Experience Gain
Formulas for calculating level and weapon experience in FE8.
Guide Contents
This guide contains the following calculations/formulas.
Weapon Experience
How weapon experience and weapon ranks are calculated.
Weapon Experience
Every time a unit enters combat and attacks, they'll gain a small amount of weapon experience for the weapon type that they had equipped. Gaining enough weapon experience will increase weapon ranks, allowing units to use better weapons.
In short, there are 5 weapon ranks in the game, and it requires a certain amount of weapon experience to reach the next level (the required amount gets higher for higher ranks). There is also a zero state, displayed in game as a "—" which indicates that a unit cannot use that weapon type. A unit will reach E rank if they gain a single point of weapon experience, which can only happen through a promotion (for example promoting from Mercenary to Hero gives E rank axes).
The weapon experience thresholds are listed below.
| Weapon Rank | Total Experience | Delta |
|---|---|---|
| — | 0 | +0 |
| E | 1 | +1 |
| D | 31 | +30 |
| C | 71 | +40 |
| B | 121 | +50 |
| A | 181 | +60 |
| S | 251 | +70 |
Gaining Weapon Experience
Gaining weapon experience is simple, it will happen every time your units attack (either on player phase or enemy phase). You'll get weapon experience per strike for whichever weapon category the unit is using, depending on the weapon used. This is doubled if the strike kills the enemy. Even if the strike misses or does 0 damage, you'll still get weapon experience for it. Battles in the arena will follow the same rules.
The strike (or staff cast) that breaks a weapon will not yield any weapon experience in FE8.
Units can only have one single S rank, except for Lyon (Necromancer) who can have two S ranks. Trainee units can only have up to 71 weapon experience, for a maximum rank of C.
Promoting will often give units a set amount of weapon experience in various weapon types depending on the class, refer to the classes page for this information.
Weapon Experience Values
The following table lists the base amount of weapon experience gained per strike for all weapons and tomes in FE8. The listed values are doubled for every strike that kills an enemy. This information is also available on the individual page of each weapon/tome.
| Weapon | WExp Per Strike |
|---|---|
| +1 | |
| +1 | |
| +1 | |
| +2 | |
| +1 | |
| +1 | |
| +2 | |
| +1 | |
| +1 | |
| +2 | |
| +1 | |
| +1 | |
| +1 | |
| +1 | |
| +2 | |
| +1 | |
| +1 | |
| +2 | |
| +1 | |
| +1 | |
| +1 | |
| +1 |
Staff Experience Values
Staff weapon experience and level experience.
Staff Experience Values
Level Experience
How level experience is calculated.
Level Experience Calculations
Similar to weapon experience, a unit will gain level experience every time they enter combat, although they don't even need to attack in this case. The game keeps an internal record of how "strong" each class is, and uses this along with the units' levels to determine how much experience you gain. You also get bonuses for dealing the killing blow, as well as if the enemy was a boss or a thief. The calculations are as follows.
If an Assassin procs Lethality and OHKOs the enemy, the total experience gained is multiplied by a factor of roughly 1.8.
Q represents the game's percieved power of each class. The ones listed above are the relevant ones that can actually happen in the game, but there are also values for unused enemy types and situations that will never result in anything other than a clink (which includes not being able to counter). These values are listed below.