Rage

Rage is the second gauge under the health bar. Heroes fill it by landing hits and spend it on combat arts and other special moves. Benita's version is called Pure Blood, but it uses the same internal property. Every hero's maximum is 100.

Gaining Rage#

Each attack has a flat Rage gain per hit (RageAdd), which goes to the attacker when the hit connects. Healing moves also grant their RageAdd.

Spending Rage#

A move with a Required Rage cannot start until you have at least that much. Its Rage cost is subtracted at the move's first trigger frame.

Decay#

Rage normally never drains. The only exceptions are the two empowered states:

The other heroes also have a RageDecrement value (100‰ for Terrence, Viola and Benita; 60‰ for Elena), but only Norwood's and Jerold's code ever applies it.

Hidden mechanics#

• The 99 cap before the tutorial. In story mode, Rage is held at max − 1 (99) until the hero's Rage tutorial quest is completed. Until then, moves that need a full 100 cannot be used. Gate quests: Terrence 15052, Viola 19005 or 29004 (two tutorial rows exist; which one counts depends on load order), Benita 29005, Norwood 29006, Jerold 95184. Elena (Arcade) has no gate. Other modes never cap.
• Getting hit gives no Rage by default. Taking damage only grants Rage with a talent such as Terrence's Revenge. That gives enemy move's RageAddHit × 500 / 1000. The most common enemy value is 6 (496 of the 1,209 enemy move rows; 295 have 0), so you get about +3 per hit taken.
• Long-range falloff. For moves with a damage range (DamageDisMin/DamageDisMax), hitting from beyond the maximum range grants a flat 1 Rage. Between the two ranges, gain scales by sqrt(1 − r²), where r is how far you are into that band.
• Low-health bonus. A trophy effect (logic type 125, "HP half Rage add") raises Rage gain by 40%, 55% or 70% depending on the trophy tier (Raw Gem Amulet, Brass Mask and Flamel's Ring carry it). Despite its name, it triggers at 30% HP or less of the attacker, not 50%. The tiers are logic parameters 400, 550 and 700 (es_trophydata.lua, 15 trophies each). See Trophy effects and Combat.
• Flat talent bonuses add to each hit: Terrence Furor +2 / +4, Benita Rhythm: Pure Blood +4, Benita Forced Bloodsucking +5 on backstab and execution, Norwood Craze +15 on backstab and execution, Jerold Craze +5. Jerold's Less Rage cuts Rage costs by 16.5%. See Talents.
• Persistence. Your Rage is saved with the hero and kept through rests, loading and switching areas. Respawning after death resets it to 0.
• Rage thresholds. Some talents raise the Weakness damage of a move when Rage is above 33% or above 66% of max. Elena's attack audio also changes at the same 33% and 66% marks.
• Elena's Rage tiers. Several steps of Elena's double-blade five-hit chains have a Required Rage of 33 or 66 and cost 0, so the chain gets longer as the gauge fills. Her two empowered double-blade arts (skills 30 and 31) cost 34 Rage and their table rows list RageAdd 100 (unverified in play).
• Lunatic Jerold loses 10 Rage when he is hit during a move that has armor (the animator's skillToughness flag; inferred wording). The code tests the Abnormal state (IsHeroSanNotNormal(10005), animalbase.lua:8960-8970), so this already holds in the first stage. See Abnormal state#Effects by hero and Lunatic state.
• Rage from marked targets and perfect dodges. In the Abnormal state, Jerold gains 10% more Rage from hits on a Sendril-marked enemy (see Sendril marks). Elena's perfect dodges and beat-back trades give her about 8 Rage once through status 10122 (see Elena).

Sources#

• ES_SkillData HeroId 10002 move 5 (Light chain): RageAdd 12 and no DamageDisMin/Max, so it is a melee swing; the heavy shots (moves 3 and 4) have RageAdd 0.
• reference/lua_src/luascript/logic/playervalue/animalbase_value.lua: 897–910 (cost with SkillRageSub talent), 1151–1198 (99 cap in AddPropertyCommon), 1586–1592 (DecrementRage), 2148–2190 (distance falloff), 2340–2365 (Rage-threshold Weakness talent), 2709–2726 (gain on being hit), 2740–2772 (gain on hit, talents, low-HP trophy), 2985–3026 (heals give Rage), 100–113 and 237–245 (saved Rage, reset on respawn).
• luascript/logic/playervalue/hero10004_value.lua: 11–23; hero10005_value.lua: 11–30.
• es_skilldata.lua RageAddHit, es_trophydata.lua LogicType 125 rows (re-counted in build/wiki/pass/scripts/combat/c2.py, c3.py, c5.py); ES_StatusData 10122 per the Elena article.
• luascript/logic/player/animalbase.lua: 4250–4304 (Required Rage), 3743–3757 (cost at trigger), 8960–8970 (Jerold lunatic Rage loss); hero10004.lua: 36–44; hero10007.lua: 736–748.
• luascript/controller/controllerstorymode.lua: 1966–1985 (respawn reset), 9465–9478 (IsPermitRageMax); controllermodebase.lua: 495–497; structdata/ms_storytutorial.lua: 25–40, 133–139.
• Tables: es_skilldata.lua (RageAdd, RageSub, RequiredRage, RageAddHit; player rows HeroId 10001–10007, e.g. rows 15, 18, 40); es_heropropertydata.lua (PropertyId 16 and 9); es_storytutorial.lua TutorialId 1002, 1038, 1046, 1048, 1051, 1081 (OpenRage); es_herotalent.lua TalentId 11405, 11406, 13109, 13206, 14204, 15202, 15206.
• Verified in a second pass: es_storytutorial.lua rows with OpenRage 1 (1002, 1038, 1046, 1048, 1051, 1081), es_heropropertydata.lua PropertyId 9 (Attribute_7: 10, 10, 10, 5, 6, 6 for 10001–10005/10007), hero10007_define.lua 65–66 (RageLevel1Limit 0.33, RageLevel2Limit 0.66), es_trophydata.lua LogicType 125 rows (LogicParam 400/550/700 and 500).