Hello there.

Today I'll share my battle under the Lost Magic ruleset. But first, I will share some of my thoughts regarding it. With this ruleset, monsters with magic attack cannot be used. This includes monsters with two types of attack. Because of this, speed becomes very important. With the right team setup, it is possible to make your opponent miss most of their attacks.

In this ruleset I try to prioritize speed. If I can use Gladiator cards, I will also go for them. The reason for this is that with every kill, their speed increases, and if they have armor, an additional 1 armor is added to them. So bloodlust is very strong in this ruleset. Abilities like Protect, Rust, and Shatter can be good options. For tanks, monsters with the Shield ability are really good since both Melee and Range attacks are physical damage types.

I believe that being flexible in battle is the ideal strategy. Check the opponent's history, check what they are most likely to use, and counter it. But always pick teams that can also counter different strategies. Without further ado, let's get into the battle.

The Ruleset

This was a tournament battle, and it was a Bronze battle with Lost Magic, Born Again, and Corrosive Fog Rulesets. A 19 mana battle is on the low amount and only Death is not available. I can think of a lot of different strategies for each so I will try to counter as much as I can.

For Fire, Tarsa with Antoid Platoon is really good because of the Shield ability. Tenyii Striker can deal damage to the backline. Add in a Uraeus and the backline monsters should melt quickly.

For Water, Kelya is really good because it gives both armor and speed, which is very important in Lost Magic, but the Corrosive Fog makes it a bit useless after the first round. Chaos Rear Guard can be the front tank with its Shield, but they might lack damage. They will mostly rely on evasion after the armor is gone. Pembrook Nymph with Noa and Isgald can catch opponents off guard.

For Earth, Fernheart might be the best option since Obsidian is useless. Combining that with martyr monster to take advantage of Born Again can be an interesting option. I would personally go for a Lobb Lowland and Katrelba team.

For Life, there is the 50/50 of Sloan or Ilthain. Sloan can deal a lot of damage in this ruleset, but Ilthain can counter that. I think Franz Ruffmane with Marisol can be a dark horse because of Marisol's high speed and armor.

For Dragon, Chwala can be an option, and adding Dhampir Infiltrator can target the backline.

The Lineup

With the low mana, I expect my opponents to go front to back. Splitting the damage can be dangerous. I opted for Katrelba to protect myself against martyr strats. I also think that opponents won't consider a Katrelba threat. I have Thane as my main tank, Krar Xoc as my secondary tank, and Chaos Agent as my Opportunity and Sneak bait/tank. I think this is a glasscanon setup, with high risk and high reward.

The Battle

Link to the Battle

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The Matchup

My opponent decided to go with a Fire Sneak team that I did not expect. I know I said that this is a good option for Fire, but I thought there were better options in other elements. Their use of Iidri as the front tank is genius, since it has good speed, armor and HP, and it prevents a lot of the strategies I considered above. With the Born Again ruleset, it is very difficult to kill, and also deals 2 instances of Redemption. Their Sneak attacks pretty much put my Katrelba in a very bad position. I don't like my odds right now.

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End of Round 1

It's insane that they didn't even miss once against my Chaos Agent. That was my biggest chance of surviving and winning this battle, but they immediately killed it. Katrelba still has good speed, but I don't know if it can evade their attacks.

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End of Round 2

Wow, even with 5 Speed, the Uraeus and Tenyii still didn't miss their attacks on Katrelba. By this point I am already thinking I lost. I don't even remember the interaction if the Bloodlust stack would go into effect first, or if the Redemption would kill Katrelba immediately. Well, there is only one way to find out.

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End of Round 3

So I learned that the Bloodlust stack comes first, and my Katrelba was able to survive. To make things better, the Tenyii finally missed its attack against Katrelba. Is there still a chance to win?

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End of Round 4

With a 5 speed difference, it was a 50/50 on whether Tenyii can hit its attack, and luckily, I won the chance this time. Their early luck of not missing their attacks seems to have caught up with them. As long as I can kill the Chaos Agent once, I should be good against the Tenyii next round.

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End of Round 5

I guess this is one of my very lucky games. I usually miss at least once on Dodge/Flying monsters, but I was able to hit the Chaos Agent twice. Even with the 70 percent miss chance, Tenyii was again able to hit Katrelba. But it is a little too late. I should be able to kill it next round, and the Uraeus a few rounds after. This battle is over.

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End of the Battle

I will have to say that I was very unlucky in the early part of the battle, but then became very lucky when it mattered. If I was the opponent, I probably would have been very pissed at how the battle turned out. They were one hit away from winning, but their monsters fell short. I was actually curious about the odds of winning in that battle, so I checked it in the battlevision.

I guess that battle has a very high amount of variance. In one set of 100 battle simulations, it was pretty close at 44/56, and at others it should have been a stomp at 30/70. What is a constant though is that I was the underdog. I guess I really was lucky to get away with the win.

The Result

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Conclusion

In tournaments where there are additional limitations on top of the Rulesets and banned elements, I try to make it a point to look at the possible teams and imagine them fighting against one another. I will then choose the team which I think is best. For this specific battle, my opponent used a team composition that was better than what I imagined. I was very lucky to win, but I also learned of a cool strategy that I can use in my future battles.