Latent and Hidden Effects

Introduction
Many items' ingame descriptions do not fully describe their effects. This article is designed to help you become acquainted with such items and how to use them.

Latent Effects are item attributes that are triggered under certain, unstated circumstances.

Hidden Effects are item attributes that are not reflected in the item description at all.

Some effects are both latent and hidden.

HP-triggered Effects
The following weapons' damage ratings vary depending on the wielder's current HP.

The following items' latent effects are triggered at certain levels of HP.

HP-and-TP-triggered Effects
The following job-specific rings and earrings have latent effects that are only active when the following two conditions are met: your HP is low and your TP is below 100%. When only one of these two conditions are met, the effects are not active.

TP-related Effects
The following set of weapons have latent (and hidden) effects when the person using them has less than 100% TP. Note that the effect is also active during weapon skills because of the order in which events occur while using a weapon skill--TP is set to zero before the weapon skill fires. Also, the single-handed ones work regardless of whether they are equipped in the main or sub slot.

The following items of the Hachiman Armor set (Lv.70 SAM) have latent effects that activate in the opposite way, compared to the weapons above. The latent is active when your TP is greater than or equal to 100%, and is not active during weapon skills.

Subjob-triggered Effects
The various Latent Effects on the following series of Level 30 earrings, mantles, belts, and shields are triggered simply by having the appropriate subjob.

Atypical Damage Type Weapons
Most weapons of a certain category deal the same type of damage. The following weapons are exceptions. Despite having an uncharacteristic damage type when meleeing, these weapons still use normal damage types during weapon skills.

Elemental Staves
The Level 51 Elemental Staves have some very potent hidden effects which make them useful to many different jobs. These effects conform to standard elemental strengths and weaknesses.

Weapon Skill Point Effects
The following weapons have latent effects that are governed by a system that keeps track of how many Weapon Skill Points you have accrued using them on Easy Prey or harder enemies. Single-handed weapons need to be equipped in the main slot in order to advance the counter.

Each weapon skill you perform using these weapons on Easy Prey or harder enemies grants you a certain number of points, as follows:
 * 1 point for a weapon skill that does not produce a skillchain effect
 * 2 points for a weapon skill that produces a level 1 skillchain effect
 * 3 points for a weapon skill that produces a level 2 skillchain effect
 * 5 points for a weapon skill that produces a level 3 skillchain effect

The weapons "of trials" are involved in obtaining quested weapon skills. The holder of the weapon must accrue 300 weapon skill points to deactivate the latent and then return it to the quest giver before continuing in the quest.

The weapons from the various 30-Kindred's Seal BCNMs require the holder to accrue 500 weapon skill points to activate the latent high damage rating (and on most, critical hit rate). Note that the critical hit rate modifier only applies to attacks using that weapon--i.e., dual wielding an "unlocked" weapon with a critical hit rate modifier in the sub slot will not affect the critical hit rate of your main slot weapon.

Combat-related Effects
The following items' latent effects only activate under certain circumstances during combat. The latent effects that drain HP, MP, or TP deactivate when the user no longer has enough left for another tick of drain.

Food-related Effects
The following equipment allows consumption of raw fish, which is normally restricted to Mithra only. As a sidenote, the consumption of raw meat is restricted to Galka only.

The following table lists equipment is affected by the food that the player is eating, and food is affected by equipment that the player is using.

Party-related Effects
The following weapons' attributes change depending on the current state of your party.

Relic Weapons
In addition to its other unique characteristics, each fully-upgraded relic weapon can occasionally double or triple their base damage.

During this effect, the base damage formula becomes : floor( ( D+ (aD) + fSTR(2)) * n)

where n is the hidden n-fold damage multiplier of a particular weapon.

Notes :
 * Sneak Attack and Trick Attack are not affected by triple damage effect when Mandau is used by Thief main


 * This increased base damage cannot be activated during weapon skills.

Elemental Gorgets
Elemental Gorgets are rewards of the quest In the Name of Science. These gorgets improve both Weapon Skill accuracy (by unknown amount) and TP Modifier by 25/256 (0.0976...). To trigger the effects, the player must use a Weapon Skill with the same Skillchain property as the gorget name.

For example:
 * Sidewinder has the skillchain properties of Detonation, Reverberation, and Transfixion; therefore, the  Aqua Gorget, the Light Gorget, or the Breeze Gorget would all enhance Sidewinder when equipped.
 * Arching Arrow only has the skillchain property of Fusion; however, since Fusion is the combination of Transfixion and Liquefaction, either the Light Gorget or the Flame Gorget would enhance Arching Arrow when equipped.

Notes: For example: Tachi: Kaiten have "can continue Light skillchain" and "have Fragmentation" properties, but the gorgets that will affect Tachi: Kaiten accuracy and damage are Breeze Gorget and Thunder Gorget only (due to Fragmentation property). None of Light Gorget nor Flame Gorget works on Tachi: Kaiten.
 * Relic Weapons' WS have the ability to continue level 3 skillchain (Light/Darkness). However that property does not count as skillchain property.

Undocumented Latent Effects Triggers
The following items have latent effects whose triggers have not been fully documented. If you come into possession of any of these items and determine how to activate their latent effects, please feel free to update this page.

Items added before the July 24, 2006 version update:

Items added in the July 24, 2006 version update:

Items added in the October 18, 2006 version update:

Items added in the March 8, 2007 version update: