Chain

A player using Sabarta on to build a chain, then Gidiga on to break the chain for extra damage

Left: Damage with no chain, right: Damage with 7 chain

Chains are the main combat mechanic of Phantasy Star Portable 2 Infinity, allowing players to do higher damage with their photon arts (excluding bullets) and charge shots by repeatedly hitting a creature with attacks first.

Using a attack after building to at least 1 chain on a creature will grant the player a minimum of double damage, with higher damage with a higher chain.

The chain system was introduced in Phantasy Star Portable 2 to incentivise the use of regular attacks alongside attacks, as the mechanics and gameplay of Phantasy Star Universe and Phantasy Star Portable, the game's predecessors, meant that combat was mostly just pressing the same button over and over again.

Proper use of the chain system is mandatory in later stages of the game, as creature health is balanced around the chain multipliers.

Overview

After attacking an enemy with attacks multiple times, follow-up attacks will do bonus damage depending on the chain counter on the creature.

Chains are increased through the usage of repeated attacks on a creature, and then used (or broken, as it is more commonly known) by using any attack on the creature with the chain counter built. After a chain is broken, any attacks will receive a boost in damage for a limited time on the creature depending on how high the chain was built beforehand. attacks will not receive this damage bonus. This means that all skills, charge shots and Technics linked to can receive extra damage from a chain.

The following types of attacks will build chain:

• Normal melee attacks
• Normal ranged attacks
• Technics linked to
• R-Mag shots
• Shield attacks

The following types of attacks will break chains, and benefit from the break:

• Melee photon arts
• Charge shots
• Technics linked to

Any hits that hit a creature on the same frame from the same damage source (e.g. 5 hits from a shotgun) will count as 1 hit for the purposes of chain building.

Chains are built on a per-creature basis, and any large creatures with multiple hitboxes will share the same chain counter across all of its hitboxes. Furthermore, chains are also shared between all party members, meaning that players can build chain counters together, and when one player breaks a chain, it will break for all players in the party. Therefore it is crucial to work with your party members to build chains quickly, and not break them too early, as all players will be affected by a break.

Chains can be built to a maximum of 100.

Chain duration

Pre-break

When a chain is started on a creature, there is a set time before the chain must be increased or broken, or it will disappear and must be built again. The timer is reset when a chain is increased by 1, but the amount of time there is to increase the chain further or break it is lower the higher the chain.

Formula
${\color {White}3.{\dot {3}}-(Chain/30)}$
Chain No.	Duration (s)
10	3.00
30	2.33
80	0.67

Because of this, a chain at 100 will instantly disappear before a player can increase it, or break it, giving the chain system a maximum of 100.

Post-break

Once a chain has been broken, it will flash for a certain amount of time, depending on the final chain amount.

Formula
${\color {White}2+(Chain/10)}$
Chain No.	Duration (s)
10	3.00
30	5.00
80	10.00

Chain damage

The amount of damage multiplier provided by a chain break depends on whether there is more than one party member (including NPCs, meaning that solo play with only NPCs follows the multiplayer formula) and the number of the chain counter at the time of break.

In layman's terms, any chain at all will double all damage, with a further 12.5% or 7.5% extra damage per chain count, depending on player count.

Formula
1 player		2-4 player
${\color {White}Damage\times {\big [}2+(0.125\times Chain){\big ]}}$		${\color {White}Damage\times {\big [}2+(0.075\times Chain){\big ]}}$
Chain No.	Damage	Chain No.	Damage
10	3.25×	10	2.75×
30	5.75×	30	4.25×
80	12.00×	80	8.00×