Stumbling upon a niche Use Case for Cripple
I've heard of the Cripple ability's usefulness for a while now, but I actually never got the chance to put its benefits to good use. So, I was positively surprised by the effectiveness of this ability in the following niche use case:
Close Range + Little League
Going into this battle, I was a bit worried about half of my units having only one single attack. With this lack of firepower, it could have quickly been detrimental against Antoid Platoon and its Shield ability.
However, while Merdhampir unsuccessfully damaged the armor of Antoid Platoon, the Cripple still took effect by reducing Platoon's max health by 1 while also increasing Merdhampir's HP by 1 thanks to the Life Leech ability.
I got lucky that the opposite Uraeus didn't manage to stick the poison to my first two units in the back. This bought just enough time to send it to the frontline before it even had a chance to hit Merdhampir.
While Uraeus finally inflicted Poison on Zenith Monk, Merdhampir had already accumulated over 10 HP. Moreover, Kulu Swimhunter, placed between the two, did a very good job at putting Merdhampir in a comfortable position to close the match.
The last matchup saw Merdhampir confronting the opposite Zenith Monk and its Heal. In many other situations, having a unit hitting for one against Zenith Monk would have been quite ineffective. But fortunately enough, Cripple got clutch once more!
Merdhampir kept on hitting Zenith Monk, which reduced his max health one HP at a time making the Heal ability simply not actionable.
Links:
On Mobile:
https://m.splinterlands.io/#/battle/game/process/sl_885789d1d20f35a6b4d1cf14f3053f3f
On Desktop:
https://splinterlands.com?p=battle&id=sl_885789d1d20f35a6b4d1cf14f3053f3f&ref=tt88
Conclusion
In conclusion, thanks to the Close Range ruleset, Merdhampir was allowed to attack from the first position, which made this situation somewhat unique. Without this favorable setup, this battle would have possibly ended up as a loss.
Even though Merdhampir accumulated 14 of HP, the fatigue kicking only at Round 21 would have most probably not been enough.
I hope you've enjoyed this battle as I did.
See you in the next challenge!
Thomas
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