Flare (ability)

Flare, also known as Nuke, is a recurring spell throughout the Final Fantasy series. It is the most powerful of the Black Magic spells in most games in which it appears. It first appears in the first Final Fantasy. The type of damage it does depends upon the game it is in, though it is usually fire or non-elemental damage and is always Black magic.

While Flare is usually the ultimate spell, next to Ultima, sometimes there are upgrades to Flare, which usually affect several targets. Flare upgrades include Giga Flare, Flare Star and Ardor.

Final Fantasy
Flare is a Level 8 Black Magic Spell for Black Wizards. It is learned in Lufein and costs 50 MP to cast. It generally does around 500-600 damage per enemy, depending on the caster's Intelligence. It attacks all enemies at once, with no option to only attack one enemy. It was translated as Nuke in the original NES version.

Final Fantasy II
Flare is a high level black magic. It can only be bought at the hidden magic shop in the Jade Passage.

Final Fantasy III
Flare is a level 8 Black Magic, which can only be cast by the Magus.

Final Fantasy IV
It was renamed Nuke in the SNES version, with Flare as the Twin version. The Twin spell was called Pyro in the Advance version.

Final Fantasy V
Flare is a Level 6 Black Magic Spell.

Final Fantasy VI
Flare does non-elemental damage and ignores magic defense. It is taught by Bahamut at a rate of X2. Its Spell Power is 60 and its Hit Rate is 150. It costs 45 MP to cast.

The upgrade, Flare Star, is an enemy only ability, and deals extreme fire elemental damage to all targets.

Final Fantasy VII
Flare is found in the Contain Magic Materia, as the level 4 magic. It does extreme Fire damage.

Final Fantasy VIII
Flare can be refined using Fire Magic-RF. It is also found in using a Flare Stone.

Final Fantasy IX
Vivi can cast Flare, which does non-elemental damage.

Kuja and Ozma have the ability to cast Flare Star. It does damage based on the target's Max HP and level.

Final Fantasy X
Flare deals non-elemental damage in this game. It is the final Sphere on Lulu's Sphere Grid path.

Final Fantasy X-2
Flare can only be used by equipping either the Conflagration or Megiddo Garment Grids and Spherechanging through the colored gates. The spell will appear in the Black Magic skillset.

Final Fantasy XI
Flare is the Ancient Magic fire elemental spell. It takes an extraordinarily long time to cast, but is the highest damaging fire-based black magic spell until a Black Mage reaches level 75. At that point the mage can learn Flare II by meriting it. Flare II deals more damage. Flare is not particularly noteworthy, though, because all Ancient Magic does pretty comparable damage outside of where a monster would have particular strength or weakness to a specific element.

Final Fantasy XII
Available as Black Magick License 7 costing 70LP, Flare inflicts heavy non-elemental damage on a single target.

The higher level spell is Ardor, which casts extreme Fire damage to all targets in range.

Final Fantasy Tactics
Flare is learned by the Wizard, and is their ultimate spell.

Final Fantasy Tactics Advance
Flare is learned by Alchemists.

Sages possess an area version, Giga Flare.

Final Fantasy Mystic Quest
Unlike most other variations of Flare, this version will attack multiple targets, and has a defined element. It is a Wizard spell, and is the strongest spell in its classification, as well as in the game.