Dark Battlemage

[weeb]

 

Artwork Source: "Antonio Salieri" by Kei Suwabe

 

Dark Battlemage

Level 7 | DARK | Spellcaster/Effect

ATK: 2500 – DEF: 2100

Effect: You can Tribute Summon this card by Tributing 1 Level 5 or higher Spellcaster monster. You can target 1 Normal Spell in your GY and banish 1 card in your hand; equip that target to this card. If this card battles: you can banish 1 of the Spells equipped to this card by this card's effect; negate the attack, and if you do, activate the effect of that banished Spell. If this face-up card would leave the field, banish it instead.

 

Design notes:

I personally enjoy battle-based effects, though I know they are generally regarded as rather slow, so I kept that in mind and tried to make a monster with a battle effect that is tantalizingly powerful enough to make it viable, perhaps even in competitive play. His Spell-activation effect has some powerful applications that I feel would be broken if it weren’t for the fact it is bound to the Battle Phase. I had the thought “I want to make a Battlemage version of the Dark Magician” and sort of worked backwards from there, which is why his name and stats are an obvious sendoff to Dark Magician. With that said, let’s talk about the card itself now.

 

So, his first effect helps him be a bit more viable to Tribute Summon, since tributing two monsters is generally less than ideal. But his second effect is where things start to get interesting. He can equip Normal Spells to himself that let you reuse their effects later, and it is not a once-per-turn effect either, meaning that so long as you are willing to banish the cards in your hand you can keep equipping Normal Spells in the Graveyard to him. Of course, once equipped, they don’t do anything but clog up zones until he declares an attack.

 

Basically, it works like this: If he declares an attack, or if he is attacked, you can Banish 1 of the Spells equipped to him to negate the attack (so he can negate his own attack), and then the effect of that Spell activates. He’s much more than just reusing a Monster Reborn or Raigeki - duelists who’ve played with or against Diamond Dude Turbo decks will recognize that his effect actually allows you to bypass the Costs and Conditions of Spells, meaning for example you can destroy all your opponent’s cards with the effect of Ojama Delta Hurricane regardless of whether you control Ojama or not, or you can draw 2 cards off Destiny Draw without discarding anything. The only thing you have to give up to use this power is 1 attack. (Not to mention the fact that on your Opponent’s turn, he’s nigh un-attackable provided he has a Spell(s) equipped to him.)

 

Contrasting this card with cards like Dark Magician of Chaos or Magician of Faith (both Spell recovery monsters who have spent time on the banlist), Dark Battlemage obviously doesn’t add the Spells to your hand, he equips them to himself. If he leaves the field, the equipped Spells leave too. Spells recovered by him are susceptible to Twin Twisters and the like. He’s also limited to only recovering Normal Spells, unlike the aforementioned who can recover any type of Spell. Granted, his equipped Spells can be bounced back with cards like Blackwing – Zephyros, and if it weren’t banned, Giant Trunade could make a really nasty combo with this card. Another fun combo with him is similar to the classic Monster Reborn combo with DMoC; you can dump Dark Battlemage with Foolish Burial, resurrect him with Monster Reborn, and then use his effect to recover both (though keep in mind you have to Banish 2 cards in your hand to do this).

 

Being a DARK Spellcaster, he’s inherently well supported. Since he’s Level 7, he’s a target for Diffusion Wave-Motion, and possibly could be that card’s best target. If nothing else, he can act as fodder for Rank 7s, and even if you don’t want to use his effect, he can still run over monsters with 2500 ATK, which… is the least you can ask for from a Level 7, really.

 

When I was designing this card, I came up with the idea for a card that doesn’t attack in the standard way, but “attacks” using Spell Effects. I thought about what it would be like if this card appeared in the Yu-Gi-Oh anime, and just like how Kaiba would command Blue-Eyes to use its “Burst Stream of Destruction” and Yugi would tell Dark Magician to use his “Dark Magic Attack,” a duelist using this card would say “Dark Battlemage! Use Raigeki!” or “Use the Harpie’s Feather Duster!” or “Cast Pot of Greed, allowing me to draw 2 cards from my deck!” and so on. He’d just be presented as this weird swiss-army knife monster who somehow had all these Spell effects at his disposal. As someone who likes the Battlemage class and enjoys Battle-based effects, thinking up a monster that “attacks” by casting Spells during the Battle Phase was kind of exciting.

 

So, hopefully you like this card. What decks would you put him in, if at all? I imagine something Spellcaster-based, but who knows.

[o_smily]

Nice to see you at work again weeb.

 

This card gives off a good impression on me. From not only my own thinking on this card and its mechanics, but also from the description that you have already given about your own vision and use of the monster, I would say that this card could not only serve as support for multiple Spellcaster/Spell Card Decks, but as a win condition for its own as well. You see, this card has multiple things going for it. For example, this monster is DARK, Spellcaster, and Level 7 monster; this card is asking for multitudes and multitudes of support, not to mention potential Dark Magician support. This card, however, recycles Spell Cards in the GY at a consistent rate as well. Unlike Dark Magician of Chaos and Magician of Faith, the two examples you've given of Spell Card recovery, as long as you are willing, you are able to reuse as many Spells Cards in your GY as possible. It may not be the most light price, but it isn't a light reward.

 

However, these are all things that you have already stated. It's kind of hard to review someone's card when it seems that they've got the whole card worked out anyways. What I can tell you though, however, is that I believe personally that with this card, less people would be asking, "What Deck do I put him in?" and more would be asking "What Deck can I make around him?" As I said before, this card could work really well as a win condition; Spell Card recovery is one important game factor that can separate the line between a good Deck and a mediocre Deck. My two cents.

[Darj]

Card looks fun enough. I doubt it would make a big impact because of little things holding back like a lack of a self-summoning condition to compensate for its high Level, requiring you to use or mill your desired Spell(s) to replicate, and relying on battle to activate its replication effect. These add up to make it slow for the competitive level. However, it looks great for lower tiers or slower formats, or as a secret tech at best in decks that consistently Summon Level5+ Spellcasters (Altergeist Kunquery and Shaddolls come to mind, although the latter aren't top tier relevant). To be fair, it does get good summoning support from cards like Magical Dimension, Dark Renewal and Instant Fusion --> Shaddoll Winds to Normal Summon it with 1 Tribute.

I wonder if it could get away without negating its own attack, although that would conflict with the flavor behind using a special (Spell) attack instead of a normal attack.

You definitely can improve it to take it a more competitive level if you desire so, but the trick is in how to do it since you have to be careful about not making the effect too good or it could become a problem by replicating power Spells that normally you wouldn't be able to activate, like Diamond Dude does, as stated in the opening thread.