Edited in Canva Pro
Introduction
I was checking other people's battles to see if I can some theories and combinations that's not yet famous or anything. I accidentally stumbled to this video from Dwayne Cunningham which made me curious. Among all Riftwatcher cards, are these two cards really that special?
Riftwatcher Prices DECLINING when will it stop? | Splinterlands by Dwayne Cunningham
According to Dwayne, these two have an amazing combination, which really shines on Silver level. If you get Coeurl Lurker to level 2, it unlocks an ability called, "Phase." Normally, magic damage types cannot miss. The hit-miss mechanic doesn't apply to them regardless of the target's speed or ability. Along with that, they passes through armor.
With Phase Ability, the hit-miss mechanic applies. Even if the attacker is a magic damage type, the attack may still miss depending on the speed and the abilities intact. The normal and easy calculation is that for every 1 speed difference, there's a 10% chance of the attack to miss.
Why is that OP? What makes this card stand out from the others?
With the release of Riftwatchers, summoners also has been unlocked. Coeurl Lurker works incredibly well with this new Riftwatcher summoner called, Skargore. Skargore is a Fire Summoner that gives Enrage ability to all your monsters. Enrage ability gives 50% more melee damage and speed to the monster if it's damaged.
With Coeurl Lurker's melee at 4 and speed at 5 on level 2, with Enrage, this bumps up to 6 melee damage and 6 speed. Coeurl Lurker also has Dodge ability which increases this evasion by 15%. In theory, if the opponent's speed is 2, Coeurl Lurker is enraged having a speed of 7, and with an additional 15% evasion chance from Dodge. This ramps up to 65% for your opponents to miss every attack while your 6 melee damage from Coeurl Lurker has a 150% chance to hit every attack. With phase, this applies to ALL damage types allowing you to evade almost all the attacks in the game.
I've tried it for 3 games, and here's the result. Unfortunately, I can only rent the level 1 Coeurl Lurker since renting the level 2 doesn't make sense as I can't use level 2 legendaries in bronze. Still, here's the result of my experiment.
Battle #1 = Win
Even though this is a win, Coeurl Lurker did not do much because the opponent is full magic damage. This means all the speed and evasion of my Coeurl Lurker doesn't really apply. The Phase part of Coeurl Lurker at level 2 is very required in order to abuse his high speed.
Battle #2 = Lose
Since Courl Lurker is only level 1 and the Phase has not been unlocked yet, I got too much damage from Djinn Renova's magic damage and Djinn Chwala's Thorns. Other than that, Courl Lurker was able to avoid all of the damage.
Battle #3 = Lose
During this battle, Scavo Hireling messed up my lineup. Courl Lurker's attacks just kept getting block by the armor which made it hard to get some damage to the opponent's tank.
This is only my games for Bronze Bracket. It doesn't really show how good this card is because of my lack of monsters and levels. This card really shines on Silver League.
Battle
I've done a little more research and I'll leave Bulldog1205's Battle here so you can see how absurd these two combinations on Silver level and above.
From Bulldog1205's Youtube Channel
Why are we talking about the battles? What's the connection on making you richer?
I've shown you how effective it is. This means that if the card is strong, there would be more demand on the market. See how much The Kraken is sold? There was even a time, where it even up to $80 per copy. Riftwatchers just released and Coeurl Lurker's price is increasing VERY FAST.
On the same video from Dwayne Cunningham, He showed that the price of Coeurl Lurker is around $26.10 when he started the video. This is the price of the card last October 8:
And here's the price of Coeurl Lurker as of today:
As you can see, the price increase to a whopping $35. It increased by $7 in a day. it is so fast and I am not going to be surprised if it gets to $60 before the end of the month. We also need to remember that unlike The Kraken, this card is a neutral monster. Even without Skargore, you can use this in any element so having this card on your arsenal, will give you the tank that you need on any of your games. If you prioritize on speed, you can get Neb Seni, a dragon summoner as well that increases your monster's speed by 1, which you can use with Coeurl Lurker in ANY of your battles as long as dragon element is not banned to use.
Compatibility with Other Cards
Since Coeurl Lurker is a neutral card, he probably has the most compatible card in the game. Repair and Slow, Swift are the cards to watch:
Repair instead of Tank Heal allows you to have this card get his Enraged ability at all times with Skargore. Repair only restores armor which keeps Coeurl Lurker on damaged state which keeps the Enraged ability activated.
Blind works like Dodge but on the contrary. It gives 15% increased miss chance during attacks.
How to counter Coeurl Lurker?
One thing I realized is that the effect of Byzantine Kitty is now more powerful. If you see a lot of these monsters, take out the cat and have your team destroy it. Byzantine Kitty gives True Strike ability which allows your monster's attack to have 100% chance to hit. They will never miss their attacks. Period.
Combine this with a full mage comp and you get to see Coeurl Lurker and Skargore go down. Magic damage passes through armor which makes the Repair useless. True Strike counters Phase and Dodge abilities.
What I want to point out is that you can use this amazing card now to increase your ranking then, probably before the next pack release, sell it to make the most of your bucks. Based on how it's going, Splinterlands seems to be doing the Yugioh thing which they release a few OP cards every pack. Selling it before the next pack is the ideal step for me, then invest on the next OP cards next pack.
However, you can also hold them until you get bored as you can use this card whenever given that Coeurl Lurker is so amazingly strong. Combine it with Kraken during 99 mana matches to form the most absurd double Taunt lineup making all your monsters safe for the rest of eternity.
Disclaimer
- This post is an entry for Splinterland's Social Media Contest.
- Other sources that I do not own are cited under their respective photos. Photos and drawings without cited sources are mine and made for this post.
- Animated Banners and Dividers are edited in Canva Pro.
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Have Fun Drawing!