Firion

Vanguard

Firion fights mostly on the ground, able to deftly wield an arsenal of weapons from a single spot. As he can chain combos without landing every attack, keep the hits coming for full effect.

Original Appearance: FINAL FANTASY II

Year: 2003

Role: Firion’s tale is one of revenge and rebellion. Firion’s hometown of Fynn is attacked by a merciless hellspawn-raising empire known as Palamecia. During the attack, Firion’s parents are killed, with Firion and his companions, Maria, Guy, and Leon, left wounded. They’re found and taken to a rebel base, where their wounds are healed. Here, Firion seeks to join the Wild Rose Rebellion in order to fight against the Palamecian Empire. After some reluctance, Princess Hilda eventually allows Firion and his companions into the resistance.

Other Noteworthy Appearances: DISSIDIA FINAL FANTASY (2009), DISSIDIA 012 FINAL FANTASY (2011)

Arsenal

Bravery Attacks

HP Attacks

EX Skill

Firion’s Custom “Force Combos”

Force-combo attacks are attacks that can be advanced further into their combo sequences without having to make contact with a target. Additionally, all of Firion’s grounded attacks can be dash canceled on miss (at the same points where they can be evasion canceled).

Firion’s grounded Bravery Attacks follow unique rules, and his gameplay revolves around the force-combo property, but with a twist: he has a much bigger ground-attack arsenal than most, and all of these attacks can be used interchangeably within the same Bravery Attack sequence, depending on inputs and the stage of the sequence in the combo. Whereas most characters have Bravery combos that progress in a predictable and linear fashion, Firion can customize his combos, changing up his subsequent attacks to immediately adapt to a situation.

In other words, in his three-step Bravery Attack sequence, Firion can mix and match between three unique options for each step, with each attack providing a different type of utility (short area-of-effect melee, wide mid-range projectiles, and narrow long-range projectile).

For instance, you may start off attacking a foe from a distance with a long-range axe throw, and then immediately force-combo into a short-range whirlwind attack to protect yourself from an approaching enemy coming at you from the side, finally finishing with a broad mid-range projectile attack to knock back all foes before you.

Firion’s grounded attacks cover a wide array of properties, making him a vanguard unique to the others. He can deal devastating damage with a triple close-range attack sequence, or he can hunt foes from afar with his throwing axe and wand-based spells.

Grounded Bravery Attacks Rundown

Bravery Attack Breakdown

Stage 1 Attacks

Lance Combo

Firion performs a whirlwind attack with his lance with such power that it forcefully draws in nearby foes, leaving them at the mercy of his next blow.

Lance Combo is a close-range area-of-effect attack covering all sides. Enemies beyond the lance’s edge are forced inward (up to 1.0 range). Lance Combo is a remarkably fast attack, suitable for offense and defense. While it lacks range, it boasts two properties generally not seen in neutral  attacks: an instantaneous draw-in effect and a hit effect that covers all sides, whereas most vanguard and assassin neutral  attacks are linear.

Use Lance Combo to quickly engage nearby opponents if you can catch them grounded. Although these scenarios may be rare, Lance Combo can pull in multiple enemies at once. With a proper team combo or setup, you can devastate entire enemy teams with massive Lance Combo > Gelid Wand > Ground Pound combos.

Additionally, Lance Combo is excellent for attacking summoning cores as it both deals damage to the core while drawing in nearby enemies who are also going for the core.

Rope Knives

Firion throws out and retracts a fan of electrified knives, piercing and stunning enemies in a broad arc before him.

Rope Knives is a mid-range projectile attack. Its hit effect diverges into a wide angle, delivering a shotgun-like effect. It’s an incredibly versatile attack thanks to its speed, reach, area of effect, and vertical-tracking property upon release (up to jump height). Thus, it’s your best “hit confirmation” attack (a feeler attack that you can throw out in order to follow up with a complete combo), so open with it liberally.

Depending on the outcome of the attack, you can force-combo into one of the three Stage 2 attacks. For instance, if the enemy backdashes away it, you can follow up with a long-range Calescent Wand (+ ) projectile to chase them. Off of a hit, you can go for extra damage with Searing Volley (+ ).

Boomerang Axe

From a distance, Firion flings an axe into an enemy. Once it reaches its destination, the axe makes a sudden return flight, striking the foe once more.

This swift boomerang attack is used to open up your Bravery Attack sequence from long range. While its flight path is direct and narrow, its extensive horizontal reach makes it highly effective for following up on team combos. Off of a max-range Boomerang Axe hit, you can always combo into subsequent +  attacks (Calescent Wand and Bullseye).

Whereas Rope Knives is effective as a proactive feeler attack, Boomerang Axe is most effective as a reactionary attack. It’s difficult to connect with against mobile enemies, but its speed and range make it ideal for peeling off enemies who are attacking your vulnerable teammates.

Stage 2 Attacks

Gelid Wand

Firion raises a wand to conjure a blizzard around himself that freezes and stuns nearby foes.

Gelid Wand is a close-range radial attack. Its low range limits its effectiveness outside of combos. Although Firion conjures a tornado of ice around him, it doesn’t have a draw-in effect like Lance Combo does, so its primary function is as a natural follow-up combo to a hit-confirmed Lance Combo.

In certain defensive situations, you can use Lance Combo into Gelid Wand as a defensive measure against assassins. In addition to the radial-attack effect of these attacks, Firion’s attacks have high poise (innate to vanguard-class characters), so he’s unlikely to be interrupted by assassin Bravery Attacks.

Searing Volley

Firion follows up his opening attack with a barrage of flaming arrows, fired in a wide phalanx formation.

Searing Volley is a versatile mid-range attack identical to Rope Knives in most respects. As all of your mid-range +  attacks cover wide areas, it can be exceptionally difficult for enemies to avoid your barrage of wide-angled projectiles. For instance, a sequence of Rope Knives into Searing Volley, finished off with Fulminating Strike, almost always forces the enemy into a retreating or guarding posture.

Calescent Wand

From his opening ground attack, Firion transitions into a magical shockwave attack, using his wand to send forth several pillars of flame in a direct line toward his target.

Like most of Firion’s projectile attacks, Calescent Wand tracks vertically incredibly well. Upon release, the fiery spikes travel in a straight flight path, potentially striking enemies within a jump-height difference in altitude.

Since all three of your opening Bravery Attacks have the force-combo property, you can use Calescent Wand to hunt down retreating enemies. For example, if you go for a Rope Knives attempt and your foe backs away from you, you can seamlessly transition into Calescent Wand to maintain pressure from range.

Stage 3 Attacks

Ground Pound

Firion completes his attack sequence by thrusting his fist into the ground, causing an explosion around him that sends nearby foes flying.

Ground Pound is a high-damage radial area-of-effect attack and is naturally the optimal combo finisher for a Lance Combo > Gelid Wand sequence. If you can successfully score the entire three-hit close-range neutral  sequence, you can deal a devastating amount of Bravery damage (nearly 750).

Fulminating Strike

Firion rounds out his attack sequence with a broad sweep of his lightning-infused sword, hurtling an immense electrical projectile toward his enemies and blasting them back on hit.

Unlike the first two stages of + , the Fulminating Strike projectile begins and ends as a wide attack (whereas Rope Knives and Searing Volley begin narrow and diverge wide). This is one of your best attacks available to you; it travels quickly, deals high damage, covers a wide area, and tracks vertically upon release. Its main drawback is that it can only be executed as a third-stage attack.

While it’s considered a magical attack, Fulminating Strike can wall-pin enemies, giving you an opportunity to dash cancel in on the stunned opponent with a massive grounded neutral > >  combo (or an HP Attack).

Bullseye

From long range, Firion ends his ground-attack sequence by quickly drawing and firing an arrow of holy light that pierces his foe and hurtles them away.

Bullseye is an incredibly fast projectile that can wall-pin cornered foes. Like the other +  attacks, it’s designed for dealing damage from a distance and as a chase-down attack against fleeing foes.

While the arrow flies in a straight and narrow path, its range makes it a natural combo follow-up to Boomerang Axe > Calescent Wand. Unlike most marksman attacks, all of Firion’s Bravery-based projectile attacks can be dash canceled on miss. As a vanguard, Firion lacks in the mobility department, but the ability to dash cancel whiffed projectiles gives him a significant boost to his ranged offense, as he can smoothly transition axe throws and arrow shots with a follow-up dash into melee range.

Swordslash

While airborne, Firion delivers a swift power slash at a foe in front of him, sending them flying away.

Swordslash is a no-frills close-range aerial attack. It’s a single strike with a knockback effect. Its primarily used as a follow-up to an air-to-air engagement off of Grasping Knives (dashing ). Although it’s a simplistic attack, Swordslash deals a decent amount of damage in a short amount of time, allowing you to quickly knock an enemy out of a skirmish, isolating them.

Plummet

Firion plummets down to the ground with a spear thrust, knocking away foes beneath him.

Upon hitting the ground, you can cancel Plummet into any of the three grounded Bravery Attacks. This cancel can be executed regardless of whether Plummet hits an enemy.

Plummet is an exceptionally powerful tool in Firion’s arsenal, as it acts as a bridge between his air movement and his superior ground-based Bravery Attacks. Since Firion has a severely limited aerial arsenal, Plummet is a central tool in your move set, as it allows you to quickly and seamlessly transition from the air down to your much stronger ground-based attacks.

While Plummet is a cancelable attack, you aren’t guaranteed a Bravery Attack combo. Opponents hit by Plummet can recover in the air before your follow-up Rope Knives/Boomerang Axe connects. However, it’s possible to combo into Lance Combo in highly specific situations when the enemy is cornered.

Grasping Knives

Firion quickly throws out an electrified knife at his target. As the knife hooks into the enemy, Firion darts in behind it to deliver a follow-up attack on the stunned foe.

Like Plummet, Grasping Knives has special attack-canceling properties. After connecting with the initial knife strike (during Firion’s automatic dash-in), you can cancel Grasping Knives with either airborne Bravery Attack (neutral  or + ). Dashing> airborne is a two-hit combo comparable to other characters’ other dashing  full Bravery combos. A more advanced technique of dashing> airborne+ > grounded+  can be used against guarding enemies. While Grasping Knives into Plummet deals much less damage than Grasping Knives into Swordslash, Plummet allows for more offensive pressure for cases in which the enemy guards your Grasping Knives.

Making use of these various techniques is crucial in maximizing your mobility as Firion.

HP Attack Breakdown

Lord of Arms

Firion slams down into the ground, causing a trail of lightning-laden weapons to erupt from the earth in a direct path to his target.

Lord of Arms is a direct shockwave attack that reaches just past mid-range. It takes a linear flight path upon release, but tracks vertically enough to take out enemies from jump height.

Lord of Arms is a balanced HP Attack with moderate travel speed, start-up time, and range. As your battle plan generally revolves around Firion’s strong mid-range attacks, Lord of Arms is an excellent supplementary tool because of its threat range. If you can condition your opponents into putting up their guard barriers with your grounded +  attacks, you can punish them with a well-timed Lord of Arms shockwave.

Weaponsmaster

Firion sends out a plethora of weapons to surround his target. After a short period, the weapons all collapse inward, devastating foes in range.

Weaponsmaster has a special property—its max range is linked to your current HP total; as your HP decreases, so does its potential range. At maximum HP, Weaponsmaster reaches farther than your +  attacks. At low HP (around 100), its max range is shortened to that of your +  mid-range attacks.

Essentially, Weaponsmaster rewards a safe marksman-like style of play. The more damage you take, the less effective Weaponsmaster becomes. You can counteract this drawback by restoring your health with Blood Weapon and the common EX Skill, HP Regen.

Weaponsmaster is an extremely powerful HP Attack in certain circumstances, as long as you can keep your HP total high. In conjunction with your unique marksman-like Bravery Attacks, Weaponsmaster makes you a viable threat from long range even though Firion is classified as a vanguard.

Vortex of Arms

Firion generates a massive whirlwind around himself that forcefully draws in enemies, shredding them with weaponry. Firion then ends the whirlwind with a ring of lightning, blasting away all nearby foes.

There are two versions of this attack. Tapping bypasses the whirlwind effect and goes straight into the lightning HP-damage attack. Holding creates a tornado that pulls in nearby opponents, dealing a high amount of Bravery damage before dealing HP damage.

While in the tornado, your poise value remains high, making you essentially invulnerable to Bravery Attacks (although HP Attacks can punish you).

Vortex of Arms is an incredibly powerful HP Attack due to its versatility. You can stop the whirlwind portion at any time or skip it altogether to deliver a quick unguardable melee-range attack. Vortex of Arms can be used offensively in wall-pin combos or as a follow-up to a team attack. As a defensive tool, it’s strong against aggressive vanguards and assassins, thanks to its whirlwind draw-in effect.

Riposte

Firion conjures a shield in front of himself for a second that blocks all Bravery Attacks. Upon successfully blocking an attack, Firion retaliates with one of three HP Attack variants, depending on the initial input combination.

, + , and + commands all generate a shield with the same Bravery-deflecting property. However, each command produces a different retaliation attack upon a successful parry. After you parry an attack, you’re invincible for a short period as you deliver your counterattack.

Blocking an attack with produces Vortex of Arms, a ring of surrounding lightning that punishes melee aggressors. Blocking with + produces the Lord of Arms attack, a mid-range shockwave. Blocking with + produces a Weaponsmaster reprisal, a direct projectile-type attack, punishing ranged attackers.

Riposte is remarkably versatile and grants a great amount of survivability and defense to your move set, particularly against marksmen. As a vanguard, you’re generally susceptible to rapid ranged attacks from marksmen. With Riposte, you can punish these attacks with + from past mid-range. Mastering this parry timing can make you nigh invincible against Bravery Attacks. However, equipping Riposte means you sacrifice the ability to inflict HP damage at will, since the HP-damage portion of this ability requires a successful parry.

EX Skill Breakdown

Blood Weapon

With Blood Weapon activated, Firion’s attacks restore lost HP and increase his speed. Blood Weapon lasts for 20 seconds.

Firion’s unique EX Skill grants a dramatic increase in survivability, as long as you can score attacks during its 20-second duration. Bravery Attacks restore a set amount of HP per attack, regardless of how much damage is dealt (e.g., from damage scaling). HP Attacks restore 40% of the total HP damage dealt. Your speed is increased by 10%.

Using Blood Weapon is straightforward. When you need to regain lost HP, activate it and continue fighting. Its speed increase is significant and gives you a much higher chance of connecting with attacks, thanks to better mobility.

HP Attacks are incredibly powerful under Blood Weapon. With a default Bravery value of 1000, you regain 400 HP for landing your HP Attack, which can easily save you from a potential death. If you need a spike in HP, considering going for HP Attacks over Bravery Attacks while under the effects of Blood Weapon.

Battle Plan

As a vanguard, your normal duties generally involve protecting your vulnerable teammates and using your high poise to punish overly aggressive assassins. Firion’s toolkit is unique and distinct from other vanguards. He has a plethora of attacks that vary widely in hit effects and properties. For instance, his grounded neutral  (Lance Combo) isn’t your standard lunge attack; it’s a circular area-of-effect attack with a draw-in effect that defends against and punishes nearby enemies with a high-damage combo.

Further distinguishing Firion from other vanguards is his special interchangeability properties across his vast arsenal of grounded Bravery Attacks. He has nine separate attacks across three combo stages. Each stage of the combo (each  input) has an attack variant that’s designed for close range, mid-range, and long range. For details, see the “Firion’s Custom ‘Force Combos’” sidebar preceding this section.

Because of his wide arrangement of ground attacks, Firion’s main strength comes from a grounded position. Your most versatile attacks are your mid-range ones. One of your best combo sequences is:

Grounded+ (Rope Knives) >+ (Searing Volley) >+ (Fulminating Strike)

These mid-range attacks cover a wide arc and track vertically well. If you need more range, you can switch up your attacks mid-combo after the first attack. For instance, if the enemy is out of range of your Rope Knives, you can force-combo into +  (Calescent Wand) instead in order to chase down fleeing enemies with a long-range projectile. An effective technique is to use only the first two attacks to lock down enemies. Rope Knives > Searing Volley alone has high team combo potential thanks to its stunning effect. Alternatively, you can use this type of technique in one-on-one situations. For example, after an anti-air Searing Volley hit, you can dash cancel in and force the enemy to block Lance Combo >Gelid Wand >Ground Pound.

Firion’s grounded neutral > >  combos are exceptional defense-based attacks that deal a devastating amount of damage, while his grounded + > + > +  sequence is ideal for hunting ranged opponents. Additionally, Firion’s grounded attacks boast subtle yet highly impactful properties. They can all be dash canceled even if they don’t connect with a target. All of his third-stage Bravery Attacks can cause wall pins, including his ranged projectiles. This is unique to Firion since, generally, marksman ranged combos do not wall-pin.

While his ground attacks are exceptional, his aerial attacks are lackluster. However, they’re serviceable if you can take advantage of his dashing  (Grasping Knives) and airborne +  (Plummet) attack-canceling techniques. Since much of combat involves aerial mobility, you spend a lot of your time in the air, dashing. Dashing  (Grasping Knives) is a “warp attack”; when the attack hits, you’re automatically pulled into the enemy, at which point you can cancel into another airborne Bravery Attack. Follow up with either a burst of damage (airborne , Swordslash) or Plummet (then canceled into a grounded Bravery Attack). Plummet is one of your most important moves. It’s a dive-bomb-type attack that sends you, from any height, directly to the ground beneath you, where you’re most powerful.

Firion’s various HP Attacks cover a broad range of effects and attack traits. Lord of Arms is the most balanced out of the four, with moderate speed and range; it’s a good supplement to his solid set of mid-ranged Bravery Attacks and is effective in most situations. Weaponsmaster gives him a long-range HP Attack, but with a unique HP condition: as his HP decreases, the range on Weaponsmaster decreases. Vortex of Arms is a close-proximity attack with high Bravery-damage potential. It can be used offensively and defensively. Riposte provides an absolute defense against Bravery Attacks, but requires timing and skill to master.

Firion is a vanguard who excels at fighting from a grounded position. His customizable-on-command Bravery Attack sequences provide a unique advantage, allowing him to adapt to specific scenarios instantly. His powerful mid- and long-ranged attacks make him a pseudo marksman with strong team combo potential, while his defensive close-proximity area-of-effect attacks can repel most melee-based aggressors. Firion shines on low-verticality maps.

Gallery

Appearance

Weapons