Greetings, Splinter Family!
Even though I have been playing Splinterlands for quite a long time, I still often neglect certain new cards based only on their attack strength. This has led me to probably miss many sweet victories as I haven't been adventurous enough, testing more new strategies and experimenting with abilities.
Today, I have an excellent example battle to showcase the discovery of a mighty monster lying at the bottom of my deck for far too long. It's time to unshackle OLIVIA OF THE BROOK!
Well, not literally because at the moment I don't have enough DEC to do that... but you get the point.
Level 2 Olivia Will Steal Your Abilities
Olivia of The Brook is an epic Life Splinter unit with both melee and magic attacks. While her attack strength might seem insignificant at first, keep in mind that she also has the Opportunity ability that will make her target the weakest opponent unit. This combined with her two attacks, she will likely remove unprotected smaller enemy units from the battlefield.
For some reason, this was never enough for me when I owned a level 1 Olivia. However, just recently I managed to upgrade her to level 2 and was intrigued by her new ability - Mimic.
This ability lets Olivia steal one opponent monsters ability in the second round and more abilities in each following rounds! In theory, this sounds just amazing but in my first test battles, it didn't quite work out the way I had planned because Olivia died around the second round before gaining any major abilities.
It wasn't until just recently when I discovered by accident that she needs to be protected, to make sure opponents will be targeting other units and to make sure she will be the last one standing.
Entering The Arena
Here in the picture below are my and my opponent's lineups for the upcoming battle. As you can see, they have chosen Baakjira, a giant whale, as a tank unit. A high-level Baakjira like this is extremely hard to defeat as it has a lot of health a many useful abilities. But what if those abilities would belong to Olivia?
Before I let myself fantasise about adding new abilities, I need to make sure Olivia stays alive long enough to acquire as many of those as she can.
My Team
Here's a good strategy of mine for relatively low mana battles:
It consists of two passive units that are placed on both sides of AVES STURGIS.
This owl-like creature has the Weapons Training ability which allows him to teach the art of war to peaceful monsters adjacent to him. In other words, they'll learn his magic attack.
Other than that, and especially in this battle, the Divine Shield ability plays an important role. With this, Aves can absorb one attack made by an opponent unit. Since Aves has less health than Olivia, those nasty Opportunity monsters will target him before Olivia so an ability that will make them waste even one attack can prove to be crucial.
Another very important piece of the puzzle is NIMBLEDOOK EXPLORER.
This guy will use his Protect ability to provide +2 armour to all friendly units - another important part of my plan to protect Olivia as long as I can.
I have placed the Explorer second to my tank unit because if the tank should fall, the Explorer would be able to use his Armored Strike ability from that position. This means in addition to his magic attack he'd be using a melee attack (which is the amount of armour he has left) from that position.
HELMET KHARAFAX is a Gladiator unit also without its default attack strength.
Thanks to Aves, he has learned some magic for this battle and that will make it possible for his Martyr ability to trigger if he manages to kill an enemy monster.
Martyr will add Helmet's health and so will his other ability, Scavenger, which will add +1 health to Helmet each time a unit dies on the battlefield.
Helmet Kharafax is the last friendly unit before Olivia so I hope he has gathered a good amount of health to help protect Olivia when the time comes.
The Battle
This is definitely a battle you don't want to miss! Even though I'm saying it myself, this is quite impressive...
You can watch the thriller HERE and/or continue reading my battle report below.
So, here's how it all went down:
During the first five rounds, I was pretty certain I was gonna lose this one. The opponent team was very strong with powerful upgraded monsters such as Deeplurker who was doing plenty of damage with Opportunity and Poison. Baakjira, their tank, seemed almost invulnerable with its Heal ability.
In the third round half of my team was wiped out while their squad still seemed very strong with all the monsters alive and kicking. However, Olivia had already picked up a couple of interesting abilities...
The tables started to turn in the fifth round as Olivia acquired Poison and we were beginning to use their weapons against them.
After Baakjira was out of the way, Olivia was now head to head against Deeplurker while both were suffering from Poison. However, Olivia's Heal ability stolen from Baakjira was essential when Deeplurker finally fell.
In the end, there was only one obstacle left, Venator Kinjo had been lurking in the back and was now ready to face Olivia. Unfortunately for him, Olivia of The Brook had now become unbeatable with an amazing set of new abilities.
Conclusion
The trick here was to keep Olivia on the battlefield as long as possible but even if successful, it doesn't guarantee anything as luck has a thing to do with what kind of abilities a Mimic unit will receive. Gladly in this one, Olivie managed to acquire the much-needed Poison and Heal that eventually secured the victory for us.
But the lesson learned here is to always try out upgraded cards with new abilities with different combinations. You never know what's gonna fit and you might be pleasantly surprised by the outcome.
As for me, I think Aves has now found a fourth member of his squad. So powerful is Olivia of The Brook when properly protected.
Thank you for reading!
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