Clair Obscur Devs to Nerf Overpowered Ability in First Major Patch
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- Clair Obscur’s May 9 hotfix will nerf Maelle’s overpowered Stendhal ability, which allowed one-hit kills on the game’s toughest bosses.
- The move’s massive damage—up to 150 million—came from stacking Pictos and Luminas, which act as damage multipliers.
- Despite the nerf, developers say players will still be able to “break the game” through creative builds and strategies.
Sandfall Interactive has announced that it will nerf a game-breaking move in Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 after players discovered it made combat too easy—especially against the game’s toughest bosses. The update, set to go live on May 9, will be the game’s first full hotfix and will roll out first on Steam, followed by other platforms.
The to-be-nerfed ability, Stendhal, belongs to the character Maelle and was unintentionally overpowered due to a late-stage balance pass. “We hadn’t planned to make any balance changes this early—just bug fixes, unless something clearly stood out,” the studio wrote on social media. “Well, Stendhal did.”
The ability in question, Stendhal, allowed Maelle to inflict absurd amounts of damage—up to 150 million hit points per attack—by stacking the right combination of Pictos and Luminas (perks and passives), which act as damage multipliers. This setup effectively trivialized the game’s most difficult encounters, including the secret super boss, who typically requires a fully equipped and maxed-out party and flawless parry timing to defeat. With Stendhal, the fight could be reduced to simply applying buffs and pressing attack, one-shotting the boss before it had a chance to act. To pull this off, however, players first had to defeat some of the game’s toughest bosses using conventional tactics and invest dozens of hours into progression.
According to the developers, Stendhal was underwhelming throughout much of development, prompting them to give it a large damage boost prior to launch—one that “clearly overdid it.”
Despite the nerf, the studio emphasized that it still wants players to be able to break the game and that the opportunity to do so will remain.
The patch comes just as Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 celebrates a successful launch, having sold over 2 million copies. The game has received high praise for its unique art style, solid writing, fluid turn-based combat system and original soundtrack, which recently topped Billboard’s classical list. Earlier this week, the game was even recognized by French President Emmanuel Macron.
