%%%BRAVERY AND FAITH%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%brave

Bravery and Faith are two "special" statistics that are not affected by gaining
levels.  Bravery affects a couple of different combat skills, while Faith
governs the effectiveness of magic.

Bravery and Faith each range on a scale from 0 to 100 for each character, both 
human and monster.  They are not affected by equipment, experience level, or 
job.  Instead, only a few abilities and story events (listed below) will change
Bravery or Faith temporarily for a battle.  At the end of the battle, a quarter
of this change (rounded down) also becomes permanent.  For instance, raising 
your Bravery by 4 during a battle results in a 1-point permanent increase at 
the end of the battle.  Or, a 9-point decrease in Bravery during a battle will 
result in a 2-point permanent decrease.

This calculation means it's not possible for Bravery or Faith to be permanently 
raised above 97 or below 3 -- you can only get a 3-point change, which is not 
enough for a permanent change!

---Bravery----------------------------------------------------------------------

Bravery relates to a couple different elements in combat.  Generally speaking,
a high Bravery is better (and, in fact, will help you out quite a lot!)

---WHAT DOES BRAVERY AFFECT?---
- The chance of using most Reaction Abilities in response to an enemy attack is 
  equal to your Bravery.  So, a high Bravery means you'll use Reaction 
  Abilities more.  This is quite helpful, and the best reason for raising your
  Bravery.  This is true both for human Reaction Abilities, and for the standard
  Counter ability that every monster has.

- A higher Bravery increases the damage you deal when attacking with fists, 
  knight's swords, and/or katanas.

- If you're using a knight's sword, high Bravery also increases the damage from
  the Dark Knight abilities Abyssal Blade and Unholy Sacrifice.  If you're using
  a regular sword or fell sword, then your Bravery does not affect these
  abilities.

- Some monster abilities also do more damage if the user has a high Bravery.
  Specifically, the abilities that depend on Bravery are the FIRST abiities
  listed in each monster's menu.  A few exceptions are Leaf Rain (Dryad
  family) and Tri-Breath (Tiamat), and the abilities of special "story
  character" monsters -- none of these depend on Bravery.

- The gil/JP received from some Errands is affected by your Bravery -- some
  Errands give you more gil & JP if your Bravery is high, others more gil & JP
  if your Bravery is low.  (And many other Errands aren't affected by Bravery
  at all.)

- If a unit's Bravery drops below 10 during battle, she/he/it will turn into a
  Chicken.  As a Chicken, the character cannot be controlled and will simply
  flee into a corner and do nothing.  A Chicken regains 1 Bravery each turn and
  will turn back into its regular self once his/her Bravery gets back to 10.

  Some bosses are immune to the Chicken status.  Even if their Bravery drops
  below 10, they will function as normal and not turn into a Chicken.  However,
  they will still regain 1 Bravery each turn until they get back to 10 Bravery.

- If a character's permanent Bravery drops to 5 or lower, he or she will abandon
  the team out of cowardice and permanently disappear from the roster.  Even
  story characters and monsters will desert in this way.  The only exceptions
  are Ramza and AI-controlled Guests, who will never desert no matter how low
  their Bravery drops.

  You'll start getting Desertion Threat warnings after every battle when a 
  character's permanent Bravery drops to 15 or lower.  No actual desertion will 
  occur unless permanent Bravery falls to 5, though.

  As long your permanent Bravery remains above 7, you're at no real risk of 
  desertion.  With a Bravery of 7, the maximum Bravery change possible within a 
  single battle is just 1 point, which still keeps you above 5.  Of course,
  you'll probably want to keep your Bravery over 10 anyway, so that you don't
  become a Chicken :P.

  Characters will NEVER desert due to HIGH Bravery.  You can raise your Bravery
  as high as you like without fear of desertion.

- When discovering items using the Treasure Hunter movement ability, you 
  receive one of two different possible items based on Bravery ... in this 
  case, having a LOW Bravery makes receiving the "good" item more likely.  For 
  this reason, Rapha makes a great Treasure Hunter as she starts with a very
  low Bravery.
  
Any ability or item not listed above is unaffected by Bravery.

---WHAT CHANGES BRAVERY?---
Bravery can be increased during battle by:

- Your choices in two story battles.  Choosing to rush the enemy and not help
  Argath on the Mandalia Plain in Chapter I will raise the current team's
  Bravery by 10 for the battle (at least 2 of which is thus permanent).  In 
  Chapter II, choosing to help Mustadio at Zaland will raise Bravery by 20;
  choosing not to help him will raise Bravery by 10.

- The Orator's Praise skill raises Bravery by 4.

- The Dancer's Bravery Boost reaction ability raises Bravery by 3 in response 
  to a physical attack.  Note that one use of this by itself is not enough for 
  a permanent change.

- Ramza and Luso's ability Steel (only available in Chapter II or later) raises
  Bravery by 5 and has a 100% hit rate.

- Ramza and Luso have an ability called Shout (not available for Ramza until
  Chapter IV) that raises their own Bravery by 10, but can only target 
  themselves, not other allies.

- Reis's Dragon's Might ability raises a dragon or hydra's Bravery by 5.  It
  does not work on other characters/monsters.

- A character with Bravery less than 10 regains 1 Bravery per turn until he or
  she reaches 10 Bravery.

Bravery can be decreased by:

- Choosing not to help Boco in the story battle at Araguay Woods in Chapter II.
  This gives a 10 point penalty to the party's Bravery

- The Mystic's Trepidation magick lowers Bravery by 30.

- The Orator's Intimidate ability lowers Bravery by 20.

- Beowulf's Chicken ability lowers Bravery by 50!

- The Dread Gaze ability possessed by the Floating Eye and Ahriman monsters
  lowers a character's Bravery by 10.

Remember that only 1/4 (25%) of these changes remain after a battle.

---WHAT LEVEL OF BRAVERY IS GOOD?---
There's little reason not to shoot for as high a Bravery as you can get.  It
makes your Reaction Abilities more effective, and increases the power of 
certain weapon types.  The ONLY downside to having a higher Bravery is that it
keeps you from finding rare items with Treasure Hunter.  But, you can just keep 
one specialized character with a low Bravery for that, and raise your main
fighting team to have as high a Bravery as possible.  Plus, once you've 
collected all the rare Treasure Hunter items, you don't need a low-Bravery
character any more and can raise his/her Bravery back up.

Since a high Bravery does not cause characters to desert, you can increase your
permanent Bravery all the way up to the maximum of 97.

---HOW CAN I RAISE BRAVERY?---
The best way to gain Bravery is to use Ramza and Luso's Steel ability.  Steel 
gives you the largest Bravery boost (5) and has a 100% hit rate.  (To increase 
Ramza and Luso's own Bravery, Shout is even better.)  If you want to grind 
Bravery, deploy both Ramza and Luso, increase their speed, and use Steel/Shout 
until everyone's Bravery is maxed out at 100.  Then finish off the enemies.  
Since only 1/4 of your Bravery gains are permanent, you'll have to repeat this 
process quite a few times to actually reach the highest permanent Bravery 
possible (97).

Also, when you encounter the three battles in the story where you're given a
choice of mission objectives, be sure to pick the options that net you a higher
Bravery (don't help Argath; help Boco and Mustadio).  This is a nice early 
Bravery boost before you have other abilities to tweak it.

---HOW CAN I LOWER BRAVERY?---
The only reason you'll want to lower Bravery is for Treasure Hunter, but the
quickest way to do this is with Beowulf's Chicken magick.  (The good Treasure
Hunter items don't show up until after Beowulf is available.)  Each use of
Chicken can net up to a 12-point drop in permanent Bravery.  Use it over the
course of several battles to drop your Bravery quite a bit.  For final tuning of
your Bravery, use Intimidate to make smaller 4-point changes.  Remember to keep
your permanent Bravery above 10 so you don't turn into a Chicken.

---Faith------------------------------------------------------------------------

Faith is mostly related to magick, and can be both good and bad.

---WHAT DOES FAITH AFFECT?---
- Magick is most effective when cast by characters with high Faith.  Attack
  magicks do more damage, healing magicks restore more HP, and status-changing
  magick is more likely to succeed.

- If a character has high Faith, healing magicks used by allies will restore
  more HP to the character and status change magicks will be more likely to
  succeed.

- BUT, enemy magick is also more effective against you when you have high Faith!

- Marach's Nether Mantra abilities reverse all of the above: they do more damage
  when Marach has LOW Faith, and when his targets have LOW Faith.

- Healing magicks will restore more HP to you when you have high Faith, and
  "buffs" like Protect and Shell are more likely to work on you.

- "Magick" guns (Glacial Gun, Blaze Gun, Blaster) are more likely to do high
  damage when the user has high Faith.

- A LOW Faith increases the attack strength of fell swords wielded by the
  character.  Faith has NO effect on the damage you TAKE from fell swords
  wielding by someone attacking you.

- If you're using a fell sword, low Faith also increases the damage from the
  Dark Knight abilities Abyssal Blade and Unholy Sacrifice.  If you're using
  a regular sword or knight's sword, then your Faith does not affect these
  abilities.

- The gil/JP received from some Errands is affected by your Faith -- some
  Errands give you more gil & JP if your Faith is high, others more gil & JP if
  your Faith is low.  (And many other Errands aren't affected by Faith at all.)

- If your character's permanent Faith level rises to 95 or higher, the character
  will experience a religious conversion and permanently quit the team.  Even
  story characters and monsters will desert in this way.  The only exceptions
  are Ramza and AI-controlled Guests, who will never desert no matter how high
  their Faith gets.

  You'll start getting Desertion Threat warnings after every battle when a 
  character's permanent Faith rises to 85 or higher.  No actual desertion will 
  occur unless permanent Faith reaches 95, though.

  As long your permanent Faith remains below 93, you're at no real risk of 
  desertion.  With a Faith of 93, the maximum Faith change possible within a
  single battle is just 1 point, which still keeps you below 95.  You will have
  to put up with the Desertion Threat warnings after every battle, though.

  Characters will NEVER desert due to LOW Faith.  You can lower your Faith as
  low as you like without fear of desertion.
  
Any ability or item not listed above is unaffected by Faith.

---WHAT CHANGES FAITH?---
Faith can be increased by:

- The Orator's Preach skill raises Faith by 4.

- The Bard's Faith Boost reaction ability raises Faith by 3 in response to a 
  magick attack.  Note that one use of this by itself is not enough for a 
  permanent change.

- The Mystic's Belief spell and the Templar's Belief swordskill cause Faith
  status, which acts as a temporary increase in a character's Faith to 100.  
  Because this status has no effect on a character's actual Faith number, it 
  does not result in any permanent change to Faith.

- The Rod of Faith weapon gives the character equipped with it a permanent 
  Faith status as long as it is equipped.  (But, again, this never affects your 
  actual Faith number.)

- Striking characters with the Rod of Faith can bestow the Faith status on
  them.

Faith can be decreased by:

- The Orator's Enlighten skill lowers Faith by 20.

- The Mystic's Disbelief magick, the Templar's Doubt swordskill, and hitting
  people with the Gokuu Pole can all inflict Atheist status, which is the
  reverse of Faith status: It acts as a temporary reduction to 0 in Faith, but
  also has no permanent impact on Faith.

---WHAT LEVEL OF FAITH IS GOOD?---
Unlike with Bravery, there's no "best" Faith value since Faith is a double-
edged sword -- it makes your own magicks stronger, but it also increases the 
damage you take from enemy magicks.

For MAGICK-USERS, you'll probably want a high Faith in order to increase your
magick strength.  If you have a support character using a magick gun, you might
want to boost his Faith as well to make the gun more effective.

Remember, though, that you can't get your Faith TOO high (95+) or the character
will quit your team.  For characters other than Ramza, the safe number is 93; at
this level of Faith, the maximum Faith change possible within a single battle is
just 1 point, which still keeps you below 95, so even if the character's Faith
gets raised during one battle, he or she won't desert, and then you can lower it
back to 93.  You will have to put up with the Desertion Threat warnings after
every battle, though.  If you don't want to bother with the Desertion Threats,
keep your Faith at 84.

Ramza never deserts no matter how high his Faith is, so if you want to use Ramza
as a magick-user, raise his Faith all the way up to the maximum 97.

If a character ISN'T going to be using magick, you may want to lower his Faith 
as low as possible.  Of course, this destroys his/her ability to use magicks, 
but it also renders them virtually invulnerable to enemy magicks.  For 
characters who use primarily physical attacks (e.g. Ninjas, Dark Knights,
special characters with swordskills) and not magicks, low Faith is actually a 
great defensive asset!  Characters will not desert due to LOW Faith, so you
can drop your permanent Faith all the way down to the minimum of 3.

No monster abilities require Faith, so you can lower monster Faith pretty
safely.

---HOW CAN I RAISE/LOWER FAITH?---
You're pretty much dependent on the Orator's skills to change Faith.  Just have
as many characters learn Enlighten or Praise as possible, defeat most of the
enemies and cripple the remaining ones (see tips below), then have them use
Enlighten or Preach on each other.

Since the success rate of Enlighten and Preach depends on your Magick Attack
stat, you may find it advantageous to change your characters to jobs with a
high Magick Attack (i.e., Black Mage) and/or equip gear that raises their Magick
Attack if you want to grind Faith.  Although Magick Attack doesn't alter the
AMOUNT of Faith you gain/lose, it makes the abilities more likely to succeed.