Battle Mage Secrets Weekly challenge... and a giveaway

Another week in Splinterlands realm! With only 4 days left to play in the current season, I'm still in mid-gold... and I really don't think this new rating system is working as intended, since I'm facing maxed decks basically every battle. Maybe time to reassess?

While the team is working on improving our gaming experience, battles are still fun as they are; and this week's prompt for the Battle Mage Secrets challenge is...

No heals in this ruleset! That leaves you with two strategies: going in full attack mode, where high damage and speed is important to take out the opponent's team as fast as possible, or combine that with a focus on the possible defense, using abilities like the void shield and repair, which together work more or less as a heal! If I can, I tend to use the latter strategy, altough I do like to go beserk mode as well, depending on the remaining rulesets.

I've chosen a battle where this combined strategy proved to be quite effective:

Life vs Water! As I saw the battle lineup I knew this would be a hard battle, but my chances were pretty reasonable. The other ruleset in this battle makes all magical attacks attack armor first, which in practical terms meant every card would behave like it had void armour.

My strategy and lineup:

• Grandmaster Rathe as the summoner: one of the best summoners in this ruleset: giving void shield to every unit, any repair works like a heal, which can be the gamechanger in the battle.
• Drybone Barbarian as tank: high mana high health card, with huge melee attack and retaliate - in a no heals ruleset, every chance for an extra attack is even more useful
• Corsair Bosun: good high melee attack offtank, that can attack from second position; besides, it has immunity against blat attacks, which are often used in this ruleset
• Iziar: a great taunt, and with martyr ability! Given that it couldn't be healed, I used it here to by some time for the tank, and to buff the nearby cards upon it's death.
• Pelacor Arbalest: good ranged damage dealer, with a double 3 damage attack
• Adelade Brightwing: a great support card here, with the repair ability, and the ressurect; the extra speed is always handy as well
• War Pegasus: fast ranged attack, and the shatter ability to clear any armor from the opponent - very useful here, given both rulesets that favour heavy armour

My opponent chose one of the best summoners ingame, Lux Vega. In this lineup, the focus was clear on heavy damage and speed: a fast tank, diemonshark, followed by an also fast offtank, flying squid. Deeplurker followed, a very strong card with a meleedebuff and poison, followed by the supply runner, providing even more speed and a decent ranged attack. Finishing the lineup with two magical damage dealers, Djinn OShannus and Nerissa Tridawn.

So, and how did the battle went?

Mid round one, I was able to clear the opponent's tank, although my tank was already near death, with only 2 HP left.

My opponent managed to bring my tank down, but Adelade came to the rescue and ressurrected him; as the battle went one, Iziar was gone at round 2, and martyr kicked in, buffing corsair and the pelacor arbalest.

That helped to clear deeplurker as well, placing the supply runner in a no attack position, leaving just the two magical cards to be able to do some damage.

Djinn Oshannus eventually came to the front, and the forcefield abilty proved handy, since my corsair was only providing 1 damage in each attack; fortunately, the repairs from Adelade were enough to keep him alive while the ranged damage dealers finished what was left of the other team. You can see the entire battle here.

A fun battle against a strong team, which gives an even better taste of victory! What's your prefered strategy in this ruleset? Damage overload, or a balanced approach?

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By the way, if you haven't joined a guild yet and you're a dedicated player, our guild Roaring Twenties is at level 10! If you're thinking about joining in, you can check the info on the guild page, or reach us on discord here to discuss membership!

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So, and who won this week's card?

Congratulations @steven-patrick! The Chaos Orc is going your way!

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For this next giveaway, the card that will be switching hands is...

The Deeplurker!

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Rules:

No upvote, follow or resteem required. Just comment! Or even better, tag a fellow player! Winner will be randomly chosen at post payout; good luck everyone!

Still haven't joined Splinterlands? In what planet do you live in? Click the banner below and join the fun! (It has my referral link; you can go directly to the website if you don't want to use it; either way... join in! 😎 )