Tools of the Trade: Status Attacks

[Freyia]

Status Attacks are also known as Weapon Abilities. They give extra properties to a weapon to make it more powerful, or buys you some time to change your strategy in a fight.
Like other RPGs, status attacks are special in that once the attack connects, the enemy unit falls into a 'Status Ailment'. In the SimChamber, such rules still exist.

How to identify Status-Attack weapon types

They are shown in Bold in a mech's Weapons list. They are shown after the name of the weapon, to prevent confusion of the Weapon Type itself. In this example (from Huckbein Mk II):

Weapons:
1) Vulcan- 2 damage, 20 rounds
2) Light Sword (M)- 10 damage
3) Photon Rifle (SV)- 8 damage/PC
4) Chakram Shooter (P)- 20 damage, PARALYZE, 1 EN/shot
5) Gravity Impact Cannon- DESTROY, 5 EN/shot

In this example, the attacks which can inflict status is the Chakram Shooter and the Gravity Impact Cannon.

Remember, Weapon Types are identified by their brackets, while Weapon Status Abilities do not have brackets!

The different Status Attacks are discussed below.

[Freyia]

As the name suggests, PARALYZE weapons mean that if an attack connects, this inflicts paralysis on the opponent, sealing his/her movements.

What Happens when I get hit with a PARALYZE weapon?

- You will lose your current and next Attack Phase.
- You will lose the ability to dodge during your frozen Attack Phases.
- You CAN Block incoming attacks, but you lose your Shield.
- You cannot use Active Pilot Abilities, such as Psychic Overload activation, or Bunshin.
- Your Passive Pilot Abilities, such as Dairyoku and Mazin Power still remain "on" when you are paralyzed.
- You cannot use any seishin.

Simply put, you can't do ANYTHING except block when you're paralyzed.

How can I use it?

Simple. There are 2 situations to how you use a PARALYZE weapon.

1. 'Pure' PARALYZE weapon

These depict the weapons which only have the PARALYZE ability attached to them, such as:

5) Rocket Anchor (P)- PARALYZE

In this case, this is easy. If you use this weapon, and it hits, then the target is paralyzed.

2. 'Hybrid' PARALYZE weapon

Hybrids are those which has a damage rating as well as the PARALYZE tag written on it, for example:

3) Mirage Sign (M)- 25 damage, PARALYZE

In this case, you can choose which you want to do. You can either attempt to paralyze the target, or deal regular damage with this weapon.
You cannot deal both damage and paralyze the target at the same time.

Take note that once a target has been PARALYZEed, he/she cannot be affected by any other PARALYZE attacks during his/her frozen turns. In other words, one cannot continuously PARALYZE one target for every turn, except through weapons that deal Sustained Paralysis.

There are also special cases with paralysis. They are shown with the tag Sustained Paralysis beside the weapon specs in a mech's statistics sheet. Such abilities allow you to continue paralyzing and dealing damage to your target(s) for a cost. For a clarification, please refer to the Hangar Lexicon.

[Freyia]

DESTROY weapons... are a love and hate relationship. You'll love to use them, but you'll hate to be targetted by one of these.

DESTROY weapons have been classified into 3 ranks of strength, to accentuate the differences in strength between the various types.

Some examples would be:

6) All-Out Attack- DESTROY:L1, 1 round

3) Black Hole Cluster- DESTROY:L2, 8 rounds

7) Infinity Cylinder- DESTROY:L3, 30 EN/shot

Level 1 indicates weapons capable of obliterating an average unit in a single hit, but stronger, unique units will just shrug it off.
Level 2 indicates stronger attacks, capable of smashing all but the strongest of units in a single blow.
Level 3 indicates the strongest of all attacks, that nothing can resist without special assistance.

Such weapons are pretty rare, in that they have low ammo counts or use a high amount of EN or PCs. Use them wisely.

The levels mean different effects depending on the target. To a regular unit, DESTROY weapons do just that. Totally eradicate the target, regardless of their HP. In SC terms, your HP gets reduced to 0.

For units with the Class: Boss or Class: Final Boss tag, however, the effects are different.

Units with the Class: Boss tag take damage equal to 50% of their Max HP as direct damage if hit by a Level 1 DESTROY (DESTROY:L1), unreduceable through any means. DESTROY Level 2 (DESTROY:L2) or Level 3 (DESTROY:L3) still instantly kill Class: Boss units, however.

Units with the Class: Final Boss tag take damage equal to 25% of their Max HP as direct damage if hit by a Level 1 DESTROY, unreducable through any means, and damage equal to 50% of their Max HP as direct damage if hit by a Level 2 DESTROY, unreducable through any means. DESTROY Level 3 still instantly kills Class: Final Boss units, however.

The only way to work around it, is to either dodge, or in more rare situations, you have an item, an Inherent Ability or belong in a Pilot Class which can negate DESTROY weapons.