Strategy Corner #51- Broken Arrows Ruleset - No range so what ?

Another week, another ruleset. Recently I switched from travel mode to more active holiday mode ( I will put a photo of that on next season's report :) ). So I got even less time than usual. But I do my best to find a little time to catch up on news and be aware of what is happening around SPL :).
For this week we got the Broken Arrows ruleset, one of those, which limits quite drastically our collection choice. We cannot use any monster with a range attack, so it will be easier to try to counter the opponent. Let's see the definition and general strategy overview.

Description:

Units with ranged attacks cannot be used.

Units with 2 types of attack (which include ranged) cannot be used.

Consider utilizing units with Thorns or Magic Reflect, as your opponent will have to use either melee or magic units.

Firstly, the description of the ruleset in the game is not perfect, sometimes you get just general information which does not give you all the information you need. The best way to read the full description as above from the game documentation at least once. You can check all here.

I seriously encourage you guys to check this site, even more advanced players could find something interesting there.

Broken Arrows, like other similar rulesets: Lost Magic and Keep Your Distance (you can check the previous article with attached links) completely takes away the ability to play one type of damage. So even hybrid damage units cannot be used. It is still not like a ruleset that forces you to use only one type of damage, but still, it is much easier to find a good counter here. As it was mentioned even in the definition, abilities like Thorn and Magic Reflect could be useful here, but besides that, there are many different options. What options ? Let's check battle and talk more :)

Today's battle ladder wild gold match, which is as often versus an opponent with a higher level of the cards. The Back to Basics is ruleset, that many people hate, but I think here is a good example how important it is to adapt to the battle's conditions.

That combination of the ruleset forces a lot. Back to basics and no range units: magic attack monster is a must here. And of course, you cannot use any monster's abilities, which could help you to counter you that. So obvious choice was a summoner that can affect that conditions.
Thadius Brood was one of the obvious choice, and you know I like the death splinter a lot. Unfortunely there are not many magic units with high HP, so it was good idea to put most HP melee units in front to get some protection.
The opponent had even better plan , with that older card collection he got better arsenal. High damage magic units and one good defender could be though to beat. Hopefully our Thadius and tanks could be enough. Let's check :).

Round 2, our main first of the main tank survived the first round, it's a good sign :). The opponent lost Chicken - cannon fodder :), it would be good to have it here for us as well.

Round 3, even with the speed boost from the summoner, our team is fast enough to kill the opponent's units before they can attack. That eleven-life and magic attack looks scary, but we have another good tank unit that still can survive some attacks.

Round 4, yep, Cursed Windeku still standing :). our team was able to kill .. before it could do anything ;). The situation looks very promising.

Final Blow - Round 5 - our firepower was enough (and speed of course), to win this battle, so as you can see, even a beta summoner could be defeated with mostly only chaos card setup. Thadius FTW, more in the analysis section :)

As you can see thinking in terms of countering the opponent's setup is important here. And even lower-level limited collection cards are able to beat quite powerful older beta setups. Thadius Brood is one of my favorite summoners, and when you have more chances to counter the opponent with it it's even better.
The two higher HP units/tank was a very good idea. Death Splinter lacks some more defence-oriented magic units (there are a few higher mana-cost ones) so putting around 10 HP units in the front for protection was the winning element here, in my opinion.
And of course, the speed was so important here. The opponent's even with that very good summoner which gives great boost of everything here: speed, magic damage and health was not enough to keep up with our faster units.
Thadius is still underestimated summoner, keep eye on him even when so many new summoners are around.

THADDIUS BROOD, as I mentioned above, I always like death splinter, even before Chaos Legion. Thadius is just a good addition to both formats: wild and modern. In today's battle, it was a key card, reducing the whole opponent's team magic attack was very important. People usually forget about the second debuff - -1 health. It may seem not a lot, but it makes a big difference in every battle.

PELACOR DECEIVER I rarely see people who uses that card. I think it is still a very solid choice for a tank, and even better in the earthquake ruleset. Of course in today's battle, back to basics just make it a vanilla 10 HP tank with not-so-bad speed, but it is enough. For 5 mana it is a good deal, and sometimes that higher speed allows it to avoid some damage and go first for the attack. Definitely nice card to have in the collection (and it's cheap :) ).

MAGI NECROSI, in normal circumstances snipe is not always the best ability to use. There are not many monsters (and especially magic attack monsters) with that ability and it is the same case as with opportunity ability, The best is to have at least 2. Of course, back to basics cancels all those speculations, because we get a high-damage, high-speed magic-damage dealer, which is just great here. I still like Magi in both situations, and sometimes to have the possibility to snipe out a fragile target could be the winning condition.

I think today's battle shows us, how important is adaptivity. Even when the ruleset limits our options, still there are many options to counter the opponent. And even with a lower collection of cards, there is a chance to win versus an opponent with a higher level and more powerful cards.

I hope you like this kind of report, battle, and strategy presentation. More strategy analysis, discussion, and prediction games you can find on my Wednesday Twitch Channel stream. There will be schedule soon :)

If you have any comments, please do not hesitate. Do you think I could improve anything just tell me :)

If you wish to try out Splinterlands you can use my reference link.

Thumbnails and other pictures borrowed with permission from the Splinterlands team or made in Cooltext