Bigby in Yomi

I had an idea for how Codex’s Bigby could play in Yomi.
I would imagine if Bigby were in a fighting game, he’d probably be a Testament-style trap character. I’m attempting to emulate that with this deck build.

Bigby Hayes
Ironfisted Magistrate
80 hp
3 CP
milling: During your draw phase, you may discard a card to draw.
Normal atk speed: x.4
Throws: 2 CP, starter, 5 dmg KD, x.8

2 a/d
3 a/d
4 b/d
Injunction
Draw phase
The opponent cannot dodge this turn
5 a/b
6 a/b
7 t/b
Arrest
Draw phase: the opponent’s attacks and throws are 3.0 spd slower. all of your attacks and throws knock down this turn.
8 t/b
9 t/b
10 t/b
Redacted
Reaction: discard a card to counter an ability
J: arm of the Law 2.4 spd atk 7(6) damage 1cp ender
Jurisdiction
This card acts as any nonA, non joker ability card in either player’s discard.
Q: Order in the court
0.4 spd atk 8(2) damage can’t combo
K: Hammer of Justice
3.0 8(3) damage KD 0cp starter
If This card wins combat, the combo is immune to jokers
AA: Guilty Verdict
1.2 spd atk
20(4) damage
2cp ender
AAAA: judgement day
Can’t combo
9.0 spd throw
60 damage

He’s probably broken but I think it’s an interesting idea at least

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He seems really weak, tbh. I’m not sure what his 4 ability is supposed to do, given he has kind of crappy attacks. I’m not really getting a trap/gimmick character vibe from him, because his abilities are mostly about making his opponent discard cards. His Ace super is really strong, so I think as-is, people would just try to go for that. His J ability is a cool concept, but I think in practice, there’s really few abilities he would actually be able to copy to any benefit.

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I’ve buffed him by making K a really scary attack and changed some of his abilities. IDK if this was a big boost or not.

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He only has four ranks of normal attacks and can’t do straights. This seems kinda tough if he doesn’t draw face cards

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His innate does double his card cycling.

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Alright, now that I have some more time to type out thoughts. I am by no means good at evaluating this kind of thing, but I’ll try. Putting Aces aside for the moment… his attacks are weak, given his poor damage conversion (three combo points, no linkers, no pumpers) and no straights. His throws are also weak, with their slow speed and 5(!) damage. His turn-by-turn combat damage is around the low teens.

Now, add Aces in and that all changes. AAAA deals obscene amounts of unjokerable damage, but is slow. It was a good idea to add in an AA option and change the K, since previously his opponents can just throw to counter the entire mixup, and Bigby would have no good answer since his attacks are awful. Now, he has a very deadly endgame mixup with dodge into 60, raw AAAA for 60 unjokerable, or K into 56AA for 39 unjokerable. His card filtering allows him to draw into cards with Gwen level consistency, so he’s very capable of getting those Ks, As, or pair/triples he needs.

This means he has a block heavy gameplan, trying to navigate his weak early game while trying to get the pieces assembled for endgame, using 2, J and Q as defensive pokes. You rarely want to throw with him, with their bad damage conversion and mixup normals not following into much besides AA, but you’d rather go straight to AAAA than take the chance there. Unlike Lum or Oni those throws don’t really increase in value in the endgame, so they’re just bad. His increased chances of drawing into Jokers help him survive while he pokes the opponent to sub 60~40, from which totals he could steal the game. Reminiscent of a weaker Geiger in that sense.

For his abilities:
I’m not quite sure how Injunction fits into his gameplan here. Against his endgame mixup opponents are most incentivized to fast attack (the only option that they could have joker backup with) or fast throw (if loses combat leads to ~20 less damage), so the non dodge clause isn’t terribly impressive. It does buy him a turn if he needs it with Q, so there’s that.

Arrest doesn’t do too much in the early-mid game except to get you out of a sticky mixup situation, but supercharges your endgame mixup by making all your options virtually non-outspeedable. A 6.0 60 damage throw, and a 0.0 39 damage attack. This is far more powerful than Burst of Speed, and imo needs to be toned down or have extra conditions. The KD doesn’t feel relevant because of aforementioned weak mixups. EDIT: This could work in conjunction with KD to make him play at pseudo-Zane. I feel that’s more of an indication that this needs to be toned down than validating Bigby’s bad throws, though.

Redacted needs a change too, I think. It’s just strictly better than Grave’s counter at the moment. I liked the original A discard clause, since that means Bigby has a difficult decision of not having access to his mixup if he decides to use it that turn, and he has access to As more reliably than other characters. On the topic of J, not sure how the block damage fits into things. It makes it seem he wants to pressure blocking opponents, but he’d much rather just block up himself.

Jurisdiction I just don’t like, really. It’s really bad against certain characters (Geiger, Midori) and really good against others (Onimaru, Vendetta), giving him a sudden boost of advantage arbitrarily.

K as said is pretty central to his mixup, and is a pretty interesting design. I would probably make it even slower, though.

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I’m not ready to try to evaluate the character as a whole, but I will note that 60 damage AAAA is an instant deal-breaker for me—not because I object to high damage supers, but rather for flavor reasons.

Deathstrike Dragon is the strongest single move in vanilla Yomi at 55 damage, and I believe that it’s intended that nothing is allowed to match it, let alone surpass it. The next strongest move is a fully-pumped Final Dragon Buster, which previously held the title for strongest move before the Shadows characters were added, and it’s telling to me that the two strongest moves in the game both involve transforming into a dragon. A mere judge, no matter how strong, surely can’t do more damage in a single strike than a dragon, right?

That’s just my two cents. Obviously this is a fan-made character, so it does have the option of breaking the conventions of the source material. That said, if your goal is to make a character that could be official, I believe you would need to change that super to do less damage.

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My goal was to structure Bigby as a sort of control deck, so Judgement Day is supposed to be his big win condition. The only way I could see it working was doing crazy damage. Alternatively, it could do 50 damage and the opponent has to discard their hand.

How close to Testament were you looking for? Having cards that make the opponent discard has the"flavour" of weakening the opponent à la Menelker. My vague understanding of Testament is that he sets up traps and then knocks you into them to make a chain. To me that suggests setting a trap card face down (like Stash!), then if your current attack/combo card satisfies some conditions you can add a trap to the combo without using CPs.

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That’s kinda how Testament works. Another big part of how the traps work (that actually fits your idea kinda) is that they’re invisible so the opponent has to mentally track them. I like that idea though, so I’ll try to figure something out with it.

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New Draft

Bigby Hayes
Ironfisted Judge
85 hp
3cp
Atk spd. x.4
Throw spd. x.6
Throws 6 damage + KD. 2cp starters
Legal Entrapment
If you did damage or block damage to the opponent, you may facedown a card as a trap card at the end of the turn. If the opponent combat reveals a card of the same rank (other than a block), it loses combat and they take 5 damage. If they blocked with that rank, they take 2 block damage and don’t draw from blocking. Discard the trap card afterwards.

2 a/b
3 a/b
4 b/d
Arrest
If this is your trap card, the opponent’s dodges trigger the trap.
5 a/d
6 a/d
7 a/t
8 t/b
9 t/b
10 t/b
Injunction
Discard a card to counter an ability.
J
Stricken Record
2.4 spd atk. 7(3) damage 1cp ender
Jurisdiction:
Draw phase: you may Retrieve a 4 or 10 from your discard pile
Q
Order in the Court
7.0 spd atk. 12(4) damage 2cp starter
K
Hammer of Justice
0.6 spd atk 8(1) damage 2cp ender
A
Double Jeopardy
1.0 spd atk. 2(2) damage. Can’t combo
If this does damage or block damage, you may play a second trap next turn.
AAAA
Judgement Day
5.0 spd throw. 50 damage

This version is more Testament like and also has elements that are meant to parallel Quince.

As an aside, Testament usually uses the traps to win neutral in the first place.