Character Stats
Final Fantasy XII gives every party member the same six core stats. Each character grows them at a slightly different rate, but the gaps are small and most of them can be raised to the cap with equipment and the License Board, so they rarely decide who you bring along. Here is what each stat actually does.
What Each Stat Does
| Stat | What It Does |
|---|---|
| HP | Short for Health Points, this is how much damage a character can take before being knocked out. At zero HP the character is incapacitated until revived with a Phoenix Down, Raise, or Arise. HP has the widest spread between characters and is raised further by the HP licenses on the License Board. |
| MP | Short for Magick Points, this is the resource spent to cast Magicks. Every spell has an MP cost, and a character cannot cast once it runs out (MP recovers by moving around, with items, or the Charge Technick). Buying a character’s Quickening licenses also doubles and then triples the size of their MP gauge. |
| Strength | The stat behind physical attack damage. It feeds the damage formula for nearly every melee weapon, including swords, spears, poles, katana, daggers, ninja swords, axes, and hammers. Each Battle Lore license adds +1 Strength, and armor raises it far beyond the small differences between characters. |
| Magick Power | Governs the damage of offensive Magicks, the potency of healing spells, and the chance of landing status-effect spells. It also powers Mace weapons and adds to katana and staff damage. Mystic Armor and the Magick Lore licenses (+1 each) raise it. |
| Vitality | Shortens the duration of harmful status effects on the character and lengthens helpful ones, so a high-Vitality character shrugs off Poison or Sleep faster and holds Haste or Protect longer. It also feeds the damage formula for axes, hammers, and hand-bombs, the weapons used by the Foebreaker. |
| Speed | Affects how quickly the Charge Time gauge fills, so a faster character acts more often, and it boosts the damage of fast weapons such as daggers, ninja swords, and bows. Its effect is modest, and the gap between characters is very small. |
Weapon Speed
The Speed stat is not the same thing as how fast a weapon swings. Each weapon type has its own Charge Time, the delay before an attack lands, and because the innate stat differences between characters are so small and so easily capped, the weapon you equip matters far more for your damage over time than which character holds it. Faster weapons land more hits, and weapons that can combo (or chain critical hits) widen the gap further.
The table below ranks the weapon types by Charge Time, where a lower number means a faster attack. These values come from Split Infinity’s battle mechanics guide on GameFAQs.
| Weapon Type | Charge Time | Combos? |
|---|---|---|
| Daggers | 21–25 | Yes |
| Ninja Swords | 24 | Yes |
| Spears | 26 | Yes |
| Bowguns | 28 | Criticals |
| Axes / Katanas | 29 | Yes |
| Poles / Greatswords | 30 | Yes |
| Maces / Measures / Hammers | 32 | Mixed |
| Rods | 33 | No |
| Staves / Hand-bombs | 34 | No |
| One-Handed Swords | 35 | Yes |
| Bows | 36 | Criticals |
| Guns | 51 | Criticals |
Daggers and Ninja Swords sit at the top because they pair the lowest Charge Time with the ability to combo, while Rods, Staves, and Hand-bombs cannot combo at all. The biggest speed boosts of all come from Haste, Berserk, and the Swiftness licenses, every one of which is available to all six characters.
A few characters are slower with specific ranged weapons. Balthier is the slowest in the party with guns, Fran with bows, and Penelo with crossbows and guns, each losing roughly 0.2 seconds per shot compared to everyone else.