Documenting my Splinterlands Knowledge - Rebellion Reward Cards Review: Rares Part 2

Hello there.

In my last post I reviewed the Fire, Water, and Earth Rebellion rare reward cards. For this one, I will be talking about the Life, Death, Dragon, and Neutral rare monsters. Rare monsters have a consistent chance of showing up in chests, so one should still get a good amount of them over time. For these cards I will first discuss the cards objectively, looking at the stats and abilities, and eventually on what teams it can work with. I usually play up to Silver level cards so I'll be looking at them from that perspective, but I'll also share my thoughts on their max level versions.

Janni Rebel

Janni Rebel is a 9 cost Life monster. It has the Flank and Inspire abilities at level, gets to 3 damage at level 5, and acquires the Divine Shield at max level. This card is a bit of a head scratcher. The Flank and Inspire are a good combo and can make cards like Jared Scar more easy to use. But my problem with this is it having magic attack. The ability of magic being able to attack from the back is a bit wasted on this since it needs to be placed in the front to activate Flank. It has ok HP, but it isn't that fast to evade physical attacks consistently. It doesn't have much survivability apart from the Divine Shield it gets at max. In most cases the Flank ability is useless. I can see it being used together with Iziar, but monsters like Drybone Barbarian can kill this quickly.

I think the Inspire can be good with the many backline attacking monsters of Life. Mana Warden with the Shield can make it a bit tankier and make use of the Flank. I think it is a bit niche, but will only see play in lower league for the Inspire, or as a tank in magic only rulesets.

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Skyspire Leopard

Skyspire Leopard is a 5 cost Life Monster. It gets the Retaliate at level 2, and the Void Armor at level 4. A no ability monster at level 1. For the Rebellion reward cards, that's actually pretty rare. Getting both abilities early on compensates for it though. This card is a bit underwhelming. It has good stats for its cost, but the abilities are not as good. Retaliate is nice, but the Void Armor is a bit meh. Rathe already provides that, so that is one summoner it isn't that good with. If it was at 4 mana, that might have been better. I think it can be good with Elias, but apart from that, it doesn't really shine in others. I think it is nice to have, but will see little play as long as CL is still in Modern.

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Meriput Slinger

Meriput Slinger is a 7 cost Death monster. It has the Impede ability at level 1, gets the Slow at level 4, the Reflection Shield at 5, and Redemption at max level. I think this card having 3 attacks early on is pretty nice. The Impede and Slow makes it very good at controlling the opponents. The Reflection Shield makes it a good monster next to the Helheim Demon at the back, but the Redemption is a bit out of place. Death has a good amount of Redemption monsters and Weaken, but this monster having 7 HP can make triggering it a bit harder. I think it reaches its potential at level 5 since it only gets HP and Redemption in the later levels.

It can work well with Thaddius, but it can definitely make Astral Entity stronger because of the Slow. But at 7 mana, it is debatable whether it is better than Dhampir Stalker that has True Strike. I think this is more versatile, and is better for longer battles.

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Dark Arborist

Dark Arborist is a 4 cost Death monster. It has the Demoralize ability at level 1, gets Magic Reflect at level 3, and Void at max level. I think having the Demoralize at level 1 and at 4 mana already makes this a very good card. Death already has a good amount of monsters with Demoralize, so this one can be added to shut them down even more. Getting Magic Reflect and Void really makes it a good tank in little league, as well as being able to counter both Melee and Magic. This is almost a must use during Broken Arrows ruleset if you have it maxed. Death is really setting itself up as an element that has answers to all attack types. Even at level 1, I find myself using this over Revealer in little league. Being able to use this with Thaddius, means I can counter both Magic and Melee teams easily.

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Dragon Egg Forager

Dragon Egg Forager is a 5 cost Dragon monster. It has the Opportunity ability at level 1, and gets Scavenger at level 3. Getting its abilities early is really nice. But it has a good level up curve where it gets more attack in higher levels. I think it is pretty straightforward in what it does, and being a Dragon monster, can easily bolster up the sneak/opportunity strategies of other elements. The Scavenger really makes it stronger since it can be a secondary tank early on. It seems a bit boring, but it gets the job done.

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Chaos Adjutant

Chaos Adjutant is a 5 cost Neutral monster. It has the Scattershot ability at level 1, gets Snare at level 3, and Poison at max level. Getting its attack to 2 at level 5 is a bit unfortunate, but the combo of scattershot and snare can be pretty nice in the Earthquake ruleset. Getting the Poison combos really well with it as well, but it can be difficult to reach max level. We are getting a lot of Flying monsters, and we even have a summoner that grants Flying, so the Snare can see a lot of uses. But between this and the scavo technomancer, I still prefer the Blast for more consistent damage. I think this can shine in specific rulesets, but the low damage is really holding it back. If you have a max level though, it is significantly more viable at that point.

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Final Thoughts

I remember the Fire, Water, and Earth rare monsters to be rather strong, so I was a bit underwhelmed at the Life, Death, Dragon, and Neutral ones. Life is a headscratcher and can be good at a few niches. The Death ones are the standouts for this group. The Forager is good, but the 5 cost hurts it usability a bit. Chaos Adjutant at low levels has its uses, but only shines at max level. Including the other rares, I think the Rebellion reward cards are still pretty strong. They introduce different ways to create teams, and that might be the reason why I don't like some of them. I'm still too comfortable with my current strategies, but that might change once I level these cards up more. Similar to the common cards, I like how a lot of the abilities in the rare monsters appear in low levels. Some of the max level abilities don't seem to fit or are too weak to warrant getting them, but it does make the cards really good for newer/weaker players.

This wraps up my review of the rare Rebellion reward cards. I will share my thoughts on the epic reward cards next time. Don't hesitate to let me know what you think, and if you have suggestions for improvement.

And as always, these are Not Financial Advice, and Do Your Own Research.

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