How to calculate your Chaos Frame

What is Chaos Frame?

Chaos Frame is an invisible reputation value that determines which special characters you can recruit and which ending you receive. Exactly how this system works is still not completely understood, but there is enough information calculate – or estimate – Chaos Frame with reasonably accurate results.

Chaos Frame is a numeric value between 0 and 100. You begin the game with a Chaos Frame of 50.

What changes Chaos Frame?

• Liberating strongholds increases Chaos Frame.
• Capturing strongholds decreases Chaos Frame.
• Dialogue choices (including recruiting some characters) can increase or decrease Chaos Frame.
• When you can choose multiple missions to play, the order you play them in can increase or decrease Chaos Frame.

No other game features or decisions affect Chaos Frame.

Liberating and Capturing Strongholds

When you liberate a stronghold, your Chaos Frame by 0, +1, or +2. The most common change is +1.

When you capture a stronghold, your Chaos Frame changes by 0, -1, or -2. The most common change is -2.

We do not yet know what causes the changes to be bigger or smaller.

The “Rule of Thumb”

You can use a basic formula to roughly estimate your Chaos Frame.

0.5(# of Strongholds Liberated) - 2(# of Strongholds Captured) + 50 = Estimated Chaos Frame

This is not an accurate way to determine your exact Chaos Frame because it uses incorrect assumptions about how much your Chaos Frame changes when liberating and capturing strongholds (it is not a fixed value) and it ignores other events that change Chaos Frame.

However, this formula has been used with some success for many years because it often calcuates a lower Chaos Frame value than what you actually have. So, if you are trying to recruit all of the Zenobians or trying to get the high Chaos Frame ending (both very common scenarios), then using this calculation is likely to incentivize you keep your Chaos Frame as high as possible.

Guaranteed Chaos Frame Checkpoints

There are six times throughout the game when you can accurately estimate your Chaos Frame based on whether or not a character joins your battalion.

• Remember that you begin the game with a Chaos Frame of 50.
• Scene 13: Sable Lowlands: If Liedel joins, your Chaos Frame is higher than 34.
• Scene 16: Azure Plains: If Sheen joins, your Chaos Frame is lower than 60.
• Scene 25: Tremos Mountains North: If Debonair joins, your Chaos Frame is greater than 34.
• Scene 29: Gules Hills: If Destin joins, your Chaos Frame is greater than 34.
• Scene 29: Gules Hills: If Gilbert joins, your Chaos Frame is greater than 68.
• Scene 33: Ptia: If Carth joins, your Chaos Frame is lower than 29.

Liedel and Sheen, are the best opportunities to estimate Chaos Frame because they have no other prerequisites. Debonair, Destin, Gilbert, and Carth all have other story requirements that could prevent them from joining your battalion, so it is less reliable but still useful if you are certain you met the other requirements.

Last Update: November 4th, 2025