Unleash

An Unleash is a special attack most Artifacts and no standard weapons can perform. Only artifact weapons have unleashes, but not every artifact has an unleash. You have no control over when an unleash is triggered; if you have a weapon equipped that has an unleash, then after attacking you may get a message like this one: " Ivan's Masamune lets out a howl! Rising Dragon !" Where this is the name of the Adept who attacked, this is the name of his or her weapon , and this is the name of that weapon's unleash (obviously the in-game text is not different colors, it's all white).

When an unleash occurs, a new attack animation sequence is triggered, instead of the usual jump/slash enemy. Each unleash has a different animation sequence, and no two weapons have the same unleash.

An unleash has a certain percentage attached for the unleash to occur. Most weapons Unleash at a base rate of 35%, but some have a higher base rate. The rate of unleashing can be altered by equipping certain equipment.

Some unleashes have a special effect, such as instantly downing the target, afflicting enemies with status conditions, replenishing HP or PP, or multiplying base damage two or three times.

Every unleash is connected to an element. This means that Unleashes are elemental attacks: the damage done is calculated by comparing the Adept's power with the element in question against the target's resistance. Normal attacks, however, compare the Adept's attack with the target's defense.

A full list of weapons in the Golden Sun series that have unleashes can be found here.