Hi everyone! It's time for the weekly Battle Mage Secrets challenge and the challenge this week is the Holy Protection Ruleset.
About the Ruleset
Odd Ones OutThe Odd Ones Out ruleset states that "Only Monsters with odd Mana costs may be used in battles". This means that you can effectively only use around half your monsters and only monsters with odd mana costs can be used.
Battle Ruleset(s)
Details of my battle with this ruleset is as follows.
Odd Ones Out: Only Monsters with odd Mana costs may be used in battles
Mana Cap: 41
Available Splinters: Only Water, Earth and Life Splinters can be used
Format: Modern
Cards & Line Up
vs
Summoner: General Sloan - It increases the Ranged attack of my entire deck by 1.
 |  |  |  |  |  |
 |  |  |  |  |  |
| Position | Name | Description |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Drybone Barbarian | It has the Enrage and Retaliate ability, and is here to quickly take down the opponent's tank with its high attack when enraged. |
| 2 | Chaos Agent | It has the Dodge ability is here to slow the opponent down a little when Drybone Barbarian gets taken down. |
| 3 | Spirit Hoarder | It has the Triage and Dispel ability, which will help heal Iziar and also remove any positive buffs from the opponent's tank. |
| 4 | Meriput Magician | It has the Heal ability, and is here to help Drybone Barbarian last a little longer. |
| 3 | War Pegasus | It has the Flying and Shatter ability, which can help remove the shields from the opponent. |
| 4 | Iziar | It has the Taunt and Void ability. It will be targetted first and takes reduced damage from Magic attacks. |
Strategy
The ruleset here meant that (1) all monsters will get a reduction in their shields when hit, (2) monsters with odd mana costs can be used.
With this ruleset combination, I thought that the Life Splinter had a good mix of odd mana monsters I could use. I opted for a strategy that uses Iziar's Taunt ability to direct damage away from the tank, Drybone Barbarian which works well as a high damage tank, and Spirit Hoarder and Meriput Magician which can heal them both. War Pegasus is also used here as it is fast and has fairly high damage.
I would say that the opponent used a similar Taunt strategy as well, with Obsidian giving the magic monsters a fairly good damage output. It was a fairly close fight, and I just managed to prevail slightly. I could have lost if the opponent had faster monsters.
Thoughts on the Odd Ones Out Ruleset
The Odd Ones Out ruleset is rather restrictive, as it immediately reduces the monsters you can use by half. I think the Water and Life splinters, with the current chaos and rebellion decks, have a slight advantage in this ruleset. The other splinters have some great odd mana monsters too, but lose out a little in terms of the overall combination that can be used.