Challenge Rules
All Monsters have the Thorn ability.
All monsters receive the Thorns ability at the start of the battle. Enemy monsters that use melee attacks receive damage back.
Damage returned is equal to damage of the attacker divided by 2, rounded up.
Melee attack monsters with the Reflection Shield ability do not take damage from thorns.
The Amplify ability increases damage.
The Battle Ruleset
Lost Magic: Monsters with Magic attack may not be used in battles.
Up to eleven: All Monsters have the Amplify ability
This is a high mana ruleset game and every color is available to play except the Death Splinter, so I have choosen the most obvious Splinter, which is the Life and we will see how it went.
My Team Composition
 | General Sloan is the best Summoner what we can choose for this ruleset, because he gives one ranged attack to all friendly ranged attack monsters. |
 | Uriel the Purifiel is a melee attack monster and such he will be affected of the Thorns, but he has huge health and the ability to heal himself, so it is not a big issue for him. I liek him a lot, because it is a very solid tank. |
 | Corsair Bosun is a melee attacker as well like Uriel, but he has a secret, which is his Reflection Shield ability. This ability will protect him completely against the refelcted damage from the Thorns, so he is pretty safe there. He also has the Reach ability making him the perfect off-tank for thi game. |
 | The War Pegasus is one of the new soulbound card and I like him a lot, because he is a perfect match with the General Sloan. He has a lot of health and the Shatter ability to destroy all the armor from his target with a succesful attack. |
 | The Supply Runner is a ranged attack monster and such he is getting +1 damage from SLoan and on top of that he gives +1 speed to all of his fellow monsters. |
 | The Pelacor Arbalest is a Double Strike ranged attacker who is able to deal significant damage to his targets. |
 | The Prismologist is also a ranged attack monster who has the Blast ability, which means that he will indirectly damage the two neighbour of his target. |
The Battle
Link to my Battle: https://splinterlands.com/?p=battle&id=sl_4e2e8e551e9ead306b9a9bd23e7e2444
My strategy worked as expected, because I brought the perfect team for the Briar Patch ruleset. The magic attack cards was banned in this battle, so the ranged attack monsters with the Corsair Bosun were the best and obvious choice for me. The ranged attack creatures can't fight in a face to face situations, so they are not going to receive any reflected damage from the Thorns ruleset.
Corsair Bosun has a Reflection Shield, which makes him immune against the Thorn damages. My opponent brought Quix the Devious against me and he countered my +1 ranged attack buff and decreased one speed from me. Luckily my Supply Runner negated that, so I didn't received any de-buff on that at least as long as he is alive.
My opponent brought a pretty solid tank as well with self heal, but he had no attack, so it was a bit less threat than my Uriel against him. In the first round nothing much happened as both tank has huge health and they have been supported by themselves and from the team behind.
In the second round Uriel showed his power and with the help of his Recharge he single handedly killed the Baakjira.
Arkemis has a lot of health, but without a proper protection like Shield he was quite useless as an off tank and died after Baakjira.
I lost my main tank afterwards, but the Corsair Bosun is an excellent off tank as well and my opponent ran out of tanks, so it was just a matter of time before all of them fell into their own deathtrap from of my Bosun. 😅
Do you like the Briar Patch? Why or why not?
I like this ruleset, because it is much easier to choose a team for this game and easier to prepare against the opponent team. It is not recommended to use a melee attack monster in this ruleset, because they will collect a lot of unnecessary reflected melee damages onto themselves.
