It's been a few seasons now since Escalation, a Conclave Arcana mini-set, was released, which introduced new cards and new abilities that once again shake the game's meta. The mini-set has consisted of 43 cards in total, with 12 commons, 12 rares, 8 epics, and 11 legendaries, not including the promo cards that can only be acquired by participating in the set presale and the additional Archons that will be airdropped through conflicts soon.
In this post, I want to take a look at all the Death units from Escalation.
Escalation Death Units
The Escalation Death units consisted of cards under different bloodlines, so, depending on what their bloodlines were, it was possible for them to be used by Archons from other elements and benefit from their Bloodline Dominion abilities. But aside from that, they had these new abilities that could affect the result of the battles.
Magnificent Mollusk
Magnificent Mollusk is a Tideborn range unit with a max damage of 7, Along with some decent speed, armor and health stats. The catch is that summoning this unit will require you to spend 13 mana, making it difficult to use on low and mid mana battles. It also doesn't have Close Range, making it quite useless when it goes to the first position, unless, you summon it with the Archon Razi Clanktrap.
As far of its abilities goes, it only has 2 abilities, one of which was Demoralize that reduces the melee damage of all opponent units, and one of the new abilities called Apex Strike that targets the enemy unit with the highest attack.
In terms of other Archon use, this card can be used by the Life Archon Captain Frankie, and with that, it gains the Inspire ability to boost the attack of all your allied melee units, and through tactics, you can give this card the Piercing and True Strike ability that will make sure that you would not miss your target and able to inflict damage to it even if it has an armor.
Apex Strike - Targets the enemy unit with the most power.
Shire Knacker
On the other hand, Shire Knacker was another range unit with the Halfling Bloodline, with a maximum of 3 damage for 5 mana that can strike the closest non-melee unit with its Snipe ability, and as a support, it has the Rust ability that reduce the armor of all opponent units, as well as Invigorate that will keep any units from being Exhausted, making it a good match with cards that has the Weary debilitation and units with the Soul Siphon ability, such as Heloise the Hollow
Being a range unit, Using it with Razi Clanktrap will give it the Close Range ability, so even if it gets into the first position, it will still have the means of attacking the enemy unit.
Ignited Alchemist
Moving on with the rare units, we had Ignited Alchemist, which is a 5-mana non-damage unit, so the only way that it can attack was if it was placed next to a card with Weapon's Training ability, and make use of its Affliction ability to prevent the opponent unit from being healed, which it can also further spread out through the opponent units due to its Scattershot ability. Aside from that, this card also has Flying, which will enable it have better chance to evade both melee and range attack.
But it has some downside to use since it has the Incendiary debilitation that will inflict burn damage to this card. It has the Flamefed ability that will allow it to increase in health instead, but the problem was that the Burning has 33% chance to spread among allied units.
Since it was a Dwarf unit, using it along with the Fire Archon Fithe Bladestone will gain this card the Void ability, reducing the damage it receives from magic units, and it is also posible that this card has some good use with Razi Clanktrap if you use a lot of Gnome units since they will gain Painforge and increase their damage each time they get the Burning damage.
Flame Fed - When Burning, instead of losing health, gains +1 health and max health at the beginning of each round.
Grimshield Hexpriest
Grimshield Hexpriest, on the other hand, was a Leonine magic unit, that can inflict a maximum of 8 damage on its target, and with Apex Strike, the initial target of this card will be the enemy unit with the most attack. Aside from that, it also has Void that reduces magic attacks to half and Magic Reflect that will return magic damage towards the attacker. This was certainly a good anti-magic, magic unit.
Among the modern Archons, using it with the Archon Lorkus will allow it to gain an additional magic attack, and if you want to, you can also give it the Life Leech and Affliction tactics, so that this card can gain more health as it damage your opponent units.
Vextali
For the only Epic Life unit, we have the range unit Vextali, which has the Goblin bloodline, so it gains the Deflect ability when used with the Fire Archon Hanv. Its Kindred Spirit ability will give the unit next to it that has the Kindred Will the Stregthen ability and got all your team a health boost, but its Final Rest ability makes it kind of underwhelming amongst the epic cards in the mini-set, given how the ability was recently nerfed. Aside from that, it has the Return Fire ability that returns range damage to the attacker.
By the way, for an epic card, this unit only costs 3 mana to use, so it can be used on low mana and little league battles.
Kyraseth Nythlarian
Moving to the legendary units, we have Kyraseth Nythlarian, which is a melee unit with the Elf Bloodline, so it gains the Execute ability from the bloodline skill when used with the Earth Archon Kaylia Silverleaf. It does not have much health and damage, but it still deserves to be a legendary unit, since it does not cost any mana to use, and can attack the opponent with the least health using its Opportunity ability. Aside from that, it has the Bloodline Pact ability, which is kind of similar to Bloodlust, but will trigger if any of the cards that share bloodline with this card defeat an opponent, which will increase the damage of all the cards with the same bloodline.
Bloodline Pact -Allied units that share this unit's bloodline gain +1 power when any of them defeats an enemy and take 1 true damage when any of them is defeated. If this unit is defeated, allied units that share its bloodline take 2 damage and lose all power gained from this ability.
Skritka
And finally, we have the Rodentian unit Skrika, with both melee and range attack, for 7 mana. It has the Charge ability that allows it to use melee attack in any position, and when it got yo the first position, its Bulwark ability will now be triggered and will now gain an additional 8 health and armor though it will also lose -2 attack in the process. Aside from that its Kindred Will will give the unit with Kindred Spirit the Life Leech ability and be able to gain health for every time that they inflict damage to their opponent.
Being a Rodentian unit, it can be summoned by the Life Archon Captain Frankie and gains the Inpire ability. And given that it has melee attack, the more Rodentian and Tideborn units in your team, the stronger the melee damage of this card would be. Now you just need to give it the True Strike and Piercing ability to make sure that it can effectively inflict those damage.
Bulwark -When in the first position, -2 power, +8 health, and +8 armor.
Closing
And that was it for my early assessment of the Escalation Death units. So far, I find them not as strong as the units from other elements. Can't be really certain right now as I neither do own or rent any of the cards. But the recent nerf to the Final Rest may have heavily affected my assesment.
Thank you, and see you on the next post!
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