Battle Chip

A Battle Chip (バトルチップ) is the main armament of NetNavis in the MegaMan Battle Network series, which the operator of the Navi use with the PET. They serve various purposes, usually as a means to inflict damage, and also provide a line of defense to fall back on. Although most enemy Navis don't use Battle Chips as part of their attacks in the game, some do as part as their basic moveset, and DS Navis will use any Battle Chips that exist within the game.

Battle Chip Rankings
Battle chips are placed in the folder in the games. They vary in power and rarity and thus have different rankings. The following ranks divide up the vast number of chips since MMBN3:


 * Standard Chips
 * Basic chips that are unrestricted in any folder, except for number of copies allowed. In the first Battle Network game, 10 copies were allowed, reducing to 5 in MegaMan Battle Network 2, 4 in MMBN3 to 5, and in MegaMan Battle Network 6 they were restricted according to their MB.


 * Mega Chips
 * Without the Team Style or Mega Folder Navicust program, you can only use a maximum of 5 Mega Chips in a folder. These were known as Navi chips from BN1 to BN2. In BN3 to BN5, only one copy of a Mega Chip can be used, but you can insert a similar chip from a different series (e.g. ShadeMan and ShadeManSP chips in the same folder is allowed).


 * Giga Chips
 * Without the Giga Folder Navicust Program, you can only use one Giga Chip in a folder. These chips are version-exclusive, and by all means cannot be traded.


 * Dark Chips
 * Tainted chips that cause bugs and permanently removes 1 HP per battle used, along with moving MegaMan down the "dark" side. In BN4 they appear only when MegaMan is anxious or "dark", and cannot be used with any other chip aside from other Dark Chips. In BN5, they can be inserted in the folder, complete with their own codes, but are restricted to a maximum of 3 per folder, no exceptions or Navi Cust Parts (unless you hack the game), and can also be used to perform Chaos Unisons. In BN6, Japanese owners of a Beast Link Gate could slot in BN 5 toy Dark Chips to activate their attacks, due to some secret data in the game containing these attacks. US players could hack the game to achieve a similar result.


 * Secret Chips
 * Chips that usually consist of Navi Chips from the opposing version of game (ie in Team Colonel they would be Team ProtoMan Chips like finding the Meddy chip in Colonel or TomahawkMan chip in ProtoMan), or special chips gained from certain events (e.g. upgrading Bass to BassGS). This division was not present in BN3. These chips function like any Mega Chips would.


 * Sub Chips
 * Chips used only outside of battle that can have various effects like restoring HP, reducing random encounters, or unlocking PMD


 * Synchro Chips
 * Exclusive to the anime only, the Synchro Chip can unite a human and a Navi.


 * Scrapped Chips
 * Chips that were cut from the game (and are sometimes Japanese-exclusive). Some of these chips are classified, but others don't have a class at all (this causes the game to interpret them as standard chips). Most of them freeze the game when used, but proper hacking allows them to execute smoothly. Although some chips have an image, most earlier scrapped chips had an image of MegaMan holding his buster, while later ones contained no image at all or a purple box.

Chip Types
Chip Types and attacks affect the properties it has against certain enemies, and later on, affect which ones can be used as sacrifices for Souls, or which can be charged. The first 3 games had only Fire, Water, Elec, Wood, and Null, but later games added on new elements, leaving these elements (although some aren't actually counted as elements) as the elements all chips are classified under. This system is still in effect in Star Force, with the change that battle cards in Star Force can have multiple elements, and that all elements but Null, Fire, Water, Elec, and Grass are now "affinities".


 * Null : Any Battle Chip with this Chip Type have no special advantages, and make a good standard method of attack for the early part of the game.
 * Fire : Battle Chips with this element symbol will do double damage to any wood-based enemies. They can also cancel any Grass panels they come into contact with, doing a further double damage to objects on them.
 * Water : Battle Chips with this element symbol will do double damage to any fire-based enemies. They are also capable of removing Lava and Geyser/Volcano panels, and freezing enemies on Ice panels in BN6.
 * Elec : Battle Chips with this element symbol will do double damage to any water-based enemies. They also do a further double damage to any enemy standing on an Ice panel (BN2-4) or a Sea panel (BN5), or encased in a bubble (BN6). They are also known for inflicting paralysis and other status effects.
 * Wood : Battle Chips with this element symbol will do double damage to any electric-based enemies. They are known for not inducing flinch, allowing other attacks to be used as a follow-up, and on occasion they cause confusion.
 * Wind : Battle Chips with this element symbol will do double damage to cursor enemies (BN6 only). They are also known for shifting the position of objects or enemies on the field, as well as removing auras and barriers regardless of strength.
 * Sword : Battle Chips with this element symbol will do double damage to wind enemies (BN6 only). They are also known for having a great damage, but limited range. Some viruses in certain games are immune to all but sword attacks.
 * Breaking : Battle Chips with this element symbol will do double damage to sword enemies (BN6 only). They are also known to break through guards and generally have a high power, albiet limited range but a single strong hit in earlier games, but enabling slightly weaker, multiple hits in later games.
 * Cursor : Battle Chips with this element symbol will do double damage to breaking enemies (BN6 only). They are also known for being able to pierce through Invis-like defenses, as well as targetting panels on the player's will.
 * Recovery : Battle Chips with this element symbol generally do not do any damage (some do, most notably Roll's chips) - instead they heal, or on occasion provide a friendly status boost. This element was removed in BN6, replaced by the null element for healing chips.
 * Cracking : Battle Chips with this element symbol involve cracking or destroying panels, limiting movement space and cancelling any ground-based attack. This is often coupled with another element (usually null).
 * Plus : Battle Chips with this element symbol involve boosting the attack power of other chips, and your Buster for a select few.
 * Invis : Battle Chips with this element symbol involve a defense that lasts a short time, but renders the player invulnerable to all but a few attacks.
 * Barrier/Aura : Battle Chips with this element symbol give the player a barrier or a special aura-like barrier that negates a set amount of damage. While Barriers act as if they had their own HP count (but are permanent until destroyed), an Aura protects the player from any damage below a set number until negated by it's time limit or it's set damage is matched or overidden. Some of these chips have elemental stereotypes, causing them to be weak against other elements, but have special abilities like regeneration or higher defense. Wind attacks blow away the barriers regardless of how much health it had or if the Wind attack even connected.

Chip Codes
Each chip has its own code as shown on the chip. However a single chip can have various codes which usually leads to a Program Advance. For example, combining Cannon A, Cannon B, and Cannon C creates Z-Cannon. Normally, chips of the same name, or chips of the same code can only be selected in the Custom Screen, but * codes, introduced in BN2, act as a wildcard, allowing the player to load up more chips.