The five strongest Fiends

[Trap Master]

I remember the very first shown Magic&Wizards Duel between Yugi and Kaiba, where Yugi played Summoned Skull. Kaiba was shocked and said Summoned Skull would belong to the five strongest Fiend-Type monsters.

This may be a dumb question, but has there ever been a quotation or at least a hint who the other four elitary Fiends are?

[Ryusaki]

'Fraid not. The Yugi/Pegasus TV duel had a chart with certain monsters that fit into the four different 'Magic-User' categories (one of the categories was Devils and Demons), but I think the Demon Summon comment was just a throwaway.

[Avenger of Mythos]

The only way to do it really would be to go through all the manga duels and see which Fiends pop up and make a list of strength, and take into account that they may be later releases than that Duel.

[Supremeking_Judai]

Kaiba also said that Gaia the Knight was the strogest between the Warrior types... He was mistaken....

[Avenger of Mythos]

Actually, at that point it pretty much was the strongest Warrior. We never saw a stronger one before the end of Duelist Kingdom, except Black Luster Soldier, and it appears that Ritual Monsters have never been considered really, given how Dark Magician has been stated as the strongest spellcaster around. So yeah, I think at the time of DK, no stronger warriors had been released within the anime world.

Additional Comment:

Off the top of my head, in Battle City we see 2 Fiends stronger than Summoned Skull, those being Masked Beast - Des Guardius and Lava Golem, which each obviously have their own difficulties in use.

Oh! We also see Zoa during the DK saga, so we can probably safely assume that Zoa is one of those 5 Fiends.

There's also Zera the Mant, but as a Ritual Fiend I'm disinclined to consider him, given what I mentioned about Black Luster Soldier and Magician of Black Chaos.

Later, after Battle City, in the R timeline, there's also Gors (2700) and Kaien (2500), as well as Belial. Also, Pegasus plays Bickuribox with 2300 ATK.

So the list as shown goes:

* Masked Beast Des Gardius
* Lava Golem
* Belial
* Messenger of Hades - Gors
* Zoa
* Messenger of Hades - Kaien
* Summoned Skull
* Bickuribox

This poses the problem of Summoned Skull being the sixth on the list. However, given their lateness in the manga and the fact that they appear to be a pair of cards and as such likely released together, you can remove Gors and Kaien I'd suggest, and potentially also Belial.

So as best we know, the 5 strongest that could reasonably be around at the time of Kaiba's comment are Des Guardius, Lava Golem, possibly Belial, Zoa, Summoned Skull and possibly Bickuribox. At least off the top of my head.

[freezermcnasty]

IMO the 5 strongest Fiend monsters would have to be vanilla-y, so the text would clearly identify them as the big shots among the Fiends.

Beast of Talwar's got 2400 which isn't bad considering he's an old monster, and his text makes him sound like a big shot.

Masked Beast Des Guardias
Zera the Mant
Zoa
Summoned Skull
Beast of Talwar

[Avenger of Mythos]

Actually, if you go right back to the Bandai trading card game that followed from this, you get some interesting things.

The strongest Fiend was B. Skull Dragon (3200/2600). However, the strongest pure Fiend was King of Yamimakai (2600/1600).

Following, in order:

Summoned Skull (2500/1800)
Labyrinth Tank (2400/2400)
Wicked Worm Beast (2400/600)
Dragon Zombie (2400/400)
Armored Zombie (2400/0)
Pumpking the King of Ghosts (2300/2100)
Hitotsu-Me Giant (2300/1500)
Mammoth Graveyard (2200/1300)

Which would make Summoned Skull the second most powerful fiend at the time.

[freezermcnasty]

That is pretty interesting. But I think we can all agree that we have to go by the actual legit cards.

They don't necessarily have to be the strongest in terms of attack, only by reputation.

King of Yamimakai only has 2000 attack, but he is a King and a Fiend, so he might be considered one of the strongest Fiend monsters even if he actually isn't.

It's a bit off-topic, but they really mangled the stats of cards back in the day.

I remember Blast Sphere had like 4000 def when Bandit Keith used it.

Thank God it didn't stay that way, otherwise we would have had another Duel Masters out in the world.

[Avenger of Mythos]

They were the legit cards at the time. The Konami one didn't come about until (surprise surprise) Konami got the rights to the manga/anime.

So I actually think the Bandai game has more validity than the current one in this discussion.

[Medigo]

Zera the Mant was filler anyway
If we go by the manga and the stats given to monsters, the only nonritual or fusion demons that show up in the original manga that are stronger then Summoned Skull are: Devil Zoa, Masked Beast Des Guardius and Lava Golem.
(Necrofear, Legend Devil and Archfiend of Gilfer would be just below..)

[Ryusaki]

There's really no legit way to work this out, since manga cards don't have their Type written on the card. Heck, in R there are 'Forest-Types' and tons of weird stuff. Konami are the ones who decide on the real-life card's Type. Since Demon Summon/Summoned Skull was one of the very first Duel Monsters Kazuki Takahashi created, I really don't think he was planning ahead to stuff like Masked Beast Death Guardius.That is pretty interesting. But I think we can all agree that we have to go by the actual legit cards.King of Yamimakai's 2600 ATK comes from the manga, not just Bandai.

[Avenger of Mythos]

Cuz Bandai based it on the manga, amirite?

I wouldn't ever assume that Takahashi actually planned the 5 most powerful fiends, but it's still fun to speculate, eh?

[Trap Master]

Well, about four years ago, I came up with the idea of

Masked Beast Des Guardius
The Masked Beast
Zoa
Summoned Skull
Dark Ruler Ha Des

But Ha Des never appeared in the manga. So Dark Necrophear could take this rank.

By the way, Beast Of Talwar was the first TCG-exclusive. So he wouldn't count.

[Avenger of Mythos]

Then yeah, King of Yamimakai would fit in there well, since he was in the manga, Panik used him. And I'm fairly sure he had at least the 2600 ATK the Bandai version had.

[freezermcnasty]

well then i guess i'm out of this discussion lol.

i have no knowledge of any prior attempts at creating a YGO ccg

I do remember KoYM having 2600 attack in the manga and in DK, but i thought we were only considering the TCG, since the cards were remade with plausible stats and more people could contribute.

[Medigo]

wait at first KOYM's card says 2600 ATK, but in the next chapter once the swords of light are down, the card says 2300 ATK (And Def), unless thats a mistake of Viz.
(Of course none of Paniks cards seemed to have the same stats as their OCG counterparts, its almost as if there wasnt a powerboost at all..)

[Trap Master]

wait at first KOYM's card says 2600 ATK, but in the next chapter once the swords of light are down, the card says 2300 ATK (And Def), unless thats a mistake of Viz.
(Of course none of Paniks cards seemed to have the same stats as their OCG counterparts, its almost as if there wasnt a powerboost at all..)

When Panic's monsters hit the OCG, their stats have been reduced by 30%. That's why the stats are so strange.

[Supremeking_Judai]

If u go by Duelist Kingdom, its:

- Black Skull Dragon
- Summoned Skull
- Labyrinth Tank
- Bakuribox
- King of Yaminaki

[Aarikku]

If u go by Duelist Kingdom, its:

- Black Skull Dragon
- Summoned Skull
- Labyrinth Tank
- Bakuribox
- King of Yaminaki

Uh... Black Skull Dragon and Labyrinth Tank are Dragon and Machine.

[SilentMagician7]

Actually, at that point it pretty much was the strongest Warrior. We never saw a stronger one before the end of Duelist Kingdom, except Black Luster Soldier, and it appears that Ritual Monsters have never been considered really, given how Dark Magician has been stated as the strongest spellcaster around. So yeah, I think at the time of DK, no stronger warriors had been released within the anime world.

Gaia the Fierce Knight and Dark Magician were the strongest of their class period.

Black Luster Soldier and Magician of Black Chaos are Gaia the Fierce Knight and Dark Magician both empowered by Chaos.

[Trap Master]

Gaia the Fierce Knight and Dark Magician were the strongest of their class period.

Black Luster Soldier and Magician of Black Chaos are Gaia the Fierce Knight and Dark Magician both empowered by Chaos.

And what does this have to do with the five strongest Fiends?

[SilentMagician7]

I apologize. I forgot to quote someone. Edited.

[Master K]

I think that the 5 strongest fiends was a throwaway thing that was never explored later. However, I happen to like the connection between Beast of Gilfer and Best of Talwar, since they are two fiends with comparable stats (and the fact that they are both called beasts, although the current card is now Archfiend of Gilfer). I know Beast of Talwar was not originally Japanese, but I like to consider those two along with Summoned Skull as three of the five strongest fiends, since they are some of the strongest.

[Sesshomuronay]

What about Terrorking Archfiend? I mean he IS the king of terror.

[Trap Master]

But he didn't exist at that time.

[Master K]

Archfiends are so-named in the English version. I'm pretty sure they had different OCG names, and they are their own class, so I don't think they can actually be counted as part of the 5 strongest fiends. It's like how the alien monsters are reptiles, but need their own deck. They don't mesh well with others of their kind.

[PegasusX_MJH]

Whoever the "5 strongest Fiends" are, we'll never know, it was just a way of hyping the use of Summoned Skull in that very first duel. For all we know Kazuki Takahashi was thinking about 4 other monsters we've never seen before. Or he just wrote that cause it's a cool line for the Magic and Wizards game that wasn't supposed to even appear again after that duel.


As for King of Yamimakai, his strength in the manga came from the Darkness/Yami field, so the same stats would carry over to the real card game if you play the Field Spell to copy that duel.


Archfiends are so-named in the English version. I'm pretty sure they had different OCG names, and they are their own class, so I don't think they can actually be counted as part of the 5 strongest fiends.

They were named Gilfer Demon and Talwar Demon, which is why they are called/considered Archfiend monsters in the TCG. They actually have nothing to do with the other Demon/Archfiend monsters from Dark Crisis other than sharing a word in their name. This makes them unique and in theory still possibly two of the other four strongest fiends.

Afterall, Summoned Skull or Demon Summon is also an Archfiend.