Granblue Fantasy / Tropes I to L

This page covers tropes in Granblue Fantasy.

Tropes A to C | Tropes D to H | Tropes I To L | Tropes M To Q | Tropes R to Z |

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I

• Idle Animation: Most characters have simple stationary animations whenever they are not selected, or when their Charge Attack bars are not full. A limited number of newly-released characters have their own unique ones, such as Ayer tilting his neck, Drang jugging his orbs, or Yuel swaying her tail in her Water version to name a few. This becomes completely averted when the game is played on the "Lite" Graphics settings, as the characters will simply stand unless selected. But an update around April 2019 removed the "Lite" setting, fully applying this trope by default.
• Image Song: Numerous songs based on this style for popular characters have been released, not even including the numerous idol-style songs:
  • Eugen, Soriz and Jin share "Song of the Three Men", which famously becomes the BGM whenever a Drum Master activates a Full Chain.
  • Cagliostro's song is titled "It Would be Better to Create a Cute Girl than to Create the World in Seven Days"
  • Lancelot, Vane, Siegfried and Percival share "The Dragon Knights".
  • Yuel and Societte have a duet in "Souku Hana no Mai".
  • Narmaya has "Houmatsu-mugen Kochoujin".
  • Vira's song is "Another Sky".
  • Beatrix has "PRIDE".
• Imagine Spot:
  • The "L.E.T'S. H.A.N.G." and "Table for Six" events are chock full of these as Lowain and his bros, and later Sutera, Korwa and Lamretta fantasize about potential romance.
  • A Grand Blues! Radio free quest also has Lowain and his bros imagine a moment where Vira becomes friendly and stops antagonizing them.
• Immortal Breaker: The chaos matter Beelzebub discovers in the Crimson Horizon is utilized and refined into various weapons that can nullify a Primal Beast's regeneration.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: As revealed in the "Between Frost and Flame" event, Percival and Aglovale's mother, Herzeloyde, died being impaled by the debris of the overturned carriage they were on when bandits they helped before attacked them.
• Improbable Use of a Weapon: The Full Metal Recoil weapon is a sniper rifle but classified as an axe as the Captain uses the handle to whack enemies. There is some justification as the description notes it's out of ammo and using it as a blunt weapon is the only use available.
• Inescapable Ambush: The "Do or Die" scenarios in Arcarum – A set of enemies may suddenly pop up from an unvisited node (preventing the player from clicking other nodes), and the only way to progress further is to defeat said enemies. If you lose, they will still remain in that node, waiting to be defeated.
• Infinity -1 Sword:
  • The Seraphic Weapons. They're only useful for the element they correspond to, and mostly only for fights where you can exploit elemental weaknesses, but they're comparatively easier to obtain and upgrade than the Infinity Plus One Swords detailed below.
  • There is also a Bonito-tier summon group that provides a weaker multiplier (80% - 130%) than the Shiva-tier Infinity Plus One Summons mentioned below. Their base multipliers start out low, and there are requirements to be fulfilled to increase their benefits, such as having varied races in the front-lines for Tezcatlipoca, or having Water elemental summons for Bonito. As such, a player can only benefit from their maximum potential if and only if their character or summon combinations fulfill said requirements.
• Infinity +1 Element: Or rather, Infinity+1 Race. Some of the game's skills and items only benefit a specific race, most notably the Bahamut Weapons. However, characters of the Other race (who don't fit in the main four races, such as demons, vampires, or Primal Beasts in human form) get bonuses from any and all of these. This includes the player character, allowing him/her to fit into any party setup.
• Infinity +1 Sword:
  • The Bahamut weapons not only have the highest ATK skill boosts in the entire game (up to 32% ATK for some Coda weapons), but they provide the boosts based on race rather than element, allowing them to be splashed across multiple element-based parties. However, in order to get one, you have to fight Bahamut, one of the hardest midgame bosses, and in order to fully upgrade it to Coda form, you have to fight an even harder form of Bahamut meant for High Level players.
  • The Xeno weapons are some of the few weapons to have the Massive boost in their skills for EX modifiers (the only other ones as of writing are 4★ Level 120 Grand Weapons for Normal modifiers), have powerful charge attacks, and can be upgraded in a more powerful True form, but in order to get them, you have to participate in the difficult Xeno clash events.
  • The Class Champion weapons provide boosts to their respective class lines when wielded, and getting one of them unlocks the Tier IV classes (getting one for an EX class also unlocks the corresponding EX II class). Getting one involves farming the materials from Co-Op mode, which consists of high-level enemies that have higher HP pools compared to their Story Mode counterparts. In the first place, Co-Op is meant for multi-player content, and one could solo them only if the player has a decent DPS output. Add in the factor where the materials needed for forging the weapons are mostly Rare Random Drops.
    • The Class Champion weapons can be further upgraded into a new form with a higher level, stronger skills and charge attacks, and the ability to add one of three new skills that further enhances their respective class. The materials for the upgrade, though, only drop from the last two Extra tiers of co-op mode. The fifth tier is more difficult than the previous tiers, and the final tier is pretty much 4-man raid bosses.
  • In terms of characters, the Eternals/Guild Wars Characters are among some of the most powerful characters in the game. In order to get one though, you have to fully upgrade an Infinity Plus One Weapon known as the Revenant Weapon. Months of grinding are needed to gather all the materials to gather the weapons, you can only get enough copies for one fully uncapped weapon only once every time the bi-monthly Guild War event comes around, and each Eternal corresponds to a different weapon type, meaning that if you want all ten Eternals, you'll need to fully upgrade at least ten different weapons. And have fun going to through the lengthy process to fully uncap the Eternal.
  • The Shiva-tier summons (Shiva, Grimnir, Alexiel, Europa, Bahamut, and Lucifer) also count, as they provide 100% - 140% increase in damage even when set as Support Summons. The multiplier is high enough to warrant them as the top priority support summons in every battle. Their call effects are also notable for their utility, whether in terms of attack, defense and heals. Lastly, because of their extremely useful aura and call, they are non-ticketable, and one can only rely on the gacha to obtain them.
  • The Arcarum Summons are the first batch of summons with a sub-aura, additional bonuses which take effect even if the summon is set as a sub. But in order to get one, you need to spend months on the Arcarum expeditions, which is gated by tickets, and require rare crafting materials, including a Sun Stone. Their stats are also higher compared to Omega Summons, and their first call cooldown can be reduced depending on the Arcarum summon's uncap stage - even an Arcarum that has reached its final uncap can be used on Turn 1 if its element matches that of the captain's. Lastly, the Arcarum Summons are the only summons with a very high damage cap upon calling, and can scale depending on the caster's attack buffs and the target's defense debuffs. On the 5th Anniversary Update, they are also the first batch of summons to receive a 5★ Uncap, further improving their stats, auras and increasing their damage cap.
  • The Atma Weapons are basically Bahamut Weapons that work based on weapon specialty instead of race. In addition to a rather sizable attack and health boost, their first weapon skill can be given extra bonuses (such as multiattack rate) using a different item called Keys. They can also be further upgraded into Ultima Weapons, which gives them an additional weapon skill that can affect certain damage caps (such as skill caps or charge attack caps). However, making the Atma weapon and related items requires fighting Ultimate Bahamut in order to acquire the materials, and the Ultima upgrade requires fighting the even harder High Level version.
  • The 5th Anniversary updates introduced Dark Opus weapons that can be obtained from Lucilius raids and forged using rare end-game materials. They are unique in a sense that they have three weapon skills (the last two can be chosen by slotting in Pedulums like how Keys are for Ultima Weapons), and the player can have a version for both Normal or Omega weapon skill modifiers. The only limitations for Dark Opus weapons are that only one can be slotted in a party's weapon grid and that a Dark Opus weapon's Pendulum skill won't stack with an Ultima weapon's Key skill if both boost the same stat.
• Ink-Suit Actor: Nobuo Uematsu appears as "Nobiyo", one of the most famous composers in the sky and basically is just Uematsu in the Granblue art style. He also does the voicework. Similarly, the other composer, Narita is just Tsutomu Narita also rendered in Granblue art with Narita providing voicework.
• Innocuously Important Episode: Robomi's titular event is primarily a loving pastiche of Super Robot tropes, but is also one of the first big hints there are precursor civilizations rivalling the Astrals in age at minimum, which is later reinforced by later revelations with Moondwellers and Otherworldly Beings.
• Insect Queen: The primary raid boss battle for the "Little Skyfarer: A la Sacre Blumiel" event is Queen Bee, a humanoid woman with the wings and lower body of a bee. A variant named Vespa Regina can also be fought in Arcarum.
• Instant-Win Condition:
  • Sometimes, the objective for an Arcarum map will be written as "None", allowing you to freely explore the nodes or simply move to the next map.
  • In some scripted event and story battles, reaching a certain number of turns will automatically end the fight and proceed with the next episode of the chapter.
• Interface Screw: A boss named Oktopode can apply the Inked debuff on the entire party, which covers the HP of the members with a black ink, while giving their attacks a chance to miss.
• Interface Spoiler: Fully upgrading an Arcarum Summon to its 4★ Uncap will replace its respective upgrade screen from the typical summon/material requirements to a shadowed image of the hooded figure bound to it. This is notably different from the image displayed when a Seraphic weapon is fully upgraded, as the screen of a fully-upgraded Seraphic hints further upgrades to the weapon even though the Seraphics are tied to their respective Primarchs, while the Arcarum Summon's post-upgrade screen hints the respective character that would eventually become Promoted to Playable. A little bit subverted now that the 5th Anniversary Update adds yet another uncap for the summons. But still, the Evokers can be recruited.
• Intimate Lotion Application:
  • A Naoise / Scathacha Ship Tease event in the Summer episodes of Naoise makes use of this trope, where Scathacha adamantly tries to convince Naoise to let her apply sunscreen on him, but he declines the offer because he finds the idea immodest and embarrassing.
    Scathacha: Oh, no you don't, Naoise! I'm putting this sunscreen on you one way or another!
    Naoise: A lady should not so casually run her hands across the body of a man! You may be the true dragon, but you must act in a way befitting of your current form.
    Scathacha: What's wrong with a little physical contact? Don't tell me you've forgotten how we bled all over each other!
    Naoise: Enough! I can apply sunscreen on myself!
  • The end of the "Wanted! Repel Tactics!" summer event has Ms. Fanservice Rosetta requesting the Captain's assistance with applying sunscreen on her, something that narration describes as "the greatest privilege of all".
• Intoxication Ensues: As demonstrated in the "Handsome Gorilla" event, consuming enough amounts of the titular tonic drink can lead to some gorilla-themed side-effects. The Harvin cast initially needed it for energy and refreshment during an overnight manga project. One-by-one, the supplement's side effects were made clear to the players, even though they vary between individuals: Mahira speaks like a gorilla, Milleore hallucinates everyone else as gorillas, and Melissabelle's hair sticks upwards until it touches the ceiling. When they went outside, all of them view everyone else as wild gorillas. The captain is not even exempt from this, as they also drank a "Triple Attack" variant of the drink just before facing the event's final boss.
• Island of Mystery: Pretty much every single floating island in the world and geography of Granblue count, as each of them have at least one mythological being or Primal Beast being worshipped or known by the dwellers, with some islands building their own culture around their god's abilities. Extreme cases of "mystery islands" include:
  • The Mist-Shrouded Isle (formerly known as Tramont Island) which is always covered in thick black fog due to Celeste's influence. Its inhabitants do not die and remain as rotting, walking corpses.
  • Medvecia, the home of the vampires. By the time you visit it in the "Fall of the Dragon" event, there are mysterious cases of vampires being killed by doppelgangers, and you get to help the royalties solve the case.
  • Tano Island in the "Kappa Summer Chronicle" event. It is the home of the mythical Kappa race who went into hiding. Their existence, the Riverfolk festival, the shrine, the inhabitants' cucumber-offering ceremonies, and the expertise of the Miyasato restaurant in sushi dishes are all connected, but the exact details were kept secret to the newer generations and tourists.
• It Began with a Twist of Fate: It just so happens that the protagonist and Vyrn are wandering outside near the area where Lyria and Katalina landed as the latter pair tries to escape from Erste soldiers. Lyria's glowing crystal, visible from the skies is even the trigger that piques the curiosity of the former pair. And so, the protagonist does what a hero typically does - to help others.
• It Only Works Once: Certain Summons have such powerful call effects that they can only be summoned once per battle, such as the Genesis Series which includes Shiva, Europa, Alexiel and Grimnir.
• Item Crafting: Certain Weapons or Summons are obtained or strengthened by "forging" them with farmed items at Sierokarte's Shop. These include the Seraphic, Revenant, Class Champion, Bahamut, Ultima, and Xeno Weapons, along with the Arcarum Summons.
• Item Farming:
  • Uncapping characters, (and the final uncaps of weapons and summons) require a number of materials found by completing quests, and defeating enemies... And they are element-specific.
  • Showdowns and Events feature items, weapons, and summons which can only be obtained by collecting and trading quantities of event-specific materials.

J-L

• Job System: There are four general tiers of classes, with 10 classes each tier plus 13 extra classes (for a total of 53 classes), and each class has twenty levels before mastery. After mastering a particular class, you can further enhance it with Extended Mastery Points, obtained from gaining extra "levels" with a mastered class.
• Joke Character: Many exist, with quite a few characters of each rarity being worse than a number of characters in the tiers below them.
  • Richard is seen as the absolute worst character in the game, due to his skills affecting your party either positively or negatively depending on the RNG, making him outright detrimental to use. Krugne is only marginally better, having RNG skills that only backfire on him when they inevitably do.
  • Ludmila's charge attack is based on whatever animation the game decides to play. Only two of its five possible outcomes will actually do anything beneficial for the player.
  • Among SSRs, the Aqours Third Years are seen as so terrible that they'd be low tier SRs. They do have some good qualities (15% fire damage up on super use, veil), everything else they have is very underwhelming for an SSR and even some SRs. The biggest joke is their damage cut, which is 20%, which is outright useless.
• Judge, Jury, and Executioner: While the Primal Beast, Vohu Manah, was originally intended to just be the first one, giving just verdicts to all, the War caused the Primals to convert it into all three for all mankind.
• Kappa: They exist in Granblue as well, but are furry and tailed. They were once thought to be just products of folklore but a number of them are actually hiding in Auguste Isles. These kappas of the island are being worshipped as the messengers of a god, having built shirnes and offered cucumbers as gifts by the townsfolk. The ones you encounter at the "Kappa Summer Chronicle" event are a friendly bunch who even help a chef prepare ingridients for his restaurant.
• Katanas Are Just Better: A weird example. They were introduced later than all other weapons, to be used by Extra Classes such as Ninja, Samurai or Sword Master. As a result, you get a weapon class that's not much better than the rest but is only usable by the most experienced players. Some of the newly-released Katana-specialty characters and classes would then share a unique quirk that most weapon types don't have; Their Charge Bars can exceed 100%, allowing them to unleash more than a single Charge Attack in the same turn.
• Kill Enemies to Open: Arcarums Expeditions may sometimes require you to hunt down "Bound" enemies on the map before you can proceed to the next one.
• Kill Sat: The Great Wall is a giant weapon installed in a floating island capable of destroying other islands.
• Kissing Discretion Shot: Two in "The Maydays" 2019 summer event, both between The Oceanographer Ellen and the Shark Hunter Martin rekindling their love. The first kiss happens in the beach, but the next shot is focused on Lyria, Sariel, Halluel and Malluel watching and commenting on the kiss from the rocks, reacting to the scene. The second is when Ellen and Martin did it again inside a building, while Azrael playfully says "kissy, kissy".
• Know When to Fold Them: During the Silverwind Stretch arc, Io, Eugen and Rosetta are saved from an avalanche by Orchid while everyone else was caught in the avalanche and separated. With Orchid exhausted from the effort, soldiers quickly moving in to surround them, and the cold weather not getting better, Eugen decides the best course of action is to surrender.
• Lady and Knight:
  • This dynamic plays out with two duos in the story mode, with Katalina as the devoted protector to Lyria and the Black Knight as the devout knight for Princess Orchis, willing to go to the ends of the sky to protect her friend.
  • And then there's the duo of Anne and Owen, who are fellow students of the Mysteria School of Magic.
• La Résistance: Formed when Gilbert took over the Rhem Kingdom.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia: During the Dydroit Belt arc, most of the crew loses their memories of each other and as a result have wandered off in their confusion. In particular, everyone, especially Rosetta, is worried about the younger Io, who seems to be nowhere to be found, even potentially far away from the Dydroit Belt. Rosetta is quite relieved when she finds that Lecia found her and took her to the Enforcer outpost thinking she was an average lost child.
• Last Chance Hit Point: Characters with the "Lethal Attack Dodged" status buff, passive, or EMP Skill can survive a fatal attack for one turn, leaving them with 1 HP.
• Late-Arrival Spoiler:
  • The Attack on Titan crossover retells the events of the 57th Expedition arc which reveals that Annie is the Female Titan among other huge spoilers. It also reveals the true name of Eren's Titan form which was something only revealed very late into the series.
  • The Code Geass crossover summarizes many of the franchise's plot points for the sake of providing exposition to Granblue players who don't have knowledge about the anime's lore, while also casually dropping spoilers. Key details such as the Geass only working once per target, and the capabilities of the unique Knightmares are mentioned in the event's dialogues.
  • Several twists in old events can be seen as this to newer players. Such as, say, Ayer is Jessica's missing brother and the primal beast Nephthys was never involved with his disappearance in the first place. Also, the mere fact that Sturm, Drang, Orchid, and the Black Knight are all featured in the monthly Premium Draw banners spoil a twist to those who aren't deep into the story yet - That those who acted as the Big Bads of the first arc can join your crew.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: A common story element for some of the Crossover characters, who comment on the game's setting.
  • Teru occasionally thinks of the setting as a Fantasy-themed video game, upon discovering some of the unusual traits or culture that the game has.
    "To meet a Harvin in the flesh, it really gives me that "Fantasy" feeling, you know?"
    "Of course, I need those currencies like they have in that video game. I can't use my money here!"
  • In "A Tale of Intersecting Fates", Lyria states that Milla Maxwell's and Katalina's voices sound alike. Well of course, they share the same voice actor.
  • In the "Persona 5: Thievery in Blue" event's daily cutscenes, Ryuji / Skull is amazed at how the world of Granblue "totally looks like an RPG Fantasy".
• Legendary Weapon: Special weapons like the Revenant Weapons and Bahamut Weapons are well-known and mythical according to Sierokarte, especially the Revenant Weapons since they are sought by the Eternals.

• Lethal Lava Land: The Valtz Duchy has several factories built over rivers of lava.
• Lettered Sequel: The title of the third Robomi event is simply "Robomi Z".
• Level Grinding: It is fairly easy to level-up characters who are at their early levels by placing them at the back-row and having your higher-level front-line party members do the killing, all of them get the same amount of EXP otherwise. Utilize this tactic while repeating the quests mentioned in the Peninsula of Power Leveling entry, and you'll be able to easily grind out the levels of your newly-acquired characters at the same time. Aiming for that final fate episode of your recent 5★ Star character? Well, you'll be needing this trope. Leveling a character from 99 to 100 will require a million EXP points. Fortunately, the game has items and mechanics that allow you to accumulate experience points faster than usual.
• Level-Locked Loot: Downplayed, as a majority of the SR to SSR summons and weapons can only be equipped if the player's Rank is at least 10 (or 30). But since the early ranks of the game can be leveled-up very quickly with a little bit of grinding, players can easily overcome the level restriction in equipping these items.
• Level-Up Fill-Up: Every time your Player Rank increases, your current AP/EP reserves will be increased by the amount of your new AP/EP caps, making them overflow.
• Lightning Can Do Anything: The explanation for the Case Closed crossover is that a lightning bolt that zapped Dr. Agase's lab while Conan, Ai, Kogoro and Amuro were testing a VR game somehow teleported them into Granblue Fantasy.
• Lightning Lash: Ferry's recruitment weapon is the Ethereal Lasher◊, a magical whip where everything but the handle is pure magical energy, which takes the form of greenish-blue lightning. However, the description says that it can theoretically take on "countless forms".
• Limit Break: Both playable characters and enemies have a charge attack, or ougi as referred to in the Japanese version. With enemies, it fills up through a series of diamonds while your characters have to fill up a bar up to 100%. Samurai-type characters have the ability to go beyond 100%, keeping the extra to use their charge attack again sooner or, if they fill it up to 200%, even able to use their charge attack twice in one turn. Playable characters also have the bonus of being able to utilize chain bursts when multiple characters use their charge attack in one turn, dealing extra elemental damage based on the element of the character who started the chain.
• Limited Loadout: A party slot can only have up to 10 weapons and 5 summons at once.
• Literary Allusion Title: The Signature Move of the Supreme Primarch, as well as the sequel of the first "What Makes the Sky Blue" event is titled Paradise Lost.
• Living Battery: The Great Wall is fueled by living organic beings, such as powerful monsters, or skyfarers, and it requires at least 2 to operate - one being sacrifices itself in the weapon's "urn" while the other controls the trigger. How the Great Wall actually works by absorbing living beings is never explained, though when the monstrous Gilbert was sent into its urn, it "disintegrated" inside the weapon.
• Living Weapon: Primal Beasts were created and/or altered to be weapons of the Astrals during the War.
• Loads and Loads of Sidequests:
  • Aside from the main story quests, there are a lot of other quests to do which provide additional crystals when completed, and almost all of them involve defeating mobs or raid bosses.
  • This does not end there, as the list of side-quests also include the repeatable "Special Quests" designed for grinding and farming materials and items, and the Story Events which focus the spotlight on other characters.
  • The Fate Episodes of playable characters count as well as most of the earlier characters' episodes mix in lore-building with some monster-killing.
  • Not to mention the various Weapons and Summons that you can craft in Siero's Shop using rare items, as these require you to farm given quantities of certain items all across the game's contents. To extend it further, this includes the Eternals and Evokers that you can recruit. The items you craft or the characters you recruit are the rewards that you can get from here.
• Loophole Abuse:
  • Almost all Fate Episodes with battles in them will require the featuring character to be used in the battle, but they do not state which version or rarity. For example, you can use Rosamia's SSR version to clear her R version's episodes.
  • Lore-wise, this comes back to bite the Medvecia citizens near the end of "Fall of the Dragon". The Primal Beast Vaselago creates shadow illusions of vampires to attack other vampires. The citizens have a rule that harming another vampire would result to death penalty. And because the majority of the citizens are so keen on sticking to the rule, most of them harmed and tried to kill the others in retaliation because they were harmed in the first place. This caused mass panic to the point where almost everyone tried to kill one another in the end... Until Vania declared that rules be damned.
• Lost Technology: The epilogue of the Dawning Sky Arc reveals that the Grandcypher, the very ship ridden by the crew, was also used during The War. Noa also mentions in Chapter 118 that its engine is made out of Astral technology, which cannot be found in the world of the skydwellers.
• Love Potion: Vyrn becomes the unwitting drinker of one provided to him by Sierokarte. Its effects on those who already adore him heighten their adoration to insanely scary levels.
• Low-Level Advantage: Lower-rarity characters provide a bonus amount of Prestige Pendants than the higher-rarity characters, but the bonuses are only counted for characters who are at the front-lines when the raid ends. For example, 3 R characters will net the player 24 Pendants in an Omega Showdown raid, while SR characters will provide only 12 Pendants in the same condition. SSR characters do not have this perk.
• Luck-Based Mission: The Arcarum Expeditions, as you'll never know what kind of gimmicks do the stages have in store for you, nor the elements of the enemies and their drop lists. This takes in full effect if you are aiming for a specific Arcarum Summon and are planning to farm the element-specific materials related to it. The final bosses you encounter at the third, sixth, and ninth stage of every expedition are chosen randomly, and may or may not change on the next day. However, there is an item that allows the players to freely select the Arcarum boss that they want to fight on the ninth stage.
• Lucky Rabbit's Foot: The three summons (White Rabbit, Black Rabbit, Kaguya) that help in increasing treasure drop rates during battles are all rabbit-themed.
• Lyrical Cold Open:
  • "Lyria", the Image Song of the eponymous character, starts with Nao Tōyama's vocals, with the instrumental playing after 0:35.
  • Belial's Leitmotif "Parade's Lust also begins with the singer saying "Ah hell!" just before the instruments.