Splinterlands Share Your Battle Weekly Challenge Mycelic Infantry

Back To Splinterlands -Building My Team to Level 2 Summoners

As I continue to post these battles from level to summoners I hope it can show new players some of the best strategies to use when you're starting out. Not everyone will have opportunity to play Max level cards if you're going the ownership versus renting out. I know I could rent cards and play too much higher level but right now I prefer to build my ownership.

For the cards don't have near as many abilities as they do the higher levels you can still make some amazingly deadly combinations.

Weekly Challenge -Mycelic Infantry

It was interesting to see this week's challenge since I have tended to shy away using Mycelic Infantry in most matches in favor of a unicorn Mustang or Hill giant. 95% of my Earth matches focus around using as much magic as possible, and I have not been using it much in melee centered matches. This was a good reminder that Earth can be great for melee matches if he used to write combination of seminary cards.

Since Mycelic Infantry really shines when paired with Mylor, I went out and rented a level two for three or four days.

Edition: CHAOS LEGION
Rarity: RARE
Element: EARTH
Attack: MELEE
Abilities: SHIELD
Health: 8
Speed: 1
Attack: 3
Armor: 3

Reasons Why I like it
When you're fairly certain it's a melee heavy match, the fact that it has both three armor and shield to reduce melee attacks by 50% is amazing. If you can combine it with Mylor then you get a deadly combination. The biggest downside and reason I have not been using it is it's higher mana cost with lower health versus other options, especially when I consider most lineups will probably be using magic against me and it's especially prone to magic. It also has a speed of one which makes it unlikely to hit many of those speedy monsters with flying.

I definitely think this fits into a smaller more niche use case scenario than a almost every lineup type scenario.

The Matchup

https://splinterlands.com?p=battle&id=sl_24149155f2f038b12499677930ac23ff&ref=senstless

MANA: 15

Ruleset: Holy Protection: All monsters gain the divine shield ability which reduces the damage of the first attack received to 0.
Ruleset: Melee Mayhem: Melee monsters can attack from any position.

Initial Rule Set and Mana Gameplay Thoughts

This is a pretty hard and unique setup for me. Low man matches are always a struggle for me because I second guess myself knowing that if I go the wrong direction to counter their setup it'll be over so quickly. Low man of matches are even still at high risk for magic given that Earth can build a pretty good magic lineup for 15 mana. Since almost all splinters are available it's really open game. My thought process was that the opponent was likely to try to use the melee advantage. Even given the fact that everyone has a Divine Shield will start to match. In this case thorns takes away the Divine shield and every attack so it really cuts down the number of hits required since I always hit back.

SPLINTERS: Water, Earth, Life, Death

• Summoner MYLOR CROWLING
  I figured if they chose melee then the thorns would really be key for me. Without the thorns it becomes much harder to win

• First Position MYCELIC INFANTRY
  True tank in every sense, I shield, high armor, high health, with thorns it can single-handedly take out a team in some cases

• Second Position FUNGUS FIEND
  The rest of my lineup is actually built to put in as many cards as I can with thorns to hopefully take them out if they are using melee attack

• Third Position MYCELIC MORPHOID
  Another one man a card, just stacking my lineup with thorns

• Fourth Position VENATOR KINJO
  I wanted to have that nice ability of not being targeted as well as not taking any Thorn or splash damage. I figure if they're also playing thorns this might be the one advantage I have.

• Fifth Position CHAOS AGENT
  Again this is just to deal that thorn damage to anyone trying to do a sneak attack. One man a card stacking my lineup is full as I can

Opponent Lineup & Match Play

• Summoner LORNA SHINE not quite sure I understand this play as we all get a Divine shield from the rule set it almost seems like kind of a waste
• SOUL FIEND pretty good tank in the scenario considering it'll take at least two attacks to get rid of
• GARGOYA SCRAPPER it's starting to look like they built the exact reverse lineup than I did with all of their romantic cards first
• VULGUINE this can actually build up to have quite a decent health considering to have scavenger and we have five or six really low health cards. If it gets a chance it could build up a pretty big
• STICH LEECH great card to melee sneak attack should do really well when these types of matches it's a solid play
• DUMACKE EXILE one of my favorite new cards actually, giving it speed health attack Shield armor it's just great. It's interesting that they went so sneak heavy but maybe that's to try to counter someone to put in a big tank out like I did.

Round 1

Before the round starts I'm feeling pretty confident because at this point they only have two cards that can damage a tank. The rest of the cards while attacking me are going to take damage back and deal a significant blow to their lineup. Why I only get one knockout in the first round because of the Divine shield and every monster, I can already tell the second round is going to devastate their lineup.

Round 2

Round two starts off and Mycelic Infantry really starts to shine taking absolutely no damage while giving back to Thorn damage. The fact that it has Shield, and most of the melee monsters attacking are only a one attack. It has basically going to run the Gambit unscathed. Before the round even started the only two monsters that could hurt it are going to be significantly weakened well before they ever get a chance to attack.

Round 3

Round three stripes off and just at a glance it looks much more even than it really is. Both stitch leech and Dumacke exile you're going to lose two more health before the round is over just from thorn damage. Even with the chance to survived around 4:00 it's guaranteed victory for me, even if I were to miss with Mycelic Infantry which I had to 30% chance to do, but I still managed to get a hit.

Thoughts - and Chances to Win Again

I think this is a perfect type of match where a heavy tank with both shield and armor combined with Mylor Crowling can really shine. There is certainly risk that the opponent would not play a melee match and instead focus all on magic. That was my biggest concern and I feel I'm likely to lose if they played magic.

Well clearly the percentages for me to win extremely high in this particular lineup, I think I would have a very high chance of losing if the opponent instead chose magic.

This was clearly one of those times where Wayne the best counter lineup to the rule set paid off insecured my victory. There are many times where the strategy won't work because someone will choose a different path and completely ignore the rules set and still build a really solid lineup. There are still other times especially in low man of matches where I get too cute with my counters of counters and overthink it to the point of where my lineup is almost completely useless except for the small niche lineup that I thought they might potentially play.

~~@senstless

#sbi-skip