In this week's Social Media Challenge, one of the suggested ideas was to share one of our most remarkable moments! For me, that would be an interesting strategy that I encountered recently!
We all know the power of Martyr ability, and it is a common strategy to make use of Resurrect, be it from Rebirth rulesets or from cards like Astral Entity, to trigger Martyr twice to further boost adjacent cards.
In a recent battle, I actually realised a card can be Resurrected twice, which means a card with Martyr ability can be trigger Martyr 3 times! That's indeed crazy!
Of course, in this case, the card behind this whole setup is Venari Marksrat and I have one in Gold Foil.
To demonstrate this, here's an interesting battle that I encountered.
But before that, here's the lore for Venari Marksrat for your reading interest:
Venari Marksrats spend more time in the forests than they do underground. Most of it is taken with hunting and foraging, with marksrats being the main food gatherers for the venari colonies that inhabit the upperdark caverns of the Realm of Silence. They are incredibly agile and have honed their hunting skills to perfection.
Their crude bows are fashioned out of branches and saplings. Don't be fooled by their unrefined look, though. These skilled archers can still hit a fleeing rabbit at a hundred yards with precision. They hunt alone or in packs, and if you ever manage to spot one, you can guarantee they saw you first and have been watching you for some time.
Battle Type & Team Lineup
| Position | Card/Level | Mana |
|---|---|---|
| Summoner | Astral Entity | 6 |
Astral Entity is my favourite Death summoner, because as explained above, it gives me a lot of flexibility to form my lineups because all the abilities are suitable for many types of battles.
| Position | Card/Level | Mana |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Venari Marksrat | 3 |
Venari Marksrat starts from the tank position - I know this is a controversial move sometimes because it cannot attack from this position. However, with just 1 damage, it is relatively insignificant and its role to trigger Martyr, with the help of Rebirth and Astral Entity's Resurrect.
| Position | Card/Level | Mana |
|---|---|---|
| 2 | Pelacor Deceiver | 5 |
Pelacor Deceiver is chosen as the card to receive potentially 3 Martyr boost, which means it can go up 5 Attack, 7 Speed and 11 HP. At such stats, it is very hard to be hit by non-Magic attacks.
| Position | Card/Level | Mana |
|---|---|---|
| 3 | Uraeus | 3 |
The ruleset is actually quite restrictive so we make do with Uraeus which is a simple 3 mana battle that does Sneak attacks.
| Position | Card/Level | Mana |
|---|---|---|
| 4 | Soul Strangler | 3 |
Soul Strangler is one of the glass cannons in Death lineups. The challenge is keeping it alive, and if one is able to do so, the hits will help the team a lot.
| Position | Card/Level | Mana |
|---|---|---|
| 5 | Dhampir Stalker | 7 |
Dhampir Stalker is one of my favourite big cards in Death because of his True Strike. It is very assuring to know that big 3 Ranged damage will land 100% on your opponent, even for opponent with tricky stats.
| Position | Card/Level | Mana |
|---|---|---|
| 6 | Creeping Ooze | 1 |
Creeping Ooze fills the last mana quota, hopefully to absorb some Sneak attacks and slow my opponent down.
- Pre Battle: When the lineups showed up, both teams looked evenly matched and my opponent included a Gladius card along with 2 cards with Martyr ability. That can potentially be dangerous.
- Round 1: The power of Astral Entity meant we get more misses due to the Dodge ability. Venari Marksrat stayed alive the entire round while my opponent got their first Martyr on their Gladius card. A little nervy there.
- Round 2: This was the crucial round. Venari Marksrat went down twice, and came back twice! The first time by Rebirth in the ruleset, the second time by Resurrect from Astral Entity! I always thought these two abilities don't stack but apparently they stack!!! As such, Pelacor Deceiver sits on 4 Melee attack and 10 HP after getting two Martyr boosts!
- Round 3: As expected, Venari Marksrat went off the 3rd time and Pelacor Deceiver sat on 5 Melee attack, 6 Speed and 11 HP. With Flying and Dodge, it is a tough card to hit.
Round 4: Pelacor Deceiver was relatively unharmed except from the sole Magic attack from the opposing Regal Peryton.
Round 5: My opponent still had further tricks in backline and now I faced a Regal Peryton with 7 Speed after 2 Martyr boosts. Fortunately, it was of no issue from Dhampir Stalker because of the important True Strike ability.
Rounds 6-7: And we were done!
If you are interested to watch the battle, you can find it here.
Post Battle
Did my strategy work? To be honest, I didn't expect the Rebirth in the ruleset and Resurrect from Astral Entity to stack and it was a pleasant surprise to see Martyr happen 3 times on a card in the battle. Now that I know, I will definitely incorporate this strategy in my future battles for sure.
So back to the question in the title, the answer is YES!
So that's all I have! Let me know if it's something new to you, or perhaps, I am just the slow one here. Hehe!
As always, thanks for reading and have a pleasant day ahead!
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