Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 - How to easily clear Ono Puncho's 9999 damage challenge

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 has a wide variety of interesting optional challenges, including the Ono Puncho 9999 damage challenge. In the Gestral Village, a pink Gestral named Ono-Puncho wants the player to hit it with everything they have — as long as it is done with just one attack. Now, there are caveats to this, to make it a little bit easier, but it still may feel impossible to you. Thankfully you can actually do this early in the game, depending on your setup.

We’ll give you a setup for the early game, and something a little later on, depending on what you’re looking to do. The best characters for this are Maelle and Verso, though both still require a little bit of setup first.

The way the contest works is, you can only strike with a weapon once. Buffs don’t count against you, nor does Free Aim, provided the Free Aim user is also the person that strikes Ono-Puncho. Here’s how we cleared the Ono Puncho 9999 damage challenge in Clair Obscur: Expedition 33.

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Tips to clear the Ono Puncho 9999 damage challenge in Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

If you’re trying to clear the Ono Puncho 999 damage challenge in Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 in Act I, Maelle is your best bet. However, it also requires you to do one of two things: win the Gestral Village tournament with Maelle, to unlock the Medalum weapon, or go back and fight the Village Chief, Golgra as just Maelle. You could, in theory, do it without Medalum, but starting the fight in Virtuose Stance makes it so much easier.

Just head to this Pink Gestral to take up the challenge (Image via Sandfall Interactive)

If you have Medalum, you don’t need to buff Maelle with Gustave, but I’d do it anyway. Powerful is a very useful buff for things like this. Here’s the general setup, including one of my favorite Pictos in the game, Roulette. You also need a weapon that’s at least 200 power. If you can unlock Medalum, and upgrade that further, even better.

Maelle

• Medalum Weapon or 200+ power weapon (later in the game, the Last Chance weapon is an amazing replacement).
• Roulette: Every hit has a 50% chance to deal 50% or 200% damage.
• Burning Shots: 20 % chance to Burn on Free AIm shot.
• Critical Burn: 25% increased Critical Chance on Burning enemies.
• Marking Shots: 20% chance to apply Mark on Aim Shot.
• Equip any Pictos that increase her Critical Strike as much as possible.
• Percee skill.

Gustave

• Powerful Skill.
• Either more Speed than Maelle, and/or First Strike Pictos.

Lune

• More Speed than Maelle, and/or First Strike Pictos.

When you’re ready, enter the fight with the Pink Gestral, Ono-Puncho in Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. Have Gustave cast Powerful on Maelle, and then use an Energy Tint with Lune to give Maelle as much AP as possible. This is an RNG-focused strategy, so it might take a few tries. You don’t have to do this, but we did, and it can help.

Have Maelle use Free Aim shot until she inflicts Mark on the enemy (red X in the middle of their torso). Then, just strike with the Percee skill if you’ve got the AP, and if you’re lucky, you’ll deal 9999 damage. Since this relies on Crit/Roulette, it can take a few tries, but it can be done.

You can also come back with Verso - or any powerful party member. There are lots of ways to complete this challenge (Image via Sandfall Interactive)

However, if you want to do this in the late game, come back with Verso. You really don’t need as much setup. Pick your hardest-hitting weapon, equip a few Pictos with high critical strike chance, and make sure Roulette is equipped. A powerful weapon like Liteso is helpful. From there, open the fight, and build AP with an Energy Tint if needed, then slam Ono-Puncho in Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 with Perfect Break.

Success will net you the Sakapate Outfit for Maelle, and that’s it. You can swap to it in the Wardrobe section of the game, like you would for any other character in Clair Obscur: Expedition 33.

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Check out our other Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 guides and features

• Does Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 have New Game+?
• Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 difficulty settings explained
• Best attributes available in Clair Obscur: Expedition 33