I'm stuck

[The furthest light]

Hey, I'm brand new to this so I might **** it up lol, anyway I'm stuck on final fantasy 13 it's fairly near the end where you fight barthandulis the second time, this guy just tears me up and 2,000,000 hp any tips would help thanks

[Andromeda]

I'm guessing that you're fighting him on Grand Pulse? The best strategy is to have Haste available on your party. Use Haste and Protect at most times, probably want Shell as well. If you can boost your attack damage then that would help as well. Additionally, you'll want to make sure you keep up with your debuffs Slow, De-Protect, De-Shell, Poison, etc. I don't remember which he is immune to, but he is not immune to everything. So pull out your Saboteur and debuff him.

The best way to work is start the fight where you Buff yourself as fast as possible, try to have the character with the Buff be your main so you can control that Haste is first. They generally don't Haste first as dumb as that sounds. After that you will want to focus on Debuffing the boss and then switch to Magic to get the combo up to break status. After that attack with all you got on Physicals. This is generally the basic strategy for any fight, but it is especially critical for boss fights or tough monsters. You need to prioritize Buffs and Debuffs over fighting. The upside to Debuffing is that it will still work on keep the break meter increasing. So you are making forward progress on it.

Most Buff and Debuff setups will have a healer in to restore the party back while you're pausing in the assault or a tank to raise defense. If you are getting destroyed easily, having a healer in your offense might be good as well.

[The furthest light]

I'll have to give it a try, lately my team and strategy has got me through a lot, I'm a defensive man not offensive, It's been Lightning Snow and Sazh and Light's a commando snow is a setinal and sazh a synergist, I get his health down by 1,000,000 and then he just destroys me.
Thanks for the tip.

[Andromeda]

Defensive can work up to a point, but when you reached Grand Pulse the strategy changes. The game completely removes the training wheels and you'll have to adapt to often sudden difficult spike. The thing you'll find is that a strong offensive will help you out rather than playing too defensively. Especially since most boss fights are timed at that point. If you're in it for too long you'll be cast with doom and the fight will have a definite end, usually with your death. So it is best that you don't play too defensively. A certain amount of aggressiveness is required to succeed.

[The furthest light]

heh yeah unfortunately I learnt that the hard way.

[nickness89]

A huge factor in this fight, is how far along the Crystarium you are. You should really be aiming to be almost completely finishing the Crystarium to the maximum that you can at this point of the game, it will make the fight a LOT easier.

You will want a party of Lightning, Hope and Vanille. Start off by using a Librascope if you have one, and have your starting paradigm as COM, SYN, SAB to allow for buffing and debuffing. If your health starts to deteriorate then switch to COM, MED, MED for quick healing. Once buffs/debuffs are finished, then switch to COM, RAV, RAV to get Barthandelus staggered, and bash him for as long as you can, while healing where necessary. This is basically all you need to fight him, making sure to top-up your buffs/debuffs whenever necessary, and healing when your health gets too low.

My first playthrough, I struggled with this fight, but when you finish as much of the Crystarium as possible at this point of the game, then it is a breeze, and shouldn't last more than a few minutes (didn't for me anyway).

[The furthest light]

like I said before i'll give everything a shot and my crstyarium is almost fully developed because of me doing c'ieth stones so...

[The furthest light]

hey guy's thanks i've just beat barthandules he had 3mil health this time but i used light sazh and vanille thanks for the help