A Marathon, not a Spirit...err, Sprint - Using Spirit Hoarder in Battle!

This week's Share Your Battle challenge features Spirit Hoarder! Spirit Hoarder is one of my favorite Chaos Legion cards, as its cheap cost, relatively rare ability, and status as a Neutral monster make it useful in many battles. And we have got quite the battle today - some unusual monster positions, cool card combinations, and an extra long battle? Check, check, and check!

Before we get into the fight, a few words about Spirit Hoarder. It is a pricey card (dollar-wise), but is well worth it. Even at just level 1, 3 mana gets you a reasonably sized magic attacker. We're just talking about a single magic damage and speed paired with 3 health here, but keeping in mind that magic attackers tend to cost a lot of mana, that isn't bad at all. The thing that makes Spirit Hoarder unique is that it also comes with the Triage ability. This allows you to heal your back line monsters, and is something that is relatively rare to see in the lower leagues. Worried about damage from Sneak or Snipe, or using a Taunt monster at the back of your lineup? Triage is potentially exactly what the doctor ordered.

If you wanted to jump right to the action, the Battle Link is right here. Want to hear some more about the lineup? Read on further!

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These were the rules for this battle. There is a big one in Keep Your Distance, eliminating melee monsters from the battlefield. This leads to an interesting interaction with Target Practice, as that ruleset is now guaranteed to give ALL monsters Snipe. Finally, Armored Up gives everybody a little bit of extra armor.

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The Armored Up ruleset makes me think that it is likely for my opponent to select some magic attackers for their team. I attempted to counter this possible strategy by going with Bortus as my summoner. Bortus debuffs all magic damage, and will be very helpful if my opponent does indeed bring some magic into battle.

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My frontline monsters look a little funny here, because I was playing around the Target Practice ruleset, which gives everything Snipe. Snipe means that it is unlikely for the front monster to take very much damage, and that arracks will instead be likely to get focused on the second position. I positioned Water Caller in the first spot in order to try and stun my opponent's front monster as much as possible. Chaos Agent was there as a meat shield and the first monster on my team that I expected to take heavy damage.

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The 3rd and 4th positions in my team contained the most important parts of my plan for this battle. Djinn Oshannus deals a good amount of damage, and also comes with the Void ability. With the combination of Bortus' magic debuff and Djinn Oshannus' Void, I was hoping to stop my opponent's magic attackers in their tracks. To help all of this magic resistance even, I had our guest star of the week - Spirit Hoarder! Spirit Hoarder's Triage can heal any backline monster, which is particularly useful when most of the monsters have Snipe. With this combination, Djinn Oshannus could potentially delay the enemy monsters all day!

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Finally, I closed out my team with even more healing. I didn't want to have to rely on Water Caller being able to Stun the frontline monster every turn, so I added in Merdaali Guardian. With Tank Heal, she should be able to keep my Water Caller nice and healthy.

With the lineup set, it's off into battle! When I see the selected teams things look pretty good for me. As I suspected, my opponent did indeed go with a team which is heavy on magic attackers. And in fact, with the combination of Bortus and Oshannus' Void, there is a nice setup here - all of the enemy monsters are unable to damage Djinn Oshannus. However, not losing is not always the same as winning, and battle endgames can be tricky - we'll have to see how it turns out!

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Over the course of the first 2 rounds the opposing lineup knocks out my Chaos Agent. And then take a close look at both teams - with all of the healing on the field, we have a stalemate!

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Both teams fight through 20 grueling rounds, and we arrive at the beginning of Round 21 with the situation looking exactly the same as it was at the start of Round 3. That won't last for long though - fatigue damage is about to kick in!

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Fatigue damage takes its toll relatively quickly, and the weaker monsters are soon cleared off the field. I have a crucial advantage here, as my Djinn Oshannus is actually able to deal damage to my opponent's, while the debuffed enemy Oshannus is not doign any damage at all. By the start of round 23 that damage has accumulated enough to make the difference - fatigue damage is about to finish off the enemy monster, while leaving mine with a couple of health points remaining. And again, if you wanted to see the whole battle for yourself, you can see it right here.

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My plan for this battle worked out perfectly - Bortus and my defensive monster lineup were able to weather the storm from my opponent, and my combination of summoner and monster abilities were able to set up a winning endgame. While Spirit Hoarder's Triage ability ended up not being necessary in this particular fight, it acted as an important insurance plan against my opponent selecting harder hitting magic or ranged attackers. As I mentioned at the start of this post, Spirit Hoarder is one of my favorite Chaos Legion cards. I am a huge fan of it, and it will certainly see heavy use in my monster teams going forward.

Thank you so much for reading all the way to the end. Interested in seeing some more of my writing in the future? Be sure to give me a follow! In the meantime, if you'd like to see some of my recent posts:

• Trio Triumphs - Using Neutrals in Battle! - A battle challenge, featuring three Neutral monsters!

• Splinterlands Economics: Causation - A look at causation, and how we can apply it to Splinterlands!

• Splinterlands Economics: Ceteris Paribus - An introduction to the concept of Ceteris Paribus, and how we can apply it to Splinterlands!

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Thinking about giving Splinterlands a try but haven't signed up yet? Feel free to use my referral link: https://splinterlands.com?ref=bteim, and be sure to reach out to me if you have any questions!

All images used in this article are open source and obtained from Pixabay or Unsplash. Thumbnails borrowed with permission from the Splinterlands team or made in Canva.