Archfiend Article Finished!!

Archfiends: The Low-Down

Now when someone asks me about Archfiends, they generally ask me the 3 same questions:

1) Is the die-rolling effect a trigger or a continuous effect?

2) Can I Divine Wrath an Archfiend die-roll?

3) Why can't I Divine Wrath an archfiend if it has a Trigger effect?

Answers:

1) The die-rolling is actually a Trigger effect.

2) No you can't.

3) Because the Trigger effect of the Archfiends (for die-rolling) occurs during the middle of the resolution of a chain. If the effect made it's own block on the current chain, then you could, but alas, it does not do any such thing.

More info:

1) The Trigger effect of Desrook Archfiend can be chained to, because it does not occur during chain resolution.

Deck Construction Tactics:

When constructing an Archfiend deck, it helps to remember a few things:

1) Your Life Points will drain quickly if you don't get Pandemonium out quick.

2) Terraforming is your best friend, remember that.

3) In my opinion, I believe that Archfiend decks should resolve around speed, that is why cards that seem out-of-place, such as Marauding Captain, can help the theme (Summon Marauding Captain, Special Summon Terrorking Archfiend).

4) Cards such as Life Absorbing Machine will help tremendously, and since you'll be paying life points, don't count on running cards like Confiscation, etc. that require costs of Life Points to activate, outside of Premature Burial.

Now, a few advantages that Archfiends have:

To start off, a list of the Archfiends:

Axe of Despair

B. Skull Dragon

Beast of Talwar

Fiend Skull Dragon

Lesser Fiend

Shadow Tamer

Summoned Skull

Toon Summoned Skull

and all cards with "Archfiend" in their name.

1) Non-Monster Archfiend, such as Axe of Despair, can save the game. Since a good part of your cards require one Archfiend face-up to stay in play or be played, like Falling Down, you can equip their monster with Axe of Despair, and then play Falling Down.

2) Archfiend's Roar - You can revive any Archfiend with this card, and then play Interdimensional Matter Transporter, etc. to keep it on the field. This card also works well when they target a Terrorking Archfiend, and you use Archfiend's Roar to bring darkbishop Archfiend back, giving you two chances for a positive negation roll, THEY DON'T STACK!! (thanks to Dark Ruler Ha Des)

3) Power - Most Archfiends have high ATK power, ways of donating ATK power, or supportive effects.

4) Swarming - Marauding Captain, Dark Necrofear, Black Luster Soldier - Envoy of the Beginning and Archfiend's Roar all provide additional swarming support.

5) Targeting - Most Archfiend cards come with at least one negation roll number built in, and darkbishop Archfiend gives ALL Archfiends a 1,3 and 6 negation roll in addition to what they had before.

6) Secret Weapons - Fuh-Rin-Ka-Zan, Elemental Burst, etc. The Archfiends have secret weapons that they can take advantage of since they have an Archfiend for each Attribute.

7) Pandemonium - What better way to swarm than to replenish your hand every time an effect kills one of your Archfiends.

8) Recursion - Archfiend's Roar, Call of the Haunted, Premature Burial, Desrook Archfiend, Return from the Different Dimension all provide recursion and an infinite potential for swarming.

Archfiend Disadvantages:

1) Life Points - This deck will drain your Life Points very quickly unless Pandemonium hits the field. Include Life Absorbing Machine to help alleviate these costs.

2) Warriors - This deck has problems once Warriors have completed a turn or two of swarm, so you may need Threatening Roar, etc. to save your monsters or your Life Points.

3) Chaos - This deck has rather big problems with Chaos, because once BLS comes out, unless you have a Necrofear in your hand, the duel's probably over.

4) Jinzo - Archfiend/Swarm decks have a tough time once Jinzo hits play, because no monster they would run can kill it, exception to Tribe-Infecting Virus.

Deck Construction Tactics:

For a good view at tactics, here are some cards that may find their way in.

1) Reinforcement of the Army - you can only run 2 Marauding Captains, and you need them to swarm FAST!!

2) Fuh-Rin-Ka-Zan - It's a good backup plan.

3) Interdimensional Matter Transporter - Good for Archfiend's Roar.

4) Dark Necrofear - Yes, Yes, Yes, Necrofear rocks in an Archfiend deck.

5) Dark Ruler Ha Des - he works in here, psych, Dark Ruler is too much of a slow down for this type of deck. If you want to run him, go ahead, but I think he is too slow.

6) Marauding Captain - see #1

7) Divine Wrath - counter those stupid non-Targeting monster effects, like Tribe-Infecting Virus.

8) Life Absorbing Machine - keep half or all of those LP you paid that previous turn (if you have 2).

9) Summoner of Illusions - this card is playable at your own risk, but if you summon Fiend Skull Dragon with his Flip Effect, then the Fiend Skull Dragon will negate the Flip Effect and stay on the field, so you have another Archfiend ready to kill stuff.

10) Toon Summoned Skull - yes, you could run a Toon/Archfiend deck, since the Life Point paying idea is consistent with both.

Now that the Pros/Cons are out of the way, we can move on to sample decks (keep in mind that these decks are coming off the top of my head, so don't criticize too badly):

Archfiend Swarm:

Monsters (17):

Tributes(3):

2x Dark Necrofear

1x Black Luster Soldier - Envoy of the Beginning

Non-Tributes(15):

3x Terrorking Archfiend

3x Archfiend Soldier

2x Marauding Captain

3x Desrook Archfiend

1x Familiar Knight

1x Sangan

1x Sinister Serpent

1x Tribe-Infecting Virus

Spells (15):

3x Pandemonium

2x Terraforming

2x Reinforcement of the Army

2x Nobleman of Crossout

1x Pot of Greed

1x Graceful Charity

1x Heavy Storm

1x Mystical Space Typhoon

1x Premature Burial

1x Snatch Steal

Traps(8):

2x Interdimensional Matter Transporter

2x Archfiend's Roar

1x Life Absorbing Machine

1x Mirror Force

1x Call of the Haunted

1x Return from the Different Dimension

Archfiend (Pure and true):

Monsters (17):

Tributes (2):

2x Dark Necrofear

Non-Tributes(15):

3x Terrorking Archfiend

3x Archfiend Soldier

2x Desrook Archfiend

1x Sangan

1x darkbishop Archfiend

1x Tribe-Infecting Virus

1x Summoner of Illusions

1x Cyber Jar

1x Exiled Force

1x Sinister Serpent

Spells(17):

3x Pandemonium

2x Terraforming

2x Nobleman of Crossout

1x Pot of Greed

1x Graceful Charity

1x Giant Trunade

1x Mystical Space Typhoon

1x Snatch Steal

1x Falling Down

1x Premature Burial

2x Axe of Despair

1x Scapegoat

Traps(6):

2x Archfiend's Roar

1x Interdimensional Matter Transporter

1x Threatening Roar

1x Call of the Haunted

1x Mirror Force

1x Life Absorbing Machine

 
Click to expand...
One helluva archfiend glitch ya got here

Did you know that your link to "Desrook Archfiend" in there is instead a link to your rough draft of this same article? The same link in the draft seems to work fine, however.


Edit: Aaawwwwww..... You fixed it.:(
 
1) The die-rolling is actually a Trigger effect.
Click to expand...

Actually, the dice-roll effect is a continuous effect. It doesn't "activate" per se, it just is. You can tell because it has no Spell Speed.

2) Archfiend's Roar - You can revive any Archfiend with this card, and then play Interdimensional Matter Transporter, etc. to keep it on the field. This card also works well when they target a Terrorking Archfiend, and you use Archfiend's Roar to bring darkbishop Archfiend back, giving your Terrorking a positive negation roll for anything besides rolling a 4.
Click to expand...

This is slightly wrong. The Effect of darkbishop Archfiend is a separate Dice-Roll. So in that scenario, darkbishop is Special Summoned and when the card targeting Terrorking is resolving you get 2 dice rolls - 1 for Terrorking (in which a 2 or a 5 negates the effect and destroys the card) and 1 for darkbishop (in which a 1, a 3 or a 6 negates the effect and destroys the card) and NOT 1 dice roll in which a 1, 2, 3, 5 or 6 does the job. (you can decide the order)



Dark Ruler Ha Des
 
thanks for the "2 seperate dice rolls" problem, I fixed it, but under the Netrepâ„¢ card registry, look up Infernalqueen Archfiend, it says that it is a trigger effect (dice-rolling, that is)


EDIT: NetRep card registry sez:

5. The effect of rolling a die for an Archfiend is a Trigger Effect

-chaosruler
 
Nice to see someone appreciating a pre-contsructed deck build (like this, amazoness, gravekeepers and Sanctuary). Although sadly it proves that Chaos soldier fits into far too many decks still, this one especially as deathrook archfiend dumps to the graveyard so easily.
 
chaosruler said:
thanks for the "2 seperate dice rolls" problem, I fixed it, but under the Netrepâ„¢ card registry, look up Infernalqueen Archfiend, it says that it is a trigger effect (dice-rolling, that is)


EDIT: Netrepâ„¢ card registry sez:

5. The effect of rolling a die for an Archfiend is a Trigger Effect

-chaosruler
Click to expand...


Whoops, you're right!

LOL!!


Dark Ruler Ha Des
 
chaosruler said:
thanks for the "2 seperate dice rolls" problem, I fixed it, but under the Netrepâ„¢ card registry, look up Infernalqueen Archfiend, it says that it is a trigger effect (dice-rolling, that is)


EDIT: Netrepâ„¢ card registry sez:

5. The effect of rolling a die for an Archfiend is a Trigger Effect

-chaosruler
Click to expand...
It can't be possible. Triggers are chained effects.

2 conflicting rulings

"Rolling a die for an Archfiend cannot be chained to since you are resolving an effect."

"The effect of rolling a die for an Archfiend is a Trigger Effect."

So it is not a Trigger Effect, it is a Continuous/Trigger that attempts to "replace" the effect with negation. It will cut in and allow you to roll a die any time she is targeted, if you fail, the effect resolves properly, if you do not, the effect resolution is replaced (negated) and dissappears.

Trigger Effects always create Chain Links.

This also applies to Big Shield Gardna
 
Archfiends

My understanding is that the trigger can be chained to, but not the dice roll because it is resolving the effect. You can have a chain of 4 things, Effect 1 goes off, Archfiend triggers, Chain 1 goes off, Archfiend triggers;

Resolve...Roll for stoping chain 1, success, Roll for stoping effect 1, sucess.

That is my understanding...

P.S. Does anybody have a clue when the ruling says "You can roll a die for an Archfiend during the Damage Step."
:confused:
 
No, the dice roll is the effect, and you CANNOT chain to it, check out my Divine Wrath article for more info.

-chaosruler
 
Chaosruler,
Great article, Thanks!
I was wonder if your sure about the following:

chaosruler said:
9) Summoner of Illusions - this card is playable at your own risk, but if you summon Fiend Skull Dragon with his Flip Effect, then the Fiend Skull Dragon will negate the Flip Effect and stay on the field, so you have another Archfiend ready to kill stuff.
Click to expand...

I thought this ruling had changed. I went back an looked, it was true in Netrepâ„¢ 4.0, but disappeared by Netrepâ„¢ 6.0. I haven't see it since. We have several examples of lingering effects that can't be negated. For example, Skill Drain won't save my fusions that were summoned by Magical Scientist. Clearly the Fiend Skull Dragon/Summoner situation is a little different, since Fiend Skull Dragon will come out while Summoner of Illusions is still resolving. But I still expected Fiend Skull Dragon to be destroyed in the end phase.

-yugi
 
Well, Skill Drain won't save them because Scientist sets a condition on every Fusion monster he summons, where as Summoner of Illusion's Flip Effect will be negated when it tries to effect Fiend Skull Dragon

-chaosruler
 
I think Summoner of Illusion also sets a condition on the fusion monster he summons. Namely, that it "is destroyed at the end of the turn". This is very simular to Scientist's effect of "is returned to your Fusion Deck at the end of the Turn"

Summoner of Illusion effect:
FLIP: Tribute 1 monster on your side of the field (excluding this monster). Special Summon 1 Fusion Monster Card from your Fusion Deck. The Fusion Monster is destroyed at the end of the turn this effect is activated.

Magical Scientist effect:
Pay 1000 Life Points to Special Summon 1 level 6 or lower Fusion Monster from your Fusion Deck in face-up Attack or Defense Position. That Fusion Monster cannot attack your opponent's Life Points directly, and is returned to your Fusion Deck at the end of the turn.
 
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