I just looked into this because I made the change to disable auto torque. With it enabled and no motion (the reduction circuitry is triggered off the X/Y/Z step lines), it reduces the reference voltage for the stepper driver to 30% of the set value from the pots (per the driver datasheet).
That’s a pretty large reduction. In a “typical” carve, only the Z axis goes idle which may be okay since it is screw driven. But in a raster carve where you may have X or Y idle, that could introduce cut issues.
With the auto torque reduction enabled, I could move my carriage and X axis. With it disabled, the whole machine moves before the steppers slip. Maybe I need to secure the machine now.