Hello everyone, in this post about Splinterlands I will talk about the Briar Patch rule that grants Thorns ability to all monsters on the battlefield and tell my experience in the battles I had with this rule.
For those who don't know the ability, it is represented by the image above and its function is to cause 2 damage against melee attacks, this means that when a melee card attacks a card that has the ability Thorns, the card that attacked will receive 2 damage. damage after the attack.
When I enter a battle with the Briar Patch rule I usually avoid using melee cards because they are at a big disadvantage, but you also need to analyze other factors like mana cost, all the rules and what cards available you have. Usually melee cards with a lot of health and the ability Shield can also be good choices as they won't be taken down easily even if they take damage from the ability Thorns. But for this rule my favorite cards are the ones with magic attack since they won't be affected by Thorns ability and also because they are able to attack in any position.
Particularly the cards with magic attack are my favorite because I feel easy to use them since they can attack in any position and generally have great abilities, in addition they are very useful against cards with shield since they ignore him and attack directly on life of the cards.
The battle above is an example of which cards I usually use when there is the Briar Patch rule on the battlefield, as you can see I exaggerated a bit and used all the monster slots with magic cards and although it seems to be an exaggeration it is a great strategy in my opinion for this type of battle.
My first 2 cards have a lot of life and they will serve as my tanks in battles, although cards with magic attack are not usually used as a tank, Djinn Oshannus and Nerisa Tridawn will play well in this role since the 2 are difficult cards to be defeated, in addition to choosing Venari Wavesmith to further increase my defenses since he has the ability Protect and it grants +2 shield to all my cards. I consider the Venari Wavesmith essential in my battles as the shield can be the big difference between victory and defeat.
My team is formed and none of my cards will be affected by the Thorns ability since they all have magic attack. On the other side of the battlefield is my opponent who also chose excellent cards, he has Diemonshark as his tank and he is a melee card so he will be affected by the ability Thorns, but it won't be a big problem because he has a good amount of life and shield and also the summoner Kelya Frendul to further increase its defenses, in addition it also has the help of Merdaali Guardian which is a powerful support card with the ability Tank Heal.
Both sides have great cards with great defenses but there can only be one winner, so the battle finally started and my cards had a great ease in dealing damage as they ignored my opponent's shield and attacked their health directly, at first I I thought that victory would already be in my hands but my opponent's cards were also powerful and had healing support so the result became more and more unpredictable with each round and after several exchanges of attacks my 2 main tank cards (Djinn Oshannus and Nerisa Tridawn) were defeated and it was then that I realized that defeat might be an option.
After having my main cards defeated I was vulnerable and my opponent still had powerful cards in the battle so what seemed to be an "easy" victory became an inevitable defeat.
My strategy wasn't enough to win the battle but I realized that my main mistake was not having put a support card like Merdaali Guardian in the battle, if I had it the result would have been different and I would be savoring a nice victory, but the important thing is that I learn something new from this battle and I will certainly continue to use cards with magic attack when I have the Briar Patch rule but this time I will have a support with healing accompanying me.
This is a simple but very effective strategy, I hope you enjoyed it. If you want you can also look and participate in my daily giveaway that can be found on my blog.
