This week's Splinterlands Challenge of the Week was to showcase the Defender of the Truth from the Life Splinter.
Unfortunately I only have this card levelled up to L3 where it just can't compete with my other cards - even if I did have this up L6 I think this is card is way overvalued for what it gives you when maxed - OK decent damage, but the health is too low meaning it's too weak against reflect.
I tried and lost FOUR TIMES to win with my L3 version and that's enough losing for one season because of this piece of junk, so instead I resent an interesting LIFE battle where Defender of Truth would have been completely useless, like he is for so many rulesets....
So as an alternative battle I present to you.....
A Noxious Cubing
This is a 32 round battle in which a combination of the cleanse ability with the Cube result in victory in the noxious fumes ruleset.
Trust me, go put a brew on, then kick back and relax, you'll enjoy this one...
The Rule Set and Line Up
- 40 mana
- Noxious Fumes - all monsters start poisoned - so this doesn't favour a low health monster life DoT - although I played the Herbalist, but he has triage so it's OK!
Summoner - Chanseus - for triage mainly
- Kralus - for cleanse! So no poison
- The Cube - self heal!
- Truthspeaker - cleanse for the front row in case Kralus dies AND heal and protect
- Paladin - reasonable health and the main damage card
- Herbalist - low health, but cleanse again and triage
- Evangelist - Mainly for the damage, even if slow!
OUCH - note all that magic damage my opponents got, from those three legendaries.... no likey!
Did my strategy work?
Not as planned, but thanks to cleanse and The Cube YES - to see it in action click here!
- Round 1 - OUCH - it's not looking good for Kralus on only 2 health at the end of this round
- Round 2 - Kralus dies first, but it's OK - he gets resurrected, then dies again. i take out his giant. ANNOYINGLY stoopid Chanseus triages the Cube rather than the Herbalist who then triages TruthSpeaker....
- Round 3... and then the Herbalist dies at the beginning of this round, I also lose Truthspeaker, but he's cleansed the Cube which is crucial!
- Round 4 - Ouch - I lose both the Paladin and the Evangelist.
The state of affairs after round 4:
Not going to plan, but thanks to my Cube having bean cleansed of poison it's all OK!
- By round 7 he's lost the Elemental Phoenix and Black Dragon to poison.
- Rounds 8 - 20 = he's only doing 3 damage to the cube, which isn't being poisoned, because of cleans, and he's got the capacity to heal 8 damage.
- Round 24 - he loses both Cerberus and the gold dragon to Fatigue
- By ROUND 31 Here we are:
Those cumulated poisoinings of his cube have weakened him relative to mine! It's game over by round 32!
So this didn't go to plan, my opponent played too heavy on the damage and took the cat out early than I'd anticipated, but man did cleanse and the cube come through or what!!?!?!
A few thoughts on a Noxious Fumes Strategy
- Play cleanse - if this battle teaches you nothing else, it's to play cleanse with this ruleset.
- Play triage - NB it would help if triage worked properly - it should be on relative damage rather than most damage, or closeness to death. The fact that Chanseus didn't triage the Herbalist meant he died and set in motion a chain reaction I think,
- Play higher health monsters in general.
- Play self-heal.
- Play affliction to counter self-heal.
- So play cleans to counter the affliction!
Of course I would have played Lif and the Sacred Lama mage, but that option was frozen out.
Better options rather than Defender of the Truth
Honestly, Life was the first deck I sought to level up to a decent degree (in retrospect NOT a great decision, I should have gone for earth) and Defender of Truth just isn't worth the money IMO.
He has too low health which makes him too vulnerable to attack with high magic damage, and only one buff for an epic card which is shit.
You're much better off playing Truthspeaker - you get 3 defensive buffs and no risk of him ripping himself apart because of reflect or anything else.
Another better option for shields would be the neutral Tower Griffen I think.
If you don't yet play Splinterlands, why not give it a go?
Anyone using my referral link will receive a free rare card!