Another week is gone and my Splinterlands collection has grown. With PayPal as an option it's so easy to throw a few bucks into my Splinterlands account and grab some cards... which is exactly what I did at the start of today's session.
5,000 credits ($5) was enough to grab a Mushroom Seer, a Mylor Crowning, and a Light Elemental, leaving some credits left over for more cards next time. I resisted the urge to buy "just one" booster pack this time...
How Do I Decide What Cards to Buy?
My method is usually that if I see a card in a battle and it destroys my team, I go and buy it. Sometimes cards are too expensive, but anything that costs less than $3 is usually an insta-buy. Recently I am trying to only spend money that I have earned from my content creation -- either donations from live streams or cryptocurrency earnings from Hive and elsewhere. Then it can be a tax write-off and I'm at least breaking even on those expenses.
The best part is that I tend to make more back than I spend, not from day trading or any investing sense but just from income on the content. Most of this is my stream community on Twitch, but a small and growing percentage is now crypto.
Enough of that, let's get to the match:
Splinterlands PvP Match #2: A THORNY MUSHROOM ATTACK
One of the cards that yeeted me in a match early on in today's session was Mylor Crowning. This is a hero I had never seen before today.
This guy gives "Thorns" to all of my creatures for just 3 mana. Thorns does 2 damage whenever the monster is attacked by a melee creature. If I'm using a tank combo with Wood Nymph, those thorns could give a lot of 2 damage procs across the match. Even when a melee monster gets through my tank and attacks the Wood Nymph directly, it'll continue to take thorn damage.
Tank heal is SUCH a strong power.
Of course neither of these cards is the main event of today's match. That would be Mushroom Seer, an interesting 5 energy card that offers decent magic damage while reducing the opponent's magic damage. The main downside is low health, meaning the opponent may be able to take it down quickly and slash 5 mana from your side of the battlefield.
I'll be honest, 6 stats of value for 5 mana is very low. I usually aim for 2x value in terms of stats per mana, even though that is not always possible based on turn 1 card value.
Nonetheless, I was determined to give the seer a try. It took me a while. After many matches, I found my opportunity.
The Battle
Watch the battle here: https://splinterlands.com?p=battle&id=cd987881473da217ddfb5e34da5de307f023abb2&ref=quixoticflux
My opponent did not bring very much damage, opting for the chicken and ooze alongside three other monsters. Don't get me wrong, 8 total damage on the team is ok but not when 3 of it is locked away in the middle of the team. Also, red team should be doing more damage in general.
With my 8 damage team, I had more turn one damage output (7 -- only brownie rests). On top of that, five of the damage was magic and my opponent luckily didn't bring any anti-magic cards. The end result was a clear and decisive victory for me.
Reflections on Mushroom Seer
I doubt I will use mushroom seer too much on my future teams. Two magic damage is pretty good but not when it's only 1 speed and 3 health. This card gets killed too easy by monsters with snipe ability. It's too low value for low mana matches and doesn't have enough power to make it into high mana builds.
I don't regret adding it to my collection. Cards are cards, and it's always good to add a copy of a card that I do not yet have. The closer I get to a full set of Splinterlands cards, the better.
The game continues to be fun and I'm pretty close now to breaching the power limit of the Silver tier, a scary idea...
Even upper ranks of Bronze are quite difficult for me. Silver will be a whole new challenge. I'm not trying to get there faster, but I am also not avoiding it. Whenever my card power puts me in range, I'll go there. For now, I'll keep working on getting higher ranks and try to crack 1200 rating in this season.