This week's Battle Mage Secrets challenge features the Reverse Speed ruleset! One of the most easily overlooked card attributes in Splinterlands is speed. After all, speed doesn't directly affect how much damage a monster deals with an attack, or make an impact on how many hits a monster can survive before being forced to leave the battlefield. Instead, speed plays a somewhat hidden role - deciding the order that monsters get to attack in, and determining whether or not an attack manages to hit its target. As a player gains more experience in Splinterlands, it becomes more apparent just how important speed is. And in the Reverse Speed ruleset, all of that conventional knowledge gets turned on its head.
In Reverse Speed battles, the traditional impact of speed is flipped - instead of monsters with higher speed getting to hit first and have a change to make the other monster miss, that advantage instead goes to the monster with lower speed. This means that there are some very clear winners and losers. Monsters with high speed lose value in Reverse Speed, and monsters with low speed become quite a bit stronger. Abilities such as Swiftness are to be avoided, and monsters with Last Stand or Bloodlust can backfire a bit, since those stat boosts become offset by the increases in speed.
If you wanted to jump right to the action, the Battle Link is right here. Want to hear some more about the lineup? Read on further!
Here are the rules for our battle. Of course, we have Reverse Speed, which reverses the advantages offered by monster speed stats. To go along with it we also have Equal Opportunity and Going the Distance, which gives every monster the Opportunity ability and limits our monster options to ones with ranged attacks. Finally, we have a relatively high mana can of 60 and 3 different splinters to choose between.
Back when I had Yodin Zaku as a rental, this ruleset would have been perfect for him. Unfortunately, I am no longer renting Yodin. But Tarsa is more than servicable as a stand-in for this battle. The Fire splinter has plenty of beefy ranged attackers, which is exactly what I am looking for in a Going the Distance battle. And even better, many of those ranged monsters have a low speed stat, which is great in Reverse Speed. While Tarsa's melee buff shouldn't be playing a huge role in this battle, the additional health she grants my monsters is always welcome.
I started my team with a pair of tanks. Molten Ash Golem and Lava Launcher both have plenty of bulk. Molten Ash Golem has the made-for-Reverse Speed statline of just 1 speed, and Lava Launcher is an incredibly hard hitter with 4 damage per turn. Both of them also have Close Range, which means that they can attack from the front position. Since Equal Opportunity is in play I don't expect there to be too much turnover in my front position, but it is always a good idea to have some Close Range monsters at the front.
Up next were some more heavy hitters. Tinderlock is another bulky ranged attacker who can also attack for 3 per turn - and 2 speed is no slouch in Reverse Speed! Rune Crafter doesn't hit quite so hard, but has a good amount of armor, as well as the Fury ability which could come in handy of my opponent decides to attempt to use a Taunt monster to deal with the Equal Opportunity ruleset.
We'll close out our lineup with a pair of all-stars for this ruleset combination. Ash Mirage is a champ in Going the Distance, with Headwinds getting a guaranteed debuff on the entire enemy team. Drybone Raider is a fair attacker with Double Strike under normal conditions, but with Equal Opportunity our Raider will be able to get 4 attacks off per turn, for a eye-popping 8 damage per round!
With the lineup set, it's off into battle! When I see the selected teams I am a little confused. Conqueror Jacek is normally a great summoner to use, but in Reverse Speed his +2 speed is not something you generally want to have on your side of the battlefield. I'm not sure whether my opponent had a brain fart during team selection and forgot about Reverse Speed, or if that was their only summoner available...but they have handed my monsters a significant speed advantage right off the bat!
In the first round of battle my monsters are able to put that speed advantage to good use. My team is able to knock out half of the enemy lineup, while taking minimal damage in return thanks to the combination of my Ash Mirage's Headwinds ability and the additional speed granted by (my opponent's!) Jacek.
This battle ended up being a quick one - by the beginning of round 3 it was all but over.
With just a single monster remaining on the other side of the battlefield unable to attack, you can stick a fork into this one - it's done! And again, if you wanted to see the whole battle for yourself, you can see it right here.
My strategy for this battle worked out perfectly. My team of Fire splinter ranged attackers, buoyed by my opponent's unforced error in summoner selection, was able to sweep through the opposing team in short order. This battle showcases the importance of paying attention to (and remembering!) the battle rulesets. It is incredibly easy to forget a single factor in a fight and make a misstep that costs you the game.
Thank you so much for reading all the way to the end. Interested in seeing some more of my writing in the future? Be sure to give me a follow! In the meantime, if you'd like to see some of my recent posts:
Surprisingly Orderly - Battling with Melee Mayhem! - A Splinterlands battle analysis, featuring Melee Mayhem!
Splinterlands Economics: Causation - A look at causation, and how we can apply it to Splinterlands!
Splinterlands Economics: Ceteris Paribus - An introduction to the concept of Ceteris Paribus, and how we can apply it to Splinterlands!
Thinking about giving Splinterlands a try but haven't signed up yet? Feel free to use my referral link: https://splinterlands.com?ref=bteim, and be sure to reach out to me if you have any questions!
All images used in this article are open source and obtained from Pixabay or Unsplash. Thumbnails borrowed with permission from the Splinterlands team or made in Canva.