About Opentopia
Opentopia Directory Encyclopedia Tools

Rafael (Yu-Gi-Oh!)

Encyclopedia : R : RA : RAF : Rafael (Yu-Gi-Oh!)

Rafael
Enlarge
Rafael

Rafael (ラフェール Rafēru), is a fictional character from the Waking the Dragons (or Doma) arc in the Yu-Gi-Oh! second series anime, known in Japan as Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters.

[Spoiler warningSpoiler warning]: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Of Doma's Three Swordsmen, Rafael is often considered the strongest, and the most mysterious in his strategy. He is the only swordsman that defeated his target once. He is also the only swordsman not to lose his soul after he was defeated by his target. He and Alister were responsible for bringing Rex Raptor (Dinosaur Ryuzaki in the English-language manga and Japanese versions) and Weevil Underwood (Insector Haga in the English-language manga and Japanese versions) to Dartz. He is also one of the two characters who is able to defeat Yami Yugi (Dark Yugi or Yu-Gi-Oh in the English manga, Yami no Yugi in the Japanese versions) in a duel without cheating or any form of manipulation (the second character being Little Yugi during The Ceremonial Battle).

He is voiced by Yoshihisa Kawahara in the Japanese version and by Marc Thompson in the English dub.

Contents

History

Rafael comes from a very wealthy family, and led a perfect life. He had a little sister and brother, and two parents. Rafael was separated from them when, on a luxury cruise, the boat went off course and directly into a tidal wave. As a result the family was killed (In the English anime version the story was altered to say that the family survived, but had forgotten about Rafael). Rafael was stranded on a deserted island with only his Duel Monsters, which included Guardian Eatos, Guardian Grarl, and Guardian Kay'est, which he treasured. One day, Rafael saw a city right off the island. He quickly sailed towards it, but as he got near, it disappeared, and he was pulled down underneath the sea by a tidal wave. There, Dartz's voice told him to remember his voice, for they would meet again. Rafael became conscious aboard his raft, and was then rescued by a fishing boat. He traveled and eventually went with Dartz to a graveyard, where he was tortured by digging (In the Japanese version the grave he was digging was his siblings' grave, but was changed to an Orichalcos marked grave in the English version) until he found their skulls (in the original. In the dub he merely finds a Chaos Duel Disk.) He was then seduced by a Dark Guardian, and given the Seal of the Orichalcos card. Forced to do Dartz's bidding, he then became one of his many minions. Until the duel between Yami Yugi and Seto Kaiba vs. Dartz, Rafeal did not know that Dartz drove the ship into the tidal wave.

Rafael is probably the most complicated of all Dartz's lackeys, except perhaps Mai Valentine (Mai Kujaku in the English-language manga and the Japanese versions). He honestly believed that he was simply following his set destiny, and proceeded to capture many souls in the series, including Yugi's and Mai's. Eventually, he battles Yami Yugi (also known as Dark Yugi or Yu-Gi-Oh) atop Dartz’s skyscraper, where Yami Yugi defeats the dark Guardian and sets him free from evil. His Orichalcos Stone then shatters and he is brought to the light.

In the anime, he uses mostly Guardian cards. Unlike many other duelists in the show he does not activate his strongest monster and rush at his enemy with that creature. Rafael went slowly, and corrupted the person from within, with his/her own monsters. Rafael was very slow in his first battle with Yami Yugi, making Yami Yugi use the Seal of Orichalcos, which unleashed his dark side. Yami Yugi was then hated by his monsters, and when he lost the duel, Yugi sacrificed himself in place of Yami Yugi.

He has two monsters who represent his character. Guardian Dreadsythe represents his dark mind and Guardian Eatos his light mind.

Profile

Duels

Rafael (Raphael in the Japanese) was involved in 3 of the 16 Orichalcos Duels. Two against Yami Yugi and one against Mai Valentine (Kujaku Mai). In his first duel against Yami Yugi, the Orichalcos Stone that Yami had around his neck tampered with his mind, and he was forced into activating the Seal of Orichalcos (which the Pharaoh attained through the Spell card "Exchange"). When the Pharaoh finally lost the duel, little Yugi sacrificed himself, and let the Orichalcos take his soul instead of the Pharaoh's.

The second duel in which Rafael participated in was against Mai. After beating Joey Wheeler (Jounouchi Katsuya in the Japanese) in a duel and taking his soul, Mai took his Claw of Hermos card and ran off to challenge Dartz at the Doma headquarters, only to run into Rafael. We never see this duel in action, only the outcome- Mai's defeat.

When the Pharaoh finally finds Rafael on the rooftop of the Doma headquarters, he is given Joey's Hermos card. During this duel, Rafael finally uses the Seal of Orichalcos, and with his Guardian monsters, almost manages to win the duel. With the destruction of his favourite monster, Guardian Eatos, he snaps and brings forth the powerful Guardian Dreadscythe (Deathscythe in the Japanese). Sacrificing the monsters he previously sought to protect at all costs, Dreadscythe becomes an almost unstoppable force, with the ability to return from the graveyard after it dies as long as Rafael discards a card from his deck. The Pharaoh was finally victorious when he revived Rafael's Guardian Eatos, and used the Claw of Hermos to form the Goddess Bow. With the final destruction of Dreadscythe, Rafael finally understood his mistakes, and used the last of his Life Points to revive the Guardian monsters he had so callously destroyed. Much to everyone's surprise, however, the Seal of Orichalcos did not take his soul, merely the dark side of his mind.

During the final duel, Rafael gatecrashes it and demands that Dartz release all the souls he had taken. Dartz reveals that it was he who had manipulated all three of the Doma Swordsmen's past so they would serve him. Rafael, maddened with rage, activated his Seal of Orichalcos in an attempt to stop the duel. However, the dark side of his mind had been cleansed, and therefore the Seal couldn't be used, and instead took his soul for the mistake.

At the end of the Season, he is set free with every other captured soul.

Notable Dueling Cards

Rafael uses a Guardian Deck, where many of the monsters require a specific Equip Magic Card to be on the field before they can be summoned. His particular attachment to his cards means that he will use any means necessary to protect them, which is seen with cards such as Rescuer from the Grave and Swords of Revealing Light. In the Japanese versions, this is because Raphael's family died, and he doesn't want the monsters he has spent his life with to suffer the same fate. The majority of his cards are also very old and worn, and can be seen with wrinkled edges and numerous discolored spots on their front.

The majority of his early offensive strategy relies on Guardian Grarl, a powerful 2500 ATK monster that requires the presence of Gravity Axe - Grarl (which is an equip card, and can only be activated by equipping to a monster) on the field before it can be summoned. His monster, Backup Guardian, allows any equipped cards to be switched to any other monster on his side of the field, thereby allowing him to activate Gravity Axe, summon Guardian Grarl, and then equip Gravity Axe to Guardian Grarl.

His upmost protection of his monsters also serves another purpose, as his most powerful monster, Guardian Eatos, can be summoned with no Tributes as long as his Graveyard is free of any Monster Cards. Eatos has the potential to gain immense strength through its effect, which absorbs the Attack Points of every monster in the opponents' Graveyard. In Rafael's first duel against the Pharaoh, Eatos' Attack Points were raised to 10,000 because the Pharaoh, consumed by his darkness due to the fact he played the Seal of Orichalcos, fired off all his monsters at Rafael with Catapult Turtle.

In his second duel, he reveals the dark side of his Guardian deck, Guardian Dreadscythe, which can only be summoned when Eatos is destroyed. This monster has impressive regenerative abilities, being able to return to the field as long as the player discards a card from their hand- except that the player has no choice, if they can, they MUST discard a card to revive Dreadscythe. Furthermore, for the sacrifice of other Guardian Monsters, Dreadscythe can increase its own attack strength (which is actually being increased by the number of monsters in his own graveyard). Rafael's willingness to sacrifice his own monsters at this point is due to the fact that Dreadscythe is the representation of Rafael's darker side and as such, is a completely different persona.

Monster Cards

Magic Cards

Trap Cards

 

From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.

Search Titles
0123456789
ABCDEFGHIJ
KLMNOPQRST
UVWXYZ?

E-mail this article to:

Personal Message: