Karma

Karma is mainly obtained by selling Demons in the Pandemonium which is the easiest way to get rid of demons you consider useless. Karma is not a farmable resource but more a resource that is accumulated. For non-veteran players, Karma is then mainly used for Arch-Shifters to change the Archetypes of Demons.

Archetypes

Barong's status page: his Awaken skill is Recarmdra, it is the skill maked by a lock. If Barong is Awakened the skill gets unlocked

Each demon may exist in 5 Archetypes : Common (clear/grey), Aragami (red), Elementalist (teal), Protector (yellow) and Psychic (purple). The color/archetype your demon has is visible on its status page.

• The Archetype of a demon only determines the Awaken skill it possesses (see each demon wiki entry to see the different Awaken skills it may have).
• Awaken skills are locked until the demon is Awakened in Pandemonium in exchange of Aethers (items you can farm in Strange Signal).
• For a given demon, some archetypes may be better than others (see Tier List or the demon's wiki profile page to know what is the best Archetype for a given demon).

• Archetypes are attributed to the demons when you summon (Gacha) it. Except for "Normal Summon" and "Hell Bun Summon" (both only give Common/Clear demons), the Archetype of the summoned demons is chosen completely randomly among the 4 non-Common Archetypes.
• However fusing a demon allows you to fully decide which Archetype the demon will get: you need 1 of the two fusion materials to be Clear, and the result of the fusion will inherit the Archetype of the other fusion material.

This poses a problem : whenever you pull/summon a demon, you only have a 1/4 chance of getting the demon's optimal Archetype. This is even more serious if the demon you wish to summon is not fusable.

This problem is solved by items called Arch-Shifters that allow you to change the Archetype of a demon. They are either obtained through events or in the Karma shop.

Shifting Archetypes Items

Picture of the different Arch-Shifters

Arch-Shifters are consumable items that can be used on a non-Common Archetyped demon that, when used, will randomly change its Archetype.

• 2 types exist : one that can only be used on Natural 4★ (Arch-Shifter 4★) and the other on Natural 5★ only (Arch-Shifter 5★).
• The random aspect of the Archetype change means you will often need to use more than one Arch-Shifter on the same demon to obtain the desired Archetype.
• Arch-Selectors will allow you to change to the Archetype of your choice. They also come in the 2 same types.
• On a price per utility basis, Arch-Shifters are better than Arch-Selectors (on average you only need 3 Arch-Shifter to get the desired Archeype while Selectors cost 5 times more Karma)

Managing Arch-Shifters

Arch-Shifters 5★ are very expensive: 3000 Karmas represent 10 non-Common 4★ demons sold... And 3 of them are usually needed. The 4★ version is also expensive for what it does. As such, Arch-Shifters should be kept for:

• Non-fusable Demons. Fusable ones should be fused with the correct Archetype instead.
• Demons you plan to use immediately and who would benefit a lot from having the correct Archetype. If you don't plan to use the demon in the near future, it is smarter to wait as there is a chance you would summon the Demon again but in its correct Archetype.
• Very expensive fusable demons. It can be acceptable to use Shifters on very high Grade 5★ demons (Lucifer, Metatron, Shiva etc.) if you absolutely need them now.

Aside from the very expensive Karma shop, Arch-Shifters can be obtained through events. It is not impossible to get one Arch-Shifter 5★ each month, from events, if Sega is being generous.

Karma management

Accumulating Karma

Karma is not to be farmed :

• Do not pull/summon gacha with Gems for the sake of "farming" Karma.
• Do not fuse higher rarity demons for the sake of selling them.

You must not farm Karma. You simply accumulate Karma by selling "useless" Natural 3★ and 4★ demons. Do not sell 5★! And not every 3★ and 4★ are suitable for being sold though:

• if they have rare or useful transferable Gacha skills, you should keep them as transferable skill fodders (see Skill Transfer#Advanced skills - Gacha skill hoarding for a list of rare transferable Gacha skills)
• Common (aka Clear) Archetypes should not be sold as they offer you little Karma
• Gacha demons (aka non-fusable) are not to be sold.

A few "useless" fusable demons should be kept for future fusions you may want to perform. Good fusion materials are high Grade demons, so you may want to keep the highest Grade 3 and 4 ★ demons. You would probably want them to be of diverse colors, in case you need to fuse a demon in a precise Archetype.

Last advice : only sell demons if you immediately need an Arch-Shifter or you feel flooded with too many Demons and are urged to do some cleaning.

Spending Karma

Arch-Shifters are the primary items for Karma spending. But you can buy a few other items with Karma:

• Tendency Selectors: this item allows you to change the AI-type of a demon. 10 Karma in exchange of 10 Tendency Selectors; a very good price, good item to spend a few Karmas on.

• Low rarity demons (1 and 2 stars): they are purchased in the compendium (not the Karma shop). Kanbari is one of the better compendium demon to purchase (see Leveling.
  • Other than that it can be worth it to spend on 2★ if they belong to the road map for a demon you want to fuse.
  • But you should be very conservative with your Karma purchase with the compendium. Try to avoid it as 2 stars and 1 star demon are easy to recruit and fuse.

• 4★ (Clear) demons in the Karma shop: a selection of 4★ are available in the Karma shop. Unless you are a veteran, they are not worth it. The purpose of buying them is to save up a few 100s kilo Magnetite when fusing 5★ demons.

• Hell Buns : they should not be bought.