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.

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