Earthquake Ruleset - Positioning The Units Well

Hello Splinter family!

Today's Splinterlands Battle Mage Secrets challenge is featuring the Earthquake ruleset. On the battlefield, this means that every non-flying unit takes 2 points of damage.

So, without further ado, let's see how did I tackle this one!

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Entering The Arena

Another day at the office. I really hope you guys are not bored with me playing with the Water Magic team all the time. The thing is, my two other competitive teams are Fire and Life while Earth and Death are still under construction. Of these three useful teams, water is the most lethal and efficient so hang in there guys, it's Alric time once again!

To my pleasant surprise, I was up against Contessa L'ament instead of my regular foe - Thaddius Brood.

The player with this lovely IGN had chosen an Untamed summoner who would debuff the attack of all of my ranged units(as if there were any) by 1. This is a much better choice from my point of view since Thaddius would have kinda mitigated Alrics buff by reducing my magic attacks.

In this 24-mana battle, all the splinters were playable and it also included two rulesets:

Rulesets	SplinterGlossary	My Strategy
	Earthquake	I usually have two ways to approach the Earthquake ruleset: either choose monsters with heavy armor or/and Protect ability or bet on the monsters with Flying ability. Todays team is a mixture of both these approaches.
	Super Sneak	Super Sneak adds a bit of flavor to this already shaky setup. Their melee units will target my last spot monster so I've put a fiend(with armor) there a sacrificial lamb. After that, their melee monsters will have to deal with two of my flying units so there's a chance they'll miss some valuable attacks.

So, what about my opponent's lineup?

There's a nice retro vibe to this team which I really like and appreciate. Untamed era monster, a level 5 Phantasm, is their tank unit with Return Fire and Flying abilities. Other ones are:

• Pelacor Deceiver - healthy, flying creature.
• Gargoya Lion - yet another flying thing with Void which is not good because this one will now take reduced damage from magic attacks.
• Creeping Ooze - to slow down my team. On level 4 this monster can also perform melee attacks.
• Shadowy Presence - one of my favorite Death monsters. Doesn't really do anything but has a nice amount of health and costs only one mana point AND also provides one extra health to all enemy monsters because of the Strengthen ability.
• Undead Priest - this monster will reduce the health of all of my units by one. It also seems to have a magic attack of its own on level 4.

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My Team

As mentioned above, I'm going with Alric Stormbringer. One of the many reasons for that is him providing that one extra magic attack point and part of my strategy is to deal as much damage as I can before we get to see the effects of the Earthquakes.

Besides, I was counting on my opponent to use armor and with magic, we can get to reduce their health faster. One of my most dreaded magic monsters is Djinn Oshannus who has it all: speed, health, strong attack, and Void and Phase as abilities.

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Venari Wavesmith is an excellent choice for Earthquake battle because she is giving armor to all her teammates and of course to herself. This could prove to be crucial since she only has 4 health which would mean surviving only two earthquake hit without armor.

Sea Genie wouldn't need armor cos he can use the Flying ability but it's a good thing to have in case of those Opportunity monsters. Genie's other stats are pretty weak but his magic is strong.

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Ice Pixie is a fragile little creature. It costs only two mana points but can be a real asset in earthquake battles because of that flying ability - that is if she is kept somewhere safe.

For that purpose, I added the Torrent Fiend, a zero mana monster to take the Super Sneak attacks and buy some time for Ice Pixie and friends. With the added armor it can probably withstand up to two attacks but will most likely be gone before the first round ends.

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The Battle

There we have it, both teams ready for battle. You can watch the whole show here, or/and continue reading the highlights down below.

ROUND 1

As I suspected, Torrent Fiend was easily crushed in the first round by their sneaky melee monsters. Their tank unit was probably more suited for an opponent with ranged monsters and had no chance against our strong magic attacks.

ROUND 2

The first wave of earthquakes hit the battlefield destroying the opponent Creeping Ooze. After that, their newly appointed tank, Pelacor Deceiver took some major hits and was left with only 1 health point.

ROUND 3

While both teams' backline was still standing, the enemy deceiver was first to drop making way for Gargoya Lion.

ROUND 4

The third earthquake wiped out the weaklings leaving only flying monsters to settle the score. After the Undead Priest was gone our remaining troops regained some of their health back. On the opposite side, there was only a badly injured Gargoya Lion left who had no chance against Sea Genie and Ice Pixie.

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Conclusion

The outcome of this battle is a good example of how you should trust the flying monsters when playing the Earthquake ruleset. Just like in this case, they are usually the ones left at the end of the battle.

If we take another look at the setup of this battle we can see one major difference between their lineup and my team.

Yes. Their flying monsters are all in the front while mine are lurking in the back. This is crucial since their units are now taking damage from my monsters even though they are safe from the earthquakes. Meanwhile, my flying units stay safe and healthy waiting for the final showdown. Djinn Oshannus and Venari Wavesmith are kinda taking hits for them and without flying ability, they will fall anyway.

So if I look at the outcome from this perspective, I'd say my strategy worked really well. It could've been much worse if, for example, they would've kept the healthy Pelacor Deceiver waiting in the back.

As a ruleset, I favor Earthquake to Noxious Fumes probably because I've built my deck better to counter that one while I've been neglecting Immune and Cleanse abilities.

Thank you for reading!