(last updated: 10/23/23)So just how hardy is your character? How much endurance does he/she have? Reserve answers these questions: Reserve is a rough measure of how much "energy" your character has to throw attacks.
A character's Reserve is shown on the +stats page as a percentage of their maximum Reserve. Characters with high Reserve are hearty and hale; characters with low Reserve are tired and worn out. This is reflected in a penalty to attack speed and, at very low reserve, a penalty to reactions. (See also: Fatigue)
A character's maximum Reserve is calculated by adding together a cross-section of their stats:
- The highest Defense stat
- The second-highest Defense stat
- The sum of Offense stats divided by five.
For the purposes of this calculation, 75% of the character's Reflex is counted as a "Defense" stat. From there, the base Reserve pool is modified by traits and abilities such as Vigor and Imbued.
Special attacks will generally have a reserve cost, while normal attacks will generally restore reserve (shown as a negative reserve cost). Certain abilities also cost reserve; these costs will be described in the relevant info file for those abilities. Reserve can also be lost when hit by attacks with the SAP effect or EXHAUST Overdrive effect.
The cost of a given attack depends upon a number of factors. The biggest factor is the type of the attack: an attack with just one attack type will cost less Reserve than an attack with two or three attack types. An attack using an offensive stat with a high value will cost more Reserve than one with a lower value. And certain attack flags such as PRESS may modify the reserve cost.
In summary:
- Attacks relying on high-Offense stats will cost more Reserve
- Characters with proportionally high Reflex tend to have higher Reserve costs
- Characters with evenly-balanced Defense stats tend to have higher Reserve costs
- Characters with high and low Defense stats tend to have lower Reserve costs