I love playing the Death Splinter, so when I saw that the monster for this week's 
I had to head to the rental market to pick up a copy of this card since I didn't already have it. And it was totally worth it! This card is amazing, even at level 1!
Dark Ha'on is a fantastic tank with high health starting at 13, and a little bit of armor. Its speed is fair, and melee attack is serviceable for a tank. I used it at level 1 for 13 health, 1 armor, 3 speed, and 2 melee attack.
But the stats aren't the best thing about this card. Dark Ha'on has both the Taunt and Flight abilities at level 1. This forces opponents to focus attacks on your tank, protecting your back row. Flight keeps Dark Ha'on safe from melee attacks.
At higher levels Dark Ha'on gains Scavenge, adding to its health with each monster that dies, Void which protects from magic attacks, and Reflect which returns a portion of magic damage back to the attacker. All solid abilities for a formidible tank! 10 mana is a lot in some battles. But with a card like this, it's mana well spent.
Let's Talk About The Battle
The Ruleset for this battle was Weak Magic forcing magic attacks to hit armor first, and Enrage increasing attack and speed when a monster takes damage. All Splinters except Water were available. This was a 17 mana battle.
My Strategy
I expected that my opponent would avoid magic attackers in the weak magic ruleset, and with a low mana battle I anticipated a good melee tank at the front of his lineup. I chose Zintar Mortalis as my summoner to debuff my opponent's melee attacks.
Using Dark Ha'on as my tank took up a significant amount of my available mana. So the plan was for it to do most of the heavy lifting in this battle, and give it a little bit of damage support from the back row.
Furious Chicken served to provide a buffer between my tank and ranged damage in the event that an opponent with the Blast ability found its way onto my opponent's team.
Twisted Jester is a fair, all-around ranged attacker that I rely on in many of my Death battles. Its Snipe ability and its 3 speed give it the opportunity to pick off weaker monsters in the back row fairly well.
Did It Work?
Dark Ha'on really carried the team. It did its job of taking hit after hit after hit and protecting the back row long enough for Twisted Jester to help with damage. The Enrage status helped me to do just enough damage to outpace opponent's healing.
My opponent fielded no magic, as expected. But also fielded no ranged attackers. In this scenario Dark Ha'on's Flight ability really made a difference. All in all, our tanks had similar damage they could handle between health and armor. But Flight kept Dark Ha'on from getting hit as often as the opponent's tank.
Zintar's de-buff worked well since the opponent used all melee. Even when Enraged and having added attack, the de-buff kept my opponent's damage output down.
Here's the link to the battle so you can watch it yourself!
Reflections
I was a little reluctant to spend so much mana on one monster in a low mana battle. But this card pulled its weight and more and I very much look forward to using it again and again. I may have found a new favorite Death tank!
This game keeps getting more and more fun. And now that I'm in Silver League, the battles are really heating up. Now is a fantastic time to pick up this awesome game. Click here to start playing!