you agree to support Alternis Dim’s hyperinflation-inducing poor laws, you’ll fight Khamer.  When the cartoonish Time Mage Asterisk Holder from Bravely Default makes more sense, you know the writing staff failed.  The Khamer Footmen blinded the Red Mages, which was pointless when they were never using physical attacks in the first place!  Their Prey On Weak attack was more concerning because it occasionally knocked out one of my characters.  Khamer alternated between regular attacks, Stop, and several attack spells.  Quara was a weak Earth elemental spell that mostly resulted in giving my Red Mages Revenge BP.  Meteor worried me much more, but its random targeting worked in my favor.  Magnolia was on healing detail once again.  Maybe I should equip her with a staff soon to increase her Mind.  Mind governs healing in this series, not Magic Attack.  Chainspell Blizzara was the answer like always.

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Fiore DeRosa & 2 Mage Apprentices:  The sleaziest character from Bravely Default returns as a mad scientist.  If you oppose his magical research in the desert sidequest, you’ll fight the Red Mage Asterisk Holder instead of Jackal. 

It’s the battle all. . .two people reading this thread have been waiting for!  Red Mage vs. Red Mage!
My party took out the Mage Apprentices early on by spreading Blizzara damage, and DeRosa never respawned them.  He wasn’t the most threatening boss, but he was annoying to kill because he kept casting healing spells on himself and attacking my party with Drain.  I was more worried about running out of Turbo Ethers in a war of attrition than being wiped out from a powerful attack. 

He had the Revenge passive too, and often got extra BP whenever my Red Mages cast Blizzara on him.  Sometimes, he would use regular attacks.  Captivating Cologne charmed Yew once, but Magnolia cured that with Esuna.  Equipping a staff improved Magnolia’s Curadas, which helped a bit.  For the final Brave rush, she equipped two Rods of Ice and cast Blizzara along with everyone else.  Turns out four Red Mages with abilities you aren’t supposed to have until Chapter 6 could beat one Red Mage who can’t Chainspell.
 



Revenant & Geist:  Geist for some reason has only 45,000 HP on Hard in the reset timeline.  This was low enough for 3 characters to take him out with one Brave rush with Blizzara.  Revenant KOd Yew and Edea with a Soul Cannon and possessed Tiz for a few turns.   This left only Magnolia alive, so she Braved a few times to revive everyone with Phoenix Downs and cast Curada.  Then he possessed Tiz again, so I cast Blizzara on him with Magnolia.  After that, he decided to possess Magnolia, and Tiz again a couple of times.  After using Withering Wave, he possessed a character and cured his debuff.  Piercing Bolt was more useful to me.  At least he couldn’t possess his way out of direct damage! 


Possession makes me wonder about the viability of solos using only one class.  Can Revenant possess a solo character causing an instant Game Over?  I’m not sure.  Even multiclass solos would have a problem with that.  Jump only activates at the end of the turn.  High Jump costs 2 BP, and Hasten World doesn’t exist in this game.




 
Aimee & Angelo:  Aimee and Angelo made a better team than any other boss fight in the game, except for maybe Ominas and Bahamut.  Angelo debuffed my party’s defense and Fire resistance with his Items For All cakes, while Aimee enchanted her gun to exploit it.  Angelo sometimes attacked with Flambé, which did little damage because it’s an early game ability.  That, and Magnolia was equipped with the Icefire Shield.  Angelo turned Tiz into a ghost, which made me laugh because now he was an invincible mage who could regain MP with Aspir.  Several of the bosses in this game never figured out that I was using a purely magical party. 


The other three party members who were “alive” were still in danger, especially when Aimee used Shrike, a delayed attack that causes 150% damage.  My team Blizzara rushed her because Shrike fails when the user is dead.  Angelo wasted his turns debuffing me while my team was at negative BP, and fell to another Brave rush.  And the kicker is that I don’t have to cure Ghost status in a cutscene this time!  Tiz could go through the rest of the game as a Ghost.  I might as well, because this is the first mage single class challenge that I’ve played.  Red Mages get the "Free MP in a Pinch" passive that works well with Ghosts too. . .


Minette & Bismarck:  No!  The game “revived” Tiz in a cutscene during the battle and cured his Ghost status.     Now I have to play honestly.  The rematch was similar to the Chapter 1 fight.  I finally remembered to equip the proper accessories for once, so Minette couldn’t put the Red Mages to sleep.  Bismarck’s Dread status was annoying, but Red Mages have Esunaga to deal with that.  Blizzaras dealt with them like any other boss.    
 


Janne & Nikolai:  This is the final battle with them, I promise!  Janne went down quickly to a Blizzara Brave rush on turn 2, but Nikolai was tougher.  My party fell short on a Brave rush against him, and he decided to cast Sacrifice.  This killed him, but also killed my entire party resulting in a Game Over.  Pokemon had the sense to make whoever used a self-destruct move on their last character automatically lose the match!  The second attempt ended with a bad damage roll on Nikolai’s Lightning Lightning.  Then I decided to play cautiously (ugh!).  Caution is not the Red Mage way, but healing and Defaulting on the turn Nikolai used Sacrifice worked.



 
Kaiser Oblivion unmasked:  Was he reading my controller inputs the first time?  He didn’t use Noble Eagle to buff everyone’s Magic Attack like I hoped, he Defaulted on the turn I Brave rushed, and used Blinding Light to kill the Red Mages after they spent all their BP.  Blinding Light is an attack that damages all foes for half the user’s current HP.  The reason I tried to kill him so quickly in the first place was that Blinding Flash would have killed my party from full health if he had more than about 20,000 HP.  I could have used Enopu Mushrooms for auto-revive, but I was trying not to use the most overpowered tactics here.  Winter Storm disable my healing, Turbo Ethers, and BP recovery, while his Dawn of Odyssey gave everyone 1 free BP every 4 turns.  Kaiser Oblivion was fast due to his class’s high stats, and often knocked out a character each time he swung his sword.  

Leveling up to the recommended level of 58 was the answer.  It allowed my characters to occasionally survive one of his regular attacks, and Brave rush to victory.  In Bravely Default, most stats are based on job levels, but character level is much more important in the sequel.


Diamante is so annoying when you can't kill him quickly.     My Red Mages died so many times to his Light elemental attack that I may have to grind to survive it.  If only there were more Lustrous Shields!  Debuffs are better than buffs as a general rule because late game bosses like Diamante can Dispel them.  Enopu Mushrooms also become somewhat unreliable at this point because auto-revive can be Dispelled too.

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Diamante:  Diamante was probably the most annoying boss in the game, mostly because of its unique ability.  Diamante's Mirror status reflected my Red Mages' attacks onto it, and recharged by 20% at the end of every turn.  To get rid of it, I had to whack Diamante with weak physical attacks.  Mirror drains based on hits taken, not how much damage is done.  I had to learn this trick from GameFAQs to win with my Hawkeye team.  The Patissier squad used Specials with the Item trigger, because Specials ignore all kinds of enemy defenses in this game.

I was tempted to use Enopu Mushrooms in this fight, even though there was a chance Diamante would Dispel auto-revive.  Scintillation was a powerful random target attack, and Brilliancy killed everyone but Magnolia, who had a Lustrous Shield to negate Light damage.  Dispersion rendered a character unable to do anything but Default for a few turns.  Diamante was tough even with an overleveled team.

Like other late game bosses, Diamante revived itself after losing its first HP bar.  The second half of the fight meant I could be less cautious and use a Brave rush to finish the Ba'al off quickly.


Braev Lee, Duchy Guardsman, Duchy Pike Guard, & Duchy Mage Guard:  Yes, you can start the fight early if you carried over the Grand Marshal's Sword and Grand Marshal's Shield in a New Game Plus file.  I couldn't sell them at the beginning, so I decided to avoid using them until the point where you're supposed to get them. 

Two of the minions went down quickly, but the Mage Guard had a surprising amount of HP.  Braev easily took out my level 65 party with his physical attack Giant Slayer and his Light attack Radiant Blast, so I leveled up to about 72.  For a normal party, this would be the recommended level for the final boss.  Red Mages have lousy defenses, so I had to gain that extra HP.  Defaulting with a shield saved my characters, and it was always good to see Braev waste a turn using Radiant Blast on Magnolia's Lustrous Shield.  For Braev's first two "lives", I waited until he had 3 BP before attacking because he Defaulted so often.  On his last life, he used his attacks at around 2 BP, so I had to use a more risky Brave rush tactic to avoid running out of MP in a war of attrition.

The Red Mages succeeded in the end without having to use Enopu Mushrooms or attack items.


Ba'al Turtle Dove:  Turtle Dove is much weaker than Diamante despite being later in the game.  It only has one life, and its attacks are somewhat weaker.  Turtle Dove's gimmick is making your characters fall in love, which either makes them mimic each other's actions, or hit other party members with physical attacks.  Red Mages with rods were so weak they couldn't damage each other with them.  Heartbreak usually knocked the party into critical HP rather than killing anyone, and ended their annoying Love status.  Withering Wave and Blizzaras worked as usual.    

(Note for any Final Fantasy 5 fans:  The Wonder Rod only uses random Black magic in Bravely Second.  No Shell for you, Sullla!  The Aegis Shield gives Dread immunity, but is otherwise a normal shield.)


EDIT:  I just beat another boss, and wanted to post it here.


Yoko:  Vampire Castle is a special dungeon in this game because you can't turn off random encounters.  At first, I tried to fight every battle by casting Aerora.  After losing a few times to a mandatory streak random encounter, I realized I could just run away from the fights.  How embarrassing!  

Yoko herself was easy enough that the Red Mages beat her on the first try.  Equipping Safety Rings on everyone but Magnolia made the fight a lot easier since her Consume Life attack had an instant death chance.  Otherwise, she mostly cast Thundaja and Aeroja, which were less powerful than their "ultimate attack magic" status would suggest.  Ringabel joined as a guest character in this fight, and occasionally used Specials to deal about 4000-5000 damage per hit.  I was a bit worried about Sloth, a move that dispels buffs and creates a weakness to every element.  Fortunately, Yoko couldn't follow up Sloth with Airy's Zeta Flare from Bravely Default to do 9999 damage to everyone.  Yoko had only one life, and went down after the Red Mages pelted her with Blizzaras.

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Finally, the end of the 4 Red Mage challenge!  I should have mentioned in the previous post that you don't get job level 11 abilities (e.g. Chainspell, Crossfire, etc.) in a normal playthrough until you defeat Yoko and get the Yokai asterisk.  The point of this playthrough was to show off the Red Mage at its maximum capabilities, so I used Chainspell through the whole game instead of throwing hundreds of thousands of Arctic Winds at the enemies.



Anne:  This boss is the reason why I wonder if most jobs are viable for a solo playthrough.  Anne can use Undermine, a nasty move that reduces the target’s max HP to 1 for the rest of the fight.  Even if the character dies and is revived, the 1 HP cap remains.  I’ve heard Exorcists can get around this with their Undo abilities.  Other classes may have to leave the other party members alive, and make them Default every turn or something.


My Red Mages beat this fight on the first try.  Undermine isn’t so bad when you have 4 characters.  Anne used Acedia to lower everyone’s resistances, then Dark Flare.  Anne is Airy’s less talented sister, so Dark Flare didn’t do 9999 damage to everyone.  Airy’s Zeta Flare was the death of my 4 Monks variant in Bravely Default, and I still resent her for that.


Anne was already weak to Fire, so Withering Wave wasn’t needed until the end of the battle to lower her Speed and Magic Defense.  Yew finished off Anne with a Piercing Bolt, and gave her a smirk while saying “For the gravy!” to rub it in.


Providence "Bird Form":  Normally, I avoided using Enopu Mushrooms in this playthrough.  This boss was an exception.  Bird Providence often used Pawn of Fate, which put the entire party in Doom status (equivalent to FF5's Condemn).  Mandate of Heaven ordered one party member to kill another, or the entire party would take 99,999 damage in about 3 turns.  My level 78-79 party went with auto-revive instead, because the party members had high enough Magic Defense to make it unlikely for them to commit suicide with -ara spells.

When I was lucky, Bird Providence hit with regular attacks and the random target Seven Stars.  Seven Stars was blocked by Magnolia's Lustrous Shield whenever it hit her.  The programmers loved giving bosses Light attacks in this game!  Star of Destruction was much more dangerous.

Bird Providence was weak to Wind from the start because it counted as a Flying enemy.  The Red Mages except for Magnolia spent most of their time Defaulting and then casting Aerora.  Bird Providence revived itself once in a cutscene, so I had to be cautious.  Magnolia was the healer again, though she joined in the Brave rush at the end.   


Providence "Freemason Form":  Providence's second form looks like the pyramid with the eye on the dollar bill.  This leads to a lot of Freemason and Illuminati conspiracy theory jokes.  It doesn't help that one of its attacks is called New World Order!  

The reason I was at level 79 instead of the recommended level of 72 was because of this boss.  My Hawkeye party lost many times until I leveled them up to 80 out of frustration.  Red Mages have lower HP than Hawkeyes and a lower Shield proficiency, so some Grapp Keep grinding was in order.  However, Red Mages have a few advantages that Hawkeyes don't.  Curada, decent Speed, and area of effect attacks that aren't useless like the Hawkeye's Sidewinder.

The Red Mages Defaulted and healed for the first few turns, because Pyramid Providence couldn't be killed before the cutscene where he almost deletes your save files.  After that, Withering Wave Blizzaras did the trick.  Getting rid of the two arms was essential, because the pyramid could buff them with Ruin or Salvation?, and the pyramid had very weak offenses without them.  New World Order was a unique attack in that it could hit the party before they selected their actions, but it usually gave them extra Revenge BP instead of being a serious threat.  The pyramid usually used Dispel when it wasn't buffing the arms, but Red Mage isn't a job that depends on buffs.  It kept me from using Enopu Mushrooms, though.  This was an easy boss overall thanks to being over-prepared.

Verdict:  Red Mage was a fun job to play through the game with.  Chainspell made up for being restricted to Chapter 2 spells, but it had the drawback of being inefficient.  4 Braves with Blizzara Chainspell costs 200 MP.  The Red Mages had a nasty Turbo Ether habit, which cost 5000 pg per item.  I wouldn't recommend trying this challenge without a lot of money carried over because of that.  In the Red, Revenge, and Revival gave the job a unique risk vs. reward element for most of the game.  Do you go into negative BP now to make your spells stronger with the danger of being helpless for a few turns?  Or do you Default and use more of your limited Turbo Ether supply?     

I learned the true power of debuffing Specials here.  Spells that hit an elemental weakness do double damage, and reducing Magic Defense by 25% further increases their strength.  Buffs are nice for a while, but later bosses such as Diamante, Anne 2, and Pyramid Providence can easily dispel them.  Bosses are stuck with debuffs until they wear off. 



My next challenge will be solo Exorcist if I get around to it.  Probably with Edea, because I'll want to shout "Mrgrgr!" during difficult boss fights.  She's also the main character in most of the sidequests.

The rules:

-Growth Egg will be carried over to speed up grinding, all other equipment is sold at the first shop.  Elixirs and Megalixirs are sold off too, since you can't get them until Chapter 4 or so.
-The Obliterate passive will be used for mindless grinding at high levels, even though it's a Yokai skill.  It won't be used in Geyser Grotto, Vampire Castle, or any other place with mandatory non-boss enemies.
-Job levels are carried over.  Auto Undo was the inspiration for the idea in the first place, and I'll need all the help I can get for solo single class challenges.
-Character levels are not carried over, so Edea will have to grind from her starting level.
-Funds transfer too, because I'll need a lot of money to buy attack items for bosses that have minions.
-I may have to revive the other characters during Revenant fights if possession means Game Over for a solo character.  If this happens, they'll sit around Defaulting or taking other useless actions.

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

I started my first solo in Bravely Second today!  Edea will use only the Exorcist job's abilities if possible, with the exception of Obliterate for easy grinding at high levels.

Why Exorcist?


The Exorcist job doesn’t have an equivalent in Bravely Default or its ancestor Final Fantasy 5.  It’s a healing and support role with strange mechanics.  Casting Curaga isn’t their style.  Exorcists rewind time to the turn before their ally was damaged in the first place.  It was a bit hard for me to understand at first, so I never used Exorcists very often.  Now, I think they’re the best chance for a solo single class playthrough.
 
Exorcist Abilities

1.  Undo HP:  This restores an ally’s health to the way it was on the previous turn, and can also revive dead characters.  Geist uses this to kill recently revived character s in his boss fights too.

2.  Undo Action:  Prevents one action against the target.  I will probably use this often during Brave rushes to prevent damage.  I’ll learn more about the exact mechanics this playthrough.


3.  Steady MP Recover:  A useful passive that gives you 30 MP per turn.  Several Exorcist skills use MP, so it’s relevant even if they aren’t using other job abilities.

4.  Purgation:  The in-game description is questionably written, but it seems to remove buffs and debuffs.  Useful for certain boss fights.


5.  Undo MP:  This lets Exorcists restore MP for other characters, but it costs 1 BP.  This job has Steady MP Recover and Auto Undo, making Undo MP irrelevant for this challenge.
 
6.  Undo BP:  Yikes!  That 3 BP cost is way too high for my liking.  It’s meant to restore BP for your other characters.  The description says it doesn’t work on bosses, so you can’t manipulate their turns with this.
 
7.  Undo Trois:  Undo skills go back 3 turns in time instead of 1.  It’s the Exorcist’s innate passive skill, so I don’t need to equip it.
 
8.  Eradication:  This has a 33% chance to instantly kill all enemies.  I doubt it’ll work on bosses, but it’s nice for grinding.  Going to -4 B on the first turn means it’s more likely to work than not, and Eradication ignores resistances to other instant death techniques.
 
9.  Ectoplasm:  You turn into a ghost at 0 HP instead of dying normally.  Ghosts can only cast spells, Brave, and Default, making it great for mages but useless for pure Exorcists.  Ghosts are still “dead” according to the game, so 4 ghosts means Game Over.
 
10.  Glossolalia:  This skill lets you cast spells your Friends know.  This is pretty much a gimmick to encourage players to use the game’s online features.  I won’t be using this.
 
11.  Auto Undo:  You aren’t supposed to get this skill until you defeat Yoko in Chapter 6, but this is a New Game Plus anyway.  Exorcists have low health even compared to some of the mage jobs, and this ability is the reason I chose Exorcist for the first solo challenge.  Auto Undo restores your HP and MP to the way they were the previous turn, unless you’re dead.  This means Exorcists can be almost immortal if they aren’t knocked out in 1 round, if I understand this skill correctly.  Auto Undo is often used on defensive jobs during the postgame.
 
Exorcist Equipment Proficiencies

Swords:  S
Axes:  E
Spears:  E
Rods:  C
Staves:  C
Daggers:  B
Bows:  E
Katanas:  E
Knuckles:  E
Great Swords:  E
Firearms:  E
 
Shields:  E
Helms:  E
Armor:  E
 
Ay, ay, ay!  Exorcists have terrible proficiencies in most weapons and all armor.  Proficiencies increase the stat gain from equipment.  If you have E rank, you only get the base stats from equipment.  S rank gives you double the equipment’s normal offensive and defensive stats.  E rank armor hurts the most, because solo characters need defense more than offense.  You can get around bad offense in this game with Specials and attack items, but bad armor proficiency and lower HP than some mage jobs means lots of level grinding.  Fortunately, grinding is quick in this game relative to other RPGs.
 
Prologue
 
I didn’t count the Troll as part of this variant, because you don’t get to change jobs yet and Edea wasn’t around.  It’s a tutorial boss designed to teach new players the Brave and Default system.  If you don’t Default on the turn the Troll has 0 BP, you’ll be punched multiple times for major physical damage.  I defeated it the same way I always do.  Yew and Janne Defaulted a few times, then slashed the Troll with their swords.  Don’t become too attached to Janne and Nikolai, because you can probably guess what’ll happen once you realize they can’t gain levels.  The game is kind enough to give you their equipment when they leave, unlike Final Fantasy 4 with its revolving door cast of characters.
 
Edea joins the party during the first Bella battle after a few turns where Yew is too afraid to attack.  In a New Game Plus, she keeps her job and equipment for this fight.  One Aero knocked out Yew, and one took out Bella.  After the fight, the challenge officially began.  Edea became an Exorcist, equipped weapons and armor more suitable for the prologue, and fought a few random encounters to avoid being underleveled.  Bravely Second doesn’t split experience points, so solo characters don’t gain levels any faster.  There’s a reason I’m allowing the Growth Egg and Obliterate.  The preferred grinding method involves finishing a battle in one round to get winning streaks.  Solo Edea could get a 2 battle streak at most. 

Auto Undo prevented the enemies from doing anything to her, even the Crab Applings and their Bad Apple poison move.  Auto Undo activates after poison damage, as if it weren’t overpowered enough already.  The Frozen Hollows random encounters were as helpless as the Pilgrim Grove enemies.  As for this area’s boss fight:
 

Cu Chulainn:  2500 HP, Lightning weakness, Human

Bella:  1200 HP, no weakness, Human

Some boss fights in this game have an annoying tendency to revive characters with 1 HP in cutscenes, so Edea Defaulted until Yew and Magnolia were dead again.  I could have killed these two easily with a level 4 Special and attack items, but there was a way to humiliate these bosses in a way that no other job could.  They couldn’t kill Edea with Triple Wield and Frost Dart in one round even at level 8.  So Edea slowly killed Bella with regular attacks, and laughed as Auto Undo restored her HP every round.  I was careful not to attack Bella if she cast Frost Wall on herself because Edea would take damage every time she whacked her with her Stinger sword. 

After Bella went down, I set the game on autobattle and did household chores for a few minutes.  Cu Chulainn died without me having to participate at all!  No wonder the developers restricted Auto Undo to Chapter 6.
 

Eradicate helped level Edea to 10 in Eternian Central Command.  One of the Imperial soldiers Silenced her, but Exorcist abilities don’t count as spells.  No need for Echo Grass!  The treasure wasn’t any better than her current equipment.  This is the point where you get Tiz, so Edea had to take him outside and convince him casting Aerora on himself was a good idea.  The rest of the dungeon was uneventful.
 
Edea so far: 

Character level 10, job level 11 Exorcist with Auto Undo and Steady MP Recover
 
Weapon:  Bishop’s Staff
Shield:  Round Shield
Head:  Mystic Hood
Armor:  Manarobe
Accessory:  Growth Egg (probably should have switched to a Physical Defense accessory) 
 

Boss time!
 
Janne:  3000 HP (revives once), no weakness, Human
Nikolai:  2500 HP, no weakness, Human
 
Janne was too tough for Edea to autobattle at level 10.  The first attempt involved stacking the buffs from Sword specials.  It seemed like a good idea, but Edea was knocked out after Nikolai showed up.  Magnolia refused to die from the bosses’ attacks when she was revived in a cutscene, so Edea tried to knock her out.  When Edea stopped Defaulting to do this, Janne and Nikolai’s physical attacks were too much for her to survive.  It turned out the way to victory was Acid Rain, a level 2 staff special.  Acid Rain hits all enemies, and is stronger than the level 4 sword Special for some reason at this point in the game.  Maybe Acid Rain is based on Magic Attack or has a high damage multiplier?  I wish I had an algorithm guide for this game!
 
Janne was predictable.  He went into Wolf Stance, occasionally Defaulted for a turn, and then hit with Wolf Fang and regular attacks.  Edea made sure to Default the turn after he Defaulted, and Acid Rained whenever she had an opening.  The bosses were kind enough to kill off my other characters this time after the revival cutscene activated.  I was worried Nikolai would heal, but he was content with using physical attacks and buffing his party with Holy Night.  Holy Night heals targets whenever they take damage while Defaulting.  Working around Janne’s pattern was easy, and the final prologue boss fight was over soon.

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Here's a giant wall o' text if you want to see how Chapter 1 went for my Exorcist solo:



I was relieved to be able to buy better equipment for Edea in Al-Khampis.  Bravely Second has different sets of light armor for Physical Defense and Magic Defense, so to speak.  For example, the Desert Cap gives +8 Physical Defense and +4 Magic Defense, while the Mortarboard from the same town gives +6 Physical Defense, +8 Magic Attack, and +12 Magic Defense.  Of course, I bought both.  Every bit of defense helps me deal with the Exorcist’s low HP.  The Harena Kaftan and Academy Gown are pointless for solo characters, because you can get the Kalasiris armor in the Harena Ruins that’s superior to both.  Of course, I forgot about this and bought both. 


The first decision this chapter for any playthrough is whether to fight Jackal the Thief or DeRosa the Red Mage.  Edea had no immunity to DeRosa’s Captivating Cologne charm ability yet, but could pick up an accessory for that later.  So the obvious choice for a solo was to fight the Thief.  The problem was that Edea’s HP and Physical Defense were too low to survive more than a couple of turns, even while Defaulting.  The thieves were also too fast for Edea to kill them with a Special or attack items on the first turn.  Some grinding was required. 
 

Bravely Second must use a similar RNG system to Fire Emblem 7.  I kept getting the same results whenever I loaded my save file, and even the second encounters in a streak were the same.  It took the same amount of Eradicates to kill them each time too.  I imagine this can easily exploited, but I don’t know the algorithms.  Edea died 2 or 3 times to the same Venomous Snake and Mummy encounter when the Mummy got a critical hit each battle.
 
Predictable RNG aside, Edea leveled up to 15 in order to stand a chance.  Even then, I still died many times to this boss:
 

Jackal:  4500 HP, no weakness, Human
2 Jackal’s Vigilantes:  1425 HP, no weakness, Human
 


For the first few attempts, Edea Defaulted until Jackal Braved to -1 BP and then used a Special to take out Jackal’s Vigilantes on the turn when Jackal couldn’t attack.  The problem was that when both of the minions died, Jackal Braved and killed Edea with 4 Steal Breaths in one round.  If one of the enemies got a critical hit early in the fight, that was a Game Over too.   Due to the wonky Speed system in the Bravely series, sometimes Edea went first, and sometimes not.  After a while, I decided to use a trick from my 4 Red Mage challenge.  A few of my readers are probably groaning about me using Withering Wave again right now.  Exorcists may not have Chainspell Blizzara, but they can throw Antarctic Winds at the problem when Withering Wave applies an elemental weakness.  The Physical Defense debuff let Edea survive Jackal’s Brave rush too!  When you’re using a class with no attack abilities whatsoever, you have to resort to cheap tricks like this.       

 
The Ba’al Crater had a Peace Ring, a vital accessory for a solo character.  It grants immunity to confusion, which works like it does in Final Fantasy.  The reason I did the Harena Ruins sidequest before the Ba’al Crater was because I was concerned about this boss:

 
Ba’al Urchin:  7500 HP, Light weakness, Insect


Cloudy Sky blinded Edea, but she wasn’t a physical attacker anyway.  Specials and attack items always hit their targets, if I’m correct about the game mechanics.  Urchin sometimes created a Shadowcaster version of Edea that attacked her with a Dark spell for minor damage.  Attempting to use Eradicate on both enemies failed, as expected.  Normally, when an enemy is immune to something, a message saying “Guard” will appear.  In this boss battle, it said “Missed” instead of “Guard”.  Why is that?  When Eradicate misses in random battles, no message appears at all.   Yet another question for an algorithm guide to answer. . .
 
I equipped the Turban before the fight for more Magic Defense, but in retrospect Edea should have worn the Harena Shemagh because Urchin mostly hit her with its regular attack.  It didn’t matter in the end  Being level 15 meant that even the worst damage rolls left her with about 140 HP, and Auto Undo healed it all.  The entire fight after the failed Eradicate attempt consisted of Edea Defaulting until she could use Acid Rain.  Piercing Bolt would have been quicker because it only required 5 Defaults instead of Acid Rain’s 10, but Staves give Magic Defense, and I wanted to play it safe.  Urchin has a random target multihit attack that I think deals magical damage, but fortunately it rarely used that move in the fight.

 
Edea had to fight dirty during the next boss battle in Al-Khampis:
 
Norzen:  7500 HP, no weakness, Human
 
Norzen buffed himself with Physical Boon and punched Edea to death.  Over and over again.  This fight taught me how Undo Action works.  It functions like the Ninja’s Utsusemi in that you can prepare it in advance, but negates any single enemy action instead of just physical attacks.  Unfortunately, Edea didn’t always go first at level 16, so Norzen would punch her to death even when she Defaulted.  Curse you, Final Fantasy 3 style semi-random turn order! 

Norzen didn’t play fair, and neither did I.  Edea used the level 4 rod Special Holy Weapon to begin the fight, then threw Zeus’s Wraths and Arctic Winds until he went down.  Yes, I said Arctic Winds, not Antarctic Winds.  Arctic Winds may be overpowered for this part of the game, but it was either that or grinding levels.  The other characters were revived in a cutscene so they could argue with Norzen, but he helpfully killed them again by casting Tornado.
 
After defeating Norzen with my shameful tactics, I looked at GameFAQs and found that I had missed the Thief’s Knife in the Harena Ruins.  When Used in battle, it attacks and attempts to steal an item, much like the Mug/Capture ability in Final Fantasy.  I never bothered much with stealing in Bravely Second, so I’ll have to find out if there’s any equipment worth swiping.   The Miasma Woods sidequest bosses crushed Edea at level 17 thanks to having 3 minions on Hard.  Edea fought random enemies in that area until she hit level 20, then attempted to fight Kamiizumi.  She still died on the first turn.  Kamiizumi often Brave rushes with regular attacks, and his Multitask passive sometimes gives him extra hits.  So Edea had to tell Gho Gettar to go back to the Ancheim windmill to provoke this boss instead:
 
Mephilia:  7500 HP, no weakness, Human
Legion Impaler:  1200 HP, Lightning weakness, Human
Legion Archer:  700 HP?, no weakness, Human
Legion Mage:  700 HP?, no weakness, Human
 
Mephilia the Summoner was much weaker than Kamiizumi the Swordmaster.  At level 20, Edea outsped the minions and used Holy Weapon.  To prepare for the fight, I changed Holy Weapon’s element to Lightning and its status effect to poison.  This paid off when the Legion Archer and Legion Mage died to poison damage after a few turns while Edea was Defaulting.  I should have given Edea the Peace Ring because the Legion Archer confused Edea with her attacks, but Auto Undo let her survive it.  After her allies were dead, Mephilia whacked Edea with her rod and sometimes summoned Hresvelgr.  Summons are all-target attacks in this game, so it’s no more dangerous for a solo character than for a party.  Hresvelgr did little damage with all the Magic Defense armor Edea had equipped.  I was paranoid enough to have Edea wield a Staff for the Magic Defense bonus and use Acid Rain for the rest of the fight in case Mephilia had some other spell that I forgot about.

 
After finishing up the Chapter 1 sidequests, it was time to head to the Harena Sea Caves.  Most of the treasure there wasn’t useful for Edea, but the Thief’s Glove might come in handy if she needs to steal something.  The next battle required some preparation, so Edea wore the best physical armor available at the time along with the Clothespin accessory to avoid Sleep.  She equipped the Fire element and Beast Slayer parts on her offense Special attacks too.  As for the fight itself:
 

Minette:  10,500 HP, Water weakness, Human
Bismarck:  7500 HP, Fire weakness, Beast
 

The Clothespin was necessary because Minette the Catmancer often used Catnap on Edea to try to put her to sleep.  Yew revived twice during the fight for in-battle conversations.  The bosses killed him before he could cast Aero on himself.  On the first turn, I used Eradicate to see if it would work, and it did!  Bismarck the lion died on the first attempt, even.  Maybe I should have used a Water element for my Specials instead of Fire, because that would have made Minette a bit easier.  Minette’s other attacks were physical, and therefore had a critical hit chance.  I was a bit nervous when Minette hit a high damage roll.  Edea chipped away at her HP with Piercing Bolts, making sure to use Undo Action on the turns she attacked to make up for the lack of Default’s defense boost.  The randomized turn order made that tactic a bit unreliable, but Auto Undo carried me to victory again.
 

To prepare for the boss in the Ancheim windmill, Edea equipped the Star Pendant to prevent poison, and the Harena Shemagh and Caravan Coat to reduce physical damage.  I thought level 21 wouldn’t be high enough for this boss, but I was proven wrong:


 
Amphisbaena:  2 heads with 7500 HP, Water weakness, Dragon

Amphisbaena is unique among Bravely Second bosses.  One head can only be harmed by physical attacks, and the other head is only affected by magic.  The boss only dies when both heads are killed, and one head can revive the other with partial health after a few turns.  Amphisbaena will sometimes shuffle its heads to confuse the player too.  Undo HP can’t re-kill a head after it has been revived so far as I can tell.  I started with Eradicate on the first turn, but it “Missed” and Edea died to a bad damage roll shortly afterwards.    
 
The next try succeeded, even if the fight was a bit silly.  Holy Weapon wasn’t strong enough to kill the physical head, and throwing Arctic Winds healed it because attack items deal magical damage.  Amphisbaena couldn’t kill Edea while she was Defaulting, and she didn’t have a chance to kill the boss until she could use a level  4 Special again.  I wondered what to do, then equipped Edea with a Mythril Sword.  The Exorcist’s S rank in Swords gave her enough strength to kill the physical head with a Bolt Storm Special and a few regular attacks.  Right before that, I used an Arctic Wind to finish off the magical head.  Chapter 1 is complete!