LKP's Axie Log #32: Plant Reptile Wars [ Battle Against Literally Toxic Opponents ]

Hello there axie pips!

Do you know what are some of the most annoying deaths of an axie in battle? For me there are some very particular cases that I experience still leaving a bitter taste in my mouth every time I remember them. It's almost certain that they may happen again in the near future. Heck! If I jinx this convo this might happen to me even tomorrow. One of them is our plant getting killed in round 1 which is pretty annoying. It rarely occur but when it does it's really frustrating. My experience with this one is both against BBP's (Bird-Beast-Plant). Even one Pumpkin can't sustain something like Post Fight followed by a Double Nut + Ronin from the beast. Well, because our current team has mediocre damage we always tend to prolong the game to maximize that Tiny Dino card from our midline reptile by letting our plant stay alive till round 4. So, getting our plant too early is a great disadvantage as we burn more cards to attack because of the average damage output of our team in the earlier rounds.

Another one which is related to our discussion for today is that annoying death by poison. We rarely have a matchup against 48+ speed jumping posion Dusks here in our bracket. They are the current meta so it is already expected that they are sitting at the top of the rankings. There are some improvise and economical build variations we battle from time to time. They have slower speeds and use parts like 'watermelon' and 'dark swoop' instead of the high end backdoor cards for jumping posions which are 'smart shot' and 'toothless bite'. I have watched some content creators budget team building challenge and quite alot of them tries to build their own more economical version of the jumping poison build. It is really popular. They were quite entertaining and it's interesting that even with floor builds they could still achieve a pretty decent rating. I've seen a floor team almost reach 2k mmr in one sitting. Of course, they are pretty much experts already. Knowing what skill greatly sync with each other is an undervalued talent.

For today were not dealing with those annoying backdoor poisons that jump here and there. Spreading vile disease in every corner of our battlefield. But even if coming from the front, poison is still very terrifying. Aside from 'grass snake' the opponent have the bug card 'garish worm' for both their mid and backline. It would help if we have 'zigzag' instead of 'yss' but there's nothing to do about it. Anyway, let's proceed with the battle.

Double Garish Worm, Double Grass Snake

Although frontal poison damage is much more easier to deal with compared to backline poison/ jumping poison, the opponent having zero cost card for all of their axies is quite a headache. Of course, 'grass snake' is given but having a 'bidens' in their plant is just unforgiving. For every action or every turn, a poison tick is triggered so even us gaining energy from the back using 'luna absorb' is actually a bit of detrimental for our front. Nothing to do in round 1 so we passed. It's very unlikely that they would went all out because like what we discussed earlier reptiles damage is pretty mediocre compared to other classes such as aquas, beasts birds etc. Beasts having a full combo of Donut + Ronin in round 1 can kill a tank in round 1. Double aquas usually don't want anyone stealing energy from them so they most often went all out with three cards at the start of the round. These are merely observations from my experience playing between 1550- 1900 so don't take this advice too seriously if you're playing in a much higher mmr. They played 2x ' grass snake'. This card doesn't have that much of an initial damage but the damage output overtime is one of the most painful ones especially at full stack. Another reason why we see alot of 'bidens', 'mint' and 'post fight' when watching battles in the higher mmr is mostly to counter the poison effect.


_{Double Snek!}
The following round we just went with a 'pumpkin' and their plant go for a 'hotbutt'. If given an option I like playing against 'hotbutt' more than a 'yam'. The reason for this is that our team has other ways to gain energy even when 'serious' got disabled. 'Yam' on the other hand is just like eating spoiled food. Every time an opponent defended with it and we attacked there's a stack of poison we acquire for every hit we make. It's terrible bursting a plant with six or seven cards knowing that they have 2 'yams' available for defense. A passive exchange continued until round 3 as they throw most of their zero cost cards while we defended with another 'pumpkin'. We were expecting a 2x 'garish worm' this time but the opponent bide their time really well. The actual takedown happened in round 4. We put a 'carrot'+'cactus' combo in case they still play passively which was not likely the case this time. Anyway, at least the 'carrot' can provide an energy so we would only have a deficit of 1 if the plant is taken down. They played most their offensive aqua, reptile and plant cards but the deadly bug card is yet t be seen.


_{Reflecto Patronum}
We already expected that 2x 'garish worm chain' in round 5 so we responded with a 'bone sail' + ' 2xcatapult + 'tiny dino'. Because of the shield from 'bidens' we might not be able take their plant down so we just went with some high from the back. We defended the mid pretty well and managed to reflect a bit of their damage. It's a great response on our side as we also took down their tank. The beauty of 'bone sail' shines in situation like this as we can still playa 4 card combo from the mid. they didn't have much energy so it's quite unlikely that they would take us down. Also they reptiles are in the slower side so it's an advantage for us. We badly needed our mid to stay alive until we complete our card set in the back and accumulate sufficient energy for the endgame battle. Their two reptiles are quite slow because of the attribute of the bug card 'garish worm'. That's why people prefer dusk because they are alot speedy than reps which is perfect for an aggressive poison gameplay. Both midlines failed to take down one another but the exchange dealt significant damage to both parties.


_{Finishing it off with Yellow and Pink}
In round 7 we notice that we lack energy and it was the same as them. they advantage we had was that we would be going first. So we went with a 'tiny dino'+'kotaro' combo just enough to bring down their mid. the opponent responded from their back with a 'grass snake'+'garish worm' combo of their own. They don't have slow so the only disable to watch out is the stun coming from 'chomp'. To counter this we just placed a 'luna absorb' for our first turn followed by 'acros' to make sure we would be the first one next round. We also gained energy so that we can do a 4 card combo the following round. They down have enough energy and only rely on the stun from chomp to bide their time. With 2x acro + 2x ill-omened we secured our victory against this team in round 9. This team is not weak but I rather found chops poison team like those with watermelons and dark swoops to be more annoying because the have capabilities to spread the poison throughout the battle field.

Anyway, this is the end of our log #32.
Thank you very much for dropping by.

See you soon.

Ciao~