Special (XC2)

Specials, also sometimes called Blade Specials, are a kind of attack in Xenoblade Chronicles 2 and Torna ~ The Golden Country. They can be used by pressing A in combat. They are one of few attacks for which the player has control of when the party members use them; the 2nd active Driver performs a Special when ZL is pressed, and the 3rd performs it when ZR is pressed.

Specials tend to be of greater power than s and Driver Arts, but are less strong than Blade Combos and s. However, they are an integral part of the function of Blade Combos and Chain Attacks, making them fundamental to the combat of these games.

Special levels
There are four 'levels' of Specials, ranging from level to level. In Xenoblade Chronicles 2, the Specials available are determined by a Driver's active Blade; each Blade has four Specials, one of each level. All Legendary and Rare Blades have unique Specials; Common Blades' Specials are determined by their gender and weapon. (A full list is included below.) In Torna ~ The Golden Country, all playable characters (both Drivers and Blades) have a set of three unique Specials of level to, and Blades have a fourth of level ; those currently available to the player are those of the character(s) currently in the vanguard (level  to ) or the active Blade (level ).

Specials of a higher level tend to deal more and have longer animations than Specials of lower level. For Specials of level, , or , these trends are by no means universal; however, level Specials essentially always have much longer animations than those of lower levels, and are almost always stronger than lower-level Specials of the same Blade. Level Specials also grant the entire party invulnerability to damage, reactions, and s (except for the infliction — but not the activation — of Doom) for the entire duration of the animation. Visually, Specials of level to  are performed by the active Blade (in Xenoblade Chronicles 2) or character in the vanguard (in Torna ~ The Golden Country). Those of level have animations that include both the active Driver and Blade using the active Blade's weapon together.

In Blade Combos
Specials are intricately linked with Blade Combos. Using a Special will begin a Blade Combo, indicated by a depleting metre on the right side of the top of the screen and a tree icon in the upper-right corner. If another Special of level (or higher) and of an appropriate element (see the article on Blade Combos for details) is performed before this metre fully depletes, the Blade Combo will advance to stage 2 and the metre resets. If a third Special of level or higher and of an appropriate element is then performed before the metre depletes, the Blade Combo will advance to stage 3 and finish; the Special's animation will be zoomed in on, all allies and enemies pause their attacking, and the party becomes invulnerable for the duration of the animation. The importance of Specials towards Blade Combos also makes them an integral part of Fusion Combos.

Special gauge
To use any Special, one must fill up the Special gauge. This is visualised as a light-coloured line running clockwise around the rightmost square in the lower right of the screen in combination with a Roman numeral from to. The Roman numeral indicates the current level of Special built up, whereas the line indicates progress towards building up to the next level. Pressing A when the Special gauge is built up to at least level will perform a Special at the current level built up; pressing it when the gauge is not yet at level  does nothing.

Building up the Special gauge is typically done via using Driver Arts. Normally, performing a Driver Art will increase the gauge by 1/4 of a level; this is increased, however, if an was cancelled into the Driver Art in question. Cancelling the first auto-attack increases the gauge by 3/8 of a level; cancelling the second auto-attack increases it by 1/2; and cancelling the third increases it by 5/8. Cancelling a Blade Switch or Vanguard Switch into a Driver Art, or (with the Arts Chain skill or equivalent) a Driver Art into another Driver Art, both increase the gauge by 1/2 of a level. The gauge can also be built up over time using pouch items (chiefly instruments). Some Battle Skills (e.g. 's ) also have Special-gauge-filling effects. The above methods only apply when the Special gauge is built up to level. To build to level from there, the active Driver and Blade must be at maximum  (with a golden thread connecting the two), during which the Special gauge builds up to level  over time (at a rate dependent upon the Blade). This pauses during Driver Arts. If the golden thread between Driver and Blade breaks, either due to physical distance or due to loss of Affinity, the Special gauge resets back to level (regardless of whether the gauge was built fully or only partially up to level ). Only the player-controlled Driver or Team can build Specials up to level.

The gauge fully depletes after a Special is performed, unless the Special's button challenge was fully or partially completed (see below), in which case it remains filled part of the way to level. The extent to which it is filled depends upon how successfully the button challenge was completed; at best with an 'Excellent', it is filled halfway to level. Aside from using a Special, the only way for the Special gauge to decrease below level is for the Driver and Blade to drop to 0 affinity. At 0 affinity, the Special gauge resets to nothing and cannot be built up until a certain minimum threshold for Affinity is reached. The gauge does not decrease upon a Blade Switch or Vanguard Switch, unless the gauge was built up past the threshold for level, in which case it drops back to level.

Button challenges
During a Special, the icons in the bottom-right of the UI (representing Driver Arts and the Special gauge) and the bottom-left of the UI (representing available Blades/Team members) disappear. In the centre of the screen appear 'button challenges': these either take the form of an icon of the B button, indicating that the B button must be pressed a certain number of times within a given time limit (e.g. 10 times within 1.5 seconds), or of the B button surrounded by 2 concentric circles (forming an annulus) and a third brighter concentric circle of decreasing radius. In the latter case, the player must press the B button when the bright circle's radius is between that of the other two (ideal) or lower than the smaller of the two (not perfect but still a success). Pressing the B button when the bright circle's radius is greater than the larger of the other two, or not pressing it at all, results in a failure. Many Specials have more than one of these challenges (level Specials always have multiple); the exact set, as well as the timings for each, depends on the Special. Successfully or partially completing these challenges will cause 'COOL!', 'GOOD!', 'GREAT!', or 'EXCELLENT!' to flash on screen (and be uttered by the ), with 'EXCELLENT!' being reserved for if all button challenges were completed perfectly. Doing so very slightly increases the damage dealt by the Special, and (as mentioned above) results in the Special gauge being slightly built up above 0 afterwards.

AI party member Specials
As mentioned above, party members controlled by the AI will not perform Specials on their own, instead doing so when ZL or ZR is pressed. This only works if doing so will continue the current Blade Combo (or start one if one is not active). The Special currently available to AI party members are indicated via tags on the left of the screen (for the second Driver/Team) and the right (for the third): the colour of the tag indicates the element, and their current Special gauge level is indicated by white orbs circling their portrait on the tag (one orb for level built up, two orbs for level, three orbs for level ). When an AI-controlled party member is able to continue a Blade Combo (and therefore the player may use their Special), a ZL or ZR icon appears on the tag. A similar tag appears at the bottom screen if the player-controlled party member is able to continue the Blade Combo. (In Torna ~ The Golden Country, any Blade Combo will allow AI-controlled party members' Specials to be used, not only critical routes.) Button challenges (see above) do not appear for AI party member Specials.

Additional effects
Every Special has some sort of additional effect (except for a small number of level Specials and those of Drivers in Torna ~ The Golden Country). What this effect tends to be depends upon the type of Blade. For ATK Blades, most Specials include a situational damage increase: examples are 's Termination Blast, which deals additional damage if Wulfric's Driver is at or below 30%, and 's Death Wing, which deals additional damage to aerial enemies. HLR Blades tend to have Specials that heal the Driver or party on hit, or ones that drop HP potions. TNK Blades may have Specials that increase or damage-increasing effects. A few Specials have very different effects that do not fit into any of the above categories, such as 's Lacerna Noctis which has a chance of removing an enemy's Rage. The Poppi forms' Special additional effects are customisable and can be changed via Poppiswap.

The Specials of each Blade from level to level  appear on a Blade's. They can be levelled up like Battle Skills and Field Skills can; the conditions for levelling Specials up usually either entail performing the Special a certain number of times in combat or defeating a certain number of a specific enemy. Levelling up a Special causes it to do more damage and increases the potency of its additional effect.

Interaction with other gameplay elements
Unlike Driver Arts, Specials can be initiated at any point during the animation of an auto-attack or Driver Art, and doing so will cancel the rest of the animation of said attack as the Special immediately starts. This is not a 'cancel' in the regular sense of cancelling an auto-attack into a Driver Art (no blue ring appears) unless the Special was initiated during the auto-attack's or Driver Art's usual animation-cancel window, in which case a blue ring does appear. Cancelling an animation into a Special during the animation-cancel window does not increase damage as with Driver Arts; however, it does slightly increase the.

Specials cannot be initiated when the active character is inflicted with a reaction, if they are suffering from Shackle Driver or Shackle Blade, or if the Driver is so far away from the Blade that the affinity link does not appear. (An already-initiated Special will not be halted by these.) increases to 100% throughout the animation. In Xenoblade Chronicles 2, during the animation of a (non-level-) Special, the Driver's movement speed increases to their out-of-battle movement speed, and running far away from their Blade will not incur a loss of Affinity. It is therefore recommended to use this period to collect HP potions and reposition (especially since this is the only period when repositioning does not waste time otherwise spent attacking). In Torna ~ The Golden Country, movement is not possible during Specials.

In Chain Attacks
Specials are used in Chain Attacks in Xenoblade Chronicles 2 and Torna ~ The Golden Country. When a Chain Attack is initiated, the player chooses a Blade on the player-controlled Driver (in XC2) or any member of the player-controlled Team (in TTGC), and the selected character executes their level Special. This is repeated with the 2nd and 3rd Driver/Team in that order (unless they are incapacitated or fewer than 3 Drivers/Teams are in the active party).

If one or more elemental orbs were burst by the Specials, the Chain Attack is extended for another round, with every Driver/Team executing Specials in turn again. This repeats until an entire round passes without any elemental orbs being burst or until the Full Burst gauge fills. At the start of each round after the first one, a button challenge appears (see above). If this is successfully completed, everyone will use Specials of one level higher than the previous round (up to a maximum of level ); otherwise, everyone will use Specials of one level lower than the previous round (or of level if the previous round also used level  Specials).

In a Full Burst, every active Driver/Team uses a Special (as well as a Driver Art) simultaneously. Which Special is used depends on if the Driver/Team was the one who burst the last elemental orb or not. If they were not, they use a level Special (the Blade/Team member who uses the Special is the same as the one who last used a Special for that Driver/Team). If they were, they use the level Special of the most recently used Blade (in both XC2 and TTGC). Only the button challenge for the level Special appears.

Exceptions
Specials cannot be used by characters without Blades (the Special gauge will not increase). This applies to in chapter 1 (before  joins the party) and to Jin when he is in the party during the Ancient Ship and Land of Morytha sections of the story (as well as the  battle Titan Battleship Assault).

cannot use her level Special except for on  files — the Special Gauge will not increase past level, and she uses her level  Special during Full Bursts.

cannot use her level Special indoors. The Special gauge may still rise to and display the numeral, but if A is then pressed, the Special will not initiate and the gauge will drop back to level. Mythra uses her level Special during Full Bursts indoors.

The maximum level of Specials is limited in the Spirit Crucible Elpys for all Blades except for Poppi, Poppibuster,, , and ; the Special gauge will not rise above the maximum level. This makes performing Blade Combos, and with that also Fusion Combos and Chain Attacks, much more difficult. Specifically, from the entrance to the Bone Road, the maximum level which the Special gauge can rise to is (even though  can be raised to maximum here); between the Bone Road and the Grave Robbers' Haunt, the maximum level is ; and below the Grave Robbers' Haunt, the maximum level is.

Building the Special gauge quickly
Depending upon how far along one is in the game, the bread-and-butter damage output may consist of Specials, Blade Combos, s (powered up by elemental orbs from Blade Combos), and/or Fusion Combos. In all of these, Specials are central; therefore, being able to build up the Special gauge as quickly as possible is of critical importance in combat, forming the basis for essentially all effective means of dealing damage.

Cancelling auto-attacks
Cancelling s into Driver Arts substantially increases the amount of Special gauge gained as a result, from 1/4 of a level at no cancel to 5/8 of a level at maximum. However, when cancelling auto-attacks into Driver Arts, there is a tradeoff — waiting for a later auto-attack in the cycle may grant more Special gauge at once, but it also takes more time. In general, the most efficient way to build up the Special gauge through this method is actually to cancel the 2nd auto-attack into a Driver Art, building up the gauge by 1/2 a level per Art.

Regardless of whether the 3rd or 2nd auto-attack is cancelled, it still takes two Driver Arts to build up to a level Special and four to build up to level. Using only the 2nd auto-attack to cancel means that building up to level requires an extra Driver Art over using only the 3rd auto-attack, but this is more than made up for by the amount of time saved not waiting for the 3rd auto-attack in the cycle.

Arts chaining and Pouch Items
The Arts Chain skill and its equivalents on Drivers' s is of paramount importance precisely because it speeds this process up so much. Cancelling Driver Arts into Driver Arts provides the same amount of Special gauge gain as cancelling the 2nd auto-attack into a Driver Art, but because the auto-attacking is bypassed, much time is saved; the process of building towards Specials becomes twice as fast or more. Obtaining Arts Chain and its equivalents as early as possible (typically around for ) is therefore almost always the best use of one's  in the early game.

The process is also sped up massively using Pouch Items. Some (chiefly Instruments) build up the Special gauge directly, but in fact it is generally much more efficient to use those that recharge Driver Arts over time (chiefly Desserts) to support the Driver Art cancelling cycle. (Narcipear Jelly is available from the start of Xenoblade Chronicles 2 and is extremely good for these purposes.) A Pouch expansion kit is obtained relatively early on in Xenoblade Chronicles 2, after fighting ; if this is used on the player-controlled Driver, two Desserts can be added simultaneously, almost completely eliminating the need to auto-attack altogether.

Other methods and factors
When the between a Driver and Blade is at a maximum (with a golden thread connecting the two), Driver Arts go up one level, which may mean that their cooldown is reduced. Therefore (and for many other reasons), it is ideal to always be at maximum affinity. Hunter's Chemistry aux cores aid this.

Several factors recharge Driver Arts instantly without relying on arts recharge Pouch Items or auto-attacks. Some weapon classes provide Drivers with Arts that recharge on a critical hit ('s also has this effect); if this is strong enough to recharge an Art fully in one go (as such effects typically are at maximum level) and can consistently be relied upon to work, it provides a very fast way of building up the Special gauge through cancelling a Driver Art into itself repeatedly, and may also free up the use of Pouch Items for other beneficial effects besides recharging Driver Arts.

After a Blade Switch or Vanguard Switch, all Driver Arts are automatically charged to full. Setups may rely on making use of this to build up the Special gauge without arts-recharging Pouch Items (possibly making use of accessories such as the Overclocking Bangle). In Xenoblade Chronicles 2, this carries the additional concern of managing the affinity of 3 Blades; this is less of an issue in Torna ~ The Golden Country, as only 2 affinity links per Team must be managed.

Comparing different Specials
Which Specials are considered better than others depends on several factors. The most obvious is, naturally, ; all else being equal, a more damaging Special is effectively always better, as this leads to stronger Blade Combos, Fusion Combos, and Chain Attacks. This depends on both the damage ratio of the Special (included in the table below) and the statistic (and crit rate) of the Blade, so a higher damage ratio is not necessarily a perfect indicator of how powerful a Special is in practice.

Another much-more-easily-overlooked aspect that determines how useful Specials are is the length of their animation. A shorter-animation Special is considered better because it will be much easier to use in a Fusion Combo. The most powerful Fusion Combos are performed by initiating a stage of the Driver Combo and then advancing a Blade Combo as much as possible before the Driver Combo either runs out or is moved to the next stage, or until a Chain Attack is initiated (everyone receives a great damage multiplier as long as the Driver Combo stage lasts). This is made difficult by the fact that Driver Combo stages do not last long (and, in Xenoblade Chronicles 2, cannot be extended without using certain accessories). Cramming as many stages of a Blade Combo as possible in the short window of a single Driver Combo stage requires accordingly quick Specials, as does making many attacks in a Chain Attack before an active Driver Combo stage expires. This is one of the reasons certain common Blades are (possibly surprisingly) highly sought-after: female Megalance Blades (for their level Special, ) and brute Ether Cannon Blades (for their level  Special, Zero Burst) are examples of Blades with extremely fast Specials that are accordingly useful in Fusion Combos. Level Specials are the exception to this, as they pause the Driver Combo timer upon activation. Because of the way works, their long animations make them significantly less useful in Fusion Combos built upon Launch, but they can be used to great effect in combos built upon  or. The same applies to level Specials in the specific situation of finishing a Blade Combo, so a level  Special which is ordinarily held back by a particularly slow animation may be able to have such a weakness mitigated in this situation.

Certain additional effects are more practical than others. For example, Blazing End's effect increases damage dealt by any of the Special, something which does not require player effort and which will (on average) substantially increase the effective damage of the attack. On the other hand, 's effect increases damage dealt when the enemy is launched; this is something which requires substantial timing on the player's part and opportunities for it do not arise often, making it significantly less practical even though the numerical value of the damage increase is greater than that of Blazing End. How practical an additional effect is depends both upon the effect's condition if one exists (all else being equal, a Special with a less situational condition will obviously be better) and what the additional effect actually does - for example, effects that directly heal the entire party are more useful than those that only heal the character in question or those that spawn HP potions.

Special execution
If a Special's additional effect relies on a difficult conditional to fulfil (e.g. if it increases damage dealt from an enemy's back) it is often not worth waiting to be able to fulfil this conditional for the amount of extra damage that will result. However, it is very often worth waiting for a Break or a Topple, especially if the Special in question will finish a Blade Combo; a chance to obtain the amount of additional damage and party gauge gained from the resulting Fusion Combo easily makes up for a few lost seconds.

In very early stages of the game, it may also be beneficial to wait to use a Special if an AI-controlled party member must be relied upon to build up their own Special gauge in a timely manner for a Blade Combo. For example, if (on the AI) starts a Stone Blade Combo with  and then  immediately thereafter advances it to Volcano with, Tora's AI must build up his Special gauge all the way to level  before the Volcano runs out in order to finish the Blade Combo with a Mega Eruption. Early on in the game, when Driver Arts take a long time to recharge and only one Pouch Item can be used at once, this may not be possible. However, if Rex waits until the first stage of the Blade Combo has almost run out before advancing it to Volcano, Tora then has the entire duration of the Volcano plus almost the entire duration of the Stone to build up his Special gauge to level, drastically increasing his chances of doing so in time. (As the game progresses, building up the Special gauge quickly becomes much easier both for the player and the AI; by lategame, the above is essentially a non-issue.)

The button challenge for any particular Special will always be the same. Assuming the player will be using story Blades often (and especially if they primarily control one Driver), they will find themselves using the same Specials over and over. Memorising or partially memorising the button challenges entailed for each commonly-used Special is not difficult with repetition; this increases the chance of getting an 'Excellent' (beneficial for the Special gauge gain and the additional damage) and frees up mental capacity to do other things like movement. Getting an 'Excellent' is almost always beneficial, with two exceptions. In speedkills and speedrunning, the delay between attacks in a Chain Attack after a successfully or partially completed button challenge is longer than that after failing; the damage increase from an 'Excellent' button challenge, despite being beneficial, is not substantial enough to make up for the extra second of delay. Therefore, in speedkills and speedrunning it is better to fail the challenge entirely. (This does not apply outside of Chain Attacks because there is no such delay.) The other exception (also in Chain Attacks) is if there is a strong effect on the enemy. Letting a timing button challenge fail by not pressing B at all takes a small amount of extra time during which the DOT effect will be active; in this case, the damage from the DOT may be greater than the damage lost from missing the button challenge. In normal play, however, these factors are irrelevant and button challenges should ideally always be completed perfectly.

As mentioned above, in Xenoblade Chronicles 2, Specials are the best opportunity to move; movement during them is much faster than otherwise, and it does not waste time otherwise spent attacking. Good uses of this opportunity include collecting HP potions and loot from defeated enemies or ing, moving away from the party's tank if there is a fear that AOE targeting them may hit the player Driver, and moving into the Just Range of one's weapon.