This week's Splinterlands Challenge of the Week was to showcase the Haunted Spider from the Death Splinter.
Having most of my main deck rented out (and LOVING the returns, thank you very much!) I'm still stuck down in bronze league playing with my scraps so I've only got the capacity to play the Spider @ Level 3 ATM - and it's not to bad at that level - 2 damage for 3 mana, reasonable health (some cards have VERY low health in Bronze!) but he is SLOW.
The battle below features the Spider in a battle where 'he did his bit'!
The Rule Set and Line Up
- Mana cap 27
- Standard Rules (Bronze League!)
Summoner - Reflector Death Dude
- Harklaw - well, if you've got the mana, why not! Shield and LOTS of health
- Undead Priest - I love this under-rated card - weaken is GREAT in Bronze and a snipe soak, although the two functions do sort of contradict each other!
- Boogeyman - slow and 2 magic damage, bit pricey on the mana.
- SoulStorm - just an awesome card even at L1 - fast and three damage, the main engine here.
- Haunted Spider - perfectly reasonable addition, behind SS in case of sneak
- The Chicken - sneak hedge.
Did my strategy work?
Beautifully, to see it in action click here!
- Round 1 - I lose my undead priest to snipe, bollox.
- Round 2 - straight back at it, SoulStorm takes out his Golem with 3 damage, all of which was needed to finish him off! I also take out his TruthSpeaker, and all my enemies shields go 'bye bye'.
- Round 3 - SoulStorm strikes again and takes out the Herbalist (bit a naff card until it gets to L8!), I lose the Boogeyman to snipe. Second snipe misses SoulStorm
- Round 4 - SoulStorm AGAIN does 3 damage to the Peacebringer and finishes him off straight away, another snipe miss on him too.
- Round 5 - Soulstorm takes out The Lone Boatman, it's all over now, just one ranged attack left in the front for my opponent....!
How important was The Haunted Spider?
He 'did is bit' is about as much as I can say - thankfully my opponent played fairly slow cards up front and so missing wasn't an issue, and with 2 ranged damage that worked nicely against the Golem up front.
The Level 1 Soulstorm stood out more - with 3 damage caning it to my opponent and his faster speed eliciting a couple of misses.
And the fact that my opponent played his Protect card in second position didn't help him either as once that's gone, so are the shields, which against my mainly ranged attacks were useful.
And let's not forget Harklaw up front - what an Awesome budget tank for Bronze League.
But let's not be too unfair to the Spider, for only 3 mana he was more useful than my summoner and the Boogeyman given my opponent's line up!
If only this were silver league then the Spider could have had Poison, which would have made him a lot more useful!
I didn't need the chicken, he'd have been better off in second position! But you can never predict whether yer gonna get snipe or sneak.
Final Thoughts: Haunted Spider - Worth Levelling Up?
Certainly it's worth taking the spider up to Level 4 where he picks up Poison, and at that level he's a pretty decent card - 3 mana giving you 2 damage and the very handy poison buff, which can work well as part of a death Splinter which does tend to also favour weaken - especially useful lower down the leagues where many cards do tend to have low health.
One hit on a monster with shields but low health from the Spider and that monster could well die the following round, so certainly!
However getting him buffed up further is expensive - you need to take him all the way up to Level 9 to get him an extra damage point, and i don't think that's worth the money!
And having said he's worth taking to L4, he is painfully slow at that level, and for that reason I haven't actually included the Spider in my 'Silver Level Death Deck'!
If you don't yet play Splinterlands, why not give it a go?
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