Demi-Fiend is perhaps the hardest super boss in Shin Megami Tensei 5 Vengeance. He is significantly more challenging than Shiva and can single-handedly wipe out your entire party as soon as the encounter begins.
While he is an optional fight in the JRPG, you will need to beat him in order to unlock his fusion. Demi-Fiend is the best demon that you should be recruiting for your party, so if you are looking to achieve a power fantasy where you one-shot everything in NG+, then you might want to beat and fuze the SMT 3 protagonist.
Here is a guide that can help make the Demi-Fiend boss encounter a bit more manageable in Shin Megami Tensei 5 Vengeance.
Demi-Fiend Weakness and Resistance in Shin Megami Tensei 5 Vengeance
Demi-Fiend Elemental Weaknesses and Resistances
| Element | Resistance/Weakness |
|---|---|
 Physical | Resist |
 Fire | Resist |
 Ice | Resist |
 Electric | Resist |
 Force | Resist |
 Light | Resist |
 Dark | Resist |
Demi-Fiend Status Ailments Resistances
| Status Effect | Resistance/Weakness |
|---|---|
 Sleep | Resist |
 Confuse | Resist |
 Charm | Resist |
 Mirage | Resist |
 Seal | Resist |
 Poison | Resist |
Demi-Fiend Skill Proficiencies in Shin Megami Tensei 5 Vengeance
Elemental
| Element | Proficiency |
|---|---|
| Physical | +8 |
| Fire | +8 |
| Ice | +8 |
| Electric | +8 |
| Force | +8 |
| Light | +8 |
| Dark | +8 |
Other Statuses
| Status | Proficiency |
|---|---|
 Almighty | +8 |
 Ailment | +8 |
 Recovery | +4 |
 Support | +4 |
Demi-Fiend skills in Shin Megami Tensei 5 Vengeance
Ruler of Chaos (Innate Skill)
- Foes’ innate skills will not trigger when user attacks, and counterattacks triggered by innate skills will not trigger afterwards.
Freikugel (+8):
- Severe Strength-based Almighty attack to foe. High chance of landing Critical hits.
Gaea Rage (+8):
- (Unique): Severe Physical attack to all foes. Ignores affinity resistance and Pierces through.
Javelin Rain (+8):
- (Unique): Severe Physical attack to all foes. Chance of inflicting Seal.
Deadly Fury (+8):
- (Unique): Medium Physical attack to 1 foe. Always lands Critical hits.
Chaotic Will (+8):
- (Unique) Chance of intakill to all foes. Foes’ Press Turn Icons will be halved next turn.
Mdeiarahan (+4):
- Full HP recovery to all allies.
How to beat the Demi-Fiend in Shin Megami Tensei 5 Vengeance
1) Grind till you max out your stats
One way of making sure that the Demi-Fiend is not one-shotting the Nahobino and their party is by maxing out your stats and the stats of the demons that you want to use in your active party. While this might not happen in one play-through, you can complete consecutive NG+ runs and get your hands on the required amount of Balms, Grimoires, Incense, and Gospels. This is a very time-consuming process, but it’s also one of the more reliable ways of taking him out.
Alternatively, you can make use of the Dance of the Mitama DLC. It will let you set up higher spawns for the Mitama that you want which will let you target farm them for resources like Macca, Gospel, Grimoire, and Glory.
2) Try him on a lower difficulty
Even on Casual difficulty the Demi-Fiend and with a good party set-up, the Demi-Fiend can be incredibly difficult to deal with. So it’s recommended that if you really want to fuse him, you should try the fight on Normal or Casual difficulty after you have at least taken your active party members to level 99.
3) Avoid Gaea Rage: Take out Demi-Fiend’s ally demons every 3 turns (Focus Pixie and Parvati first)
You will need to kill Demi-Fiend’s ally demons every couple of turns or he will use his Gaea Rage. This move will do 10,000+ damage to the entire party and will most likely wipe you out.
The move usually comes after he had about 6 action turns and you haven’t killed a single ally demon for some time.
If you see that he is spawning Pixie of Parvati make it a priority to take them out first. They will be able to completely heal up the Demi-Fiend forcing you to chunk out his HP all over again.
4) Keep increasing evasion to avoid Chaotic Will
After reaching a particular HP threshold the Demi-Fiend will hit you with Chaotic Will. This move has a very high chance of insta-killing your entire party. To avoid it, the best thing you will need to do is to keep buffing your evasion while rebuffing the Demi-Fiend’s accuracy.
You can do this by having demons with the Debilitate or the Luster Candy skill. Party members like Cleopatra, Lilith, Na’amah, and Idun will fit the bill perfectly
Keep buffing and rebuffing as his demon allies will at times hit Dekunda and Dekaja. So don’t forget to keep reapplying them.
5) Don’t be dismayed by his Mediarahan
By the time you take him down to half HP, the Demi-Fiend will use Mediarahan to fully heal himself and all his party members. He will usually use this once, and it’s very unlikely that he will use this again for the rest of the fight.
6) Demi-Fiend’s AI attack patterns will depend on your party composition
The attacks that the Demi-Fiend throws out will depend on our party composition. If most of your party members are neutral to physical he will then throw out Deadly Fury and Javelin Rain.
If all party members block or resist Phy, he will use Freikugel. As it has a high chance of landing crits, the Demi-Fiend will be able to use this move to keep increasing his press turns.
7) Have at least one or two Phy Block or Phy Repel demons in your party
While he will rely more on Freikugel when you have more Phy Resistant demons, he will still go for Deadly Fury from time to time. It’s a great way of eating up his press turns if he attacks the Phy Block or Repel demon with the move.
8) Avoid the Accursed Poison strategy
In the base game using Avian/Raptor demons gave you access to the Accursed Poison Magatsuhi Skill which had a very high chance of inflicting the Demi-Fiend with poison while reducing all of his stats by 1 rank.
Atlus fixed his AI in Vengeance, and while he can get inflicted by it, the chances of you pulling it off are rather slim. You will not be able to consistently use cheese-strat anymore.
9) Have demons with skills that ignore affinity and resistance
Demons that have skills that ignore affinity will be able to directly damage the Demi-Fiend. Someone like Khonsu Ra is a great pick for the fight as he will be able to cause burn damage to all enemies with Heliopolis Dawn while reducing their attack by one.
10) Pray to the RNG gods
Even with the best party setup, you will need to have favorable RNG on the Demi-Fiend’s attacks and the accuracy on them. If RNG is on your side in the fight, you are likely to come out ahead.
Best demons for beating Demi-Fiend in Shin Megami Tensei 5 Vengeance
At this stage of the game, there really isn’t anything called a “best demon.” the perfect party will depend on the type of playstyle that you are going for, along with the Abilities that you have provided the demons that you are looking to use in your active party.
We beat the Demi-Fiend on Casual difficulty and we depended on the following demons for the fight:
- Support: Cleopatra, Na’amah, and Lilith.
- Healer: Agrat, Idun, and Maria
- Damage: Nahobino, Eisheth, Agrat, Metatron, Amon, Shiva, and Khonsu Ra
Even in casual mode, victory is not guaranteed. We had to try the encounter multiple and eventually brute force it with our party.
