This week's Battle Mage Challenge is about the rule Going the Distance.
Splinterlands describes the rule with the following text: "Only units with ranged attacks may be used." That is indeed what it does. This also means that monsters with two attack types, where one of them is ranged, can still be used. This rule have a huge impact on how the game will be played. Often, one unit will not be able to attack, since it has to be in the front position, where ranged attackers cannot attack, unless they have Close Range.
Incompatible rules
Going the Distance is not compatible with the following rules:
(Briar Patch, Counterspell, Melee Mayhem, Stampede, Super Sneak, Weak Magic)
Desirable abilities
(Close Range, Headwinds, Return Fire, Protect, Blind, Flying, Dodge)
Perhaps the most important ability in Going the Distance is to have a unit with Close Range. That unit will take the first position. Headwinds will reduce the damage of all enemy monsters, and is hugely valuable. Return Fire makes each attack against the unit that has it hurt a little bit back, thats nice. Since any damage, apart from with a magic double attacker, will hit armor, Protect is great. All abilities increasing miss chance are also very effective.
Notable summoners
The following summoners are of high value for the Going the Distance rule. They are sorted based on how I personally would rank them for this rule:
Lir Deepswimmer has perfect abilities for the ruleset. All his abilities provide increased defenses against ranged attacks. Yodin Zaku has the highest damage output of any summoner in this mode, and is also a top pick. Ilthain provides Return Fire and is in many ways a cheaper version of Lir, and also more applicable for low mana matches. Fernheart avoids the problem of the ranged attacker in front position. Quix is in my opinion the second best of the summoners that affect ranged damage because of having two stat debuffs (the speed is almost always relevant) and being a dragon summoner.
Notable Monsters
(Sorted by color)
My Battle: Going the Distance battle
My battle had the following configuration: Wild bronze league, no legendaries tournament, 15 mana, red, blue, green and white colors available, ruleset: Close Range, Going the Distance, and Are You Not Entertained?
This combination itself removes some of the challenge with Going the Distance. Since we have the Close Range rule, we can put anything in the front position. "Are You Not Entertained?" opens up some powerful Gladiator units:
Of these, Ajax Lightfoot is by far my favorite unit due to her extreme speed. With the low mana in this battle, I will always be very tempted to play her.
My Lineup
This looks a bit stupid given the third rule for the battle. This is something I unfortunately have a habit of doing, namely forgetting one of the three rules. I should not have played Franz Ruffmane here, but instead General Sloan or Tyrus Paladium, who would even have given me two or three more mana to work with. Franz does give 1 armor though, which is valuable.
Opponent's lineup
My opponent also had a strange summoner choice, or maybe they didn't have many to choose from. Fernheart is not particularly useful in the Close Range rule, but at least he provides +1 health. They chose to go for a horde of small range attackers, maximizing the effect of the +1 health. The downside to this strategy here is that there is potential to trigger many bloodlust stacks for a gladiator unit.
Battle progress and Result
This battle is very straightforward. The only unit that could hit anything else than the frontline unit is the Acid Shooter, who lands a hit on Ajax in the first round. With the armor point, my Xenith archer is able to survive the first round, while their Venari Marksrat died and buffed up the Acid Shooter. The beginning of round two looks like this:
Round 2 doesnt have any big events. Xenith Archer dies, and the Acid Shooter is lucky enough to dodge a hit. However, when we get to round 3, things are starting to look promising for my team:
Here, Ajax gets her first bloodlust stack, and is also immediately boosted by the martyr stack when Venari Marksrat dies. The enemy Cutter Brieze also hits a bloodlust stack, but Cutter is much weaker than Ajax to begin with so I am not particularly concerned. After the round, we have the following situation:
At this point it is clear that the enemy team has no chance of taking down Ajax. The remaining rounds proceed by Ajax dodging a lot and taking down the three remaining targets. Seeing Ajax pop of like this is one of my favorite things in this game!
Alternative lineups
Lineups I could play
General Sloan
Kelya Frendul
Skargore
Lineups with a maxed collection
Lir Deepswimmer
Prince Rennyn
Ilthain
I hope you found this post interesting. If you did, you might also enjoy my other content:
Battle mage challenges
Battle Mage Challenge: Going the Distance
Battle Mage Challenge: Ferocity
Battle Mage Challenge: Fog of War
Battle Mage Challenge: Fire & Regret
Battle Mage Challenge: Explosive weaponry
Battle lineup suggestions
1. Modern Diamond Even Stevens 20-20 Mana
2. Modern Diamond Keep Your Distance 30-38 Mana
3. Modern Diamond Odd Ones Out 38-44 Mana
Card usage statistics
Card popularity in Modern Bronze League, Summoners, Gladiuses, Souldbound cards
If you would like to see more of this content, please let me know, like and share the post. Also, if you have not yet started playing Splinterlands, you can join and support me and the same time with the following link
Best of luck in Splinterlands!
Kalkulus