Welcome to the actual stat topic of this game! I'm in the process of getting some numbers (namely multipliers on crafts) and will hopefully have a completed spreadsheet at some point that will become available so people can play around with the numbers as they see fit.
These are the base assumptions and interps that I will be taking into this topic. If you need a frame of reference for some of the stuff in this topic, go here:
http://www.rpgdl.com/forums/index.php?topic=6832.01) PC Levels are taken at the Epilogue dungeon and are between 140-142, with Rean being about Level 144. Each level is worth about 100-150 HP, 6-7 Strength, 2-4 Defense, 11-13 ATS and 11-13 ATD. Speed goes up irregularly, but about once every 3 levels.
2) Starting CP is assumed to be 100
3) Chrono Burst is allowed after some discussion with Pyro. It doesn't have a huge effect as originally anticipated due to the large EP cost, so there doesn't seem to be further reason to restrict it.
4) Physicals/Crafts that can stagger are assumed to be going up against an enemy with average vulnerabilities in the final dungeon. A phantom copy of the PC is assumed to be involved for link attacks. No other link functions are assumed otherwise.
5) Standard Delay Value for now is assumed to be 2500. This is the approximate average delay of all available commands in-game (2598). It also reflects more closely to an in-game "turn" which is usually used with crafts or spells that have a greater delay value than 2000.
6) Master Quartz (MQ) levels are assumed to be all Mastered and each PC is equipped with his/her starting MQ.
7) Secret characters are not assumed into the averages for now due to the cost prohibition and additional interp issues.
8) Other than Toval and Angelica, all other PCs are assumed not to have any accessories. This gives them 2 free slots for status blocking.
As a reminder, here's some of the stuff that I'm porting over so you don't have to swap back and forth between topics:
Gameplay OverviewGame is essentially divided into separate Chapters and in each chapter, there's also a few different phases. There's the
introductory phase, which often deals with getting to the location or reaching the first objective at the start of the chapter. Following that is a
free phase, where you're allowed to explore the map/area you're allowed to go. This is the period where you usually have side quests, which can involve solving riddles to beating up bonus monsters. Once you manually decided that the Free Phase is done, you go into the
Operation phase, or the main goal/objective of the Chapter. There is usually a boss at the end of each Operation and once that plays out, you go to the last phase, which is the
Bonding Phase. There's no combat here; just talking to NPCs/your party members to get more character development. When you manually declare this to be done as well, then the game moves onward to the next Chapter. In total, there are about 10 Chapters, with 2 Gaiden Chapters. Other than the guest PCs in one of the Gaiden Chapters, I believe its best to take the PCs in the Last Chapter where everyone is available. This avoids issues such as scaling temp PCs since at this point they all become playable. Thanks to Trails' EXP scaling, it's not too difficult to keep everyone within the same ball park either, so should make gathering data easier too.
When you're in a map area, random enemies will be walking around the field. Making contact with one initiates a fight, where PCs are positioned on a field shaped like a circle. While positioning is important as attacks have different area of effects, there are no terrain penalties or bonuses. There is however, an event wheel that can offer different bonus/penalties on specific turns. Battles works on a CTB system, so players can smartly place their characters along the turn order to gain the best advantage. The event wheel by and large benefits the players(and therefore the PCs) over the enemies since the enemies won't actively try to line up their turns properly. Since it's a Trails game, it has 3 bars for each character: HP, MP (called EP) and CP. CP stands for Craft points but are basically the currency you use for using special techniques or abilities. It works the exact same way as in previous Trails games (so it increases when you attack/take a hit and goes down when consumed), so do check out Pyro/Snowfire's Skies topics. I'll be going some specifics afterwards, but again, by and large, its the same thing. Once combat is initiated, characters take turn according to the turn order and the fight goes on until one side is completely incapacitated.
CP GainFor the most part, this is the same as in FC/SC. Note that for a PC to gain CP, they must actually hit their target. These gain rates are on a 'per hit' basis. So someone like Sharon who has multi-hitting crafts will actually generate a little more CP from it than the others. CP doesn't tend to generate super quickly without the use of items/accessories and the Impassion spell, but one can certainly do stall type tactics and build it as enemies hit them. One way not noted below for PCs to generate CP in-game is with Linked Attacks. These count as a base physical, and the advanced commands will get other characters to join in. If you do this against a group, then you can hyper generate CP since hitting a group of 6-7 enemies means it multiplies the rate 6-7 times and is actually the fastest way to gain CP. The CP gain rate seems to also be multiplied by a bonus/penalty based on the enemy level difference compared to the attacker. So go hype them against Ness?
- Base physical attacks - 10 CP
- Casting offensive magic - 10 CP
- Crafts - 5 CP
- Taking damage - 10 CP
- Taking lots of damage - 50 CP (Unsure. This feels similar to Wild ARMS FP in that the amount gained is prorated against a maximum allowable which is probably 50. Taking a particularly strong hit increases CP by a notable chunk).
- Killing an enemy - 5 CP
- Using buffs/defensive magic/items - 0 CP
- Event Wheel Bonus - 10/50/100 CP or CP-0, based on the draw.
Linked Attacks/BonusesCharacters in battle can be linked together. Physical attacks in this game have the effect of staggering enemies based on how vulnerable they are and the character's proficiency at that physical type. If an enemy is staggered, then the linked character can join in and add a base physical hit as well. There are advanced versions of these linked attacks where you can get 2 PCs attacking a small group or the entire party to attack all enemies at once. You can swap links between characters freely with no penalty, so it is possible in-game to be always linked to the strongest physical PC if you so wish.
S-BreaksLike in previous Trails games, when a player character has 100 CP stocked, he/she can utilize their S-craft, which is basically a technique that hits much harder, often with a big multiplier and has a greatly increased rate at inflicting status. Some S-crafts do not deal damage. However, all S-crafts share the ability to cut into the turn order immediately at any point, which is called an S-break. You can use S-Breaks to snipe useful event wheel icons such as the Guaranteed Critical or +50 CP. Note that using a S-break doesn't increase the recharge normally associated with S-crafts, however, you are *locked* into using the S-craft. So even if it means you can instant turn, it doesn't mean you can instant turn and do something freely. If a PC manages to get to 200 CP, the S-craft receives a 1.5x damage bonus.
QuartzEach PC in CS2 has an ARCUS system which has 9 nodes in total. These nodes are used to slot in quartz, which are equippable items that can provide stat boosts, spells and other effects. 1 Node is meant for the MQ, so there are 8 nodes available. Of these 8 nodes, every character has 3 nodes that are elementalized, meaning that they can only be equipped with quartz of the corresponding element. These are different for every PC, so of course we should use them for PC differentiation!
There are several ways you can take quartz as noted in the other discussion topic. You can choose to ban all quartz period (the purist view), or you can try to do what Pyro/Snowfire have done and allow PCs access to spells in the schools that have access to. You can also assume PCs have the starting quartz they are equipped with. For this topic though, the stance that I'm basically taking on this is to allow only the elementalized nodes as customizable. Every other slot is upgraded, but assumed to be locked or affixed with something that is also equipped by every member of the cast (thereby creating no change in the average). This differentiates the PCs and provides as much of a in-game feel as possible. PCs with nodes of a certain element can often gain a specialty to that element because they won't be bogged down with irrelevant nodes compared to other cast members.
It is assumed that all purchasable quartz that do not require U-materials are available to the cast (since U-materials are rarer and are used for many other things). This provides them with the choice of stat bonuses or spells and creates some interesting trade offs. Certainly, the best "build" may be in question, but I like this idea because it means PCs have to give up certain things to access certain other choices that they may want. In many ways, it feels akin to say Pokemon move sets (where they have to choose 4 moves) or equipment (where equipping say the Judo Outfit versus the Black Costume is a trade in Str/Death Immunity for more HP/Stop Immunity). YMMV of course, so I will list the stats/quartz I'm using. Once the Excel is uploaded, you can play around with the pieces for the modified numbers as you like and recalculate the average to your liking.
Note that quartz of the same effect can stack together. So Defense 2 and Defense 3 being equipped means your Defense increases by 130. Cast 1 and Cast 2 equipped means that casting time is reduced to 3/4*4/5 or 60%. However, the same quartz cannot be equipped more than once. Status infliction quartz and stat down quartz can only be equipped once per line. For the most part, this is largely irrelevant because the elemental nodes are often spread across a PC's ARCUS. However a couple of characters only have 1 line (Emma comes to mind), I will note this for the character as it comes up. Buffs/Debuffs also kick in only at the beginning of the next turn. For the most part, this isn't significant except in the case of Speed, since it means the slow effect isn't applied until after the target takes his next turn. Finally, some spells have fixed targeting (meaning it must be cast cast on a target), while others have free targeting (meaning you can cast it in empty positions). This may matter for things like FE counters since many spells are often GT, but I would certainly see free targeting ones as bypassing them (since enemies can in theory, walk out of the targeting zone).
For magic tiers, as a general rule of thumb, the higher the tier of magic, the more effective that magic is at inflicting damage per clocktick. This means that even though they take longer to charge, they are more damaging for Damage per turn. What they lose out on though is EP efficiency. In this case, PCs want to cast the lowest tiers of magic as they are more effective at doing damage per point of EP. If a PC doesn't want to burst out his/her damage, they will actually want to use lower tier magic although the nature of the battle may mean they don't have the time for it. Some PCs really can't afford the tier 5s in magic because of their low EP pool and how prohibitively high the cost becomes (it effectively shuts down their other spell casting).
The list of available quartz is as follows:
Earth- Defense 1/2/3, which raise Defense by 20/50/80 points respectively
- Needle Shot: Tier 1 Earth Magic. Single target. 20% chance to Petrify.
- Earth Lance: Tier 2 Earth magic. Free target. 20% chance to Petrify.
- Grand Press: Tier 3 Earth Magic. Free target. 100% Chance to inflict Move-50%
- Yggdrasil: Tier 4 Earth Magic. Free target. 30% chance to Petrify.
- Ancient Glyph: Tier 5 Earth Magic. Free target. 20% chance to Petrify.
- Adamantine Shield: Nullifies one physical attack (includes Multi-hitting)
- Crest: Adds Defense+25% for 5 turns. If cast a second time, becomes Defense+50% and refreshes duration.
- La Crest: Same as above, but GT.
- Earth Pulse: 20% Regen for 5 turns
- Poison: 10% Chance to inflict Poison with physicals/crafts
- Petrify: 10% Chance to inflict Petrify with physicals/crafts
- Shield Breaker: 10% chance to inflict Defense-25% with physicals/crafts
Fire- Attack 1/2/3, which raise Attack by 15/30/50 points respectively
- Fire Bolt: Tier 1 Fire Magic. Single target. 20% chance to inflict Burn.
- Heatwave: Tier 2 Fire Magic. Fixed target. 30% chance to inflict Burn.
- Flame Tongue: Tier 3 Fire Magic. Fixed target. 20% chance to inflict Burn.
- Volcanic Rain: Tier 4 Fire Magic. Fixed target. 30% chance to inflict Burn.
- Flare Bomb: Tier 5 Fire Magic. Fixed target. 20% chance to inflict Burn.
- Purgatorial Flame: Tier 6 Fire Magic. Fixed target. 50% chance to inflict Burn.
- Forte: Adds Attack+25% for 5 turns. If cast a second time, becomes Attack+50% and refreshes duration.
- La Forte: Same as above, but GT.
- Impassion: Restores 20 CP at the end of each turn for 5 turns
- Heat Up: Recovers from Stat-Downs and restores 10 CP
- Burn: 10% chance to inflict Burn with physicals/crafts
- Seal: 10% chance to inflict Seal with physicals/crafts
- Sword Breaker: 10% chance to inflict Attack-25% with physicals/crafts
Water- HP 1/2, which increase max HP by 1000/2000 points respectively.
- Shield 1/2/3, which raise ATD by 20/50/80 points respectively. More importantly, adds Magic evasion at 10%/15%/25% respectively
- Aqua Bleed: Tier 1 Water Magic. Single target.
- Frost Edge: Tier 2 Water Magic. Fixed target. 20% chance to inflict Freeze.
- Hydro Cannon: Tier 3 Water Magic. Line Fire. Free target.
- Crystal Flood: Tier 4 Water Magic. Line fire. Free target. 20% chance to inflict Freeze.
- Maelstrom: Tier 5 Water Magic. Multi-target.
- Tear: Restores a low amount of HP, exact formula unknown. Influenced by ATS.
- Teara: Restores a medium amount of HP, exact formula unknown. Influenced by ATS.
- Tearal: Restores a large amount of HP, exact formula unknown. Influenced by ATS.
- Thelas: Small HP Revival, exact formula unknown. Influenced by ATS. Can be used to heal HP regularly too.
- Athelas: Large HP Revival, exact formula unknown. Influenced by ATS. Can be used to heal HP regularly too.
- Curia: Restores status condition to Normal (single target).
- Mute: 10% chance to inflict Mute with physicals/crafts
- Freeze: 10% chance to inflict Freeze with physicals/crafts
- Spirit Breaker: 10% chance to inflict ADF-25% with physicals/crafts
Wind- Evade 1/2, which increase Evade rate by 5%/10% respectively.
- Move 1/2/3, which improves movement range. Numerically, it goes 5, 10, 15.
- Air Strike: Tier 1 Wind Magic. Single target.
- Spark Arrow: Tier 2 Wind Magic. Line fire, free target. 20% chance to inflict Seal.
- Aerial: Tier 3 Wind Magic. Free target.
- Judgment Bolt: Tier 4 Wind Magic. Line fire, free target. 50% chance to inflict Seal.
- Ragna Vortex: Tier 5 Wind Magic. Multi-target.
- Breath: Restores a low amount of HP to a group, exact formula unknown. Influenced by ATS.
- Holy Breath: Restores a medium amount of HP to a group, exact formula unknown. Influenced by ATS.
- Recuria: Restores status condition to Normal (large group target).
- Blind: 10% chance to inflict Blind with physicals/crafts
- Sleep: 10% chance to inflict Sleep with physicals/crafts
- Leg Breaker: 10% chance to inflict Move-25% with physicals/crafts
Time- Impede 1/2, which adds AT Delay to physicals by 2/4 Delay respectively. Also provides a 30%/60% chance to cancel spell charging with physicals/crafts.
- Cast 1/2, which improves casting speed by 20%/25% respectively. Can be stacked together.
- Action 1/2/3, which raise Speed by 4/8/12 points respectively.
- Soul Blur: Tier 2 Time Magic. Single target. 30% chance to inflict Faint
- Demonic Scythe: Tier 3 Time Magic. Fixed target. 30% chance to inflict ID
- Grim Butterfly: Tier 4 Time Magic. Fixed target. 50% chance to inflict Nightmare
- Shadow Blade: Tier 5 Time Magic. Fixed target. Drains 5% of damage as HP.
- Chrono Drive: Adds Speed+25% for 5 turns. If cast a second time, becomes Speed+50% and refreshes duration.
- Chrono Break: Hits the target with Speed-25% for 5 turns (if not a boss) and adds 15 Delay. If cast a second time, becomes Speed-50% and refreshes duration.
- Chrono Burst: Allows user to take an extra action. Stackable.
- Nightmare: 10% chance to inflict Nightmare with physicals/crafts
- Speed Breaker: 10% chance to inflict Speed-25% with physicals/crafts
Space- EP Cut 1/2, which reduces spell cost by 20%/25% respectively.
- Hit 1/2, which improves DEX by 50%/100% respectively.
- Golden Sphere: Tier 2 Space Magic. Free target. 30% chance to inflict Blind
- Dark Matter: Tier 3 Space Magic. Free target. 100% chance to inflict Mov-50%
- Cross Crusade: Tier 4 Space Magic. Multi-target.
- Altair Cannon: Tier 5 Space Magic. Multi-target. 100% chance to inflict ATS-25% and ADF-25%
- Seraphic Ring: Full healing + 3 turns of 20% Regen
- Fortuna: Adds ATS/ADF+25% for 5 turns. If cast a second time, becomes ATS/ADF+50% and refreshes duration.
- Shining: Adds Insight status to the target, boosting Hit and Evade by 50%. If cast a second time, refreshes duration.
- Vanish: 10% chance to inflict Vanish with physicals/crafts
- Voice Breaker: 10% chance to inflict ATS-25% with physicals/crafts
Mirage- EP 1/2, which increases Max EP by 100/200 respectively.
- Mind 1/2/3, which raise ATS by 15/30/50 points respectively.
- Luminous Ray: Tier 2 Mirage Magic. Line fire, free target.
- Silver Thorn: Tier 3 Mirage Magic. Fixed target. 40% chance to inflict Confuse
- Phantom Phobia: Tier 4 Mirage Magic. Fixed target. 100% chance to inflict a random stat down.
- Claimoh Solaris: Tier 5 Mirage Magic. Multi-target.
- Analyze: Scans enemies. Gdlk.
- Saintly Force: Adds Attack/Defense/Speed+25% for 5 turns. If cast a second time, becomes Attack/Defense/Speed+50% and refreshes duration.
- Crescent Mirror: Adds ATS/ADF+25% and will reflect one Magic based attack back to the attacker (even Magic based physicals!). Casting it a second time strengthens the buff but does not add anything to the reflect portion of the spell.
- Confuse: 10% chance to inflict Confuse with physicals/crafts
Weapons / ArmorAs is the case for Trails games, weapons is easy. Just take the penultimate for every character. The best weapon is limited to 4 the first game, but the last one you don't even get before the final boss, so in practice, its 3 at most. As a result, the most fair way is to just take the 2nd best one, which is available at the last shop in the last dungeon. These can be bought for money and are relatively affordable.
Armor is trickier. Like in the case of SC, DEF/ADF are not terribly great stats from experience. In general, these are the equipment available that characters would be interested in (and are universal):
GenderlessArmorRed Jumper - +25 Str, +800 Def, +540 ADF, 10% EVA
Patterned Shirt - +350 Def, +150 ADF, 20% EVA
Gorgeous Gown - +30 ATS, +500 Def, +800 ADF
FootwearRed Boots - +400 Def, +7 Speed, +3 Move
Jeweled Boots - +250 Def, + 15 ATS, +3 Move
Males OnlyArmorPlatinum Jacket - +45 Str, +880 Def, +590 ADF
Females OnlyBodyCrystal Dress - +30 Str, +30 ATS, +870 Def, +600 ADF
FootwearCrystal Heels - +15 Str, +15 ATS, +435 Def, +4 Move
tl;dr version: By default, pretty much all fighters want the Red Jumper. It provides strength and gives them a little bit of evade. For Fie and Sharon, their default is likely the Patterned Shirt, since they have great base evade and the extra 10% Evade is likely more meaningful to them than increases to Strength/Defense. Gaius and Toval may opt to use the Patterned Shirt depending on the situation. Mages are similar. By default, they probably want the Crystal Dress (if female) or the Gorgeous Robe (if male). Footwear though is easy and assumes everyone is equipped with the Red Boots. +7 Speed is no joke when Speed is like the DL god stat.
Status BlockingThere is a nice plethora of status blocking equipment that is available. I know recent DL trend has been to make the characters give up other default accessories for the blockers as a trade off. Cold Steel 2 is a little messy in this regard because most of the status blockers have an upgraded version that provides stat boosts! So, is there really a trade off then if you can equip the blocker that boosts the stats anyway? Well, in fact, yes. While these stat boost blockers are available, in my experience from playing the game, they aren't a high priority buy or exchange item because there are better things you can get. What's the more realistic in-game picture?
Typically, you can get one of the colored pendulums which will block a group of status effects. This is what you typically use in-game for status blocking. There are upgraded versions of these of course, but the line is easier to draw because the upgraded versions are much rarer and take more materials than the standard blockers to improve. Obviously, the upgraded versions in this case are illegal. As for what you give up to equip a pendulum? The in-game cost is about 5000 Mira, which is an improved basic blocker. So the stat cost is easy - just use the stats on the improved basic blocker. A second alternative is to default to the Warrior Badge. This costs 150 Fishing Points in-game, but is reasonably quick. It provides 1000 HP/15 STR/15 ATS, which is actually surprisingly close to the first level improvements on basic blockers.
For reference, here's a list of status that can occur in-game:
Poison - Lose ~10% MHP every round
Blind - ACC and EVA - 50%
Seal - Cannot use physical abilities (Attack or Crafts)
Mute - Cannot use magical abilities (Arts)
Sleep - Target cannot act until damaged or duration is over. All hits on the target (phys/mag) are guaranteed crit (crits are 50% more damage and guaranteed stagger) until target wakes up.
Burn - Lose ~20% MHP every round
Freeze - Lose ~15% MHP every round. Target cannot act until the duration is over.
Petrify - Target cannot act. If attacked, 30% chance for the target to be instantly incapacitated.
Faint - Target cannot act until duration is over. All attacks on this target are guaranteed critical hits.
Confuse - Target will attack any allies in range. If no allies in range, than move about randomly
Nightmare - Target cannot act until damaged or duration is over. All hits on the target are guaranteed crits. Adds a random status effect that is not ID, Vanish or Delay when target wakes up.
Instant Death - What it says on the tin. Target is incapacitated
Vanish - Target is ejected. Can return after a period of time with 0 EP, but is functionally dead until return
Delay - Target takes additional clockticks for his next turn, where the number of clockticks is equal to the Delay value. If a PC can receive a turn faster than the Delay inflicted, they will be able to act again. Most notably, the Delay inflicted is cumulative, meaning net gains in Delay stack and can allow a PC to perform other actions safely before the target recovers. Success rate can be increased with more Speed.
Stat Down - Target is debuffed in the corresponding stat.
Here's the list of Pendulums and what they block:
Red Pendulum - Petrify, Stat Downs, Freeze
Yellow Pendulum - Seal, Mute
Blue Pendulum - Blind, Poison, Burn
Green Pendulum - Sleep, Nightmare, Confusion
Black Pendulum - AT Delay, Instant Death, Vanish
I need to check the amount of HP lost from the various poison type status, but the rest should be accurate. Also take note of the following. While PC status blocking is 100% immunity, boss status resistance is divisive/multiplicative. Meaning that if an attack has a 70% chance at inflicting something but the boss is susceptible to it only 20% of the time, it means that in practice, there is a 14% chance for the status to land (70% * 20%) instead of 0 (70% - (100%-20%)). I don't know if we'll ever get around to getting boss stats due to the complications noted above, but its worth mentioning. This is why there are attacks in game that have say 300% chance at something. Typically this means it awards high status resistance and penalizes lower status resistance. How you want to take this against PCs with status attacks is up to you. Personally, I would just take it as addition/subtraction for the sake of ease. But maybe someone else has a better idea of how to get the better representation.
Most status effects are rarely blocked against weaker monsters. Stronger monsters usually have some resistance (~50%) to certain lethal statii (like Petrify) while bosses tend to have heavy resistances across the board. The only thing that bosses tend to be unanimously vulnerable to are AT Delay and Stat Downs. Remember that status resistance in this game works on a multiplicative basis, so it tends to work better against randoms (who even if they have resistance, tends to be lower) than on bosses (although bosses may still be effected). Enemy damage tends to be quite high across the board, so even weenies can still do quite a bit if you leave them unchecked. Status effects are typically about 3-5 turns, but large monsters/bosses will tend to recover in 1.
StatsHP - Lose these and get rekt
EP - Used for casting Arts/Magic. Stands for Energy Points
CP - Used for utilizing crafts/S-crafts. Stands for Craft Points. Max for every PC is 200. Assumed to be at 100 for this topic.
Atk - Increases the amount of damage dealt by physicals
Def - Reduces the damage taken from physicals. Each point of defense reduces 1.25 points of damage
ATS - Increases the amount of damage dealt by magic/arts
ADF - Reduces the damage taken from magic. Each point of ADF reduces 1.25 points of damage.
DEX - Influences Hit. Presumably, used to determine base Accuracy
Hit - The bonus modifier to DEX presumably. So 100% Hit = double the DEX score. A high score here means you are more accurate.
AGI - Influences evade. Presumary, used to determine enemy's base Accuracy
Eva - Effective Physical Evade. From experience, likely subtracted directly from accuracy and can be taken as a literal evade percentage.
Move - The amount of ground that a PC can cover. You need about 16 move to move from one end of the field to another. Most PCs have 9 move.
Range - The attack range on basic physicals. Note that magic has infinite range and some crafts effectively have infinite range (the PC doesn't have to move). Other crafts have their own range / area of coverage and may require a PC to move first before executing.
Threat - The numerical value of how much effective ground a PC can reach across the field with basic physicals. So the higher this is, the more distance they can be away from the opponent (lets them kite more effectively if you're into that).
Speed - Determines how fast a PC gets a turn and how fast PCs recover from every action. Used also for spell casting. Linear if all PCs are using the same move.
In case it wasn't obvious, defense and magic defense stats are not very good. You need to increase them in large chunks for them to make any real difference. A +50% defense boost only raises effective P.dur by about 30%. So PCs will rarely if ever want to trade in other stats just for defense values. In terms of range, the game is pretty clear cut on this thanks to the weaponry used by the PCs. You can effectively summarize this into 3 areas, which can then be translated to other games:
Short - Swords/Knives/Rods/Fists (1-2)
Middle - Spears/Staves (3-4)
Long - Guns/Bows (5-6)
FormulasSpecial thanks to Random for pulling / deciphering some of these for me. We have both the base damage formula as well as the speed formula, so its a good start to figuring out damage values without needing to completely test everything (hopefully).
For the most part, CS2 uses the same formula as CS1 and from the sounds of it, Azure and Zero (the Crossbell arc games). Only difference is, the multiplier stacking can get really silly, which also explains why the damage numbers are larger. Oh, and speaking of stacking, you can stack stuff that normally isn't stackable in the older games. That also probably explains why the later entries are a little easier (more broken being handed out? Hell yes).
Base damage formula:<+RandomKesaranPasaran> ((Atk * 5 * mult) - (Def * 2.5)) / 2
Note that Towa, Alfin, Elliot and Emma have base physicals that use Magic and hit M.Def instead of Def. The formula above is the exact same for magic, except swap out Atk for ATS and Def for ADF.
Base speed formula:Delay value / Speed = CT until next turn.
A note regarding this. Since every action in this game has a delay value, I'll be directly translating this into the Delay (CTs) needed for the PC to take their next turn after that action. The game doesn't note how much delay a "normal turn" is, so if you change what you consider to be the standard, it will universally effect all the PCs. For the purposes of this topic, as noted above, a standard turn is considered to take 2500 Delay. The PC speed average (after quartz) ends up at 97.44. Taking this into the formula means a normal turn is 25.6 CT. Delay values are truncated (since you can't have half a clocktick) in-game, so for the purposes of a 3 turn average, I have assumed the same thing. Keep this in mind as you are reading about CTs. If you want to know how fast/slow something is relative to normal, just divide the CT of the move by 25.
Evade and AccuracyNo notes on these other than personal experience unfortunately. From many other players and in-game performance though, Evade is very much what the stated number translates to. My current assumption is that DEX and AGI values are used to determine the base accuracy of the character, and then evade is subtracted directly afterwards. This means that evade is very potent at dodging Evadeable attacks, which is certainly the feel in-game. This is likely the same street for enemies, so enemies that do have evade are likely to feel much more evasive. Unfortunately, there are are no enemy Dex/Agi stats that I can test against, but suffice to say, in order to hit reliably with physicals, PCs will want to boost Hit. With even a single Hit Boost of 100%, enemy dodging is greatly reduced.
Magic evasion works the same way and is additive. By default, Toval and Emma are the only two characters who have Magic Evasion (50%/75% respectively). The Shield series (a regular Water Quartz) also provides some minor Magic evasion as well as M.Def if you allow those for the PCs with Water nodes. Generally though, they will probably want HP over it unless they can stack the Magic Evade. Unlike physicals, Magic is always 100% accurate barring forms of evade on a PC. Note that CS2 doesn't have any elemental resistances on the PC end, so Magic Evasion is the best that they get.
The Insight status adds +50% Hit, +50 Evade and +10% Unbalance chance. This is added to the raw score by the way, so a PC with Insight gets to take their base evasion and add it to the boost provided. Alisa/Angelica/Gaius can all cast Insight due to their MQs, and in Gaius' case, he starts with Insight beginning every battle.
Evade is still active while PCs are charging spells. The main disadvantage from that though is that they will not counter attack as long as they are charging. Note that Counterattacks in this game are similar to Suiko5 in that they do not occur unless the PC evades and when countering, the counterattack is unevadeable. Counterattacks can only be launched if a PC can reach the attacker with his/her attack range. The exceptions to this are Sara and Fie, who will have a counter attack range of 6, despite regular attack ranges of 1.
ElementsNot too complicated for the most part. There are the 4 basic elements in game: Fire, Water, Earth and Wind. Fire and Earth spells are self explanatory. Water and Wind spells house 2 elements based on flavour (Ice and Lightning respectively). The game also has what it refers to as Higher elements. This comprises of the 3 more advanced schools: Time, Space and Mirage. How you want to treat this is up to debate. Many areas in the game do not have higher elements functioning so for all intents and purposes, the majority of the time, these spells are non-elemental. If you go by flavor arguments though, Time is most closely associated with Darkness (Colouring, ID type spells as well as names and animations of their spells) while Mirage is most closely associated with Light (Colouring, many attacks focus on brightness and are light themed). This leaves Space which doesn't really have an analogous element. It has attacks that use gravity and light and is probably the one true non-elemental typing. YMMV of course on how you want to take this. For the purposes of this topic, it is assumed that Time = Dark, Mirage = Light and Space = Non-Elemental.
EDIT: All character data is up! Special thanks to Snowfire and Pyro for overlooking the topic as it was being drafted and for various suggestions/corrections. Especially the catch on Alfin.
EDIT 2: For frame of reference, enemy averages, based on a total of 40 random monsters at the last dungeon:
Defense: 3532
ADF: 2578
Slash Vulnerability - 1.85 stars
Thrust Vulnerability - 1.68 stars
Pierce Vulnerability - 1.40 stars
Strike Vulnerability - 1.50 stars
RELEVANT AVERAGES - Damage (3 turn average /w Valimar) - 17971
Kill Point (/w Valimar) - 44926
Damage (3 turn average /w out Valimar) - 16808
Kill Point (3 turn average /w out Valimar) - 42020
Damage (5 turn average per Pyro) ~ 17000
Kill point - ~42500
HP - 18084
Speed - 97
Move - 9
Threat - 12
