Gilgamesh (Final Fantasy) Discussion

IT'S MORPHIN' TIME!

Gilgamesh is a character from Final Faantasy who has appeared in almost all of the games. He may look goofy on the outside but Gilgamesh himself once destroyed an entire army. Later in the series Gilgamesh grew more and more arms out of nowhere even when not in his true form. But I'll be using his most balanced form with two arms.

Gilgamesh has a special type of passive, he randomly switched through his weapons with every new melee attack. The weapons and their special abilities are as follows:

Excalibur - All damage dealt is doubled.
Excalipoor - All damage is reduced to 1.
Naginata - Attack has greater range.
Masamune - Long range but shorter than Naginata, generates more % on hit, 75% normal knockback.
Genji Blade - Depletes the opponent's smash gauge with each hit. 75% normal damage.
Zantetsuken - Has a low chance of inflicting 250% damage and 150% knockback instantly when attacking.
Battle Axe - Attack does random damage, from 25% to 175% normal damage.
Chicken Knife - The higher Gilgamesh's %, the higher the damage done, from normal damage at 0% to 220% damage at 300%.

Neutral Normal: Dual Thrust: Gilgamesh quickly stabs forward with two weapons and then swings his weapons upward.
Tilt: Cross Slash: Gilgamesh leans out, slashes, and then slashes twice more. Dealing decent knockback. Has long end frames.
Up Tilt: Double Trouble: Gilgamesh slashes above him with two weapons in an arc. Gilgamesh then slashes again for medium-strong knockback. Has slightly longer start-up and end frames than other moves.
Down Tilt: Electrocute: Gilgamesh calls a lightning strike directly in front of him, slamming the opponent to the ground, sometimes trips.

Aerial Neutral: Rolling Slash: Gilgamesh quickly rolls in place, dealing damage all around him.
Fair: Double Trouble (aerial): Same as up tilt, but directly in front of Gilgamesh, second hit can spike.
Bair Reverse Dual Thrust: Gilgamesh quickly thrusts two weapons behind himself. Scales quicker with % than most attacks.
Uair: Mild Rocket Punch: Gilgamesh shoots two rocket fists that explode after a short time, propelling him downward. Longer start-up than most of his attacks.
Dair: Lowest Dual Thrust: Gilgamesh quickly thrusts two weapons below himself, can spike.

Neutral Special: Actual Rocket Punch: Gilgamesh shoots two rocket fists that explode after a time, can charge to increase range, speed, and damage. Longer start-up than most of his attacks.
Side Special: Whirlwind Slash: Gilgamesh runs or flies forward while spinning his weapons. Then sends them flying in the other way.
Up Special: Jump: Gilgamesh jumps up and slams down with his head. Slightly longer end than most of his attacks.
Down Special: Death Claw: Gilgamesh charges slightly forward and slashes the opponent twice, deals heavy knock-back if both attacks land. Quite slow.

Grab: Gilgamesh reaches out on one leg and attempts to grab his opponent. Has a longer than average grab range but has longer end frames than most other grabs, not counting grabs like the Hookshot or the Grapple beam.

Pummel: Gilgamesh equips a weapon and hits his enemy with it, while grabbing an enemy the equipped weapon doesn't change until you throw your enemy or the enemy shakes free.

Throw forward: Gilgamesh impales his enemy and throws them forward, dealing moderate knockback and moderate damage.

Throw backward: Gilgamesh leans on his back leg and throws the enemy behind him, dealing low damage and slightly stronger than normal knockback.

Throw downward: Gilgamesh impales his enemy and smashes them down on the ground while doing a quick pose. Deals the most damage of his throws and allows Gilgamesh to quickly follow up with any attack.

Throw upward: Gilgamesh calls Enkidu to grab the opponent and carry them upward. Dealing very low damage and picking them up higher depending on their %. Can be button mashed out of but gets harder the higher %. Allies can hit Enkidu but it's harder to make Enkidu drop the opponent the higher the % of the opponent.

Final Smash: Gilgamesh Morphing Time: It's morphing time! Gilgamesh grows 6 extra arms, making his melee attacks deal more hits for a period of time. Giglamesh has a 45% chance of wielding eight of the same weapon, a 45% chance of using four weapons twice each, and a 10% chance of a random alternate combination.

Feedback is appreciated.

You don't need to put EVERY game he's in in the title you know, just put "Final Fantasy"

First off; cool gimmick. Already a unique character. Good job.

The moveset itself is great, really. No problem with it; there's nothing bad about it at all, really. Though make sure to put in the grabs when you can.

The character itself isn't a bad idea, really. He's a pretty iconic FF character, so it wouldn't be bad at all to have him in.

I'm considering supporting. Good thread!

Same as Shaq. Interesting, recognizable, neutral Final Fantasy character, good moveset, solid presentation. Yup, support. Just change his series name in the title to Final Fantasy. One question though, do the weapons he's holding stay until the actual attack is initiated? If so, I think that's good, because it means the player has no idea what weapon he'll attack with until they've carried out the attack.

I don't like the 'gimmick'. There are 2 main issues with it:

- Spriting. This means that every attack needs a variation for each weapon possibility.
- Unreliability. This makes it difficult to play the character when you're relying on luck for your damage output. A single move is ok (G&W's Judgement), but not his whole playstyle. If it rotated each attack (ala Olimar) it might work better.


I'm ok with the character choice - Gilgamesh is signifcant in Final Fantasy. There's 2 other FF characters I like more though (Chocobo Knight and Kefka), and Cloud is really popular... I'm not sure about supporting yet.

I defiantly support, though spriting might be an issue

Roy wrote:

I don't like the 'gimmick'. There are 2 main issues with it:

- Spriting. This means that every attack needs a variation for each weapon possibility.
- Unreliability. This makes it difficult to play the character when you're relying on luck for your damage output. A single move is ok (G&W's Judgement), but not his whole playstyle. If it rotated each attack (ala Olimar) it might work better.


I'm ok with the character choice - Gilgamesh is signifcant in Final Fantasy. There's 2 other FF characters I like more though (Chocobo Knight and Kefka), and Cloud is really popular... I'm not sure about supporting yet.

The gimmick is supposed to be one of his balancing factors, while he has a strong moveset you have to wish for a good weapon or else your move is wasted.

Naughty Ottsel wrote:

Same as Shaq. Interesting, recognizable, neutral Final Fantasy character, good moveset, solid presentation. Yup, support. Just change his series name in the title to Final Fantasy. One question though, do the weapons he's holding stay until the actual attack is initiated? If so, I think that's good, because it means the player has no idea what weapon he'll attack with until they've carried out the attack.

Yup, the weapon randomizes with every attack.

Added his throws and his pummel, his moveset should be complete.

TheMayMaysJack wrote:

The gimmick is supposed to be one of his balancing factors, while he has a strong moveset you have to wish for a good weapon or else your move is wasted.

I understand that, but that doesn't mean it's effective in-game. Fighting games are supposed to be skill-based, but Gilgamesh's randomness ruins that completely.

The point I'm making is, competitively, no one is going to use a character that is completely random if any of his attacks will even be effective, and variable knockback making it impossible to prepare any kind of combos. There's a reason Phoenix Wright is bottom tier in MvC3 - one of the reasons is that his evidence gathering is unreliable, and it's an integral part of his playstyle. G&W is ok because it's a single move that has a chance for an early KO, with a clear risk (1) and the rest of his moveset is reliable. (Actually, if customs are on, the best G&W custom for tournament play is the one with the least amount of randomness) Gilgamesh is impossible to predict for the player using him, let alone his opponent.

Roy wrote:

TheMayMaysJack wrote:

The gimmick is supposed to be one of his balancing factors, while he has a strong moveset you have to wish for a good weapon or else your move is wasted.

I understand that, but that doesn't mean it's effective in-game. Fighting games are supposed to be skill-based, but Gilgamesh's randomness ruins that completely.

The point I'm making is, competitively, no one is going to use a character that is completely random if any of his attacks will even be effective, and variable knockback making it impossible to prepare any kind of combos. There's a reason Phoenix Wright is bottom tier in MvC3 - one of the reasons is that his evidence gathering is unreliable, and it's an integral part of his playstyle. G&W is ok because it's a single move that has a chance for an early KO, with a clear risk (1) and the rest of his moveset is reliable. (Actually, if customs are on, the best G&W custom for tournament play is the one with the least amount of randomness) Gilgamesh is impossible to predict for the player using him, let alone his opponent.

I'll just leave this Dissidia 012 tier list right here, Gilgamesh uses the same gimmick. S and higher means the characters are great to amazing in competitive. Gilgamesh here also has some good attacks in the game. He was put up there for his good attacks and his random moveset.

Spoiler:

That is some person's tier list, the actual official competitive community tier list is this one:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1TnqRQ8YgIPMG8JORX1mJF1ris5cqqKNmUapk44YElaA/edit#gid=0

Gilgamesh is mid tier. Not bad, not great, still viable. The mechanic he uses in Dissidia was literally copied and pasted into this moveset, so it is a pretty good reference point for viability.

I firmly believe any mechanic is possible to balance, including randomness. In this case, balancing would be a matter of the average function. Taking into consideration how many worse-than-average and how many above average options can appear and the percent chances of those appearances, you make each attack accordingly that percentage below or above average in terms of damage and/or knockback. You can also make sure certain combos work across a variety of weapons so that there is SOME stability. Overall you want his different weapons to all balance each other out and add up to an above average character. The reason you want him to, on average, be BETTER than other characters is to account for how much randomness in itself detracts from his playability, thus balancing him out.

According to that list, Gilgamesh is A+ ranking. I'm trying to understand what makes him viable (I've never played Dissidia). From what I'm reading, there are Bravery and HP attacks... and the random weapon affects Bravery more than HP which means he has something reliable. Though I also see something about builds, selecting certain attacks, abilities, and summons? These types of things can heavily skew how the character functions. It could also be part of how Dissidia functions as opposed to Smash (3D fighter vs 2D fighter, combo mechanics, EX mode [Smash characters are balanced without Final Smash taken into account], etc). The 'build' I saw for Gilgamesh involved building up his EX. This could be implemented into Crusade with a higher Final Smash build rate, but that won't affect competitive in any way...

Also, this is the list I found, with Gilgamesh at B:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1TnqRQ8YgIPMG8JORX1mJF1ris5cqqKNmUapk44YElaA/edit#gid=0


EDIT: Seems like PH beat me to it a bit. I just feel like it would be extremely difficult to play even if his average is above the average for all characters, since he'd be unreliable. Making combos work accross most types of weapons is a good start, though. If, say, out of the 8 weapons, only one had changed knockback, it'd be semi-reliable, especially if they all had similar range.

Perfect Hell wrote:

That is some person's tier list, the actual official competitive community tier list is this one:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1TnqRQ8YgIPMG8JORX1mJF1ris5cqqKNmUapk44YElaA/edit#gid=0

Gilgamesh is mid tier.  Not bad, not great, still viable.  The mechanic he uses in Dissidia was literally copied and pasted into this moveset, so it is a pretty good reference point for viability.

I firmly believe any mechanic is possible to balance, including randomness.  In this case, balancing would be a matter of the average function.  Taking into consideration how many worse-than-average and how many above average options can appear and the percent chances of those appearances, you make each attack accordingly that percentage below or above average in terms of damage and/or knockback.  You can also make sure certain combos work across a variety of weapons so that there is SOME stability.  Overall you want his different weapons to all balance each other out and add up to an above average character.  The reason you want him to, on average, be BETTER than other characters is to account for how much randomness in itself detracts from his playability, thus balancing him out.

Thanks for the feedback. You perfectly translate the state of mind I had when making this character, and when seeing him played/playing him in Dissidia.