Untamed Top Ten Special

The latest addition to @steemmonsters, now better known under Splinterlands, has opened the door to many new cards and abilities. Since yesterday, everyone is trying to figure out all the cool new combinations and try to get their hands on the first cards on the market.

My Top Ten

Here are my top ten cards, in loose order, as I see all of them equally beneficial to the game. I have focused more on Fire and Death, as those splinters have suffered before and are now much more competitive. This is why I chose only one card from Life, Earth, Water and Neutral.

Parasitic Growth - Neutral Splinter

The new combination of opportunity and scanvenger is my favorite addition to the game. There are several cards with that and all will have a huge impact on team design. They can attack the weakest monsters, no matter of their position in the enemy team. And if any monster dies, even from their own team, they get a life boost.

	Opportunity	Monsters with the Opportunity ability may attack from any position and will target the enemy Monster with the lowest health.
	Scavenger	Gains 1 max health each time any monster dies.

Since the Parasitic Growth is a neutral card, we can add it to any team we like in most of the rule sets. This makes it a powerful universal damage dealer. Since most splinters have gotten similar cards, we can now easily make double combos of these, making this effectively the new Elven Cutthroat.

Dark Ha'on - Death Splinter

The death splinter was weak in Alpha/Beta. But with Untamed this has now changed. My favorite addition here is the Dark Ha'on, one of the new legendary cards, which all cost 10 mana (except for the Dragon Splinter). Besides his 13 Life, 2 Shield and Flying, he gets Void and Magic Reflect, making him strong against magic and decent against melee and range.

But his true power comes from the additional combo of these new abilities:

	Taunt	All enemy Monsters target this Monster (if they are able to).
	Scavenger	Gains 1 max health each time any monster dies.

While all enemy monsters (who can) will attack just him, the rest of your team can start plucking them off one by one - for example with the new Opportunity monsters, giving the Dark Ha'on one extra total life each time. If he gets some extra Tank Heal from behind, the amount of heal he receives is growing with his growing maximum health. And his artwork is also my favorite one from Untamed.

Maggots - Death Splinter

With the Maggots we have the native death version of the Parasitic Growth. It is one mana cheaper but also comes with one life less. But since it also has Scavenger, it is likely to heal itself and even grow in health with each death on the battlefield.

	Opportunity	Monsters with the Opportunity ability may attack from any position and will target the enemy Monster with the lowest health.
	Scavenger	Gains 1 max health each time any monster dies.

I like to partner it with Parasitic Growth and Dark Ha'on for a Scavenger feast!

Cursed Slimeball - Death Splinter

We've got a Slimer for the death team and it costs only 1 mana. It's most important role is to die! With the new Redemption ability, it will explode after death and deal 2 damage to all enemy monsters. This is huge and works great as bait in the tank position or in the back against sneakers.

To reach Redemption, you must upgrade the card to level 6, which requires only 100 BCX. Most people will leave it at that, making the card probably one of the more affordable top cards of Untamed.

	Redemption	When this Monster dies, it does 2 damage to all enemy monsters.

Dragon Jumper - Dragon Splinter

The Dragon Jumper is clearly inspired by Hiccup from How To Train Your Dragon and a fitting addition to the Dragon splinter. With 7 mana, it is the most expensive to play Opportunity card in the game - and without Scavanger. But it has an impressive lineup of stats and abilities, making it strong, fast and able to survive for a while.

It comes with Flying and Stun (which can create a combo with the new Knock Out ability), as well as the following powerhouse:

	Opportunity	Monsters with the Opportunity ability may attack from any position and will target the enemy Monster with the lowest health.
	Snare	When attacking enemies with Flying, removes the Flying ability and cannot miss.

This card will be huge against flying teams in the Earthquake rule set but will generally play an important role on the battlefield. Since it always attacks the lowest health enemy, it is hard to really protect weaker monsters against it. It will literally one-hit half of all monsters without protection.

This might be the most powerful Dragon card yet.

Cave Slug - Life Splinter

The Cave Slug is the Life Splinters answer to Parasitic Growth, allowing for the double combo as well. It even brings more life and damage, but for one more mana and one less speed. Additionally, it packs the Slow ability on top of it.

	Opportunity	Monsters with the Opportunity ability may attack from any position and will target the enemy Monster with the lowest health.
	Scavenger	Gains 1 max health each time any monster dies.

The Life splinter with various Protect cards and Shield summoners is perfect for Opportunity cards. They can survive longer against Thorns and Retaliate, as well as against enemy Opportunity monsters.

This is the new Feral Spirit of the Life splinter, with plenty of use-cases.

Khmer Princess - Earth Splinter

The Khmer Princess is a powerful healer for the Earth splinter. It gets Triage on the highest level, in addition to the earlier available Tank Heal. This ability wasn't available for that splinter before but fits perfectly in!

If this wouldn't be powerful enough, it comes for only 2 mana. It also has 1 Magic attack, enough to annoy unprepared enemy tanks, while at the same able to heal herself from the Magic Reflect ability.

	Triage	Heals the friendly back-line Monster that has taken the most damage.

She will be easily one of the most used Earth cards in the Champions league!

Coral Wraith - Water Splinter

The Coral Wraith brings magic Sneak to the Water splinter - where it belongs! This will create a massive pressure to the back of each team, that comes unprepared for this foe! With a +1 Magic attack buff from one of its summoners, it can one-hit smaller monsters. The only answer to it, when hidden in the center of a very defensive team, is Magic Reflect and Opportunity.

Additionally, it brings the new Rust ability, that will debuff the enemies shields.

	Rust	Reduces the Armor of all enemy Monsters.

This is the new deadly glass canon of the Water splinter. It will force players to pay more attention to the back of their teams like no other card before.

Pyromaniac - Fire Splinter

Very similar to the previous card but with Range attack instead: The Pyromaniac is a 6 mana monster with the first Sneak and Blast combo in the game. When this one hits, it will hit the second from the back as well. This will open the doors for Opportunity monsters to strike hard.

It is a little bit weaker than Coral Wraith, despite its higher damage number, due to dealing Range damage. It can miss and it can hit Shield first.

This is a powerful monster and needs to be answered appropriately or else he will burn you to ashes.

Fire Elemental - Fire Splinter

First it burns and then it burns even harder: The Fire Elemental has the Fire typical Blast ability, spiked with the Affliction debuff. This will make it hard for the enemies healers to keep their tanks alive.

And when the final hour of the Fire Elemental has come, it will trigger the new Redemption ability and explodes for 2 damage to all enemy monsters.

	Affliction	When a Monster with Affliction hits a target, it has a chance of applying Affliction on the target causing it to be unable to be healed.
	Redemption	When this Monster dies, it does 2 damage to all enemy monsters.

The only question about this fiery one is, how much damage this card can do, before it becomes fodder for glass canon eaters - like our new Opportunity/Scavenger hunters.

This was my 923rd post on the Steem blockchain, a number I have been talking about on my @flauwy.apx account, connected to the Golden Gate. I think this was a marvelous sync and fitting to the release of my favorite game. I even made the title fitting in with Gematria.