Sometimes in life, the strongest tools are also the riskiest ones to use. There is a saying, "No pain, no gain." You get more power but at the same time you add more danger if things don’t go your way. I’ve seen that in my games and I’ve seen that in real life too. A little mistake or a small miscalculation can flip that power into weakness in a heartbeat. In Splinterlands, that can be brutal if you don't know how to work out those weaknesses. On the other hand, you get the win fast if it works but if it fails you crash even faster. That kind of gamble can be exciting and scary at the same time. That is why pulling off these risks feels special and there are some units that do give you exactly that kind of high risk, high reward experience. One of them is Shock Trooper.

Lore

Lash Stagmuck, the scavo technomancer renowned for his role in creating the runi, is hard at work on his next invention: the electrovolt zappack.

This handy contraption consists of a backpack infused with mana, water, and bottled lightning, used to empower a weapon with electrically charged water magic.

https://splinterlands.com/card-detail/670/regular/13?tab=lore

Stats

Shock Trooper is a heavy magic damage unit with 5 base magic attack at max level. Even on just level 1, it already have 4 magic attack. Its attack is enough to pierce through most tanks in only a few rounds. It also brings extra support with Swiftness for extra speed advantage for your team and Magic Reflect for punishing enemy magic attackers. While Electrified can hurt your own team, in certain setups, it can help your team do amazing combos whenever this debilitation hits your own units.

Abilities

Icon	Name	Description
	Electrified	Debilitation: Deals 1 damage to all allied Units at the beginning of each round.
		is a match because Electrified deals 1 damage to all allies each round and that directly triggers Painforge’s effect, giving +1 attack to units with Painforge every time it happens. If you stack multiple Painforge units behind Shock Trooper, your team can snowball into a high damage units very quickly in a couple of rounds. What looks like a drawback at first actually becomes one of the strongest combo in the game.
		is a counter because when enemies have units with Weaken, your whole team loses health, and combined with Electrified’s own chip damage, your side would die faster. Weaken can stack as well so if they stack weaken, your Electrified can be a dangerous debilitation for you.

	Swiftness	All friendly Units have their Speed increased by 1.
		is a match because the extra speed from Swiftness makes Dodge more reliable, stacking evasion so that melee and ranged attackers struggle to land hits.
		is a counter because the entire idea of speed advantage will not work since True Strike makes attacks always hit negating both that part of advantage from Swift.

	Magic Reflect	When hit with a Magic damage, does half the Magic damage (rounded up) back to the attacker.
		is a match because this adds more reflected damage to Shock Trooper's Magic Reflect. This punishes enemy units with magic attack harder every time they attack Shock Trooper.
		is a counter because if your team have this ability, it reduces the enemy magic attack. With a reduced magic attack, it also reduces the damage they would get from Magic Reflect.

Good Rules to Consider

Icon	Name	Reason
	Armored Up	All Units have 2 Armor in addition to their normal Armor stat.
		Since Shock Trooper uses magic attack, armor does not help protect the enemies from its attack. This makes Shock Trooper a strong pick in this rule. The bonus armor also helps it survive other's melee or ranged attacks that might normally take it down quickly. Armored Up rule is a good rule for magic attacking unit increasing their survivability while not being a hindrance to their damage.
	Up to Eleven	All units have Amplify (increases damage of Retaliate and all Punishment abilities—Corrosive Ward, Magic Reflect, Return Fire, and Thorns—by 1; does not stack).
		Amplify boosts Magic Reflect by giving it an extra 1 damage, meaning any enemy unit with magic attack takes extra damage when they attack. This rule is very beneficial to Shock Trooper’s Magic Reflect ability. Combined with its already high base magic attack, it is dangerous to face especially for other units with magic attack.
	Equalizer	The initial Health of all Units is equal to that of the Units on either team with the highest base Health.
		Normally its 6 health is on the lower side for a big attacker but Equalizer rule fixes this problem. It gives Shock Trooper extra boost in health without removing its role as a magic attacking monster. Equalizer rule basically covers one of its biggest weakness while letting it keep all its strenght. Just make sure that you have another unit that's higher than 6 health or else it might not work if your enemy also doesn't have units with more than 6 health.

Bad Rules to Think Twice

Icon	Name	Reason
	Counterspell	All units have Magic Reflect (returns 50% of magic damage to attacker, rounded up).
		Since Shock Trooper has pure magic attack, it will constantly trigger Magic Reflect from Counterspell rule. Whenever it attacks an enemy, the self-inflicted reflect damage usually outweighs the benefit. It becomes too risky to play as it dies in 2-3 turns and its death means a huge damp in your team's firepower.
	Noxious Fumes	All Units start the battle Poisoned.
		In this rule, each unit gets poisoned and takes 2 damage per round. With Electrified, you get an extra 1 damage per round giving your team 3 damage per round while the enemy only gets 2 from poison. While this helps your units with Painforge, it would still drain your team's health very fast which is very problematic if your enemy survived the first few rounds.
	Weak Magic	Magic attacks hit Armor before reducing Health.
		In this rule, armor can be used to block magic attack which delays the death of your enemies. Since Shock Trooper has Electrified dealing 1 damage to your team each round, you can be soft locked by an enemy unit with Repair and your own Electrified kills your entire team.

Battle

Link to battle

While my enemy has more units than me, I have better damage than them. Marlai Singariel is a really good Archon giving your team extra magic attacks at the cost of high mana. Since there was Super Sneak rule in this battle, I placed my Abyssal Elemental at the back to block the Sneaks. He's a good unit to serve as a temporary tank because of Resurgence allowing him to get revived once more. When he dies also, it would be problematic with the enemy Thanalorian Scion that only have 1 health. Resurgence deal 1 damage to all units and it cannot be blocked by armor. Shock Trooper's 4 base attack with additional 1 from Marlai Singariel will surely 2-hit any unit in this battle if they don't die on the first hit. While it looks like I'm on the losing side at first glance, the enemy has a lot of melee and range units that cannot deal damage to my unit's health immediately since they need to deal damage with the armor and Armored Up rule hinders that idea more.

Images were taken from Splinterlands, made in Canva, drawn in Krita and animated in Photoshop.

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