It’s a Flame Strike ability for Alphen and can be charged from several of his Sword Strikes, including Reigning Slash, Double Demon Fang, and Eternal Devastation. It’s an incredibly powerful arte that hits every enemy in a straight line in whichever direction Alphen is facing. Fully charging it will cause it to hit enemies for tens of thousands of damage points each. Note: As a Flame Strike ability, the more it’s charged, the more damage it will do. However, charging a Flame Strike also hastily depletes Alphen’s HP. Using a Fire Strike is a very risk/reward based strategy.
Unlocking Incineration Wave
Step One: Unlocking the Unrelenting Blaze Title
Unfortunately, it will be quite a while into the game before you’re actually able to make use of Incineration Wave. To unlock the arte, you must complete the story segment in Berg Volcano and defeat Efreet Malum, the boss encountered upon reaching the end of the dungeon. After doing so, you’ll unlock a new title for Alphen, the Unrelenting Blaze.
Step Two: Purchasing Incineration Wave
From here, the Incineration Wave arte can be purchased as a part of the Unrelenting Blaze title. It’s rather pricey, going for an eye-watering 1520 SP. Regardless of this, it’s totally worth the investment. This is factoring in not only how powerful it is, but how it can complement certain Sword Strikes as well.
Using Incineration Wave
Pros
Hits multiple enemies at once One of the hardest hitting artes in the game Can charge very quickly with an upgraded Alphen Easy to use once unlocked, just charge it from the relevant Sword Strike
Cons
Fully charging it will almost kill Alphen, leaving him with 1HP It requires good positioning relative to your targets
Extra Tips & Details
Since Incineration Wave is a Flame Strike, it’s a little more flexible than the Sword Strikes or Aerial Strikes since it can be paired with a number of different Ground Artes. These include (but aren’t limited to) Reigning Slash, Double Demon Fang, and Eternal Devastation. Flame Strikes aren’t equipped directly, but are instead automatically assigned to other types of artes. To make use of Incineration Wave, you must equip one of the appropriate Sword Strikes to Alphen’s active arte set. Note: You can see which Flame Strike comes with each arte by looking at the ‘Flaming Edge’ section of the arte description. If the Flame Strike is in a yellow font, it has been unlocked. If the Flame Strike appears in gray, it’s currently unavailable. The Incineration Wave will hit everything in a straight line in the direction that Alphen is facing. It doesn’t stop after hitting the first enemy either, so it’ll pass through them to hit any other targets in Alphen’s sight. By personal preference, I always combo it after Reigning Slash. Reigning Slash is devastating on its own for a single target, so following it up with Incineration Wave will hit the same foe even harder, while also wrecking any other enemies hiding behind them. One thing to remember about Reigning Slash is that it has a very small hitbox. As a result, at certain times you may completely miss the target, causing Alphen to dramatically swing his sword into the air to no effect like a bit of a muppet. However, by hastily following this up with the devastating Incineration Wave, you can make it appear as though that was the plan all along. If you’re willing to play it rather fast and loose with Alphen’s HP, feel free to charge up Incineration Wave as much as possible to unleash a truly devastating attack on multiple enemies at once. Just be sure that you have a swift way for Alphen to get his health back via gels or healers! As Alphen acquires more upgrades, some of those will boost his damage done when at critical health – which is certainly something that can be exploited for Incineration Wave, since charging a Fire Strike is a very fast way to deplete Alphen’s HP to critical levels.
