If you had to miss a secret boss, I think this one hurts the most possibly considering it gives a very useful equip(Edit: Not the Shadow Crystal, though, even if it would help a lot)+helps in something else. Still, I don't think it's going to like ruin your game. Some might advocate missing this one in particular too. Honestly I think more people will know what happens with all the Shadow Crystals than not given how "secret" these bosses actually are lol. I think I missed an Egg all the way back in Chapter 1 and there's no way I'm going back for that. Shadow Crystals are probably more important but if you care about the secret stuff I don't think missing either would give peace of mind.

I will say that restarting at this point isn't too bad though. It's what I did and I mostly sped through it since most of it is just the dialogue. If I recall there's somewhere in the bottom of the Green Room that lets you buy S rank for 1500 points, which you can grind through Susie's habit of picking up coins in the first board if nothing else. It was easier to get S rank the second time around though.

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This should tell you everything.

I did, worth it.

Take it from me, you'll at least want to take some time over the course of the game to build specific and powerful personas. The secret third semester boss on mercliess is no joke, you think you'd be prepared but you're not.

But in terms of just skipping all the story and myriad truthing the palaces until third semester you're probably looking at around 10-15 hours.

I did a run to get all the Thieves' Den achievements after waiting a few months, and after I did 3 runs of Persona 3 Reload. It was nice to take my time experience the story again.

I waited until I was ready to explore >!Mementos Depths!< and had my Personas all at level 99. Had a few close calls. Honestly wished the final boss was as difficult as the twins were.

If you rush it, you'll regret it. And not even your DLC Personas will be able to save you.

Caroline/Justine are available as soon as you have access to Mementos.

Lavenza is only available in the third semester.

Yes there are secret bosses but very few has managed to find them as far as i can see

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I got the ice key but idk what to do now

I’m doing it right now, the only thing you need to know for chapter 3 is that you need to get an S rank. Of what I won’t tell you.

Okay, so, TECHNICALLYYYYYY, the Knight is the secret boss. She does not have the freedom motif, however, she does have a shadow crystal if you beat her. It is IMPOSSIBLE to beat her, unless you get the shadow mantle, and even THEN, your party members die in TWO HITS, and CANNOT be upped (from what i saw)

So you need to NO HIT the Knight to get her crystal.

|Get s rank in both games|

Get at least an S rank on both rounds, and enter the Star Dressing Room. Once you complete these puzzles, you don’t need to do anything else. You will encounter the secret boss naturally.

First get your team to the Mid 70s, that should be enough. Maybe 80.

Now i recomend your team, I recomend A healer/suporter, a phys attacker and a magic attacker (Personaly i used junpei, yukari and aigis).

Next is the MC, Fuse the highest level personas available and make extra sure thry are imune to death/holy. You DO NOT want to be insta killed mid battle.

As for the battle itself, Use fuukas scan every single time he changes phase, this is the most important part. Because if you dont, your party members might just spamm attacks nyx nulls

Avoid using debuffs. Nyx gets 2 turns and that somehow makes the debuffs last shorter, focus on purely buffs instead.

I dont recomend using Armageddon, it just really destroys the challange, and fun, of this battle.

Get a back up persona with mediarahan/salvation if something goes horribly wrong. Tetrakarn and makarakarn help too

Final boss can be cheesed if you have the fusion spell Armageddon and wait to deploy it at the opportune time.

I’m not recommending you do this, I am letting you know that if you’re about to lose a 40+ minute boss fight you might be glad to be able to pull the ripcord.

just use matarukaja and a strong persona

Go to the bathroom before the boss, it’s a long one

Make sure that everyone has Null Charm, either as a Persona skill or from accessory (Narcissus' Heart item). It would also be good to cover the weaknesses of your teammates by giving them weapons with appropriate resistances (obtained by fusion in antique shop). Apart from that, nothing in particular.

Chapter 3 secret boss in a room where you need to get S rank, if you didn’t, you can go down the green room, and find someone who can sell you the s rank.

To get the shadow crystal, you need to defeat the knight

Apparently you can't re do them after a certain point, but on the A rank room you can re do the mini games, maybe that counts for it, but you will probably have to start over, take the chance to make some copies of the save file so you can go back at any moment

There's a Pippins at the bottom of the greenroom who you can pay 1500 points to fudge your score to an S-rank. But that's only for the board immediately previous - if you moved on to board 2 without S ranking board 1or moved onto board 3 without S ranking board 2 then yes you have to restart the chapter

In my opinion, the secret boss is still a Knight, because it can be passed without >!the shadow mantle!<. And the shadow crystal will also fall from the Knight.

Both are permanently missable if you aren't careful. Chapter 4 is a lot more obvious, but Chapter 3 actually misleads you into thinking the requirement for the Secret Boss is just for fun

I will say, playing blind for both, I completely missed the secret boss of chapter 3 but I collided head first into the secret boss of chapter 4.

If you’re the type of player who explores everything, I think you could find both bosses without issue, with one caveat - save “before each board” in chapter 3 and replay “the board” if you “don’t get S, T, or Z rank.” I think these will make sense as you eventually play chapter 3 without getting too spoiler-y.

Chapter 3's is highly recommended to ignore the first time and get it on a second playthrough. It should be fairly clear how to find it with knowledge from the first playthrough (and is actually slightly easier to do if you have a chapter completion already). (If you really don't want to replay it (even though it's like 30 minutes of stuff that's probably actually going to be a pure replay), then >!get an S-rank on the first Board!<. If you don't know what that means, you will know what it means before the first save point that would lock you out of doing such a thing.)

Chapter 4's is obvious and won't be missed as long as you don't go the way that is obviously forward progress.

Chapter 4s is very heavily signposted. As long as you’re paying attention you won’t miss it. Chapter 3, on the other hand…

Chapter 3: once you get to >!the green room!< for the first time, you should get an idea of what you have to do to get to the secret boss. Just don't spend all your points until you've fully explored the area, and know that you have to do the thing multiple times. Be smart with your saves, since if you mess up in some places the only way to try again is to revert to an earlier save.

Chapter 4: Backtrack, read every sign, and you should be able to find it.

Practice on the bosses you struggle with individually or just keep replaying pantheon 3 like a maniac till you get it

I suggest replacing sharp shadow with heart or spell twister. For uumuu you have to have a lot of patience and move around the arena, especially on the top part of it then strike when needed, for god tamer always focus on the beast, I find it easier to pogo it and wall jump or stale in the air when they turn into a ball, hornet is probably the hardest one since it's right before the last boss, one tip I have is to stay as low on the ground as you can and let her jump over you when needed or just dash out of the way, for the things she puts on the arena, you can hit them with the nail to make them disappear and give yourself more space to dodge. Good luck on sly

Equip spell related charms such as shaman stone and spell twister and practice the bosses in hall of gods.

for god tamer just know that when he starts rolling attack and hits the wall he’s gonna go to your last known location. meaning the best strategy is to stay in a safe ish place (middle of arena since it’ll give you most moment) until he bounces on the wall then immediately run left or right (whichever side the tamer isn’t) and u can easily hit him 3/4 times. then for the spit attack, downward dark dive spell and you’ll avoid all the projectiles and do damage! for UMMU make sure you dreamnail twice at the beginning of the fight and then conserve soul to shoot shade soul at the jellyfish to UMMUs direction from far away (this is super low risk and makes sure you don’t get exploded hit) good luck!!! P3 was super hard for me i just beat it like a couple days ago haha

Yes it is. It is not mandatory to get the shadow crystal, but it makes getting it easier.

Although you can also get it if you get exactly 0 points

Yes