@splinterlandsTerrifying to behold, Deeplurkers are a poisonous fish that dwell at the bottom of the ocean and prey on the weak. However, they are known to travel to the surface in times of dire need. Many believe that they are sensitive to the balance of elemental water magic and, when that balance is in danger, the Deeplurkers rise to attack or defend it.
Hi everyone, welcome back again to my entry post for Splinterlands weekly battle challenge. This week we have Deep Lurker from Chaos Legion Water Element for the battle challenge, one of everyone favorite. Let's see our battle first, shall we?
- EXPLOSIVE WEAPONRY ~ All Monsters have the Blast ability.
- RISE OF COMMONS ~ Only Common and Rare Monsters may be used in battles.
- 40 MANA ~ With thIs amount of Mana, having a 6 monsters team is a must.
I want to use Life Element Deck regarding I have strong Mages there, Djinn Renova and Bila. Bila and all Leachers are outstanding when we have this EXPLOSIVE WEAPONRY ruleset. however the RISE OF COMMONS ruleset changes it all, prohibiting Epic and Legendary to take part.
To make my team, I have to maximize this blast abilities that every monster will be given to. These points become my main consideration:
- [Offense] I need speed, my monster should hit first
- [Offense] I need a massive hitter, so blast effect will damage heavily nearby monsters
- [Defense] Need some buff, armors, to reduce damage
- [Defense] Need some meat walls, so some monsters won't die fast due to blast
My commons Life Deck aren't as good as My Water Deck, So I have to pick water and here is my plan:
| Position | Card | Ability | Plan and Strategy |
|---|---|---|---|
| Summoner | Lir Deepswimmer | +2 Armor , Return Fire, Blind | I want to pick Keyla, but my Lir has higher level. This summoner is a perfect one to counter blast attackers, especially if they are range attackers |
| Main Tank | Sea Monster | Heals | +5 Melee damage and a heal ability, I think this is the best tank to maximize the blast ability. It won't die easily |
| Second | Flying Squid | Reach | the meat wall. of course due to blast effect, meat wall has to be a monster who can attack too. Reach ability makes this Squid a good choice for this position |
| Third | Deep Lurker | Opportunity | Our main actor this week. one of the best opportunist |
| Fourth | Venari Wavesmith | Protect | She is my main support mage. I need as many armor to reduce the impact of blasts |
| Fifth | Merdaali Guardian | Tank Heal | She will keep my tank alive |
| Last | Pelacor Bandit | Sneak, Flying | I think pelacor bandit is the best in this situation. He will move first, ruining opponent defense and with his high speed and flying ability, he will dodge any sneak attack which mean my back side will be free from blast attack. |
HERE COMES THE BATTLE!!!
If you want to see the battle directly, you can see it directly here:
https://splinterlands.com?p=battle&id=sl_1567863d1540a703d9f5cd64d8c498ba&ref=dewabrata
It is a Water vs WAter Element battle. I see two monster that quite irritating, Lvl 5 Elven Defender (he has shield and I only have Venari Wavesmith as my mage) and Captain Ghost (he has affliction, will negate my Sea Monster healing and tank heal from Merdaali Guardian). And to put this worse, they don't even bring any range attackers. Fortunately he makes 2 mistakes that keep my winning odds quite good:
- He put Ice Pixie beside his Venari Wavesmith. My Deep Lurker will aim this
- He put Venari Wavesmith behind, it will be targeted by my Pelacor Bandit.
Round 1
The first round runs as both side delivering their attack based on their tactics
- Opponents strategy for this round works better. Neither my Sea Monster and **Flying Squid ** can hit well their Elven Defender with his shield ability.
- Their Captain Ghost manages to deliver affliction curse, making my Sea Monster healing useless.
- Round 1 ends with my Sea Monster and Squid in near death situation.
- The only good thing on my side is that I manage to make their back lost all the armor. Next turn my team will swipe those who hid on their backline.
Round 2
- My Pelacor Bandit kills their Venari WAvesmith and their Ice Pixie gets blasted away.
- Although their Elven Defender can hold my Sea Monster Attacks, their Sand Worms gets killed by the blast. This is a huge lost in their strategy.
- As expected before, their magic attacks kill my Sea Monster and my Flying Squid in this round
Round 3
It looks like I am already guaranteed to win here
- My Venari Wavesmisth kills their Elven Defender
- Their Captain Ghost, who is heavily wounded by some blasts, can't withstand my Deep Lurker attack.
Round 4
Nothing they can do. My bandit kills their medusa. It's a game over.
The Key Winning Point are:
- Overall my team is faster, they hit first, kill opponent first with blast effect. Even though my opponent managed to deal massive damage in the first round, speed made my team killed them first in crucial timing.
- Opponent use straight forwards pattern, trying to overload my front with massive damage + blast. I have Pelacor Bandit and Deep Lurker who keep killing their weakest part.
MY OPINIONS AND REVIEW
Deep Luker is one of the best common water element monster. Personally I think this card outperforms most of rare and epic rarity cards with similar 6 mana. At a glance, most people, including me, see this as a stronger version from Feasting Seaweed. However as thing progress, I think both has difference basic characteristic.
Why Feasting Seaweed Sometimes Doesn't Work
Stat-wise, Deep Lurker and Feasting Sewaeed look similar, a hard hitter opportunist. Fundamentally there is a hugh difference between them, which is that low level Feasting Seaweed only works well if you have Kelya Frendul as the summoner. The idea of having 1 speed and 2 health is the same as asking your opponent to kill it first before it moves... and even if Seaweed manages to hit, 1 speed is prune of getting many misses. If your opponent use weaken ability, it gets to 1 health point, putting itself into more dangerous situation.
However this Seaweed is not something that is useless. It grows very well as the level gets higher. You need to keep this in mind, low level Seaweed without Kelya = disaster. This is why Deep Lurker is on different league than Seaweed.
Deep Lurker is one of the Best Opportunist
In my opinion, there are 3 opportunist monster that stands out and can be considered the best in game. Those 3 are :
The reason I choose these 3 are:
- All of them are great in any level. There are other opportunist that are great but only after they get on certain level
- A few opportunist are good only if their summoners support them. for example Feasting Seaweed that I have talked about above. A great opportunist should be great whoever their summoner is.
- A monster with Opportunist Ability is meant to kill or delivering a finishing blow. A high damage and high speed are a must. Some have good speed but low damage, or high damage but slow speed... A good one must have both... It's a bit useless you manage to hit the lowest health but it doesn't kill it, or you let your opponent hit first before you kill it.
- Most opportunist are great finishers, however these three are not only great finishers, they are die hard. Serpentine Spy from fire element are very dangerous, but you only need 1 hit to finish him. You want to finish Lira the dark and Deep Lurker? Most likely you need more than 3 hits, 2 heavy hits might not be enough.
SUMMARY
Ok here is the point I have summed from above about Deep Lurker.
The PROs are:
- Stats wise, all are great
- Can work well with any summoners
- It's price for a common rarity Chaos Legion is one of the highest. However it's still cheaper than most of untamed editions. Investing in this card seems profitable in a long run.
The CONs are:
- Mana > 6, can not join Little League Ruleset
Thank you for visiting my weekly battle challenge, don't forget to leave your comments and feedback below. There are credits in this post for these people:
- splinterlands : for holding weekly battle challenge events
- carrieallen : for ultimate markdown tutorial
- flauwy : for wonderful divider art