Elemental Archfiends

[Lord Blizz]

So, as a fan of Yu-Gi-Oh! and Final Fantasy, I created four cards based off the four Archfiends from Final Fantasy IV. Each Archfiend represents one of the four Elements of Nature, Water, Earth, Fire, and Air. Tell me what you think, and feel free to show cards you think would support any of them or build a deck centered around one of the four monsters. I say one because there's no way to build a balanced deck that is centered around more than one of the Archfiends.

 

 

 

[Surge77754]

These are really good when you consider a custom archetype that specializes in a specific attribute.  I love the artwork.  

I'd suggest putting a hard once per turn on their effects so that they don't loop, but otherwise, good job of showing me that final fantasy vibe.  For Drowned King, I'd suggest making the effect being BOTH players draw 1 card and discard 1 card from their hand, as forcing your opponent to go minus -1 without you going -1 in the hand can be bad for both you and the opponent.  

 

[Lord Blizz]

3 hours ago, Surge77754 said:

These are really good when you consider a custom archetype that specializes in a specific attribute.  I love the artwork.  

I'd suggest putting a hard once per turn on their effects so that they don't loop, but otherwise, good job of showing me that final fantasy vibe.  For Drowned King, I'd suggest making the effect being BOTH players draw 1 card and discard 1 card from their hand, as forcing your opponent to go minus -1 without you going -1 in the hand can be bad for both you and the opponent.  

 

Well, with their effects, it only activates when the monster is Special Summoned, so IDK if it needs the once per turn, since you can't Special Summon the same card twice in one turn. I think at least. But thanks for the feedback

[drowsyCoffee]

To be honest, i think Drowned King is probably the only one of the gang that would really be playable, as all the others of the group dont really archieve enough to justify the three materials, at least, not in modern yugioh, specially when you take into consideration the fact that these monsters are NOT extra deck monsters and thus must be hard drawn. However, they are in my opinion kind of close to playable, and with some specific changes they could maybe even shot up as either part of a board on a combo deck or some sort of boss monster for a rogue tier strat. And all in all, they are hella cool, which is also an important factor

Their protection is decent, but given that they all have over 3000 ATK, i would much rather have them have destruction by effects immunity instead of destruction by battle immunity (Or, much better, both), as its harder for you to access a monster over 3000 than to find a card that could destroy them without targeting (To give an example of a potential card that could do so and sees play, Lightning Storm).

As for the On Summon effects, honestly, other than Drowned none of them archieve enough to justify the cost, BUT Autarch and Empress could maybe reach playability as some finicky interaction options if their On Summon effects were instead Quick Effects (Maybe with a "Once while this card is face up in the field" clause to keep the theme of you only being able to get their effects once for each time you pay them? HOPTs aint that necesary on those two too, given that you need to tribute 3 cards to get the eff. Drowned King and Despot, though, should get HOPTs just in case, as they maybe could end up having a problematic interaction down the line), as then they would be kind of a makeshift Master Peace tbh. Since you didnt specify from where you can special summon them, making so you could do so from Hand or GY would further push them towards being sort of a generic-ish boss monster that decks that heavily played into their respective attributes could go into (And honestly, specially Fire would appreciate the love ngl. Maybe, given that Empress effect to shuffle is way stronger, either only give Autarch a Quick Eff, or make so Empress Targets and Autarch does not to compensate)

Despot just, doesnt do that much for the cost of 3 whole monsters. If it said destroy instead of tribute, maybe it could see some playability within a Dino engine from time to time, like Lithosagym. Otherwise, maybe it could work  if it could summon back any level, or if it included deck but restricting to something like Earth Rocks, but at the end of the day it wouldnt be that bad if it were underpowered, given how Earth is quite a strong attribute thanks to Warrior Earth having a metric ton of support. Not as much as Dark Dragon, but still. The only reason i would give it a HOPT anyways is because in general any non-HOPT summon effs has an inherent danger to it, with the ability to become hella problematic in the future (Also, have in mind, you CAN tribute a face up Despot as one of the three tributes to summon it, making so you are only going -1 with each you summon in that case. Its already close to being exploitable, but not quite. The cards dont have any clause on them preventing you from summoning multiples like you seem to have intended, so you should add one if you want them to have one. Drowned King, though, definitively needs a HOPT, as summoning multiple copies of himself and looping multiple cards in hand through them would NOT be a fun interaction tbh)

 

Finally, of all of the group, Drowned King is probably not only the most playable of them, but also, the one that best fits their attribute. Water Handloop has been legal for quite some time, and while Drowned King would definitively help the deck, at the end of the day its not like Water Handloop could ever be relevant so long as decks like Prankids that can go full combo with a single card in hand are legal. Not only it already has a home, but is balanced within it. Very good card. Plus, simplifying the gamestate by handlooping your opponent benefits a card with this much protection. 10/10 mate, this one in particular is really good

[Lord Blizz]

3 hours ago, drowsyCoffee said:

To be honest, i think Drowned King is probably the only one of the gang that would really be playable, as all the others of the group dont really archieve enough to justify the three materials, at least, not in modern yugioh, specially when you take into consideration the fact that these monsters are NOT extra deck monsters and thus must be hard drawn. However, they are in my opinion kind of close to playable, and with some specific changes they could maybe even shot up as either part of a board on a combo deck or some sort of boss monster for a rogue tier strat. And all in all, they are hella cool, which is also an important factor

Their protection is decent, but given that they all have over 3000 ATK, i would much rather have them have destruction by effects immunity instead of destruction by battle immunity (Or, much better, both), as its harder for you to access a monster over 3000 than to find a card that could destroy them without targeting (To give an example of a potential card that could do so and sees play, Lightning Storm).

As for the On Summon effects, honestly, other than Drowned none of them archieve enough to justify the cost, BUT Autarch and Empress could maybe reach playability as some finicky interaction options if their On Summon effects were instead Quick Effects (Maybe with a "Once while this card is face up in the field" clause to keep the theme of you only being able to get their effects once for each time you pay them? HOPTs aint that necesary on those two too, given that you need to tribute 3 cards to get the eff. Drowned King and Despot, though, should get HOPTs just in case, as they maybe could end up having a problematic interaction down the line), as then they would be kind of a makeshift Master Peace tbh. Since you didnt specify from where you can special summon them, making so you could do so from Hand or GY would further push them towards being sort of a generic-ish boss monster that decks that heavily played into their respective attributes could go into (And honestly, specially Fire would appreciate the love ngl. Maybe, given that Empress effect to shuffle is way stronger, either only give Autarch a Quick Eff, or make so Empress Targets and Autarch does not to compensate)

Despot just, doesnt do that much for the cost of 3 whole monsters. If it said destroy instead of tribute, maybe it could see some playability within a Dino engine from time to time, like Lithosagym. Otherwise, maybe it could work  if it could summon back any level, or if it included deck but restricting to something like Earth Rocks, but at the end of the day it wouldnt be that bad if it were underpowered, given how Earth is quite a strong attribute thanks to Warrior Earth having a metric ton of support. Not as much as Dark Dragon, but still. The only reason i would give it a HOPT anyways is because in general any non-HOPT summon effs has an inherent danger to it, with the ability to become hella problematic in the future (Also, have in mind, you CAN tribute a face up Despot as one of the three tributes to summon it, making so you are only going -1 with each you summon in that case. Its already close to being exploitable, but not quite. The cards dont have any clause on them preventing you from summoning multiples like you seem to have intended, so you should add one if you want them to have one. Drowned King, though, definitively needs a HOPT, as summoning multiple copies of himself and looping multiple cards in hand through them would NOT be a fun interaction tbh)

 

Finally, of all of the group, Drowned King is probably not only the most playable of them, but also, the one that best fits their attribute. Water Handloop has been legal for quite some time, and while Drowned King would definitively help the deck, at the end of the day its not like Water Handloop could ever be relevant so long as decks like Prankids that can go full combo with a single card in hand are legal. Not only it already has a home, but is balanced within it. Very good card. Plus, simplifying the gamestate by handlooping your opponent benefits a card with this much protection. 10/10 mate, this one in particular is really good

Thanks for the feedback. Since you've made it seem like the other three besides Drowned King have effects that don't justify tributing three monsters of the same Attribute, would you possibly be able to think of better card text for the other three?

[drowsyCoffee]

Sure thing! I think this is how i would make them, if i wanted to push them into playability as hard as i could:

 

Autarch:

 

Cannot be Normal Summoned or Set. Must first be Special Summoned from your Hand or GY by tributing 3 FIRE monsters you control. Cannot be destroyed by card effects or battle. Cannot be targetted by card effects. Once while this face up card is on the field (Quick Effect): Destroy one card on your opponent's field

  

Empress: 

 

Cannot be Normal Summoned or Set. Must first be Special Summoned from your Hand or GY by tributing 3 WIND monsters you control. Cannot be destroyed by card effects or battle. Cannot be targetted by card effects. Once while this face up card is on the field (Quick Effect): Target 1 card on your opponent's field; shuffle it into the deck

 

Despot: 

 

Cannot be Normal Summoned or Set. Must first be Special Summoned from your Hand or GY by tributing 3 Earth monsters you control. Cannot be destroyed by card effects or battle. Cannot be targetted by card effects. If this card is summoned: You can target one card in your GY; Special Summon it to your field. You can only Activate this effect of "Blighted Despot" once per turn

 

Drowned King

 

Cannot be Normal Summoned or Set. Must first be Special Summoned from your Hand or GY by tributing 3 WATER monsters you control. Cannot be destroyed by card effects or battle. Cannot be targetted by card effects. If this card is summoned: Your opponent discards 1 card (Their choice). You can only Activate this effect of "Blighted Despot" once per turn

 

Those are the specific changes i would include, though im not entirely certain if the "while this card is face up on the field" clause is up to date, as the card i took it from (An X Saber monster) was quite antiquate, so you should take that one with a grain of salt. Essentially, what i did to try and push them was give them full Towers status (General destruction and targetting inmunity). The cards originally didnt had a specified location for their own self summon eff, so i choose Hand or GY as the location, given that it tends to be a pretty flexible and powerful one, allowing you to recur the cards or access them through a Foolish Burial esque effect if needed. For Empress and Autarch, i made their removals into Quick Effects so they could be used for interruptions during your opponents turn, with Empress being non-destruction and Autarch being non-targetting. Finally, i added HOPTs in Drowned and Despot  just in case there was some broken interaction lying there, and removed Despot's restriction on the SS target because, lets be honest, if yer putting that much effort into a revival, we might as well make it a flexible one.

 

Of course, those are my personal recommendations, and there probably are other different takes to approach those guys. As for example, instead of tackling Autarch and Empress as potential interruptions and making them Quick Effects, you could treat them as going second tools and make their effects boardwipes, maybe with Autarch as Monsters and Empress as S/T. There are a lot of ways you could take to make those guys more powerful (If ya want to, of course) and this is just my opinion on the matter

[Dokutah]

This dont need HOPT @Surge77754 having it needing 3 tributes already costly enough that its impossible to loop. This is why monster that needs actual 3+ tribute/material is rarely playable and the ones that usualy played i meant to win right in the turn its summoned (provide the combo need to enabled it is balance. This might fall into design argument of Enablers vs Enabled)

right on the bat, Fire and wind ones is the best. Water is the 3rd best because hand ripping but bit balance by the fact your oppoent get to choose the card they discard. Earth one is simply bad investment. You already -2 with 3 tributes  only to end up with -1 [banish 3 (-3) + get 1 monster (+1) = (-2) + then summon effect for 1(+1)= (-1)]. Sure it can revive anything without negation tax which might cover the minuses but i rather go -3 for better value

[Surge77754]

5 hours ago, Dokutah Jolly said:

This dont need HOPT @Surge77754 having it needing 3 tributes already costly enough that its impossible to loop. This is why monster that needs actual 3+ tribute/material is rarely playable and the ones that usualy played i meant to win right in the turn its summoned (provide the combo need to enabled it is balance. This might fall into design argument of Enablers vs Enabled)

right on the bat, Fire and wind ones is the best. Water is the 3rd best because hand ripping but bit balance by the fact your oppoent get to choose the card they discard. Earth one is simply bad investment. You already -2 with 3 tributes  only to end up with -1 [banish 3 (-3) + get 1 monster (+1) = (-2) + then summon effect for 1(+1)= (-1)]. Sure it can revive anything without negation tax which might cover the minuses but i rather go -3 for better value

In this case, the cost of having 3 Tributes covers the lack of HOPT. Thanks for telling me.    

 

[Lord Blizz]

10 hours ago, Dokutah Jolly said:

This dont need HOPT @Surge77754 having it needing 3 tributes already costly enough that its impossible to loop. This is why monster that needs actual 3+ tribute/material is rarely playable and the ones that usualy played i meant to win right in the turn its summoned (provide the combo need to enabled it is balance. This might fall into design argument of Enablers vs Enabled)

right on the bat, Fire and wind ones is the best. Water is the 3rd best because hand ripping but bit balance by the fact your oppoent get to choose the card they discard. Earth one is simply bad investment. You already -2 with 3 tributes  only to end up with -1 [banish 3 (-3) + get 1 monster (+1) = (-2) + then summon effect for 1(+1)= (-1)]. Sure it can revive anything without negation tax which might cover the minuses but i rather go -3 for better value

Well, to be fair, Blighted Despot's effect is slightly based on the fact that the Final Fantasy IV boss it's based off of becomes stronger after being killed. Right after you defeat him the first time, you face a stronger version of him, with him saying that in death, he only becomes stronger