HELLO to all Splinterlands readers of my humble blog.👋🏻👋🏻👋🏻 Welcome to yet another week of the "new" iteration of the Splinterlands Weekly Challenges 😜.

For any old Hivers/Splinterland players who've just come back and are confused, fret not! Even with the name and format tweaks, right at it's core, battles are still the foundation of these posts.

In this week's edition of Battle Mage Secrets... Dear Passengers, please stand behind the yellow line. 😜 Well, at least that's the first thing which comes to mind when I think about this ruleset. It isn't quite as similar as what it does in game though. 🤣

No matter! I present to you the ruleset — KEEP YOUR DISTANCE ❌⚔️

The game's description of KEEP YOUR DISTANCE is as follows: "Units with melee attacks may not be used in battles."

This is a ruleset which removes an entire class of units from the game. Any unit with a melee attack will automatically not be available for selection. This means dual attack units with melee are also restricted, as are units which do not have any attacks at lower levels but gain melee attacks as they level up.

This also means one needs to have a good variety of cards in order not to be caught blindsided by this ruleset. If you've always focused only one certain attacks only, you will be in for a shock when almost nothing is available to you! 😱

That said, this also means anything units which buff/debuff melee are effectively pointless here too. So do pay attention to your choice of cards when setting up your team for battle.

I will take advantage of this ruleset in my battle showcase today to show how 1 of my units in particular becomes a lot stronger than one would expect with KEEP YOUR DISTANCE. Introducing the Summoner, Thaddius Brood.

Messing with the dark arts should not be taken lightly. But that was the risk that Thaddius Brood took. A curious young man fascinated by the occult, he took to casting rituals and holding dark ceremonies. And it wasn't long before he got in touch with a dark entity that drove him into madness.
His family sent him to an asylum, but it only worsened his condition. And the entity within him festered and grew more powerful. Soon there was no boundary between Thaddius and it. Using his newfound dark magic, Thaddius broke from his prison and now wreaks havoc everywhere he goes. Through his rituals he got into contact with Doctor Blight. And the Doctor was fascinated with his power.
Thaddius has now joined the ranks of the Chaos Legion as an agent in the Splinterlands, sowing death wherever he can.

From Splinterlands Lore on Thaddius Brood

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Thaddius Brood is a Rare card released during the Chaos Legion expansion. It has definitely found it's place in many Death decks given its availability and usefulness. It's effects on the battlefield are -1 🪄MAGIC ATTACK🪄 and -1 ❤️HEALTH❤️ to all enemy units. It's summoning cost is, like all other Chaos Legion Rare Summoners, 4 🧪MANA🧪.

The stat buffs it gives are nothing out of the ordinary, so at first glance, he might look pretty bland. It would seem that in terms of firepower, this summoner does almost nothing to boost your team. However, under the correct battlefield conditions, he could end up being really strong!

As it is obvious from his ability to reduce your opponent's magic damage by 1 across the board, Thaddius is clearly an anti-magic based summoner. As an added bonus, he also reduces the health of all enemy units by 1 too! This is an all round ability that further increases his advantage if the opponent decides to field a magic heavy team.

As I mentioned before, the ruleset KEEP YOUR DISTANCE basically means there is no point picking any cards which buff or debuff melee units. This is one of the main reasons why I picked Thaddius too! With an entire attack type being removed from the game, there is a very good chance the opponent would choose to pick Magic attack units, which is where Thaddius will shine.

This could make all the difference if the battle comes down to the wire where the slightest advantage is the fine line between victory or defeat! 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻 This is definitely what I'd consider game changing! 😱😱😱

⚔️🛡️My Battle Showcase🛡️⚔️

Let me present a battle I fought recently in which the ruleset KEEP YOUR DISTANCE was in effect. My opponent used the Chaos Legion edition Summoner Immortalis from the EARTH splinter as his main pick, while I used the Chaos Legion edition Summoner Thaddius Brood from the DEATH splinter. 🌱 VS 💀

At first glance, it would seem like I was at a distinct disadvantage.

• My opponent was using a level 2 Legendary Summoner VS my level 3 Rare.

• Effectively, that puts him at roughly 2 levels ahead of me.

• His units were likewise significantly higher levelled than mine. 😱

• This gave his entire team a huge increase in raw damage output.

• To exacerbate matters, Immortalis gave all his units the SHATTER ability, which would destroy my armour in just 1 hit!

I was honestly expecting this to be a really bad matchup for me 😜🤣. This was a team who had an innate advantage in this ruleset. The significantly higher levels coupled with a max levelled Legendary summoner would be hard to beat. Would I be able to turn the tide of battle against such an opponent then? Victory or defeat would lie in the small details.

I would say that the ruleset KEEP YOUR DISTANCE was DEFINITELY the MVP of this match, having played it's role in turning the tide of battle. The advantage it gave my team resulted in me outlasting my opponent in this battle. It definitely provided the edge that I needed to overcome my opponent.

This ensured that the other units could eventually wear down the opponent until victory was achieved! 🏆🏆🏆

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LINK TO MY FIGHT

👯‍♀️👯👯‍♂️LINEUP CHOICES👯‍♀️👯👯‍♂️

1st CARD SLOT

The Will-O-Wisp is chosen for this slot. He plays the role of the Main tank perfectly with his great stats. His high health stats and the FLYING ability will also allow him to have much longer staying power on the battlefield. This allows all other units to be kept safe until he is taken down.

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2nd CARD SLOT

The Undead Priest occupies this slot. It's main role here is to debuff the enemy units with it's WEAKEN ability. It will also play the role of a backup tank.

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3rd CARD SLOT

The Haunted Spider fills this slot and it's main role is to be the DPS for the team. At just 3 mana, it is an amazingly efficient card being able to output 2 ranged damage together with an extra POISON ability.

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4th CARD SLOT

The Soul Strangler fills this slot. It's role is to be ranged DPS for the team. Just like the Haunted Spider in the previous slot, this is another very cost efficient card, being able to output 2 damage for just 3 mana.

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5th CARD SLOT

The Ravenhood Warden occupies this slot. His main role is to buff the team with the PROTECT ability granting extra armour to the entire team.

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6th CARD SLOT

The Soulstorm occupies the last slot. It's main role is to be a high damaging ranged DPS which is almost guaranteed to strike first with it's very fast attack speed.

I hope you're starting to see the pattern here in my team setup. 😉

⚔️🛡️Battle Action Report🛡️⚔️

As you can see, both of us fielded very different units in our matchup. We both used different splinters, and our unit selection were completely worlds apart too! 😱

🌱EARTH🌱 VS 💀DEATH💀

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My opponent used the Mushroom as his tank in the 1st slot which was a VERY good choice. With his great defensive stats, and the SILENCE ability making it the perfect anti magic unit, this is a unit which will protect it's entire team until it falls.

The Goblin Psychic occupied his 2nd slot. This is an amazing support and DPS unit. Capable of dishing out damage and also having the TANK HEAL and AFFLICTION abilities, this is a unit that can completely change the tide of battle.

His next 2 units were similarly also Magic DPS units in the form of Djinn Biljka and the Suidae Shaman. Both these units pack a ton of damage will will decimate the battlefield if they manage to get a hit on my very fragile units.

All in all, I would say that the opponent picked a really strong team.

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My choice of the Main Tank was the Will-O-Wisp who is perfect for this task. He has really high HEALTH stats in order to take extra hits to ensure that all the other units are protected. Not only that, it also has the FLYING and WEAKEN abilities. This allows it to last longer on the battlefield.

The Undead Priest comes next in the 2nd slot. It's low stats and lack of any attack means it's just there mainly for it's WEAKEN ability. Other than that, it would be used as a sacrificial backup tank.

My next 4 units were all ranged DPS units. They had one aim only, and that was to bring down the opponent before the tank fell. Should they fail to complete this task successfully, I was almost certain to lose the battle. However, they do pack a huge punch overall, so I was pretty confident they would not disappoint me.

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The battle started out with all our units just duking it out pound for pound. It was a mid mana game with 28 mana as the limit. The rulesets were TAKING SIDES & KEEP YOUR DISTANCE.

• The first round saw the initial few "steps" being a series of buffs and debuffs, testament to both our unit choices bringing with them a lot of abilities to the battlefield.

• It was only till Step 10 of Round 1 before all those buffs and debuffs were done being cast and the first attack could finally begin (at step 11)! 🤣

• My choice of Thaddius Brood paid off handsomely too as I was able to negate the magic damage from my opponent's "All Magic" team.

• Thaddius's ability to reduce the enemy's health by 1 worked amazingly well in tandem with my 2 other WEAKEN units too! In total, the enemy had it's entire army's health reduced by 3! This would be key to my victory as you would soon see.

• In just 1 round of attacks, every single hit from my ranged units resulted in a kill for me! 😱

• They had so little health left that they became really fragile and died with just the slightest touch! 🤣

• It was all over for the opponent now as I eventually mopped up his entire army. 💀💀💀

Talk about doing WAY MORE than it was supposed to!!! 😱🤯🥳 All I expected was for the KEEP YOUR DISTANCE ruleset to give me a slight advantage. Individually, on their own, my units would face a huge disadvantage against an enemy which has higher levelled than me. However, thanks to being able to debuff all his units down to almost the minimal amount of health, I was able to turn the tides of battle! The opponent simply could not handle all that at all.

Well as you can see here in this video recording of my battle, the results were pretty good! 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻

This was truly an eye opener! 😁🏆

Slowly, but surely, I wore down the opponent's team and the match ended up with me inflicting a crushing defeat. My team selection proved to be the edge I needed to eventually overpower my opponent. 💪🏻

🔮🔮🔮Hindsight is 20/20🔮🔮🔮

Would I have done anything differently? 🤔 This might have seemed like a disadvantage at the start but I ended up winning handily. IF I had to use the same cards again, there would be no better lineup than what I had already used for the match. Any other combination MIGHT have resulted in a loss for me. I'm really satisfied with the results against such a worthy opponent. 🏆🥇

💭🧐💭Ending Thoughts💭🧐💭

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I definitely can appreciate the ruleset KEEP YOUR DISTANCE and how it changes the dynamics of usual gameplay. This is one of those rulesets which can be turned into a huge advantage if surrounded with the proper team. The role it brings to the battlefield will give a player the edge in squeezing out every tiny advantage to get the win. 👍🏻

I hope this article has given you some insight into its potential. 😉

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