Splinterlands Battle Mage Secrets Weekly Challenge - Close Range Ruleset

Winning a Close Range Ruleset battle

RULESET: Close Range

Description: Monsters with ranged attacks are allowed to attack in the first position.

I don't consider myself a range battle mage and is an area that I still have a lot of room to improve. For this week's Battle Mage Secrets Weekly Challenge, let's see if there's something I could have done better.

The Strategy

Ruleset for this battle was simple - Close Range only - and had only two elements active - Fire and Water. Coming up with a lineup with range usually gets complicated when you have the life element active. Fortunately, that wasn't the case for this battle.

Choosing between melee, range, and magic, and considering that melee and range attacks can be blocked by shields, I leaned towards magic.

The Summoner

Since I wasn't able to check what the recent lineup the opponent had, I chose to focus on increasing magic damage, thus chose Alric Stormbringer for his +1 magic.

It was a matter of speculating whether the opponent will take advantage of the Close Range ruleset or completely ignore it and choose with a carefully selected lineup.

1st Slot - Health Buffer, Kelp Initiate

Since I was not sure what the lineup of the opponent will be, I chose Kelp at tank because of its 5 health and 5 speed. Hopefully, by putting it at tank position, it'll evade attacks from slow monsters.

2nd Slot - Legendary Monster, Djinn Oshannus

It's only been lately that I've been considering the speed of the monsters I'm using. To increase the chances of opponent to miss, I chose Djinn Oshannus for its 5 speed, 2 magic damage, 11 health, and its void and haze skills.

3rd Slot - Blast Magic Monster - Ruler of the Seas

Usually, healers are located somewhere behind the tank. To cause damage on the 2nd position (assuming that the opponent's monster at 2nd position doesn't have reflection shield), Ruler of the Seas' blast skill is critical to offense.

4th Slot - Shield Magic Monster

Since there's a possibility that opponent will be using melee or range, I opted to choose a monster with added defense. Venari Wavesmith's Protect (+2 Armor) achieves that.

5th Slot - Quick Water Power - Mischievous Mermaid

Something I still have to learn was the different skills or abilities monsters have based on their level. Mishchievous Mermaid's Dodge ability at level 3 would have been awesome.

6th Slot - Low Mana Monster

Since I've used up 29 mana at this point, it was just a matter of choosing a monster that will help in tipping the chances of winning in your favor. Albatross's Flying ability adds the chances of the opponent in missing.

This completed my lineup.

The Battle

Looking at the initial lineup, I always look at the monster at tank. With a magic lineup, having a monster at tank with void is already an indication that winning won't be in your favor. Luckily, for this battle, the opponent's monster at tank doesn't have void but have a lot of health.

After buffs applied:

Let's see how this battle pans out.

End of Round 1

I really wasn't expecting for the opponent to be using monsters with sneak ability as well as the addition +2 health that the summoner added.

At the end of Round 1, as expected, Albatross at 6th slot was already downed by opponent. It served its purpose of adding buffer at the rear.

Good news is the opponent's monster at tank was already defeated, the next monster in line - Flying Squid - still has a lot health with 7.

I'm just worried at monsters at the. rear because the opponent has already taken down Mischievous Mermaid's 2 armor.

Let's see how it goes in Round 2.

End of Round 2

At the end of round two, as expected, Mischievous Mermaid was also downed by the opponent and initial monsters at tank position has been defeated and Vernari Wavesmith's 2 armor also got destroyed.

During the round, one of the monsters I had my eyes on was Deeplurker because of its opportunity ability. Luckily Vernari Wavesmith +2 armor was able to block it and was still in this round to give other monsters their +2 armors.

With Flying Squid defeated at tank, Deeplurker was next in line to be attacked.

End of Round 3

Since the opponent focused its attacks on the rear, it wasn't surprising that Kelp Initiate survived for two rounds. At the end of Round 3, the opponent was finally able to take it down and the opponen't Trample buff took effect and Deep Lurker was able to destroy Djinn's armor.

But looking at the remaining monsters, things seem to be in my favor.

Let's see what happens in the next round.

End of Round 4

At the end of Round 4, the opponent was able to finally take down Vernari Wavesmith. At this stage, its +2 armor did make the difference because all the armors of my monsters got destroyed before they got the direct hits to their health.

Looking at the remaining monsters, this was another battle won.

End of Round 5

The order of attack this round was Djinn (speed 5), Pecalor Bandit (speed 4), and Ruler of the Seas (speed 3). Ruler of the Seas dealt the final blow to end the battle.

Battle Result

We get a nice +21 boost to ranking and 0.418 SPS to our SPS HODL stash!