Awakening (XC3)

Awakening is a buff in Xenoblade Chronicles 3. It increases the affected character's attack, defense, and recharge rate.

At base, this buff grants +75% damage, 25%, and +50% recharge rate. The damage bonus can be increased with effects such as Swelling Blessing; the other effects cannot.

This is an extraordinarily strong buff, massively increasing both damage and survivability, and any situation which grants it is to be highly prioritised. Despite being additive, the damage bonus is strong enough to be very substantial in most cases, and the recharge rate bonus is a great boon to almost any setup. The damage reduction is strong on its own, but becomes particularly potent when combined with other sources of damage reduction; Awakening is rare among these sources for also increasing damage dealt, making it an especially useful survivability means for offense-focused setups.

Awakening lasts 20 seconds at base, up to 40 seconds with buff-duration-increasing equipment. As Awakening sources are relatively rare in the Xenoblade Chronicles 3 main game (in particular, it cannot be obtained by Feather Sanctuary,, or Cry of Faith), it is important to be able to keep Awakening once it is acquired; this is typically done via Pause Buff Timer from Glittering Melody. If a character with Resonant Flag has access to Awakening (typically via Deflector Field or Interlinking with a Seraph) they can grant it to the entire party; keeping the party under a permanently-paused Awakening buff is often an integral part of optimised postgame setups.