Chrono Ark The Forgotten King / TFK (Boss Guide)

Contents

How to Defeat The Forgotten King / TFK

How to Defeat The Forgotten King / TFK

The Final Boss of this game can feel very unfair when you first fight him. However, he is made manageable by the fact that his patterns are completely predictable and you have the entire game to prepare against him. There will be a TLDR at the end summarizing the most important points.

Phase #1

Try to stockpile as many consumables as you can for this fight. Herbs can remove his bleed debuffs which can help your party stay alive. Tablets can remove the ‘Incoming healing reduced’ debuff that he can apply with his Punishment (strong single-target attack). Try to secure at least 1 Small Barrier Generator for reasons I will explain later.
Having at least 1 Speed is very useful here, since it will ensure that TFK cannot outspeed you with his Blade Rush (Double-target bleed attack). 1 Speed can be achieved by fishing for a Swiftness Scroll during the playthrough or acquiring a Speed item.
Try to prevent risky scenarios as much as possible. NEVER let him get off 2 attacks in a row in enemy phase. Burn his action counts with non-swiftness skills or the hourglass to bait out his Blade Rush, and bait his Punishment too if you can. Healing between his attacks is very important because receiving 2 attacks in a row from him usually means death.
For reference, Punishment deals 22 damage without any armor and 33 damage with a crit.

Phase #2

If you get TFK down to 450, he will turn invincible. Next turn, he will cast Shield Pulse (weak AoE) and summon multiple pillars(+shackle on Expert Mode). This is known as the Pillars Phase.
The scariest part of the entire fight is the phase transition where he uses Shield Pulse. Shield Pulse always goes before your own turn and this will kill one of your characters if he gets someone into death’s door with Punishment in the previous turn.
What you can do to prevent this is use a Small Barrier Generator which will soften his Punishment damage and guarantee no one goes into death’s door. You have the entire run to find one, pretty feasible. You can also use it to block Shield Pulse but he can still damage your party if he gets multiple crits.
Once he summons his pillars, you want to get rid of them as soon as possible, because TFK will summon Purifying Lightnings in your hand while the pillars are active, forcing you to damage your own party. The problem is that these pillars are hiding behind TFK’s taunt. Therefore, you want to build your deck with multiple Ignore Taunt / AoE options with Pillars Phase in mind. Also be aware that when a pillar dies, all skills of the character who last damaged it will be discarded, which can bring down your hand size massively and remove useful skills. This phase can be very brutal or very free depending on your builds.

Phase #3

Once you clear all of his pillars, he will enter his 3rd phase where he starts excluding your cards and he tries to bleed you to death.
This phase is relatively simple. Damage rush him and use your best judgment to exclude your less important skills.
Note that his second attack deals 12 damage with no armor and 18 damage with a crit, so try to keep your characters above 18 HP.
It’s sometimes worth it to give up on saving your less important party members to keep your important units (main DPS and Healer) alive.

For reference, this is the entirety of the fight.

Turn 1: Blade Rush (Double-target bleed attack) + Punishment (Strong single-target attack).
Turn 2: Summon Shackle + Punishment

If Shackle was not broken last turn:

Blade Rush + Punishment

If Shackle was broken last turn:

Summon Shackle + Punishment

(After hitting 450HP)

Shield Pulse + Summon Pillars

(After player kills all the pillars)

AoE bleed attack + Double-target attack

TLDR

Key of the fight is preparation:

1 Speed – Prevents him from acting before you.
Herb – Can remove bleed.
Tablet – Can remove Healing Reduced debuff.
Small Barrier Generator – You can use it on his strong attack when he reaches 450HP so no one goes into death’s door and dies to shield pulse.
Ignore Taunt / AoE – Useful for clearing pillars quickly.

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