The battle challenge ruleset this week is Target Practice. In this ruleset, all Ranged and Magic monsters have the Snipe ability.
One thing to note is that only Magic and Ranged monsters can be attacked by a monster with the Snipe ability. So you can simply use all Melee monsters in your lineup and all your opponents Snipe attacks will be directed at your card in first position.
The battle I chose to showcase is a 37 mana match with the Blast and Target Practice rulesets. The available splinters were Water, Earth, Life, and Death.
Here is a link to the battle:
https://splinterlands.com?p=battle&id=sl_05c161d102a6e6f3640e5b6eed88a79e&ref=ninjamike
Target Practice and Blast are an interesting ruleset combination for a battle. In a Blast ruleset, attacking backfield monsters is better than attacking the monster in first position for a couple reasons. First, your opponent might have placed a monster with Reflection Shield in second position. Second, it is more efficient because the blast hits the monsters on both sides of the attack. So Snipe, Opportunity, and Sneak attacks are often king in Blast rulesets. In this particular match, any Ranged or Magic monster will automatically have a Snipe attack.
My strategy was to make use of all 3 backfield attacks. I will also be using a monster with the Rust ability which reduces opponent shields by 2. I ended up playing 2 opportunity monsters, one sneak, and two ranged which of course have the snipe ability.
I started out my lineup with a couple soulbound rewards cards. First, I played a no-attack card given a Melee attack by the Weapons training card behind it. I am not expecting a strong Magic attack on my first monster which has 7 speed and 5 armor. So it will be difficult for primarily Melee attack monsters to defeat. I further augmented this first card with a shield repair card in my backfield.
In third position I placed a ranged card with the Martyr ability. This will be the first card that snipers will attack and kill. When defeated, it will increase the stats of the cards on both sides of it. I finished out my lineup with a sneak, an opportunity, and a ranged monster.
Start of Battle / Round 1
My opponent went with a Melee attack monster in first position and a Melee monster with Reach in second. Most of their backfield monsters that have been given the Snipe ability are Magic attack monsters. Like me they have made it so that the first monster my snipers will kill is a card with the Martyr ability.
Round 2
During the first round, my opponent did not do any damage to my first position monster. One attack missed it and the other monster with Reach never attacked because it died and was resurrected. Thus losing its turn in the round. We both managed to defeat each others’ Martyr cards and I also managed to defeat their monster in last position.
Round 3
In the second round, I defeated two of my opponents’ monsters and they only defeated one of mine. Things are looking good for me.
Overall my strategy for this match worked. My opponent and I both chose the Water splinter. However, they focused more on Magic while I focused on speed and reducing any armor they had. This way I could make use of a combination of Melee and Ranged attacks. The combination of the Rust ability and the high damage attacks particularly from my opportunity monsters was too much for my opponent.
I think the Target Practice ruleset was more interesting in the earlier years of Splinterlands. Snipe was much more part of the Meta than it is now. When the Opportunity ability was introduced, it sort of replaced Snipe which became less frequently used.
