Hello there.
Today I'll share my battle under the Lost Legendaries ruleset. But first, I will share some of my thoughts regarding it. With this ruleset, Legendary monsters may not be used, but Legendary summoners are still available. With this ruleset, there is a higher importance to Epic monsters, and legendary summoners. Apart from Moxian Rebel that is a neutral monster, only Fire and Earth have Weapons Training available.
In this ruleset, I have a few teams that immediately don't work. My Possibilus with Kulu Mastermind team is not available. My Katrelba with Mycelia for Protect is harder to use. My high mana Life team with Iziar is significantly weaker. Of course, the same can be said for my opponents,
I believe that being flexible in battle is the ideal strategy. Check the opponent's history, check what they are most likely to use, and counter it. But always pick teams that can also counter different strategies. Without further ado, let's get into the battle.
The Ruleset
This was a tournament battle, and it was a Bronze battle with Unprotected, Lost Legendaries, and Counterspell Rulesets. A 50 mana battle is on the high amount, and only Earth and Life are available. I can think of a lot of different strategies for each so I will try to counter as much as I can.
The ideal team for Earth can be an Immortalis with magic damage. The Void can protect against the magic reflected back. Unfortunately it can be weak against a Sloan team that has range damage. Since there is no armor because of Unprotected, range attacks can directly go for the monster's HP. There are Gladiator options like Quora or Katrelba that can take the opponent by surprise.
For Life, Sloan is a very nice option to counter a possible Immortalis, but an Ilthain is good to counter Sloan. But Ilthain likely loses to Immortalis, so it becomes like a rock paper scissors situation. They have good gladiator options though, so that might be another option to go for.
The Lineup
For me, between the lineups I mentioned above, I'd rather go with a Marisol team. Drybone Barbarian can deal a lot of damage since there are no armor, while Marisol with its fast speed can hopefully dodge a lot of attacks. Disintegrator is there to counter any Melee shenanigans, while Prismologist is the primary ranged damage. Venari Crystalsmith with the heal can hopefully keep my front line monsters healthy, while War Pegasus is there to tank in case my opponent uses sneak monsters like Katrelba.
The Battle
The Matchup
My opponent decided to go with a Franz Gladiator team as well. But on the Drybone Barbarian and Prismologist were the same. They had Corsair Bosun which is good against my Blast, Ajax Lightfoot for their gladiator, Henchling Enforcer that has Halving, and Gobson Bomber. I'm fairly surprised that they used a lot of Range monsters though. Without the armor, their front line might not as long as they expect.
End of Round 1
Their Drybone Barbarian died rather quickly, even though they were able to apply Halving to mine. Bosun's Reflection Shield became useless when it was placed in the first position and was hit by my Prismologist's attack. They still have a lot of damage at the back, but with the rest of them being ranged and with low HP, they should easily fall once Ajax dies.
End of Round 2
I was a bit scared when Ajax got to 7 speed and the Gobson Bomber killed my Marisol, but luckily, we were able to kill Ajax as well. Looking at the state of the battle, War Pegasus having 4 speed pretty much sealed this battle for me. Gobson will need time to recharge its attack, so they don't have enough time to kill all my team now.
End of the Battle
Considering it was a 50 mana battle, I was very surprised that it was over by the end of Round 3. The lack of armor from the Unprotected really made monsters die faster. I also think that my opponent went for a glass cannon team so their monsters died even quicker. Looking at my remaining monsters, without the Venari Crystalsmith's heal at the end there, my team was also fairly low HP. War Pegasus at the back has 7, but it can't really do much once it gets placed in the first position.
The Result
Conclusion
In tournaments where there are additional limitations on top of the Rulesets and banned elements, I try to make it a point to look at the possible teams and imagine them fighting against one another. I will then choose the team which I think is best. For this specific battle, my opponent used a team composition that I wasn't expecting, but was ready for. I was hoping to fight against an Immortalis or Iziar team, that might have less damage compared to Sloan. The Franz team that my opponent used was similar to that, and their mostly ranged monsters and low HP eventually led to their loss.