So I see a bunch of misconception everywhere on what exactly KH2 "Revenge Value" is. It's understandable, as it is a confusing concept. Most people seem to have a general grasp or idea of what it does, but are never clear on its specifics or details. So I'm here to help clear up some confusion, so everyone can understand the game a bit more.
So yeah, KH2 is pretty much universally acclaimed to be the best game in the entire series with its incredible combat system and details. One of the reason is due to the implementation of Revenge Value in the game. Simply put, Revenge Value is an invisible counter inside the game within every enemy. It essentially determines when the enemy will retaliate, thus preventing you from infinite-comboing an enemy to death (although there are a few exceptions of these).
To give you an idea, no other game had a system as complex as this. KH1 had a very simple Revenge Value system for certain bosses (i.e. Riku-Ansem in Hollow Bastion can take 4 hits before retaliating, Sephiroth takes 4 consecutive hits or 7 separate hits before teleporting). ReCoM obviously didn't have Revenge Value, due to its Card system. The other handhelds (BBS, Days, Coded, DDD) all didn't have a revenge value system, and the bosses/enemies seemingly retaliated whenever they felt like with zero consistency, which is also why many criticize the gameplay of those games; and with good reason too.
Anyways, in regards to Revenge Value itself; most people understand what it is, but there are far more details and complexity behind it. Revenge Value is not the only counter that determines how a boss or enemy acts. There are also HP barriers to take into consideration, as well as other invisible counters such as Flinch Count or Action Count. I'm not gonna go TOO in-depth into those, or else this will turn a literal book about KH2 mechanics, but just know that Revenge Value, perhaps the most important, is not the only invisible counter that affects enemy patterns.
I'll break this down slowly. There are two types of retaliation that enemies can do.
1. You hit their Revenge Value and they retaliate.
2. You stop attacking them and they retaliate.
We'll call these "Forced Revenge" and "Normal Revenge" respectively for simplicity. Both come into consideration when fighting. When you're attacking an enemy too much and hit their Revenge Value, they strike back. If you stop attacking them but haven't reached their Revenge Value, they'll still strike back, but most likely with different attacks (this is where other counters such as Action Count comes into play, but I won't get into that once again). It's really simple to understand; attack too much, they counter. Stop attacking, they counter.
So you might be asking at this point: is Revenge Value a constant thing? Or does it change and differ with bosses/enemies? The latter would be correct. Revenge Value for every boss is a number, but it differs from boss to boss. Here's a little list:
-All Data Battles (excluding Vexen and Saix) = 9.375
-Every other boss = 12.5
That is the Revenge Value of every single boss in the game. Most have a RV of 12.5, but the ones I listed above are the exceptions. Basically, if you attack them to a point where their RV exceeds their limit, they will retaliate. Simple enough, right?
So in regards to how RV is actually built up: each individual attack Sora has will add a certain amount of Revenge Value. Here's another list:
-Ground horizontal swing = 1
-Ground vertical swing = 1
-Ground thrust = 1
-Ground Vertical Finisher = 3
-Ground Horizontal Finisher (when there are a bunch of enemies around Sora) = 3
-Aerial upper swing = 1.5
-Aerial drop swing = 1.5
-Aerial vertical finisher = 3.5
-Aerial horizontal finisher = 3.5
-Upper Slash (square) = 3
-Horizontal Slash (square) = 1.5
-Finishing Leap (square) = 3
-Retaliating Slash (square recovery) = 1.5
-Slapshot = 1
-Dodge Slash (lol) = 1
-Flash Step = 1
-Sliding Dash = 1
-Vicinity Break (or Round Break) = 1
-Guard Break finisher = 3
-Explosion finisher = 6
-Aerial Sweep = 2.5
-Aerial Dive = 1.5
-Aerial Spiral = 1.5
-Aerial Finish = 3.5
-Magnet Burst (or Magnet Splash) = 3.5
-Counterguard = 1
-Form Transformation = 0
-Firaga = 1
-Firaga Finish = 3
-Blizzaga = 2
-Blizzaga Finish = 4
-Thundaga = 4
-Thundaga Finish = 4
-Magnet = 4.5
-Reflect/Finish = 3
Those are all of normal Sora's abilities and their Revenge Value. It's a pretty long list, as you can see. There are even more for Drives, Summons, Limits, etc. but I obviously won't list them all out. If you're curious, check this thing out; it pretty much lists out all the Revenge Values. http://pastebin.com/mKMSsDfL (also where I got a bunch of this info )
Revenge Value and the type of Revenge also changes depending on where you hit the boss. For example, if you strike Roxas' Revenge Value in mid-air, he'll do his downward spiral attack. If you strike his Revenge Value on the ground, he'll do his long ground combo. It's different for every boss, and it really adds a lot to the learning factor of the game.
If you've ever seen any speedruns of KH2, you'll notice a lot of RV manipulation. The biggest example is probably the Roxas fight in a 2FM speedrun; it's a very specific use of combos, Magic, and well timed Reflects to perfectly manipulate Roxas to do whatever we want him to do. It's a really nifty thing to know and really adds a lot of depth into the gameplay you've never realized before.
There are exceptions to revenge value, of course. One example would be using Peter Pan against Saix, where by spamming aerial hits nonstop, you can basically stun lock him to death. Saix doesn't retaliate in this example because his retaliation has a really slow charge up, and Pan's dagger has a lot of stun lock properties to it. As such, every time Saix attempts to retaliate, Peter Pan will simply stun him and break him out of his retaliation animation with his dagger, basically leaving him stun locked in a loop until he dies.
Another example of RV exception is Firaga, which has several unique properties to it. Firaga adds zero Revenge Value until the last hit of the attack. As such, a lot of speedrunners would abuse this to chain Firaga combos on bosses. In addition, Final Firaga adds very little Revenge Value if the Keyblades spinning around Sora also hits them. This is how people can chain Firaga combos on bosses.
There are other exceptions out there, but once again, I'm not gonna cover them in too much detail. For the most part, just understand that Revenge Value is a thing inside the game, and it works. Most of the time.
When a boss uses an attack, their Revenge Value will typically drop to zero. There are hacks/cheats demonstrating this, and you can probably look up "Revenge Value code" on YouTube or something and find several videos of it. Either way, it's a good illustration of how Revenge Value actually looks if we could see the counter.
Some skeptics might ask, "What exactly does this do in KH2 gameplay that makes it so good? If we all understood Revenge Value, doesn't that mean we can manipulate all bosses in the same way?" And to a degree, that is true; if you fully understood Revenge Value and how each of your attacks affect a boss, you would know exactly when a boss retaliates and know exactly how to counter. However, that's difficult. That's extremely difficult to do. Not even the best KH players in the world know how one boss will react to each one of your attacks.
You might've seen a bunch of people do no damage challenges, with crazy restrictions, etc. They can do that because they're so knowledgeable about that one fight. It differs from boss to boss, the way they retaliate, the RV they have, and fully understanding that for every single enemy in the game is pretty much impossible. For the most part, people who are playing the game on high difficulties get an idea of how RV works, even if they don't know it exists. For example, they may die several times fighting a Data battle on LV1 Critical Mode, but then they realize, "Hey, Marluxia retaliates exactly after ___ hits and attacks + a thunder, so if I Reflect immediately afterwards, I can avoid it!"
That's what makes KH2 so incredible and complex; when you set your mind to "take as least damage as possible" instead of "mash X to win", you really start to learn about its mechanics. You start realizing when to avoid, when to dodge, and when to attack for an opening. You get rewarded for dying, because you learn something new. A lot of people never discover this side of KH2 because they're too busy mashing X, but those who do quickly fall in love with the game because its such a genius system. If you're one of those "mash X to win" people, I urge you to give Critical Mode a try. Don't go out of your way to grind in frustration because you can't beat a fight; instead, try learning the fight and avoiding the attacks, and at least get a vague idea for the Revenge Value of the boss and how they retaliate. I guarantee you, you'll beat it eventually, and you'll (probably) have a blast doing it.
Anyways I'm ranting now and this has gone on for way too long so I'll end it here. I realize it's not much for discussion, but any questions/feedback and stuff would be really cool. Hopefully I taught you something new (assuming you actually bothered to read through all this crap), and have a wonderful day
So I see a bunch of misconception everywhere on what exactly KH2 "Revenge Value" is. It's understandable, as it is a confusing concept. Most people seem to have a general grasp or idea of what it does, but are never clear on its specifics or details. So I'm here to help clear up some confusion, so everyone can understand the game a bit more.
So yeah, KH2 is pretty much universally acclaimed to be the best game in the entire series with its incredible combat system and details. One of the reason is due to the implementation of Revenge Value in the game. Simply put, Revenge Value is an invisible counter inside the game within every enemy. It essentially determines when the enemy will retaliate, thus preventing you from infinite-comboing an enemy to death (although there are a few exceptions of these).
To give you an idea, no other game had a system as complex as this. KH1 had a very simple Revenge Value system for certain bosses (i.e. Riku-Ansem in Hollow Bastion can take 4 hits before retaliating, Sephiroth takes 4 consecutive hits or 7 separate hits before teleporting). ReCoM obviously didn't have Revenge Value, due to its Card system. The other handhelds (BBS, Days, Coded, DDD) all didn't have a revenge value system, and the bosses/enemies seemingly retaliated whenever they felt like with zero consistency, which is also why many criticize the gameplay of those games; and with good reason too.
Anyways, in regards to Revenge Value itself; most people understand what it is, but there are far more details and complexity behind it. Revenge Value is not the only counter that determines how a boss or enemy acts. There are also HP barriers to take into consideration, as well as other invisible counters such as Flinch Count or Action Count. I'm not gonna go TOO in-depth into those, or else this will turn a literal book about KH2 mechanics, but just know that Revenge Value, perhaps the most important, is not the only invisible counter that affects enemy patterns.
I'll break this down slowly. There are two types of retaliation that enemies can do.
1. You hit their Revenge Value and they retaliate.
2. You stop attacking them and they retaliate.
We'll call these "Forced Revenge" and "Normal Revenge" respectively for simplicity. Both come into consideration when fighting. When you're attacking an enemy too much and hit their Revenge Value, they strike back. If you stop attacking them but haven't reached their Revenge Value, they'll still strike back, but most likely with different attacks (this is where other counters such as Action Count comes into play, but I won't get into that once again). It's really simple to understand; attack too much, they counter. Stop attacking, they counter.
So you might be asking at this point: is Revenge Value a constant thing? Or does it change and differ with bosses/enemies? The latter would be correct. Revenge Value for every boss is a number, but it differs from boss to boss. Here's a little list:
-Axel II = 11.5
-Pete (Timeless River) = 12.5(first phase)>10(second phase)>8.75(third phase)>7.5(fourth phase)>6.25(final phase)
-Hyenas = 7.5
-Scar = 6.25
-Luxord (Story) = 9.375(first phase)>6.875(second phase)
-Armor Xemnas = 10(first phase)>6.25(second phase)
-Final Xemnas (Zebraman) = 9.375
-Zexion(Absent Silhouette) = 15.625(first phase)>12.5(second phase)>9.375(final phase)
-Vexen (Absent Silhouette) = 18.75
-Vexen (CoR Data) = 15.625
-Saix (CoR Data) = 12.5(first phase)>9.375(second phase)
-Lingering Will/Terra = 25
-All Data Battles (excluding Vexen and Saix) = 9.375
-Every other boss = 12.5
That is the Revenge Value of every single boss in the game. Most have a RV of 12.5, but the ones I listed above are the exceptions. Basically, if you attack them to a point where their RV exceeds their limit, they will retaliate. Simple enough, right?
So in regards to how RV is actually built up: each individual attack Sora has will add a certain amount of Revenge Value. Here's another list:
-Ground horizontal swing = 1
-Ground vertical swing = 1
-Ground thrust = 1
-Ground Vertical Finisher = 3
-Ground Horizontal Finisher (when there are a bunch of enemies around Sora) = 3
-Aerial upper swing = 1.5
-Aerial drop swing = 1.5
-Aerial vertical finisher = 3.5
-Aerial horizontal finisher = 3.5
-Upper Slash (square) = 3
-Horizontal Slash (square) = 1.5
-Finishing Leap (square) = 3
-Retaliating Slash (square recovery) = 1.5
-Slapshot = 1
-Dodge Slash (lol) = 1
-Flash Step = 1
-Sliding Dash = 1
-Vicinity Break (or Round Break) = 1
-Guard Break finisher = 3
-Explosion finisher = 6
-Aerial Sweep = 2.5
-Aerial Dive = 1.5
-Aerial Spiral = 1.5
-Aerial Finish = 3.5
-Magnet Burst (or Magnet Splash) = 3.5
-Counterguard = 1
-Form Transformation = 0
-Firaga = 1
-Firaga Finish = 3
-Blizzaga = 2
-Blizzaga Finish = 4
-Thundaga = 4
-Thundaga Finish = 4
-Magnet = 4.5
-Reflect/Finish = 3
Those are all of normal Sora's abilities and their Revenge Value. It's a pretty long list, as you can see. There are even more for Drives, Summons, Limits, etc. but I obviously won't list them all out. If you're curious, check this thing out; it pretty much lists out all the Revenge Values. http://pastebin.com/mKMSsDfL (also where I got a bunch of this info
)
Revenge Value and the type of Revenge also changes depending on where you hit the boss. For example, if you strike Roxas' Revenge Value in mid-air, he'll do his downward spiral attack. If you strike his Revenge Value on the ground, he'll do his long ground combo. It's different for every boss, and it really adds a lot to the learning factor of the game.
If you've ever seen any speedruns of KH2, you'll notice a lot of RV manipulation. The biggest example is probably the Roxas fight in a 2FM speedrun; it's a very specific use of combos, Magic, and well timed Reflects to perfectly manipulate Roxas to do whatever we want him to do. It's a really nifty thing to know and really adds a lot of depth into the gameplay you've never realized before.
There are exceptions to revenge value, of course. One example would be using Peter Pan against Saix, where by spamming aerial hits nonstop, you can basically stun lock him to death. Saix doesn't retaliate in this example because his retaliation has a really slow charge up, and Pan's dagger has a lot of stun lock properties to it. As such, every time Saix attempts to retaliate, Peter Pan will simply stun him and break him out of his retaliation animation with his dagger, basically leaving him stun locked in a loop until he dies.
Another example of RV exception is Firaga, which has several unique properties to it. Firaga adds zero Revenge Value until the last hit of the attack. As such, a lot of speedrunners would abuse this to chain Firaga combos on bosses. In addition, Final Firaga adds very little Revenge Value if the Keyblades spinning around Sora also hits them. This is how people can chain Firaga combos on bosses.
There are other exceptions out there, but once again, I'm not gonna cover them in too much detail. For the most part, just understand that Revenge Value is a thing inside the game, and it works. Most of the time.
When a boss uses an attack, their Revenge Value will typically drop to zero. There are hacks/cheats demonstrating this, and you can probably look up "Revenge Value code" on YouTube or something and find several videos of it. Either way, it's a good illustration of how Revenge Value actually looks if we could see the counter.
Some skeptics might ask, "What exactly does this do in KH2 gameplay that makes it so good? If we all understood Revenge Value, doesn't that mean we can manipulate all bosses in the same way?" And to a degree, that is true; if you fully understood Revenge Value and how each of your attacks affect a boss, you would know exactly when a boss retaliates and know exactly how to counter. However, that's difficult. That's extremely difficult to do. Not even the best KH players in the world know how one boss will react to each one of your attacks.
You might've seen a bunch of people do no damage challenges, with crazy restrictions, etc. They can do that because they're so knowledgeable about that one fight. It differs from boss to boss, the way they retaliate, the RV they have, and fully understanding that for every single enemy in the game is pretty much impossible. For the most part, people who are playing the game on high difficulties get an idea of how RV works, even if they don't know it exists. For example, they may die several times fighting a Data battle on LV1 Critical Mode, but then they realize, "Hey, Marluxia retaliates exactly after ___ hits and attacks + a thunder, so if I Reflect immediately afterwards, I can avoid it!"
That's what makes KH2 so incredible and complex; when you set your mind to "take as least damage as possible" instead of "mash X to win", you really start to learn about its mechanics. You start realizing when to avoid, when to dodge, and when to attack for an opening. You get rewarded for dying, because you learn something new. A lot of people never discover this side of KH2 because they're too busy mashing X, but those who do quickly fall in love with the game because its such a genius system. If you're one of those "mash X to win" people, I urge you to give Critical Mode a try. Don't go out of your way to grind in frustration because you can't beat a fight; instead, try learning the fight and avoiding the attacks, and at least get a vague idea for the Revenge Value of the boss and how they retaliate. I guarantee you, you'll beat it eventually, and you'll (probably) have a blast doing it.
Anyways I'm ranting now and this has gone on for way too long so I'll end it here. I realize it's not much for discussion, but any questions/feedback and stuff would be really cool. Hopefully I taught you something new (assuming you actually bothered to read through all this crap), and have a wonderful day