Blood and Sunder modifier has one of the scariest sounding names but in practice, this modifier hardly do anything. This modifier can remove the unit's armor but as along as there's no armor to remove or it's not a melee unit, it won't do anything to your lineup. Even if it doesn't affect your team, you can use this information to set up your winning lineup. Since your enemies would most likely avoid using melee units as well, you can use abiltiies that can affect non-melee units and surprise your enemies with a special lineup just for that battle.

Modifiers

Blood and Sunder - All units have Corrosive Ward (-2 to attacker’s armor and maximum armor when hit by a melee attack).

• Blood and Sunder modifier gives Corrosive Armor to every unit in the battle. Since this ability reduces armor permanently for that battle, it is a bad modifier if you like using your armor to absorb some of the damage of your enemies. Corrosive Ward only works on melee attacks so as long as you avoid using melee damage units, you would not get any damage from Corrosive Ward.

5 Combos You Can Do with Blood and Sunder Modifier

Thorns - Returns 2 physical damage to attacker when hit by a melee attack.

• A good combo with Corrosive Ward is by having the same unit get Thorns. If the melee enemy attacks, they get hit by the Corrosive Ward and then Thorns for a total of 4 damage on that one attack. This damages your enemies more than you.

Amplify - Increases damage of Retaliate, Corrosive Ward, Deflect, Return Fire, and Thorns for all friendly units by 1. Does not stack.

• This ability increases the Corrosive Ward damage by 1. It is a small increase but it can accumulate a lot especially if your enemies still played a lot of melee units in this modifier.

Deflect - 0 damage from Corrosive Ward, Magic Reflect, Thorns, Return Fire, and Blast splash damage.

• If you want to play melee units even in this modifier, make sure they have Deflect ability. This ability negates any damage of the Corrosive Ward. If the enemy Corrosive Ward doesn't work, you can freely use melee units and even Repair the unit's armor if you does wish so. Just make sure that this unit is the only one that is the melee unit since the unit with Repair will still try and Repair other melee units affected with Corrosive Ward even if their armor has been permanently removed.

Silence - -1 magic power to all enemy units.

• Since the enemies would be using magic attacks most of the time in this modifier, having an ability that reduces magic damage is a good idea. This gives you protection on the enemy's probable strategy in that battle.

Void - 50% less damage (rounded up) from magic attacks or 0 damage from magic attacks of 1 power.

• When there's Blood and Sunder modifier, usually, the enemies would be avoiding melee attacks to not suffer the Corrosive Ward penalties. So, you can get advantage by expecting them to use range or magic attacks. That's why you use Void or Shield abilities to deal with the problem before it even starts.

Battle Breakdown

Early Game:
In this battle, I had to fight against Sheng Xiao, a Conclave Arcana Dragon archon that can give Poison Burst to his team. When a unit with Poison Burst dies, the attacker gets poisoned. The two units beside the attacker also has a 50% chance of getting poisoned. This is a strong archon and like a master, my enemy added it to the main tank and the Taunt unit, the two units that would most likely die the earliest in this battle. For their lineup, they also used a lot of magic damage, just like mine, in order to avoid the punishment of the Corrosive Ward. My main problem with this lineup is Rage, a strong 14 mana unit that has magic damage and Void. He's the perfect unit you can use when you have to fight in battles where melee units have the disadvantage.

Mid Game:
By the mid game, I was able to go toe to toe with them despite not having a Void unit and a unit with Tank Heal. My team was able to kill the enemy's Taunt unit as well as the main tank being in the red. Another problem rose though. My backline units were poisoned. Remember, the two units that has Poison Burst is the main tank and the Taunt unit. This means when that Taunt unit got killed, the Poison Burst affected my back line and now they are ticking towards death by every round. My Ulundin Overseer also died so my back line is in disarray and I have no tank to deal with the front. By this time, I admit that they were stronger than mine but we'll see if my units can withstand and do a miracle.

Late Game:
With two units remaining and I still have to deal with the healthy Rage, I stand no chance in this battle. I don't think I could've done better for now. They have a better lineup and Rage just owns this modifier as well that he can both tank and deal damage without being affected by Blood and Sunder's Corrosive Ward because of the magic damage. Sometimes, there are battles where you just cannot win and you have to accept those and move on.

Link to Battle:https://splinterlands.com/battle/sl_1fb3d552a0f7f73d85b354deaf962134?ref=ashenova

Closing Thoughts

Blood and Sunder modifier may sound really scary at first but with a few tricks, you can deal with it very easily. Since this modifier gives disadvantages to melee units in particular, as long as you avoid those type of units, you should be fine. To increase your chance of winning, always try and anticipate your enemy's next move. If using melee units were a disadvantage, what would they do next?

The battle with Rage is a good example. As I mentioned in the abilities section, since players would naturally avoid melee units, you should use Void. The next most common way your enemies would play is with magic units so having a Void tank would drastically improve your chances of winning. You can also use melee units like Captain Fellblade without a problem. Since Captain Fellblade has no armor, Corrosive Armor will have no effect on her as there is no armor to destroy. Compounding your advantages can be a good habit to win more games in Splinterlands.