DARK
6Apprentice Illusion Magician
Archetype:
Dark Magician
ATK:
2000
DEF:
1700
View:
9454
You can Special Summon this card (from your hand) by discarding 1 card. If this card is Normal or Special Summoned: You can add 1 "Dark Magician" from your Deck to your hand. During damage calculation, if your other DARK Spellcaster monster battles an opponent's monster (Quick Effect): You can send this card from your hand or face-up field to the GY; that monster you control gains 2000 ATK/DEF during that damage calculation only.
Apprentice Illusion Magician — Power Evaluation
Final Score: 64 ± 6 · Confidence: Medium
- Intrinsic: 62.5 · Deck: 65.3 · Meta: provisional
- Primary role: Starter / Combo enabler · Secondary: Searcher/Tutor
Why it scores here
The card converts a hand-discard Special Summon plus a Normal/Special Summon search for Dark Magician into a board body and a searched boss-class card, which is the core of its value. Its battle-step quick effect adds a 2000 ATK/DEF pump, but that is a single-use trick that costs the card itself, so it earns only modest resource and interaction credit. Its 2000 ATK and Level 6 DARK body do not earn points on their own; the score comes from accessibility, the search, and a clean 1-2 copy deck slot. Combo evidence is absent, so the combo and starter scores rest on text and deck-level evidence.
Axis scores
| Axis | Score | Evidence |
|---|---|---|
| Accessibility | 70 | Hand Special Summon by discarding 1 card gives a live opening-hand route, and 400 recent decks run it at 1.74 copies on average (verified from text and decks_evidence). |
| Combo & Conversion | 60 | The Dark Magician search on Normal or Special Summon converts the body into a strong follow-up, but no recorded boards exist to confirm it (inferred from text). |
| Resource Economy | 50 | Discard-to-summon plus a search nets roughly even card count, and the battle-step GY send is a one-time cost with no refuel (inferred from text). |
| Effect & Interaction | 25 | The quick effect is a battle pump, not negation or removal, so opponent interaction is minimal (verified from text). |
| Material Utility | 60 | A Level 6 DARK Spellcaster body is a usable material and it stays on the field after the pump is spent (inferred from text and card stats). |
| Resilience & Flexibility | 55 | It works from hand and field, but its hand summon and pump both depend on a discard and a battle step (inferred from text). |
| Deck-Building Efficiency | 80 | It is cheap to run with no garnet or lock, and the 1-3 copy spread shows it fits at low slot cost (observed from decks_evidence). |
Calculation
Weight profile: 0.7 Starter / Combo enabler + 0.3 Searcher / Tutor. Intrinsic ≈ 62.5, Deck ≈ 65.3, Meta = provisional. Modifiers: none. Final formula: 0.40*Intrinsic + 0.60*Deck
Strengths
- Hand Special Summon gives a live opening-hand route
- Search on summon adds Dark Magician to hand
- Very low deckbuilding cost with no garnet or lock
- Appears in 400 recent decks across 57 archetypes
- Battle-step pump can win a combat step
Weaknesses
- Requires discarding a card to Special Summon
- Its quick effect only matters during a battle step and costs the card
- No negation or removal
- Value collapses if the hand summon is stopped in response
- Combo performance is unverified because no combo boards were supplied
Counters / choke points
- Hand traps that respond to the hand discard-summon (inferred from text: the summon is a hand-activated effect)
- Any interruption to the search trigger on Normal or Special Summon (inferred from text)
Best use
Hand-summoned starter that searches Dark Magician and provides a battle-step pump. Decks: Dark Magician. Suggested copies: 2.
Evidence & gaps
- Verified: Hand Special Summon by discarding 1 card (card text); Search Dark Magician on Normal or Special Summon (card text); Battle-step quick effect gives +2000 ATK/DEF to a DARK Spellcaster and sends itself to the GY (card text); 400 decks run it at an average of 1.74 copies, across 57 archetypes (decks_evidence)
- Observed: Dark Magician is the most common archetype home at 28.2% of decks (decks_evidence); Top partners include Dark Magician (95.8%) and Magicians' Souls (94.2%) (decks_evidence)
- Inferred: Searching Dark Magician gives a strong follow-up, given Dark Magician's role in the same decks; The battle pump matters mainly in the battle step of Dark Magician-style lines; Its effect value depends on having a discard available
- Data gaps: no combos supplied, so combo conversion is text-only inference no banlist token, so 3 copies (unlimited) is assumed card text gives no once-per-turn wording for the hand summon or the search, so none is assumed no rulings supplied for the damage-step timing