Is it wrong to pick up girls in a dungeon: what is falna?

Key insights

• Falna is the foundation of power in DanMachi, granting adventurers supernatural abilities and growth essential to overcoming dungeon threats.
• Excelia, powered by the gods through Falna, determines adventurers' level and stat upgrades, achieved through effort or monster energy.
• Falna's limitations include dependence on God for upgrades, personal motivation for growth, and vulnerability to overuse of skills.

In DanMachiFalna is the divine blessing bestowed by gods and goddesses who have descended into the mortal world upon adventurers who choose to become their followers. This divine blessing allows adventurers to acquire supernatural abilities and grow exponentially, transforming them from ordinary humans into powerful adventurers capable of meeting the threats in the dungeon.

Essentially the foundation of the energy system and development in Orario, Falna allows adventurers to gain strength, magic, and abilities that are increasingly refined as trials progress. Without Falna, adventurers are mere mortals, unable to acquire and utilize the special skills required to face the horrors of the dungeon. Falna also influences Orario and the world of DanMachi as a whole, which has a major impact on the growth and stability of the city and beyond.

Origin of Falna

Life as mortals

Even before the gods descended, the people in the dungeons fought against the monsters. However, due to their limited ability to fight the monsters, they found it difficult to deal with them. The gods, with their immense powers, could only observe humans in the mortal world. Out of boredom, the gods decided to descend from heaven to live among humans, connect with them, and experience life more closely. In order to achieve this, the gods had to seal most of their divine abilities. However, they retained the ability to bestow blessings on mortals who followed them. This divine blessing is called Falna.

The gods decided to descend into the mortal world and understand humans, but not as mere mortals. They still wanted to be recognized as gods and influence the progress of the mortal world, and Falna was the perfect way to do that. With Falna, the gods can significantly influence the mortal world and are still worshiped as gods. Falna can also be awarded on items. An example is the Hestia Knife, which Hephaestus forged with Hestia's blessing. The knife currently wielded by Bell is considered an extension of the Hestia Familia, reflecting the connection between his god and the adventurer.

Falna system

How gods empower adventurers through Falna

Although often referred to as a blessing from the gods, Falna is much more than that. It acts as a stimulant to awaken an adventurer's innate power. The gods pour a portion of their divine power, also known as arcanum, into the adventurers they choose, and the adventurers receive a boost of power. However, the power boost they receive varies from adventurer to adventurer depending on their type and level, with Excelia playing a large role.

Excelia

Excelia is essentially an advanced experience that helps you develop your physical abilities. The Blessing of Falna opens a kind of container with hidden potential, and Excelia fills this container, allowing adventurers to level up. Excelia can be acquired in two ways: through effort and through the energy of monsters, with monsters being the richest source of Excelia. In places like the Amazon homeland, they prefer effort and kill other Amazons to increase their level.

However, acquiring Excelia does not immediately result in leveling up, as they are not immediately converted into stats. This requires the God who bestowed the Falna so that he can properly direct the values ​​to where they should be. Excelia is also a conduit through which gods can relive the experiences the adventurers went through to get there. This strengthens the bond between gods and their followers and allows the gods to know exactly where to distribute those Excelia points in their stats.

The 5 parameters

Falna tracks five key parameters: Basic Skills, Developmental Skills, Level, Magic and Skill, but the area where its effects are felt most strongly is in Basic Skills. The basic skills consist of Strength, Defense, Dexterity, Agility and Magic and are ranked from I to A and then S, with S being the top. These lettered rankings are also numbered and each have a difference of 100 points, i.e. from I (0-99) to S (900-999). However, there are adventurers like Bell Cranel who defy this ranking and manage to exceed the limit and achieve ranks in SS and even SSS. Development skills are acquired after leveling up and unlock an adventurer's potential, improving their abilities. It's more like excess Excelia funneled into a fighting technique or way of life. However, this is not guaranteed.

Additionally, skills and magic develop independently of the leveling system. They evolve with use and the more they are used, the faster they level up. Abilities arise from the soul and are based on the character's personality and desires. For example, due to Bell Cranel's great admiration for Ais, he was able to acquire the ability “Liaris Freese”, which grants him rapid growth as long as he is in love. Magic can also be purchased, but there is a limit of three categories of natural magic per adventurer. However, there are exceptions, such as Lefiya, who can use any elven magic she sees, and Riveria, who can alter the effects of her three categories of natural magic at three different levels. This shows that each individual's progress depends on their personal experience, which ultimately leads to how they level up.

Leveling

Although acquiring Excelia results in leveling up, there are other criteria that must be met before leveling up. Although most of these criteria are not clearly stated, one requirement is that the adventurer must have at least a D rank in a basic skill and use that skill to accomplish a great feat. Once Falna is awarded, the adventurer starts at rank I0 and then builds Excelia to advance in rank. After they achieve enough Excelia, their god helps them increase their level and their stats are reset to I0, although the previous level's stats remain as the basis for the next level.

Additionally, the higher you level up, the harder it becomes to level up. The quality of Excelia is measured by how difficult an activity was relative to the character's level. For example, if a level one character were to fight an extremely dangerous monster, they would receive more high-quality Excelia than a level three character fighting the same monster. As seen with Bell Cranel, who is often faced with many monsters and characters much stronger than himself, he receives a lot of high-quality Excelia, which allows him to level up quickly and increase his stats exponentially. This drastic growth also extends to his weapon, the Hestia Knife, as Hestia also grants her Falna and is directly related to Bell's status.

Limitations of Falna

Dependence on God

For all of its amazing benefits and effects on adventurers, Falna also has its drawbacks. The most serious is that they rely heavily on their god to level up. When adventurers earn Excelia, they require their God or Goddess to use to enhance their basic skills to match their strengths. Without the presence of their gods, the Excelia earned by adventurers cannot be used to improve their stats or even their levels, and gods may be absent, sometimes even permanently. While gods cannot be killed, they can be banished back to heaven if they violate divine rules, causing them to lose their ability to interfere in human affairs. An adventurer in the family of such a god will undoubtedly lose the ability to progress.

The growth of one's Falna also depends heavily on the adventurer's desires and personality. While this may be an advantage for some adventurers like Bell, it could be a significant limitation for others. Adventurers who have no personal desires or motivations may never reach their full potential, even with Falna. Furthermore, Falna does not spare adventurers from the disadvantages that come with the extreme use of their abilities. Although it increases their pain tolerance, these adventurers are still vulnerable to injury, exhaustion, and even death if they are not careful.

Meaning of Falna

Stability of Orario

Falna remains a core concept in the world of DanMachi. It's what adventurers need to survive the dangerous dungeon full of monsters and become strong enough to make a name for themselves. The adventurers rely on their Falna to improve and survive, giving them a fighting chance. This is one of the main reasons many people want to join a Familia. Falna also significantly extends the lifespan of adventurers.

The arcanum that gods pour into adventurers contains some of the essence of their being, resulting in slower aging. The higher the level, the stronger they become and the slower they age. Hestia mentioned that increasing level reduces the distance to the deity and each step closer causes them to age more slowly, significantly increasing their lifespan but not granting immortality. As a pillar of Orario's stability and development, Falna not only empowers individuals but also enriches the world of DanMachi as a whole, combining divine influence with mortal ambition.

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