Battle Mage Secrets - Playing The Martyr Ability To Perfection

The theme for the current "Battle Mage Secret" challenge is Healed Out ruleset this time! This means all healing abilities are removed. It's not always easy to get the specific ruleset, but if you play hard enough, you definitely can find one! This time I was lucky enough to have one - woohoo!

So hers's the interesting battle that I encountered.

Anyway, I thought it would be still be interesting to introduce some useful cards and show how their strengths can be maximised especially with a particular ruleset. In this post, the featured card is a Neutral Soulbound card, Venari Marksrat!

Venari Marksrat is well known for its Martyr ability and it is best used either as the tank or when you predict that your opponent is going to use Opportunity or Sneak attacks.

As usual, here's the lore for Venari Marksrat for your reading interest:

Venari marksrats spend more time in the forests than they do underground. Most of it is taken with hunting and foraging, with marksrats being the main food gatherers for the venari colonies that inhabit the upperdark caverns of the Realm of Silence. They are incredibly agile and have honed their hunting skills to perfection.

Their crude bows are fashioned out of branches and saplings. Don't be fooled by their unrefined look, though. These skilled archers can still hit a fleeing rabbit at a hundred yards with precision. They hunt alone or in packs, and if you ever manage to spot one, you can guarantee they saw you first and have been watching you for some time.

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Battle Type & Team Lineup

Position	Card/Level	Mana
Summoner	Kelya Frendul	4

For this battle, I have used my trusty Water summoner once again. Snipe is in play so definitely Venari Marksrat with Martyr ability would be a good pick.

Position	Card/Level	Mana
1	Torrent Fiend	0

A filler card to start things off and soak up a bit of the opponent's attack.

Position	Card/Level	Mana
2	Djinn Oshannus	8

The trump card in this battle, versatile in most if not all areas. Decent damage, high speed, high HP.

Position	Card/Level	Mana
3	Venari Marksrat	3

Venari Marksrat is positioned here to gamble on the Martyr ability. Both adjacent cards are powerhouses so a boost will be extremely beneficial.

Position	Card/Level	Mana
4	Axemaster	7

Axemaster is the one of the best Ranged cards in this game, even at Level 1. He takes the last spot and hopefully gets the Martyr boost to make it even stronger.

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• Pre Battle: Both teams put out Water lineups but with differing strategies. I went for Magic and Ranged but my opponent relied on mostly Melee attacks. One good thing was that my opponent had Opportunity attacks which meant that Martyr will likely be triggered.
  

• Round 1: It was a tricky battle because my opponent had Weapons Training and Rust but it worked somewhat to my advantage as my Venari Marksrat was immediately taken down, triggering Martyr for my strong adjacent cards.
  

• Round 2: With 3 Magic damage, not many can stand in Djinn Oshannus' way. My damage output from my remaining two cards was massive.
  

• Round 3: It was never going to be an easy battle facing the opposing Kulu Mastermind, but my lineup was definitely slightly stronger here.
  

• Round 4: And there we have it! The Martyr boost did well here.
  

If you are interested to watch the battle, you can find it here.

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Post Battle

Did my strategy work? Definitely, the opponents are getting tougher these days. Even in Silver leagues, using Level 2 summoners are already the minority, so strategising is become more and more important to outwit these high level summoners, just like in this case. Venari Marksrat's Martyr ability was executed perfectly for the two adjacent cards.

What's the Battle Mage Secret? Always look for opportunities to use cards with Martyr boost!

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So that's all I have! What are your takeaways from this battle? Feel free to comment below, as I am always keen to learn and improve!

As always, thanks for reading and have a pleasant day ahead!

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