LP

Life Points (LP) are an attribute which is a characteristic element of the SaGa series. As opposed to Weapon Points (WP), Spell Points (SP), Battle Points (BP) etc, they are constantly appearing in the games. While other video games may also use them, the SaGa series is special considering Life Points are not considered the same as Health/Hit Points (HP).

Explanation
In general, in all the games, regardless of what other uses the LP had, there always were a few similarities.
 * Whereas HP always was in high numbers (sometimes even reaching 999), LP always was short (barely ever exceeding 20).
 * It's number is fixed, aside from a few rare exceptions.
 * When it runs out, the character cannot be used until he/she rests at an inn or even worse, vanishes forever.
 * If a main character runs out of all LP, it always means Game Over.
 * When the character HP drops to zero or his unconcious body gets attacked, he/she looses 1 LP.
 * A few opponents are capable of decreasing a character's LP even should he/she be alive.
 * Some spells or attacks may require LP to be cast.

Saga Frontier 2
In Saga Frontier 2 the LP was not as important. It decreased only when the character died (not the cast with the Reviva spell where the character would be revived before LP damage could take place), when the unconcious body was hit or if a specific opponent hit the character with a specific command. The only specific for this game ways to decrease the LP were the "Recover HP" command which for the prize of 1 LP recovered the character's entire HP (this command was usable between turns) and the second way being not having enough WP or SP to cast a spell or perform a weapon art, if such were the case, the game would allow the player to perform the action regardless, but for the prize of 1 LP.

The enemies also had LP, however due to the fact that dealing any LP damage to the enemy was a very rare instance and since nearly all enemies had more than 1 LP, this was no way to eliminate enemies.

The English Version of Saga Frontier 2 was a lot more challenging than the japanese original. The enemies not only had more HP, stronger attacks, but in the case of the Final Boss, a lot of his attacks, which were weak in the original, were turned devastating by allowing them to deal LP damage and sadly the chance of doing so was 100%! This added with the fact that the main hero Ginny Knights did not posses a that large ammount of LP, forced players to take several precausions in order to have any chance of winning, such as giving her the "Wall" Role to reduce damage dealt to her, putting her in the back row and casting the "Guardian Best" spell which would be the only chance of avoiding the attacks of the enemy.

Unlimited Saga
In Unlimited Saga, the LP was as important as never before. The player started each quest with max HP/LP, and had to survive to the end without loosing all LP. The only way to recover LP in the middle of a quest would be herbs which could only be obtained during a quest in the Chapa Village, the quest could only be done once and some of the herbs in the quest were not as effective as others. As opposed to nearly all other video games, if a character had 0 HP, this would not mean his/her death. This confused a lot of players. In Unlimited Saga HP serves merely as a shield to protect the LP. As long as a character has full HP it's nearly impossible to deal LP damage to him/her, but should it drop to zero, it's nearly sure such damage will be taken. The game provides armor that has the "Life Protection" ability and the Endurance attribute, they both provide higher protection which is extremly useful.

All enemies can only be defeated by deplishing all of their LP (the only exception being using an instant death spell or weapon skill on them).

Since protecting the LP became such an important factor, the game provides several ways to recover HP to be able to protect one's LP. One of these being resting on the map or having a character not participate in the current turn, both these would be affected by the character's recovery rate which added even more confusion to the players, since every character has preferences for different climax and that would determine the ammount of HP recovered. For example some characters would feel better in cold, while others would prefer it warm and would recover more HP on the desert.

===Romancing Saga: Minstrel Song === In the PS2 remake, LP was present. It mostly was lost due to fighting specific opponents and falling in combat or the unconcious body being attacked. But it also was used as an alternative to DP if the weapon one was using was Martial Arts or Magic. Legendary weapons also applied to this and consumed LP instead of DP.

Enemies also posses LP. Just like in Unlimited Saga, aside from instant death attacks, only possibility to kill an enemy was to damage his/her/it's LP, however this did not mean that droping it's LP to zero was necesarry. Due to a weird design decicion, at least 1 LP would be lost by the enemy upon death, since the LP ammount they had was far greater than that 1 point, we can be sure that the LP the enemy lost is not the reason for it's death but rather a reaction to it, yet it still leaves one wondering if such a thing was necessary.

Also if a character looses all LP, he/she dies and is gone permanently (unless it's to be the main character, then it's Game Over). There is however a way, if the player visits The Netherworld and talks to Death, the fallen characters can be revived, but only for the prize of 1 LP of the main character being lost permanently. The game also features as only the possibility to increase one's LP. If one accomplishes the Fairie's Grove quest, the main character's LP will increase by 2 permanently.