For the first time in a while, an offline single-player Japanese role-playing game is getting a hotfix and nerfing an ability. Unsurprisingly, it’s a skill that belongs to Clair Obscur: Expedition 33’s most powerful 16-year-old.

In Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, your party member Maelle has an ability called Stendhal that deals a lot of Void damage. That’s normal for a JRPG, right? Well, Maelle is a stance-based fighter where she has a stance called Virtuose that makes her deal 200% more damage. Basically, you put her in Virtuose stance, then have her slap enemies around with Stendhal, and then you win the battle.

Since Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is a game where any Luminas ability you acquire from equipment called Pictos can be used by virtually everyone in the party (if they have enough Luminas points), diligent players basically ran with this combo and buff it up. And when I mean buff it up, I mean having it deal 4 billion damage.

Naturally, developer Sandfall Entertainment want to nerf Stendhal, though they still want players to experiment and break the game as they see fit. Funny story: the devs thought the initial version was underpowered, so they boosted the ability’s damage and clearly overdid it.

“It was underwhelming for most of development, so in our final pre-release balance pass, we gave it a big damage boost—and clearly overdid it. It ended up overshadowing most other options. We still want you to be able to break the game—and you absolutely still can—but Stendhal was making it a bit too easy.

You’ve got one more day to enjoy it in its current form and set some wild records. The adjustment will be included in our first full hotfix set, going live tomorrow. The patch will roll out on Steam first, and other platforms will follow. After the change, it’ll still be a strong single-hit skill with great synergy potential… just more in line with everything else.”

Expeditioners, a quick note on Stendhal and balance changes:

We hadn’t planned to make any balance changes this early—just bug fixes, unless something clearly stood out.

Well, Stendhal did.

It was underwhelming for most of development, so in our final pre-release balance… pic.twitter.com/JwmC6luh3p

— Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (@expedition33) May 8, 2025

While I’m usually on the side of players having fun with their games on their own time and parameters, Sandfall Interactive may have made a good call here. The spell won’t be completely useless, but players will have to find other workarounds to boost up their damage tenfold after the update goes live tomorrow evening. Besides, Maelle is already powerful enough as she already is without this ability; in my playthrough, she saved my team’s ass countless times due to her Virtuose Stance and other skills that make her deal damage to all targets, coupled with buffs from Scielle.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is out now; for more on the game check out our review and guide.

How To Deal Massive Damage With Maelle & Stendhal

In case you want to give it a go before the hotfix, here’s how to do big damage with the Void move.

• Get the following: Medalum (Maelle sword) which makes you start the battle in Virtuose Stance.
• Unlock and equip the following Luminas: Cheater (gives you second turn), Shortcut (gives you an extra turn when you are below 30% health).
• Get this other skill for Maelle called Last Stand (get into Virtuose stance but your HP is reduced to 1)
• Equip a bunch of other Luminas that buff damage (Painter Power, At Death’s Door, Confidence Fighter, Inverted Affinity, etc.)
• Once you get all of that, go into battle. Start in Virtuose stance with Medalum, use Stendhal. Then get a second turn with Cheater; use Last Stand. Then get a third turn, use Stendhal again.