Can kimahri be competitive?

Kimahri is an interesting one. His base stats of 8000 power for 4CP is solid and pretty much the top end of the 4CP Forwards. So his strength comes down to whether his special ability is strong enough. The problem that I see with his special is that it is so dependant on what your opponent does. If your opponent has no Forwards in play, or even just Forwards that don't have special abilities then Kimahri basically has no text. This leaves the power level of Kimahri in the hands of your opponent which is not really where you want to be (i.e. they could simply not play a Forward with a powerful special ability if you have Kimahri in play). There's a certain level of upside if they don't play their own powerful Forwards because of this but my point is that Kimahri is very variable in how strong he will be in your deck.

Looking in a wider context, a deck with Kimahri would obviously have to be Earth and so you'd be looking for a element that pairs well with this. I like Earth with Lightning for a very controlling build, but that probably doesn't suit Kimahri very well. I've also seen Water with Earth that seemed quite strong and probably a better home for him. It included some of the power Water tools of Tidus, Wakka, Minwu and Scholar (which was particularly effective at protecting Forwards from removal) and things like Prishe, Cecil and Hecatoncheir from Earth.