Archon

A archon
Difficulty	26
Attacks	Weapon 2d4, Weapon 2d4, Gaze 2d6 blinding, Claw 1d8, Spell-casting

A archon
Difficulty	26
Attacks	Weapon 2d4, Weapon 2d4, Gaze 2d6 blinding, Claw 1d8, Spell-casting
Base level	19
Base experience	706
Speed	16
Base AC	-6
Base MR	80
Alignment	15 (lawful)
Frequency (by normal means)	Very rare, appears only outside of Gehennom
Genocidable	No
Weight	1450
Nutritional value	400
Size	Large
Resistances	Fire, Cold, Shock, Sleep, Poison
Resistances conveyed	None
An archon: never leaves a corpse. can fly. is a humanoid. can see invisible monsters. can regenerate hit points. can travel to other levels with you. is strong. is nasty. can pick up weapons and food. can pick up magic items. is visible by infravision. has infravision.
Reference	monst.c#line1106

Archons are the most powerful of the angelic beings and, indeed, possess the second highest difficulty level of all randomly generated monsters (next to the arch-lich). They are exceedingly popular as pets due to their power (and as pets cannot cast attack spells, the arch-lich is next to useless as a pet due to its weaker physical attacks).

If Demonbane or Sunsword have not yet been created, Archons will be generated with one of them; they are also guaranteed a shield of reflection.

Archons have such high difficulty that even for a level 30 character they cannot appear before dungeon level 22. Since the Dungeons of Doom end at or before level 29 and Archons cannot be generated in Gehennom, most characters will not see one before finding the Amulet of Yendor (and level 22 or lower characters definitely won't). Once you have the Amulet, your effective dungeon level is at least 45, so Archons may be randomly generated from the Castle up. There are no guaranteed Archons in the game.

Strategy

Archons will always be peaceful for lawful characters of sufficiently high alignment. Some players consider this a significant advantage of being lawful.

Archons will reflect a death ray (or any other ray, for that matter), but Vorpal Blade can decapitate them. They are too large to be bisected.

Pacifists may use an early wish for a blessed figurine of an Archon.

The best way to fight Archons is to use a cockatrice/chickatrice corpse and be blinded to protect yourself from the stunning gaze. Or you could just try avoiding them and keep moving. If you are a high level player when you reach the planes, you are almost guaranteed to see one to several Archons.

Archons as pets

As mentioned above, Archons make outstanding pets. They are fast, use their confusing (monsters don't get stunned) gaze, hit hard and wear armor. The easiest way to get a pet Archon is to apply a blessed figurine of an Archon. It is possible for a high level character to tame an Archon with a spell of charm monster but it may require a number of attempts.

Archons will wear gloves, helmets, boots and shields but they're too large to wear any armor that fits on the body. To get a pet Archon to wear armor, enchant the piece of armor and then drop it in from of the Archon. Archons will also pick up and use a variety of items, including unicorn horns, amulets of life saving and potions of gain level.

Archons will wield weapons left for them but getting them to drop their starting weapon can be difficult. Applying a bullwhip towards them can strip them of their current weapon, allowing you to hand them another weapon or simply giving you the opportunity to enchant their starting before handing it back.