ETERNAL TOFU.

As we all know Eternal Tofu was released, it easily integrated itself in the current meta as he was crushing melee composition and in this blog I want to go deeper why he was in the meta and he is very effective.

Tofu's Kit

It is the very first summoner with 3 skills and double tactic giving it 5 kits in a single summoner.

Its skills are:

1. Thorns

2. +2 health

3. Snare

Tactic skills:

1. 3 units to give: divine shield and corrosive ward

2. 1 unit to give: scavenge and Triage

Main Team Comps of Tofu

As I play more or less 100 matches in high ranked matches in champion these are the main team composition that i always and some use and abuse because of its effectiveness

Grim Tofu V1. debuff-sustain

The idea of this lineup is to funnel heals and debuffs to help the smith tank all the incoming damage from the enemies. If you notice i put a conjurer as a first position before the smith because some players want to create some space for the smith (i.e. reflecting damage and that might kill some back supports) but you can switch it up for acid shooter which is better in the some long matches to pick off some back lines. You can modify the lineup according to the ruleset, your preference, and also your enemy. Players prefer always using a magic debuff (silence) because most useful supports are magic hitters.
As for the tactic skills, you can either use the first skill for potential venka and mantaroth lineups because it will melt away mantaroth's armor and if venka has an armor it will proc corrosive ward first then thorns meaning it will melt the armor first before the thorns will damage venka and pair it with amplify!. You can use the 2nd tactic for more sustain and heal at backline but what best tactic to use is very subjective

• Strengths

1. Strong against a melee lineups
2. Defeats Aves weapons training with very magic return power and sure hit on pelacor because of snare (since aves use a pelacor conjurer as first position)

• Weakness

1. Lost to a full sustain lineups with more offensive prowess (cryptic double heal, inevitable triple heal) because it doesnt have enough damage to pierce the heals even if all attacks land and all skills proc.
2. Will probably lost on a heavy scattershot team such as jacek or units that has scattershot skill

Grim Tofu v2. ScatterTofu

This lineup stills follows the idea of the debuffs but with more offensive power because of the scattershot. Ideally you want to support your grim with a healer and goblin psychic is his best partner not only because of his heal and silence but it also has dispel to counter potential martyr plays. The scattershot will prioritize the backline (hopefully) as you can modify the lineup and change what cards to use but just with the same idea.
The lineup will be very versatile too because you can put the first tactic to the smith or any unit to prevent any potential burst damages and if the enemy puts a mantaroth or any unit that relies on armor, the armor of that unit will melt away with corrosive ward. Same as the first lineup, you can also put the scavenge+triage to anyone at the backline to provide more sustain in a battle of heals and fatigue

• Strengths

1. Will defeat the v1 of grim Tofu
2. Can defeat teams the rely on heavy magic (lorkus)
3. it has advantage against a lily-smith

• Weakness

1. Venka with Reflection shield. Compared to the first lineup which can outheal the venka's damage even though it has reflection shield. this lineup only has one and if the scattershot wont land on venka before it kills the smith then it will be a -20 ratings.
2. RNG
3. Cryptic with front line barrage

Weapon training

This is the main idea of the team which can be good for 19 mana just put the 2 fiends in between the puffer and conjurer. But i havent utilized this lineup yet because i would just go full sustain in front which i prefer more. I prefer using scavenge on the puffer on this one because it will scale more and sustain more for backline damage. We put the pelacor on front to eat some hits before the damage dealers.

• Strengths

1. can counter a forced akane-venka play
2. can win against 19 mana avina-inevitable.
3. can out-sustain sneak teams and will kill the thru thorns

• Weakness

1. Grim heal+silence with acid shooter
2. baakjira+merdaali because it doesnt have an affliction and baakjira will out prevail until fatigue even though the poison will proc

IneviTofu

This is a simple idea in which you will use inevitable as your main tank and you will determine what backline to use. you can either go with a full sustain like the grim tofu. You can also use scattershot and also you can use weapons training. But personally i would like 2 healers then scattershot for more variety

This is the lineup I personally like using in tofu as it offers a little offensive power with the addition of acid shooter and the magic damage of renova. but most especially the sustains that makes it good and very reliable.

• Strengths

1. Grab-Mantaroth teams.
2. Will out-sustain grimtofu/grimheal because of higher health
3. front barrage reliant teams except cryptic

• Weakness

1. Front barrage cryptic with double heal
2. Lily-Rage with heals will defeat this team once it reaches the fatigue phase.

GRAB-martyroth-Tofu

This lineup's main composition is the first 3 units. The mantaroth will take the grab skill so that once iziar dies and does its job, the mantaroth will survive longer since it is in the 2nd position dishing out max damage. It depends on you if you want more resurrect on iziar, heals on the front lines, or triage to heal the iziar but as i've mentioned that the first three units are the key units of the composition.
As for the tactic, you can either use the scavenge for more sustain on iziar and health scaling but i suggest that when faced in a mirror match (same idea of team) use the divine shield on the first 3 units as it will melt the armor of the opposing team's mantaroth.

• Strength

1. Can potentially defeat a cryptic team with oshannus as main tank because of the scattershot and the support doesnt exceed 4 attack damage unless buffed by martyr)
2. Versatile in high mana teams
3. Mantaroth's blast will kill 2nd position units once given enough rounds to dish out damage.

• Weakness

1. Inevitofu with proper supports (heals and blast shield)

Additional Tip

Tofu can also be used in flying ruleset to cancel out enemies with flying as tofu has sustain because of its splinter.

In Conclusion
The reason why tofu is so good is that it use defense as its offense because we know that light and earth splinters provides good supports such as buffs and heals as you can see in my presented lineups that it relies on heals and buffs in sustaining the team and keeping every unit in battle and it doesnt have any "first round tank killer" kind of damages. The thorns added to its kit make it hard to burst through the backline and that is earth and life's natural enemy, sneak and backline killers which tofu solves. You can also cancel out optimizing tofu's healing capabilities of the ruleset of the match wont allow any heals

Thank YOU! and hope you learn something useful in my blog :)