For this week's Share Your Battle, let's take highlight of the dual hammer-wielding reptilian, Grund. When I saw this card for the first time, I find it really cool and at the same time, I can't help but think that I've seen it somewhere before. A dual-wielding creature is not a rare thing especially in fantasy pop culture but it's usually with swords, knives or axes, not hammers. And then it dawned on me, it's a villain from a Super Mario game, the Hammer Brothers!
Well, upon closer inspection, Hammer Brothers technically throw with one hand and not dual-wield, but with the speed of how they throw their hammers, it sure looks like they throw with both hands back then especially since it's an 8-bit game. I don't know who designed Grund's artwork but I'm curious as to where he got the inspiration for it.
Grund's stats, in my opinion, are somewhat what you'd expect from a monster with double strike. You can't have a very high attack since it deals damage twice. This has pros and cons. A benefit is that it goes around skills like forcefield since you are attacking with two instances of 3 melee damage instead of a single attack with 6 melee damage. One disadvantage though is that abilities like demoralize greatly declines the attack power.
Grund's abilities, on the otherhand, are also a fit to his character design. It has double strike, of course, since he wields two hammers. Trample is also a nice addition on level four since he can easily dispatch weaker enemies at the same time. Finally, there's cripple at max level, like he hits his hammers so hard that the enemy monster's bones begin to crack and suffer permanent damage. Such savagery.
But since Grund is not the most optimized candidate for a tank, I tend to wait for rule sets like Super Sneak before using him. It would have been nice if he was also given abilities like reach or sneak, but I understand that that might make him too overpowered.
My featured battle is a 54-mana silver league match with Armor Up and Super Sneak rule set. You can check the link to the battle.
Since match rules gave a generous amount of mana, I utilized the Scarred Llama and Kron that I was running to claw my way out of bronze league. I placed Venari Knifer as tank as I'm hoping that the enemy will delegate a melee heavy lineup. But just in case, I also placed Unicorn Mustang as a backup tank in the off-chance that they went with magic instead. It's super sneak so of course it's a nice chance to use Grund. I also have a Sporecerer to strip off enemy armor and Queen Mycelia to gain armor for my own units.
The enemy on the other hand fully prepared for an all out melee lineup from me. He placed Living Lava at the back to stop sneak attacks as well as a good old Disintegrator to weaken melee attacks.
Elven Defender was quickly taken out due to the combined melee and magic damages it sustained. The additional 2 health from Scarred Llama was a big help but the intensely focused sneak attacks of the enemy monsters ultimately killed my backline Kron.
Grund's relentless attacks finally takes its toll on Living Lava and the opponent was left with two monsters at round four. Three of my creatures still have full health and armor. Grund and Mustang Unicorn even ends up with 13 health each thanks to Scarred Llama. The battle eventually wraps up at round five with Grund delivering the killing blow to Tenyii Striker.
Grund is a powerhouse monster in terms of damage capabilities. Double strike is a seriously good ability if used in the right scenarios. Hoping for a green summoner that gives every monster reach or sneak in the future.
If you guys are still new to the game and want to join, you can click on my link here to start playing. Thank you for reading and see you on the battlefield.
